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MarkyMark wrote:
Who from ETC is reviewing it? the ETC board or one of the member countries that will be hosting the ETC?.

Due to the nature of the ETC I doubt they would go down this route nor would it pass a captains vote but is interesting none the less.

Honestly I do think it will be a case of list building to take advantage of rules like this. In the case of 6 objectives 4 in corners and 2 player placed the Eldar list I posted above would score 3 objectives easy enough and put 3 night spinner barrage shots into their objectives. For the relic asault moving 2+cover jetbike squads on the relic from turn 1.....

It will also make players want to go second?. As objectives are scored end of game turn they can easily be scored by the 2nd player as nothing can then stop him scoring those objectives bar contesting.

Tom Adriany at the least is looking at it on a train somewhere right now (he asked to be included). IT's not about whether the ETC uses the missions, but about their participation in designing and playtesting them. Nobody's going to be held to some requirement to use some catalog's missions or bust, but they aren't being designed and tested by "some GT," instead by a broad community of TOs and gamers.

MVBrandt this is a really neat idea. I think i'm gonna try and see if this can be the format with the next RT tourney in my area

While variations on KP/VP are being considered, here's something I've had rattling around in my head for a while: what if we could add some tactical consideration to the assignment of KP? Objective placement is a huge tactical matter, so maybe we could build something similar around KP.

For instance, one player could nominate one of his units as expendable and make assign it 1 KP, then his opponent could nominate another (or the same) unit for another 1 KP. Then they'd do the same for the opponent's army. The process could continue for some set number of KP (probably on the order of 1/unit).

A system like this could let players weight KP tactically on a per-game and per-opponent basis, hopefully allowing them to better play to their strengths and exploit their opponent's weaknesses.

So the 4 objectives being locked into specific locations, I understand that working at nova because of the way you guys do terrain, will that jive with how other events do terrain setup?

I've encountered this locally, mission tells you to put 1 or more objectives in specific spots, only problem is each board differs greatly from one to the other and in some it's not possible to place it where the mission is telling you to.

Something important here is that when we release Alpha 1, it's going to probably have some fixed objectives, and points accruals / etc. tuned to that.

This CANNOT be the case for every mission; the Catalog has to be a genuine Catalog, where variety of presentation and subtle variations allow events to tune their selection to their specific parameters (i.e., player placed terrain vs. fixed terrain, player placed objectives vs. fixed objectives, etc.). That way it's not a mandate of narrow mission-sets that only work for one setting.

As this progresses, and expands, the baseline mission alphas are going to be in theory coming from divergent sources, each of them operating within their own constraints along the lines above, and that'll influence design. It'll subsequently be up to TOs to choose which [if any] missions best suit their own specific set of constraints.

I believe Reece has considered sideboards, has anyone else? That combined with better missions could go a long way towards balancing. Proliferation of options has made balanced lists rarer, sideboard would possibly help mitigate that.

also maybe points accrual for objectives happens at end of player turn? Need to diminish advantage of going second.

MarkyMark wrote:
Who from ETC is reviewing it? the ETC board or one of the member countries that will be hosting the ETC?.

It will also make players want to go second?. As objectives are scored end of game turn they can easily be scored by the 2nd player as nothing can then stop him scoring those objectives bar contesting.

I posted on page 1 this very concern but was pretty much ignored by the big wigs. If you make scoring a point occur at the end of the opposing layers turn I think it makes the game more engaging and less op sided at the start/end. Of course with a system like 40k were I go with everything then you go, there is always going to be some issues with start/finish.

 Red Corsair wrote:

MarkyMark wrote:
Who from ETC is reviewing it? the ETC board or one of the member countries that will be hosting the ETC?.

It will also make players want to go second?. As objectives are scored end of game turn they can easily be scored by the 2nd player as nothing can then stop him scoring those objectives bar contesting.

I posted on page 1 this very concern but was pretty much ignored by the big wigs. If you make scoring a point occur at the end of the opposing layers turn I think it makes the game more engaging and less op sided at the start/end. Of course with a system like 40k were I go with everything then you go, there is always going to be some issues with start/finish.

We could also theoretically fix this by counting objectives you hold at the start of your player turn. That gives your opponent a chance to contest every move and gives a bit of an incentive to go first.

 Crablezworth wrote:
So the 4 objectives being locked into specific locations, I understand that working at nova because of the way you guys do terrain, will that jive with how other events do terrain setup?

I've encountered this locally, mission tells you to put 1 or more objectives in specific spots, only problem is each board differes greatly and in some it's not possible to place it where the mission is telling you to.

Maybe they should also include in the catalog a choice of ways to place objectives and do terrain/fortifications etc. etc I don't think its smart to design missions without considering these points as well as they impact the missions so greatly.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

PanzerLeader wrote:

 Red Corsair wrote:

MarkyMark wrote:
Who from ETC is reviewing it? the ETC board or one of the member countries that will be hosting the ETC?.

It will also make players want to go second?. As objectives are scored end of game turn they can easily be scored by the 2nd player as nothing can then stop him scoring those objectives bar contesting.

