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 SilverDevilfish wrote:

WayneTheGame wrote:

Felldrake wrote:
edited by motyak

Yeah, this comment isn't helpful.

With all the cheese talk I wonder how something like this would be received This was a 2000 point Eldar from from White Dwarf 219, April 1998 circa 2nd edition when the Falcon and Fire Prism just were released. Minor modifications due to changes over the years:

Farseer (the 2nd edition one had a Witch Blade, Psychic Hood and Spirit Stone. No idea what translates)
Warlock (I think they go in units now and aren't characters?)

2x 10 Guardians (the 2nd edition one was three squads of 5 and one squad of 7; back in these days there were no weapon platforms either)*
* Seeing as the box now has 8 guys and a heavy weapon (I remember it having I think 12 guys in 3rd!!!) I guess heavy weapons count here. Umm... Starcannon and Bright Lance I guess?
Rangers ("Eldar Scouts" back in the day)
Wraithguard (with D-Cannons, only option back in 2nd)

6x Jetbikes, 1 w/Shuriken Cannon
Vyper w/Shuriken Cannon
Vyper w/Bright Lance (Lascannon back in 2nd)

Fire Prism
2x Falcons w/Scatter Lasers

That's nostalgic. Would you ban that? Note I have zero clue how many points that translates to in 7th edition. That also comes to around $480 (!!) if anyone was wondering, just to make a jab at how high the prices are.

I don't think that's even 1.2k points now.

Sounds about right actually. How times change.

WayneTheGame wrote:

That also comes to around $480 (!!) if anyone was wondering, just to make a jab at how high the prices are.

Wow... are you sure that was $480? If so, they were actually more expensive then, than they are now. The total price right now would be $409 MSRP:

Farseer & Warlocks $33
20 Guardians $73
Rangers $33
Wraithguard $50
6 Jetbikes $60
2 Vypers $60
Fire Prism $50
2 Falcons $50

You can either have the plastic Farseer and 1 metal warlock, or the box with finecast farseer + 3 warlocks at the that price, and for $15 more, you can have an extra Vyper (by buying the squad box).

I have to say the "You can only take 1x unless you do X" argument doesn't hold much water with me. The current design philosophy seems to be "Play with whatever you want if you spend enough money on data slates". I'm fairly sure pretty soon there will be a convoluted way to ally with yourself, take X special character and Y formation and use whatever you want. On the other hand, this thread is waaay premature.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
Where can you get two falcons for $50?

I hope he means $50 each, in which case the total was mis-added.

 AnomanderRake wrote:
I hope he means $50 each, in which case the total was mis-added.

Yeah. Still, cheaper now!

Add 50 bucks to the total, $459 now.

Please hold while I put my entire 101,299 points of Eldar into storage because someone is a wee bit upset all the units are useful in a codex for once

On a serious note, its called comp in a tournament and its used to handicap top tier armies or compositions that are just nasty. There are many ways to have an enjoyable experience while playing armies with good units. Every dog has its day at some point.

 Morachi wrote:
Please hold while I put my entire 101,299 points of Eldar into storage because someone is a wee bit upset all the units are useful in a codex for once

On a serious note, its called comp in a tournament and its used to handicap top tier armies or compositions that are just nasty. There are many ways to have an enjoyable experience while playing armies with good units. Every dog has its day at some point.

I think a major problem in the competitive scene is that this specific dog has been having his day for a couple years now.

That and I hate having to have all kinds of discussions about how units a b c d and e are too good for my little jump pack blood angel army, and if I was an eldar player, I'd be annoyed at having to tie a hand behind my back every game so I don't table someone so hard that they go into a coma.

To be fair, we've seen a number of armies have their few years in the past as well. At the current rate armies are getting new codex books released, others should come up to par in the near future - or at least the duration of power should cycle more frequently at the very least. The beauty of the Eldar is there are so many options you can mix up a list each time so the opponent doesn't feel like its a constant barrage of serpent spam or whatever the current flavour is at the time.

 Morachi wrote:
To be fair, we've seen a number of armies have their few years in the past as well. At the current rate armies are getting new codex books released, others should come up to par in the near future - or at least the duration of power should cycle more frequently at the very least. The beauty of the Eldar is there are so many options you can mix up a list each time so the opponent doesn't feel like its a constant barrage of serpent spam or whatever the current flavour is at the time.

