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.

So the other day I ran my 'Crons against AdMech/IG, and I ran a very expensive orikanstar, roughly 1100 points worth. After the game was over we tallied up what it killed and it only ate about 800 odd points (it eventually killed a baneblade, but this was after the game had finished, we just wanted to see what would kill what).

Usually I deem a unit doing well if it makes its points back (ignoring stuff that has been influenced by very lucky dice rolls) but obviously it didn't make its points back, so on one hand it was inefficient, however, it singlehandedly won me the game.

Since then I've been thinking of other ways a unit can be considered effective in a game, and was wondering what other gauges people use?

- Does it score objectives?
- Did it absorb a lot of fire?

Your anvil isn't going to do as much damage as your hammer, but you still need both.

On objective games, it's hardly worth considering.

On kill point games it's still not that black and white. Did it help support another unit that made more than it's points back? Did it distract a unit allowing other models to survive? Did it allow you to get warlord VP etc?

My plague zombies often don't even get their points back, despite being cheap, but they tarpit bloody well.

I like it when my models get their points back, but it isn't always a gauge of success in my eyes.

It's simple math. Lose less points worth of army then your opponents. Now points worth mean different things to different armies. 100 pts in guardsmen will get you more guardsmen then marines and can take more individual casualties and still lose less pts then marines in favourable conditions.

Other situations might occur when someone invests a huge load of points in a single unit and is therefore supported by far less pts worth of other units. Facing against an army with many multiple small units a canny opponent can tie up that huge expensive unit with only a fraction of the cost and is thereby free to engage the opponents smaller pts worth of other units with nearly a full army and easily claim the objectives while the super unit is tarpitted with a simple short line of small cheap expendabe units.

Depends on what the unit is, what you want it to do etc.
For example I wouldn't care if a Rhino failed to kill anything so long as it got it's squad where it needed to be in one piece.

Anything after that is a bonus

It can't be measured because you don't only pick units to kill stuff, you pick units to support other untis and make specific things in the batlefield.

If your 200 points sniper kill his 80 point psycher that was vital to the synergies in his armies, that was worth it, even if the 200 points sniper don't kill anything more in the battle.

consider this hypothetical (and extreme) scenerio. a 300 point unit, cannot attack but it makes all your units on the board invisable and turns their guns into strength D (which means you don't need to invest in any heavy weapons, that could pay for itself) even though that unit won't kill stuff by itself, it'd proaaaably worth it

I usually compare units to others to see if they can do a job well.

For Example, Assault Marines and Bikes basically fulfill the same role, but Bikes are superior to Assault Marines because they get more special weapons per point (2 special weapons at 63 points base, as opposed to 2 special weapons at 70-85 base) have just as much survivability at the same points cost (more if you're facing dedicated AP3 attacks) and can become Troops if you have a character on bike. The only real perk Assault Marines have over Bikes is Deepstrike (which is iffy at best without mitigation) and the eviscerator. Point wise, I would probably go with an equal points amount of bikers over assault marines, ignoring possible formation benefits (obviously Assault Marines would be preferable if you're running the Skyhammer Annhilation formation).

Likewise, distractions usually require a minimum of points that can cause a maximum of havoc. A drop pod dread is fairly inexpensive but also fairly scary when it drops behind you, since it can fire on the turn it comes in and will probably be three inches to the tender rear of whatever you want penetrated. Three of these cost about 400 points and can make for a very good distraction at your opponent's rear, likely disrupting their battle lines and formations. If they somehow actually kill 400 points worth of troops, that's a bonus.

On the other hand there are some units that can be measured by this if only because you take them just to forcibly "lower the points limit". I'm talking about stuff like the Imperial Knight ally and Vindicators; these things will draw a hell of a lot of fire and likely only get off one shot, but that one shot is all it needs to wipe out something of equivallent points cost.This would let you dictate the flow of battle as you were prepared from the getgo to be short whatever points you spent on the thing, but your opponent didn't.

TL;DR Yes when it's 1100 points of your army, it matters that they didn't make their points back because there is no way the remaining 750 in a decurion can make up that large of a deficit. If your opponent lost because you killed 700 points with 1100 points, then you weren't really in much danger of loosing to begin with.

I don't know if you have played WoW, but the holy trinity isn't a bad way to think of the components of your army, you have units that are good at killing, units that take a lot of effort to kill for their points cost, and units that support other units. Your tanking units and support units will rarely make their points back, so it's vital that your offensive units be able to hit above their weight. So on the Necron side, your offensive units need to be things like Harvest or destroyer cults, things that will almost always earn their points back and then some. You need to protect them with inexpensive but tough units like warriors or scarabs. Finally, you can increase your armies overall effectiveness by using support units, things like Orikan, Tomb spyders, Stalkers, a monolith, and ghost Arks.