I posted on page 1 this very concern but was pretty much ignored by the big wigs. If you make scoring a point occur at the end of the opposing layers turn I think it makes the game more engaging and less op sided at the start/end. Of course with a system like 40k were I go with everything then you go, there is always going to be some issues with start/finish.

We could also theoretically fix this by counting objectives you hold at the start of your player turn. That gives your opponent a chance to contest every move and gives a bit of an incentive to go first.

Well, end of opposing players turn/start of your turn is the same thing pretty much, except now you need to address that it happens BEFORE reserves. Also saying that it happens at the end of your opponents turn takes away some of the advantages of going first and second.

Great discussion guys. Been 4 years since I did any 40K tournamenting, but if you guys get something like this going and it catches on, it would definitely reignite my interest!

How about half a point for being on a objective (uncontested of course) per player turn EXCEPT for the first turn where you cant score any objective points?. This would still favor jetbike armies and drop pod armies to a extent but that should be migated by the objectives in each corner

 Red Corsair wrote:

 Crablezworth wrote:
So the 4 objectives being locked into specific locations, I understand that working at nova because of the way you guys do terrain, will that jive with how other events do terrain setup?

I've encountered this locally, mission tells you to put 1 or more objectives in specific spots, only problem is each board differes greatly and in some it's not possible to place it where the mission is telling you to.

Maybe they should also include in the catalog a choice of ways to place objectives and do terrain/fortifications etc. etc I don't think its smart to design missions without considering these points as well as they impact the missions so greatly.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

PanzerLeader wrote:

 Red Corsair wrote:

MarkyMark wrote:
Who from ETC is reviewing it? the ETC board or one of the member countries that will be hosting the ETC?.

It will also make players want to go second?. As objectives are scored end of game turn they can easily be scored by the 2nd player as nothing can then stop him scoring those objectives bar contesting.

I posted on page 1 this very concern but was pretty much ignored by the big wigs. If you make scoring a point occur at the end of the opposing layers turn I think it makes the game more engaging and less op sided at the start/end. Of course with a system like 40k were I go with everything then you go, there is always going to be some issues with start/finish.

We could also theoretically fix this by counting objectives you hold at the start of your player turn. That gives your opponent a chance to contest every move and gives a bit of an incentive to go first.

Well, end of opposing players turn/start of your turn is the same thing pretty much, except now you need to address that it happens BEFORE reserves. Also saying that it happens at the end of your opponents turn takes away some of the advantages of going first and second.

Agree it needs to be clearly stated it happens before reserves/psychic powers. The nice part of saying start of your player turn is that it gives each opponent equal turns in which to score but still gives you a chance to counter your opponents play except for the top of 1. It also gives an incentive to going first because you can then score first on top of one before your opponent moves (or just say scoring starts at the top of 2 similiar to warmachine/hordes). This way, you have a chance to counter your opponents plays before he scores and don't run into awkward situations like "I move on to an objective on turn 5 using alternate scoring, the game ends at the end of 5, I can't score that point because my opponent never had a turn six. So I don't get to score of my turn five moves, but my opponent gets to score off his turn five moves because I have to end my turn 5 eventually."

Honestly I miss the old Mission Cards from 2nd edition; it was a neat idea that your army might want to reach the enemy deployment zone, while they want to hold the ruin in the middle. It gave you different victory conditions, and meant that you played differently depending on the mission. Some of them were a bit lame (Tyranid Assault springs to mind - if you have anything left alive you win, otherwise the Tyranid wins) but the different objectives made each battle something different.

I wonder why they got rid of those.

WayneTheGame wrote:
Honestly I miss the old Mission Cards from 2nd edition; it was a neat idea that your army might want to reach the enemy deployment zone, while they want to hold the ruin in the middle. It gave you different victory conditions, and meant that you played differently depending on the mission. Some of them were a bit lame (Tyranid Assault springs to mind - if you have anything left alive you win, otherwise the Tyranid wins) but the different objectives made each battle something different.

I wonder why they got rid of those.

A million reasons. IT's important to note they do have some impression of their game as being targeted at a younger and/or less complex audience.

The scoring-at-start-of-2nd-player-turn-and-on suggestion is a good one that I think is going to make it into an updated test mission before we even release it. Good conversations guys.

I like the idea of starting with the position that there will be no escalation, stronghold assault etc. But shouldn't we hold out hope that a system could be devised that would possibly build towards including them? It isn't necessarily that players hate the models themselves. Just that they unbalance things. If the idea begins with balancing DA drop pod lists against screamerstars, could it not at the far end balance that same DA drop list against a Revenant? Shouldn't the focus of balance be on how well the player plays the army they bring rather than who's list comes from an army that has been updated more recently?

I think that a new set of "match-up" objectives determined by the army a player brings to the table would help a great deal to even out the different styles of play. Assault based armies suffer in 6ed, but would they if an assault based army got 3 points for each enemy unit destroyed in the assault phase? While the shooty army across the table only received one point for each enemy unit destroyed? Decide which army style suits your list best and choose that "alternate" form of scoring based on your opponents list and what you brought to the table.

