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Malestorm missions as taken from the book are wholly unsuited for tournament play. The closest analogy I can think of is playing a football ball game where you randomly determine from which yard marker each team gets to start its drive from. One team might consistently get the ball within the other teams 50 yard line, while the other team may have to start each drive close to their own end zone.

Two sources has a lot of positives. For less competitive people it narrows down the meta they have to prepare for. It eliminates the aforementioned 34 point Inquisition which ruins a few different builds (remember anyone taking Ahriman, Huron, or going for the infiltrate warlord trait is thwarted by a simple 34 point invest that also give LD 10 to a unit and stubborn. It also stops cherry picking of relic wargear like SM getting 2 EW Chapter Masters for a 60 point scout investment (which is obsec) and slapping it into their favorite TWC Deathstar or other shenanigans. Some people might feel restricted by this common sense limitation but there is still a huge amount of list building options there. Tyranids and Orks may suffer but a bad book is still going to be a bad book. Allow people to cherry pick a FOC slot to spam 2-3 options from their book really doesnt make the game more enjoyable.

This has come up a few times, could someone explain to me how tyranids suffer from limiting the number of sources?

I can only ever fit in one formation. Maybe self-allying and one formation. But every list I've tried to cram two formations into, it has not looked competitive at all. So, I don't personally think nids are limited by a cap on the number of sources, as long as everything is allowed in (including forgeworld units). If I'm wrong on that, I'd love to get a link to something showing how/why a tyranid list with two formations makes them stronger than just one. But it seems at that point, you can't fill up the key slots of a normal FOC anyway, so the second formation is not needed/helpful.

I think there is a bit of a disconnect that I'm probably responsible for. Sources does not equal detachments. Sources also include things like dataslate (such as the upcoming officio assasinorum) and formations.

@Mike

Oh, I'm far happier it got shifted instead of deleted. Don't get me wrong on that count I'm just saying that since it didn't get deleted it needs to be looked at differently if it still exists but TO rules prevent an army from being run the it has been. Think of it as a TO saying you can can only use 2 of the following 3: Librarians, Scouts, Space Marines Tanks. A silly example I acknowledge but I'm just trying to get the point across

@Glocknall

All of the positives still hold with limited detachments and unlimited formations. There are no additional negatives by opening up formations/dataslates that don't already exist in the current format.

@RiTides

Honestly I'd be tempted as Nid player to run pretty much exclusively formations But with seriousness you can pretty easily fit a normal if small FOC with living artillery and bio blast for example.

Example of a list i'd consider without the force org: 2 Incubator Broods, 1-2 Living Artillery Broods, and depending on flavor or points skyblight or bio-blast.

@Hulk

I'm pretty sure that the BRB defines formations as a type of detachment. So a 2 detachment limit would limit them unless you declare them seperate from other types of detachments it seems odd to only have formations be an unlimited detachment type.

Beyond that I'm not sure any TO (that I know of) is counting dataslate units (like Be'lakor or cypher) as a second source. Which is one of the reasons I was always against the "2 source language" as I believe it causes confusion.

From everything I have seen no one is saying that dataslates use up one of your slots.

So belakor, cypher, and now assassins are still fine to add into a army without limiting yourself.

I agree that the language in the BRB for detachment includes formations. Here is how I see it though:

We are already having to use language to explain the difference between CAD's and the new codex detachments and allied detachments. What I would honestly recommend is a 0-2 limit on FOC Detachments. i.e. any detachment that has an FOC attached to it (supplement FOC's or Codex: Inquisition) or a codex force (Imperial Knights) or the allied detachment.

The reason for unlimited formations is that they don't allow for cherry picking of the best units (the only spectacular one is the 3-Knight one) which is most people's issue with open source and it seems like non-bb armies seem to work better with them. Is there a good reason to limit formations? (Honest question, no snark or sarcasm implied which I have to type cause this is the stupid internet )

Spamming out the Firebase Cadre is pretty boss. Being able to put that much twin linked, Tank Hunters firepower without a troops tax is really good. Also it would be more fun to punch yourself in the nuts then play against it.

The minimum cost for the Cadre is 570pts with zero upgrades. You can't really spam it. You could, in theory, take 3 of them and have 140pts left over without upgrades. More reasonably you could take 2. Awesome. Even with a cad full of other units 650pts isn't much to make a list out of to support those units.

