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 RiTides wrote:

 ArbitorIan wrote:
Ok. So, not sure what a 'decorian' is, but let's say 'Mixed Detachments'.

Thank you, that was getting me, too

Is "Decurion" the official term for these types of detachments? In the end the slight distinctions between formations, detachments and now possibly another demarcation of the structure has always felt like needless distinctions when they're all performing a similar function (providing army structure).

Same. I generally use Combi-Detachment, though I've seen mixed detachment, multi-detachment, and meta-detachment. Decurion bugs me if only because it's a similar misuse of terms that I think lead to a lot of the confusion about army building to kick off 7th edition (Formation vs. Detachment vs. CAD vs. Dataslate).

I too would love to see some data on that. I play DE (shelved in tournament scenarios as my Coven list no longer has teeth) and in comparison to other armies they are very over costed,IMO. Add to that their inability to psyker without allies, no access to free stuff, and an inability to summon or add units post game start and they are uncompetitive. Compare to marines that get free stuff and can summon and things get way out of wack. If Coven for instance received free transports and every enemy model killed created a new wrack added to the closest wrack unit then we might see a comparison.

If you think balance is to lower points then you simply make summoning armies and armies with free stuff that much better. Marines would become uber top tier (but I think that is what ITC wants anyway). I also think Alpha strike becomes dominant as there are fewer units to kill and fewer units to retaliate. This also plays into marine armies.

The real problem right now is free stuff for some armies and the continuance of death star combos. Tau had a fix for the death star but ITC nerfed that.
The fix is to make kill points tie more heavily into victories. This will reduce min/max and number of units thereby decreasing turn time. I played an ITC style event where my first opponent had 36 kill points. His set up time took 45 minutes. The psychic phase with heavy psyker armies slows the game down a lot right now, both pre game and during game.

I think chess clocks are a great fix and better balance. It forces streamlining of armies and game play but at the players level.

Invalidating army lists is fine, detachment and LoW restrictions often do that. But we don't want to invalidate models themselves.

So can anyone name a detachment or formation that literally costs between 1500 and 1650 points? That's pretty narrow and I don't think there's any. What's the minimum size for that huge infantry Cadian detachment? I think it's closer to 1000

I think 1,500 is more limiting than you think for Gladius. That said, yes, the free points become a larger percentage boost. Summoning becomes a bit more powerful, and it already is, but armies would have 350 less points to generate their dice battery to begin. Not gonna say it's a perfect solution, but I also don't think it would unbalance the meta more than it already is.

 FTGTEvan wrote:
I think 1,500 is more limiting than you think for Gladius. That said, yes, the free points become a larger percentage boost. Summoning becomes a bit more powerful, and it already is, but armies would have 350 less points to generate their dice battery to begin. Not gonna say it's a perfect solution, but I also don't think it would unbalance the meta more than it already is.

I think Battle Company and War Convocation players have nothing to complain about. The ratio between free points and paid points becomes much bigger. These lists will become more powerful, in the new smaller meta, not less.

So that's a good reason to go to lower points ? I'd like to see some actual results for the purpose of verification.

 axisofentropy wrote:

 FTGTEvan wrote:
I think 1,500 is more limiting than you think for Gladius. That said, yes, the free points become a larger percentage boost. Summoning becomes a bit more powerful, and it already is, but armies would have 350 less points to generate their dice battery to begin. Not gonna say it's a perfect solution, but I also don't think it would unbalance the meta more than it already is.

I think Battle Company and War Convocation players have nothing to complain about. The ratio between free points and paid points becomes much bigger. These lists will become more powerful, in the new smaller meta, not less.

War Convocation really gets hurt at 1,500. It's I believe minimum 1,435 or something, and cannot fit a dual-dakka knight at 1,500, or any expanded units. By a similar token, while Gladius will have ~400 points to add equipment and allies, that's still a lot less of a punch than they currently have at 1,850. So yes, the ratio of free points is greater, but they lose some of their teeth and become even more of a survive and grind out a win with bodies than a punchy, dangerous enemy.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Dozer Blades wrote:
So that's a good reason to go to lower points ? I'd like to see some actual results for the purpose of verification.

"It won't definitively solve all the problems with the game so we shouldn't bother."

The meta will shift, for sure, but going to 1,500 will NOT suddenly make the game unplayable or uncompetitive or something else. You can't have any "actual results" until you try it out.

 Dozer Blades wrote:
So that's a good reason to go to lower points ? I'd like to see some actual results for the purpose of verification.

We can't try it out unless we have verification from actual results
We can't have actual results until we try it out

Your actual results have been presented in this thread or others, best stated in the comments on the FLG post, from all the Euros - they play almost exclusively 1500 and sometimes 1650, and are getting along just fine.

You can fit the dual dakka knight. Barely. I think it's basically like 1485 for the detachment with the dual dakka knight. Which means no pod/anti-psyker support for the War Convo which is fine.