That's a horrible counterpoint.

Yet that is as good as you're going to get from GW sorry. It's the best of the worst in this case.

 Morachi wrote:
To be fair, we've seen a number of armies have their few years in the past as well. At the current rate armies are getting new codex books released, others should come up to par in the near future - or at least the duration of power should cycle more frequently at the very least. The beauty of the Eldar is there are so many options you can mix up a list each time so the opponent doesn't feel like its a constant barrage of serpent spam or whatever the current flavour is at the time.

I think I would be even more upset if this level of power became "standard" across several books. That would probably get me to move permanently back to 5e, where things you pay 200 points for aren't just dead as fast as gretchin.

This book is deep into the territory of pulling apocalypse into non-apocalypse games, and that is territory I hate being in.

Akiasura wrote:

With the absurd range on the guns, destructive ability of the guns, and overall power level of the guns, the codex will be dangerous in anyone's hands. More than any other dex, considering the lack of bad units in the dex that a bad player would take.
The necron codex with the new formation is very strong, but is good in anyone's hand. You pretty much push the wraiths forward and hide the spyder.

Army lists tend to come in 2 varieties in most table top games. They either ask questions or answer questions. The ones that ask questions don't require nearly as much tactical work as the ones that answer questions. This is true in 40k, WMH, infinity, and most of the games I have seen.
The necron codex asks "Can you kill all my absurdly tough guys before they reach your lines?"
The SM codex asks "Can you stop my deathstar from destroying your army?"
The new Eldar codex asks "Can you withstand my shooting?"
It's easy to build this question from the army book compared to say, daemons, who are a strong army that requires a bit more work.

You make it sound so easy for someone to pick up and army and master the rules. I don't know if this is true for everyone.

Akiasura wrote:

 techsoldaten wrote:

If that requires some kind of evidence, assume I am just a boastful jerk, consider your own experiences and go from there. I would say it's only about 3 out of every 10 players I meet really know how to use the rules to their advantage, which would correspond with the upper end of a bell curve (it's actually being a little generous.)

I think you'd have to define using the rules to their advantage. 40k isn't an indepth system, and the majority of decisions are made in the list building stages. Anyone with an ability to work the most basic of statistics can see what units are good, make sure they have threat saturation, and go from there. I would say 3 in 10 don't have the ability to do this, and depending on your meta more or less may opt not to.
Figuring out how a deathstar operates, for example, is using the rules to help you, but anyone can do that given google and a short amount of time. There is little the enemy can stop it.

It takes more than good shooting to win games.

Making proper use of cover, target priority, choosing the right psychic powers, knowing the AV for enemy tanks, placing fortifications, making use of buildings, understanding terrain, knowing how to take and hold strategic points, making full use of cards in Maelstrom games, good deployments, knowing your opponent's armies and special rules, making effective use of psychic dice, etc. These are some of the the fundamentals I see too many people lacking in when the bring competitive lists. They count on some tricks working with their lists and don't know what to do when something doesn't go right.

Akiasura wrote:

 techsoldaten wrote:

Most of the people I see running competitive lists tend to have bought clones of armies they heard won at NOVA or LVO, and thus lack some skills either with the army or 40k in general. Their armies tend to be hastily assembled and they have a tendency to overestimate / underestimate what they can do with them.

Depends on competitive. Since the meta shifts so rapidly due to whatever region you are in, which is a symptom of house ruling the game differently all the time, it would be absurd to copy a list. Back in the day, this was the case since comp wasn't really heavily encouraged, and op lists dominated the boards. Nowadays it is different, with the strongest lists being told they probably won't be able to find games.
So anyone copying is probably from an older generation of the game. It doesn't work.
That being said, in an anything goes match, an OP list can be unstoppable. Admech lance I believe it is called? It's absurdly hard to defeat as I understand, looking at the rules. No one in my meta is...encouraged to run it though

Yes, an OP list can be unstoppable. All I am saying is it has to be in the right hands.

