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This is hypotetical.
This is not me saying any unit should be banned from the game.
This is not me professing hatred for any particular unit.
This is not me trying to give an unfair advantage to any particular army.
(Analogy) This is me saying what is your ideal starting XI for Real Madrid if Ronaldo was injured.

Ok now that is over and done with. What would you think of a tournament with the certain theme of, each army has a banned unit. Oh and no allies allowed. Would the following balance the books between dexes somewhat?

So the banned units (feel free to make alternative suggestions):
BA - Furioso dreadnoughts
C:SM - Thunderfire cannons (or grav cents? Which?)
CSM - Helldrakes
Eldar - Wave Serpents
Tau - Riptides
Tyranids - winged Tyrants
Orks - Nob bikers
Necrons - Night scythes (or wraiths? Which?)
Deamons - Screamers
Inquisition - Servo skulls (ok not a unit but nothing so broken for their points cost in the game)
Imperial guard - Vendettas
Grey Knights - Dreadknights
Space wolves - Thunderwolf cavalry (or rune priest? Which?)
Dark Eldar - Venoms
Dark Angels - errrr, errrr, a stand out DA unit... hmmmm, can I say banner of devastation?

Could you stomach not seeing these units for one tournament. Would it help even out the armies a bit more? Would you suggest different units? What might you take?
This is a hypothetical situation, with an aim of stopping the commonly competetive net lists. Imagine if you could build a list without having to worry about particular units on here. I imagine it may look very different, even if you wouldnt normally take any of said units yourself anyway.

This would change nothing, and simply shift the net lists to something different.

A lot of these 'tournament/40k fixes' fall clearly into the "simple solution does not solve a complex problem". Rather than do anything that actually addresses balance issues, you simply use a big paintbrush and try to cover up anything, and expect that to magically fix balance issues.

And, like all of these bans, they affect armies in far unbalanced ways. How does banning Venoms make them more balanced? How does banning Servo Skulls (SERIOUSLY?) balance things?

Also, it is shortsighted, which is how it comes across. It reads like you just read netlists and decided to ban stuff arbitrarily with no thought.

I will always be of the opinion that removing options from players is a bad idea for tournaments, leagues, groups, and other gatherings of gamers.

 Blacksails wrote:
I will always be of the opinion that removing options from players is a bad idea for tournaments, leagues, groups, and other gatherings of gamers.

Blacksails speaks the truth.
Nothing matters bar the slaughter.

No to everything the OP posted. In some cases, you've eliminated the only unit that allows that book to compete at all in the current meta (Orks, CSM, Nids, DE, DA) and in others you've picked units that are either not that great at all or not as powerful as something else from the same book (BA, SW, Nids again, Demons). Telling a DE player not to bring Venoms to a tourney doesn't balance anything. You may as well tell him to not even bother showing up. By the same token, a SW player can forgoe the use of Thunderwolf cav and just spam Long Fangs. In addition, the top tier armies aren't really effected as much by what you're trying to remove. For example, the issue with Demons isn't as much the Screamers as it is Grimoire and Fateweaver. Tau without Riptides will just sink more points into SMS broadsides and still smoke you. Eldar can drop the wave serpents and still run seer council, etc etc.

I'm not a huge fan of comp systems anyway, but I think this specfic type of comp system is probably one of the more potentially disasterous ways to go (imo of course).

this list is stupid for 2 reasons

It nerfs certain armies that will still have no issues with taking other powerfull units

It nerfs certain armies that absolutely need those units.

Flyrants for nids are a must not because there amazing, its because any other synapse is too easy to kill.

Wave serpants, oh well now we must rely on our seer council on jetbikes, our warwalkers, reapers, well the rest of our stuff thats good.

I like how once again Sisters have failed to make a mention in this kind of thread despite how they are not even considered the weakest army by many.

EDIT: I mean come on you included the Inquisition digital codex but forgot the Sisters!

