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As I am sure the internet knows, the new "Daemon Farm," list is a CD army list built around summoning large numbers of models to the board with the new Malific Psychic tree.

I do not want to discuss the relative merit of this style of list. It may be super OP, it may NOT be nearly as bad as it sounds because of the large number of Warp Charge dice needed to get a lot of these things to work consistently. I do not want to discuss the army from a power level prospective simply because I have not actually played against it. I have seen the Frontline Gaming Batrep, and read a Batrep from ToF but that is about it.

What I want to throw on the table for discussion is the concept of creating units mid-game.

The reason this game is based on a points system is to insure that each side has an equal number of resources available. Units/ Abilities that add units/points to one players army mid-game flies in the very face of this system does it not? We have previously seen things like Tervigons, Portal Glyphs, and the new Skyblight formation which add what are essentially free units to the game. These have always been a great advantage for the owning player as it basically allows one player to play with semi-renewable resources while the other player is stuck playing with the resources allotted to him/her based on the points limit. I am not saying that it is auto-win by any means as any Nid player will tell you, but it does put a strain on the idea of fair play and competition.

The examples I have given above are thankfully difficult to field in large numbers, and require a measure of luck to function well. Also, these units/abilities are theoretically point costed, keeping in mind the fact that they create other units. (With the exception of the Skyblight formation which is simply a way to get free units with no additional points cost and free special rules, I will avoid the long rant about how unbalancing it is to charge the same points cost for units with more rules on this thread)

Now consider the new Malific powers. Psychic powers can be spammed in large numbers with certain armies. The warp charge investment needed to cast several successful Conjuration powers is massive, but it exacerbates the problem with free units to a whole new level. Does this not completely invalidate playing in a points based game system? Do we as a community want to play in an environment where some armies can create units out of thin air?

I do not see how we as a community can truly consider 40K a balanced game, capable of competitive play when one side has renewable resources and another does not.

I am not saying the Daemon Farm is OP, that remains to be seen, but should we not reject the concept of Conjuration powers simply on principle, in order to retain some semblance of validity to a points based game system?

The game we play occurs in a finite number of turns, the ability to use units that were not initially points costed with the intent of creating units that are of equal points value, or in the case of Possession, much more valuable, are a threat to the concept of having a fair game.

Who really thinks it's ok to get to swap a 120ish point Herrald for a Greater Daemon worth easily twice the points just because you rolled the correct power? Never mind that no matter what you roll you get Summoning which will net you a 90 point unit for free that can itself, create more copies of itself as the game goes on.

An army like this, given unlimited time would end the game with several times more points than it started, barring outside influence. Such a thing should not be allowed in the game as it completely removes points limit restrictions, as well as the need to build an all comers list since you can choose to summon units that best fit the situation.

This is a clear cash grab by GW, please do not let them alter one of the fundamental principles of the game and get away with it, all in the name of making a $

 IK Viper wrote:


The reason this game is based on a points system is to insure that each side has an equal number of resources available.

You are wrong. It doesn't and never has ensured parity.

From Space Wolves and eldar in 2nd to - Leafblower IG/GK/Crons - To Taudar.TauTau, DE/Eldar in 6th The Points system has never been an arbiter of balance.

Point efficiency is definitely a problem.

Clown car certainly appears to be very points efficient.

I do not see how we as a community can truly consider 40K a balanced game, capable of competitive play when one side has renewable resources and another does not.

GW have never considered their rules nor have they published rules they consider to be balanced for competitive play.

This is a clear cash grab by GW, please do not let them alter one of the fundamental principles of the game and get away with it, all in the name of making a $

THE fundamental principal is for GW to make ££££

Just enjoy YOUR game.

 IK Viper wrote:

I do not see how we as a community can truly consider 40K a balanced game, capable of competitive play when one side has renewable resources and another does not.

40K isn't a balanced game. It's that simple.

The best suggestion I have here is to equate in some way the warp charges to points and allow the summoned units to be purchased- at reduced cost due to the random factor- before the game but not deployed. This would effectively be translating you warp charges to points, balanced in some fashion against the randomness of actually getting the unit or not. You would be 'over' the points limit because you got a discount on your demons but you may not get to deploy them or they may not show up when you want.

That's all I have that maintains the intent of summoning and gaining points that doesn't result in a factory that can run amok. I'd have been much happier with a blessing that a unit could put on itself. Nurgles Embrace or something that, whenever an affected unit fights in melee record the wounds. At the end of the turn you can 'spend' the wounds to put Nurglings, Plaguebearers or (should you cause a massive number of wounds) a Great Unclean One that is summoned by the infections/death/slaughter (modify to suit each Ruinous Power as you see fit). That gives you your 'free' demons- if you can earn them.

