Forum adverts like this one are shown to any user who is not logged in. Join us by filling out a tiny 3 field form and you will get your own, free, dakka user account which gives a good range of benefits to you: No adverts like this in the forums anymore. Times and dates in your local timezone. Full tracking of what you have read so you can skip to your first unread post, easily see what has changed since you last logged in, and easily see what is new at a glance. Email notifications for threads you want to watch closely. Being a part of the oldest wargaming community on the net. If you are already a member then feel free to login now.

I think it's time to start scaling back my 40k collection, it's gotten a bit absurd with 10 armies and over 40,000 points between them. Long story short, I'm looking to scale down to about 2 armies (hopefully I can make myself do it), but I like the challenge of wining because of tactics and strategy and not because I fielded a bunch of strong units. So my question is this: Which armies out there see to struggle the most in competitive play? I'm not asking what army you think I should play, but what armies have the hardest time overall. I have no preference between close combat and shooting, I play some games where I'm in your face and others where I sit back and let my long range weapons hammer away at my opponent.

Pure Tempestus
Pure Legion of the Damned (theoretically impossible given reserve rules and tabling)

I would say Orks or Dark Eldar, vanilla with no supplements. Vanilla CSM as well, without Traitor Legions they are pretty naff. Got to be one of them.

 curran12 wrote:
Pure Tempestus
Pure Legion of the Damned (theoretically impossible given reserve rules and tabling)

I rock Pure Tempestus sometimes. It does surprisingly well. The Castellan's Detachment is going to make them even better now that you can respawn Taurox and Troops.

 Cephalobeard wrote:

 curran12 wrote:
Pure Tempestus
Pure Legion of the Damned (theoretically impossible given reserve rules and tabling)

I rock Pure Tempestus sometimes. It does surprisingly well. The Castellan's Detachment is going to make them even better now that you can respawn Taurox and Troops.

I have a pure list of them as well, I do enjoy them on a casual setting. Though if I can ask, where's the Castellan detachment from? I've not heard of it.

http://imgur.com/a/4ypvF

Brand new detachment from Fall of Cadia.

Scroll to the final two images.

 Cephalobeard wrote:
http://imgur.com/a/4ypvF

Brand new detachment from Fall of Cadia.

Scroll to the final two images.

Oh nice. I'm getting that tomorrow. That is some good stuff there. Especially since my main army is Sisters of Battle. I can definitely get use out of that. Thanks!

Astra Militarum always seem hard to me. Either they slaughter everything, or people get in their back lines and they're dead. Side note, my current personal record against Guard is 100% victory.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Cephalobeard wrote:
http://imgur.com/a/4ypvF

Brand new detachment from Fall of Cadia.

Scroll to the final two images.

Does Codex: Space Marines includ DA, BA, etc? Or will they be FAQed later?

How do you play with them ?

I would say Orks and Tyranids are probably the two armies suffering the most from a competitive point of view.

The Nids still don't have any Decurion to call their own, they are a CC based army in a game edition that favors shooting, and their one competitive build relies mostly on flyrants. They also basically can't ally with any other armies very well.

The Orks have more shooty gits than the Nids for sure, but BS 2 really hurts their ability to hit anything consistently. So again, another army that favors CC hordes in an edition that likes shooty gits better. Now the Orks do have their own decurion finally through the revised supplement but from what I've read by glancing through it and hearing from Ork players, it is not considered competitive at all until you get over the 2000 point range. They also don't ally very well with any other armies, and finally their own poor leadership values added in with their Mob Rule special rules can cripple them as well.

Dark Eldar Wych Cult.

Ork Kommando spec-ops force.


Both look awesome while they die though.

Harlequins are challenging, but rewarding. They're not as bad as Nids or Orks by any means, but they're very satisfying to play with. They severely punish you for making mistakes, and greatly reward you for playing intelligently. Nids and Orks just punish you, regardless of whether you play good or bad, and Dark Eldar punish you for your mistakes but don't give you much of a bonus when played well either.

Is the taun'ar legal? If yes, SoB; if no Blood Angels.

 oldzoggy wrote:
How do you play with them ?

I only just started an AM army myself, but I've played against several flavors (Vet heavy, Tank heavy, blob heavy) and splattered all of them. Sure, it could be argued I rolled lucky, I also took losses each time, but every game had the same outcome: no matter how much damage I took, once I was in their deployment zone, it was over.