I thought about which units are most commonly seen in powerful lists. Included one for each army. And asked what would you take instead.
I should have also put the proviso in that I am NOT trying to fix the game.
It is a simple thought experiment. Yes there will be alternative net lists in such an environment. But people would then have to think of new ones... which is the point of such a thought experiment.
I do not think it will balance the armies personally. Take necrons for example: ban the scythes and you still have the anni barges and wraiths. I am asking in that respect 'how far would it balance certain codecies aginst each other?' 'Would there be new top dogs?'
Again - I do not think I am a messiah trying to fix the game. It is just a thought experiment.

As to servo skulls. Yes. A 3pt wargear option that twinlinks blasts but most importantly prevents infiltration - a massive disadvantage to certain units and often whole armies. And a huge benefit to a gunline... again - for 3pts!


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Apologies about sisters.

Sorry I asked. Simple thought experiment. Just to try different things. Synapse getting you down with nids? Primes hidden in units. BA furioso imo as a BA player is the stand out unit by far.
If you think there are other uniys such as long fangs for SW. Suggest them. I didn't say it was a be all and end all list.

If you ban the best unit (or at least a contender for that title) from every codex you more or less get more of the same, because the damning thing about 40k balance isn't single units, but the codices themselves.

Sure, Tau might seem less-scary without Riptides, but when matched up with Tyranids their other suits/weapon systems are still going to go to town on the poor bugs who don't have their all-important Flyrants to save them. Daemons may not be able to do Screamerstar with the changes, but they can still FMC spam and stomp people that way. And removing Nob Bikers from Orks just further hamstrings a struggling codex, etcetera, etcetera, etcetera. Hell, I know Wave Serpents are bonkers but you'd be removing the only dedicated transport in the book! All that would do is force the netlist folk to spam something else bonkers (and there's plenty in that book that is) and slap in the face the players who actually want to use the Serpents to cart around infantry.

I agree with Curran that the single-unit bannings seem shortsighted in the extreme. It might be interesting to see what cheese is thought up in the unique environment, but if anything I think it only makes an already balanced game more unbalanced. If you truly wanted to tweak things to balance the armies you'd have to pretty much rewrite most the codices for the tournament. And parts of the BRB, for that matter. And then you're really not playing 'true' 40k anymore, I guess.

Just require everyone show up at the tourney with some beer and a bag of pretzels.

And I can't even remember the last time I've seen a Furioso do anything worthwhile.

In fact I specifically asked for such suggestions as I am no expert with many of the dexes...
Just give it a go at thinking up a list with these restrictions. You never know - you might have fun. Or you can just slate it for trying to 'fix' the game, which was never my intention.
Maybe I shouldn't have used the word 'balanced' anywhere near my OP. That word does always seem to get people agitated.

I do not think it will balance the armies personally.

I think that's the real answer though. There is no way to balance (or really even change) the game using this method. The top tier armies will stay there, and everyone else will stay the same or get worse. The actual army compositions might change a little, but yeah, the over all meta will stay much as it is now. I just don't think there's a way to alter things in the way you are asking by using a method sucha as this.

A few months ago I came up with a thread in armylists which had very particular rules against spamming units. It was very popular and many people gave it a go. There were some fantastic lists made and everyone seemed to have fun with it. I was merely trying to do the same again. Apologies if I annoyed people.


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Also I realise I should have just eddited my first reply. As now it became interspersed with other comments and nobody has a clue who I am replying to. Sorry again.


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http://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/list/555867.page

There you go. Proof you can have fun with restrictive selection rules.
Pity I failed with this one. I thouroughly enjoyed the last one.

The "comp will just lead to spamming something else" arguments just seem like a "perfect solution" fallacy to me. Just because restricting say, Riptides/Drakes/Serpents/Screamers/whatever, won't completely solve the issue of overpowered units, it doesn't mean that such a restriction should not be put in place.

One person told me, "if we restrict Helldrakes, chaos players will just spam Spawn instead! Thats just as bad!" But the way I see it, if we limited Helldrakes to 0-1 (as an example), maybe we'd see one drake *and* some spawn on the table - surely a small number of two overpowered unit type is better than just a hell of a lot of the one type. And if people started running spawn en masse, why couldn't that just have a limitation on it as well?