Akiasura wrote:

 techsoldaten wrote:

Of course, your standards and mine could be completely different. But I would put experience over an OP list any day.

Part of experience is building an OP list in the first place.

I have a feeling you aren't well versed in the idea of match ups.
In a match up, you would say someone has 70:30 odds. This doesn't mean one person is going to win, that means that, given equal player skill, one player will win 70% of the time. It's an arbitrary number that denotes how much greater a player you must be to overcome this inherent disadvantage.
In the past, armies had certain match ups that favored and disfavored them, with the stronger being armies that had more in the former column then the latter. That doesn't mean it can not be won, it just means that it likely won't.
The new eldar codex, for example, has a 80:20 match up against bad dexes, 70:30 against normal ones, and probably 60:40 against good dexes. Against certain lists that are really OP and combine allies from several dexes to achieve it, it is probably 50:50. I would argue that it has no bad match ups at all.
In a tournament setting, the only list that matches it is heavily comped, while the Eldar codex will not be (outside of the ranged D thing, which I am not sure how that'll go).

Yeah, it's important to know what units to choose. I can't argue against that and bring multiple lists with me to the FLGS to handle different opponents.

I have no clue where those numbers come from and don't really care what they mean. All I know is that you can't buy an army and just win. 40k doesn't work that way.

Akiasura wrote:
If you feel that only 30% of players can use the rules well, and many just copy the lists off the internet, you are probably in a terrible meta. Warmachine is a big thing in my area. We have people who actively try to qualify for the WTC. My main opponent has played in GT's back in the day (5th), and he is not alone in this regard.
I can not assume I am so much better that I can overcome a 80:20 match up because my opponents are not terrible players. I could play eldar or another army, I own most, but Alpha Legion is my favorite. It would take a lot to pull me from Cryxing for the rest of the year.

That's awesome! Sounds like you are in a great location with lots of very competitive players.

But most of the people I see playing 40k (about 70%) have only been at it a few years and don't have a good grasp of the rules for armies other than their own. I would not chalk this up to the local meta, it's been my experience when traveling too. It takes a remarkably long time for most people to really get a good grasp of the game, with the understanding there are many exceptions that prove the rule.

I suspect this has nothing to do with the local meta, and really just means our standards for what makes a good player are very, very different.

Does GW still "Apocalypse" from "non-Apocalypse" any more? As I understand it, it's all 40k. Flyers are everywhere. Superheavies and D weapons are in Codex: Knights; Gargantuans and D weapons are in Codex: Eldar. Assume Guard will get Superheavies, and Nids will get Gargantuans as well. And Orks, definitely the big Stompa. All 40k.

I don't want Eldar gone I just want them all wimpy and soft like their supposed to be.

 chazz huggins wrote:
I don't want Eldar gone I just want them all wimpy and soft like their supposed to be.

Except they're not. They have ancient, super powerful weaponry. They're a T3 army at its base, but their strength is in their mobility and weaponry.

I can't believe the kneejerk reactions to this codex. I for one am excited for the challenge.

 Robisagg wrote:

 chazz huggins wrote:
I don't want Eldar gone I just want them all wimpy and soft like their supposed to be.

Except they're not. They have ancient, super powerful weaponry. They're a T3 army at its base, but their strength is in their mobility and weaponry.

I can't believe the kneejerk reactions to this codex. I for one am excited for the challenge.

On tabletop, they're t4, t6 and t8 army, however. With just a handful of t3 guyz in serpents.

 koooaei wrote:

 Robisagg wrote:

 chazz huggins wrote:
I don't want Eldar gone I just want them all wimpy and soft like their supposed to be.

Except they're not. They have ancient, super powerful weaponry. They're a T3 army at its base, but their strength is in their mobility and weaponry.

I can't believe the kneejerk reactions to this codex. I for one am excited for the challenge.

On tabletop, they're t4, t6 and t8 army, however. With just a handful of t3 guyz in serpents.

Blame the game. So is everyone. When was the last time you saw non-vehicle models deployed on the table that weren't Artillery, Bikes, or Necrons?

 AnomanderRake wrote:

 koooaei wrote:

 Robisagg wrote:

 chazz huggins wrote:
I don't want Eldar gone I just want them all wimpy and soft like their supposed to be.