If you were looking to include Escalation, Stronghold Assault and the like. Could a replacement or addition to the list of secondary objectives help to balance them out? At game start, you look and see your opponent has brought a Revenant and select the option that replaces the standard secondary objectives with one that awards the same number of points just for killing the Rev? It would remove the requirement to fulfill First Blood, the worry of facing a Rev AND chasing down your opponents warlord, likewise the requirement to survive long enough to achieve linebreaker. You chose to make it your secondary objective to kill the super heavy and you'll be judged on whether or not you succeeded.

Could a DA drop pod list that chose objectives on turns held, grabbed them early, and made it his objective to bring his opponents Revenant down at all costs win the game? If he brough the Revenant down, held the majority of the objectives well past mid game, would it matter if in the end he was tabled by his opponent? Didn't the DA player achieve all their objectives?

 dracpanzer wrote:
I like the idea of starting with the position that there will be no escalation, stronghold assault etc. But shouldn't we hold out hope that a system could be devised that would possibly build towards including them? It isn't necessarily that players hate the models themselves. Just that they unbalance things. If the idea begins with balancing DA drop pod lists against screamerstars, could it not at the far end balance that same DA drop list against a Revenant? Shouldn't the focus of balance be on how well the player plays the army they bring rather than who's list comes from an army that has been updated more recently?

You have to start with a baseline and work your way up in variables, starting the other way around there's just too many variables to lock anything down. Better to test it as is and get it to a point where most to's see it working and then move on to "ok, factor in escalation, what changes? How do we address that?". There are plenty of codex's and supplements to consider before adding to that.

Also, it's pretty much a non starter if you include giant player placed fortresses or void shield generators that vary in size from something on a 40mm or 60mm base al lthe way up to a huge building with battlements and the like. A lot of that stuff I just think isn't workable in an organized event like a tournament. And even for gladiator style no holds tournaments, a to at some point is still going to have to set dimensions for the fortifications that as of yet don't have any gw models. Assuming you're using a scenario that involves fixed positions for some or all objectives, having a player remove a bunch of terrain and plop down their own really screws that up.

 Crablezworth wrote:
You have to start with a baseline and work your way up in variables

I agree completely, though I would prefer to see the intent to work towards including whatever could be "balanced" into a game scenario format. Stating from the start that some things just will not be included is not the same as saying we want to start "here" and work towards including what we can.

Panzer I am you. I think objectives should be counted starting turn 2 and you score them before psychic powers and reserves at the beginning of your turn instead of the end. This stops people from starting on objectives and allows each player equal turns to get points.

Regarding caps, I think if there are less than 4 objectives you cap overall, and 4 or more objectives you cap the points per turn. Adds missions variety and allows people to honestly think about what they really want.

Shared the revised and TO-reviewed first playtest mission with the OP here. It should go up in the OP soon.

For those who don't like going back, I'll post it here. Commentary from numerous TOs who've already joined in on participation via a collaborative google drive process, as well as commentary even here in this Dakka thread, helped shape it into more of a Beta than an Alpha, but it's testing time.

Feedback in the form of detailed bat reps is MOST welcome of all feedback (though thoughts in general are fine, theorycraft only goes so far, as has been indicated by numerous posts in here that are a little behind the curve on tweaks already being made, etc.), especially if you include detailed info on when points were scored, what the armies were of course, and also photos of the terrain and objective locations prior to beginning deployment.

Feedback can go here, be sent to mvbrandt@gmail.com, be submitted to your local TO (along w/ encouragement to get himself involved and participating by seeking invite to the google docs group), posted on your blog and crosslinked to us, posted on other blogs that talk about the missions as they're being developed, etc.

Participant organizers/players/etc., are welcome to submit their own draft missions toward the same concept and intent for inclusion in the catalog for purposes of revision, commentary, etc.

http://whiskey40k.blogspot.com/2013/12/asymmetrical-mission-design-for-better.html

First post updated with the playtest mission! Reproduced here for your viewing pleasure:

Asymmetrical Tournament Test Mission #1
Note: This mission is currently designed toward fixed objective location and symmetrical terrain. In the future and comprehensively we anticipate not every mission will look like this - the variety needs to allow TOs to tailor their selections from the Catalog to the specific parameters and constraints of their particular tournament environment.

For purposes of playtesting, we recommend you note down Standard/Alternate and Secondary Escalations prior to rolling any dice. Suggestions for alternate times to reveal and why are welcome! We recommend playing this particular mission in either Vanguard or Dawn of War deployments. On a separate piece of paper (for playtest), privately note whether you will be playing the Standard Primary or Alternate Primary; also note which Secondary you will be Escalating (see below for more information).
Immediately after rolling to determine deployment zones / place objective markers, both players must reveal their Primary and Secondary choices as noted above.

Primary - Whoever scores the most points from OBJECTIVES wins the Primary
Secondary- Whoever scores the most points from SECONDARIES wins the Secondary

OBJECTIVES
HOW YOU SCORE POINTS:
Standard Primary Objectives - Each Objective is worth 3 points if controlled at the end of the game
Alternate Primary Objectives - You score 1 point for each Objective you control at the start of YOUR OWN player turn 2, 3, 4, and 5. (i.e. No score on turns 1, 6, 7). Make this calculation BEFORE anything else (before reserves, psychic powers, etc.).

You may not score more than 9 points for either the Standard or Alternate version of this mission.

