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Thoughts on Apocalypse, Titans , and D weapons.

Posting this because of recent concerns in my local gaming group, over an upcoming Apocalypse game. Was hoping to hear Dakka community's thoughts on the matter. People were wanting to ban models, amount of D weapons, Etc. Placing restrictions on what I feel is a form of 40k that, if played, should not be restricted.

-Apocalypse is the "anything goes" category of 40k. Its for the grand, epic games. It is not meant to be an equal match up, with perfectly balanced sides. Apocalypse is the same concept as the battles we enjoy watching in movies like Lord of the Rings, games like Mass Effect, etc. No one is counting the number of human infantry compared to orks in these moments. Its the story, the scale of the battle. To say "you cant bring that" diminishes the value of the game. If its part of the game, put it on the table. Waves of infantry will die, titans will fall, and it will make a great story. Apocalypse is not the place to ban models from enjoying the party. Many models will never see the table outside of Apocalypse games. Let it all be played.

-Titans can be removed with any decent dedicated fire power. At easily 1/3 a titans cost. Melta squad drop pods. Haywire "anything", thunder hammer terminators. Expect to fight titans, and either bring your own, or a unit from your codex that can hunt them. Every codex has a way to deal with them.

-D Weapons are, honestly, kind of needed at this point. And because they are a premium, target priority with these weapons is crucial. Even in low points games (750 points) in our own league, people were running Death Star squads. 2+, 3++, 3+ FNP re-roll, with special rule stacking shenanigans. Were no matter the volume of fire, or strength of the weapon, it was mitigated and the Death Star ruled the board. This is where D Weapons come in. To remove these "stacked" units. Moral of the story, if you know there will be D on the board, think twice about putting all your eggs in one basket. Diversify your units. D Weapons have to carefully prioritize their targets. Which is other D Weapon models, titans, and Death Stars.

-In short, bring everything, play everything. If its GW approved, put it on the board. Titans, Stompas, Lord of War Daemons. Yes, whole platoons can die in a turn. If your worried about being wiped off the board, take multiple formations or detachments, Deploy them in different sections, know their jobs. Pictures from last years Apocalypse game* still get brought up around the internet with people saying they would have loved to have been there. It wasn't about winning or loosing, it was the experience.

--Princess Mononoke (1997)
Lady Eboshi: "Now watch closely, everyone. I'm going to show you how to kill a god. A god of life and death. The trick is not to fear him. "


Pic for reference

Absolutely! Apocalypse is apocalypse for a reason. If you're going to ban units, you might as well play a normal game. This is the time where old man dodgers gets to pull out his forge world emperor class titan- where these units and moments of legend get to come alive.

Apoc is where God machines march, whole armies clash, continents and cities shudder under the thunder of a thousand, thousand guns, whole planets brought low by conflict between opposing forces so immense that to measure them you must measure their losses not in individuals, but in whole squadrons, platoons, divisions and more.


Apoc is the only place my monsters can come out and play, with at least 13 different Super Heavy tanks under my command, 3 Knights, 3 Super Weapons (Ordinatus Majoris, War Zeppelin, Atomic Cannon). I build them as they are a lot of fun to build, but Apoc is the only time they are let out to play.

Hell, I have 90+ armored vehicles (including the Super Heavies). Only a handful ever see combat at any one time even though I rotate them through.
I won't even bother with my infantry. most of which will never see the table without Apoc.

ALso I have a full bunker system with Firestorm Redouts, an Aquila Strongpoint and plenty of Wall of Martyrs trenchs. While they can be used in normal play. They never do, due to their points cost and so on.




Apoc lets me bring everything I have or at least a heck of a lot more than what I can in normal games.





I still wish for a "Bring everything you have" game, but I've long since surpassed the points value that let me do that.

If people want to Ban things in Apoc. Just play normal.

But I would find a "bring legions of non-super heavies" game interesting. I have MORE THAN ENOUGH tanks and troops to overwhelm anything in my way.

I disagree with you here.