Genuinely confused as to why people think allowing Wave Serpents etc to run rampant is a good idea. Is it the "big boys table" argument, lose round one to some OP list and let them go play spamhammer on the top tables? If thats the case, why do they create events for both players and then allow them to segregate naturally, rather than just running a "no holds barred" and a comped event? The "who do we let decide the comp" or "there will be many comp systems around making the game confusing" arguments? I believe neither of those are grounds for abandoning the idea of reigning in the current unbalanced 'meta'. "We'll ban drakes then ban spawn then ban X then ban Y..." is another argument I've seen, but thats precisely what they do in Fantasy comp and it seems to do a decent job of varying up the lists there.

Etc etc. If only GW would just balance this crap themselves... someone care to explain it to me?

Poly Ranger wrote:Ok now that is over and done with. What would you think of a tournament with the certain theme of, each army has a banned unit. Oh and no allies allowed. Would the following balance the books between dexes somewhat?

I probably would. Though I would probably go to a everything goes as well.

I do not believe that something like this would even remotely work to balance the game. It would just serve to remove some armies from the playing field and make it more difficult for people with limited collections to enter said tournament.

Poly Ranger wrote:
BA - Furioso dreadnoughts
C:SM - Thunderfire cannons (or grav cents? Which?)
CSM - Helldrakes
Eldar - Wave Serpents
Tau - Riptides
Tyranids - winged Tyrants
Orks - Nob bikers
Necrons - Night scythes (or wraiths? Which?)
Deamons - Screamers
Inquisition - Servo skulls (ok not a unit but nothing so broken for their points cost in the game)
Imperial guard - Vendettas
Grey Knights - Dreadknights
Space wolves - Thunderwolf cavalry (or rune priest? Which?)
Dark Eldar - Venoms
Dark Angels - errrr, errrr, a stand out DA unit... hmmmm, can I say banner of devastation?

Those are some random choices. The only ones that would be widely acknowledged as reasonable are the riptide and helldrake as they are both OP and other options exist. However if you actually wanted to limit abuse the Tau should be the buffmander not the riptide.

The best unit in the BA codex is probably the Baal predator or stormravens if spammed. However do BA really need to be nerfed? I would like to see them again on a regular basis. Similar with the Orks, I don't think they really need any more disadvantages but if you want to remove the real powerhouse in their codex it is lootas and shoota boyz. Lootas are the crutch on which the orks walk.

If you remove the waveserpent from eldar then you have literally removed their only dedicated transport. If you do that you automatically loose most eldar players as they do not have the models to run foot or jetbike eldar. You would need to allow falcons to replace waveserpents or something. Much the same problem with necrons and dark eldar as though they have other options most players will not be able to field their collections. I will not deny that the night scythe and waveserpents both deserve some type of comp but we are talking removing entire army archtypes from the game with these choices not just a unit.

Grey Knights, Dark Angels, and C:SM all have relatively good internal balance. If you wanted to see more variety you could remove the units you said for DA and GK though it would have little to do with balance and more you are tired of those units. C:SM would be white scars bikes if you want to shift that codex's most played list but honestly the only reason for the dominance of white scars armies is they are fun to play and a general lack of imagination and/or appropriate models to run the other competitive lists.

Nids is a tough customer as it actually has reasonable internal balance between units but is not balanced well to certain other codices. The flyrant would certaintly shake their builds up but may actually remove them as entirely as they have a very limited number of HQs that work within the framework of IB.

Space wolves...thunderwolf cavalry? I am very curious as to why this? Rune priests or long fangs would be my answer but honestly this codex has terrible balance with essentially 3 really great units, 3 decent units, and a bunch of filler.

Imperial guard is fair enough. Though without vendettas they will get owned by any flyer spam opponent, hard.