HOW YOU PLACE OBJECTIVES:
After rolling to determine deployment zones, place 6 objectives in the following fashion:
Place 1 objective in the center of each Table Quarter (12" from the nearest long table edge, 18" from the nearest short table edge)
Starting with the player who won the roll to select deployment zones, each player places one objective in a location of their choosing, no closer than 12" from any other Objective, and no closer than 6" from any table edge

Example: Player A selects to play Alternate Primary Objectives; he controls 3 Objectives at the start of his 2nd Player Turn (3 Points), 2 at the start of his 3rd Player Turn (2 Points), 1 at the start of his 4th Player Turn (1 Point) and none for the remainder of the game. Player B selects to play Standard Primary Objectives and controls 2 Objectives at the end of the game (6 Points). Both players score 6 Points toward the Primary, yielding a tie on Primary.

SECONDARIES
HOW YOU SCORE POINTS:
Each SECONDARY is worth 2 points; ESCALATED SECONDARIES are worth a maximum of 4 points. You must choose to convert one Secondary into its ESCALATED version.

You may score a maximum of 8 points for accomplishing SECONDARIES.

First Blood - 2 Points for being the first player to destroy an enemy unit
Slay the Warlord - 2 Points for destroying the enemy Warlord
Linebreaker - 2 Points for ending the game with a scoring/denial unit in the enemy deployment zone

HOW YOU ESCALATE SECONDARIES:
Each player secretly chooses one of the secondary objectives to escalate. They then score the escalated secondar INSTEAD of the basic secondary.

ESCALATED First Blood - Up to 4 Points for destroying more units than your opponent destroys; subtract the # of units your opponent destroyed from the # of units you destroyed; the sum is the # of points you earn for this Escalated Secondary (minimum of 0, maximum of 4); you no longer score any points for achieving Standard First Blood
ESCALATED Slay the Warlord - 1 Point for each enemy Character destroyed, to a maximum of 4 points; you no longer score any additional points for destroying the enemy’s Warlord.
ESCALATED Linebreaker - 1 Point for each non-Independent Character scoring or denial unit WHOLLY within the enemy's deployment zone at the end of the game, to a maximum of 4 points; you no longer score any additional points for standard Linebreaker.

EXAMPLE: Player A chooses to Escalate First Blood. During the course of the game, he completes Linebreaker (2 Points), Slay the Warlord (2 Points), First Blood (now worth 0 Points) and he destroys 4 more enemy units than his opponent destroys of his (4 Points). He has scored the maximum of 8 Points toward winning Secondary.

When it comes to secretly selecting an esclated secondary, how do you guys envision that process in terms of a tournament?

Also, for the tabulation of vp's from objective holding, witll this involve both players recording the amount accumulated on the same score sheet?

I might give this scenario a try this weekend, obviously in a friendly game there shouldn't be any issues keeping track of the vp's, just curious.

Hey guys, sorry I dropped out of the convo, glad to see it going strong! The Mgea Mat project is taking up most of our time.

I like the turn 2 option, too. It helps mitigate really fast armies. But, it also helps armies that have deep striking troops, too such as Daemons. Or, from another perspective, it makes it fair for them by giving them a chance to come out of reserves before the other player jumps ahead in points.

Frankie had voiced his opinion that after reading the draft so far, he still felt that the power armies will win the missions more often than not through raw power and that the missions may become overly complex. That was my initial fear, too, but I think at this point we need to just try it out and start play testing. Simplicity is important though, as a lot of folks are going to come to the table with these missions cold, reading them for the first time. The secondary objectives particularly, get pretty convoluted.

What is the logic behind capping the objective points? I think that will result in more tie games. Taking the cap off gives more definitive results. Are we worried the alternative mission can run away with victory too early?

Also with the line-breaker secondary, can you get that and an objective? If so, I can see lists with fast scoring units double dipping quite easily on that one, particularly if they go second.

Last critique, and not at all a big deal, I love keeping things simple personally and round numbers. As it stands each mission yields up to 17 points? Seems a bit arbitrary? Maybe I am just anal!? haha

What about attributing a set amount of points to each win condition and then taking the cap off of the actual objectives. For example, say you score as many points in objectives as you score, full stop, and make that a binary win condition worth a total of say, 3 battle points. That way it doesn't hold players back in what may be perceived as an unfair advantage or disadvantage. For example, if someone caps at 9pts with the alternative objective primary, and their opponent gets 9 also at end game in the normal objective scoring, but the first player gets creamed in secondaries (playing against a Death Star army, for example) the mission didn't really benefit them much.

You then set secondary objectives to also have an uncapped point limit (kill points + bonus points, or whatever) and set that win condition at 2 battle points as an example.

That way each game yields 5 points total? That is just an example of the concept, perhaps not the best one, but hopefully that was some good feedback.

 Reecius wrote:
Hey guys, sorry I dropped out of the convo, glad to see it going strong! The Mgea Mat project is taking up most of our time.

I like the turn 2 option, too. It helps mitigate really fast armies. But, it also helps armies that have deep striking troops, too such as Daemons. Or, from another perspective, it makes it fair for them by giving them a chance to come out of reserves before the other player jumps ahead in points.

