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Yoyoyo wrote:

 Jancoran wrote:
We just saw Militarum Tempestus win.

I'd be very interested in hearing more about this.

How exactly did Tempestus keep up with the powergaming factions that abuse free transports and silly formation bonuses?

617 Tempestus, 616 Eldar, 616 Tau.

Guys, he played against mono-Codex IG laden with Abhuman spam... easy win!

 deviantduck wrote:

Yoyoyo wrote:

 Jancoran wrote:
We just saw Militarum Tempestus win.

I'd be very interested in hearing more about this.

How exactly did Tempestus keep up with the powergaming factions that abuse free transports and silly formation bonuses?

617 Tempestus, 616 Eldar, 616 Tau.

Oh you are such a tease.

Details please!

As far as I know, it was just spammed Taurox for a bunch of OS. It wouldn't be my exact take on a competitive list, but it is close.

Yoyoyo wrote:

 Jancoran wrote:
We just saw Militarum Tempestus win.

I'd be very interested in hearing more about this.

How exactly did Tempestus keep up with the powergaming factions that abuse free transports and silly formation bonuses?

My Militarum Tempestus won by using null deployment and then overwhelming a sector, then using the Transports to abate the response from the enemies (that's taking a lot of Warhammer and turning it into one sentence so...clearly...there was more to it than that). I used IG as allies to cover anti-air and melee duties and to battle enemy Psykers (which I faced when I fought Eldar)

I played against an IG player in round one, and that game was not close. He just could not stand up to the Volley guns, and the Taurox Prinms got in on his Plasma spam veterans early and often. And once you're committed to staying in those boxes and firing, it makes it progressively harder to do anything when the blob takes up space and the Deep Strikers have so many shots.

Space Marines in round 2. lots tougher. Centurion star, plus he actually had some long range blasts to throw from Thunderfire cannons. They had bolter drill, so they weren't missing much either. He did a number on me, but I essentially just shot everything that wasn't a Centurion with the Militarum Tempestus and shot just Centurions with the Blob until they went away. But I took pretty hefty casualties in that game. I think I MIGHT have had 25% of my force left when it was over.

hen against Eldar (of course) in round 3.

The Eldar in particular were not fond of the Ignores Cover the IG allies brought. Those bike squads like to run close to the table edge so a failed morale check on LD 8 and gone in one case. I bounced Fortune once in that game, which was cool (I had 10 dice to throw...hey why not). That Eldar battle was a battle i explained in another thread. The game came down to a failed charge by the Wraith KNight from about 8 inches out from my blob. That could have gone either way, but because it failed, i was able to kill it without getting tangled up. We butchered the Scatter Bikes with Ignores Cover and DS'ing Twin Linked units. The Volleyguns, once they get settled are really nice. Like really nice.

My favorite tactic was running the vehicles up and then moving them flat out to cover my men after they fired. I took 4 Taurox Primes. All of them died in most of tghe games eventually, but for a good cause. Against Eldar in particular, that worked really well because I tried to get my drops near terrain pieces, which then allowed me to form a wall with them so that I could cut them off from just moving around the vehicle to get shots on my exposed dudes.

I did a way more detailed report on this somewhere on here.

I can't find your report Jancoran, but thanks.

Also, congrats on making it work. You're definitely swimming against the current in that Eldar matchup!

Yoyoyo wrote:
I can't find your report Jancoran, but thanks.

Also, congrats on making it work. You're definitely swimming against the current in that Eldar matchup!

the report was on another thread where this similar thing came up. It was a long thread filled with acrimoney. Lol. In any event, I am actually ranked with Militarum Tempestus in the ITC. Lol. I might need to take them for a few spins just to see if I can repeat the magic. Militarum Tempestus is a very difficult list to play on its own, which is why the allies.

