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You're incorrect, but even if you were, at least my imbalance would be more newbie friendly than the current imbalance. I'm pretty sure if someone new walked into your group and played a list that was built around one of the starter sets - Assault on Black Reach or Dark Vengeance - they'd get tabled in a couple turns and wind up having a terrible experience. The same player could walk into my group with the same army, and they probably wouldn't win, but they could at least make a game of it.

I'm just going to focus on this one piece (and I agree with your sentiment, a newb that buys a starter box and then tries to field it will get tabled in quick order... what happens next is the details of my response).

There are generally two modes of thought that dominate most gaming store communities when it comes to this event.

The first is that we want players to have fun, and that by fielding tournament style lists, we are smashing newbs and driving them out of the store and hobby because aint no one got time for that. That to avoid this, we should strive to field softer lists and tailor build for our opponents so that new players and casuals can have good games too, and competitive style players can have fun by you bringing a competitive list.

The second is that it is desirable to be as competitive as you can be 100% of the time and to smash newbs because it teaches newbs how to play in the meta. Destroying them shows them that they need to look at creating a stronger list and teaches them proper list building, and that if a newb quits because they get destroyed then they weren't really good for the game or the community anyway because they weren't going to offer up any real competition. That you won't learn if your opponents are fielding soft lists so that you can "have fun", because fielding soft lists is not "having fun" because when you come up against a real player fielding a real tournament powered list you will get pwned in short order and neither player will have fun.

Now for the follow up question... are either of these right or wrong?

I'd say no, they are neither right nor wrong, this is a culture thing and every store seems to have its own gamer culture within. The group and store I play in follow the first directive. There is another store nearby that does the same, and we have a tournament-dominated store that strongly follows the second directive in my city.

To the thread in general, my preference would be for list building to not be as heavily dominant as it is now. That every army in general should have tools to handle anything, and that the blatantly undercosted yet overpowered units should have their points adjusted. If you can open up a codex and in ten minutes figure out something is grotesquely busted, that is not a good game to me.

 Traditio wrote:

If I brought a CAD with devastators, tactical marines and assault marines, but no grav, why should I even bother unpacking my models to play a game with someone who brought wraithknights and scatter bikes?

Three Tactical Squads w/Plasma+Combi Plasma in Drop Pods can Combat Squad and force Jink and Morale Checks for six of those 3-man Jetbike Squads. You've got a decent chance to chase some of those Jetbikes off the board before they even fire.

So anyways, I'd start with that.

Then the Eldar start doing reserve shenanigans. Most Eldar players I know are well-versed in anti-alpha strike tactics.

Martel732 wrote:
Then the Eldar start doing reserve shenanigans. Most Eldar players I know are well-versed in anti-alpha strike tactics.

Response A for Traditio: Good, we're playing the game!

Response B for Martel: The first round of Drop Tacticals set up near objectives roughly 15" from Eldar deployment line and prep for counter-attack. The second group of Drop Tacticals react to his reserve shenanigans. Assaults and Devastators supporting, obviously.

 Traditio wrote:
If I bring a cultist spam list and you bring an army of wyverns, what should my chances of winning be? I'll admit that that it should be less than 50 percent.

But if it's 0 or anywhere near 0, why should I even bother playing?

You shouldn't - but there's no reason for you to bring such a list, and if you choose to then on your own head be it.

The game system is balanced. The fact you can't kill tanks with Cultists doesn't change that.

 Insectum7 wrote:

Martel732 wrote:
Then the Eldar start doing reserve shenanigans. Most Eldar players I know are well-versed in anti-alpha strike tactics.

Response A for Traditio: Good, we're playing the game!

Response B for Martel: The first round of Drop Tacticals set up near objectives roughly 15" from Eldar deployment line and prep for counter-attack. The second group of Drop Tacticals react to his reserve shenanigans. Assaults and Devastators supporting, obviously.

It doesn't work. I've seen Eldar beat marines trying that over and over and over. The nature of exactly what grab bag of insanity the Eldar are running determines the exact counter play, though. Tactical marines are a liability vs Eldar unless they are in free transports that they can hide in.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 BBAP wrote:

 Traditio wrote:
If I bring a cultist spam list and you bring an army of wyverns, what should my chances of winning be? I'll admit that that it should be less than 50 percent.