And a lot of armies are going to be making you pick up those units with the shift back to AP 2 weapons for anti-tank. All in all it's a pretty poor example of a "broken" formation.

My reason to say limit formations at the moment is that not every army has formations at the moment. SO if there is not limit we are essentially adding extra FOC slots to armies that have formations and not to those that don't unless we are saying that you can take whatever formations you want from all books (so Skyblight, plus knights, plus Firebase....)

 Hulksmash wrote:
The minimum cost for the Cadre is 570pts with zero upgrades. You can't really spam it. You could, in theory, take 3 of them and have 140pts left over without upgrades. More reasonably you could take 2. Awesome. Even with a cad full of other units 650pts isn't much to make a list out of to support those units.

And a lot of armies are going to be making you pick up those units with the shift back to AP 2 weapons for anti-tank. All in all it's a pretty poor example of a "broken" formation.

I think you are grossly underestimating that formation. . Free Tank Hunters and preferred enemy space marines with skyfire or interceptors on the 'sides makes it extremely formidable. Other than marines which armies will be spamming AP2? Necrons can't, Eldar don't have too, Daemons are incapable. Guard are the only other well played army with consistent ranged AP2. Not to mention deploying in cover.

MVBrandt wrote:

 Hulksmash wrote:
I hate my computer....For the second time, slightly more concise (internet ate the first one)....

@Mike

I feel that there is a difference between changing your army because something isn't good anymore and not being allowed to change your army to include units that have been in it because of it's spread across to many sources. It would be one thing if a unit is deleted but simply shifting to another source isn't nearly on the same page. Another example would be the likely removal of Legion of the Damned from the SM book in the next iteration.

Additionally I would prefer if you dropped the "You're pushing it for your special snowflake armies" angle. Would I like more options for modeling? Yep. Is that a drive for me? Nope. I'll build lists in the format of events and have a good time. Sometimes they'll be a template with personality tacked on and other times they'll be just silly but work decently.

Just so we're 100% clear on where on stand on this:

-I am in favor of open Battleforge
-I understand open Battleforge makes some people cringe
-I understand I am currently in the minority in my views
-I am OK with structure for list building for events
-I am OK with detachment limitations (i.e. 2 Detachments with only 1 CAD)
-I am in favor of no limits on Formations
-I am going to win 80% of my games across this edition no matter the format

I think 7th has the most potential for diversity at the top tables of any edition we've seen so far. Even with people being people. I just felt it was time to revisit source limits (not detachment limits per se) based on the first 3 releases for 7th. Formation numbers have increased and of the armies arguably designed for 7th (Nids forward) we've got two imperial armies that stand fine without formations and two non-imperial/BB armies that seem designed to function better with formations.

Initial limitations were put on based on 6th edition. Which is fine. I just felt it was time to revisit based on what we're seeing now.

These are good stance clarifications, and I apologize, genuinely, for misinterpreting some of your motivation as wanting to run a specific army.

Also, given that every event is allowing at least some multi-detachment choice, isn't it better if a unit is sent to another source than simply deleted (as has often been the case, and is increasingly the case)? Hell, Tyranids lost several units for - as far as we know - ever. Like my lovingly painted and converted Parasite of Mortrex, which is gone. :( ... I'd love for him to be in a Formation aside from the dex instead.

Diversity is fun, but then some Tourns decided to restrict CtA because of... reasons, possibly fear of rebuttal with the rules being so fresh, where the recompense is; well you can take more of the same!

It looks like armies may start to split up more. Some models are only going to appear in a specific source where as before they were included in the codex, this may come more of a issue as it opens up, if the Tourns don't open up the source.

7th Ed has been out for a while now, people have gotten over the changes and it should open up, little by little.

Glocknall wrote:
Malestorm missions as taken from the book are wholly unsuited for tournament play. The closest analogy I can think of is playing a football ball game where you randomly determine from which yard marker each team gets to start its drive from. One team might consistently get the ball within the other teams 50 yard line, while the other team may have to start each drive close to their own end zone.

