Forum adverts like this one are shown to any user who is not logged in. Join us by filling out a tiny 3 field form and you will get your own, free, dakka user account which gives a good range of benefits to you: No adverts like this in the forums anymore. Times and dates in your local timezone. Full tracking of what you have read so you can skip to your first unread post, easily see what has changed since you last logged in, and easily see what is new at a glance. Email notifications for threads you want to watch closely. Being a part of the oldest wargaming community on the net. If you are already a member then feel free to login now.

 TheKbob wrote:
You play with optimal lists because there's literally no reason not to.

Other than the fact that most Eldar layers aren't going to own 30 jetbikes and 3-5 Wraithknights.

Some will eventually, but assuming they will, or already do, is like assuming all Space Marine players own 30 bikers, or Necron Players will own 30 tomb blades and 15 wraiths.

 adamsouza wrote:

 TheKbob wrote:
You play with optimal lists because there's literally no reason not to.

Other than the fact that most Eldar layers aren't going to own 30 jetbikes and 3-5 Wraithknights.

Some will eventually, but assuming they will, or already do, is like assuming all Space Marine players own 30 bikers, or Necron Players will own 30 tomb blades and 15 wraiths.

I have 4 wraithknights and 30 jetbikes >.> I had them before the codex update but thats beside the point >.>

 TheKbob wrote:
You play with optimal lists because there's literally no reason not to.

What about those who play with 'sub-optimal' units, because they are more fun for them to use?

 TheKbob wrote:
You play with optimal lists because there's literally no reason not to.

Do some players have that attitude? Absolutely. Will you possibly run into players with that attitude and will they trounce you with Eldar? Absolutely. Did Eldar really change anything in this regard? Not a single thing.

You could be "That guy" by bringing 3 Riptides to a game at your local store. You could be "That guy" by bringing Imperial Knights to a game where you know your friend really can't defeat them. You could be "That guy" by bringing 4 Flying Hive Tyrants. Now you can be "That guy" by bringing 30 freaking Jetbikes. Nothing has changed. But the sky isn't falling. Like the OP indicated. Eldar are powerful. Eldar will have some hugely awesome stuff in their arsenal, and they might be harder to beat than some army. But just because your opponent puts Eldar on the table doesn't mean they're automatically going to blow you off the table.

There are LOTS of reasons not to play optimal lists. If you're a "I MUST WIN THIS GAME" type of guy, then I just feel bad for you. What kind of player are you if all you want to do is WIN. Unless you're at a tournament, both you and your opponent have invested tons of time and effort into building, painting and then playing your two armies. If you can't have fun unless you blow him off the table, then that's your problem. For me, personally the BEST games of 40k are the games where it comes down to the LAST TURN. Both of you are losing troops left and right, you only have a couple units left, and you have to hold onto that last objective, or kill that last enemy hero, or destroy that one vehicle to pull out a win. I'd REALLY feel like a dick if I built a 30 Jetbike with 2 Wraithknight army and shot my friend off the table in 3 turns. I've just wasted his time. However, I'd have felt equally like a dick if I did that same thing with 3 riptides. Eldar changes NOTHING. Fighting Eldar will be an uphill battle for some armies. Yup. I play Orks. ANY battle is an uphill battle for me. That's how the game works. But you can still get great games out of it.

I played Eldar throughout 6th Edition. I don't own more than two Wave Serpents. I have a Wraithknight sitting in a closet I haven't assembled yet. Why? Because I play Biel Tan. I use the Avatar. I use lots of Aspect Warriors. I use the Night Spinner. I use Vypers. Those aren't optimal! Why don't I use my Wraithknight? Well because I'm having FUN. I'm using the models I want to play with, and I enjoy building fluffy Biel Tan lists.

When I picked up Warhammer 40k 10 years ago I picked up Orks and my best friend played Space Marines. All he had to do to defeat me was bring a Landraider. I didn't have any models to kill it. He owned 3 Landraiders. He never once brought a Landraider against my Orks. WHY? It's certainly not OPTIMAL for him to do that. Why did he do it?

So we'd have a BETTER GAME for Christ's sake.

I don't think in reality there are many "I ONLY play to win" people just as in reality there aren't many "I don't care AT ALL if I win or lose". I think the reality is most people lie somewhere in the middle.