But if it's 0 or anywhere near 0, why should I even bother playing?

You shouldn't - but there's no reason for you to bring such a list, and if you choose to then on your own head be it.

The game system is balanced. The fact you can't kill tanks with Cultists doesn't change that.

The game system is not balanced because you can bring unit A that has the same job as B that does said job twice as good for half the points.

Martel732 wrote:
The game system is not balanced because you can bring unit A that has the same job as B that does said job twice as good for half the points.

That's a problem with unit design, not core rules. We've been over this. Game system is balanced.

 BBAP wrote:

Martel732 wrote:
The game system is not balanced because you can bring unit A that has the same job as B that does said job twice as good for half the points.

That's a problem with unit design, not core rules. We've been over this. Game system is balanced.

The core rules are meaningless without the context of the units, though. And I think a unit activation system would be a lot more fair.

Martel732 wrote:

It doesn't work. I've seen Eldar beat marines trying that over and over and over. The nature of exactly what grab bag of insanity the Eldar are running determines the exact counter play, though. Tactical marines are a liability vs Eldar unless they are in free transports that they can hide in.

It doesn't matter, you've already proven the point for me that the game can still be played. A Nub net-listing Eldar player not comprehending the importance of reserve shennanigans can get a nasty surprise from a good player with a suboptimal list.

Martel732 wrote:
The core rules are meaningless without the context of the units, though.

No they aren't. Every Codex in the game could suck and it wouldn't affect the functionality of the core rules.

 BBAP wrote:

Martel732 wrote:
The core rules are meaningless without the context of the units, though.

No they aren't. Every Codex in the game could suck and it wouldn't affect the functionality of the core rules.

We can agree to disagree about that. Every core rule set to me has been more or less okay until the codices get rolled out.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Insectum7 wrote:

Martel732 wrote:

It doesn't work. I've seen Eldar beat marines trying that over and over and over. The nature of exactly what grab bag of insanity the Eldar are running determines the exact counter play, though. Tactical marines are a liability vs Eldar unless they are in free transports that they can hide in.

It doesn't matter, you've already proven the point for me that the game can still be played. A Nub net-listing Eldar player not comprehending the importance of reserve shennanigans can get a nasty surprise from a good player with a suboptimal list.

If that's your bar, then I can't argue with that. My bar is much higher.

Martel732 wrote:
We can agree to disagree about that. Every core rule set to me has been more or less okay until the codices get rolled out.

Right - so it's the Codexes, like I said, and not even all of those are bad.

Martel732 wrote:

If that's your bar, then I can't argue with that. My bar is much higher.

Heh, don't look at me, the bar was artificially set by Traditio in the first place. "Tacticals, Assaults and Devastators (no grav) vs. Scatterbikes and WKs", and you and I have shown that generalship is still relevant.

We might disagree about the ideal importance of listbuilding, that's fine.

 BBAP wrote:

Martel732 wrote:
The game system is not balanced because you can bring unit A that has the same job as B that does said job twice as good for half the points.

That's a problem with unit design, not core rules. We've been over this. Game system is balanced.

No it isn't. The game system offers three key methods of unit removal - shooting, assault and psychic.

While I'd agree that access to psychic offence and defence is a unit/faction design element, the core rules are inherently biased against assault. This could be resolved via unit design (chiefly discounting assault heavy units) but it stems from the core rules.

 BBAP wrote:

Martel732 wrote:
We can agree to disagree about that. Every core rule set to me has been more or less okay until the codices get rolled out.

Right - so it's the Codexes, like I said, and not even all of those are bad.

They're pretty bad as a whole, because of the stratification. I will point out that the devil is in the details. BA are 90% identical to vanilla marines, and yet are far, far inferior because of a handful of differences.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Insectum7 wrote:

Martel732 wrote:

If that's your bar, then I can't argue with that. My bar is much higher.

Heh, don't look at me, the bar was artificially set by Traditio in the first place. "Tacticals, Assaults and Devastators (no grav) vs. Scatterbikes and WKs", and you and I have shown that generalship is still relevant.

We might disagree about the ideal importance of listbuilding, that's fine.

I think your tacs, assaults and devs will get mercilessly stomped nearly every time. A gladius of said units might be able to win via objective spamming, but without gladius, I don't think that approach has any hope. You can make so bikes jink, but they're so crazy cheap that the Eldar player has plenty of other units to vaporize your marines with.

