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 hyv3mynd wrote:

Despite the comp hate, here is some interesting info: DaBoyz GT 2012 had no comp and brought in about 88 players. DaBoyz GT 2013 has comp (0-2 max, 4 flyers max, unique chars in primary or allied only, not both) and has more players already registered than last year with 4 weeks still to go. Andrew Gonyo, Tony Kopach, Justin Cook, and a slew of other GT finalists are already signed up. If that's not a shining endorsement of comp I don't know what is.

But...did I just...get posterboyed off as a comp endorser????

Seriously though, take what Target said, but change the very first line. I'll still be bringing the most egregious thing you could imagine, in the grimdark there is only facebeatings!

As an aside, MVBrandt that article made my day!

Great Article Mike.

You are absolutely correct about competitiveness.

I had maybe 2 of 6 games at BFS that were truely competitive.

Seriously though people who think that it is somehow "unfair" that some people have newer/stronger armies, must not have competed in many other things in life. Most Competitions are not balanced at all.

Target wrote:

I personally dislike comp, and feel it's not needed, however Da Boyz have it as part of their tradition, and this year's is as good as comp gets imo. It makes minor changes to what can be brought, and is completely disconnected from your event score - I can deal with that. Comp rarely fixes anything, because as has been said multiple times here by better spoken folks than I, all it does is move the bar, and change the game - competitive players were good at figuring out how to win in uncomped 40k, and they'll be just as good at figuring out how to win in comped 40k.

I just want to bring attention to a minor point: Comp means different things to different people, which is one of the reasons why it's hard to work up a comp system that fits everyone.

For instance, Comp at Da Boyz isn't intended to really 'fix' the game; rather, the goal of the comp system (at least in years past) is to encourage diversity in unit selection and discourage bringing special characters.

What the comp system is trying to do is exactly what you were saying, shift the meta of the game around to test another aspect of generalship.

With regard to the tennis example about how competition is inherently not fair: It is not an issue of you being out classes based on external factors you cannot control (assuming your opponents were not on steroids etc.) Unfitness can be fixed through training, using the proper equipment to participate is about as expected as bringing dice to a 40k table. The competition is fair in that both opponents both have the oppertunity to train/ prepare and compete free of external disadvantages.

To use your tennis example, Eldar, Tau, and to some extent CD are coming to the tennis match with a bionic arm, a cheating line judge, and a doubles partner. They have more resources available to them based on the codex point decreases, have access to much more powerful abilaties then previous books, and they have many units that simply ignore the normal rules that govern the game being played.

If Screamer Star and MEQ lists were so even why are the tournament results not reflecting this? If all armies are so evenly balanced why is it that the "elite," players feel the need to bring the newest armies? Why not just stick with the armies they already have since all armies are "balanced" and there is no need to spend all the time and money building/painitng a new army?

Based on the current tournament results we are seeing, it is not a stretch to say that most armies cannot compete on an even playing field with the Tau, Eldar, and CD. Why do we as a community not want to create some sort of system (comp) aimed at creating a meta in which all armies can compete. Would that not result in more diversity in tournaments and more people attending tournaments? People would not set at home and thinking, "Well I would like to play in that GT, but I play army X and they are not good right now. I have no realistic shot of winning and I will have to play alot of armies that are build from codecies that out perform mine so why sign up for a beating?"

I suspect that GT attendance would vastly increase if more armies were "competative." I know for a fact that many of the RTT players in my local group have stopped even coming to the monthly RTT's becasue they view playing as a waste of their Saturday becasue they only own/ play one of the older armies. They don't even contemplate going to GT's becasue the problem will only be worse there. We as a community can either ignore the obvious GW marketting tactic of "codex creep drives sales," or we can take conservative steps to correct or modify GW's bone head rules writting. Though I will say, any such action needs to originate from the major GT TO's and needs to be uniform across the board to be seen a legitimate.

Ok so here is the thing. NO one is saying Tau, Eldar, or Daemons are balanced. What we are saying is that it is not unfair. Going back to the tennis example. So say I go and spend money on Tennis lessons with the best tennis coach, buy the best shoes,racket, get a personal trainer....and you play on your local court in a park with your buddy.. IF we were born with the same natural talent I will very likely still beat you down on the court, and fairly badly. If Roger Federer Shows up he will beat us both, very badly completely based on external factors I cannot control (he is flat more talented and atheltic that I could every hope to be...no drugs need be taken.)

Equating Top armies to Bionic arms or cheating judges makes it sound like I gain some "unfair" advantage...I don't, you have the same option to run out and buy a new power army as I do (just like you could pay for tennis lessons.) It is an option and completely fair.

What you are arguing is that you don't want to need to change anything and show up preparing however you want and have a chance to win....

Now I'm certainly not saying you must enjoy playing against better armies, any more than a highschool JV football team would enjoy playing against The Baltamore Ravens (assuming a serious game, full contact etc). But that does not make it unfair.

AS for having No shot at winning. I go to GTs all the time with little realistic shot at winning (its like entering the New York Marathon, I may have no realistic shot at winning, but I might enjoy it so I enter anyway.) The ability to win should not be an expectation for people that want to enjoy themselves. Now if you don't go because you won't have fun.... that is different.