Two sources has a lot of positives. For less competitive people it narrows down the meta they have to prepare for. It eliminates the aforementioned 34 point Inquisition which ruins a few different builds (remember anyone taking Ahriman, Huron, or going for the infiltrate warlord trait is thwarted by a simple 34 point invest that also give LD 10 to a unit and stubborn. It also stops cherry picking of relic wargear like SM getting 2 EW Chapter Masters for a 60 point scout investment (which is obsec) and slapping it into their favorite TWC Deathstar or other shenanigans. Some people might feel restricted by this common sense limitation but there is still a huge amount of list building options there. Tyranids and Orks may suffer but a bad book is still going to be a bad book. Allow people to cherry pick a FOC slot to spam 2-3 options from their book really doesnt make the game more enjoyable.

What about the analogy of changing battlefield? Which is pretty much the simulation, Maelstrom missions simulate a changing in object as and when your going along in the game, it does inspire different list building though, you have to handle being able to get across the board to cap and some plan for every eventuality. In cases where you lack in some ability to meet the objective you should be able to stay fluid capping some to gain others, meanwhile with exclusion of the relic, EW you just have to pick some durable (Not even troops now) scorers, different guns and sit there, not dying and only asses threats / etc. I would argue it's easier to just spam 1 dimensional lists for EW rather than Maelstrom, as you need much less diverse lists going into those missions. ObSec is not the best choice in all armies as means of capping a Ob far away for example, there are much better means depending on your army composition, position etc etc. I have done fine with these missions in 7th with Tyranids & DE allied (Just a Duke & some Warriors in Raiders hah).

The majority of fears that came with 7th have dissipated in a poof of 'not as bad as I thought'. Daemon summoning spam is so ill adept at it's job you'll struggle to find decent lists or tactics anywhere, relies too much on luck, the points limit does its job (In the most part) regardless of detachment numbers, source type or alliance type.

 Hulksmash wrote:
The minimum cost for the Cadre is 570pts with zero upgrades. You can't really spam it. You could, in theory, take 3 of them and have 140pts left over without upgrades. More reasonably you could take 2. Awesome. Even with a cad full of other units 650pts isn't much to make a list out of to support those units.

And a lot of armies are going to be making you pick up those units with the shift back to AP 2 weapons for anti-tank. All in all it's a pretty poor example of a "broken" formation.

That was my argument about the tyranids formations, though. I think the cheapest one is 390 for Living Artillery, but BioBlast is like what, 725? I could see taking those two (I have often tried to work up lists involving both, actually but always seem to be too short on points for the rest) and so wouldn't really mind if a second formation were allowed. But as you say, once you get past two it becomes hard to make effective lists, anyway.

I hadn't actually considered running a list without the force org, and only formations... didn't even really know that could be a possibility, to be honest

Glocknall wrote:

 Hulksmash wrote:
The minimum cost for the Cadre is 570pts with zero upgrades. You can't really spam it. You could, in theory, take 3 of them and have 140pts left over without upgrades. More reasonably you could take 2. Awesome. Even with a cad full of other units 650pts isn't much to make a list out of to support those units.

And a lot of armies are going to be making you pick up those units with the shift back to AP 2 weapons for anti-tank. All in all it's a pretty poor example of a "broken" formation.

I think you are grossly underestimating that formation. . Free Tank Hunters and preferred enemy space marines with skyfire or interceptors on the 'sides makes it extremely formidable. Other than marines which armies will be spamming AP2? Necrons can't, Eldar don't have too, Daemons are incapable. Guard are the only other well played army with consistent ranged AP2. Not to mention deploying in cover.

I don't think I am though. You can already bring one. Bringing a second and having 650pts left for the rest of an army isn't that great. And you'll have less if you take interceptor/skyfire/target locks and so forth. It lacks AP2 so 2+ armies will give it fits. It lacks pyschic defense in the form of stopping other powers. It lacks the ability to capture objectives. The list gets long.

It's an instant lose to armies most marine armies that go drop pod or bike heavy. It's an instant lose to having AV14 on the table. Eldar will make it sad because of range. Dark Eldar same. Orks w/Battlewagons make it sad. The list that breaks that open is pretty long. It's actually a worse Tau list which I'm ok with

@RiTides

And yeah, all formations could work Cost is going to prohibit more than 2 formations generally if you're also taking a force org of some type.

