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From what I've read, I'd guess the Slaanesh thing is setting up an aelf/Slaanesh release period.

Why complain and wish the company to fail when you haven't even tried to educate yourself?

Makumba wrote:
How can AoS be censored. You have dudes wearing other dudes skins, horrible deformations and diseases in it. they would have to put everyon in power armor like eternals to make it kid friendly.

I think he means that GW censored it by not including material that could offend Some LGBT players.

 Kilkrazy wrote:
People who say that points can't take the opposing list, the nature of the terrain into account, and so on, are quite right but they have misunderstood the purpose of points.

It is the player's job to take account of scenarios, terrain and so on. That is called Using Tactics.

The purpose of points is to ensure that comparable units are balanced. For example, in 40K 200 points of Tau infantry should be equal in combat value to 200 points of SMs. If you choose an army with no infantry, you can't expect your extra tanks to do the jobs that infantry are supposed to do, like capturing objectives.

There are no points amendments in WRG Ancients for terrain, opposing lists and so on but the game still works.

Points do not work in GW's games because GW made mistakes assigning the levels, failed to take special rules into account, and have never settled down and made them work.

Any wargame is a mathematical system that is solvable., even a system like 40K that has a large number of factors.

Look at the RTS games like starcraft, do you know why they are so balanced? (at least starcraft 1)it is because they only have 3 armies with specific themes that can be balanced... its much harder to do that if you have 6+ armies and each one trying to be distinct from the other.... the only way for GW to truly balance their games if to limit how many things each army has or get rid of most armies and stick with 3 (eldar, space marine, nids) to the basics for EACH army and balance those against each other, when one army has 3 types of troops and another has 2 and another has 4 and another has 1 its really hard to balance all the troops against each other and that is not even taking into account the things those troops can get (remember gauss guns in the first necron armies? just take a horder of troops and you will win most games) (that is just an example, have not played in ages but I know that some armies have more things then others in certain parts)

just saying its hard for GW to do any balancing unless they take drastic changes, AoS is that as the points do not matter because the scenarios do not require them...


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 BobtheInquisitor wrote:

Makumba wrote:
How can AoS be censored. You have dudes wearing other dudes skins, horrible deformations and diseases in it. they would have to put everyon in power armor like eternals to make it kid friendly.

I think he means that GW censored it by not including material that could offend Some LGBT players.

its not even LGBT players... its just sex in general, society frowns upon sex and nudity (especially when kids are involved) and that is a social problem not a miniature wargame company problem, GW HAS to change slaanesh or alter him slightly from his "sexual" nature (and please no aguing about excess, I get it slaanesh is excess, its still boobies daemonettes that rules his armies) they will most probably fuse him more with the dark elves (his boys) into some excess in violence, pain, suffering, backstabbing sorta thing...

Think taking piles of cocaine and then stabbing people to death and laughing instead of taking piles of cocaine off a naked daemonette and then stabbing people to death.... I remember here were problem with the dark eldar wyches and their "thongs" back in the day...especially when dudes wore it.

 bitethythumb wrote:

Look at the RTS games like starcraft, do you know why they are so balanced?

How about you look at another tabletop wargame, instead?

I hate to use the stereotypical example, but WMH has 12 different factions (19 if you count all of the Mercenaries and Minions individually), and seems to do a good job of balancing factions and making all but a tiny fraction of the various units worthwhile.

burningstuff wrote:
From what I've read, I'd guess the Slaanesh thing is setting up an aelf/Slaanesh release period.

Why complain and wish the company to fail when you haven't even tried to educate yourself?

When the Slaneesh thing was made known I was already educated enough. It's a tiny thing anyway compared to sigmarines, rules or lack of balance, not to mention it still might turn out to be pg7 version. Nice try but the game is still crap and the company is still a tt vermin, I'm very sorry.

I'm not interested in Starcraft and RTS.

WRG Ancients has over 300 armies and they are all balanced.

I think the problem with the no points system are GW players.