I'd love to see (as I posted previously) some rules tweaks to re-balance things a little. But even if those are made I don't have a realistic chance to win most GTs.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
Let me put it this way. You playing an MEQ army have a more realistic chance of beating me playing screamer star than (assuming you were not a highly competitive national level runner...if so than my conjecture is off) you ever would have (no matter how hard you worked) of beating me in a 3 mile race when I was still competing. That does not make the race unfair, non-competitve sure...but we are using the same set of base rules, I just happen to have a better "system" At the same time, I still had no realistic chance of winning the National Championship when I competed...no matter how much I worked....

Warmaster Primus wrote:

Target wrote:

I personally dislike comp, and feel it's not needed, however Da Boyz have it as part of their tradition, and this year's is as good as comp gets imo. It makes minor changes to what can be brought, and is completely disconnected from your event score - I can deal with that. Comp rarely fixes anything, because as has been said multiple times here by better spoken folks than I, all it does is move the bar, and change the game - competitive players were good at figuring out how to win in uncomped 40k, and they'll be just as good at figuring out how to win in comped 40k.

I just want to bring attention to a minor point: Comp means different things to different people, which is one of the reasons why it's hard to work up a comp system that fits everyone.

For instance, Comp at Da Boyz isn't intended to really 'fix' the game; rather, the goal of the comp system (at least in years past) is to encourage diversity in unit selection and discourage bringing special characters.

What the comp system is trying to do is exactly what you were saying, shift the meta of the game around to test another aspect of generalship.

Or another aspect of comp to consider is the inclusion of additional elements, rather than the exclusion of others. I find it interesting that while most people dislike comp in the traditional sense, many are willing to comp tournaments by allowing certain forgeworld units in to help balance against standard codices.

Breng77 wrote:
Ok so here is the thing. NO one is saying Tau, Eldar, or Daemons are balanced. What we are saying is that it is not unfair. Going back to the tennis example. So say I go and spend money on Tennis lessons with the best tennis coach, buy the best shoes,racket, get a personal trainer....and you play on your local court in a park with your buddy.. IF we were born with the same natural talent I will very likely still beat you down on the court, and fairly badly. If Roger Federer Shows up he will beat us both, very badly completely based on external factors I cannot control (he is flat more talented and atheltic that I could every hope to be...no drugs need be taken.)

Equating Top armies to Bionic arms or cheating judges makes it sound like I gain some "unfair" advantage...I don't, you have the same option to run out and buy a new power army as I do (just like you could pay for tennis lessons.) It is an option and completely fair.

Automatically Appended Next Post:
Let me put it this way. You playing an MEQ army have a more realistic chance of beating me playing screamer star than (assuming you were not a highly competitive national level runner...if so than my conjecture is off) you ever would have (no matter how hard you worked) of beating me in a 3 mile race when I was still competing. That does not make the race unfair, non-competitve sure...but we are using the same set of base rules, I just happen to have a better "system" At the same time, I still had no realistic chance of winning the National Championship when I competed...no matter how much I worked....

I do not see Rodger Federer beating us as a problem, he is a better PLAYER then we are. His SKILL will beat us, not his shoes/ requet. I would guess that he could beat me with a ping-pong paddle and some sandles. Money spent on lessons can have an affect on your SKILL but when you step onto the court each player is still playing with the same basic equipment. I am arguing that the equipment that Tau/Eldar/ CD can bring is far better.

I think the point of disagreement between us revolves around the fact that we are using an athletics based example. Some people are born with more talent then others. To me, talent falls under the same catagory as "player skill," becasue it cannot be controlled. Things like equipment, such as requets and shoes fall for me under the same banner as "game rules." We are not God and we can do nothing about talent/player skill, infact that is the quality we as gamers should celebrate when someone excels. But, we can control the equipment/game rules. Just look at Olympic Swimming, the swimming suits that aid a swimmer were banned in favor of a return to traditional Speedos to eliminate the equipment based varibles from the sport.

I do not think that in order to compete you should have to continue to hop from army to army, buying the newest units. What that does is render players that don't want to, or cannot afford to jump armies "non-competative." Which is unfair at best and exploitative by GW at worst. The most fair game I can think of is chess. Everyone has all the same assets at their disposal, the player makes the difference not the pieces. 40k is nowhere near that exact and thankfully has more variaty, but you get the idea. Isn't the most basic concept of a competative game, that it is fair. If it is not, then it is not a competative game because it is slanted to favor one side (see Fairground Games). If the game is slanted against you from the start, who in their right mind would try and make it into a competative activity?

Comp is basically a method of "removing the slant," if you will, that GW has in my opinion intentionally put on the game in order to drive sales. Players are buying the new armies these days in the name of being "competative" because they know it gives them an advantage. Who wants to win becasue you were on the positive end of an unfair slant? That is like feeling good about beating someone in chess when all your Pawns function like Rooks... It's not a game at that point, it is a farce. Yet "competative" players are going out and basically buying a chess set with Rook Pawns and going to tournaments. The logic they use to justify this is "well everyone else is doing it so I have to to compete," meanwhile we who do not subscribe to this peer/meta pressure are labled "casual gamers," or "non-competative."