Actually bringing two and having six fifty left is a very big deal. With genuine love, Brad, I think you overstate some things (I recognize this as a trait I share at times lol). Example is brushing off inquisition servo plugs as "only" invalidating two builds. Not only are more than two invalidated, marine bikers are a popular army that lots of people own. There's a reason so many people at adepticon took them, and it isn't "oh there's barely any Nick builds this invalidates lol." Suggesting there's nothing meaningful that six fifty points can add to a double fire base is similarly brush-off-ish. And you know I love ya, not trying to target.

I think the larger issue is not the "i'll spam 2 of said formation." But instead, I'll take a CAD + allies, then this other formation. At which point we are not really limiting things all that much. Only the best formations will get taken, and because they won't be limited odds are we will see more of them.

I'm not saying it is necessarily broken (haven't tested it.) but what stops in your scenario. Knights + IG + fire cadre for example. Whereas with a 2 detachment limit on all detachments you are only getting 2 of those things.

I've yet to see old armies invalidated (if assasins are a data slate and not a formation you could still run inquisition + GK + assassins.)

I think the biggest 'problem' with the Firebase as a formation is that there isn't really a tax to get it. You just take the army that you normally would and get tank hunters for free. Some/many other formations require you to take more of a unit than you normally would (be that 1 instead of 0 or 3 instead of 2) or some other such method that you have to design your army around.
People won't necessarily spam 2-3 of the Firebase cadre... yet they will consistently take one because they probably were already anyway.


Warmachine has the same thing with some of the tier lists, which function a little like formations. Some casters force you to make tough choices and give up good units to receive the tier bonuses (in my experience, most of the Troll tier lists), whereas other forces you build the army as normal and then find out you have 2-3 additional bonuses for free (most of the cyris tiers).

Formations would be a reasonable thing if they were say part of the FOC. SO if you take these themed units in your FOC, you get X bonus. Now Firebase would still be good in that scenario, but as it is now you could take 3 Skyrays, and 2 Broadside teams instead of a total of 3 of both (assuming we are not going double CAD), and without paying troop/HQ tax for the additional slot.

@Mike

Adepticon is a horrible example of the excessive taking of Inquisitors. They allowed characters w/infiltrate to confer the ability. That right there meant that instead of 2 builds at the time there were a ton of infiltrating Ovesastars, Centstars & Beastpacks also out there. Quite a difference from just scouting bikes and dogs.

Name me a relevant army currently negated servo-skulls that isn't khorne dog rush (might not even be relevent) and/or scouting marines (bike or rhino). As an outside to the current discussion since we've already determined I'm not against a FOC Detachment restriction, just a source restriction

@Travsi

But were people really already taking those units. Riptide I'll give you. But I don't see many broadsides and if I do it's one unit. So is it really "free abilities". They are not putting 200-400pts of new units into their army. That has to come from somewhere.

@Breng77

Nothing stops it. But who cares if they bring IG/Knigths/Fireblade.Taking almost 600pts out of an army of IG supporting knights (or vice versa) isn't that easy to find. The only real concern I see here is fluff for people. But in game there doesn't seem to be an issue.

Yes, the best formations will be taken. That's a given. And yes, they might get tacked on top of a CAD & other detachment. But the vast majority are a) expensive and b) contain units that aren't optimal or at an optimal number in exchange for some awesome rules.

I think I went through and the cheapest formation available is the Ork HQ one with 3 Big Meks, a Warboss, and a Pain Boss. And even that is closing on 200pts. The minimum seems much closer to 300 and rises steeply from there. They generally aren't cheap enough to just slot in.

As for formations being "unreasonable" what's unreasonable about them? Not paying an HQ/Troop tax? See above. You do pay in that most formations don't include models you would normally take in the quantities they require or with the equipment they require (Adamentine Lance being an exception). You are paying for those additional rules because you probably weren't going to bring that 5th Battlewagon or 5-Man MAN squads or that Tyranid Warrior Brood.

Well I would also add the chance of getting the strategic warlord trait that gives infiltrate.

Yeah, which when they get it is a huge boost for nids, obviously- getting up close immediately with a lot of big bugs.

What are the top teir armies in seventh?

I have said this before, but I will say it again. If there were still soft scores around for things like (in this specific case) comp, you would not be struggling with this issue (as much). The game of 40k will never be the air tight ruleset for competitive play that Warmahoards or XWA are. The newest set of rules has simply shined a bright light on that issue. You guys tried to push the format one way and GW actually actively worked to make the format worse. Start implementing soft scores if you want to play anything other than simple force org armies or you will be revisiting this issue until 8th (or GW finally collapses under its own hubris).

lliu wrote:
What are the top teir armies in seventh?