 Hulksmash wrote:
You can fit the dual dakka knight. Barely. I think it's basically like 1485 for the detachment with the dual dakka knight. Which means no pod/anti-psyker support for the War Convo which is fine.

Yeah I'm still going to build a War Convocation this year after Adepticon and I'm looking forward to the efficiency at any point value. who needs psykers when you've canticles? Who needs a Culexus when you've SO MUCH DAKKA.

Anyway, this is not an argument for 1500, but it's important to make sure that popular collections are not totally invalidated. I mean, 1000 points would be bad because war convocation and maybe other popular detachments would be impossible. The meta will inevitably shift and that's fine because it's always shifting and it doesn't prevent good players from doing well.

If all the rolling random powers and stuff for peoples lists takes up too much time would people accept the TO doing it for them before hand if the alternative is games not finishing?

I suspect not both because people like to roll their own dice and will get grumpy (especially if the results are bad)

and because some will just not trust the TO not to rig things for their mates


or is there a way for the TO to connect his game to an online random number generator that the players themselves can 'roll' on before hand when they submit their lists so they are the one who's done the 'rolling' with the results being private (except for the TO) until the day, but again that bit is done by the time people start playing?

would players go for that?

would players who rolled badly just not show up thus messing up the match ups and numbers for everybody else?

What was the time limit for the 1850 games at this year's LVO? (Work Blocked for me, sorry).

Increasing points will not make IG / CSM / Orks more competitive - their army cores still suck and taking more bad stuff against more good stuff is still bad vs good. The balance remains the same, but the game is still slower.

People need to separate balance from play time. If the intent is to adjust points for balance, then make Decurion armies play at 1400 pts, mixed armies play at 1500 pts and junk armies like IG play at 1600 pts.

Or, revise the rules packet so that the armies play at 1500 pts, but IG get to choose all of their powers and traits, whereas Decurion has to roll randomly.

 kronk wrote:
What was the time limit for the 1850 games at this year's LVO? (Work Blocked for me, sorry).

2:45 I believe (other events do 3 hours, but that's got to be about the max right?)

 RiTides wrote:

 kronk wrote:
What was the time limit for the 1850 games at this year's LVO? (Work Blocked for me, sorry).

2:45 I believe (other events do 3 hours, but that's got to be about the max right?)

NOVA last year was 3:30, and will be this year as well.

Target wrote:

 Dozer Blades wrote:
So that's a good reason to go to lower points ? I'd like to see some actual results for the purpose of verification.

We can't try it out unless we have verification from actual results
We can't have actual results until we try it out

Your actual results have been presented in this thread or others, best stated in the comments on the FLG post, from all the Euros - they play almost exclusively 1500 and sometimes 1650, and are getting along just fine.

Spoiler alert from Europeland: what's good and what's bad at 1500/1650 is pretty much the same as at 1850.

 FTGTEvan wrote:

 RiTides wrote:

 kronk wrote:
What was the time limit for the 1850 games at this year's LVO? (Work Blocked for me, sorry).

2:45 I believe (other events do 3 hours, but that's got to be about the max right?)

NOVA last year was 3:30, and will be this year as well.

3:30 hours? Ugh. 2:45 is fine. For a 3-game day, that's 8.25 hours of gaming. That's a long damn time. Longer than that, I'd be fatigued. At 3:30 per round, that's 10.5 hours.

This is just my opinion obviously, but I'd much rather go to a 1500 point game at 2:45 than 1850 at 3:30.

I'm apparently insane and it was 3... don't know why I was so convinced it was 3:30.

I see. 3 hours is close enough to 2:45. I can dig it. 3:30 is a bit much.

Thanks for the correction.

 FTGTEvan wrote:
I'm apparently insane and it was 3... don't know why I was so convinced it was 3:30.

It was all that rum heheh.

I think back to the days when we played 2000 points in two hours at tournaments and almost always finished games. To me what has changed more than anything else is the psyker phase (including pre game) and the spamming of min units for max objective securing. Back then kill points were a big part of the game too. I have seen tournaments go from 1750 to 1850 to 2000. I would hate to see a drop to 1500 or even 1600.

I'm not sure that spamming Min units has changed, it was a thing back in 5th as well. I think the move away from Mech has changed it a lot more than simple min maxing. Moving 8 vehicles is much faster than moving 8 units of guys on foot. Though I do agree the psychic power part of the game has added a lot of time. In 5th most armies cast maybe 1 or 2 powers a turn and it was fast, but most powers were meh. In general there is a ton more dice rolling than there used to be, more shots, more re-rolls, etc.

 JohnHwangDD wrote:
Increasing points will not make IG / CSM / Orks more competitive - their army cores still suck and taking more bad stuff against more good stuff is still bad vs good. The balance remains the same, but the game is still slower.

People need to separate balance from play time. If the intent is to adjust points for balance, then make Decurion armies play at 1400 pts, mixed armies play at 1500 pts and junk armies like IG play at 1600 pts.

Or, revise the rules packet so that the armies play at 1500 pts, but IG get to choose all of their powers and traits, whereas Decurion has to roll randomly.

