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Cleave is a standard action, making it very suboptimal. Break harder. None of my choppy PCs have cleave.

Traditio wrote:

Regardless of your standard for how much balance is right, more variety = more imbalance. It's an intrinsic risk of variety,

Risk =\= reality.

This is (not unusually) a flawed assumption on your part.

There is absolutely no reason why a game with near infinite variety can still offer a reasonable stab at being balanced enough to offer a fair contest.

The only limiting factor is the greater number of options, the more hours need to be invested into testing. So there's a limitation to how many hours a commercial enterprise can invest into development and still retain viability, but there's absolutely nothing inherent to variety which dictates imbalance.

Besides, most other names you'll hear bandied around as examples of how to do it right have feedback mechanisms and correction methods if something does slip through the net, and take steps to fix the problem, removing the pressure to get things perfectly correct 100% of the time. GW doesn't do this and this hurts 40K badly.

I can even recall a Dakka poster reporting on a conversation had at an open day with a studio member who basically said "we know the Tau and Eldar books have screwed the pooch, but we're not going to do anything about it."

With the advent of the FAQ requests, we may be seeing an attitude adjustment more towards how the other major gaming names approach this, but it's too early to say yet.

Traditio wrote:
Pathfinder and D&D are cooperative games.

While I think this is a very valid point as people have less problems with things they aren't on the receiving end of, bad imbalances are still spotted. Certain characters in Zombicide are stupid strong and the game isn't considered well balanced. Slippery is by far the strongest talent in the vanilla game, and combining it with the "move two squares for the price of one" makes the rollerblading bitch an essential pick unless you want to try to win scenarios with both hands tied behind your back.

The strongest possibility for 40k army balance is for GW to give a crap about army balance. Formations aren't necessary for balance, they might be one of several possible ways, but it doesn't really matter until GW starts caring enough to change things.

 Vaktathi wrote:
Apparently taking a tac company and getting free drop pods on everything is balanced.

I never said that. "Balanced" is a relative term. "Balanced" indicates relative equality in terms of chances for victory independent of player skill. "Balanced" against what? The Gladius Strike Force may or may not be balanced against the Decurion. It's not balanced against Tau or Eldar: Tau and Eldar are better. It's not balanced against Chaos Space Marines. It's vastly better than Chaos Space Marines.

In principle, there is no reason why 5 tactical marines and a "free" drop pod could not be balanced against Chaos Space Marines, if Chaos Space Marines received rules updates and formations which rendered units which were roughly "balanced" against those 5 tactical marines and free drop pod for the same points value.

Currently if you get 70 points of chaos space marines, and I get 70 points of space marines with all sorts of cool rules AND a free rhino, that's horribly unbalanced in my favor. However: if you get 5 chaos space marines (with rules roughly equivalent to what vanilla marines get, or else, if you get them more cheaply) and...say...I don't know....a free veterans of the long war upgrade, a free icon of despair and a free mark of nurgle...well, that's a different story, isn't it?

Sorry, there may be issues with infantry in 40k, but adding those sorts of capabilities, not to mention that much board presence and scoring ability, at zero cost, isnt balanced, and even if it is, its a band aid on a deeper problem of scale and individual unit issues, not a solid balance mechanism.

Again, balanced against what?

Balance simply signifies a kind of equality or fairness. There's no reason that my free rhino couldn't be roughly "equal" to something that you could get.

Yes, currently, the Battle Company is unbalanced against oudated codices. There's no question.

What I'm arguing in favor of essentially is everyone getting their equivalent of the battle company.

Likewise, just because Scatbikes arent getting shuriken bonuses, doesnt suddenly make them fine and balanced in the formation, thats still a single unit putting out as much firepower as some IG gunlines, except in the formations its supporting elements just become more capable.

That's a problem with scatbikes, not with formations.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

Galef wrote:Formations aren't the issue. The issue is that there is no consistent "core" that all armies must field before spending points on the cool stuff. This "core" used to be the Force Org chart (now called the CAD). Unlimited detachments is another issue

I completely agree. That's why I like the Decurion and the GSF. They force you to field a core before you can buy cool stuff.

And frankly, if formations like that were MANDATORY for all codices, it would take the sting out of allies.

Sure, you can take as many allies as you want...

...

But you're going to have a lot of core troops on the field and pretty much NO cool toys.

If I could rewrite the rules, I'd do the following:

1. Remove all formations which allow you to take only 1 unit or model (I include with this the four demon prince formation). [That said, the ability to spam a unit in a formation isn't in and of itself bad. Is anybody really afraid of the 1st company, where you can field 3-5 terminators, sternguard or vanguard veteran units (without free drop pods, may I add)?]

2. Make a rule that all units in your army MUST belong to a formation.

3. Make relatively expensive "core" components for all formations (like the Decurion and GSF).

4. Make a rule so that you can't have more than one of the same component (apart from the core) of a formation in that formation.

[You want an extra 1st company? Ok. Then you'd better bring another demi-company to go with it.]