With that said I'll come back to the question, I've never ever seen a large royal court make its points back, so they are not a good offensive unit. They also are very expensive, and very tough, so you could think of them as a tank, but when you spend 2/3 of your points on tanking your offense will be weak. Finally, They don't help friendly units so they are not a support unit. Basically, a royal court's job could be performed by an O-lord with a few lych guard with sword and board for a fraction of the price. If you go with a lych star instead, You can spend the saved points on units that will hit harder and more reliably. So that's why royal courts are the suck right now, too expensive, and other units do their job better and cheaper.

Interesting points all around, it is super hard to gauge effectiveness in a game Ive come to realise. I find it easier to figure out what performed badly, and theres always one unit I find that is the stand out, but usually everything else I cant figure out how well they did. I suppose its how you play your games too, I play two different ways. either try to ensure I have every possibility accounted for in regards the army I'm facing and I'm playing to win, or else I just think of a cool army build, with no thought of who I'm. So for most units they have their job to do, if they succeed at it then they're worth including in future competitive games. I just find most of the games I play are for fun and built in the latter style, so I never take into account effectiveness of certain units. Just have to be more aware I suppose, so I can better my gaming when harder lists come along.

 Grimgold wrote:
TL;DR Yes when it's 1100 points of your army, it matters that they didn't make their points back because there is no way the remaining 750 in a decurion can make up that large of a deficit. If your opponent lost because you killed 700 points with 1100 points, then you weren't really in much danger of loosing to begin with.

With that said I'll come back to the question, I've never ever seen a large royal court make its points back, so they are not a good offensive unit. They also are very expensive, and very tough, so you could think of them as a tank, but when you spend 2/3 of your points on tanking your offense will be weak. Finally, They don't help friendly units so they are not a support unit. Basically, a royal court's job could be performed by an O-lord with a few lych guard with sword and board for a fraction of the price. If you go with a lych star instead, You can spend the saved points on units that will hit harder and more reliably. So that's why royal courts are the suck right now, too expensive, and other units do their job better and cheaper.

TBH, I hardly ever run a decurion. I find it so boring and restrictive in what I can bring (I dont usually face top teir armies however). I was running a CAD with 2x sentry pylons, which ate whatever came within range. They made their points back in huge numbers, soaking a lot of fire and dishing out brutal punishment. The royal court had 10x sword and board lychguard, with a D/lord and a cryptek. I've ran smaller stars before, but I wanted to go all out and see how much abuse they can take. I lost my voidreaper early, which hampered my effectiveness later on, but overall 10 lychguard, 3 warscythes, orikan's ap2 dished out alot of punishment. Against dedicated CC armies it wouldn't do as good, but there is alot of high quality attacks coming out of it.

In saying this I do suppose while they didn't kill their points back, they took an extreme amount of abuse. 3 Large Blast D templates during the game, a full volley of grav from kataphrons, 3 full rounds of combat with cawl (that thing is a better tank than my star, needed the voidreaper ), and they managed to eat every tank he had in the backlines, which was their job. We eventually played 9 rounds I think (star vs baneblade basically), and I managed to eat the baneblade, which tabled his army. Out of the full star I had Zandrekh and super sayian Orikan left. So lost 14 models out of 16, but I still had other units left on the board.

I'm playing orks. Only lobbas are making their points back. And yet i manage to pull wins somehow.

Consider the humble marker drone. Rare is the day when it gets a kill, but the tau army still takes them in droves as they are (for many builds) a vital part of the force. How well would a tau army do when stuck at BS3 and no ignores cover? Not very (unless you mitigate that with things like OSC and stacking to-hit bonii).

If your 1100 point unit absored 5 turns of 1850 points of opposition shooting that let your warriors and immortals squat on objectives, allowing you to win the game, then while it hasn't killed its points back, it has earned its points by doing the job that it needed to, just like if the warriors sit on an objective and don't kill anything all game, they're still allowing you to win.

Same for a min jetbike unit. The old trick was to keep them in reserve until T4, hide them and the turbo onto objectives to claim/contest. They did nothing all game, rarely shot their weapons but still had a major contibution to victory.

What about a drop pod for a grav cent unit? The stormbolter will rarely kill anything of worth, but without that alpha capability, they're get shot to bits and/or outmaneuvered before they could have their impact or their libby could make them invisible.

In 4th(?) where you used to compare points killed by you against points killed by your enemy, then you might have an argument, but when victory can be achieved when you haven't killed a single model and only have 1 guy left on the board, killing potential isn't the be all, end all of metrics to assess the worth of a unit in your roster. The only question you should be asking (beyond is it cool) is this: Does this help me win the game/achieve my objectives better than another unit?