Frankie had voiced his opinion that after reading the draft so far, he still felt that the power armies will win the missions more often than not through raw power and that the missions may become overly complex. That was my initial fear, too, but I think at this point we need to just try it out and start play testing. Simplicity is important though, as a lot of folks are going to come to the table with these missions cold, reading them for the first time. The secondary objectives particularly, get pretty convoluted.

What is the logic behind capping the objective points? I think that will result in more tie games. Taking the cap off gives more definitive results. Are we worried the alternative mission can run away with victory too early?

Also with the line-breaker secondary, can you get that and an objective? If so, I can see lists with fast scoring units double dipping quite easily on that one, particularly if they go second.

Last critique, and not at all a big deal, I love keeping things simple personally and round numbers. As it stands each mission yields up to 17 points? Seems a bit arbitrary? Maybe I am just anal!? haha

What about attributing a set amount of points to each win condition and then taking the cap off of the actual objectives. For example, say you score as many points in objectives as you score, full stop, and make that a binary win condition worth a total of say, 3 battle points. That way it doesn't hold players back in what may be perceived as an unfair advantage or disadvantage. For example, if someone caps at 9pts on secondaries, and their opponent gets 9 also, but they get creamed in secondaries (playing against a Death Star army, for example) the mission didn't really benefit them much.

You then set secondary objectives to also have an uncapped point limit (kill points + bonus points, or whatever) and set that win condition at 2 battle points.

That way each game yields 5 points total? That is just an example of the concept, perhaps not the best one, but hopefully that was some good feedback.

Reece; many of these are good comments; please insert them into the google docs too, so the ever-increasing group of collaborators can all see them in a centralized spot in terms of revision consideration. Mostly I just want those members of the collaboration team who don't use Dakka to see the thoughts and points you have, that way they don't go missed by anyone.

We've been playtesting these already; the other night I beat a tooled jetstar run by a local multi-GT-winner (names withheld to protect the innocentish!) fielding 60 DA tactical marines and 20 black knights (rwcs / rwbk squads) by playing better to the mission. I think better players will still win, but the power gap has definitely been curtailed dramatically, b/c you're - again - able to pursue what your army is good at, instead of going after a forlorn hope of a basic mission while also getting beaten in the face by a power army. If the mission had been "simple" objectives, I'd have lost 1-0 at the end due to mass jetbike movement and location; by sacrificing models hard early (that were going to die anyway due to the matchup) and collecting my 9-cap as quickly as possible, I was able to then maneuver heavily to keep my army alive and swinging and contest as many of his objectives / kill as many of his troops as possible (as opposed to the standard way of playing this, where the jetstar alone would have largely laughed at my army or any variant build of it). IT totally changed the dynamic of what I could do, without at all nerfing what Jetstar could do ... it just had to actually beat me up and outplay me, instead of barely surviving and grabbing 1 objective while contesting the rest.

The objective points are capped for the reason that you want to generally prevent "runaway" games in all cases. This can apply to someone accumulating points. It can also apply to giving players at least the feel that they have a very real opportunity to compete and at least push it to secondaries. We've already got feedback from Aaron Aleong of the Indy Open that he (a vetted GT-winning player) fielded a tooled Necron/CSM list up against a fluffy all-Slaanesh Daemons player. The game ended 9 points to 8 on Primary in favor of Aaron despite the Slaaneshi player being fairly light on remaining models. In a "traditional" objective game it would have simply been "well I won on objectives, and your army is nearly tabled, and I hold 3 objectives too lol." In this game, the player actually reflected that he felt completely OK with the loss - he felt Aaron was the better player, yet also felt he was in the game until the very end; even his few remaining models had at least a shot at trying to contest one of those 3 objectives Aaron grabbed, and doing so would have netted him a win for the loss and troubles he put in getting up to 8 points early.

That said, you don't want to overbalance by not having a points cap; by having the cap, you prevent someone "gaming" the accrual by just fielding millions of troop models and strangle-holding the objectives early no matter the long-term cost, putting himself at an uncontestable advantage and guaranteeing a win. We want to minimize power gamers going "well I can just game for one instead of the other," and the cap actually accomplishes that fairly elegantly. Let's take the above example with Aaron; if he'd been up against a better player able to get just 2 more points in the current point allocation, Aaron would have been in a position of having to take FOUR distinct objectives at game-end ... possibly creating an insurmountable lead (the very problem with points accrual systems and gaming them, and also a problem you initially pointed out). You want to allow tweaking your army toward points accrual to put pressure on your opponent at the cost of having as many high powered hitters in your list (aka, you're taking more troop models to strangle objectives for as long as possible, but you might not be fielding quite as mean a deathstar), but you don't want to allow someone to tweak to a point where his opponent is forced to play the same mission variation if he wants to keep up at all. Again, you don't want to nerf X-star; you want to buff everything else.

I think making it so the linebreaker escalated can't be accomplished by units controlling objectives is a really good tweak. Good one!