Another one of these posts.

Demons are not getting units for free. They are using their valuable resources to make new demons.

Again I have to use the example of 16 Horrors and a Tzeentch herald with ML3. This unit has the choice of either shooting 8d6 strength 6 shots or summon 90 points of demons.

So, to oversimplify, they can either kill 90 points of their opponent’s models, or summon 90 points of demons. Why are you ok with the first and not the second? What do you think their opponents army is doing while they are standing around and summoning demons? They are get shot to death from an army they are not doing any damage to.

People need to think more about the mechanics of the game.

Again, I have not played against the army, I just object to the concept of creating more units on principle.

I think the best use of the Conjuration powers is to simply swamp the board with troops. There would as you say, be very little offensive output. But lots and lots of 10 man units and/or small daemon units.

If ALL armies had options/ ways to create new units to score objectives, then it would be somewhat ok, but it's not that way. Even it other armies take the Malific table, few have the Warp Charge to really leverage the tree.

Blackmore to your question, all armies shoot you. I would submit that the units summoned are going to be summoned in terrain and go to ground if needed, or better yet out of LOS, with the intent of stacking on more units to flood the board and in the case of PH's, add more Warp Charges to the pool to repeat the proccess. Also, that 16 PH unit and the Lvl 3 Herald would need to achieve 2 successful castings of Warp Charge 3 FF of Tzeentch (total of 6 Warp Charges) in order to manifest the 8d6 shots your talking about, or instead manifest a single Warp Charge 3 to summon a unit and then shoot you with 4d6 shot left over from manifesting the first power. Also, Conjurations are much, much harder to stop than Witchfire to begin with.

The thing I think your missing is I don't care what form it takes. If there was a formation that allowed Space Marines to continually Drop Pod in a Tactical Squad on a 4+ at the start of their turn I would oppose it as well. If IG got a fortification that could accept an order to produce an Infantry Platoon every turn I would be opposed to it.

There should be no free resources. You spend points up front to build an army and that is it. You should have to fight with the models you bring, just like everyone else.

There are certainly much more broken thing/ armies out there, I just think that the creation of new units is way out there and only serves to dilute the already watered down tactical depth of the game. We lost Focus Fire, Precision Shot/Strike on Characters, many things are now Random allocation, Night Fight is just blanket Stealth no matter if your 1 inch or 60 inches away, the Force Org is basically meaningless even in Battle Forged armies, everything scores even Rhinos and Drop Pods, where does it end? Where do we as a community dig our heels in and say enough is enough. The major draw for adult 40k players is the tactical depth of the game. Being able to add points to your list mid game, in any way, breaks the whole attrition warfare and limited resources concept central to good army list design. It is also very convenient to be able to choose what units you need mid-game. Why worry with an all-comers list when you can simply summon the units best suited to the enemy at hand? Can any other army create units on demand that can be tailored on the fly to the situation? No. How is this fair to all the other armies in the game that are stuck with the list they brought to the table?

Bottom Line: creating units mid-game is a problem, no matter what form it takes. We pay points for stuff... for a reason.

PS none of the daemon units that are going to be doing all these conjuration powers, was point costed with the intent of being able to manifest these powers...

Yes we get it, any other abuse is OK, but Summoning units is one abuse too much....Groan, you could have added this to any of the 800 threads on this subject already, you aren't saying anything that hasn't been said.

Why is adding units any more broken than armies with super points efficient units that murder the enemy?

Swamping the board is the worst use of conjuration powers, because in the end you likely lose out on units if your opponent targets important units first.

Also if you play tactical objectives, and the summoners are not achieving them they lose...

While I don't feel as Allan does, I'm also not sure they need to be tweaked, or that there's a reasonable understanding of how to tweak them at present.

That all said, basic 10-man horror units will not do 90 points worth of damage really ever, yet they can summon 90 points worth of horrors or some other unit instead. So it's a bit off probably to focus on whether a fully buffed herald-inclusive unit of horrors is doing something marginal instead of something major. It's probably better to focus on things like 95 point base heralds turning into Lords of Change, swooping across half the field and summoning 3 Plague Drones on top of someone's backfield. That's a fairly common likely outcome of Conjuration.

Still, at the same time, conjuration armies have so far been fairly terrible at winning missions, so it's a bit of a balance between what's onerous / "unfun" in terms of time consumption, and what's actually good. I'm personally reminded of the early concerns about 'Cron Air.

