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.

I've been out of the game for a while, so I suspect that this is something of a gradual change but...since when did using allies become so normalized?!!

It dismays me to see so many gamers happily combine two forces. Often, it will be to address a weakness in one army with the strength of another (which for me, kinda defeats the whole point of a faction-based game). Very rarely it will be for fluff reasons and even then, the fluff is normally retrospective.

I'd feel - frankly - a bit of a fraud for having some of these combos. I see the correlation between SM and IG, but some really do boggle the mind.

It's a real shame as I see it diminishing the value and character of each race or faction :(

Most places allow only 3 detachments in a single 1850 game, your primary force and 2 allies. Most people choose to ally in the same codex or with battle brothers, but I have seen many that aren't.

Primary Detachment is normally one of the following
CAD-Standard Force Organization chart
Decurion Formation- only 3 codices have it so far that I know Necron, Eldar, Space Marines
Formation

0-2 All Detachment is normally one of the following
CAD
Ally CAD- 1 HQ, 1-2 troops 0-1 everything else
Formations

You are right it has just created a whole mess of crap that is slowly killing 40K. It has become a arms race, more than a tactical game. instead of being able to show up with any army and have a chance to win, now its many armies are so obsolete that they are unplayable in their current form.

Solo 2016!

"x edition's rules are ruining 40k!"

-40k players, 1987-2015

I agree, it does seem pointless have different factions sometimes. Obviously this is the most abundant with IoM armies. They might as well be one giant codex. But there are some crazy combos I've seen. Tau and Nids...need I say more lol.

I am all for fluff allies though. IF they would actually work together let them. And a decent amount of Iom would not work together...

And yes, Solo 2016

Solo 2016!

I enjoy the Allies rules as it finally lets me use both Chaos Daemons and Chaos Marines again within the same army.

The problem I find with Allies stems more from those who only care about 'winning' as the only goal of the game. In this regard, I agree that allies in general are killing the enjoyment of 40k for a majority of players.
However, I don't want to see allies removed or else banned because of a minority of try-hards and noob-slayers giving allies a bad rap.

Allies are just fine. I personally think that they just need more punishing rule when took outside of battleborthers.

 PandaHero wrote:
Allies are just fine. I personally think that they just need more punishing rule when took outside of battleborthers.

That only solves half of the problem.

One of the easiest fixes for broken ally shenannigins is to not allow allied elements to mix when deployed. No allied IC's in squads, no allied squads in transports/droppods etc. After the game starts, they're free to move around as normal, but just restricting deployment instantly solves a lot of bogus combinations.

Allies are the only reason I can field 2k points of DKoK. I am quite happy with allies.

 McGibs wrote:
One of the easiest fixes for broken ally shenannigins is to not allow allied elements to mix when deployed. No allied IC's in squads, no allied squads in transports/droppods etc. After the game starts, they're free to move around as normal, but just restricting deployment instantly solves a lot of bogus combinations.

This is actually a great idea. I'd back it up.

Its funny how you're so agaisnt allies and on the flip side you play Necrons.

Necrons-free-2k17 anyone?

I don't see what your getting at with that...

But there are some allies that are fine, and McGibs has a great idea actually.

 Bobthehero wrote:
Its funny how you're so agaisnt allies and on the flip side you play Necrons.

Necrons-free-2k17 anyone?

I'm against allies and I play a faction that can't effectively use them. Your point?

How are allies the only way to field 2k points of DKoK?

If you mean you need to use a double (or triple) CAD then you can structure the CADs so that characters and vehicles are with the squads with which you want to deploy them. Another alternative is declare that CAD and formations from the same codex can deploy as per current battle brothers.

I'd say one of the simplest ways to tone down allies would be to put a two-source limit on armies instead of three. This would allow for some of the benefits and positive aspects of allies while limiting some of the abuse that you can do with three sources (see Thunderdome). I'd also get rid of shared transports. You want a ride. bring your own. Don't have one, too bad. You're stuck walking.

 PandaHero wrote:
Allies are just fine. I personally think that they just need more punishing rule when took outside of battleborthers.

I feel the exact opposite, it's the battlebrothers shenanigans that gives allies a bad name. Non battlebrother allies aren't so bad. They can't ride share, form deathstars or even capture objectives.

I think his point is that necrons are a very strong codex, were others such as sisters of battle or chaos marines benefit from allies to make them strong.

As a space marine player the fact that i can legal splash in a little guard or have a inquisitor show up to commandeer my forces really makes armies feel fluffier and helps meld the background to the table top.

 krodarklorr wrote:

 Bobthehero wrote:
Its funny how you're so agaisnt allies and on the flip side you play Necrons.

Necrons-free-2k17 anyone?

I'm against allies and I play a faction that can't effectively use them. Your point?

A faction that still rapes face without them, you mean. Guard and some others need allied contingents to even hope to beat some other mono 'Dex forces.

 krodarklorr wrote:

 Bobthehero wrote:
Its funny how you're so agaisnt allies and on the flip side you play Necrons.

Necrons-free-2k17 anyone?

I'm against allies and I play a faction that can't effectively use them. Your point?

You're 1000% biased and Necrons are more than powerful enough to compete without allies, basically, your campaign would cripple a lot of armies, but yours.

 the Signless wrote:
How are allies the only way to field 2k points of DKoK?