Sisters of Battle. They rather go shopping.

the elder and tau... they have to find people willing to play them /trollface

Seriously though orks, their only hope is to counter meta build and even then it is an uphill battle

Surprised to see SoB showing up here. They are certainly hard to put an army together for in terms of cost, but to play as em? Come on. That said, as a SoB player, nothing brings me more joy than showing what they can do to someone who underestimates them.

Try playing nids without any flyrants. It's an... interesting, and somewhat depressing exercise.

Arson Fire wrote:
Try playing nids without any flyrants. It's an... interesting, and somewhat depressing exercise.

Well, you've still got MCs. Get in there and ignore all the armor for free.

Bahaha. Yes.
Have you ever tried an army where everything is just terminators walking across the field? Those ignore armour too right? Then look at the damage output of a WS3, 3 attack S6 MC, compared to a WS4 2 attack S8 terminator, and consider that you get 4 or 5 terminators per one of those MCs.

18 boltgun shots to kill a terminator.
27 boltgun shots to wound a TMC.
TMC is 1/3rd tougher per wound. Damage output is dismally lower.

Arson Fire wrote:
Bahaha. Yes.
Have you ever tried an army where everything is just terminators walking across the field? Those ignore armour too right?

MCs are considerably more durable than terminators, though. Terminators are more fragile than tac marines vs small arms. MCs are functionally immune.

I would like to say Orks are the most difficult. But luck and some strong lists can carry games forward. The glass cannon effect hurts in that there are single points of failure that can bomb a match. I don't play Nids, but from what I've seen it's the same effect. MSU can carry a game.

SoB has difficulties, but I've had matches with some insanely powerful CC units and HQ's that make my orks weep in shame.

Dark Eldar I believe struggles more than Orks. Paper thin troops and sub-par weapons. Their speed is great, but another glass cannon effect that unlike Orks, where brute strength and toughness values can hold it down, they're weaknesses really hamper ability

Imperial Guard, everything is either bad or just.... Lacking.

 master of ordinance wrote:
Imperial Guard, everything is either bad or just.... Lacking.

You at least have affordable flyers that carry troops unlike Orks. Makes a big difference.

Martel732 wrote:

Arson Fire wrote:
Bahaha. Yes.
Have you ever tried an army where everything is just terminators walking across the field? Those ignore armour too right?

MCs are considerably more durable than terminators, though. Terminators are more fragile than tac marines vs small arms. MCs are functionally immune.

This here is a Maleceptor.
http://www.blacklibrary.com/Downloads/Product/PDF/rules/Maleceptor-EN.pdf

To kill it, would take on average 90 boltgun shots.
To kill a squad of 5 terminators would take... 90 boltgun shots.

Immune to small arms.

That's a bit cherry picked, as most MCs don't have 4+ armor. They have 3+ armor. Also, your maleceptor doesn't slowly degrade as it loses wounds. The terminators do. So it's still tougher.

Obviously slow units are not ideal, but they're still far better off than lists trying to use vehicles.

It doesn't degrade, but in combat it's not much better than a single terminator. Against many targets it's worse.
If just 2 terminators reach combat, then they're doing significantly better than this thing did to begin with.

Arson Fire wrote:
It doesn't degrade, but in combat it's not much better than a single terminator. Against many targets it's worse.
If just 2 terminators reach combat, then they're doing significantly better than this thing did to begin with.

Maybe. Terminators can't even capitalize on winning their CC's, though. It's an interesting comparison, though. I usually compare MCs to vehicles.

Yeah, it is kinda interesting.

You're right that most MCs do have 3+ saves.
If you give that thing a 3+ save, then it goes up from 90 to 135 boltgun shots to kill it. 1/3rd tougher.

That is indeed tougher against small arms fire than terminators. As you said though, tac marines are tougher point for point than terminators, so lets try comparing it to them.

135 boltgun shots kills exactly 15 tactical marines. 210 points, vs 205 for the maleceptor.
So given a 3+ save to bring it in line with most MCs, it becomes fractionally tougher against small arms than equivalent points in tac marines.

Obviously, toughness isn't all that goes into costing a unit, but it's interesting just how close it is.

Martel732 wrote:

Arson Fire wrote:
It doesn't degrade, but in combat it's not much better than a single terminator. Against many targets it's worse.
If just 2 terminators reach combat, then they're doing significantly better than this thing did to begin with.

Maybe. Terminators can't even capitalize on winning their CC's, though. It's an interesting comparison, though. I usually compare MCs to vehicles.

To be honest as an Ork player, Terminators have never really caused me to sweat. With five terminators with CC weapons, Ork Boyz would usually take a couple out with normal CC and a Nob would finish off with the PKlaw, considering the Nob and Termies would be striking at the same time the number of hits is not that high.