 IK Viper wrote:

Breng77 wrote:
Ok so here is the thing. NO one is saying Tau, Eldar, or Daemons are balanced. What we are saying is that it is not unfair. Going back to the tennis example. So say I go and spend money on Tennis lessons with the best tennis coach, buy the best shoes,racket, get a personal trainer....and you play on your local court in a park with your buddy.. IF we were born with the same natural talent I will very likely still beat you down on the court, and fairly badly. If Roger Federer Shows up he will beat us both, very badly completely based on external factors I cannot control (he is flat more talented and atheltic that I could every hope to be...no drugs need be taken.)

Equating Top armies to Bionic arms or cheating judges makes it sound like I gain some "unfair" advantage...I don't, you have the same option to run out and buy a new power army as I do (just like you could pay for tennis lessons.) It is an option and completely fair.

Automatically Appended Next Post:
Let me put it this way. You playing an MEQ army have a more realistic chance of beating me playing screamer star than (assuming you were not a highly competitive national level runner...if so than my conjecture is off) you ever would have (no matter how hard you worked) of beating me in a 3 mile race when I was still competing. That does not make the race unfair, non-competitve sure...but we are using the same set of base rules, I just happen to have a better "system" At the same time, I still had no realistic chance of winning the National Championship when I competed...no matter how much I worked....

I do not see Rodger Federer beating us as a problem, he is a better PLAYER then we are. His SKILL will beat us, not his shoes/ requet. I would guess that he could beat me with a ping-pong paddle and some sandles. Money spent on lessons can have an affect on your SKILL but when you step onto the court each player is still playing with the same basic equipment. I am arguing that the equipment that Tau/Eldar/ CD can bring is far better.

I do not think that in order to compete you should have to continue to hop from army to army, buying the newest units. What that does is render players that don't do not want to, or cannot afford to jump armies "non-competative." Which is unfair at best and exploitative by GW at worst. The most fair game I can think of is chess. Everyone has all the same assets at their disposal, the player makes the difference not the pieces. 40k is nowhere near that exact and thankfully has more variaty, but you get the idea. Isn't the most basic comcept of a competative game, that it is fair. If it is not, then it is not a competative game because it is slanted to favor one side (see Fairground Games). If the game is slanted against you from the start, who in their right mind would try and make it into a competative activity?

Comp is basically a method of "removing the slant," if you will, that GW has in my opinion intentionally put on the game in order to drive sales. Players are buying the new armies these days in the name of being "competative" because they know it gives them an advantage. Who wants to win becasue you were on the positive end of an unfair slant? That is like feeling good about beating someone in chess when all your Pawns function like Rooks... It's not a game at that point, it is a farce.

This is one of the reasons the PGA works very diligently to restrict the types of equipment players on the PGA tour can use. Whether it is the restriction of pendulum putters or down to the restrictions on the types and shape of grooves on the club face. They recognize that certain pieces of equipment can give advantage and work to curb that in order to keep the playing field as level as possible amongst all players in terms of equipment.

@IK Viper

Just curious what you consider jumping to new armies? Is it building a new army for every new codex? Is there a time limit you feel you shouldn't have to upgrade your own army?

I ask because I generally build an army a year right now. Fully built and painted. And even in this year, a year of massive releases. I played that one list (with extremely minor adjustments) all year. And did extremely well.

Personally, the only thing currently wrong with the game is the 2++ re-rollable deathstars. Which will eventually phase itself out (faster depending on the FAQ for Sisters).

Or do you feel that your army should be able to compete with everything coming out without adjustment?

I generally don't think we can expect GW to change its business policies in terms of power creep. I do think we should be at least a little appreciative of the fact there are 3-5 codices right now that are all fairly competitive and able to win a GT. Plus, there are a fairly wide variety of combo lists build within those in terms of use of allies / etc.

My sole issue is with a couple of combinations that are simply not fun to play against, regardless of your competitive level.

Primarily, these are units that can move extreme distances at the drop of a hat, and possess a re-rollable 2+ save that is either difficult (jetbike council having 2+ armor, 2+ cover, 4+ invul with Fortune, and 2 x's a game able to DTW Misfortune if you're lucky enough to get it, and have the unit within range and LOS at the start of one of your turns on a 2+ or 3+ twice, and a 4+ otherwise) or impossible to modify (Screamers having 2+ invulnerable with re-roll and ability to DTW Misfortune if you're lucky enough to get it, and have the unit within range and LOS at the start of one of your turns on a 4+).

Also arguably inclusive is FMC spam with Fateweaver, where the army doesn't really "play the game" and instead spends a substantial amount of time off the board, with a model remaining on the board who has a 2++ re-rollable save and can re-roll a failed grounding test.

Finally, arguably inclusive are Trick Commanders without a limit on Signature Systems / without Signature Systems taking up Support System slots. Their ability to battle brother with the 2 newest codices, and confer a dramatic suite of rules upon units with a high volume of fire (forget Ion tides, they aren't a problem) at middling to low AP, and their ability to couple this with a relatively high I hit and run, could also be considered extremely unfun for the average player to go up against.