Many GW players are in the mindset of taking the most efficient models for the cost, and killing/winning not actually having a fun game play.

If somehow objectives/scoring were teired with what you took a non points system could work in such a game environment, but as it stands if the objectives are the same for both sides no matter the points, in order to win most people will take the most effecient units for the cost. This is why in 40k you see most tyranid lists like the following:

Flyrant x5
mucolid x 5

and some random other things on the side that are not that important to the nid player.

Its not anywhere close to being a narrative/fluffy/scenario based list, it is chosen purely because they are the most point effecient models in the tyranid army.

the people at GW probably do not build armies this way, so ignoring points works fine for them. However that does not work for the gaming masses, its like thunderdome down here.

Yes it is some players who are like this.

It was GW that created the situation by promoting tournament games without a balanced rule set.

To eliminate points from AoS deals with the problem by throwing the baby out with the bathwater.

 Kilkrazy wrote:
I'm not interested in Starcraft and RTS.

WRG Ancients has over 300 armies and they are all balanced.

Yeah, but how many dragons, goblins and wizards did they fit into those balanced lists?

If you want to argue that points and balance need not be enemies, fine, but I thought we were here to discuss the type of game that says both those concepts are unnecessary. For me, it's all about the mindset. We played BFG without using points, but some of my friends could not get into the mindset where making fun things happen was more important than winning even at the cost of fun (they were not having fun). To them, the idea that the two sides should be an even match was unshakeable, and thus the purpose of the game was to determine who was the better person (their words). The same two guys are able to play RPGs without frothing and screaming at the dice, probably because RPGs do not create such a mindset in the first place. AOS seems like it is purposefully trying to scare away the real competitive players and make a safer game for people who want to have fun by playing, and not winning, by not even allowing the concept of points and balance. At least theoretically. The starter set book is all over the place, with its only coherent message being that you should buy Citadel Miniatures and put them in a display case.



Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Kilkrazy wrote:
Yes it is some players who are like this.

It was GW that created the situation by promoting tournament games without a balanced rule set.

To eliminate points from AoS deals with the problem by throwing the baby out with the bathwater.

KoW gave that baby a good home. Now we have a new opportunity. It's a good day for a white wedding. It's a good day to start again.

 BobtheInquisitor wrote:
The same two guys are able to play RPGs without frothing and screaming at the dice, probably because RPGs do not create such a mindset in the first place.

That seems more like they were drawn to RPGs in the first place, rather then being shaped by them.

And I froth and scream at my dice while playing RPGs. Who hasn't had a night when they can't seem to get above a 4 on a d20, or are constantly failing other kinds of rolls (like in FATE)? It's hilarious when it happens though, and there are even some RPGS - like Dungeon World - that only let you gain experience when you fail rolls.

No, they naturally seek out competitive games and then act like total fethheads. It took a while to get them into RPGs, but we tended to play more for story than for combat or experience. In fact, we never gave any characters any experience points or upgrades at all in 5 years of playing. Some of the best sessions were those when we rolled the dice only once or twice.

Basically, in RPGs, they would try to do cool stuff. In board games and tabletop games, they just wanted to feth the other guy over.

Huh. People are weird.

I'm not sure if anyone saw, but this topic has apparently been hijacked by BoLS today. I'm not recommending anyone go over there, though, since it's your regular clickbaity crap with the comments section frothing over.

Care to share a highlight reel?

"Here is a summation of the points he makes against tournament players in case you didn’t read it all:

— Tournament gamers only “play to win” and are WAAC
— Tournament gaming and tournaments “destroy what the hobby is really all about”
— Tournament gaming is directly opposed to painting (LOL)
— Tournament style gaming is unimaginative

Here’s how Jervis thinks the game should be played:

— Scenario based games and campaigns are the pinnacle of the hobby
— Scenario and campaign games have no need for point values or pre-set win conditions
— Points and even match-ups are the cause and death of “casual play” and scenario and campaign based gaming for the wider community

Jervis Johnson now heads up development for Games Workshop. I took his editorial at face value as an attack on hobbyists that like to play in tournaments. It was disingenuous how he repeatedly said he has nothing against tournament players in general but repeatedly said how they ruin the game.