Appocalypse games are fun but do need some if not more guidance than usually is needed in casual 40k games to keep it so for all players involved. They can be really anticlimactic because not all players will get what is good and what is utterly useless in the game. Contrary to popular believe Appoc isn't anything like 7th 40k, just the board size alone makes it so that the entire concept of getting across on the battle field, and shooting ranges change to the point that it is alien to most regular 40k players and if you play with the strategic assets, appoc formations and environmental rules things really become a different beast.
However I do agree that D weapons do have their place in proper large scale apocalypse battles, some of these games might even be more fun with the old and more powerful D rules.

Apoc is... interesting. It's a slog unless you're playing a heavily houseruled version with your friends, and it will take days to play a game. The only practical way to do a large apoc game is to have an awesome table at your house, invite your friend over, and do multiple six-hour-long sessions, with them leaving their army at your house, or just staying the night.

Apoc is where you unleash your inner TFG in order to WAAC and nobody gives a damn because it's what they're doing as well.

 Dakka Wolf wrote:
Apoc is where you unleash your inner TFG in order to WAAC and nobody gives a damn because it's what they're doing as well.

This. This is exactly and entirely the truth.

Above and beyond that, it renders the standard format uber units semi irrelevant, because more often than not the high value targets are vaporised in the first two turns. *Then* the intelligence and strategic challenge comes to pass, because you're working with a massively mangled subset of your army, often in vastly different sections of the table where there is no likelihood of support.

That said.

A bad matchup is still a bad matchup - if you have massively imbalanced *sides* then to be sure some banning would be prudent. If there's a disproportionate amount of D on one side, and a large number of high value single model non void shields on t'other, then you should be working *hard* in the leadup to rebalance it.

Warning: opinions and rambling inbound.

First of all, Apocalypse is something to be played with friends. I hope nobody has seriously considered the concept of "competetive Apocalypse". It shouldn't need balancing because of the simple fact that you can say "don't be a dick" and be done with it. However, there's no harm in discouraging certain things in an informal way.

Second of all, Apocalypse is about epic battles. Half the fun is having things look epic. I will silently (if not openly) judge people who bring unfinished models to an Apocalypse table. Likewise, I think mismatched tables with ugly terrain drain more fun from a game than the most imbalanced orks versus taudar matchup. Any Apocalypse scenario I write has some rule discouraging unfinished models (I tried preferred enemy (unpainted models), but re-rolls on apoc scale cost a lot of time).

Lastly, a point people will often forget: it's important to give the feeling of playing a large game, rather than several perpendicular smaller games. This is why I try to make scenarios where sectors of the board can influence each other, and most importantly why I never split an Apocalypse table.

The reason why appoc does need some guidance to be fun is because it isn't just a larger 40k game.

Most players are not used to a large point multi player this requires some coordination to make it work smoothly instead of stressing out players.

Veteran or worse beginning 40k players with little experience to appoc may need some guidance in order to prevent them from making epic armies that would be really cool in a large 40k battle but are totally useless in an apocalypse game, or to prevent them from making an army that really bogs the game down by useless time consuming trivial things.

Veteran appoc players on the other hand might need some guidance in order to tone down the effectiveness of their strategy he and his or her team are planning in order to keep it fun. Normal 40k casual limitations are mostly silly, discussing about whether or not to limit invisibility etc is useless. However it is nice to get some sort of pre game feedback if the other team doesn't have a plan at all and your team has come up with cool interlocking plans, involving clever usage of strategic assets and formations to take out flanks and high priority targets fast or if the other team isn't planning to bring any of the big things at all.

 oldzoggy wrote:
The reason why appoc does need some guidance to be fun is because it isn't just a larger 40k game.

Most players are not used to a large point multi player this requires some coordination to make it work smoothly instead of stressing out players.

Veteran or worse beginning 40k players with little experience to appoc may need some guidance in order to prevent them from making epic armies that would be really cool in a large 40k battle but are totally useless in an apocalypse game, or to prevent them from making an army that really bogs the game down by useless time consuming trivial things.