You could argue Serpent Shields are a problem also, but I think their relatively fragility against simply taking hull points to death coupled w/ a shift in meta away from having to deal with some of the above will solve that problem fairly effectively.

If you remove these components of the game in some capacity (and condemnor bolt guns do impact this a little bit, depending on how the majority of tournaments rules, and depending on whether GW releases a rule that largely nerfs them a la GK psi-shock), there's really nothing else that's a problem to the point of destroying variety and forcing unfun games upon the vast majority of players who go up against it, and a lot of the various lists in the meta that are "Good" will shift pretty quickly.


EDIT - Long story short, it's an overreaction to suggest you have to have THE newest codex, and the # of codices that can compete just fine are fairly decent right now, and diverse. Even Tyranid (though they are getting a new dex) are almost unbeatable if you want to take the time and energy to play the list or two that fit that description. The "problem," if there is one, centers around a small # of specific units. For this reason, even if you subscribe to the notion the game is unfun to play right now for the average player, the solution is more a scalpel than the hammer of comp.

Comp will only accomplish what the above DaBoyz poster clarifies is their flat intent - shifting the bar, not changing the fundamental nature of the game to benefit those who player more recently updated codices and optimize their builds within the framework of whatever the FOC is (single FOC, double FOC, or comped FOC).

 Hulksmash wrote:
@IK Viper

Just curious what you consider jumping to new armies? Is it building a new army for every new codex? Is there a time limit you feel you shouldn't have to upgrade your own army?

I ask because I generally build an army a year right now. Fully built and painted. And even in this year, a year of massive releases. I played that one list (with extremely minor adjustments) all year. And did extremely well.

Personally, the only thing currently wrong with the game is the 2++ re-rollable deathstars. Which will eventually phase itself out (faster depending on the FAQ for Sisters).

Or do you feel that your army should be able to compete with everything coming out without adjustment?

I think that each codex should be legtimate and competative, that may mean bringing different units to the table, but for GW to put out books that overshadow past codicies is wrong as it invalidates the investment players who run that army have made into it. My toys should always stand a fighing chance, I see "outdated" and "unplayable" codicies as a HUGE failing by the GW design team in terms of overall game balance.

To me in a game with armies, army ability is much more akin to talent (in so far as without changing the rules we have no control over it, as no Comp system will fix it it requires rules changes) than equipment. Equipment is essentially what you need to have to play the game, nothing more

But if you want to go equipment, we can go car racing where very likely the newest technology etc is going to be better than someone with a really old car trying to compete in the same race. Now car racing dictates what things you can bring to the table. but there is a way to do this. Short of Comp being - Everyone Will play Dark Angels with no allies...they game will never be fully balanced, because GW wants to 1.) sell new models. 2.) make fluffy units.

I think to some extent this notion that every army is always going to be able to compete is a false one and has never happened in 40k. Short of all releases happening simulataneously with lots of testing , it really cannot be done. New things will always change how things work.

Also I never said people need to enjoy getting stomped...they just should stop claiming it is somehow unfair because they have artificially limited themselves in the competition (I artificially limit myself all the time...I don't think it is unfair when I lose to someone who does not.)

That said I already said I would be infavor of changing some key rules to make the game more fun. But even then you don't end up with perfect balance. Unless you want to re-write the whole game.

Off the top of my head:

IG are an edition old. And are solidly competitive, more so with Allies.

DA are this edition and solid with or without allies.

Necrons are previous edition and still solidly competitive

Grey Knights are almost a meta buster at this point and so still solid and competitive with or without allies.

SOB look to be solid with the newest update.

Space Wolves and Tyranids are both still solidly competitive, especially in the current meta that relies so heavily on psychic powers.

Now I'm not saying the same lists in the books are as competitive as they were at other times but the books themselves provide builds that are competitive. So again it's more down to adjusting your own army instead of having to buy a new one.

What book isnt' competitive right now? With or without Allies. I'm curious as to your viewpoint since it counter to mine.

Breng77 wrote:
To me in a game with armies, army ability is much more akin to talent (in so far as without changing the rules we have no control over it, as no Comp system will fix it it requires rules changes) than equipment. Equipment is essentially what you need to have to play the game, nothing more

So I'm more talented because I bought a paid for the latest and greatest? I'm more talented because I, along with everyone else in the world, figured out that Tau and Eldar combo-ed together is markedly better than anything else in the game? A bit ridiculous.

Breng77 wrote:
But if you want to go equipment, we can go car racing where very likely the newest technology etc is going to be better than someone with a really old car trying to compete in the same race.

I come from a racing family and how equipment influences the environment and the arms race that it can create is a MASSIVE issue. So massive that there are TONS and TONS of rules on exactly what you can and can't bring for each class of car. For example, who manufactures your engine, how many horsepower your engine can have, what kind of tires you can have, how much your car weighs etc etc. You might even say racing is "comped".

Breng77 wrote:
Also I never said people need to enjoy getting stomped...they just should stop claiming it is somehow unfair because they have artificially limited themselves in the competition (I artificially limit myself all the time...I don't think it is unfair when I lose to someone who does not.)

The competitive community certainly can, and is, justifying the way that they approach the game. And very little is going to change their mind.