This is a pretty artificial question because it assumes that foolproof method exists for working out exact points equivalences when clearly that is a very difficult thing to pull off, especially for a game as complex and laden with detail as 40K. I challenge anyone to come up with a workable algorithm I bet it would be a horrendous nightmare. A much better question would be should all in-game options be as close to points efficient and playable as possible.

Isengard wrote:
This is a pretty artificial question because it assumes that foolproof method exists for working out exact points equivalences when clearly that is a very difficult thing to pull off, especially for a game as complex and laden with detail as 40K. I challenge anyone to come up with a workable algorithm I bet it would be a horrendous nightmare. A much better question would be should all in-game options be as close to points efficient and playable as possible.

No, points have to be determined empirically, which is why GW doesn't do it.

Martel732 wrote:
They're pretty bad as a whole, because of the stratification. I will point out that the devil is in the details. BA are 90% identical to vanilla marines, and yet are far, far inferior because of a handful of differences.

The Vanilla Marines Codex is gak, though. Thorough-going, no-holds-barred trash. Deathstars, Grav weapons and free transports keep it afloat, in the same way Vulkan Bikers did in 5th Edition. It's a book full of spam and gimmicks, relying on supplements to keep it from disappearing below the surface entirely. I don't own the BA book, but I'd suggest the reason BA are inferior to even this cacky book is because they don't get to use the same crutches. The books beyond Marines are better, albeit with a tendency towards monobuild-itis.

The fact sucky Codexes exist is not good, but it's not a strike against the fundamental balance of the game.

 BBAP wrote:

Martel732 wrote:
They're pretty bad as a whole, because of the stratification. I will point out that the devil is in the details. BA are 90% identical to vanilla marines, and yet are far, far inferior because of a handful of differences.

The Vanilla Marines Codex is gak, though. Thorough-going, no-holds-barred trash. Deathstars, Grav weapons and free transports keep it afloat, in the same way Vulkan Bikers did in 5th Edition. It's a book full of spam and gimmicks, relying on supplements to keep it from disappearing below the surface entirely. I don't own the BA book, but I'd suggest the reason BA are inferior to even this cacky book is because they don't get to use the same crutches. The books beyond Marines are better, albeit with a tendency towards monobuild-itis.

The fact sucky Codexes exist is not good, but it's not a strike against the fundamental balance of the game.

Don't sucky codexes by definition upset the balance of the game?

Martel732 wrote:

Isengard wrote:
This is a pretty artificial question because it assumes that foolproof method exists for working out exact points equivalences when clearly that is a very difficult thing to pull off, especially for a game as complex and laden with detail as 40K. I challenge anyone to come up with a workable algorithm I bet it would be a horrendous nightmare. A much better question would be should all in-game options be as close to points efficient and playable as possible.

No, points have to be determined empirically, which is why GW doesn't do it.

Part of the problem though is how to price hard counters. My Ordinatus Ulator will annihilate a Wraithknight in 1 shot easily (I have done 35 wounds to a WK in the past with a single shot), but a squad of Tau Firewarriors can one-shot an Ordinatus in one assault phase (though not since the FAQ).

Does that mean a squad of 12 Firewarriors should be more than 1075 points?

What about the Falchion Tank Hunter against a Warlord Titan? The Falchion will win every time, because it can outrun the Titan (on an infinite size board of course; should board size be priced into the units?) and will always keep it from firing its guns because all of the Warlord Titan's guns are blast while the Falchion has a Neutron Wave Capacitor which will force the TItan to snapfire if it hits with a blast, which it won't miss because the Titan is so large it is impossible to scatter off of even with a full 8" scatter, and the Titan cannot be hidden.

Should Falchions cost more than 3000 points?

Martel732 wrote:
Don't sucky codexes by definition upset the balance of the game?

Only if you try to play the game using those Codexes. Codexes can be poorly balanced without affecting the rest of the game.

But without point values conferred by the codices, how can you make any balance judgments? I myself can't tell much about a system until I see the units for said system in context. Assault in 7th ed would be fine if most assault units were cheap. But they're not, which makes them trash because the core rules favor shooting.