Here is the list I used:

• Militarum Tempestus Combined Arms Detachment

125pts 5 Tempestus Command (4 Volley Guns)
80pts Taurox Prime (Auto Cannons, Battle Cannon)

125pts 5 Tempestus Command (4 Volleyguns)
80pts Taurox Prime (Auto Cannons, Battle Cannon)

126pts 8 Scions (2 meltaguns)
80pts Taurox Prime (Auto Cannons, Battle Cannon)

126pts 8 Scions (2 meltaguns)
80pts Taurox Prime (Auto Cannons, Battle Cannon)

126pts 8 Scions (2 meltaguns)

948pts

Astra Militarum Allied Detachment
80pts Company Command Squad (4 Flamers)

75pts Primaris Psyker (Level 2, Force Staff)
75pts Primaris Psyker (Level 2, Force Staff)
50pts Primaris Psyker (Level 1, Force Staff)

25pts Ministorum Priest
25pts Ministorum Priest
25pts Ministorum Priest

160pts 2 Hydra Flakk batteries (both with Hunter Killer Missiles)

355pts 40 Imperial Guardsman (4x power Axes, 4 LasCannons, 3 Meltabombs)

30pts 5 man Platoon Command

900pts

We're not acrimonious (a sesquipedalian method of saying bitter and angry, though I would have preferred salty since slang tends to be more evocative), you just said you'd never be convinced by any amount of evidence to the contrary, so I stopped bothering. The rest of us seem to be on the same page, Skill is the largest component, but it's not the only component, and at at close levels of skill (like those found at the top of the tournament circuit) codex becomes a deciding factor. The evidence is overwhelmingly in favor of this explanation.

A minor segway, I played Eve online, and it was fun, but I could never quite put my finger on why. One time while I was reading the bio of someone who had gate camped me, annoyed that I couldn't find a fair fight, I came across what was obviously meant to be a taunt "if you wanted a one on one you should have played chess". It was as if the scales fell from my eyes, suddenly I understood, I liked eve because it wasn't fair, everyone was out to get me, they were all better equipped than I was and had characters that had been cooking for years. My best time in eve was running for my life from goons, avoiding campers at gates, praying no one would get close enough to me to pop my cloak, doubling back on my path, letting them see me at a wormhole, it was a glorious chase, and the hate mail I got afterwards was the best part.

To circle back to 40k, it's ok that it's not fair, that's part of the fun. We don't have to pretend that skill is the great equalizer, because no matter how good you are there are certain fights where you're going to lose despite being the better player. Maybe your dice went cold, maybe your opponent had a hard counter to your list, or maybe your opponent had a better codex. Insisting your IG lost to that Taudar list because you weren't skilled enough to win is not intellectual honesty it's masochism.

 Grimgold wrote:


you just said you'd never be convinced by any amount of evidence to the contrary, so I stopped bothering. The rest of us seem to be on the same page, Skill is the largest component, but it's not the only component, .

Ironic that you claim I couldnt be convinced by any evidence and proceed to say the same thing I've been saying. skill is THE Largest component, but its not the only component. Wecouldnt agree more. So what in the world do you mean.

 Jancoran wrote:

 Grimgold wrote:


you just said you'd never be convinced by any amount of evidence to the contrary, so I stopped bothering. The rest of us seem to be on the same page, Skill is the largest component, but it's not the only component, .

Ironic that you claim I couldnt be convinced by any evidence and proceed to say the same thing I've been saying. skill is THE Largest component, but its not the only component. Wecouldnt agree more. So what in the world do you mean.

"but its not the only component"

You really make it sound like you don't believe that at all.

Martel732 wrote:

 Jancoran wrote:

 Grimgold wrote:


you just said you'd never be convinced by any amount of evidence to the contrary, so I stopped bothering. The rest of us seem to be on the same page, Skill is the largest component, but it's not the only component, .

Ironic that you claim I couldnt be convinced by any evidence and proceed to say the same thing I've been saying. skill is THE Largest component, but its not the only component. Wecouldnt agree more. So what in the world do you mean.

"but its not the only component"

You really make it sound like you don't believe that at all.

You really need to stop trying to read into what I say and just read WHAT I say. Lol.

It's wearying.