What I think people should really think about is an extension of the tennis example. Think of how many millions of people play tennis recreationally. Then think of how few people play tennis competitively. The unashamed "I'm going to beat your face in and I don't care you feel about it, you should have tried harder" mentality naturally pushes people out of "competitive" play in any activity. I think people should really think about how pushing people away from a game that is already niche influences event attendance, event finances, GW finances, and the overall health of the game.

Hulk Smash, when is the last time an Ork army has won a GT?, Blood Angels? Black Templars just got rolled in in order to help them out but you get my point. Dark Angel players have every right in the world to feel crapped on by GW when the Space Marine book just out did everything that book was built around besides Deathwing and the Magic Flag Crusader list which are both very match up dependant.

Breng77 asserts that he equates "army ability" with talent.... Talent cannot be bought, it is born/ trained. "Army ability" is available to any and everyone who can fork up the money for a codex...

As with the Car Racing example, there are tight controls imposed on the sport to PREVENT advantage based on puchasing power/ equipment in an effort to bring the sport back to a competition between human beings, not the equipment they utilize.

I think if you use comp as a tool to change army structures either by limiting certain units/charachters, or not allowing parts of the force org. to be maxed, the newer codices will still have a slight advantage.

Changing the rules on certain units could be beneficial, but that seems like a slippery slope to wander down.

I think if certain codices are under utilized, and the real goal of the GT is to get a diversity in ARMIES brought, then the simplist solution would be to give a handicap to the underutilized codices. Codices like Orks, Blood Angels, Dark Eldar get a 10% aditional point increase on their cap. Necrons, GK, and wolves get 5%.....something like that. Now how would this decision be made.....the TO i guess since they would be the ones comping the event, but in theory the % increase in points an army could spend would balance things out. It would require a lot of playtesting to find out what the numbers were, but if it made for an event that no army was played by more than 10% of the field, you may have what you are looking for.

If smeone has allies, you just get the % increase on how many points you spent for the faction. (I spent 1000 pts. on Tau and 850 on orks.....Orks gain an additional 10%, so an additional 85 points of orks.) I am just using round percentages and points. The GT could just list all codices and the % increase next to the army name so partiipating folks new what they could build.

I dont know if anyone would really do this, but just food for thought on how to "comp" an event that really isnt brought up much, or at all really.

 IK Viper wrote:
Hulk Smash, when is the last time an Ork army has won a GT?, Blood Angels? Black Templars just got rolled in in order to help them out but you get my point. Dark Angel players have every right in the world to feel crapped on by GW when the Space Marine book just out did everything that book was built around besides Deathwing and the Magic Flag Crusader list which are both very match up dependant.

Breng77 asserts that he equates "army ability" with talent.... Talent cannot be bought, it is born/ trained. "Army ability" is available to any and everyone who can fork up the money for a codex...

As with the Car Racing example, there are tight controls imposed on the sport to PREVENT advantage based on puchasing power/ equipment in an effort to bring the sport back to a competition between human beings, not the equipment they utilize.

Except for Dark Angels, all of those armies had a time when they were obliterating everybody in an unfair and unbalanced way, in the eyes of the community at large. You're playing a Games Workshop game, and their business model is oriented around constantly advancing the football. One would be better off evaluating how MANY codices can compete right now, compared to the past, than simply complaining that older codices eventually fall away in terms of functionality. It's a pointless and a little bit naive complaint, simply b/c of how familiar we all are with it by now.

At one point Orks were running roughshod over EVERYONE with both horde ork / loota spam, and nob biker spam, and battlewagon spam, etc. etc. etc. Blood Angels and Mephiston and speedy razorback spam were obliterating people for a while; Black Templars had good builds all the way through 5th Edition (ask Darkwynn) despite being an ancient dex. They're also good again, now.

IT's disingenuous to simply complain about whatever codex happens to be bad in the moment or old in the moment, b/c there's always been several that fit the bill. Ironically, right now there are MORE codices that fit the bill of able to compete despite being older than ever before. The only real problems are with - as I mentioned above - the couple of list constructs (codex kinda regardless) that present unit combos that are widely believed to be unpleasant to play against (even if they are beatable), even in the opinion of many veteran tournament competitors.

Correct, there is no more or less codex imbalance than ever, it just so happens that several of the current top armies are not all that fun to play against. That does not mean unbeatably powerful, but simply not very fun. When essentially "not playing the game" is the strategy to win, it makes for boring games.

As for the Talent V army Ability. Correct (outside of performance enchaning drugs) talent cannot be bought, which is what separates great players with top books from bad players with the same books. My point was more that you cannot control for talent anymore than you can for army ability if you want to play with the rules as presented by GW. Also talent is not trained skill is trained. talent is born. I could take 100 people and train them the same way for anything and get largely different results based on training. Again I could train as much as I like I'll never win the olympics, I don't have the talent. IN that way it is similar to army. You can practice as much as you like with a bad army build and never win.


There are only a few ways you could try to control for army difference.