Except they're not. They have ancient, super powerful weaponry. They're a T3 army at its base, but their strength is in their mobility and weaponry.

I can't believe the kneejerk reactions to this codex. I for one am excited for the challenge.

On tabletop, they're t4, t6 and t8 army, however. With just a handful of t3 guyz in serpents.

Blame the game. So is everyone. When was the last time you saw non-vehicle models deployed on the table that weren't Artillery, Bikes, or Necrons?

Orks, CSM (murderpack or 20-strong infiltration squads with cypher), IG platoons, Daemonkin, BA, Harlequins...there really ARE good options that fit the spirit of their armies.

Eldar don't feel so near-extinct Glass-hammers as they probably should. They simply feel like hammers. Huge ass hammers without downsides.

This is probably the stupidest thread I have read all day. Man up and face it as a challenge. The dex isn't even out and people are freaking out.

 Daemon Dave wrote:
This is probably the stupidest thread I have read all day. Man up and face it as a challenge. The dex isn't even out and people are freaking out.

People are freaking out because what's been shown so far is drastically more powerful than anything other armies have access to.
Can you name a dex you think isn't weaker than the new Eldar?

Experiment 626 wrote:

 Talys wrote:

 Vaktathi wrote:
How are 80% of the Eldar models "out of date"?

The overwhelmingly vast majority of models are only like 8 years old (not much older than most staple Imperial kits and *way* newer than most IG infantry) and many are only a couple of years old. Meanwhile, their only remaining truly "old" units were Jetbikes and the tanks, the Jetbikes are now new and the tanks still look fine.

The only issue Eldar have is just lots of Aspect Warriors still being Finecast. Their overall range isn't particularly old.

Just compare the Eldar models to Dark Eldar. But let's do it --

- Guardians and Vaul are junk; the level of detail with them compared to any modern kit is awful.
- Every HQ is either Metal or Finecast, except except the new Autarch and 1 Farseer model
- Finecast: Fire Dragons, Howling Banshees, Warp Spiders, Swooping Hawks, every Farseer but one, Warlocks, Rangers. These are monopose models to boot.
- Vypers compared to Harlequin and Dark Eldar versions look dinky
- They have essentially 1 tank; Fire Prism, Night Spinners and Falcons are the same model. Wave Serpents are almost the same chassis.
- War Walkers are ok-ish, but nothing exciting
- 2 nice jets that are similar
- 3 nice wraith models - Wraithguard, Wraithlords, Wraithknights


To given an example of moderness of plastic, Assault Marines are old crap. Death Company are sweet new plastic. Of all the factions, Eldar have the least sweet new plastic.

Just compare proportions to: Necron, Tyranid, Harlequins, Dark Eldar, Tau, Orks, Guard, CSM and of course, the gold standard, Space Marines. Out of all the playable factions, only Chaos Demons and Sisters have a higher percentage of dated models (nobody can beat them, since it's 100%).

To be fair, Chaos Marines look like absolute wet rodent gak compared to the Eldar range... Sure they've got the most mono-pose models next to Sisters, but at those models look damn pretty!

Chaos Marines have the most hideous model line, and not in the good way either, as well as almost as much Finecrap as Eldar...

I mean, have you seen the thousand son upgrade pack, let's try putting finecast parts on your plastic model and not bother to check if the parts are the right size.

LordBlades wrote:

 Daemon Dave wrote:
This is probably the stupidest thread I have read all day. Man up and face it as a challenge. The dex isn't even out and people are freaking out.

People are freaking out because what's been shown so far is drastically more powerful than anything other armies have access to.
Can you name a dex you think isn't weaker than the new Eldar?

We as no one has seen the codex and no one has even played it yet then no we can't. This is the same everytime a codex comes out. It was the same with the Necrons. So people won't play against each other because they don't wanna have a tough match they would prefer an easy one.

Well that's an expected response from Waac player. The new codex is not out yet. I am an eldar player and if you look at both the lvo tournament and adepticon where there were 6 and 5 eldar forces and not pure eldar I may add in the top 20. Let's see the new codex and then let's see how the tournaments pan out before getting your knickers in a twist. Surely fun is not winning but meeting new players who appreciate the hobby and gaming aspect of 40k as much as ourselves. And I don't care how op an army is what wins tournaments is making less mistakes than your opponent and having luck with the dice at the right time.so ban eldar but you will lose something from the game and those players will still beat you with a different force.