Making your points back is a long way down the list for me in terms of evaluating my units. I'm more concerned with whether it fulfils a role in my army and if it causes issues for my opponent. I'm also concerned with how it contributes towards winning the game, which often means scoring and contesting objectives.

As a practical example from a recent game, I was using Necrons against Death Guard. In turn 2 I used my 3 Tomb Blades to grab an objective in midfield using their Turboboost. The next turn I was assaulted by bikes, with a Maulerfiend failing its charge. With my Lord locked in combat and time running out to kill the Maulerfiend before it eventually charged in I sent my Tomb Blades behind it, failed to hurt it with shooting and then decided to charge, hoping to hold it up.

In the end the Tomb Blades died without causing any damage but I did manage to kill a unit of bikes, a Chaos Lord and a unit of Plague Marines while the Maulerfiend was being held up.

So did my Tomb Blades make their points back? Absolutely not. They caused literally no damage during the game. But they scored 1VP for grabbing an objective and then allowed the rest of my army the time it needed to grind down my opponent's army over a couple of turns.

Some units exist to catch bullets. They will never make their points back, yet can be critical.

I'd say it doesn't matter if the unit did its job on the battlefield. Sadly, despite the scenarios they always attempt for 40K they almost always boil down to simply slaying more of the opponent (one of the weakest things in 40K is the use of boring ass scenarios and "oh look...stand on this point to win" nonsense).

If the unit does its job -whatever it is, then sure it was worth the points.

It's about whether it did its job for me, not whether it made points back. Generally it does involve tying up a considerable amount of points, or reducing effectiveness of another unit, but that can also involve just holding objectives.

Most games my TH/SS terminators with landraider don't make points back, but them absolutely tie up a huge chunk of the enemy army for a large portion of the game (often equal to their points or more). Even if they don't, they almost always influence where the enemy moves. And they're obviously not the most effective unit out there by any means.

My las cannon dev squad may not make its points back(I put enough extra marines in there to absorb wounds that they often don't), but maybe it takes out or weakens a small squad of heavy hitters somewhere that I really needed clear of heavy hitters.

My Vindicare rarely makes his points back directly (though if he does he usually does it in a big way). However, he has turned the tide of fights by removing a buff, or removing that pesky special weapon that was going to put a huge dent into one of my units, or taking out the one guy with an armor ignoring CC weapon, or the one who gives FNP or other bonuses to a squad I needed to be much less effective.

Sniper scouts rarely make up their points for me (though it's always hilarious when they do). But for camping objectives I'm always okay with them.

The list goes on.

Of course, my Storm Raven usually makes its points back and then some...But that's the entire point of taking it most of the time(taking out high priority, tough, targets), so it's again back to the "is it fulfilling its purpose".

I'm convinced there are several ways a unit can pay itself back, but always with the same principle: does it fulfill it's role? For example a unit meant to prevent the ennemy from stepping on a portion of the battlefield is likely not to kill anythjng but if you Don't get outflanked then you can regard it as effective. That's how i'd see a unit's effectivness.

With (optimised) guard it's a pretty simple equation:

Did the unit make >~1/2 its points cost back in its first turn of serious shooting?

If yes, It's a good unit.
If no, it's a dead unit.

Hence the majority of my army is equipped with plasma guns, blast templates, and my personal favorite, plasma blast templates.

That being said, I find the measure of effectiveness is not so much 'did it surive, or did it kill' but 'what change of circumstance would render the unit *ineffective*. The units/models to whom the answer is 'near nowt' are the winners.

Did it do the job it was supposed to do?

No -> Try Again Later

Yes -> Great!

Did it do the job on its second run?

No -> Hmmmm

Yes -> Great



Does it mostly suceed in its intended role?

Yes -> Awesome! Cool beans bro.

No -> Time to rethink this.



Did you win because of it?


Yes -> Fantastic!

No -> Bad Luck

Did you lose the game because of it?

No - > Good job

Yes -> Get your Finkin' Kap on. Find a new thing to use.

Deadshot's post is pretty spot on.

"Making points back" is a lot more nebulous consideration than just "killing at least an equivalent point cost in enemy models". As others have said, it could mean absorbing a lot of incoming fire, taking and holding objectives, tar-pitting an expensive enemy deathstar unit, achieving secondary objectives, forcing your opponent to split his forces....There's a lot of ways a unit could potentially "make it's points back". Playing Necrons, I bring Wraiths almost every game, not so much for their killing power, but because I know they are going to eat at least one entire turn of enemy shooting - which is firepower the rest of my army doesn't need to worry about as I move up to capture objectives.