Screamers are not actually a problem. If you remove them then you will get invulnerable unit X Tzeentch. The problem is the 2+/2+ mechanic. Even a simple change to 2+/4+ remedies this quick. If I was going to try and shift Daemons lists I would ban the portaglyph. This would force the CD players to bring more troops and thus prompt them to actually try and make use of their troops. Fateweaver is the real one who shows up in every list but without him the warp storm table just removes daemons from tournaments.

Inquisition is definitely servo skulls, actually GK too. I cannot think of a single piece of wargear so damaging to the existence of strategy and tactics in 40K.

Poly Ranger wrote:Could you stomach not seeing these units for one tournament. Would it help even out the armies a bit more? Would you suggest different units? What might you take?

Sure, I have a large collection so I can just take whatever. It doesn't even out the armies though and removes entire army archtypes and any player with a limited collection. Could be fun though just to shake up the meta. In fact if you ran a series of them where you have to vote on a different banned unit each tournament (aka cannot ban the same thing twice in a row) you could have a really cool ever shifting meta tournament series. That would be fun.

Poly Ranger wrote:This is a hypothetical situation, with an aim of stopping the commonly competetive net lists. Imagine if you could build a list without having to worry about particular units on here. I imagine it may look very different, even if you wouldnt normally take any of said units yourself anyway.

Not as much as you might think. However I am certain that without heldrakes the SM biker builds will flourish.

Whilst I didnt do it to try an attempt at 'fixing' the game, rather just because of a curiosity to see other army lists with a set of certain restrictions (despite what others read into it), I totally and utterly agree with you dakkamite.
Building lists with such restrictions in mind leads to a varied atmosphere and doesn't reward those that stick to spamming the same op units over and over.
It wasn't even real. Just theoretical. Yet people still put up those arguments against it rather than actually giving it a go (just talking about list building there - not even playing).


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Thanks ansacs - that is the type of discussion I was lookin for.

Lootas are the crutch on which the orks walk.

Yeah gotta agree with this. Lootas are more key than Nob Bikers

I tried to make a list for your thread Poly Ranger, but it came to 3095 points and was a PITA to cut down to 2500. Gotta say 0-1 per dedicated transport sucks bad for mech Orks, had to abuse the 'technicality' of "Spanna Boyz" and "Scrap Trukks" from the Dread mob dex. Would definitely play at such an event.

I picked one unit from each army to stay 'fair'. All the choices arw of course to an extent subjective. The Furioso for example I believe to be better than the baal. And ravens would still be included in other armies so that wouldnt be technically 'banned'.
I see your point with the serpent/scythe/venom removing a whole play style from each army. But that helps with the variation of the armies on display. Totally different army selections from the same dex. But the point you make about it affecting the turn out of those armies in the tournament irl is a good one. It would have a negative impact on such a tournament.
The dexes with strong internal balance were indeed hard to pick units for but needed to be done to stay 'fair' to the theoretical principles of the tournament.
The picks are very subjective for me. Thunderwolf cavalry you ask about? Well, because they destroy me lol! I do realise rune priests or longfangs should really get 1st pick of a ban though.
Portaglyph!!! Ah why didnt I think of that??? Straight to the source of the problem!
I had thought about bikes for C:SM but then non-scars players get away scott free!
You're definitely right about the lootas actually! That should go above biker nobs.


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Haha thanks dakkamite. I loved that thread! I still theoryhammer lists with those restictions. It would make games even more fun if those rules were used on occassion.


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Btw - the voting of a banned unit you suggested ansacs with no unit twice in a row... brilliant! The meta would indeed shift like the wind!

Stupid . good armies will just replace the missing type of unit with something else , while armies that have 1 good choice will just fall apart. A tau will just spam broadsides instead of riptides , an eldar will play a eldar&d.eldar army instead of the normal taudar . While at the same time a sister player without exorcists will do , nothing . ork player without lootaz will do nothing, D eldar player without venoms may as well not come to the tournament . Without vendettas the IG player will have to either run chimeras or blob guard and both die to tau and eldar , so again may as well not come to the tournament. At the same time a SW player who doesn't have TWC will lol and if he loses rune priests , he will just ally in mantis warriors or tigurius to get divination from another source.