The internet just likes to argue with itself sometimes and I enjoy watching it happen. But this gets silly. The ITC rankings and how they reflect faction strength is the subject. The thing that sparked this "segment" of discussion was that someone said that the rankings "showed" that Joshua Deaths success with one army vs. another was some "proof" that the codex's he scored worse with were worse, which caused me to point out that people do not naturally play the style of some armies as easily as they do others and there is more to that than just the raw score...but that his use of those numerous factions and still being able to pull off his massive score is truly indicative of his ability as a General because even if he's doing "worse" with them... well... His version of worse isn't too bad. I further used myself and my experience as an example of where you can see that with an army that plays to my strengths, I am very good no matter the label on the codex and those that I am not as naturally a fit for will see my scores be lower but that is ALSO a function of opportunities and if I play ONE army a lot more than others as many did, i am more likely to climb the rankings out of sheer experience and force of good practices with that force.

Look. The ITC Rankings within each faction are fair by the measure that anyone could have competed as hard, and some did...and some didnt. Those who did are to be lawded. Those who didn't are not to be ashamed. But understand that you don't make it tothe 400+ club by accident. You kicked serious butt, a lot of the time to get there. Those in the 500+ club did it at ever bigger events. All of them deserve respect and recognition. I'm not sure the rankings tell us much about the respective armies. Sheer lack of opportunities would cause any one faction to be outbalanced. Look at Militarum Tempestus. Almost no one dared! Yes for all we know the best player could be sitting there using them and he just doesn't. Who knows.

They're also a bunch of house rules imposing limitations on what you're allowed to do. That also makes them unrealistic.

We use some of the ITC rules. Maybe we should move to all.

Slayer-Fan123 wrote:
They're also a bunch of house rules imposing limitations on what you're allowed to do. That also makes them unrealistic.

Ill beat you with whatever rules you want to use. Those in the ITC standings "get" that every tournament has rules and rulings on things. Never been to a single tournament where a TO Didnt have to rule on this or that. All ITC attempts to do imperfectly is provide the template for TO'S so they can easily move on to actually organizing and promoting. And it works in that regard. Most of the house rules as you call them (definitely not all) are voted on by you. So it is more often than not... the version of 40k that makes sense to tge majority. I am an outspoken person when it comes to the carelessness of how they ask their questions, but I do applaud the fact that they do it.

If you think you can beat the 400+ guys 3 out of five times, step up, or step off. The people in that upper echelon pown most people they play. I think you will find that most ITC rulings are ones you wouldnt dispute. Invisibikity is easily the dumbest thing they did in 40k so I dont think many people enjoy playing it RAW. if thats your one trick pony, ride it.

I'd love to do tournaments officially outside locals. However I have the following issues:
1. Due to me having to start everything over, my model count had been cut down and nothing is painted. At all.
2. I work in the healthcare industry and it isn't easy to get time off.
3. I'm schooling.

Plus I don't care what other people want. I play the rules as is. If you cannot prepare for Invisibility as written, that's on you.

I would like to take on Jancoran just to see what mistakes he finds when I play. To me, it feels like I don't have much input in the game when playing BA vs Tau or Eldar. How much better is Tempestus than BA? Probably not a huge gap, I'd say.

Dude, you're Blood Angels. You have no problem in the metagame!

Martel732 wrote:
I would like to take on Jancoran just to see what mistakes he finds when I play. To me, it feels like I don't have much input in the game when playing BA vs Tau or Eldar. How much better is Tempestus than BA? Probably not a huge gap, I'd say.

Blood Angels are a lot different from Militarum Tempestus so there's no comparison possible there. They are just absolutely different play styles in my experience. The ITC standings dont tell us much about Militarum Tempestus obviously but Blood Angels have some players with really good scores so I mean... Perhaps seeking them out for some advice could be a good idea.

Ultimately nothing will help you more than willingness to adapt. Just my opinion.

Strictly from the ITC rankings (as of Nov 4th) :

Top 3 BA : 324, 304, 273.
Top 3 MT : 357, 275, 150

I scrounged up the lists for the top player in each faction, posted here for discussion and interest.