If you follow the internet you’ll know there has been some recent speculation if 40k will get the Age of Sigmar treatment. At first I was like WHFB was doomed and needed a reboot but after reading this diatribe I’m wondering if maybe it’s their new direction. It’s been said Games Workshop just wants to focus on making models and go away from rules. How long has it been since an actual FAQ was released? There has been no FAQ for new armies such as Blood Angels, Dark Eldar, Grey Knights and Necrons plus a host of others. Sure a lot of the questions asked might seem silly but on the other hand the customer deserves some answers now and then.

If this is the new direction I think they will fail. We as hobbyists need a tight set of rules so we can enjoy gaming. Jervis is the mouthpiece for Games Workshop and that is partly why he is where he’s at today. I remember when he got sidelined having to manage their specialist games… Everybody hated his rules for Blood Bowl and used the previous edition. He was also left out of the loop when the extremely popular 4th edition codex for Chaos Space Marines was developed and responsible for the travesty that was the following fifth edition codex which just happened to look a lot like the one he wrote for third edition.

Jervis can write a good codex – I’m thinking of the third edition Space Wolves codex so he’s not totally ignorant. If Games Workshop should decide to distance themselves from writing rules it will have a direct impact on everyone that plays the game… Even if you are a casual player you need good rules. It’s just the way it is.

Some have said the rules now are bloated and overly complicated but to me it adds a ton of flavor. Third edition anyone ?"

 infinite_array wrote:

He was also left out of the loop when the extremely popular 4th edition codex for Chaos Space Marines was developed and responsible for the travesty that was the following fifth edition codex which just happened to look a lot like the one he wrote for third edition.
"

That 'popular' codex was terrible. It was a travesty of balance and utterly ruined fourth edition mate. It pretty much killed it, frankly. No codex has ever dominated in such an over the top and obnoxious way. Frankly, jj not being involved with it is a point of pride. iron warriors of that edition ruined the game for a huge number of people.

 infinite_array wrote:
I hate to use the stereotypical example, but WMH has 12 different factions (19 if you count all of the Mercenaries and Minions individually), and seems to do a good job of balancing factions and making all but a tiny fraction of the various units worthwhile.

I hate your example, because I stopped playing Warmachine when they made Jack armies uncompetitive in favor of all-infantry armies. Total lack of internal balance there.

 BobtheInquisitor wrote:

 Kilkrazy wrote:
I'm not interested in Starcraft and RTS.

WRG Ancients has over 300 armies and they are all balanced.

Yeah, but how many dragons, goblins and wizards did they fit into those balanced lists?

If you want to argue that points and balance need not be enemies, fine, but I thought we were here to discuss the type of game that says both those concepts are unnecessary. ...

The fantasy expansion for WRG Ancients fitted plenty of dragons, goblins and wizards into the lists. It wasn't hard because there was a solid rule framework that allowed for them to be included. Dragon = Elephant + Ignores terrain (flying) + Fire syphon.

We are here to discuss the proposition that both concepts (points and balance) are unnecessary. Logically that includes the proposition that they actually are necessary.

Certainly you don't need points, but some mechanism of balance is an important component of any game. Who wants to play games where things are stacked against them 'just because'? I think a game without the concept of balance is crucially flawed.

That said, I think basic AoS is a fairly balanced game. It is the special rules that will spin it out of orbit.

 Kilkrazy wrote:
WRG Ancients has over 300 armies and they are all balanced.

To what extent does WRG Ancients have Daemons, Dragons and Wizards? Not to mention ur-Wizards like Nagash?

If we boil AoS or WFB down to units that one might find in Antiquity, I'm pretty sure that they balance pretty well, too. Especially if we are playing primarily historical scenarios vs "bring and battle" X points games. Let the Warmahordes players take a crack at that WRG Ancients game, and we'll see how well balanced it really is.