5. Make a rule that if any component other than the core of a formation is fielded in a formation, the core of that formation must be fielded as well as well (no librarius conclaves without a demi-company).

6. For all codices, grant totally awesome bonuses if at least two of the core of a formation are taken (think how two demi-companies become a battle company with free rhinos), but which the army forfeits if they don't [no free rhinos for one demicompany and a bunch of cool toys].

All of a sudden, a whole lot of shenanigans just got shut down, didn't they?

That seems more complicated and less flexible than simply going back to using a force organisation chart.

Rosebuddy wrote:
That seems more complicated and less flexible than simply going back to using a force organisation chart.

It's not really more complicated [if you think otherwise, I await your explanation of this].

It is much less flexible.

It's also much more balanced.

It's more complicated because instead of the building blocks of your army being units you have batches of units with their own additional special rules. I'd rather have units X, Y and Z than unit combinations XY, XZ and YZ each with their own formation rules and with their own formation combination rules.

If it's more balanced than the current state of the game it's only because you suggest that work be put in to make it more balanced. The same can be done for the FOC system or any other simple system.

Instead of stipulating that overly powerful units be batched with worthless units, let's just not have overly powerful or worthless units.

Rosebuddy wrote:
It's more complicated because instead of the building blocks of your army being units you have batches of units with their own additional special rules. I'd rather have units X, Y and Z than unit combinations XY, XZ and YZ each with their own formation rules and with their own formation combination rules.

If it's more balanced than the current state of the game it's only because you suggest that work be put in to make it more balanced. The same can be done for the FOC system or any other simple system.

Instead of stipulating that overly powerful units be batched with worthless units, let's just not have overly powerful or worthless units.

Well, batching does prevent single unit spam. And that does do something to curve some problems.

Thinking you can make everything perfectly balanced is naive. But of course it could be much much better than it is, if there was *any* kind of playtesting.

Personally, I'd like a CAD system with balanced codexes.

I like formations because they combine fluff and crunchy power.

 Purifier wrote:
Well, batching does prevent single unit spam. And that does do something to curve some problems.

Only if GW are paying enough attention to make sure they batch weak units with strong units. Of course they don't know what they're doing so they're just as likely to batch a bunch of overpowered units together and destroy any chance of the formation system balancing anything. As it is, you could batch a whole bunch of Eldar units together and still get something a hell of a lot more powerful than if you'd batched a bunch of Ork units together.

Really?! Ban the 4x Daemon Prince formation?!! You do realise that it's easily in the running for the title of 'Worst Formation in 40k', right? I mean, you only need to sink 1000+pts into it, and the actual bonuses are pretty 'meh', and begin disappearing the second you kill a single Prince...

And no, forcing everyone into only ever playing "Decurionhammer" would be pants on head awful.

Not all armies have equal Decurion style detachments. Codex Marines, Dark Angels, Eldar, Tau, Necron, Daemonkin all get theirs at very reasonable pts costs. On the other hand, Orks & Guard are hilariously atrocious in just their basic requirements, making their Detachments almost unplayable until you're hitting closer to 2000pts!

Daemons meanwhile lose out on the main appeal of what makes Chaos so unique - playing mono God lists. Khorne & Slaanesh can do it pretty well, but there's no way you're going to make a Tzeenchian Daemonic Incursion work, since the individual formations are all based around Sacred Numbers. (meaning the auxiliary requires 9 units of Screamers and/or Burning Chariots, and the formation's bonus rules laughably nerf the hell out of Screamers!) So basically you end up forcing Tzeentch into filling out with Furies and/or Soul Grinders... (oh wait, your rules ban both of those Formations, since it's just spamming a single unit - BRILLIANT! )



40k is far from perfect, but overly restricting the way people can build their armies is not the way to go...

Another big problem with 'Decurion style only' is that some armies end up missing out on what makes them strong in the first place. Daemons for example are built around the supports offered by their Heralds, hence why they can take 4 per HQ slot.
In the Incursion detachment however, you only get a single Herald per individual formation. Depending on which God you pick, this can be annoying, to a downright kick in the teeth. (again, poor, poor Tzeentch - so unloved...)

Armies like Marines don't need lots of HQ's to boost what are otherwise overall mediocre units. Armies like Eldar & IG at least can build a decent number of their support HQ's into the army as basic squad upgrades. (though the Guardcurion is hilarious in that it no longer allows for the likes of Priests!)
Then you have armies like Daemons & Tyranids which are designed entirely around their HQ's buffing their otherwise average to below average units... Imagine if for example Tyranids got a Bugcurion that only allowed for a single Hive Tyrant + 1 unit of Warriors per swarm? There's no way the army would function properly with so little synapse. (especially since your rules would ban the idea of taking a single Trygon Prime a couple times as auxiliaries!)

Sure, the Decurions are fluffy, and can be fun depending on what you face. But overall, they're no more balanced than non-formation 40k, nor are they combating spam in any way shape or form. (your precious little GSF is hugely guilty of mass spamming Obsec Razorbacks/Drop Pods for example!)