Blood Angels CAD

HQ
Librarian (ML1), Veritas Vitae, Force Sword, Auspex
Mephiston
ELITES
Furioso Dreadnought, Frag Cannon, Melta Gun, Drop Pod
Command Squad, Melta Guns (x3), Drop Pod
TROOP
Tactical Squad (x5), Melta Gun, Sergeant with Infernus Pistol, Drop Pod
Tactical Squad (x5), Heavy Flamer, Sergeant with Infernus Pistol, Drop Pod
HEAVY
Fire Raptor, Heavy Bolter Sponsons

White Scars CAD

HQ
Librarian (ML2), Hunters Eye, Force Stave
TROOP
Scout Squad (x5)
Scout Squad (x5), Land Speeder Storm with Heavy Flamer
FAST
Storm Talon, Skyhammer Missile Launcher
Storm Talon, Skyhammer Missile Launcher
Drop Pod
HEAVY
Centurion Devastators, Grav Cannon and Grav Amp (x2), Sergeant with Grav Cannon and Grav Amp and Omniscope

Tempestus Militarum CAD

HQ
• Commissar
TROOP
• Scions x5 w/ x2 melta + taurox prime (Missile and auto cannons)
• Scions x5 w/ x2 melta + taurox prime (Missile and auto cannons)
• Scions x5 w/ x2 melta + taurox prime (Missile and auto cannons)
• Scions x5 w/ x2 flamers + taurox prime (gatling
and auto cannons)

Skitarii Maniple

TROOP
• Skitarii Vanguard x8 w/ x2 arc rifles, omnispex, taser goad
• Skitarii Vanguard x8 w/ x2 arc rifles, omnispex, taser goad
HEAVY SUPPORT
• x2 Onager Dunecrawlers w/ x2 Icarus Arrays

Execution Force Formation
• Eversor
• Callidus
• Vindicare
• Celuxsis

Interesting. Not a big fan of the Execution Force but it is interesting. He handles the anti-air via Skitarii. I handle it with IG. But either way works.

I don't have the Skitarii codex on my person, but if there's a formation to just get the Dunecrawlers that would've been the smarter choice. Nothing does AA better than them.

Otherwise I'd have gone with less Vanguard to fit Plasma Guns on the Scions instead.

Also that BA list is terrible. The Inferno Pistol? You won't even use the Melta Guns again, so why not pay less for the Combi-Melta?

Slayer-Fan123 wrote:
Also that BA list is terrible. The Inferno Pistol? You won't even use the Melta Guns again, so why not pay less for the Combi-Melta?

Explained by the list author :

The Inferno Pistols are literally hit or miss. When they work, they work well. But having that additional Melta shot has proven to be extremely useful in most circumstances.

It kills me that the top BA player is running White scars as an allied detachment, and still scored that low. In all fairness though that was probably before Angels blade, I suppose we'll see what things look like for them in upcoming tournaments.

Honest question here: How are you getting any viable data regarding individual factions from these results when most of these lists are barely 50% said faction?

 MarsNZ wrote:
Honest question here: How are you getting any viable data regarding individual factions from these results when most of these lists are barely 50% said faction?

You get more information about the player than you do the faction, as I've said.

 MarsNZ wrote:
Honest question here: How are you getting any viable data regarding individual factions from these results when most of these lists are barely 50% said faction?

Short answer; Every army has a few top builds, and we are comparing those, if those builds bring allies so be it.

Longer answer; The ability to bring allies is not unique to one list, all armies have that ability. Since we are looking at the top players for each faction, we can assume they bring the best allies for their lists. Assuming everyone brought their best allies we can still directly compare the base armies to each other because strength of allies available is another factor in army strength. For instance all of the IoM have great allies, and the fact that blood angels still placed last despite having access to those allies is very telling of the armies strength. I was hoping the top BA players were roughing it out and that's why they did so bad, but seeing they are using good allies makes it all the more clear how weak that list is. The Necrons don't have good allies, most lists with something the necrons can use are come apocalypse, so the fact they are mostly monofaction lists shows how strong the codex is. Tau and eldar on the other hand heavily borrow from each other, and we can see eldar splashing Tau are much more successful than tau splashing eldar, which shows the power gap between the two codices. I could go on, but you get the idea, there is lots to learn about factions form this.