 Talys wrote:

WayneTheGame wrote:

That also comes to around $480 (!!) if anyone was wondering, just to make a jab at how high the prices are.

Wow... are you sure that was $480? If so, they were actually more expensive then, than they are now. The total price right now would be $409 MSRP:

Farseer & Warlocks $33
20 Guardians $73
Rangers $33
Wraithguard $50
6 Jetbikes $60
2 Vypers $60
Fire Prism $50
2 Falcons $50

You can either have the plastic Farseer and 1 metal warlock, or the box with finecast farseer + 3 warlocks at the that price, and for $15 more, you can have an extra Vyper (by buying the squad box).

Might have miscalculated. Still, that's a big chunk of cash for what is likely a starting army around 12xx points!

 Daemon Dave wrote:

LordBlades wrote:

 Daemon Dave wrote:
This is probably the stupidest thread I have read all day. Man up and face it as a challenge. The dex isn't even out and people are freaking out.

People are freaking out because what's been shown so far is drastically more powerful than anything other armies have access to.
Can you name a dex you think isn't weaker than the new Eldar?

We as no one has seen the codex and no one has even played it yet then no we can't. This is the same everytime a codex comes out. It was the same with the Necrons. So people won't play against each other because they don't wanna have a tough match they would prefer an easy one.

Actually, we have seen the codex, or at least very large parts of it.

Just because you haven't doesn't mean everyone else hasn't either.


Also, people don't want easy matches, they want tough matches for both sides. If one side is having the toughest game of their life but the other side is just taking their cake for a walk in the park then that isn't fair, at all.

 A Town Called Malus wrote:

 Daemon Dave wrote:

LordBlades wrote:

 Daemon Dave wrote:
This is probably the stupidest thread I have read all day. Man up and face it as a challenge. The dex isn't even out and people are freaking out.

People are freaking out because what's been shown so far is drastically more powerful than anything other armies have access to.
Can you name a dex you think isn't weaker than the new Eldar?

We as no one has seen the codex and no one has even played it yet then no we can't. This is the same everytime a codex comes out. It was the same with the Necrons. So people won't play against each other because they don't wanna have a tough match they would prefer an easy one.

Actually, we have seen the codex, or at least very large parts of it.

Just because you haven't doesn't mean everyone else hasn't either.


Also, people don't want easy matches, they want tough matches for both sides. If one side is having the toughest game of their life but the other side is just taking their cake for a walk in the park then that isn't fair, at all.

No, you have seen "leaked images". I recall a couple years back "leaked images" for the 6th edition rulebook, included a new stat that affected rolling to hit. Amazing how nothing from those leaks actually made it into the rulebook.

Richy1971 wrote:
Well that's an expected response from Waac player. The new codex is not out yet. I am an eldar player and if you look at both the lvo tournament and adepticon where there were 6 and 5 eldar forces and not pure eldar I may add in the top 20. Let's see the new codex and then let's see how the tournaments pan out before getting your knickers in a twist. Surely fun is not winning but meeting new players who appreciate the hobby and gaming aspect of 40k as much as ourselves. And I don't care how op an army is what wins tournaments is making less mistakes than your opponent and having luck with the dice at the right time.so ban eldar but you will lose something from the game and those players will still beat you with a different force.

Having a more powerful army than your opponent, especially in the way that this Eldar codex is shaping up to be, makes individual mistakes mean less than similar mistakes for a different army.

Also, rolling way more dice limits luck and brings it more into the realm of statistics. So far it seems like the Eldar are not going to have any problem with being able to roll Ork amounts of dice, but at higher BS and strength.


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 Happyjew wrote:

 A Town Called Malus wrote:

 Daemon Dave wrote:

LordBlades wrote:

 Daemon Dave wrote:
This is probably the stupidest thread I have read all day. Man up and face it as a challenge. The dex isn't even out and people are freaking out.