1.) Change the rules

2.) Ban/restrict certain units/combos/wargear

Each have problems. Changing the rules requires community buy in which does not exist. Banning etc units requires the same and either requires a vast ammount of results indicating something is so dominant it needs fixing, or is completely subjective and based on nothing. The community is not large enough for the first to occur in the ammount of time available before the meta changes, and neither does anything but change which armies are beating people up.

So your logic for not trying to affect change is that it has always been this way... That just means that it has always needed changing. GW's market plan has always been exploitive.

Why would be praise/ defend a system where each army has its brief "time in the sun" and then falls back into obscurity, all that does is set players up to become frustrated with the hobby as they see their once powerful army descend into underpowered mediocrity. GW hopes your response is to rush out and buy more new (for now better) stuff, and we are going along with it, specially on the competative side of the hobby.

I think that if NOVA, Adepticon, FOB, BFS, and BAO adopted a standard FAQ/ Errata document, the whole country would fall in-line behind it, resulting in a more balanced gaming comminity for all. It is not in GW's interestes to write a balanced game therefore they won't, so it falls to us as a community to self regulate. The problem is that one voice is not enough, it would take a unified group of major GT TO's to garner any weight of legitimacy.

MVBrandt wrote:
Part of the problem is the "Internets" places an enormous amount of attention not on "look at those gorgeous armies that finished near the top of army judging at that big GT," but instead on "WHO WON ALL THEIR GAMES AND WHAT WAS THEIR LIST?" Both things should be rewarded AT the tournament, among many other things, and most of the big GT's do just that (Which is why players come back to them, they grow in popularity, etc.), but prospective attendees most especially see a response electronically that seems to imply the ONLY focus is on the guys who are curbstomping people. It's a web culture we could all afford to work on changing ... and certainly in a balanced way. It is just as unacceptable to gak on people who like to play to win ... as it is to gak on more casual players. All styles of play and enjoyment of our hobby deserve to be given their just due .... and certainly you can do all of that within the same events.

IMO, you saw much more of that in the days of the GW GTs. GW took professional quality pics of armies and published them on their web site and WD, where (importantly) a wide range of hobbyists could see them. I think that helped create an environment in which the motivation for attending a GT wasn't just "I want to test my mettle against Player X", but also "I want to play against armies that look like that." Events certainly can and do take pics and publish them online, but even an event as big as Adepticon can't match GW's reach and promotional ability. Meanwhile it's easy for even the smallest event to post a results sheet on a blog site, forums, etc.

It's just one of the chips that naturally fell after GW said "you can do it better than us" and got out of the GT business. I think that's created an environment in which a variety of new ideas about tournament play have thrived. On the other hand, there are a few things that a multinational corporation can do better than even the best organized and motivated group of gamers.

Regarding the thread topic, I do feel -- and this is an unscientific, unsupported, just-my-gut opinion -- that there has been some movement by the players in the middle region of the competitor-hobbyist continuum away from attending larger tournaments (and possibly smaller ones too). Furthermore, I think that the declined importance of soft scores, composition or other "balancing" factors -- even if the comfort provided there is illusory -- has been a key factor.

I have a long history with comp, from winning that category at Baltimore one year to scoring the lowest by a wide margin in Philadelphia a few years later just to prove a point to the staff. My feelings about it are somewhat mixed and complicated, although I definitely applaud DaBoyz for sticking to their guns. However, I'm not one bit surprised that the concept seems to be coming back around again and picking up steam. From the get go, GW's entire approach to 6th edition -- from more narrative-based rules, to more tables and random rolls, to more codex complexity, to the creation of supplements -- was inevitably going to force us to really think about the nature of the game. It's about more than just Screamerstars, flying circuses and mechanical dragons.

 IK Viper wrote:
So your logic for not trying to affect change is that it has always been this way... That just means that it has always needed changing. GW's market plan has always been exploitive.

Why would be praise/ defend a system where each army has its brief "time in the sun" and then falls back into obscurity, all that does is set players up to become frustrated with the hobby as they see their once powerful army descend into underpowered mediocrity. GW hopes your response is to rush out and buy more new (for now better) stuff, and we are going along with it, specially on the competative side of the hobby.

I think that if NOVA, Adepticon, FOB, BFS, and BAO adopted a standard FAQ/ Errata document, the whole country would fall in-line behind it, resulting in a more balanced gaming comminity for all. It is not in GW's interestes to write a balanced game therefore they won't, so it falls to us as a community to self regulate. The problem is that one voice is not enough, it would take a unified group of major GT TO's to garner any weight of legitimacy.

NOt at all but you have just supported my point, in order to effect change all (or at least most) major events would need to be on the same page, with the same document etc...as it would lead to community buy in. Which I stated we would need, and does not currently exist. The problem is getting all those events to agree on what is needed, and be willing to take the risk involved with making the changes. IMO it would need to start with Adepticon as very likely they are large enough to absorb any hit to popularity.

 IK Viper wrote:
Hulk Smash, when is the last time an Ork army has won a GT?, Blood Angels? Black Templars just got rolled in in order to help them out but you get my point. Dark Angel players have every right in the world to feel crapped on by GW when the Space Marine book just out did everything that book was built around besides Deathwing and the Magic Flag Crusader list which are both very match up dependant.