1. No allies.
2. Are you saying it is impossible to build an IG army without vendettas? An ork army without lootas? Well thats the entire point of the ruddy thread... to make you think of different builds for these armies if one particular unit is taken out of the dex.
3. Its a challenge not a fix. Treat it as such.
4. If worried that tau and eldar can still outshoot everybody - why not just build a list with one of those armies? Ok you're not really challenging yourself, but at least you are giving it a go, rather than reacting like the majority of posters so far screaming 'HERESY -IT CANNOT BE DONE. IT WILL RUIN OUR GAME. NOOOOOOO!'
Everyone don't worry - im not suggesting these are banned really. Im just asking what you would take to a tournament that does ban them. Citedel minitures are still producing them, you can all calm down, they will still be avaliable irl :-).

Eldar without Wave Serpents is a simple challenge.

As great as Wave Serpents are, they are only "necessary" for Dire Avengers and whatever you'd want to grab out of the Elites slot for the codex. It'd tax your Heavy Support slots a lot and you'd probably have to run at least one squad of Vypers to make up for the missing firepower but it's really not that hard. All you need to do is spend a bajillion dollars on bikers so you can run Windriders as your troops and you're golden. Eldar is a really powerful codex this edition, with lots of legitimate builds. It's just all you ever hear about is Wave Serpent spam and Warlock Council cheese because it's powerful without actually relying on a smart commander.

The loss of Wave Serpents just means Dire Avengers, Wraithguard and Fire Dragons become severely less attractive options.

Yeh I agree. The loss of wave serpents may reduce the effectiveness of many eldar builds but they could still put out a strong force. I like that you have considered what units would be in the list instead to still create an optimized list and what FOC slots it would affect. Exactly what the thread was made for.

Not cool. A good idea. But not cool, man.

I play BA, if you ban the only unit that gives us a chance, I will skåp your tournament

Okay, exaggerating here. But the point is same. It will restrict the better armies from spamming, but anything medicore or worse will get a huge hit.
Some codices only have one or two good units, so preventing them is unfair.

But on the other hand, restricting only certain armies is also a bit unfair.

2. Are you saying it is impossible to build an IG army without vendettas? An ork army without lootas? Well thats the entire point of the ruddy thread... to make you think of different builds for these armies if one particular unit is taken out of the dex.

yes , if I am to play against tau armies with broadsides instead of riptides and eldar who switched from their normal serpent spam list to baronstar , then having my troops in the form of blobs or vets in chimeras does not cut it at all . Maybe if what is banned was a secret and only people playing the list knew what their army can't use . But if an eldar or demon player knows that there will be no vendettas , helldrakes and Night scyths , then one will know that his FMC spam list just got a lot better and the other will start thinking about 10-20 man guardian squads as anvil units with weapon platoforms along side his jetbikes . Marines will play more pod lists , because lack of helldrakes will make their foot lists more powerful.
Of course all of this can only happen , if someone has a big collection from 2-3 editions . If he , like me and most people here, has a 1500 list and that is it , then the tournament is impossible to play for a lot of people . Even if I overgeared my stuff and used counts as am not going to fill the void of 3-4 vendettas , at least not with good units.


Ah and if no ally happens , the eldar just shift to their normal seer star , but I suddenly don't have servo skulls and any army with scout is in melee with me turn 2 even if I back padle.

If worried that tau and eldar can still outshoot everybody - why not just build a list with one of those armies?

I think I could get the account number of my parents . send the 1200$ and write for Krystyna Eldar/tau army .

This list does not work because you are treating it as though every army has:
a) Options that are equally overpowered
b) Only a single overpowered option per army

You are creating an environment where Furiosos, Thunderfire and Flyrants are all banned, but the Seer council is 100% ok? Nob Bikers and Flyrants are rough, but they are also the only way you are going to get Orks and 'Nids even going to the tournament. There is absolutely no way you can apply equal restrictions to every army and come out with a balanced result, because the options are not balanced to begin with.