Veteran appoc players on the other hand might need some guidance in order to tone down the effectiveness of their strategy he and his or her team are planning in order to keep it fun. Normal 40k casual limitations are mostly silly, discussing about whether or not to limit invisibility etc is useless. However it is nice to get some sort of pre game feedback if the other team doesn't have a plan at all and your team has come up with cool interlocking plans, involving clever usage of strategic assets and formations to take out flanks and high priority targets fast or if the other team isn't planning to bring any of the big things at all.

You make some good points. In terms of guidance for list building it's a good idea to talk to the players and clear up misconceptions about how the game will be run, how teams are going to work, what time restrictions are active, and give some pointers on what kinds of units are impractical in games this large either due to rules complexity or power level. Also the ref (you probably want a ref if it's a team apocalypse game) should review the rules, figure out the table logistics beforehand, and find out what significant units are goung to get used by which person.

I have to mostly agree with oldzoggy here that these games can become seriously anti-climactic. Apocalypse games are risky if people don't know what to expect, because they suffer from MASSIVE amounts of BBS (Blue Ball Syndrome).

Let's say you buy a big model that no one lets you play, like say a Wraithknight. Apocalypse is well and truly the place for it and I doubt anyone will say "no you can't bring that" in an Apocalypse setting. So you get really excited to finally... FINALLY... being able to use it. You put it down on the table. Turn 1, their Super Heavy or Apocalypse something-or-another just ups and rolls a "6" on a D table, or something. Your beloved model that you never get to ever play with is just gone. It really really hurts. Even worse is when two Super Heavy Walkers with D-blades meet in close combat. That combat pretty much goes "we touch each other and both explode" 9 times out of 10, when instead players were hoping for a back and forth brawl between titans.


That said, this is the game where the toys need to come out, it's just that the mission and the table size and terrain density really need to be adjusted to make it work. People need to understand going into this fight that whichever side goes first often has a MASSIVE advantage. I haven't cracked the codex exactly yet, but here's some of my suggestions:

#1 - Determine Attacker/Defender rolls prior to date, and let the attacker go first. Give the Defender some kind of extra defensible position, or even extra points or reinforcements or something to make up for this.
#2 - Avoid standard missions. It just won't work. What will work? I don't know yet.
#3 - Try to make the game "build up" rather than "strip down". If all players start with all their forces, the game will become less exciting as time goes on. There should be a way to offset this.
#4 - Include things that allow players on one side of the board affect another side! I've done things like having side tables of smaller games influencing the larger game, but anything that can do things at infinite or near-infinite ranges help.

Good luck!

Customised scenarios with a predetermined attacker and defender is way better than the usual "bidding time"-method the apoc book suggests. Offering whoever agrees to go last a box full of fortifications works like a charm.

Another major point that cannot be brought up often enough: Apocalypse terrain =/= regular terrain but more. You'll often have 36" or even 48" of no-man's land between forces at the start, and need something to compensate for the epic scale of the game. Ideally, you want at least one piece of terrain that can block LOS from the largest model in the game to a rhino-sized model a short distance behind it.

We play Apocalypse fairly often here... and it's the most fun we ever have with 40K.

Our biggest game here: http://atticwars40k.blogspot.com/2014/11/apocalypse-on-ordel-v-final-assault.html

My advice - absolutely use everything you have, use D weapons, use the actually GW-40K Apocalypse book and rules, and even the uber nasty "unnatural disasters" at least in later turns if things are moving too slowly. Finally plan plan plan - organize the foods breaks (when objectives are scored).

Titans and D weapons are kind of necessary, otherwise the games just take too long. If people are afraid of things dying then they shouldn't be playing Apocalypse.

Both sides need to be somewhat balanced of course and Strategic Assets can help with this.

The book is totally worth following in my opinion, good luck - post more pics!

Your all so lucky and also good painters. I want to play Apoc so bad. Just one game in my life, but it looks almost impossible for me to find anyone here to play with at all.

Someday it will all come together. Someday. For now I keep painting. I have nearly 2800 painted Tau. Likely to increase some by the end of the year since it's my main army.

In general, for Apocalypse, anything goes.

In practice, however, a little negotiating goes a long way to ensure everyone has fun.

Apocalypse is to me, where you take your entire collection team up with a guy fielding everything he has. And squaring off against another pair.