I'd like to actually see how an ork warband (multi detachment decorian) with a ghaz council does before you blow it off as uncompetitive. That list just will not fit in 1500 and is at least usable at 1650. But that combination goes a long way to fixing certain issues with Orks, army wide fearless (removes the mob rule), first turn assaults, and a near unkillable warlord with a 2+ invul, 2+ armour, 5+ fnp with reroll, eternal warrior (means even str d has issues vs him). It's a good list for a specific type of ork play style of trukk spam, but completely unplayable at 1500. Heck it barely works in 1650 but at least it's something. It's kinda like the battle co. And war convocation issues. It makes them make hard choices but keeps them relative and competitive. 1500 Just makes many lists unplayable.

The Astra Militarum is the same as Orks except while they are cheaper then. Orks and Around 1200 so they actually fit under 1500 it's all but useless however since you don't have any weapons either. Which is the only really thing Astra Militarum is good for is spamming special weapons.

The problem is people who don't play these armies feel they should discount the opinions of those who do.

 JohnHwangDD wrote:

People need to separate balance from play time.

Exactly. The points drop was never supposed to make the game more balanced. It's just a consideration to make the game go quicker. Going up or down 200-300 points is not going to make IG any better compared to eldar.

 Fishboy wrote:

 FTGTEvan wrote:
I'm apparently insane and it was 3... don't know why I was so convinced it was 3:30.

It was all that rum heheh.

I think back to the days when we played 2000 points in two hours at tournaments and almost always finished games. To me what has changed more than anything else is the psyker phase (including pre game) and the spamming of min units for max objective securing. Back then kill points were a big part of the game too. I have seen tournaments go from 1750 to 1850 to 2000. I would hate to see a drop to 1500 or even 1600.

More than just the psychic phase has changed. Pre-game in general (not just psykers), Psychic Phase, the equivalent of an 1850 Gladius or Daemon army actually putting more than 2500pts into play and that 2500pts would have been 3k at the end of 5th/early 6th. Also rules bloat, it's nearly impossible to know all the rules anymore between GW's constant infusion and the Forgeworld books people find themselves asking "What does that do?" quite a bit more.

Essentially there are a ton of things that have occurred that have cause time to creep upward. The only option is to adjust the game to cut those out or lower point values and have less things that cause time to creep upwards.

gungo wrote:

The problem is people who don't play these armies feel they should discount the opinions of those who do.

I play IG and the Cadian detachment is horrible. Plus you can already take all those units in the quantities available. The IG CAD allows you to take 678 or more guardsmen if you were so inclined. And those would be objective secured. Still doesn't mean it's a good idea.

 Fishboy wrote:

 FTGTEvan wrote:
I'm apparently insane and it was 3... don't know why I was so convinced it was 3:30.

It was all that rum heheh.

I think back to the days when we played 2000 points in two hours at tournaments and almost always finished games. To me what has changed more than anything else is the psyker phase (including pre game) and the spamming of min units for max objective securing. Back then kill points were a big part of the game too. I have seen tournaments go from 1750 to 1850 to 2000. I would hate to see a drop to 1500 or even 1600.

Oh man get with the programme...

gungo wrote:

I'd like to actually see how an ork warband (multi detachment decorian) with a ghaz council does before you blow it off as uncompetitive. That list just will not fit in 1500 and is at least usable at 1650.

Great! This is a ~*testable hypothesis*~ and it's important. Does 150 more points really make the difference between using the new Ork detachment of formations?

Breng77 wrote:
I'm not sure that spamming Min units has changed, it was a thing back in 5th as well. I think the move away from Mech has changed it a lot more than simple min maxing. Moving 8 vehicles is much faster than moving 8 units of guys on foot. Though I do agree the psychic power part of the game has added a lot of time. In 5th most armies cast maybe 1 or 2 powers a turn and it was fast, but most powers were meh. In general there is a ton more dice rolling than there used to be, more shots, more re-rolls, etc.

I would go further back to 3rd ed where there were percentages to force org and a lot less min/max. You did still see min max but it was mainly for a shooting weapon where people were only using the shooting phase anyway. I agree with the rules bloat comment as well. How much time is now spent looking things up? I often find myself telling my opponent to keep playing while I will look their rule up so we don't waste time.

I think in general people don't spend any more time than they did say five years ago looking up rules. It is just some times something tricky will come up that takes some time to resolve.

gungo wrote:

 JohnHwangDD wrote:
Increasing points will not make IG / CSM / Orks more competitive

People need to separate balance from play time.

I'd like to actually see how an ork warband (multi detachment decorian)

1500 Just makes many lists unplayable.

The problem is people who don't play these armies feel they should discount the opinions of those who do.

WTF is a "decorian?" Is that the janky Orkified version?

Making lists unplayable at 1500 is too darn bad. Everybody gives up the same 350 points going from 1850 to 1500, and everybody loses some bells and whistles.

Or, maybe the problem is people relying on the same old crutches...