The fethed up thing about 40k is that if you want a close game, you pretty much have to tailor your army to do that. If you're Eldar, you take some of your bad/mediocre units. If you're Tyranids/Orks/IG/etc, you take all your best units, then hope that it balances out when you actually meet on the table.

This is an all round sucky situation IMO. The desirable thing is that building the best possible armies from each codex would result in close games, then if you want to make things harder on yourself you tone it down. NOT have one army that must take the mediocre troops to balance off against another army's best troops.

To me it's kind of like saying you're going to race a Prius against a Corvette.... but the Corvette you'll only use 2nd and 5th gears, not allow the RPM over 4000RPM, use horrible wet weather tires on a dry track while the Prius uses slicks. You might be able to produce a closer race that way, but no one is being deluded in to thinking the Prius and the Corvette are a good match.

The light is a train. A d train with a few dozen sprinkled scatter lasers to go with them.

The best reason not to play optimal lists is that they are thematically stupid. Stated less abrasively , this is to say that, due primarily to poor GW balancing, the optimal lists are generally the lists that would never happen, or exceedingly rarely happen, in an actual battle in the admittedly completely fictional 40K universe.

They are also the same thing over and over and thus exceedingly boring.

Now if I were playing for money and not treating it as an exercise in fantasy primarily, I would have the opposite opinion of course.

You guys, you were all worrying about nothing and your fears were stupid- I threw some scatter bikes at another player and he didn't *literally* die, so I think we can drop to DEFCON 5. There is obviously nothing wrong with this book.

@Alcibiades: are you saying Samhainn jetbike armies, a staple of the game as long as it's been around, are stupid?

Samhain may have 30+ jetbikes, but they probably woouldn't have 5 Wraithknights

All bike=fluffy
All wraith=fluffy
Mix of both in large amounts=not so much

 Nevelon wrote:
All bike=fluffy
All wraith=fluffy
Mix of both in large amounts=not so much

Pretty much what I was thinking

 adamsouza wrote:

 Nevelon wrote:
All bike=fluffy
All wraith=fluffy
Mix of both in large amounts=not so much

Pretty much what I was thinking

I have an army from craftworld Sian-Te-Jianshi. (A world of my own making! Narrative forging!)
And they specialize in lots of bikes, wraiths and WK's!
Very fluffy.

Also, every bike just happens to have the most viable all around weapon, as opposed to having barebones harassment bikes and shuriken cannons scattered around in addition to the scatter lasers is kind of lame as well.

 MWHistorian wrote:

 adamsouza wrote:

 Nevelon wrote:
All bike=fluffy
All wraith=fluffy
Mix of both in large amounts=not so much

Pretty much what I was thinking

I have an army from craftworld Sian-Te-Jianshi. (A world of my own making! Narrative forging!)
And they specialize in lots of bikes, wraiths and WK's!
Very fluffy.

See, what happens is the Eldar who fall off their jetbikes obviously die, and in death they wish to repent for being bad riders. They are given the chance by the farseers who bind them to wraith constructs, allowing them to come back and defend their fellow riders against those who would do them harm.

If you don't like that reasoning, well then you're just a fluff-hating WAACo.

Besides all that, I don't want to run just bikes- that's too spammy and I want to be fair to my opponents, so I mix it up with a couple of wraith guard and wraithknights. How can you possibly fault me for that?

No army has an over arcing theme to its military force deployment composition nor does any real military. Militaries will always try to deploy what is best for any given situation.

An what is best is apparently a ton of wraithknights and scatbikers.

Murrdox wrote:

 TheKbob wrote:
You play with optimal lists because there's literally no reason not to.

Do some players have that attitude? Absolutely. Will you possibly run into players with that attitude and will they trounce you with Eldar? Absolutely. Did Eldar really change anything in this regard? Not a single thing.

You could be "That guy" by bringing 3 Riptides to a game at your local store. You could be "That guy" by bringing Imperial Knights to a game where you know your friend really can't defeat them. You could be "That guy" by bringing 4 Flying Hive Tyrants. Now you can be "That guy" by bringing 30 freaking Jetbikes. Nothing has changed. But the sky isn't falling. Like the OP indicated. Eldar are powerful. Eldar will have some hugely awesome stuff in their arsenal, and they might be harder to beat than some army. But just because your opponent puts Eldar on the table doesn't mean they're automatically going to blow you off the table.