People are freaking out because what's been shown so far is drastically more powerful than anything other armies have access to.
Can you name a dex you think isn't weaker than the new Eldar?

We as no one has seen the codex and no one has even played it yet then no we can't. This is the same everytime a codex comes out. It was the same with the Necrons. So people won't play against each other because they don't wanna have a tough match they would prefer an easy one.

Actually, we have seen the codex, or at least very large parts of it.

Just because you haven't doesn't mean everyone else hasn't either.


Also, people don't want easy matches, they want tough matches for both sides. If one side is having the toughest game of their life but the other side is just taking their cake for a walk in the park then that isn't fair, at all.

No, you have seen "leaked images". I recall a couple years back "leaked images" for the 6th edition rulebook, included a new stat that affected rolling to hit. Amazing how nothing from those leaks actually made it into the rulebook.

Leaked images of a man, holding the Eldar codex. And, you know, the white dwarf which said about the scatter lasers... And GWs page which says that the bikes can all have scatter lasers...

 techsoldaten wrote:

Akiasura wrote:

With the absurd range on the guns, destructive ability of the guns, and overall power level of the guns, the codex will be dangerous in anyone's hands. More than any other dex, considering the lack of bad units in the dex that a bad player would take.
The necron codex with the new formation is very strong, but is good in anyone's hand. You pretty much push the wraiths forward and hide the spyder.

Army lists tend to come in 2 varieties in most table top games. They either ask questions or answer questions. The ones that ask questions don't require nearly as much tactical work as the ones that answer questions. This is true in 40k, WMH, infinity, and most of the games I have seen.
The necron codex asks "Can you kill all my absurdly tough guys before they reach your lines?"
The SM codex asks "Can you stop my deathstar from destroying your army?"
The new Eldar codex asks "Can you withstand my shooting?"
It's easy to build this question from the army book compared to say, daemons, who are a strong army that requires a bit more work.

You make it sound so easy for someone to pick up and army and master the rules. I don't know if this is true for everyone.

It should take around 10 games. This is a pretty small learning curve compared to shooting games, fighting games, MOBAs, and other table tops.

 techsoldaten wrote:

Akiasura wrote:

 techsoldaten wrote:

If that requires some kind of evidence, assume I am just a boastful jerk, consider your own experiences and go from there. I would say it's only about 3 out of every 10 players I meet really know how to use the rules to their advantage, which would correspond with the upper end of a bell curve (it's actually being a little generous.)

I think you'd have to define using the rules to their advantage. 40k isn't an indepth system, and the majority of decisions are made in the list building stages. Anyone with an ability to work the most basic of statistics can see what units are good, make sure they have threat saturation, and go from there. I would say 3 in 10 don't have the ability to do this, and depending on your meta more or less may opt not to.
Figuring out how a deathstar operates, for example, is using the rules to help you, but anyone can do that given google and a short amount of time. There is little the enemy can stop it.

It takes more than good shooting to win games.

Making proper use of cover, target priority, choosing the right psychic powers, knowing the AV for enemy tanks, placing fortifications, making use of buildings, understanding terrain, knowing how to take and hold strategic points, making full use of cards in Maelstrom games, good deployments, knowing your opponent's armies and special rules, making effective use of psychic dice, etc. These are some of the the fundamentals I see too many people lacking in when the bring competitive lists. They count on some tricks working with their lists and don't know what to do when something doesn't go right.

Proper use of cover requires you to just be in cover. And don't bunch up if the enemy has blast templates.
Target priority is knowing what the weapons in the enemy list do and which units can hurt which model. There are few stats in this game and they are on a small scale, this doesn't take long to master either. The spammy nature of 40k means generally there are 1-3 main threats in an enemy army and you need to destroy it. With death stars it's even easier, just difficult to do anything. You have won or list in list building.
You don't get to chose psychic powers, they are randomly generated. If you mean disciplines, there are a few good ones (about 2-3) that are always amazing for any army and the rest are pretty bad.
The next 3 points are terrain which, again, mostly just require you to be in it.
Maelstrom cards are completely random and can not be planned for. Sometimes your enemy doesn't even have fliers for example. If your army is fast, and the best ones are, it's easier to grab them. This isn't infinity.
Good deployments are somewhat difficult to master and take a few games. Maybe 5-6. People who complain against drop pod armies usually are bad at deployments.
Psychic dice are also easy and requires a basic understanding of probability. If you only need 1-2 powers it becomes even easier. How the phase works is complicated but the system itself is easy. Defense is almost completely random and you usually have one spell you must stop, so you save it for that.