More time and consideration will tell.

The now famous game on FLG with Frankie losing with the Horror Farm was using the Tactical Objective cards btw, which I personally discount. Those stupid cards are a grab bag of yet more randomness, rewarding luck as much if not more than skill (which is not a good thing for all you more randomness junkies out there)

Not sure that game should be considered a valid example of either army's actual power level.

Not saying it should or shouldn't but if you play things other than just score last turn, it makes things much tougher for summoning armies.

I agree with that and hope that people running big events like yourselves will continue to support/ rule the progressive scoring mission in 7th edition. I think they still offer a powerful tactical flexibility that will allow more armies to play competitively.

Though I think that if summoned units score objectives, than flying DP's with Conjuration powers will be insanely good at flying over to an objective and then summoning a unit on top of it, making it really hard to beat CD's when their flying guys can bomb the board with troops. Though to be fair, you really don't want to be doing a lot of that as a CD player because your expensive, tough, flying DP will start taking wounds from Perils a lot.

 IK Viper wrote:
I agree with that and hope that people running big events like yourselves will continue to support/ rule the progressive scoring mission in 7th edition. I think they still offer a powerful tactical flexibility that will allow more armies to play competitively.

Though I think that if summoned units score objectives, than flying DP's with Conjuration powers will be insanely good at flying over to an objective and then summoning a unit on top of it, making it really hard to beat CD's when their flying guys can bomb the board with troops. Though to be fair, you really don't want to be doing a lot of that as a CD player because your expensive, tough, flying DP will start taking wounds from Perils a lot.

At least for NOVA, we'll continue to go with the Asymmetricals we've been championing for over half a year now (missioncatalog.com). They're being discussed and revised for the new edition scoring unit tweaks. The Maelstrom are basically a poor man's version, with more random and less flexibility to allow players to flex the mission to suit their army (a function of the asymmetricals that broadens the meta instead of nerfing perceived problem armies).

With re: your comment about Frankie's game on the FLG, I haven't actually watched it yet (that's my bad). When referring to summoning lists struggling to win, I'm referring at least personally to the playtesting and discussions we've been having so far to try and understand the perceived problems from a TO p.o.v.

I understand that as a TO it would be to much to flat out block the whole table as people who want to play with their toys will cry. What I was trying to do was point out the logical fallacy of the concept.

There are people out there who have no regard for the health of the game, and instead only care about winning games no matter how gimmicky. For example: if GW messed up and gave a Bastion Jink, there are some people who would try and take a 4+ Jink on a building just because it is in the rules, with no regard to "does this make any sense at all, and is it good for the game?"

I am running a small tournament in 3 weeks and am going to limit the Conjuration powers to 1 summoning per turn and see how it goes. But I do understand that you have a lot invested in a huge event like NOVA.

My intent with the post was not to institute comp. (though I support this) but to get people thinking about whether or not we want something like this in the game. If people stop playing with it, it is not a problem any more. I don't want 40k to turn into a turn based version of Dawn of War, there is value in having to work with what you have/ start with and frankly if I wanted to play DoW I would do it on my computer, the graphics, sound and animation are better then a table top analog.

 IK Viper wrote:
I understand that as a TO it would be to much to flat out block the whole table as people who want to play with their toys will cry. What I was trying to do was point out the logical fallacy of the concept.

There are people out there who have no regard for the health of the game, and instead only care about winning games no matter how gimmicky. For example: if GW messed up and gave a Bastion Jink, there are some people who would try and take a 4+ Jink on a building just because it is in the rules, with no regard to "does this make any sense at all, and is it good for the game?"

I am running a small tournament in 3 weeks and am going to limit the Conjuration powers to 1 summoning per turn and see how it goes. But I do understand that you have a lot invested in a huge event like NOVA.

My intent with the post was not to institute comp. (though I support this) but to get people thinking about whether or not we want something like this in the game. If people stop playing with it, it is not a problem any more. I don't want 40k to turn into a turn based version of Dawn of War, there is value in having to work with what you have/ start with.

On a personal level, I'm actually not a fan of the Summoning mechanic. Whether or not it's "overpowered" or "broken" or simply makes for a potentially long-drawn-out and less pleasant game in the eyes of certain people, it's a mechanic that doesn't feel right in a game that's been oriented around "Bring what you play with."