Jancoran while no doubt being a good player, but is not in his element doing this kind of analysis. His point about learning about players is somewhat valid, take joshua death for instance, 3rd rated player overall and he had to use an illegal list to win a tournament with harlequins. How effeed is your army when it requires the third best player in the ITC to cheat to win a rogue trader scale tourney? We can break down the top twenty list of players and see the same pattern emerge in their win percentages with different armies as we see comparing all players which is a huge indicator that codex strength/the meta influences the game from the top to the bottom.

Counterpoint :

That list went 5-1 at BAO and tied for 10th, out of a field of 170. I'm looking at the standings -- 12th place also went to BA, once again 5-1.

1 list went undefeated, 4 lists had a single draw, everyone else in the top 15 also went 5-1. Composition of the top 15 :

Undefeated : Dark Angels
1x draw : Cult Mech, Eldar, 2x SM
5-1 : 3x Daemons, 2x SM, 2x BA, 1x Eldar, 1x AM, 1x Cult Mech

That doesn't seem nearly as bad! More interesting -- there is a pack of Eldar and Tau placing 15th-20th who scored more ITC points than the 2x BA players who placed higher than them. I'm not sure how ITC weights their scores -- is it better to score blowout victories, than simply win more games? I'd make sure you consider this too. Quantitative data is only as meaningful as the metrics it uses.

If anyone is curious about that 2nd BA list, here's what I dug up in comments at Frontline Gaming.

Blood Angels:
Libby dreadnaught, Warlord with Drop Pod
The FW nasty dread that is 13, 13, 12, ugly meltagun and such, 4 Hull Points. With Drop Pod.
Snipers
GravGun Devastators inna Drop Pod, Combat squads the other 5 marines
Melta Devastators inna Drop Pod, Combat squads the other 5 marines
Throw in some tactical Blood Angels. Maybe.

I.G.:
Vendetta, Wyverns x2, squad of guardsmen (veterans, IIRC) … Commissar?

That ugly Dread is likely the Leviathan.

 Grimgold wrote:


Jancoran while no doubt being a good player, but is not in his element doing this kind of analysis. His point about learning about players is somewhat valid, take joshua death for instance, 3rd rated player overall and he had to use an illegal list to win a tournament with harlequins. How effeed is your army when it requires the third best player in the ITC to cheat to win a rogue trader scale tourney? We can break down the top twenty list of players and see the same pattern emerge in their win percentages with different armies as we see comparing all players which is a huge indicator that codex strength/the meta influences the game from the top to the bottom.

That is immensely interesting to me. I'm not...in my element? Hehehe. Kay.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

Yoyoyo wrote:
Counterpoint :

That list went 5-1 at BAO and tied for 10th, out of a field of 170. I'm looking at the standings -- 12th place also went to BA, once again 5-1.

1 list went undefeated, 4 lists had a single draw, everyone else in the top 15 also went 5-1. Composition of the top 15 :

Undefeated : Dark Angels
1x draw : Cult Mech, Eldar, 2x SM
5-1 : 3x Daemons, 2x SM, 2x BA, 1x Eldar, 1x AM, 1x Cult Mech

That doesn't seem nearly as bad! More interesting -- there is a pack of Eldar and Tau placing 15th-20th who scored more ITC points than the 2x BA players who placed higher than them. I'm not sure how ITC weights their scores -- is it better to score blowout victories, than simply win more games? I'd make sure you consider this too. Quantitative data is only as meaningful as the metrics it uses.

If anyone is curious about that 2nd BA list, here's what I dug up in comments at Frontline Gaming.

Blood Angels:
Libby dreadnaught, Warlord with Drop Pod
The FW nasty dread that is 13, 13, 12, ugly meltagun and such, 4 Hull Points. With Drop Pod.
Snipers
GravGun Devastators inna Drop Pod, Combat squads the other 5 marines
Melta Devastators inna Drop Pod, Combat squads the other 5 marines
Throw in some tactical Blood Angels. Maybe.

I.G.:
Vendetta, Wyverns x2, squad of guardsmen (veterans, IIRC) … Commissar?

The cause of the points differential comes from WHEN you lose your first game.

You get 3 bonus points for each successive win before your first loss. So it is quite possible for someone to place higher but have less ITC points because they lost their first game instead of their 5th or 6th.

Interesting that both BA lists here are terrible and could be improved by running almost any other marine faction instead.