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 infinite_array wrote:
I'm not sure if anyone saw, but this topic has apparently been hijacked by BoLS today.

I've linked to it in the OP, for those who want to "discuss" things with the Tournament crowd.

 JohnHwangDD wrote:

 Kilkrazy wrote:
WRG Ancients has over 300 armies and they are all balanced.

To what extent does WRG Ancients have Daemons, Dragons and Wizards? Not to mention ur-Wizards like Nagash?

If we boil AoS or WFB down to units that one might find in Antiquity, I'm pretty sure that they balance pretty well, too. Especially if we are playing primarily historical scenarios vs "bring and battle" X points games. Let the Warmahordes players take a crack at that WRG Ancients game, and we'll see how well balanced it really is.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 infinite_array wrote:
I'm not sure if anyone saw, but this topic has apparently been hijacked by BoLS today.

I've linked to it in the OP, for those who want to "discuss" things with the Tournament crowd.

I refer the right honorable gentleman to the various answers I gave previously.

The Warmahordes players have had access to Ancients rules since 1969, and there are no reports so far of shenanigans.

if your argument depends on supposing that things might possibly happen in the future, (and logically might not) it is a very weak argument.

 JohnHwangDD wrote:

 infinite_array wrote:
I hate to use the stereotypical example, but WMH has 12 different factions (19 if you count all of the Mercenaries and Minions individually), and seems to do a good job of balancing factions and making all but a tiny fraction of the various units worthwhile.

I hate your example, because I stopped playing Warmachine when they made Jack armies uncompetitive in favor of all-infantry armies. Total lack of internal balance there.

From what I've seen, they've managed to work it back to where there are some serious counters to all-infantry forces.

That's more a problem with the focus mechanic. Imagine how awesome 'Jack armies would be if they operated akin to Warbeasts and Fury?

Anyone, points! Speaking of historical games used as basis for fantasy games, doesn't HoTT do a good job at using points for fantasy units?

 Kilkrazy wrote:

 JohnHwangDD wrote:

 Kilkrazy wrote:
WRG Ancients has over 300 armies and they are all balanced.

To what extent does WRG Ancients have Daemons, Dragons and Wizards? Not to mention ur-Wizards like Nagash?

If we boil AoS or WFB down to units that one might find in Antiquity, I'm pretty sure that they balance pretty well, too. Especially if we are playing primarily historical scenarios vs "bring and battle" X points games. Let the Warmahordes players take a crack at that WRG Ancients game, and we'll see how well balanced it really is.

I refer the right honorable gentleman to the various answers I gave previously.

The Warmahordes players have had access to Ancients rules since 1969, and there are no reports so far of shenanigans.

if your argument depends on supposing that things might possibly happen in the future, (and logically might not) it is a very weak argument.

Sorry, I missed that.

I don't think that the WMH tournament crowd has attempted to break WRG Ancients, so it's been considered "balanced" due to obscurity.

Much the same way that the tournament crowd ignored Jervis' article from 2002 until I (and others) started re-posting it here on Dakka (and now Taco Bell). By analogy, for the past 12+ years, everybody was in absolute agreement with Jervis article, because nobody was looking at it or talking about it. However, this past week, his article is getting all sorts of commentary, simply because it's now got a spotlight on it. So shine that spotlight on WRG Ancients, and I guarantee it'll be broken trash in short order. Especially if you're giving "Fantasy" options. Not that making every Large Monster in to an Elephant really makes them happy, because they all love their shiny, chromey Special Rules.

 JohnHwangDD wrote:

 infinite_array wrote:
I hate to use the stereotypical example, but WMH has 12 different factions (19 if you count all of the Mercenaries and Minions individually), and seems to do a good job of balancing factions and making all but a tiny fraction of the various units worthwhile.

I hate your example, because I stopped playing Warmachine when they made Jack armies uncompetitive in favor of all-infantry armies. Total lack of internal balance there.