Check mortetvie's thread and/or Torrent of Fire for the BAO stats. Especially Torrent of Fire.

 Phazael wrote:
I have said this before, but I will say it again. If there were still soft scores around for things like (in this specific case) comp, you would not be struggling with this issue (as much). The game of 40k will never be the air tight ruleset for competitive play that Warmahoards or XWA are. The newest set of rules has simply shined a bright light on that issue. You guys tried to push the format one way and GW actually actively worked to make the format worse. Start implementing soft scores if you want to play anything other than simple force org armies or you will be revisiting this issue until 8th (or GW finally collapses under its own hubris).

+1

DarthDiggler wrote:

 Phazael wrote:
I have said this before, but I will say it again. If there were still soft scores around for things like (in this specific case) comp, you would not be struggling with this issue (as much). The game of 40k will never be the air tight ruleset for competitive play that Warmahoards or XWA are. The newest set of rules has simply shined a bright light on that issue. You guys tried to push the format one way and GW actually actively worked to make the format worse. Start implementing soft scores if you want to play anything other than simple force org armies or you will be revisiting this issue until 8th (or GW finally collapses under its own hubris).

+1

+2

I was a huge proponent for getting rid of soft scores back in 5th. That really isn't a good option anymore imo.

 Phazael wrote:
I have said this before, but I will say it again. If there were still soft scores around for things like (in this specific case) comp, you would not be struggling with this issue (as much).

You're right, you wouldn't, but only because you'd be dealing with the much worse issue of soft score abuse making the game unplayable.

Meh, it's not what this thread is about but yeah....Comp scores might not be a bad move.

As much as I pushed to get rid of comp scores that was because 5th edition didn't need them. The end of 6th certainly did and I'm thinking 7th is in the same spot.

Especially if soft scores make people more open to opening up force organization

 RiTides wrote:
This has come up a few times, could someone explain to me how tyranids suffer from limiting the number of sources?

I can only ever fit in one formation. Maybe self-allying and one formation. But every list I've tried to cram two formations into, it has not looked competitive at all. So, I don't personally think nids are limited by a cap on the number of sources, as long as everything is allowed in (including forgeworld units). If I'm wrong on that, I'd love to get a link to something showing how/why a tyranid list with two formations makes them stronger than just one. But it seems at that point, you can't fill up the key slots of a normal FOC anyway, so the second formation is not needed/helpful.

nids work a lot better with cad/cad, cad/formation, cad/self ally (like with BAO rules) than being just straight up limited to a single CAD which is how it often is. a lot of places, until recently, weren't allowing formations, weren't allowing CtA allies, and weren't allowing double CAD (therefor limiting them, by default, to a single CAD). generally (at least when this comes up on thetyranidhive) this is what we're talking about when limiting # of sources comes up.

there are a couple of extreme builds i can think of but not many (CAD/bioblast/bioblast off the top of my head) that would use 3+ sources, aside from just going CAD/CAD/CAD with nothing but flyrants, rippers, malanthropes and dakkafexes.

sorry for multiple edits, realized i wasn't being clear.

Also something to consider for those saying that formations get special rules for free. I'd point out that all detachments now get special rules for free. Combined Arms & Ally Detachments get Objective Secured. The new Space Wolf Detachment allows units to outflank on a certain roll. The new GK Supplement allows units to deepstrike on turn one. None of these armies are paying for these abilities in the classic sense. They are free abilities for the detachment. Much like the abilities that come with formations.

Comp is still a bad option, because well executed comp is about as rare as a unicorn. You end up just changing the meta for each event individually, with some players deciding to put the effort into figuring out what is "busted" under the new set of rules, and some not.

If it were me, I'd go battleforged, come up with a specific ban list for lords of war for the truly imbalanced ones, and let all formations/dataslates otherwise we fair game, with the caveat that all are 0-1 (so no 4x tau fire cadre, you can have 1 among your slew of formations/other stuff). With it all being legal we can all expect to see any variety or combination of it on any given day at an event, all that would change is that you might see more of them together at once.