Breng77 asserts that he equates "army ability" with talent.... Talent cannot be bought, it is born/ trained. "Army ability" is available to any and everyone who can fork up the money for a codex...

As with the Car Racing example, there are tight controls imposed on the sport to PREVENT advantage based on puchasing power/ equipment in an effort to bring the sport back to a competition between human beings, not the equipment they utilize.

Necron Orks just won Wargamescon this year, the orks are a huge huge part of how that list functioned and won.

I took 2nd at a GT I think with IG/BA this year? Beyond that I dont think BA have done well.

Here's the thing though - thats 1 book. Out of what, 13?

Alright Fellas,
Again I think we need to define the concepts of the current tournament scene.
RTT's as I and many here knew them are a thing of the past..as sad as it makes me, the TO's have bent to the crying of a few vocal power gamers and are afraid to do something about it by implementing a resonable comp system -- and before you shoot off again MVBrandt -- I know what im talking about when it comes to 40k tourneys -- Ive been running them successfully since 1999. And my Tournaments include comp scores. Ive seen it and heard it from sooo many players after the event was over at other bigger national tourneys -- "That guy was a jerk, his army was totally broken and I didnt stand a chance, then when I didnt smile as he was butt slamming me i got knocked for sportsmanship!"
RTT's are gone as we knew them.
GT's are really just the stomping ground for the 'ard boyz that no longer have a tournament to go to.
So lets just drop the whole comp thing, cuz the cry babies who have no social skills but have exceptional jobs and can afford the flavor of the month will just cry and cry about not being able to play the army they want to play. While the long timers like myself will just keep on playing in the local scene and continue to help it grow by showing the new kids what a fun and balanced army should be and how much fun the actual HOBBY is, not just winning.

Target wrote:


Necron Orks just won Wargamescon this year, the orks are a huge huge part of how that list functioned and won.

I took 2nd at a GT I think with IG/BA this year? Beyond that I dont think BA have done well.

Here's the thing though - thats 1 book. Out of what, 13?

This is part of what makes the game interesting, yet so difficult to talk about.

A few of things at WGC make the fact that Orks/Necrons won almost meaningless to the current conversation.

1. It was Ben Mohlie, who is an exceptional player.
2. Eldar were not even out yet.
3. Tau were barely out and almost totally unrepresented at the tournament.
4. The daemon lists that made it to the second day cut off were all cavalry rush armies, there wasn't a single screamer star in the entire place.

The game and that tournament was so different than what we are dealing with now that it's kind of moot what happened at WGC.

But #4 is kind of an interesting point in and of itself. A few people on here want to talk about seer and screamer star as if they are the only problem, and the game would be fine without them. I call bunk. There are a number of older books that actually give seer and screamer star problems. The hang up is Tau and Eldar will blow them off the table without a second thought.

I don't think screamer and seer stars are good "all around" armies. What they do do is give Tau and other forms of Eldar fits. They are counter meta armies that happen to be unfun to play against, so a large swath of the "competitive players" in the heavy meta armies are whining. I don't feel bad for them. A bit of their own medicine in my opinion. They've been making games unfun for everyone else forever.

If there weren't so many tau and eldar, the armies that CAN deal with screamer and seer star would be more prevalent.

 ArtfcllyFlvrd wrote:

Target wrote:


Necron Orks just won Wargamescon this year, the orks are a huge huge part of how that list functioned and won.

I took 2nd at a GT I think with IG/BA this year? Beyond that I dont think BA have done well.

Here's the thing though - thats 1 book. Out of what, 13?

This is part of what makes the game interesting, yet so difficult to talk about.

A few of things at WGC make the fact that Orks/Necrons won almost meaningless to the current conversation.

1. It was Ben Mohlie, who is an exceptional player.
2. Eldar were not even out yet.
3. Tau were barely out and almost totally unrepresented at the tournament.
4. The daemon lists that made it to the second day cut off were all cavalry rush armies, there wasn't a single screamer star in the entire place.

The game and that tournament was so different than what we are dealing with now that it's kind of moot what happened at WGC.

But #4 is kind of an interesting point in and of itself. A few people on here want to talk about seer and screamer star as if they are the only problem, and the game would be fine without them. I call bunk. There are a number of older books that actually give seer and screamer star problems. The hang up is Tau and Eldar will blow them off the table without a second thought.

I don't think screamer and seer stars are good "all around" armies. What they do do is give Tau and other forms of Eldar fits. They are counter meta armies that happen to be unfun to play against, so a large swath of the "competitive players" in the heavy meta armies are whining. I don't feel bad for them. A bit of their own medicine in my opinion. They've been making games unfun for everyone else forever.

If there weren't so many tau and eldar, the armies that CAN deal with screamer and seer star would be more prevalent.

That's just a moving bar - the posters point I was responding to "when was the last time orks won a GT" - I know things have changed since then, but heck, if we're going to use that standard its hard to say anythings good if we only count wins since the last big book dropped - there just arent that many events, and I think we can't start lamenting books as "unplayable" if they've only been "bad" for less than 6 months. Also, I'm aware it was Ben Mohlie - but again, if you want to discredit the status of orks based on it being mohlie playing them, you're going to have to discredit most GT wins, as most GTs are won by exceptional players (it's kind of the reason they win typically..)