Uh huh. Try another one.

Convergence of Cyriss and protectorate want a word...

Similarly, all infantry armies haven't been a thing since the colossals book...

 infinite_array wrote:

 JohnHwangDD wrote:

 infinite_array wrote:
I hate to use the stereotypical example, but WMH has 12 different factions (19 if you count all of the Mercenaries and Minions individually), and seems to do a good job of balancing factions and making all but a tiny fraction of the various units worthwhile.

I hate your example, because I stopped playing Warmachine when they made Jack armies uncompetitive in favor of all-infantry armies. Total lack of internal balance there.

From what I've seen, they've managed to work it back to where there are some serious counters to all-infantry forces.

That's more a problem with the focus mechanic. Imagine how awesome 'Jack armies would be if they operated akin to Warbeasts and Fury?

Anyone, points! Speaking of historical games used as basis for fantasy games, doesn't HoTT do a good job at using points for fantasy units?

Yeah, I saw that they made mixed Jack armies playable in 2E, but at the tail of 1E, were people even playing Jacks at all?

Focus is a bit flawed, because it doesn't scale like Fury. Which is too bad, as I own all-Jack Cryx, from the original 1E metal releases. In theory, if WMH were truly as internally and externally balanced as people say, me taking Deneghra with only my 3 Slayer Helljacks and handful of Deathripper + Defiler Bonejacks would be evenly competitive against equal points of anything and everything else that currently runs the tournament scene. I strongly suspect that this isn't true. OTOH, if I were to play WMH more seriously, it'd be all-Beast Skorne or (more likely) all-Beast Legion. I suspect that either of those forces would be far more competitive for the same points. I think my WMH Cryx force helps illustrate the "balanced" points issue in a concrete way.

I'm not familiar with HOTT. I just believe that WFB/AoS being model-based skirmish scale raises issues of unit balance if you don't water everything down to lightly-flavored generics.


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Deadnight wrote:

 JohnHwangDD wrote:

 infinite_array wrote:
I hate to use the stereotypical example, but WMH has 12 different factions (19 if you count all of the Mercenaries and Minions individually), and seems to do a good job of balancing factions and making all but a tiny fraction of the various units worthwhile.

I hate your example, because I stopped playing Warmachine when they made Jack armies uncompetitive in favor of all-infantry armies. Total lack of internal balance there.

Uh huh. Try another one.

Convergence of Cyriss and protectorate want a word...

Similarly, all infantry armies haven't been a thing since the colossals book...

The point is that "balanced" WMH hasn't always been perfectly balanced, internally or externally. There were periods in Warmachine in which Jacks were considered unplayable from a competitive standpoint. There were internal balance issues in which some Jacks (Seether) were completely superior to other Jacks in the same faction (Slayer).

Even PP didn't do a perfect job of maintaining absolute balance in their supposedly balanced system.

That should be your takeaway.

If PP couldn't do it, despite having competitive balance as a core goal, and a much smaller set of things and options to balance, why should anybody expect this of GW, with its myriad of units, unit options, wargear, etc.?

I played an AoS game with proper deployment rules today (deployment-poker) and it was loads of fun! I ended up deploying my entire Empire collection in my box after my opponent cut deployment short with a small but strong vampire counts army.

He chose assassination, and I selected my Standard bearer for an atmospheric game. My team of heroes managed to take down Neferata in the midst of battle, but the terrorgiest got a charge on my standard bearer and took him down.

It was a really fun game and felt like a spontaneous scenario that came out of the deployment and lack of points.

 Kilkrazy wrote:

 BobtheInquisitor wrote:

 Kilkrazy wrote:
I'm not interested in Starcraft and RTS.

WRG Ancients has over 300 armies and they are all balanced.

Yeah, but how many dragons, goblins and wizards did they fit into those balanced lists?

If you want to argue that points and balance need not be enemies, fine, but I thought we were here to discuss the type of game that says both those concepts are unnecessary. ...