This is nothing complicated, like order of activation, when do I feat, how do I spread out my orders, memorizing an entire map, knowing how to jungle, or any other game I've played. 40k is a very tactically shallow game.

 techsoldaten wrote:

Akiasura wrote:

 techsoldaten wrote:

Most of the people I see running competitive lists tend to have bought clones of armies they heard won at NOVA or LVO, and thus lack some skills either with the army or 40k in general. Their armies tend to be hastily assembled and they have a tendency to overestimate / underestimate what they can do with them.

Depends on competitive. Since the meta shifts so rapidly due to whatever region you are in, which is a symptom of house ruling the game differently all the time, it would be absurd to copy a list. Back in the day, this was the case since comp wasn't really heavily encouraged, and op lists dominated the boards. Nowadays it is different, with the strongest lists being told they probably won't be able to find games.
So anyone copying is probably from an older generation of the game. It doesn't work.
That being said, in an anything goes match, an OP list can be unstoppable. Admech lance I believe it is called? It's absurdly hard to defeat as I understand, looking at the rules. No one in my meta is...encouraged to run it though

Yes, an OP list can be unstoppable. All I am saying is it has to be in the right hands.

If it's unstoppable it doesn't have to be in the right hands. It will create a 80:20 match up, or slightly better, against most lists.
The fact a good player doesn't know what a match up means is really just a statement of how tactically shallow 40k is. Any other competitive game, nearly every player would know what that term refers to.

 techsoldaten wrote:

Akiasura wrote:

 techsoldaten wrote:

Of course, your standards and mine could be completely different. But I would put experience over an OP list any day.

Part of experience is building an OP list in the first place.

I have a feeling you aren't well versed in the idea of match ups.
In a match up, you would say someone has 70:30 odds. This doesn't mean one person is going to win, that means that, given equal player skill, one player will win 70% of the time. It's an arbitrary number that denotes how much greater a player you must be to overcome this inherent disadvantage.
In the past, armies had certain match ups that favored and disfavored them, with the stronger being armies that had more in the former column then the latter. That doesn't mean it can not be won, it just means that it likely won't.
The new eldar codex, for example, has a 80:20 match up against bad dexes, 70:30 against normal ones, and probably 60:40 against good dexes. Against certain lists that are really OP and combine allies from several dexes to achieve it, it is probably 50:50. I would argue that it has no bad match ups at all.
In a tournament setting, the only list that matches it is heavily comped, while the Eldar codex will not be (outside of the ranged D thing, which I am not sure how that'll go).

Yeah, it's important to know what units to choose. I can't argue against that and bring multiple lists with me to the FLGS to handle different opponents.

I have no clue where those numbers come from and don't really care what they mean. All I know is that you can't buy an army and just win. 40k doesn't work that way.

40k has worked that way across it's entire existence. Editions are defined by what was the most competitive list at the time, not who were the best players like you see in other games.
Again, you don't understand what a matchup is, so it's hard to have a discussion about how competitive something is when you don't have the jargon down.
Leaf blower, rhino rush, 5e grey knights, falcon spam, Siren bomb. The names of the lists have nicknames. In other games the players have nicknames, like JVM, M2K, Boss.
It shows you what players focus on when they talk about the game.
In older editions no one brought multiple lists for matchups. You brought your TAC list, and were a WAAC player if you brought multiple lists. It suggested tailoring.

 techsoldaten wrote:

Akiasura wrote:
If you feel that only 30% of players can use the rules well, and many just copy the lists off the internet, you are probably in a terrible meta. Warmachine is a big thing in my area. We have people who actively try to qualify for the WTC. My main opponent has played in GT's back in the day (5th), and he is not alone in this regard.
I can not assume I am so much better that I can overcome a 80:20 match up because my opponents are not terrible players. I could play eldar or another army, I own most, but Alpha Legion is my favorite. It would take a lot to pull me from Cryxing for the rest of the year.