I avoid shooting wraiths at all costs for that reason.

My Pathfinders (I know, I know...) have never once killed a single model in all the time I've fielded my Tau. From their introduction in 2001, to my most recent game today, no Pathfinder has ever fired its Pulse Carbine. However, there's never been a game that there weren't at least one squad of them on the table. But they're a key unit in my army. There's so much more involved in unit effectiveness than a binary 'did it kill more points than it cost' analysis. Their job is to support the rest of my army. Making my Riptide (singular, only own one and I don't even use it every game) more accurate, removing cover saves, launching seeker missiles, etc. I don't expect them to kill, I expect them to make the rest of my army kill better.

I have other units that I expect to make their points back, and then some. My XV8 team with double fusion, Riptide, Ghostkeels; all exist to do the heavy lifting in my army. But they wouldn't be half as effective as they are, without the support of my Pathfinders.

So on an army-wide scale, every unit making its points back is unrealistic (not to mention, mathematically impossible in all but the most fringe cases), and on the whole, is a terrible metric to measure unit efficacy.

i mean, its important, but its not important that it happens every game. You could have the best list possible and you still couldn't have every unit make back its points every game, unless you never lost, and had perfectly average rolls across all units and all were perfectly spaced for their ideal targets.

Some games some units will make their points back, others they won't. Hell if your opponent gets first turn and gets in firing range before you do, you might not even get a chance to shoot with your Bike squad or something - it doesn't mean anything.

That being said, you should be evaluating units performance each game, and getting a better and better idea of how well they are performing relative to their points value. Take note of how much they killed, but also take note of maybe how many models worth of points they might have saved by soaking up an entire armys worth of fire, or tying up some key shooter unit in melee to take his damage completely off the board, or just by supporting other units with buffs or debuffs. Remember, you pay a premium for things like speed, which often let you attack one side of an opponents army while avoiding shooters on the other, or capture objectives. It might be hard to equate a direct points value towards things like positioning, but its something you should take note of as well while playing.

If your deathstar spent the entire game getting shot by everything your opponent had, it didn't make back 800 points - it made back the whole 1500 if it tied up your opponents entire army. That unit single handedly won you the game. On the flipside of the coin, if your Devastator squad spent the entire game trying to kill a deepstriking Terminator squad double its price, and finally killed it on turn 6, but only AFTER it had wreaked havoc on your armys backline, popped a few rear armor transports and killed an assault unit + escort, then that Devastator squad was not worth it's points even if did eventually kill that much - it simply was able to because it wasn't a high priority target for your opponent.

Killing models is not the only way to "make your points back", which is basically another way of saying "justify the cost of inclusion" and when you say it like that, tells you there is much more to it than kills alone (although obviously kills are great especially if they are clean)

Another way of thinking it is are they worth the points you spent on them. If my 35 point Gretchin squad earned 2 VPs in a Maelstrom game the were definitely worth more than what I spent on them. If they killed ANY model that is also a huge plus. If they took the fire from a squad and died, that's OK too because they were targeted instead of a more worthwhile unit.

 Drasius wrote:
Consider the humble marker drone. Rare is the day when it gets a kill, but the tau army still takes them in droves as they are (for many builds) a vital part of the force. How well would a tau army do when stuck at BS3 and no ignores cover? Not very (unless you mitigate that with things like OSC and stacking to-hit bonii).

If your 1100 point unit absored 5 turns of 1850 points of opposition shooting that let your warriors and immortals squat on objectives, allowing you to win the game, then while it hasn't killed its points back, it has earned its points by doing the job that it needed to, just like if the warriors sit on an objective and don't kill anything all game, they're still allowing you to win.

Same for a min jetbike unit. The old trick was to keep them in reserve until T4, hide them and the turbo onto objectives to claim/contest. They did nothing all game, rarely shot their weapons but still had a major contibution to victory.

What about a drop pod for a grav cent unit? The stormbolter will rarely kill anything of worth, but without that alpha capability, they're get shot to bits and/or outmaneuvered before they could have their impact or their libby could make them invisible.

In 4th(?) where you used to compare points killed by you against points killed by your enemy, then you might have an argument, but when victory can be achieved when you haven't killed a single model and only have 1 guy left on the board, killing potential isn't the be all, end all of metrics to assess the worth of a unit in your roster. The only question you should be asking (beyond is it cool) is this: Does this help me win the game/achieve my objectives better than another unit?

Speaking of the Marker Drone I quite happily sacrifice 300-400 points of Drop Pods and Dreadnoughts to draw EWO or drop Flamer and Large Blast templates on them. Tau players will quite happily pump a whole shooting phase into EWO to prevent it, points for points is a very situational deal.