The fantasy expansion for WRG Ancients fitted plenty of dragons, goblins and wizards into the lists. It wasn't hard because there was a solid rule framework that allowed for them to be included. Dragon = Elephant + Ignores terrain (flying) + Fire syphon.

We are here to discuss the proposition that both concepts (points and balance) are unnecessary. Logically that includes the proposition that they actually are necessary.

Certainly you don't need points, but some mechanism of balance is an important component of any game. Who wants to play games where things are stacked against them 'just because'? I think a game without the concept of balance is crucially flawed.

That said, I think basic AoS is a fairly balanced game. It is the special rules that will spin it out of orbit.

Well I stand corrected on WRG ancients. By the way, what does WRG stand for?


I would play games stacked either against me or for me all the time if the point of the game isn't supposed to be a match. My whole point is that points and balance have created this inescapable way of thinking where games are either fair or stacked against you or considered in some other way to be about winning. The assumption that one plays a game because one cares about winning seems so deeply ingrained that many gamers can't even conceptualize how that isn't a tautology. It's like Euclid and the parallel postulate, or seagulls and French fries.

Please tell me why balance is important if one is not playing a match of skill against another player.

I do agree that a game that is meant to test skill in any way needs to be balanced or it is worthless. I am not convinced that AOS is that kind of game. It does not sell itself as one, so much as it can be said to sell itself at all. Those minis would probably be even more enjoyable in a Citadel Brand Glass Display Case, after all.

@Bottle - Glad you liked it! I too found it spontaneously fun without getting embroiled in list-tuning.

@Bobtheinquisitor - WRG = wargames research group. They have a fantasy and a historical game system for wargames, I believe; I don't really know much beyond that.

@Kilkrazy - The primary mechanisms of balance in AoS, as intended by the authors, seem to be "yeah, that looks balanced" and, "well that didn't work out so well, let's tweak it a bit". To my surprise, in the 7 games I've played so far, that mechanism of balancing armies was actually not bad.

It really isn't worse than saying "my mystery 1850 points is a fair fight to your mystery 1850 points", because so often, that's just not the case, and it's plain for all to see before the game starts. And for me personally, it's infinitely better than 2 people who don't see each other who just bring the most efficient lists they think of.

Where it falls apart though, is that it's hard to say, "let's play a game of X size on Sunday", because there is no great metric for X. So, assuming you play it in the spirit of the game, you kind of have to play to the lowest common denominator (which ever army is the weakest), rather than to a predetermined size. That's much less of a problem when playing with friends, than with strangers and for pickup games.

From what I've seen, if you want to set a size for the game, choose table size. 4x4 table limits unit availability due to deployment zone limitations and space to summon.

If you want to try balancing, look at the models themselves. Heavy armored variants of units are going to be stronger, for example. So don't expect your light cavalry to head on tackle my heavy cavalry. But they should do a number on heavy infantry because they can retreat and hit them with a charge again next turn.

Big flying monsters can go head to head with other big flying monsters, artillery pieces have similar damage output to one another etc.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
From what I've seen, if you want to set a size for the game, choose table size. 4x4 table limits unit availability due to deployment zone limitations and space to summon.

If you want to try balancing, look at the models themselves. Heavy armored variants of units are going to be stronger, for example. So don't expect your light cavalry to head on tackle my heavy cavalry. But they should do a number on heavy infantry because they can retreat and hit them with a charge again next turn.

Big flying monsters can go head to head with other big flying monsters, artillery pieces have similar damage output to one another etc.

@Bobtheinquisitor, WRG stands for Wargames Research Group.

It is a small British company that since the late 1960s has published a number of influential rule sets and supplement books for historical wargaming. Their best known products were Ancients 3,000 BC to 1,485 AD, and De Bellis Antiquitatis, but their Armies and Enemies books are also highly regarded.