In my opinion, most if not all books are currently viable in GT-winning capable lists in either a primary or an ally role.

@ Target

Two things,

1. I would add that Ben also was Necrons with Orks, not the other way around. It's not like he was running green tide. He had a fairly typical necron army, and a unit of meganobz in a battlewagon. I don't know if that it "Orks winning a GT" in the way that you meant it.

2. The moving bar essentially is the problem. The bar has moved so high so fast that the disparity between the top and bottom is huge, however you define "the top". The most recent bar move with Tau and Eldar has made some formerly "anything goes" tournament players reconsider if we should lose that attitude. Hence this thread.

Heres the thing...
We heard the same cries from people when it was DA death wing..or GK Razorback spam..
Just throw comp out the window in a GT.
Put it in RTT's
That should keep the power gamers happy and the long timers happy too.

 IK Viper wrote:
With regard to the tennis example about how competition is inherently not fair: ...

The tennis comparison was nothign to do with balance between armies. I was addressing the idea that entering a competition and not playing down to your opponent's level is some sort of dick move.

 FarseerAndyMan wrote:
Alright Fellas,
Again I think we need to define the concepts of the current tournament scene.
RTT's as I and many here knew them are a thing of the past..as sad as it makes me, the TO's have bent to the crying of a few vocal power gamers and are afraid to do something about it by implementing a resonable comp system -- and before you shoot off again MVBrandt -- I know what im talking about when it comes to 40k tourneys -- Ive been running them successfully since 1999. And my Tournaments include comp scores. Ive seen it and heard it from sooo many players after the event was over at other bigger national tourneys -- "That guy was a jerk, his army was totally broken and I didnt stand a chance, then when I didnt smile as he was butt slamming me i got knocked for sportsmanship!"
RTT's are gone as we knew them.
GT's are really just the stomping ground for the 'ard boyz that no longer have a tournament to go to.
So lets just drop the whole comp thing, cuz the cry babies who have no social skills but have exceptional jobs and can afford the flavor of the month will just cry and cry about not being able to play the army they want to play. While the long timers like myself will just keep on playing in the local scene and continue to help it grow by showing the new kids what a fun and balanced army should be and how much fun the actual HOBBY is, not just winning.

So here is the thing....do you actually attend most GTs because that has not been my experience at all, and catagorizing every player at a GT as some kind of WAAC power gamer is not only wrong it is insulting. Second, I could try to run my RTTs with Comp if I wanted them to shrink and not draw the numbers I generally do. Most people I know use small tournaments as practice for larger ones, or just to play games. IF I institute Comp on simply a local level it causes 2 problems.

1.) Players from outside the area won't attend as often, because they don't want to rebuild armies to meet my comp for a tiny event.
2.) Local Players will never venture out of the local area because they built their army to meet comp and now cannot compete on an open scene. So if the store 40 min away has different Comp and I do I have just potentially segregated local players into groups by Comp, or I have forced them to spend more money to buy several different armies depending on Comp.


Comp would be far better started by Large GTs and trickled down....no body is saying you need to smile through your face beating, but if all you do is mope about how broken the opponents army is or how stupid the game is that is no fun for either player....and Comp won't stop people from bringing OP armies, they will just bring ones that Fit the Comp system.

Great Players win tournaments Comp or Not and this idea that somehow comp will change how badly they beat on other players is a false one. Trust me I brought a terrible GK list to an RTT in August and had players complaining that they had to play me because I was going to beat them so badly....with a terrible list...and it did not happen...I won close games...but people will feel that good players will beat them regardless of the list, and some games won't get any closer.

 ArtfcllyFlvrd wrote:
@ Target

Two things,

1. I would add that Ben also was Necrons with Orks, not the other way around. It's not like he was running green tide. He had a fairly typical necron army, and a unit of meganobz in a battlewagon. I don't know if that it "Orks winning a GT" in the way that you meant it.

2. The moving bar essentially is the problem. The bar has moved so high so fast that the disparity between the top and bottom is huge, however you define "the top". The most recent bar move with Tau and Eldar has made some formerly "anything goes" tournament players reconsider if we should lose that attitude. Hence this thread.

When I said moving the bar I was talking about this: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Moving_the_goalposts

I'm discussing the way you're changing the criteria of the original claim in order to back up your assertion. First it was "when have orks won anything!" then when proof was provided: "Without Ben Mohlie, since tau and eldar, and now as primary"". It's pointless to discuss things that way. Yes, orks arent blazingly good right now - but they've obviously found a home in a "GT-Winning" list in the recent past, which is all I'm saying, and about all any book can hope for.

Yes, Tau and Eldar are currently a PITA, no, it's not a reason for comp - and as far as I know, it has made NO formerly "anything goes" tournament players reconsider if we should lose that attitude. The 4 people cited in the original post regarding da boyz (im one of them - Andrew) are not in support of comp - we're in support of Da Boyz, the two things aren't mutually exclusive. We all (if you've played a while) suffered through about 2 years of miserable Nidzilla and CSM dual lash dominance, I'm going to wait before rioting over tau and eldar until it's been at least a year and nothing has changed (which I don't expect to happen).