Traditio wrote:


1. Remove all formations which allow you to take only 1 unit or model (I include with this the four demon prince formation). [That said, the ability to spam a unit in a formation isn't in and of itself bad. Is anybody really afraid of the 1st company, where you can field 3-5 terminators, sternguard or vanguard veteran units (without free drop pods, may I add)?]

I'd just go ahead and remove all formations. That said, there are plenty of fluff reasons and good army building reasons for single unit formations to exist. With the current state of the game, I'd leave them, as it makes sense for someone doing the 1st company for their Salamanders to field nothing but terminators for their firedrake cadre.

2. Make a rule that all units in your army MUST belong to a formation.

The only way this could work is with so many formations (and many of which would be single unit type formations for the player's sake) that it'd be a nightmare to design, balance, and have the players sift through. The issue becomes that balancing becomes even harder than it currently is. You were arguing earlier that more variety = less balance, well in this case, you're adding a larger variety of rules to the game. If every unit has their own rules, and then when those units are put in a formation that require more rules, which can then belong in a larger super formation with more rules, you've essentially tripled your balancing workload. Not only does every unit still theoretically have to be balanced in the traditional way before formations, you also have to balance them within the formation they're a part of, against the formations within the same book to not invalidate anything, and then externally among all the other codices.

On top of that, its also limiting options for the player. If my building blocks become larger and have prescribed units, I'm going to be more frustrated trying to make army lists at smaller point levels and trying to get my theme just right. Its also annoying in that it essentially forces units I may not like if they happen to be bundled with a unit I do like. Further, it may run counter to the fluff my force has.

One of the big selling points of 40k is its near unlimited options and fluff, allowing you to build an army for just about any type of force your heart desires. That's achieved by letting players pick exactly which units they want in exactly the quantity they want with the specific wargear they want. Forcing them to take X amount of Y doesn't fix anything, it just frustrates some players without providing any real benefits by excluding the classic CAD.

3. Make relatively expensive "core" components for all formations (like the Decurion and GSF).

In the current system, sure, if some armies have them, every army should have them. Personally, I'd go the opposite and get rid of all them, but I imagine that's pretty clear from where I stand. I still see the merits of at least offering the super formation to everyone.

4. Make a rule so that you can't have more than one of the same component (apart from the core) of a formation in that formation.

[You want an extra 1st company? Ok. Then you'd better bring another demi-company to go with it.]

Why? This limits player options. If I want to field a 1st company task force deep behind enemy lines, I only want 1st company. If I'm playing a ~2000pts game with my Salamander Firedrakes, I want to represent that the chapter has committed a large portion of its most precious resources to secure whatever relic we're fighting for. Don't force a demi-company where it doesn't make sense in my army's fluff.

In other words, don't force things on players. Let them be creative and have more options. This is a selling point of 40k.

5. Make a rule that if any component other than the core of a formation is fielded in a formation, the core of that formation must be fielded as well as well (no librarius conclaves without a demi-company).

You're limiting player options in an attempt to limit powerful options by making them take more stuff they don't want to. This doesn't help anyone. Fix the core issue, not the symptom. If the conclave is too powerful, you fix the conclave. You don't just add a tax people may not want.

6. For all codices, grant totally awesome bonuses if at least two of the core of a formation are taken (think how two demi-companies become a battle company with free rhinos), but which the army forfeits if they don't [no free rhinos for one demicompany and a bunch of cool toys].

All of a sudden, a whole lot of shenanigans just got shut down, didn't they?

Disagree. This only aggravates power creep, pushes the game to higher point levels, makes the barrier to entry higher for any sort of competitive gaming (being more expensive, especially with free transports) and again limits list building.

I thought you were all about variety? If so, you should be supporting the traditional CAD. If every army had a huge awesome buff for bringing two of their large formations (GSF), then we'd be seeing nothing but lists built around those formations. Every army would only be different in a handful of minor changes in wargear and whatever auxiliary formation they could squeeze in.

No, the current solutions, as far as I'm concerned are either to keep the nonsense we have but make the CAD more appealing (and nerf some of the overperforming formations), or just nuke formations altogether. Nobody in 5th was clamoring for free transports if they took a battle company, nor were Necrons out on their luck because they didn't have a +1RP bonus for taking a specific set of units. Maybe its my rose tinted glasses, but I can't help but think that 5th was a much better game without all this formation nonsense handing out free stuff everywhere. Wargear and units have points costs for a reason; it stands to reason a formation offering those things would come with a relatively close pricetag. Likewise, adding buffs like +1RP or +1BS to a bunch of units also costs points. Harder to determine certainly, but something you'd test out.

Point is, formations only add complexity to a game overburdened by it. Formations don't add any additional fluffiness as the CAD covered that perfectly well. If anything, formations limit fluff options if the CAD didn't exist as a fallback. Formations as they currently stand add another layer of poor balance and bad design to a game riddled with them, and even in a perfect world where they were all balanced, it would take significantly more effort to get there than without them.