So, I get you

At the same time, I don't like to kneejerk ... Summoning armies don't do that well at winning any well-designed missions, and they are as onerous and tedious for their owners to play as they are for their opponents. As a result, it's entirely possible they'll self-resolve, because they are not the equivalent of a Jinking Bastion (which you would always take) or a 2+ re-rollable unit you only hit on 6's and that can move 48" a turn. By being tedious to play with and not very effective at winning, Summon "spam" armies may resolve themselves without interference.

I mean, is there anyone here who is really excited about spending their tournaments summoning units forever and losing their games?

 IK Viper wrote:
Again, I have not played against the army, I just object to the concept of creating more units on principle.

If ALL armies had options/ ways to create new units to score objectives, then it would be somewhat ok, but it's not that way. Even it other armies take the Malific table, few have the Warp Charge to really leverage the tree.

The thing I think your missing is I don't care what form it takes. If there was a formation that allowed Space Marines to continually Drop Pod in a Tactical Squad on a 4+ at the start of their turn I would oppose it as well. If IG got a fortification that could accept an order to produce an Infantry Platoon every turn I would be opposed to it.

There should be no free resources. You spend points up front to build an army and that is it. You should have to fight with the models you bring, just like everyone else.

Out of curiosity, do you also think that Tervigons should be removed?

I have always hated Tervigons. They are supposedly points costed to compensate for the fact that they create new stuff though so I am some what less miffed about them. No one would pay the points they cost for an MC with their stats unless they made babies. They also have a downside of blowing up and killing lots of their created units. There are enough downsides tied to the unit to make it a little more palatable, however, yes I hate Tervigons for what they do to the game. No, I do not think they are broken because the unit was designed and pointed with the intention of building in the cost of the created units into the MC's cost.

These summoning daemons were not costed in this way. Have no built in downsides besides Perils/ Using a lot of Warp Charge (which is a player choice) and can create different units suited to the task at hand.

The Portal Glyph is even more hated in my opinion, that thing, plus Fateweaver's reroll will routinely produce 3-4 times its points value in free units with no additional expenditure in resources, so long as it is not killed. Which to be fair is not that hard, but even still, its a 30 point AV12 unit. That in itself is really cheap since it now theoretically scores, much less the fact that it gives you more cheap scoring.

If every army had and equivalent, I would not complain, but as they don't, it is a problem.

SkyBROKE... not going to discuss the balance implications of paying the same points costs for units with more special rules, and the possibility to get free units on a 4+

What about Necron spiders? They generate units as well.

We played a 1,000 point game last night using daemons. While I definitely did not use a TFG list, we tried daemon farming. It is not the end of the world (no pun intended) that everyone thinks.

Perils are rampant. I tried turning a herald into a bloodthirster. It melted his head instead.

Warp dice get used up faster than you think. Also, getting cursed earth off is a must for survivability. You need to save dice for that. You also need to save dice for your horrors to shoot, otherwise, they really don't do much.

I still think the TauDar lists of 6th edition were way more difficult to deal with than this list will ever be.

I agree with every thing you are saying. And you are right, Tau and Eldar are probably better. That is not the point. Making units changes the fundamental bedrock of a game with points limits. That is all I am saying.

Aren't we already discussing this in other threads ?

paying points to summon more points,

verses paying less points to be able to blow all those other points up,

is a horrible strategy....

leave the game as it is for the most part and its fine, even in tournaments, all we really need to do is set a pts limit, FOC limit, and maybe deal with one or two specific things like INIVS and rerolling 2++'s

IK Vyper: Did you post this when Tervigons came out? They created additional units and it was fairly points effective in the previous codex? They produced units for free, in fact, with less repercussions.

And someone mentioned Tomb Spyders creating Scarabs.

I'd recommend playing af few games and then see if your opinion changes, and at what levels. Your opinion may not change, but at least it will be a more informed opinion.

Tervigons from the old Nid dex were far worse about giving away free resources for sure. I was very happy with the rewrite in the new Nid book. Makes those guys a lot more reasonable.

I see Spiders and Ghost Arks as much less of a problem because they add models back to existing units instead of create new ones. This to me is not much different that the Reanimation Protocol the rest of the army gets. It makes the units they affect more durable, but if you can wipe out the whole unit, they are gone. This concept of regrowing units does not result in the large MSU effect summoning has, which is a big deal when EVERYTHING scores now. Regrowing a unit is basically another way of making a unit tougher to kill, not by adding a save, but by adding more wounds to the unit. Still a durability buff just like Forewarning, Invisibility, Fortune, etc.