By all means draft up a list of banned or restricted units. It's not how I would go about it but if you want to try it then go ahead. But do not base it on the assumption that a Tau-without-Riptides army is on the same playing field as Blood Angels-without-Furioso.
All you are doing is scything off the most powerful unit, and so the armies that will excel are those that have more abusive units to fall back on. If anything this just increases the dominance that Tau, Eldar and Daemons will have because they have options outside of Riptides, Serpents and Screamers respectively. On the contrary, how are 'Nids going to fight when their Flyrants are taken away, because its the solitary crutch unit the book has left.

I have to echo what others have said. Pulling an "OP unit" out of every 'dex isn't the answer, because not every codex is equal. An alternative is pulling all the OP stuff, but really... that'snot going to solve anything if we're honest. It would mean tearing apart the Eldar codex entirely for one

I'd support a 0-1 limit on these things though. More often than not, the problem lies with spamming units, rather than simply taking them. Sure the Heldrake and Riptide are good units, but people only really start having problems when two, three of them show up. Removing 0-1 limitations was, IMO, a bad decision on G-Dub's part. As a Tau player, I'm all for 0-1 Riptides.

And that limit should only go for the stronger codeci. Codexes. Whatever. Only Tau, Eldar, etc should have to worry about it. If an army simply needs a unit to be competitive (BA, Orks, DE, 'Nids, etc), then they shouldn't be restricted because... well, aren't they anyway?

 Madcat87 wrote:
I like how once again Sisters have failed to make a mention in this kind of thread despite how they are not even considered the weakest army by many.

EDIT: I mean come on you included the Inquisition digital codex but forgot the Sisters!

Yeah. It's kind of sad and silly.

Though what exactly you'd pull from the sisters "codex" for this bizarre exercise is beyond me. Maybe Celestine I guess? But she was already nerfed.

... priests?

Of course, the fact that you ignored Sisters shows you really didn't put much thought in to this. Removing strong units from mediocre or weak codices isn't going to make them more balanced.


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Makumba wrote:

2. Are you saying it is impossible to build an IG army without vendettas?

yes

That is so sad for you.

 Melissia wrote:

 Madcat87 wrote:
I like how once again Sisters have failed to make a mention in this kind of thread despite how they are not even considered the weakest army by many.

EDIT: I mean come on you included the Inquisition digital codex but forgot the Sisters!

Yeah. It's kind of sad and silly.

Though what exactly you'd pull from the sisters "codex" for this bizarre exercise is beyond me. Maybe Celestine I guess? But she was already nerfed.

... priests?

Of course, the fact that you ignored Sisters shows you really didn't put much thought in to this. Removing strong units from mediocre or weak codices isn't going to make them more balanced.

Dominions, clearly. Ignores Cover Meltaguns are the only thing more broken than the Helldrake.

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Makumba wrote:

2. Are you saying it is impossible to build an IG army without vendettas?

yes

That is so sad for you.

Come on, I don't even get tanks in my IG list and I can build an army without vendettas. An effective army.

Makumba wrote:

2. Are you saying it is impossible to build an IG army without vendettas? An ork army without lootas? Well thats the entire point of the ruddy thread... to make you think of different builds for these armies if one particular unit is taken out of the dex.

yes , if I am to play against tau armies with broadsides instead of riptides and eldar who switched from their normal serpent spam list to baronstar , then having my troops in the form of blobs or vets in chimeras does not cut it at all . Maybe if what is banned was a secret and only people playing the list knew what their army can't use . But if an eldar or demon player knows that there will be no vendettas , helldrakes and Night scyths , then one will know that his FMC spam list just got a lot better and the other will start thinking about 10-20 man guardian squads as anvil units with weapon platoforms along side his jetbikes . Marines will play more pod lists , because lack of helldrakes will make their foot lists more powerful.
Of course all of this can only happen , if someone has a big collection from 2-3 editions . If he , like me and most people here, has a 1500 list and that is it , then the tournament is impossible to play for a lot of people . Even if I overgeared my stuff and used counts as am not going to fill the void of 3-4 vendettas , at least not with good units.