I don't see the advantage to formations as a player. As a company, GW is laughing all the way to the bank by making you buy 6 sentinels to make them workable through a series of free buffs, instead of just fixing the sentinel so I could field the 1-3 I actually want.

 Purifier wrote:

Well, batching does prevent single unit spam. And that does do something to curve some problems.

True, but so do 0-2 restrictions. You could of course do 'soft batching' where for every one of unit A you have to also take one of units B, C or D.

Arguably the last remaining bastion of anything worthwhile about 40K is the depth of background and the supporting depth of models that allows the player/collector to express themselves in a way that not many of the other systems do, if only because they're further behind in the development curve. Painting and modeling is certainly the only thing that's keeping me in touch with the game right now.

So the answer to balancing 40K is to essentially remove that (arguably) last positive element?

Emphatically not.

If GW are going to start prescribing what models I have to buy and paint in order to put an army on the table and play the game, then they can feth off.

Put an effort into making the two fundamental play styles (assault and shooting) on par with each other, at least give making most units viable a college try and give up on giving long lists of options which either are essentially redundant or so efficient they're an auto take.

Of course, all this would be much easier if the design studio weren't either afraid or banned from using negatives to balance out positives. I suspect they think drawbacks will frighten off all the Little Timmys, but they're key to offering a good, balanced ruleset.

Perhaps if GW plc sales department allowed the devs to let the F.O.C work how it should.
Maybe balance would not be as bad as it currently is?

And if GW plc sales department let the game devs re-write the rules for 40k focused on the new battle game size, scale and scope.
They could cover more with the core rules, use less special rules and find the whole game easier to balance.

There's just no winning.

Tactical Marines are garbage, simply put. In a CAD I'm only ever taking Scouts or Bikers. When they end up with a free transport though, it helps with one issue (cost), and they still gain the benefit of OS.

What exactly is the middle ground here? There isn't really one. You could always go back to the core codex and fix some issues (I'm very vocal on that allowing two Specials in a Tactical Squad instead of a Special and Heavy would fix many issues), but I'd still have little reason to take specific units over other ones.
7.5 codices are fine against each other, and when the other codices catch up everything will be fine. The question, though, is if that's really the way we want it to be balanced. I'm fine with it as I have no say in regards of how to balance units against units, but if I had a say we would balance everything according to a CAD and then work on formations.

Slayer-Fan123 wrote:


Tactical Marines are garbage, simply put. In a CAD I'm only ever taking Scouts or Bikers. When they end up with a free transport though, it helps with one issue (cost), and they still gain the benefit of OS.

This is an odd position to take, as you're comparing something in the current environment to a theoretical environment that doesn't exist (the one where GW are trying to make everything in game work in a given role.)

Currently, Tac Marines are only garbage because of relativism. They're not an inherently bad unit, they're not bad against most other comparable units in most other Codexes. The issue is they're bad because of all the special snowflake units people are free to deploy in their lists that are just better.

Troops in general need to be more prominent, IMO, and I think there needs to be a drawback for using non-troop choices in that role. For instance, no OS. This would need to be balanced with making objective based play one of most viable routes to victory. If SM biker lists were still allowed at an organizational level, but lacked OS, and most, if not all, victory conditions revolved around objectives, then they'd be relying on tabling or other limited scope options to win.

That then begins to level the playing field. You're free to field your tougher, faster, shootier option, but at the end of the day a string of 6s and one Guardsman in a crater on an objective could cost you the game.

Scouts are probably best as an alternative troops choice to Tac Squads, but if an environment is created where troops become more intrinsically important to victory, the reduced durability may force a player to consider selecting Tac Squads as a means of keeping game winning units around for longer, or perhaps Scouts as troops means your army is a vanguard and has an impact on what other choices you can take?

Equally, a greater number of squishier bodies could be a valid choice, but it needs to be a choice not a mathematical no-brainer.

But trying to fix one thing in isolation would be a fruitless task anyway, a holistic view needs to be taken and nothing matters until player agency is prioritized over random d6 rolls on tables.

 Blacksails wrote:

Spoiler:

Traditio wrote:


1. Remove all formations which allow you to take only 1 unit or model (I include with this the four demon prince formation). [That said, the ability to spam a unit in a formation isn't in and of itself bad. Is anybody really afraid of the 1st company, where you can field 3-5 terminators, sternguard or vanguard veteran units (without free drop pods, may I add)?]

I'd just go ahead and remove all formations. That said, there are plenty of fluff reasons and good army building reasons for single unit formations to exist. With the current state of the game, I'd leave them, as it makes sense for someone doing the 1st company for their Salamanders to field nothing but terminators for their firedrake cadre.