I have units that are exclusive to the Siege regiment and others that are exclusive to the Assault Brigade list. together they make a 2k list. I'd have to buy more stuff that I either don't want or need to mono play 2k points.

And my list is certainly not broken because of allies, its ridiculous.

 Lord Corellia wrote:

 krodarklorr wrote:

 Bobthehero wrote:
Its funny how you're so agaisnt allies and on the flip side you play Necrons.

Necrons-free-2k17 anyone?

I'm against allies and I play a faction that can't effectively use them. Your point?

A faction that still rapes face without them, you mean. Guard and some others need allied contingents to even hope to beat some other mono 'Dex forces.

This. Guard doesnt work as a mono-Codex.

I feel the exact opposite, it's the battlebrothers shenanigans that gives allies a bad name. Non battlebrother allies aren't so bad. They can't ride share, form deathstars or even capture objectives.

Oh I didn't understand that we were here to talk about ally shenanigan. I though the thread was about people playing factions that would never ally themself but player still does because of shenanigans.

I know I'm fixing only half the problem, because I though the thread was about 1 half of the problem lol. List should be restricted to 2 source. Allied should'nt be able to ride others transport. And penalties for bringing other stuff than Battle Brothers should be worst (for fluff reason, which I though was the point of the thread).

Also, don't tell the OP he is biased because he play Necrons and don't need ally, because you are also biased because you play Guard and need ally.
The thing is: you can't change a single thing in 40k without breaking or anooying someone or something else. Allied is a problem for fluff reasons and cause some unbalanced. But since it's not the only source of imbalance, you can't just change the allied ruling, you would also need to update all codex. I mean sure maybe some people want to play their Nids allied with Tau because they both love those 2 armies, but I have the opinion that the rulebook for 40k should be very restricting, while people houserule to make it looser, instead of being super loose, with people needing to houserule to tidy things up. Reason is: at home, both work. At a shop, it can cause some avoidable tantrum.

Sorry for the long post. I have a lot of opinion on the game and how it should become, but I know everybody else does too.

Nearly everytime I run allies, its fluff purposes.

 Bobthehero wrote:

 krodarklorr wrote:

 Bobthehero wrote:
Its funny how you're so agaisnt allies and on the flip side you play Necrons.

Necrons-free-2k17 anyone?

I'm against allies and I play a faction that can't effectively use them. Your point?

You're 1000% biased and Necrons are more than powerful enough to compete without allies, basically, your campaign would cripple a lot of armies, but yours.

A. I play Tyranids as well. They're in the same bout as Necrons, except they are nowhere near as strong. So, say what you want.

B. I'm sorry that GW has made terrible codexes and some that are stupid. I really am sorry. It's not healthy for a game. But the "Band-Aid" of allies shouldn't defend how bad some books are. Sure, fluff-wise it's cool to see Daemons and CSM together. But some armies are to the point of "why take Dark Eldar mixed with Eldar, when you could just bring Eldar?" Sure, some people like Dark Eldar, but most people enjoying playing an army that works without requiring buying another codex and another army to do so.

Armies have holes in them. That's the nature of every game. But way too many armies can plug all of their holes way too easily, and on top of that, you have all of the deathstar and transport shenanigans, which is not fun to even play against.

HoundsofDemos wrote:
I think his point is that necrons are a very strong codex, were others such as sisters of battle or chaos marines benefit from allies to make them strong.

As a space marine player the fact that i can legal splash in a little guard or have a inquisitor show up to commandeer my forces really makes armies feel fluffier and helps meld the background to the table top.

Necrons are strong, what about Orks? or Tyranids? Unless GW is going to change it's design philosophy to deliberately make codex's weaker based on the amount of allies they can take to compensate, than this creates major balance problems. I often run my tau with daemons. It's unique, challenging, fun and gives me something to do in the assault phase (Tau are often considered boring to face for only really being involved in the shooting phase). I even have an old white dwarf from 3rd edition (right around the time the demon hunter codex was released) with a story about a Tau hunter cadre whose ethereal gets possessed by a Lord of change. I get punished heavily enough for this as come the apocalypse allies. Personally, I like playing against more wacky allies combinations. It's different and can create some really unique games. It gets tedious always going up against Coteaz, level 1 psyker xenos inquisitors with servo skulls, Imperial knights, drop podding SoB/Skitarii/assassins and of course Invisible death stars.

Personally, for the sake of fairness, I think all allies should be the same level for every one (ideally allies of convenience) fluff be damned.

Yeah its ok for an army to have a weakness, that's the rock paper scissor effect the game should have. But then there are armies that bring Rock from one source, paper from another, and scissors from a third. Thus not having any deficiency.

For the record my track history on armies is SM, IG, Orks and Iron Warriors.

My main gripe was the willingness of many players to try to patch their army's weakness with an ally. I think if this is a regular occurrence, then its a little lazy.

Sharing transports between two separate xenos races just doesn't sit right with me.

I'm not blaming the rules or codices as such - its clearly a cultural / trendy thing to do right now and that may change - but it seems a bit of a get out on people having to learn tactics, different ways of playing and -dare I say it - actually accepting their chosen race might have weaknesses!

No amount of stepping it up will make IG work on their own in an even semi-competitive environment. It's not so much of a rock paper scissors thing as a rock paper AK47.

IG are just falling behind in a powerful meta.