There are LOTS of reasons not to play optimal lists. If you're a "I MUST WIN THIS GAME" type of guy, then I just feel bad for you. What kind of player are you if all you want to do is WIN. Unless you're at a tournament, both you and your opponent have invested tons of time and effort into building, painting and then playing your two armies. If you can't have fun unless you blow him off the table, then that's your problem. For me, personally the BEST games of 40k are the games where it comes down to the LAST TURN. Both of you are losing troops left and right, you only have a couple units left, and you have to hold onto that last objective, or kill that last enemy hero, or destroy that one vehicle to pull out a win. I'd REALLY feel like a dick if I built a 30 Jetbike with 2 Wraithknight army and shot my friend off the table in 3 turns. I've just wasted his time. However, I'd have felt equally like a dick if I did that same thing with 3 riptides. Eldar changes NOTHING. Fighting Eldar will be an uphill battle for some armies. Yup. I play Orks. ANY battle is an uphill battle for me. That's how the game works. But you can still get great games out of it.

I played Eldar throughout 6th Edition. I don't own more than two Wave Serpents. I have a Wraithknight sitting in a closet I haven't assembled yet. Why? Because I play Biel Tan. I use the Avatar. I use lots of Aspect Warriors. I use the Night Spinner. I use Vypers. Those aren't optimal! Why don't I use my Wraithknight? Well because I'm having FUN. I'm using the models I want to play with, and I enjoy building fluffy Biel Tan lists.

When I picked up Warhammer 40k 10 years ago I picked up Orks and my best friend played Space Marines. All he had to do to defeat me was bring a Landraider. I didn't have any models to kill it. He owned 3 Landraiders. He never once brought a Landraider against my Orks. WHY? It's certainly not OPTIMAL for him to do that. Why did he do it?

So we'd have a BETTER GAME for Christ's sake.

Have an exalt!
"Take the filthiest list you can, what other way is there to play?" Umm how about a scenario driven game with a mate or a fluff based army list. I almost never play competitively, I like winning sure but I also like to have a more fluff based list. Heck I'm going to sell my ass to the devil and say "I play for beer and pretzels, I like to forge the narrative."

Now don't get me wrong, I'm not being a GW apologist here, if GW wrote balanced rules EVERYONE would win. Both competitive and fluffy players would be able to play the game to their liking out of the box without need for comp or house rulings.

To state that to take the most broken options and combos in the codex, is the only way to play is both narrow minded and ignorant.

I've said this once, and I'll say it a million more times: these rule imbalances are NEVER about the characture donkeycave player that brings all wraithknights and serpent spam and has "I WANT TO WIN" tattooed across his face- those people are only a dime a dozen. What this imbalance IS about is the shades of grey army lists get into, where you have to now have a confrontation with another player of what you perceived to be unreasonable vs. what he/she perceives to be unreasonable. The subjective differences can be absolutely huge, and in a game where players are dropping generally between $135 and $185 in rules alone (not counting the $500+ army itself), this becomes a *big* problem.

What this is doing is killing the ubiquity of 40k, what many consider to be its absolute greatest strength. Players now have to spend a significant amount of the pre-planning excluding content from the game, which almost always has a negative connotation to it, especially if the other player disagrees. The game is less and less about squad-based skirmish and more big unit conflict, where those $50 (EDIT: $63) unit of Meganobz gets splatted immediately by D-ranged wraithknights. GW thought that if they got rid of Epic, they could just dump everything from that game into 40k. I think this was a tremendous mistake in understanding what players wanted from the game, and if this continues all we will have left one day are groups of very rich players who don't mind dropping thousands on a latest and greatest product. And THAT will be something so much less than 40k of the past.

Murrdox wrote:

 TheKbob wrote:
You play with optimal lists because there's literally no reason not to.

Do some players have that attitude? Absolutely. Will you possibly run into players with that attitude and will they trounce you with Eldar? Absolutely. Did Eldar really change anything in this regard? Not a single thing.