2. Make a rule that all units in your army MUST belong to a formation.

The only way this could work is with so many formations (and many of which would be single unit type formations for the player's sake) that it'd be a nightmare to design, balance, and have the players sift through. The issue becomes that balancing becomes even harder than it currently is. You were arguing earlier that more variety = less balance, well in this case, you're adding a larger variety of rules to the game. If every unit has their own rules, and then when those units are put in a formation that require more rules, which can then belong in a larger super formation with more rules, you've essentially tripled your balancing workload. Not only does every unit still theoretically have to be balanced in the traditional way before formations, you also have to balance them within the formation they're a part of, against the formations within the same book to not invalidate anything, and then externally among all the other codices.

On top of that, its also limiting options for the player. If my building blocks become larger and have prescribed units, I'm going to be more frustrated trying to make army lists at smaller point levels and trying to get my theme just right. Its also annoying in that it essentially forces units I may not like if they happen to be bundled with a unit I do like. Further, it may run counter to the fluff my force has.

One of the big selling points of 40k is its near unlimited options and fluff, allowing you to build an army for just about any type of force your heart desires. That's achieved by letting players pick exactly which units they want in exactly the quantity they want with the specific wargear they want. Forcing them to take X amount of Y doesn't fix anything, it just frustrates some players without providing any real benefits by excluding the classic CAD.

3. Make relatively expensive "core" components for all formations (like the Decurion and GSF).

In the current system, sure, if some armies have them, every army should have them. Personally, I'd go the opposite and get rid of all them, but I imagine that's pretty clear from where I stand. I still see the merits of at least offering the super formation to everyone.

4. Make a rule so that you can't have more than one of the same component (apart from the core) of a formation in that formation.

[You want an extra 1st company? Ok. Then you'd better bring another demi-company to go with it.]

Why? This limits player options. If I want to field a 1st company task force deep behind enemy lines, I only want 1st company. If I'm playing a ~2000pts game with my Salamander Firedrakes, I want to represent that the chapter has committed a large portion of its most precious resources to secure whatever relic we're fighting for. Don't force a demi-company where it doesn't make sense in my army's fluff.

In other words, don't force things on players. Let them be creative and have more options. This is a selling point of 40k.

5. Make a rule that if any component other than the core of a formation is fielded in a formation, the core of that formation must be fielded as well as well (no librarius conclaves without a demi-company).

You're limiting player options in an attempt to limit powerful options by making them take more stuff they don't want to. This doesn't help anyone. Fix the core issue, not the symptom. If the conclave is too powerful, you fix the conclave. You don't just add a tax people may not want.

6. For all codices, grant totally awesome bonuses if at least two of the core of a formation are taken (think how two demi-companies become a battle company with free rhinos), but which the army forfeits if they don't [no free rhinos for one demicompany and a bunch of cool toys].

All of a sudden, a whole lot of shenanigans just got shut down, didn't they?

Disagree. This only aggravates power creep, pushes the game to higher point levels, makes the barrier to entry higher for any sort of competitive gaming (being more expensive, especially with free transports) and again limits list building.

I thought you were all about variety? If so, you should be supporting the traditional CAD. If every army had a huge awesome buff for bringing two of their large formations (GSF), then we'd be seeing nothing but lists built around those formations. Every army would only be different in a handful of minor changes in wargear and whatever auxiliary formation they could squeeze in.

No, the current solutions, as far as I'm concerned are either to keep the nonsense we have but make the CAD more appealing (and nerf some of the overperforming formations), or just nuke formations altogether. Nobody in 5th was clamoring for free transports if they took a battle company, nor were Necrons out on their luck because they didn't have a +1RP bonus for taking a specific set of units. Maybe its my rose tinted glasses, but I can't help but think that 5th was a much better game without all this formation nonsense handing out free stuff everywhere. Wargear and units have points costs for a reason; it stands to reason a formation offering those things would come with a relatively close pricetag. Likewise, adding buffs like +1RP or +1BS to a bunch of units also costs points. Harder to determine certainly, but something you'd test out.

Point is, formations only add complexity to a game overburdened by it. Formations don't add any additional fluffiness as the CAD covered that perfectly well. If anything, formations limit fluff options if the CAD didn't exist as a fallback. Formations as they currently stand add another layer of poor balance and bad design to a game riddled with them, and even in a perfect world where they were all balanced, it would take significantly more effort to get there than without them.

I don't see the advantage to formations as a player. As a company, GW is laughing all the way to the bank by making you buy 6 sentinels to make them workable through a series of free buffs, instead of just fixing the sentinel so I could field the 1-3 I actually want.

 oldzoggy wrote:
Modern formations are the worst thing for balance that has ever happened.They give free bonuses making the models in the formation too cheap or the same models outside the formation too expensive. This is really bad.

Formations should cost points for the bonuses they give, and they NEVER should give you free units or upgrades.

If thatt were the case every one would just run CAD's unless there is a formation that lets you spam something OP.