The numbers are built around our best guess at proper numeric distribution; this was helped out by some of our more mathematically-inclined commenters so far. HOW those objectives accrue you points in a BP format or if you're scoring points for tournament scoring is totally up to you (said another way, it's not unusual or unprecedented - you already have a common situation where you score integers of 1 for each objective you control in a mission ... if you have more than your opponent, you win Objectives and net some # of Battle Points toward your accomplishments; i.e., if I score 3 Objectives and my opponent Scores 2, the Scoresheet says I won Primary and get 10 Battle Points ... random numbers equaling numbers ... presentation and clarity is really the key).

Also note that the 9-cap tie only forces the game to a Secondary determination. If Secondary is ALSO tied, any TO can add further tiebreaking mechanisms (i.e., total points destroyed), or can simply allow a tie at that point.

What's important is ... if you try too hard to make how much the different point values are "simple" or operating on base-10 type numbers, you may get into a situation where they're not at all balanced, even if they "look" simple. Right now, 40k is IMBALANCED if you just play straight missions ... in that only certain army types really have a chance to win the win conditions (and these are the very same armies that are best at being durable // killing lots of opposing models). The first intent then is to come up with mission variations that allow the other armies to also compete. Playtest needs to identify where the strengths and weaknesses are, where the numbers and values need a little tweaking, etc., and while the simpler we can make it the better (totally!), it also still has to actually be right ... or else the application of "simple" #'s is yielding a fundamental flaw to an otherwise excellent concept.

40K isn't a simple game, and people get #'s and rules wrong all the time in tournaments in all formats as it is; we DO have to make it as simple as possible, but I don't think that can be the guiding light of playtest. Said another way, if we can find the sweet spot in terms of values and numbers, we can always try to normalize them thereafter in a way that makes them easier to rapidly comprehend. Make it right, then try to make it clear ... rather than "make it simple, even if it's less right." If that makes any sense.

Keep up the feedback, folks! It's good stuff!

Really interested in this top to bottom. Have time off for the holidays coming up, will be playtesting it as much as possible.

As an aside...base 10 is unwieldy for a variety of reasons mainly having to do with the lack of divisors compared to say a base 12 system.

MVBrandt wrote:

40K isn't a simple game, and people get #'s and rules wrong all the time in tournaments in all formats as it is; we DO have to make it as simple as possible, but I don't think that can be the guiding light of playtest. Said another way, if we can find the sweet spot in terms of values and numbers, we can always try to normalize them thereafter in a way that makes them easier to rapidly comprehend. Make it right, then try to make it clear ... rather than "make it simple, even if it's less right." If that makes any sense.

While I love that you guys are trying to fix some of the imbalances, I am concerned about the implications of any fix being mission based. I absolutely agree, and see how it helps the top-of-the-top players get the competitive game they want, but as someone who easily finished in the bottom third at this year's NOVA, how does it make me want to come back and play tournament 40k? If anything, the way I understand them, it makes my situation worse:

(1) Any player who netlists a deathstar and does not know how to pilot it is going to lose in their first couple of asymmetrical mission games. So, instead of letting them bubble to the middle-top so I can play games more "my speed," I have a chance to play them each and every game? At NOVA I suffered through the second 2-3 games after accidentally winning my first, then got to enjoy a reasonably well balanced bracket and had a great time. However I definitely see this as greatly increasing the chance for any game to be against the 2+ stars I loathe.

(2) Neil and the folks over at 11th company made the point a few podcasts ago that they were confident the majority of their players scored their missions wrong. Frankly, won't this this only make it worse? Now I need to keep track of TWO missions and all their nuances each and every game so I can validate my opponent's score? Hey opponent, what secondary did you chose to escalate? Oh, you can't remember? Swell. This feels like a LOT of additional book-keeping. A lot...

(3) And this is the least of my concerns, but how many other asymmetrical missions have been developed? When I first read the title I actually thought about scoring objectives once vs cumulative scoring (thanks to Templecon) but I am having trouble coming up with any other really balanced alternatives, especially for things like KP and the Relic. Now, I fully understand generating these missions is why you guys get accused of making the big bucks (because we all know how lucrative TOing is ) but how truly extensible is the idea?

I really do no want to rain on the parade (and frankly doubt I will be able to ) as I firmly believe any action is better than no action. But as the mostly casual gamer whose only chance to win a GT is if 128 people all get food poisoning and miss day 2, a ban/restriction list is easy for me to wrap my head around and plan for (whether or not I agree with everything on it). This… this is not, and I am immensely scared of (1) becoming the norm. I think whomever made the point earlier that this will not affect the way many (most) people build their lists is right. People will still run the star-of-the-week because they can, and if these new missions enable the best-of-the-best players list flexibility at the expense of pushing the net list players down into my bracket… that is going to suck, hard. I am curious your thoughts on that, as I really do not want to have to risk my money to find out…

That's all, I just wanted to share what seems to be a different perspective! I want to go back to NOVA, I want to try the 11th Co. GT, and I want to finally make it to Connecticon and experience all the other local GTs, but I do not want to pay for a guaranteed face-punching. This mission change has given me much, much more pause than Feast's ban list did. Help!

Not to be overlooked here but if this kind of mission makes it at least feasible that people can bring an army to a tournament that isn't Jetstar, Tau gun-lines, etc., that opens doors for more diversity.

What is what you are asking for. More diversity in that not everyone is playing the same army, which I'm guessing by your post you are presuming you can't beat.