You could be "That guy" by bringing 3 Riptides to a game at your local store. You could be "That guy" by bringing Imperial Knights to a game where you know your friend really can't defeat them. You could be "That guy" by bringing 4 Flying Hive Tyrants. Now you can be "That guy" by bringing 30 freaking Jetbikes. Nothing has changed. But the sky isn't falling. Like the OP indicated. Eldar are powerful. Eldar will have some hugely awesome stuff in their arsenal, and they might be harder to beat than some army. But just because your opponent puts Eldar on the table doesn't mean they're automatically going to blow you off the table.

There are LOTS of reasons not to play optimal lists. If you're a "I MUST WIN THIS GAME" type of guy, then I just feel bad for you. What kind of player are you if all you want to do is WIN. Unless you're at a tournament, both you and your opponent have invested tons of time and effort into building, painting and then playing your two armies. If you can't have fun unless you blow him off the table, then that's your problem. For me, personally the BEST games of 40k are the games where it comes down to the LAST TURN. Both of you are losing troops left and right, you only have a couple units left, and you have to hold onto that last objective, or kill that last enemy hero, or destroy that one vehicle to pull out a win. I'd REALLY feel like a dick if I built a 30 Jetbike with 2 Wraithknight army and shot my friend off the table in 3 turns. I've just wasted his time. However, I'd have felt equally like a dick if I did that same thing with 3 riptides. Eldar changes NOTHING. Fighting Eldar will be an uphill battle for some armies. Yup. I play Orks. ANY battle is an uphill battle for me. That's how the game works. But you can still get great games out of it.

I played Eldar throughout 6th Edition. I don't own more than two Wave Serpents. I have a Wraithknight sitting in a closet I haven't assembled yet. Why? Because I play Biel Tan. I use the Avatar. I use lots of Aspect Warriors. I use the Night Spinner. I use Vypers. Those aren't optimal! Why don't I use my Wraithknight? Well because I'm having FUN. I'm using the models I want to play with, and I enjoy building fluffy Biel Tan lists.

When I picked up Warhammer 40k 10 years ago I picked up Orks and my best friend played Space Marines. All he had to do to defeat me was bring a Landraider. I didn't have any models to kill it. He owned 3 Landraiders. He never once brought a Landraider against my Orks. WHY? It's certainly not OPTIMAL for him to do that. Why did he do it?

So we'd have a BETTER GAME for Christ's sake.

Except you're entirely wrong. By both players bringing their best game possible (money, time, etc. forgone for this argument), that is literally the most fair means of competitive play. So by holding back in any perceived fashion, you're saying matter of factly you're better than your opponent and can succeed with lesser selections.

The game is designed poorly. Thus you have to play to your meta. Not like other games, where playing to your meta means intelligent selection of models as tools for success, but you have to plan lists as to "not hurt someone's feelings". In other games, you can flatly play what you want because they are games first, built into worlds second, and are designed as such. Choose any of them, the ones I have standing armies for all work this way.

Human nature is to game any system. Be it army men, video games, or even organ transplant lists... you give us a set of rules and we'll work to succeed within those confines. We have an entire profession dedicated to it and it happens to pay some of the highest salaries. It's beneficial to work to maximize capabilities within restrictions.

Philosophical, yes. But we're talking specifically of game theory. You ascribe to the set of rules when you purchase them and agree to play 40k. By modifying them in any fashion to quote "make it more fair" means you're saying that the game is a failure by design and, to have a chance to win, you have to do so. That is the definition of scrub mentality (the true WAAC) AND exacerbates the issue of why buy the rules in the first place.

It is a game. Why spend more time and effort being the fun police on some overpriced, terrible rules? Remember, it's only a matter of time before your favored models become "TFG" labelled or so utterly incapable of performing that you're forced to shelve them. That's 40k. That's not being an douche bag, that's playing a game. And to no one's surprise, a really bad one.

 TheKbob wrote:

Murrdox wrote:

 TheKbob wrote:
You play with optimal lists because there's literally no reason not to.

Do some players have that attitude? Absolutely. Will you possibly run into players with that attitude and will they trounce you with Eldar? Absolutely. Did Eldar really change anything in this regard? Not a single thing.