Ah and if no ally happens , the eldar just shift to their normal seer star , but I suddenly don't have servo skulls and any army with scout is in melee with me turn 2 even if I back padle.

If worried that tau and eldar can still outshoot everybody - why not just build a list with one of those armies?

I think I could get the account number of my parents . send the 1200$ and write for Krystyna Eldar/tau army .

You just ended up actually doing what the entire point of the thread was for - describing how it would change the meta if this happened.
Also you don't need $1200 dollars to theory hammer a list. This is all theoretical/hypothetical. Ive said this quite a few times.


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 liquidjoshi wrote:
I have to echo what others have said. Pulling an "OP unit" out of every 'dex isn't the answer, because not every codex is equal. An alternative is pulling all the OP stuff, but really... that'snot going to solve anything if we're honest. It would mean tearing apart the Eldar codex entirely for one

I'd support a 0-1 limit on these things though. More often than not, the problem lies with spamming units, rather than simply taking them. Sure the Heldrake and Riptide are good units, but people only really start having problems when two, three of them show up. Removing 0-1 limitations was, IMO, a bad decision on G-Dub's part. As a Tau player, I'm all for 0-1 Riptides.

And that limit should only go for the stronger codeci. Codexes. Whatever. Only Tau, Eldar, etc should have to worry about it. If an army simply needs a unit to be competitive (BA, Orks, DE, 'Nids, etc), then they shouldn't be restricted because... well, aren't they anyway?

I did this in a previous thread. A thread people decided to get on board with. The link to it is posted above if you would like the rules. It was a pretty nice thread tbh.

Dont ban. Put a 0-1 limit (none on allies). This still allows armies who rely on say, one unit of Nob Bikers to still function. It also limits the cheese while retaining playability of most armies.

Honestly, this is what GW should have been doing for ages. The 0-1 limit was a incredibly good way to balance units that they expected to be OP.

What I could have done is start a thread titled: 'what is your best tau list without riptides?', another 'what is your best eldar list without serpents?' Another 'what is your best cron list without scythes'... etc. Then I could have started a thread asking 'how would your army/playstyle change if you knew you wouldnt be facing units a/b/c etc'. Then I could have started a thread titled 'would you participate in a tournament with above usual unit restrictions?'.
Instead of cluttering up the forum with all these threads I combined them into one. Simply asking people to make a list without their standout unit and whether they thought such restrictions would impact the meta.
YOU all decided I was trying to fix the game (I wasn't).
YOU all decided I was trying to restrict the top dexes over others (I wasn't)
YOU all decided that I was trying to achieve something other than lists without certain units (guess what - I wasn't).
I also stated multiple times this is not real and thus won't cost a penny to list build. So price shouldn't be an issue.
All this was put up for was an attempt to see different lists. With a few side questions, one asking to what extent (if any) it would effect balance issues - but this was a side question not the same point. Maybe me putting the side question so early on in the thread confused matters. But I wanted first and foremost to see lists wothout the usual top units. Balance was a side issue.
I think you have seen the words 'banned units' 'tournament' and then seen the word 'balance' in a side question, then added 2 and 2 and got 5. I will ensure I am more selective of my words in future and when using such contriversal words I will have a thesaurus handy. I will also be aware that people focus on specific words and thus ignore the point of the thread.
It was all for fun. The reactions sucked away any chance of that.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 zephoid wrote:
Dont ban. Put a 0-1 limit (none on allies). This still allows armies who rely on say, one unit of Nob Bikers to still function. It also limits the cheese while retaining playability of most armies.

Honestly, this is what GW should have been doing for ages. The 0-1 limit was a incredibly good way to balance units that they expected to be OP.

I agree, the 0-1 restriction was one of the most entertaining threads for list building I've seen.