So, for example, suppose we ban or nerf Jetstar. Then, you will be facing Serpent SPam and Tau Gunlines. Nothing has changed. It will still be an army that, guessing based on commentary, you will still find unbeatable and punching you in the face.



Mission complexity is something everyone is aware of going into this. Try to make it as simple as can be and still try to accomplish goal of making a good mission. Being honest with ourselves, we don't even have good examples to go off of because the missions GW has given us aren't actually complex enough to be fair, which be definition means not fun. :(

Something has to give, however. There will be side effects to any given selection.

We ran a play test of the mission yesterday. At 2000 points, single FoC, Vanguard deployment. We wanted to see if the mission type would work with some of the Escalation rules. So the game included Necrons using a Transcendent C’Tan as a Lord of War choice. The SM army not exactly optimized although a bit heavy on troops and sternguard. We tried to run our Necron force as one of the standard power builds that we see locally, though the Necrons were short a lot of units trying to sneak in a C’Tan.

2K SM’s – Ultramarines Chapter Traits
Tigurius
Command Squad (apoth, std br, champ, two meltaguns) Drop Pod
4 x Tac Squads (10) w/ MG, LC. Two with Drop Pods, two without.
2 x Stern Squads (10) w/ 2 HF, several combi’s, Drop Pods.
Storm Raven

2K Necrons
Transcendent C’Tan, transdimensional slide, wave of withering, seismic assault
Imotekh
Lord w/warscythe, res orb, phase shifter, MSS, semptirnal (sp?) weave
2 units Immortals (10)
Unit of Wraiths (5)
Unit of Wraiths (4)

Space Marine player took the Alternate Objectives (scoring 1pt, turns 2-5) Escalated Line Breaker for Secondary Objectives.
Necron player to Prmary Objectives (scoring 3pts, at game end) Escalated First Blood.

Deployment: Marines won to go first, deployed the two foot tactical squads by combat squad, camped two w/ lascannons on objectives within their deployment zones, two w/sgt+meltaguns against the center deployment edge aiming to push for one objective at the center of the table. Necron player put his Immortals in Ruins on his objectives with the Imotekh in one, the Lord in the other. Both units of wraiths were deployed against edge of the deployment zone on the left flank to run up on the objectives within the SM deployment zone. With the SM player having five drop pods and a load of Sternguard, the C’Tan was held in reserve. Imotekh made sure we had Night Fight rules for turn one.

Turn One-
SM Turn- Kept the Sternguard in reserve, dropped two tacticals and command squad aggressively so as to contest one Necron home field objective and focus fire the Immortals (w/Necron Lord) on the other. Two foot mobile combat squads ran onto the no mans land objective. Entire army was able to bring down the one squad of immortals, the Lord went down as well, but stood back up.

Both drop pod tacticals were close enough to contest the objective held by the Necron Lord due to the placement of the objective close to the corner of the ruin. The Necron player opted to stay within cover rather than bubble wrap the objective.

Necron Turn- Imothekh called lightning for no effect, Necron Lord lined up to charge one Tactical combat squad. Necron wraiths ran across midfield to get in position to contest SM backfield objectives in turn two. Imothekh and Immortals tried to shoot the command squad off of his objective. Killed the Champion and Apothecary, but couldn’t move the squad. Lord charged tactical squad, died to a lucky meltagun overwatch. Stood back up.

Turn Two-
Night Fighting lifted
SM Turn- SM used Tigurius to try and keep his Sternguard in reserve to deal with the C’Tan. Worked for one squad, Storm Raven came on as well. Sternguard dropped between unit of Wraiths and the SM backfield objectives. Storm Raven lined up Wraiths for a strafing run. Foot mobile Tac combat squads set up small bubble wraps around their three objectives. One drop pod combat squad moved into the ruins on the Necron objective while the other sent one combat squad to claim an objective near where the Wraiths orignally deployed. Command squad and remaining combat squads prepared to focus fire Necron Lord.

Sternguard and Storm Raven destroyed the smaller Wraith unit, four combat squads and command squad were able to kill the Necron Lord. Who stood back up. Combat squad charged the Lord, lost two to the warscythe, stood their ground.

Necron Turn- C’Tan came in from reserve. Deployed and used slide to attack combat squad and command squad. Killed all but two in the combat squad and everyone in the command squad but Tigurius. C’Tan then took out Tigurius with his shooting, while Imotekh and his Immortals removed the weakened command squad. Wraiths were just outside of charge range of the combat squad claiming the objective, who had fallen back an inch to make sure, so the Wraiths charged the Sternguard. Sternguard did nothing in defensive fire, lost four in the assault while killing nothing. Wraiths were tied up though. Necron Lord killed the sgt with scarabs, but died to the two tactical marines before getting to use his warscythe. Did not get back up.

End of Turn Two- SM player held four objectives, so claimed four VP’s. Necron player had just the one remaining Troop choice, but had elected to score at the end of the game. Technically at this point the SM player was guaranteed a Primary victory.