You could be "That guy" by bringing 3 Riptides to a game at your local store. You could be "That guy" by bringing Imperial Knights to a game where you know your friend really can't defeat them. You could be "That guy" by bringing 4 Flying Hive Tyrants. Now you can be "That guy" by bringing 30 freaking Jetbikes. Nothing has changed. But the sky isn't falling. Like the OP indicated. Eldar are powerful. Eldar will have some hugely awesome stuff in their arsenal, and they might be harder to beat than some army. But just because your opponent puts Eldar on the table doesn't mean they're automatically going to blow you off the table.

There are LOTS of reasons not to play optimal lists. If you're a "I MUST WIN THIS GAME" type of guy, then I just feel bad for you. What kind of player are you if all you want to do is WIN. Unless you're at a tournament, both you and your opponent have invested tons of time and effort into building, painting and then playing your two armies. If you can't have fun unless you blow him off the table, then that's your problem. For me, personally the BEST games of 40k are the games where it comes down to the LAST TURN. Both of you are losing troops left and right, you only have a couple units left, and you have to hold onto that last objective, or kill that last enemy hero, or destroy that one vehicle to pull out a win. I'd REALLY feel like a dick if I built a 30 Jetbike with 2 Wraithknight army and shot my friend off the table in 3 turns. I've just wasted his time. However, I'd have felt equally like a dick if I did that same thing with 3 riptides. Eldar changes NOTHING. Fighting Eldar will be an uphill battle for some armies. Yup. I play Orks. ANY battle is an uphill battle for me. That's how the game works. But you can still get great games out of it.

I played Eldar throughout 6th Edition. I don't own more than two Wave Serpents. I have a Wraithknight sitting in a closet I haven't assembled yet. Why? Because I play Biel Tan. I use the Avatar. I use lots of Aspect Warriors. I use the Night Spinner. I use Vypers. Those aren't optimal! Why don't I use my Wraithknight? Well because I'm having FUN. I'm using the models I want to play with, and I enjoy building fluffy Biel Tan lists.

When I picked up Warhammer 40k 10 years ago I picked up Orks and my best friend played Space Marines. All he had to do to defeat me was bring a Landraider. I didn't have any models to kill it. He owned 3 Landraiders. He never once brought a Landraider against my Orks. WHY? It's certainly not OPTIMAL for him to do that. Why did he do it?

So we'd have a BETTER GAME for Christ's sake.

Except you're entirely wrong. By both players bringing their best game possible (money, time, etc. forgone for this argument), that is literally the most fair means of competitive play. So by holding back in any perceived fashion, you're saying matter of factly you're better than your opponent and can succeed with lesser selections.

The game is designed poorly. Thus you have to play to your meta. Not like other games, where playing to your meta means intelligent selection of models as tools for success, but you have to plan lists as to "not hurt someone's feelings". In other games, you can flatly play what you want because they are games first, built into worlds second, and are designed as such. Choose any of them, the ones I have standing armies for all work this way.

Human nature is to game any system. Be it army men, video games, or even organ transplant lists... you give us a set of rules and we'll work to succeed within those confines. We have an entire profession dedicated to it and it happens to pay some of the highest salaries. It's beneficial to work to maximize capabilities within restrictions.

Philosophical, yes. But we're talking specifically of game theory. You ascribe to the set of rules when you purchase them and agree to play 40k. By modifying them in any fashion to quote "make it more fair" means you're saying that the game is a failure by design and, to have a chance to win, you have to do so. That is the definition of scrub mentality (the true WAAC) AND exacerbates the issue of why buy the rules in the first place.

It is a game. Why spend more time and effort being the fun police on some overpriced, terrible rules? Remember, it's only a matter of time before your favored models become "TFG" labelled or so utterly incapable of performing that you're forced to shelve them. That's 40k. That's not being an douche bag, that's playing a game. And to no one's surprise, a really bad one.

But you talk as if competitive play is the only way to play 40k. Plenty of people (who tend to be less vocal on forums) never play competitively at all.

 TheKbob wrote:

Murrdox wrote:

 TheKbob wrote:
You play with optimal lists because there's literally no reason not to.

Do some players have that attitude? Absolutely. Will you possibly run into players with that attitude and will they trounce you with Eldar? Absolutely. Did Eldar really change anything in this regard? Not a single thing.