DBA, launched in 1990, is now in its third edition and makes a very good introduction to Ancients wargaming. You might almost call it the AoS of Ancients, being simple, quick to learn and play, using small armies, though its design is a complete departure from the preceding Ancients 7th edition, while AoS has a lot of similarity with Warhammer.

Some of the older rulebooks are available as free downloads from their website.

http://www.wrg.me.uk/WRG.net/History/wrg.html

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wargames_Research_Group

Wow. One copy of DBMM on sale on Amazon UK used £489.34 and one new at £520.39

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Bellis-Magistrorum-Militum-DBMM-Version/dp/B00SLW3CI6/ref=sr_1_4?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1431853473&sr=1-4&keywords=dbmm

I had no idea this was such a collector item.

Looks like DBA is a much more reasonable £14.95

 BobtheInquisitor wrote:

 Kilkrazy wrote:

 BobtheInquisitor wrote:

 Kilkrazy wrote:
I'm not interested in Starcraft and RTS.

WRG Ancients has over 300 armies and they are all balanced.

Yeah, but how many dragons, goblins and wizards did they fit into those balanced lists?

If you want to argue that points and balance need not be enemies, fine, but I thought we were here to discuss the type of game that says both those concepts are unnecessary. ...

The fantasy expansion for WRG Ancients fitted plenty of dragons, goblins and wizards into the lists. It wasn't hard because there was a solid rule framework that allowed for them to be included. Dragon = Elephant + Ignores terrain (flying) + Fire syphon.

We are here to discuss the proposition that both concepts (points and balance) are unnecessary. Logically that includes the proposition that they actually are necessary.

Certainly you don't need points, but some mechanism of balance is an important component of any game. Who wants to play games where things are stacked against them 'just because'? I think a game without the concept of balance is crucially flawed.

That said, I think basic AoS is a fairly balanced game. It is the special rules that will spin it out of orbit.

Well I stand corrected on WRG ancients. By the way, what does WRG stand for?


I would play games stacked either against me or for me all the time if the point of the game isn't supposed to be a match. My whole point is that points and balance have created this inescapable way of thinking where games are either fair or stacked against you or considered in some other way to be about winning. The assumption that one plays a game because one cares about winning seems so deeply ingrained that many gamers can't even conceptualize how that isn't a tautology. It's like Euclid and the parallel postulate, or seagulls and French fries.

Please tell me why balance is important if one is not playing a match of skill against another player.

I do agree that a game that is meant to test skill in any way needs to be balanced or it is worthless. I am not convinced that AOS is that kind of game. It does not sell itself as one, so much as it can be said to sell itself at all. Those minis would probably be even more enjoyable in a Citadel Brand Glass Display Case, after all.

One of the reasons is that it's easy, people can turn up to a game knowing what to expect and what the goals are even before they decide to play a game that day(week).
Once you start having to discuss more and more this cuts into play time, it's far Easter to start from a balanced point and change up the game than it is to try and balance something like this from the start.
Even if you are creating a scenario with a siege where both sides are far difernt in size and type, you are still looking at a form of balance if you want the game to decide outcome.

Now onto points and balance from above, with warmachine(and other games) it's rarely the intention of you being able to pick anything added up to the points and find it equal. Most games take the combined arms approach where you have points to work with and you put difernt elements in too make the whole. If you don't think about what you are taking and what it will do together it's not realy the games fault.
This is true for GW games as well, and even true for age of sigmar, without any points considered at all.

One of the bigist issues I see with the lack of points for sigmar is no real thought put to the players at all, they have for th most part thrown a lot of there players to the wolves. Keeping only those who play like them, but realy haven't given much to replace it with.

I don't need any points system at all, but thinking to how much I also use them in general pick up play I would be sad to see them go from most systems I play also.
It's just to awesome to be able to just ask which mission and how many points we are playing and put together a army in a few mins, taking out all the minis before the game starts so I can get ready.
I don't even take all my warmachine or hordes with me each day :0 whole fantasy collection just in case during setup the other player wants to play more than expected, No Way!