 Unit1126PLL wrote:

Martel732 wrote:

Isengard wrote:
This is a pretty artificial question because it assumes that foolproof method exists for working out exact points equivalences when clearly that is a very difficult thing to pull off, especially for a game as complex and laden with detail as 40K. I challenge anyone to come up with a workable algorithm I bet it would be a horrendous nightmare. A much better question would be should all in-game options be as close to points efficient and playable as possible.

No, points have to be determined empirically, which is why GW doesn't do it.

Part of the problem though is how to price hard counters. My Ordinatus Ulator will annihilate a Wraithknight in 1 shot easily (I have done 35 wounds to a WK in the past with a single shot), but a squad of Tau Firewarriors can one-shot an Ordinatus in one assault phase (though not since the FAQ).

Does that mean a squad of 12 Firewarriors should be more than 1075 points?

What about the Falchion Tank Hunter against a Warlord Titan? The Falchion will win every time, because it can outrun the Titan (on an infinite size board of course; should board size be priced into the units?) and will always keep it from firing its guns because all of the Warlord Titan's guns are blast while the Falchion has a Neutron Wave Capacitor which will force the TItan to snapfire if it hits with a blast, which it won't miss because the Titan is so large it is impossible to scatter off of even with a full 8" scatter, and the Titan cannot be hidden.

Should Falchions cost more than 3000 points?

It means the scale of the game is out of whack and more or less incompatible with any semblance of good balance.

And quite frankly, there comes a point when you look at the rules and seriously ask if its reasonable to have rules where individual models are moved and jump in front of each one at a time in a game with giant 2000+pts models.

If you want balance with models that small all the way to models that large, you'd need a streamlined, simplified rule set geared towards the larger models, like what Epic was. If you want to play what 40k more or less is right now, you just can't balance those massive units effectively.

I'm on board with Blacksails, here.

It's the scale of things, trying to encompass details at the infantry model level, where none should exist in the context of such large scale units. When a Knight is individually worth the better part of an IG Platoon [35 to 40 models] then what's the point of a single heavy weapon in the unit, that can't move while everyone else can?

FNP could honestly be represented with a Toughness boost. Death Company are more resilient to injury than a normal Marine. T5 it is!

So many piddly details on 10 point models, engaging 450 point models. It doesn't make sense, and you can't properly balance it.

The real fix isn't to eliminate Knights, or Wraithknights, or anything like that. The cat's out of the bag. The real answer to balance the game as unit vs unit. Or more realistically, in 200 point chunks. Something like that. Get away from throwaway units that can overwatch with 10 shots that never do anything anyhow. Any system that relies on "roll a 6, regardless of how good you are normally" is garbage.

Then shift to a d10 based system. And give a UNIT optional attack profiles against other UNITS. Forget model by model wounds. Each infantry unit gets a number of wounds, like a Monstrous Creature, and is full effect until all models are dead. Or create a rule that reduces them in effectiveness after 1/2 wounds... something like that. Model by model in a 50 model unit vs a single Giant is just never going to work out.

Or, have 2-3 versions of 40k; Kill team, Standard, and Apoc.

Wait a minute...

I think that's been done before!

Exalted for truth.

Although it's ironic to me that there are even more miscosting problems amongst the regular units than super heavies. Every super heavy walker I'm aware is perfectly fair (I'd argue many are even overcosted), and many of the GMCs I'm told are as well. The usual suspects cause all the problems. (Supremacy armor!)

The miscostings are all interconnected, however. The cheap scatterbike makes the IK far less valuable because of the AV 12 sides.

Traditio wrote:
1. Dreadnoughts are AV 12. Missile launchers should be able to take down dreadnoughts. As a boltgun is to a T4, 3 wound, AP - infantry, so too is a missile launcher to a standard dreadnought.

The missile launcher's ineffectiveness is a direct consequence of the mathematical wells GW has inadvertently created in the game.

Martel732 wrote:
The missile launcher's ineffectiveness is a direct consequence of the mathematical wells GW has inadvertently created in the game.

Yes. The current state of vehicle rules has rendered many of the "traditional" anti-vehicle weapons inferior against vehicles.

This is just one of those things that happens - as the core rules change the role of a particular weapon may change.

But Traditio has lots of options - he could be taking loads of assault cannon or las-plas razorbacks, he could be taking grav or plasma, he could be enhancing his tac squads with combi weapons, etc. Instead he's choosing the only tac squad loadout that adds zero additional utility.

Can the mods just shut this thread down already?