You could be "That guy" by bringing 3 Riptides to a game at your local store. You could be "That guy" by bringing Imperial Knights to a game where you know your friend really can't defeat them. You could be "That guy" by bringing 4 Flying Hive Tyrants. Now you can be "That guy" by bringing 30 freaking Jetbikes. Nothing has changed. But the sky isn't falling. Like the OP indicated. Eldar are powerful. Eldar will have some hugely awesome stuff in their arsenal, and they might be harder to beat than some army. But just because your opponent puts Eldar on the table doesn't mean they're automatically going to blow you off the table.

There are LOTS of reasons not to play optimal lists. If you're a "I MUST WIN THIS GAME" type of guy, then I just feel bad for you. What kind of player are you if all you want to do is WIN. Unless you're at a tournament, both you and your opponent have invested tons of time and effort into building, painting and then playing your two armies. If you can't have fun unless you blow him off the table, then that's your problem. For me, personally the BEST games of 40k are the games where it comes down to the LAST TURN. Both of you are losing troops left and right, you only have a couple units left, and you have to hold onto that last objective, or kill that last enemy hero, or destroy that one vehicle to pull out a win. I'd REALLY feel like a dick if I built a 30 Jetbike with 2 Wraithknight army and shot my friend off the table in 3 turns. I've just wasted his time. However, I'd have felt equally like a dick if I did that same thing with 3 riptides. Eldar changes NOTHING. Fighting Eldar will be an uphill battle for some armies. Yup. I play Orks. ANY battle is an uphill battle for me. That's how the game works. But you can still get great games out of it.

I played Eldar throughout 6th Edition. I don't own more than two Wave Serpents. I have a Wraithknight sitting in a closet I haven't assembled yet. Why? Because I play Biel Tan. I use the Avatar. I use lots of Aspect Warriors. I use the Night Spinner. I use Vypers. Those aren't optimal! Why don't I use my Wraithknight? Well because I'm having FUN. I'm using the models I want to play with, and I enjoy building fluffy Biel Tan lists.

When I picked up Warhammer 40k 10 years ago I picked up Orks and my best friend played Space Marines. All he had to do to defeat me was bring a Landraider. I didn't have any models to kill it. He owned 3 Landraiders. He never once brought a Landraider against my Orks. WHY? It's certainly not OPTIMAL for him to do that. Why did he do it?

So we'd have a BETTER GAME for Christ's sake.

Except you're entirely wrong. By both players bringing their best game possible (money, time, etc. forgone for this argument), that is literally the most fair means of competitive play. So by holding back in any perceived fashion, you're saying matter of factly you're better than your opponent and can succeed with lesser selections.

The game is designed poorly. Thus you have to play to your meta. Not like other games, where playing to your meta means intelligent selection of models as tools for success, but you have to plan lists as to "not hurt someone's feelings". In other games, you can flatly play what you want because they are games first, built into worlds second, and are designed as such. Choose any of them, the ones I have standing armies for all work this way.

Human nature is to game any system. Be it army men, video games, or even organ transplant lists... you give us a set of rules and we'll work to succeed within those confines. We have an entire profession dedicated to it and it happens to pay some of the highest salaries. It's beneficial to work to maximize capabilities within restrictions.

Philosophical, yes. But we're talking specifically of game theory. You ascribe to the set of rules when you purchase them and agree to play 40k. By modifying them in any fashion to quote "make it more fair" means you're saying that the game is a failure by design and, to have a chance to win, you have to do so. That is the definition of scrub mentality (the true WAAC) AND exacerbates the issue of why buy the rules in the first place.

It is a game. Why spend more time and effort being the fun police on some overpriced, terrible rules? Remember, it's only a matter of time before your favored models become "TFG" labelled or so utterly incapable of performing that you're forced to shelve them. That's 40k. That's not being an douche bag, that's playing a game. And to no one's surprise, a really bad one.

In the land raider/orks example previously given, it's more a case of, 'if I take this, the game isn't going to be fun'. Not everyone plays this competitively, and some, myself included, don't even care if they win or not, so long as they have a fun game. My space wolves army has no way of dealing with fliers. The guys that know that bring as few fliers as they can to our games, knowing that it's basically an auto win button for them, which isn't fun for either of us. People are at heart altruistic, and as such will take it easy if it makes it more fun.