I think that everyone here agrees that our game is currently "Unbalanced" and everyone wants to find a way to do this. However, and this is just my two cents, we are over thinking it. In any game a level of unbalance will exist, either by mistake, design or poor quality control. In the case of GW I personally believe that the old adage "Don't attribute to malice that which can be easily explained by stupidity" is true. GW didn't intentionally unbalance the game with the recent Eldar, Tau, SM, Necron and DA codexs. They just didn't bother to play test them enough to realize that other codexs like DE, IG, Orks, Chaos don't have any sort of chance against these on average.

Basically the way to balance the game is to try and get GW to balance the codexs BEFORE they get released. Honestly the best way to do this would be to release ALL codexs at the same time, and then make amendments with that long forgotten FAQ website for any problems that arise.

Formations are inherently unbalanced, because at the moment they aren't equal. If you really believe they are balanced then you may take my Orkurion or my friends IG Decurion and I will play your Eldar Warhost (not sure what it is called) Necron Decurion, SM battle Company/Demi Company and so on.

I think formations add flavor to the game and should be allowed, however at this point in the game they are ruining it. Some codex's get powerful formations with bonuses (SM getting FREE Razorbacks/droppods/Rhinos.) while other formations get nerfs (My Orks getting an even worse version of Mob Rule) so again, it becomes a balance issue and I just don't believe GW did it on purpose, I just believe they have sub-par rules writers.

 Azreal13 wrote:

Slayer-Fan123 wrote:


Tactical Marines are garbage, simply put. In a CAD I'm only ever taking Scouts or Bikers. When they end up with a free transport though, it helps with one issue (cost), and they still gain the benefit of OS.

This is an odd position to take, as you're comparing something in the current environment to a theoretical environment that doesn't exist (the one where GW are trying to make everything in game work in a given role.)

Currently, Tac Marines are only garbage because of relativism. They're not an inherently bad unit, they're not bad against most other comparable units in most other Codexes. The issue is they're bad because of all the special snowflake units people are free to deploy in their lists that are just better.

Troops in general need to be more prominent, IMO, and I think there needs to be a drawback for using non-troop choices in that role. For instance, no OS. This would need to be balanced with making objective based play one of most viable routes to victory. If SM biker lists were still allowed at an organizational level, but lacked OS, and most, if not all, victory conditions revolved around objectives, then they'd be relying on tabling or other limited scope options to win.

That then begins to level the playing field. You're free to field your tougher, faster, shootier option, but at the end of the day a string of 6s and one Guardsman in a crater on an objective could cost you the game.

Scouts are probably best as an alternative troops choice to Tac Squads, but if an environment is created where troops become more intrinsically important to victory, the reduced durability may force a player to consider selecting Tac Squads as a means of keeping game winning units around for longer, or perhaps Scouts as troops means your army is a vanguard and has an impact on what other choices you can take?

Equally, a greater number of squishier bodies could be a valid choice, but it needs to be a choice not a mathematical no-brainer.

But trying to fix one thing in isolation would be a fruitless task anyway, a holistic view needs to be taken and nothing matters until player agency is prioritized over random d6 rolls on tables.

They are bad because they are terrible at everything they try to do. And they pay a fair number of points to be good at absolutely nothing.

Eh, I think if the game were refocused onto a smaller scale, they'd be just fine. When compared with most other basic troops, they have enough flexibility and hitting power to function well as generalists, and, in the context of troop vs troop combat, generally fare rather well and have a grip of tricks to use.


The problem is that when games are played with superheavies, troop units that can toss out 40 S6 shots across the board, CC units like TWC's and Wraiths that no basic troops can function against, formations that allow absurd abilities, and the like increasingly make classic troops rather pointless, be they Space Marines, Guardsmen, Foot Guardians, Ork Boyz, DE Warriors, etc except in cases where they get ridiculous abilities and formation bonuses (e.g. Decurion Warriors)

Yeah,I guess in theory formations could balance the game, but in practice you get gak like this:



(This year's Adepticon champion)

If you think wraithknights are scary you need to re-evaluate how you are playing the game and building armies because honestly they are nothing but point sinks that punish bad players. They slay noobs, are bullet magnets against medium generals and suck against anyone that knows how to deal with them. Every time I see them I just think "thanks for putting 20% of your army in one spot."

I'll give you guys a hint on how to play the game these days.
1) Have the ability to kill 1 or more wraithknights or imperial knights a turn. Half my armies can kill 3 of either in one turn.
2) Counter, contain or avoid invisibility/ 2++ rerolls. Not hard
3) Bring ignore cover
4) Rapid objective taking

Seriously, if you can do these things you're fine. Now shut your pie holes, quit your belly aching, fix your busted ass dented in armies and turn down the god damn suck.

Martel732 wrote:

Spoiler:

 Azreal13 wrote:

Slayer-Fan123 wrote:


Tactical Marines are garbage, simply put. In a CAD I'm only ever taking Scouts or Bikers. When they end up with a free transport though, it helps with one issue (cost), and they still gain the benefit of OS.

This is an odd position to take, as you're comparing something in the current environment to a theoretical environment that doesn't exist (the one where GW are trying to make everything in game work in a given role.)