That's awesome! Sounds like you are in a great location with lots of very competitive players.

But most of the people I see playing 40k (about 70%) have only been at it a few years and don't have a good grasp of the rules for armies other than their own. I would not chalk this up to the local meta, it's been my experience when traveling too. It takes a remarkably long time for most people to really get a good grasp of the game, with the understanding there are many exceptions that prove the rule.

I suspect this has nothing to do with the local meta, and really just means our standards for what makes a good player are very, very different.

I have played games across most of the eastern seaboard in the united states and most of europe. I have found that, with the exception of totally new players, people rarely make mistakes outside of rolling poorly. In 7th sometimes combinations of units create things that players didn't foresee (knowing what your enemy can do has become impossible for many of us, who own 3-4 armies at least), but that is in the list building stage.
Do you play any other e-sports or table tops? 40k may seem complicated if it's all you do, it was when I started back in 3rd, but it isn't even as deep a game as Super Smash Bros or MvC3.
When people enter warmachine, we tell them it'll take 40-50 games before they start winning against anyone but a completely new player. If they were playing 40k, it'll take longer, as they have many bad habits they need to break.
In 40k, we tell them it'll be about a month if they do 2 games a week. This has been true for pretty much every edition of the game. 2nd might have been longer, necromunda and gorkamorka seem complicated, but I didn't play in 2nd.

 Morachi wrote:
To be fair, we've seen a number of armies have their few years in the past as well. At the current rate armies are getting new codex books released, others should come up to par in the near future - or at least the duration of power should cycle more frequently at the very least. The beauty of the Eldar is there are so many options you can mix up a list each time so the opponent doesn't feel like its a constant barrage of serpent spam or whatever the current flavour is at the time.

Except that's not what happens in practice.

Akiasura wrote:

I have played games across most of the eastern seaboard in the united states and most of europe. I have found that, with the exception of totally new players, people rarely make mistakes outside of rolling poorly. In 7th sometimes combinations of units create things that players didn't foresee (knowing what your enemy can do has become impossible for many of us, who own 3-4 armies at least), but that is in the list building stage.
Do you play any other e-sports or table tops? 40k may seem complicated if it's all you do, it was when I started back in 3rd, but it isn't even as deep a game as Super Smash Bros or MvC3.
When people enter warmachine, we tell them it'll take 40-50 games before they start winning against anyone but a completely new player. If they were playing 40k, it'll take longer, as they have many bad habits they need to break.
In 40k, we tell them it'll be about a month if they do 2 games a week. This has been true for pretty much every edition of the game. 2nd might have been longer, necromunda and gorkamorka seem complicated, but I didn't play in 2nd.

This. 40k requires almost no skill and is very easily mastered. If you want to talk about the skill element, play warmahordes, which is several orders of magnitude more tactically in depth than 40k. The most "basic" skill for warmahordes is to reel in your opponent's caster with a piece he thinks its integral to your combo, then using spells to traverse across terrain, assassinate him using a combination of 2-4 different units linked together. Yes, this is pretty much basic, and 40k doesn't even have a fraction of the strategy required.

40k? Shoot his assaulters, assault his shooters. Use low AP for the appropriate save, or high volume of shots, deepstrike/pod in your anti-tank/heavy infantry units near units you want gone, and done. Perhaps the only decision you have to make is whether to hide in terrain to get a coversave, or to run around in the open, which isn't even an issue most of the time, given the high AS of units around. Don't stick your valuable units out too far, attack via the weaker flanks, get rid of his annoying units without risking yours too much if possible, etc.

Even starcraft has far harder micro than 40k, and its a RTS, with players making 100 - 200 actions per minute. 40k lets you think and slowly move your units around, and you barely make 30 actions over 3 hours. This means starcraft players are 900 times faster. Not only that, they deal with a constantly changing "meta" unlike 40k, where an armylist is WYSIWYG.

People keep bandying about how 40k requires skill, your local meta is bad, players are crap, etc. If what you say is true, pray, tell me what tactics and what considerations you need to make in 40k.

The most telling thing is 40k "tactics" are all armylisting, rather than how to actually use the units.