 TheKbob wrote:
Game design is entirely based on upon ensuring competitive choices out of all options. The OP chose known moderate to poor competitive choices and performed. You don't rate mods, units, or factions based upon their least optimal performance, but on their maximum. Stop drinking GW "Forge the Narrative" Kool-Aid and realize how actual balanced game play is designed. If you can crush everyone with a specific combo out of the book, there's literally no reason not to take that. When you start getting into "what you take to your FLGS" you walk I to Scrub territory. And you don't design games for scrubs.

If this was a PvE game, this would all be false. I agree. But GW is making a PvP game. You play with optimal lists because there's literally no reason not to. And the optimal Eldar list will trounce. Everyone is in agreement. Thus the codex is hot trash if everyone is going to ban play against it unless they somehow determine your list is "reasonable" which is the true WAAC mentality. Good players bring optimal lists. Bad players bring bad lists and then complain their opponents list is OP.

I'm sorry is this a table top game or a MMO?

 MWHistorian wrote:

 adamsouza wrote:

 Nevelon wrote:
All bike=fluffy
All wraith=fluffy
Mix of both in large amounts=not so much

Pretty much what I was thinking

I have an army from craftworld Sian-Te-Jianshi. (A world of my own making! Narrative forging!)
And they specialize in lots of bikes, wraiths and WK's!
Very fluffy.

This is an extremely good point. One of the awesome parts of both WHFB and 40k has been the fact the fluff is very open to players doing what THEY think is cool.

GW obviously intended right from the beginning to have a very flexible sandbox type background. Things tend to not be said in absolutes so for the most part, you don't have to break the existing 40k fluff to create your own fluff to suit whatever army you want to create. That's largely why having unbalanced rules is even worse for fluffy players, because there is no strict fluff to adhere to when creating your army.

 TheKbob wrote:
Game design is entirely based on upon ensuring competitive choices out of all options. The OP chose known moderate to poor competitive choices and performed.

Sorry, but ScatBikes, D-Scythes, Wraithknight with D-guns, Hemlock, etc. are all moderate to poor choices? Really?

 JohnHwangDD wrote:

 TheKbob wrote:
Game design is entirely based on upon ensuring competitive choices out of all options. The OP chose known moderate to poor competitive choices and performed.

Sorry, but ScatBikes, D-Scythes, Wraithknight with D-guns, Hemlock, etc. are all moderate to poor choices? Really?

He hamstrung himself with an autarch, wraithblades, lack of farseer, and didn't run the critical mass on any of the good choices he did take. He didn't take advantage of the formations to either have 6" BF wraiths or multiple WKs. He didn't stuff a double digit number of Destroyer weapons into the list, nor did he take thirty JSJing scatter lasers. It's a bit like saying Centurion Star isn't so bad when it's 3 of them, one took a heavy bolter, and their psychic suport starts and ends with a Mastery Level 1 Librarian that rolled on pyromancy. It's unfocused as a result of player choice, not codex design.

Doesn't matter - if those pieces are as OP as the whiners claim, then any combination of them should be enough to carry the army to victory.

 JohnHwangDD wrote:
Doesn't matter - if those pieces are as OP as the whiners claim, then any combination of them should be enough to carry the army to victory.

So I take it you haven't actually read any of their comments and decided to create your own straw argument then.

Oh, I read them - I just found most of it to be junk.

 JohnHwangDD wrote:
Doesn't matter - if those pieces are as OP as the whiners claim, then any combination of them should be enough to carry the army to victory.

So what I got from this strawman was that a 5man dsycthe squad (with no support models (i.e. farseer) or formation bonus), 2x 3 man scatbike squads, and a wraithknight in say, an 1850 or 1500 point game should carry the carry the roughly 1-1.2k points left of empty army space.

 JohnHwangDD wrote:
I just found most of it to be junk.

Just like most of the OP's army

Compare contrast time

Ork Biker 18pts
Eldar Biker 17pts

Ork biker upgrades.............none
Eldar Biker upgrades......SCAT BIKE 10pts

Ork armor save? 4
Eldar ? 3

Both Can Jink

Movement? Eldar win this one by about.......a foot or two.


Weapons range? well orks can shoot 3 TL S5 shots a whopping 18 inches

eldar? 36 inches.......BS of 4 so they don't even need the TL ohh and they are Heavy 4 dont forget that.

Your right, Scat bikes aren't OP.....so long as you only take 6 of them.