Currently, Tac Marines are only garbage because of relativism. They're not an inherently bad unit, they're not bad against most other comparable units in most other Codexes. The issue is they're bad because of all the special snowflake units people are free to deploy in their lists that are just better.

Troops in general need to be more prominent, IMO, and I think there needs to be a drawback for using non-troop choices in that role. For instance, no OS. This would need to be balanced with making objective based play one of most viable routes to victory. If SM biker lists were still allowed at an organizational level, but lacked OS, and most, if not all, victory conditions revolved around objectives, then they'd be relying on tabling or other limited scope options to win.

That then begins to level the playing field. You're free to field your tougher, faster, shootier option, but at the end of the day a string of 6s and one Guardsman in a crater on an objective could cost you the game.

Scouts are probably best as an alternative troops choice to Tac Squads, but if an environment is created where troops become more intrinsically important to victory, the reduced durability may force a player to consider selecting Tac Squads as a means of keeping game winning units around for longer, or perhaps Scouts as troops means your army is a vanguard and has an impact on what other choices you can take?

Equally, a greater number of squishier bodies could be a valid choice, but it needs to be a choice not a mathematical no-brainer.

But trying to fix one thing in isolation would be a fruitless task anyway, a holistic view needs to be taken and nothing matters until player agency is prioritized over random d6 rolls on tables.

They are bad because they are terrible at everything they try to do. And they pay a fair number of points to be good at absolutely nothing.

Again, discussing actual Tac Squads in the context of the hypothetical version of the game where an effort had been made to make as many units and unit types worth taking as possible is a total waste of time.

 Ravenous D wrote:

If you think wraithknights are scary you need to re-evaluate how you are playing the game and building armies because honestly they are nothing but point sinks that punish bad players. They slay noobs, are bullet magnets against medium generals and suck against anyone that knows how to deal with them. Every time I see them I just think "thanks for putting 20% of your army in one spot."

The spot that has stellar speed, solid resiliency, hits like a truck in CC and is able to engage multiple different targets with D weapons from across the board?

I'll give you guys a hint on how to play the game these days.
1) Have the ability to kill 1 or more wraithknights or imperial knights a turn. Half my armies can kill 3 of either in one turn.

Yeah, if it's another Eldar army probably. For many/most other armies, being able to kill 3 Wraithknights a turn at range is simply not possible. If we're talking something like Lascannons, you're gonna need 20/21 BS4 Lascannons to kill a single Wraithknight on average (assuming no cover/invul). That's generally more than the typical firepower output of an entire Imperial gunline army doing nothing but shooting at one target and hoping they all have LoS/Range/No cover, etc.

Space Marines can make do with drop pod grav spam, but that requires being close, and is largely delivered through expensive means and that often are destroyed themselves quickly after.

Maybe if the WK has gotten in amongst your lines you could bring more things like plasma guns and the like to bear easier, but at that point either the Eldar player has made a mistake in not keeping to longer range, or they've already broken your line.

2) Counter, contain or avoid invisibility/ 2++ rerolls. Not hard

Not every army has access to that (or if they do, not all can utilize it effectively), nor do they usually have an adequate counter. There's a reason that armies that can bring it win tournaments and why it often gets explicitly nerfed.

3) Bring ignore cover

Most Ignores cover weapons can't harm a wraithknight, and of those that can, they're either very rare and limited in quantity or their functionality is highly unreliable (e.g. IG lascannons with orders).

4) Rapid objective taking

Again, not spectacularly easy with many armies, especially if they also want to do some or all of the above. Some armies, like Eldar, can do all of the above at the same time. Others can't really do any of them.

Seriously, if you can do these things you're fine. Now shut your pie holes, quit your belly aching, fix your busted ass dented in armies and turn down the god damn suck.

So, in other words, this applies only if you're playing Eldar vs Eldar.

This smacks a lot of "my broken toy is just fine, L2P".

 Vaktathi wrote:

Spoiler:

 Ravenous D wrote:

If you think wraithknights are scary you need to re-evaluate how you are playing the game and building armies because honestly they are nothing but point sinks that punish bad players. They slay noobs, are bullet magnets against medium generals and suck against anyone that knows how to deal with them. Every time I see them I just think "thanks for putting 20% of your army in one spot."

The spot that has stellar speed, solid resiliency, hits like a truck in CC and is able to engage multiple different targets with D weapons from across the board?

I'll give you guys a hint on how to play the game these days.
1) Have the ability to kill 1 or more wraithknights or imperial knights a turn. Half my armies can kill 3 of either in one turn.

Yeah, if it's another Eldar army probably. For many/most other armies, being able to kill 3 Wraithknights a turn at range is simply not possible. If we're talking something like Lascannons, you're gonna need 20/21 BS4 Lascannons to kill a single Wraithknight on average (assuming no cover/invul). That's generally more than the typical firepower output of an entire Imperial gunline army doing nothing but shooting at one target and hoping they all have LoS/Range/No cover, etc.