What about gargoyles coming back on 4+? I have definitely seem that win several games. You need to address everything - not just what you personally perceive as a problem for you.

yeah, no one complains about necrons getting back "free points" every time a RP roll is made...


or spyders, or tervigons, and so on....

 IK Viper wrote:
Again, I have not played against the army, I just object to the concept of creating more units on principle.

#1. Since you have not played against it how do you know if it is broken or not?
#2. If you have a philosophical problem with creating more units you need to get over it. Every army can do things that other armies can't, and that is why every codex is different. If you want every army to be the same, and to be able to do what each other army can do then I suggest that you all play from only one codex.

It is all about game balance. If they army is too good, or it can't be beat then that is one thing. So far summoning has not been game breaking or even really very good. Play some games against it and then see if all of the fears from you posts come true.

easysause => did you read what I said about Skyblight in my previous posts? How did I skip over Skyblight when I mentioned them twice on this thread, one of which was in the first post?

Responding to Blackmoor
#1 I am actively looking for games against it and reading everything batrep I can find about it.
#2 Do you honestly no care about these things? I am sure anyone who has played very long has played that one game when 2-3 Tervigons just decided to not poop out and basically take over the game based on sheer (no skill involved or required) luck. The game is basically decided not my the players, but by the sheer weight of resources one player has vs. another... That is not a tactical strategy game I care to play competitively, there is to much randomness and not enough player control of what is going on.

I know you play Nids, and I know all Nid player feel screwed by GW so they want the Skyblight free special rules/ free units/ and free force org slots at no extra charge formation to be legal, but that is no reason to support creating new units for free.

40k is one of the least balanced competitive games I know of, and adding more rules that allow armies to do stuff no one else can do (aka summon units in mass with any psycher) only adds to the balancing issue. Why not fight against this?

I played it last night. It was pretty underwhelming to be honest. While I know I could have been way more cut throat with it, it has some serious drawbacks.

For starters, anything with ranged shooting will give it problems. Second, any kind of list with its own psykers should have enough dice to try and dispel one cast by just throwing all your dice at it. Third, people are drastically underestimating how common perils is going to be.

I played TauDar several times and literally resigned after turn 1. There was not point in playing when my opponent could destroy over 600 points while I caused one wound with my entire army shooting. Where was the call to ban this list?

Let it play out for a while before just deciding to arbitrarily change rules.

 IK Viper wrote:
easysause => did you read what I said about Skyblight in my previous posts? How did I skip over Skyblight when I mentioned them twice on this thread, one of which was in the first post?

To be fair, you mentioned the word "Skyblight" twice in your OP and never again, and didn't really address the issues you have with it.
I disagree that Skyblight is free upgrades. There is a tax involved.

Same with a Tervigon - there's a tax to get "free" units. And, speaking from experience, 2-3 Tervigons refusing to quit spawning wasn't a game winner. I still lost many games when that happened.

I truly think this is all much ado about nothing.

 IK Viper wrote:
I have always hated Tervigons. ...

SkyBROKE... not going to discuss the balance implications of paying the same points costs for units with more special rules, and the possibility to get free units on a 4+

Same units as given in the codex, at the same price, with more rules...
Some people will point to the fact that you "must take Harpies. etc." but they cost the exact same as they always have. You are giving up some choices about which units to take, but at the end of the day, you are getting units from the formation that are priced the exact same as in the codex and there are more special rules tied to the unit just because they come from a formation. Literally the definition of "pay $ to get better rules,"

 IK Viper wrote:

 IK Viper wrote:
I have always hated Tervigons. ...

SkyBROKE... not going to discuss the balance implications of paying the same points costs for units with more special rules, and the possibility to get free units on a 4+

Same units as given in the codex, at the same price, with more rules...
Some people will point to the fact that you "must take Harpies. etc." but they cost the exact same as they always have. You are giving up some choices about which units to take, but at the end of the day, you are getting units from the formation that are priced the exact same as in the codex and there are more special rules tied to the unit just because they come from a formation. Literally the definition of "pay $ to get better rules,"

Except that's like saying Purifier armies are "pay $ to get better rules" and ignoring the Crowe "tax". You have to take a sub-par unit to upgrade rules elsewhere.
Your points are valid if you assume that 1 point is always worth the same as a point on another unit. That's demonstrably false (Pyrovores).

But you must operate under that assumption in order for the ENTIRE GAME to be considered a fair game, worthy of being played at a competitive level.

I agree with you that in practice 1 point of Eldar is not worth 1 point of BA. But from a conceptual level, in order for the game to be taken seriously as a competitive exercise, this MUST be true, specially within the same codex.