We kept playing, just to see what havoc the C’Tan would cause. Second Sternguard came in and rapid fired Imotekh and his squad, two heavy flamers helped dig most of them out of cover. Imotekh and his Immortals would be taken out by turn four. While the drop pod squads and sternguard were able to keep the C’Tan busy long enough in the Necron deployment zone to keep him from ever getting into the SM deployment zone and dig the marines there off of their objectives. The Sternguard in the center held the Wraiths up until the end of turn four.

The Wraiths were able to charge the combat squad holding the objective, but didn’t destroy them in turn five, though they contested it in turn four after consolidating.

With the C’Tan clearing objectives in his own deployment zone, and wracking up secondary objective kills. The SM’s were able to score three Primary objective points in turn three, two more in turn four. With both of his troop choices destroyed. The Necron player couldn’t claim an objective at games end. We later realized that the scenario write up let you claim objectives at the beginning of your turn, not the end of the game turn. From recollection this would have given the SM player one less VP on turn two, but two extras in three and four where the Necrons cleared objectives the SM’s held at turn start.

The SM player got one point from escalated Line Breaker, two for Slay the Warlord and two for First Blood.

Necron player got four points for escalated First blood, two for Slay the Warlord.

SM player won 9-5 vs 0-6.

AAR: Although more destructive, the Necron army lacked the ability to score. Even though Imotekh took a long time for the SM’s to kill, his objective was contested from the very first SM DPA until they were destroyed. So even claiming secondary objectives, the typical low troop count, high power count army build would have lost out to the eight scoring unit SM build. It would have been even worse with Pedro Kantor swapping out his command squad for a five man sternguard squad for a total of 13 scoring units. Not that the Necron list with the transcendent C’Tan was typical. It couldn’t split the C’Tan to contest as many objectives as a Screamerstar or similar Deathstar build.

Though a list that forced those builds to split up from the beginning of the game to combat a 13 scoring unit build would have really taken the punch out of them from the onset.

Enjoyed the game, will be trying to get a playtest against a Screamerstar 2k list in the near future.

ngilstrap wrote:
Not to be overlooked here but if this kind of mission makes it at least feasible that people can bring an army to a tournament that isn't Jetstar, Tau gun-lines, etc., that opens doors for more diversity.

I think all I am trying to point out is that this is a faulty assumption for the majority of players. I have no idea - but I would be curious how many people really poured over the NOVA mission packet and tailored their lists to those missions. (Sorry, sticking with NOVA as an example because it is what I am most familiar with).

I will concede it is probably better to have the option and not take it, that to be stuck in the mud like things currently are - but I guess I am not as optimistic that people will analyze these complex missions and bring an interesting scalpel when the hammer they have played with for the past N months is still equally viable. Does that make sense? And after talking it through with my gaming group I am now more concerned that my little bubble of casual-"competitive" (i.e., the lower brackets) will become more like what you noted.

I did NOT play screamerstar, or any of those broken lists at NOVA, as once I started losing (and those lists kept winning because they are silly) I had nothing to fear going into my bracket. I ended up playing an awesome ork-necron list, a beautifully painted 3 riptide tau army (which I beat ) and an honest-to-goodness farsight bomb. Things are already plenty diverse from my point of view.

My point is, the middle and lower tiers already have diversity, that is where the "fun" lists already end when they lose to the broken ones. The upper tiers are what seem to be suffering from a lack of diversity. Right now I have little-to-no concern about playing one of those broken lists I presume I cannot have a fun game against (which is different than beating) but with these new missions a solitaire list could be around any corner. Just because the missions are designed to give me a chance to win does not suddenly make the game fun. Does that make sense? (not a sarcastic question at all, I just want to make sure my concern is clear because your reply did not really touch on it)

I respect you want diversity at the top tables because you are sick of seeing the same thing over and over, but please do not solve the problem by pushing half of those players down into my tier I am concerned these missions are simply going to spread the "unfun" out rather than keeping it localized at the top, which means a broader swathe of people will experience it, which means more people will consider quitting/not returning/waiting the storm out rather than playing. I am assuming that the people who already bring those 2+ rerollable lists are going to continue to do so (which seems a fair assumption because they are neither penalized nor impeded in any way and the lists still remain quite good). I am also assuming that people who already bring less competitive lists will continue to do so (Sisters 4 Lyfe). I am predicting all these missions will accomplish is enable more list flexibility for the people who will already show up to events at the cost of those who are more on the fence.

Sure I would love a chance to win, but certainly not at the expense of having to play Jetstar or Screamerstar more than once in an event. The mechanics of the lists are not fun, more-so than the fact that they are challenging to beat. Gunlines and Serpent Spam are not different than leafblower guard and GK lists of old - I definitely may lose but at least it can be a fun game.



Editing for summation and clairty:
Serpent Spam, Gunlines, FMC, and anything else I am leaving out, are challenging lists that can be fun to play against - I am not concerned about a resurgence of these lists at all. 2+ rerollable save lists are almost certainly never fun to play against. Asymmetric missions neither solve the problem that 2+ rerollable saves are not fun to play against, nor I do not see how they will reduce the presence of those lists.

I like the alternate format for primary. Sure it will favor some builds but that's the case with any mission. And sure the competitive players will study the missions ahead of time... So should anyone that wants to win some games. I am a huge advocate of seeing the missions ahead of time - if you don't like them then don't bother