Space Marines can make do with drop pod grav spam, but that requires being close, and is largely delivered through expensive means and that often are destroyed themselves quickly after.

Maybe if the WK has gotten in amongst your lines you could bring more things like plasma guns and the like to bear easier, but at that point either the Eldar player has made a mistake in not keeping to longer range, or they've already broken your line.

2) Counter, contain or avoid invisibility/ 2++ rerolls. Not hard

Not every army has access to that (or if they do, not all can utilize it effectively), nor do they usually have an adequate counter. There's a reason that armies that can bring it win tournaments and why it often gets explicitly nerfed.

3) Bring ignore cover

Most Ignores cover weapons can't harm a wraithknight, and of those that can, they're either very rare and limited in quantity or their functionality is highly unreliable (e.g. IG lascannons with orders).

4) Rapid objective taking

Again, not spectacularly easy with many armies, especially if they also want to do some or all of the above. Some armies, like Eldar, can do all of the above at the same time. Others can't really do any of them.

Seriously, if you can do these things you're fine. Now shut your pie holes, quit your belly aching, fix your busted ass dented in armies and turn down the god damn suck.

So, in other words, this applies only if you're playing Eldar vs Eldar.

This smacks a lot of "my broken toy is just fine, L2P".

Last three threads in army lists forum..

C:SM
Tau
Eldar

So, I'd concur.

 Ravenous D wrote:

If you think wraithknights are scary you need to re-evaluate how you are playing the game and building armies because honestly they are nothing but point sinks that punish bad players. They slay noobs, are bullet magnets against medium generals and suck against anyone that knows how to deal with them. Every time I see them I just think "thanks for putting 20% of your army in one spot."

I'll give you guys a hint on how to play the game these days.
1) Have the ability to kill 1 or more wraithknights or imperial knights a turn. Half my armies can kill 3 of either in one turn.
2) Counter, contain or avoid invisibility/ 2++ rerolls. Not hard
3) Bring ignore cover
4) Rapid objective taking

Seriously, if you can do these things you're fine. Now shut your pie holes, quit your belly aching, fix your busted ass dented in armies and turn down the god damn suck.

I don't want to sound rude so please don't take this as me attacking you, with that said I really dislike comments like yours. It is not constructive and smacks of "Learn to Play", or "Learn to pay to play".

1: Nothing in my Ork codex can go toe to toe with a wraithknight and there is very little I can do to remove a Knight (Eldar or Imperial) in a single turn, even focus firing at it.

T8 means I have literally nothing in the ranged arsenal that can hurt this except Lootas which wound on 5s and maybe Tank Bustas which wound on a 4. Of course for my tank bustas to actually hit this thing they have to get within 24inches of it. 10 Tank Bustas are 130pts, put them in a trukk and its 160pts thats roughly 3 hits and 1-2 wounds, Of course the wraithknight gets either cover, invul and will get his 5+ FNP. So realistically if its positioned with its big toe in cover I have a 50/50 of inflicting 1 wound on this thing with a full unit of Tank Bustas. Lootas on the other hand, a unit of 15 = 30 shots on average, 10 hits on average and 3 wounds. Against its 3+ 5+ this works out to about 1 wound, and those 15 lootas cost 210 points. So according to you, I have to spend all my shooting phase from everything I have available to possibly inflict 3-4 wounds on this 6wound monster. So your 1st advice is useless, if you want to talk about CC? then I have to close the distance while getting blown off the board by the rest of the Eldar army and on average I need about 5-6 PK wielding nobs to kill this thing in 1 turn. 8 Nobz on the charge with Powerklaws will lose 2 instantly to the Wraithknights attacks before they get to swing. Bringing them down to 6 Nobz/PK that equals 24 attacks on the charge, 12 hits, 6-7 wounds, Of which the Wraithknight will save 1-2 with its 5+ FNP or possibly invul if it has one. If they don't manage this then they die instantly to the Stomps that happen afterwards, GG. Ohh and btw 8 MA Nob (Cheaper then regular Nobz with PKs) cost 320pts, or another way to look at that, MORE then the Wraithknight. So #1 is useless advice, unless you can tell me how to kill a Wraithknight on turn 1 with the Ork Codex.

2: I can't counter, I can't contain (except maybe by throwing boyz at it for a few turns) and I certainly can't avoid (Orks are a reasonably fast codex, but most good options are slow, with the exception of bikes)

3: The only Ignore cover in my entire codex is Burnas and Skorchas. I can bring these, but unfortunately there are no good platforms for them. As far as ranged Ignores cover? Orks don't have any besides the Burna Bomber, which is considered by most to be the worst Ork Flyer.

4: The one thing Orks can do, and are good at. I can transport hordes of orks onto objectives and I can take them quickly by bikes.

Oh, I know where this goes.

- You can't kill a Wraithknight per turn? L2P(lay) noob!
- Well I really can't. Would you mind telling me how my CSM can deal with a Wraithknight?
- Eeeeeeeeerm you did it wrong when choosing your army! L2P(ay) noob!