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 Galas wrote:
Basically because the miniatures aren't theirs and playing games is a strong social activity that can be fun even if the game is mediocre.

I know, I know, is a filthy casual mentality, but it exist.

Casual has nothing to do with anything. It's this ridiculous mentality that PL has any meaningful inherent advantage to the casual player over points that's at issue.

Well, PL are basically the point sistem of Age of Sigmar. If that system is tagged as a "abomination of a game for casual and mentally dissabled people" for some people, I assume it probably has some "casual feeling" add to it.

But I'm going in circles, just as this discussiong has goes por 13 pages. The funny thing is that I agree with you, the regular point system is better in every regard compared with Power Level system.

I only said that Power Level is gonna be usefull for me for the nature of the people I play with. You can interpret that as if I try to put the specifical over the general, but that wasn't my intention.

Trollsmyth wrote:
Normally, I'd agree with you here. The caveat, unfortunately, is that GW has all but said that their point system doesn't work outside the narrowly defined scope of equally pointed sides operating within the framework of the six Eternal War and Maelstrom of War missions using the six deployment maps.

Granted, they haven't actually said it doesn't work outside that scope, but the way they've laid things out and how we've seen them play very strongly implies it.

That's a nonsense claim for GW to make. If a more accurate point system doesn't work outside that narrow scope then a less accurate point system certainly isn't going to work. There is no possible way that you can improve the function of the game by reducing the accuracy of its point costs, so there's no way that power levels could ever be a better system regardless of the mission.

 Inquisitor Lord Katherine wrote:
No, points aren't bad at all. I'll be using them.

But, as Lobukia said, power levels remove many of the toughest decisions from list building, making them ideal for stepping new players into the game, and for setting up things like Apocalypse games, where the granularity becomes tedium when you're working out what IG Squad #15 and Leman Russ Tank #12 has.

Good point. I have no problem with power levels. If someone likes that form of list building,I'll meet them there. There's some computer games I'll do the "one button level up" on. But I personally like the fine tuning in 40k

Oh by the Emperor and all His saints, you are dense.

List building is an important part of the game. It dictates what tactical options you have available to you on the field, and is more influential in deciding the victor of any given game than any other factor.

For this reason, points are entirely unsuitable for introducing players to the world of miniatures wargaming. Not to the world of Warhammer 40k, to the entire hobby.

List building is a fundamentally challenging process, and the difficulty increases with detail. It's natural to us, we have years and years, some of us decades, of experience. But when you're stepping into the hobby, and the most complicated game you've previously played is Risk, it's daunting. It's not that selecting upgrades is a fundamentally different process than selecting units, but it does present an added degree of complexity. Power Level dis-entwines the two: you select your units, then you select upgrades for them to specialize them. With Points, you do this together, since a unit can be exchanged for an upgrade or an upgrade exchanged for a unit. How many times have you been building a list and wondered whether to spend the last 40 points of a set of Tank Sponsons, or to drop a Meltagun from a Vets squad and buy a squad of Guardsmen, or to drop the Meltagun and buy another set of guns for the Baneblade, etc. With power level they come from a different pool of "currency", if you would. Taking a Leman Russ Tank doesn't deny the opportunity to buy Meltaguns for a Veterans squad, so there aren't as many opportunity costs to consider when picking units and picking upgrades. The cost of picking Plasma Cannon sponsons is not having Heavy Bolter Sponsons.

 Inquisitor Lord Katherine wrote:
List building is a fundamentally challenging process, and the difficulty increases with detail. It's natural to us, we have years and years, some of us decades, of experience. But when you're stepping into the hobby, and the most complicated game you've previously played is Risk, it's daunting. It's not that selecting upgrades is a fundamentally different process than selecting units, but it does present an added degree of complexity. Power Level dis-entwines the two: you select your units, then you select upgrades for them to specialize them. With Points, you do this together, since a unit can be exchanged for an upgrade or an upgrade exchanged for a unit. How many times have you been building a list and wondered whether to spend the last 40 points of a set of Tank Sponsons, or to drop a Meltagun from a Vets squad and buy a squad of Guardsmen, or to drop the Meltagun and buy another set of guns for the Baneblade, etc. With power level they come from a different pool of "currency", if you would. Taking a Leman Russ Tank doesn't deny the opportunity to buy Meltaguns for a Veterans squad, so there aren't as many opportunity costs to consider when picking units and picking upgrades. The cost of picking Plasma Cannon sponsons is not having Heavy Bolter Sponsons.

No, you don't get it. You do the exact same thing with the less-accurate point system. You still have to evaluate which upgrades you want to take. You still have to evaluate which units are powerful enough for their point cost to be justifiable. Taking sponsons on your LRBT may not deny the opportunity to take melta vets, but you'd better correctly identify the optimal sponson choice or your LRBT is going to be paying too many points for its guns. Having to add up the point cost of your upgrade choices is trivial once you reach the level of understanding of the game required to identify the correct upgrade choices, even under the assumption that all upgrades cost zero points.

And making point increments come in whole-unit blocks makes it harder to finish building a list, not easier. If you're 5 points over in a 1500 point game you can say "plasma vets are good, but I can take melta vets instead and save 15 points, bringing me below the point limit". If you're 5 power over you have no choice, you have to remove an entire unit and be significantly under the point limit. Now you have to re-shuffle everything else about your unit choices, hoping to find the right combination that gets to the point limit without going over.

 Peregrine wrote:
That's a nonsense claim for GW to make. If a more accurate point system doesn't work outside that narrow scope then a less accurate point system certainly isn't going to work. There is no possible way that you can improve the function of the game by reducing the accuracy of its point costs, so there's no way that power levels could ever be a better system regardless of the mission.

Not necessarily. It's entirely reasonable to assume that the further outside the proscribed bounds you get, the worse discrepancies in actual utility between equally-pointed units get. If that is the case, a system of measure that's less granular with more wiggle-room built into it might actually be more accurate in measuring relative utility.

Again, I don't know this is GW's reasoning; I'm making the best guess I can from what they have told us. It could simply be that they don't want to invest the time and effort into ambush and siege missions necessary to balance them to the point where people who really care about that will be satisfied; power level could totally be guesstimates deemed good enough for "casual" play. But even if that's the case, it implies the Narrative missions will be exercises in frustration for folks only interested in Matched play. And if that's the case, then I'll save myself a lot of headache by making sure folks know that my campaign isn't going to be that rigorous by declaring it's using Power Levels.

And all that having been said, if GW comes out and says Power Levels exist only to make the math easier, I'll dump 'em like a hot potato. ;p

You don't have to correctly identify anything with power level, that is what YOU don't understand.

Power level doesn't punish you for taking an under powered unit, it allows you to field what you want without worrying if it is too weak for the cost. If someone wants to make all of their units bare bones with no upgrades, then that is on them. But I have never once, in any format, in any battle report or table seen a person field un-upgraded units that weren't simply filling up points, or ran out of them and wanted to field something else.

Power levels allow people to field the models they feel look cool without being penalised for taking sub optimal choices.

Heavy bolters lover isn't choosing the weakest option in the arsenal in 8th edition, he is choosing a weapon to threaten hordes. Weapons have more definitive targets now with the advent of multiple damage per hit in the game.

Trollsmyth wrote:
It's entirely reasonable to assume that the further outside the proscribed bounds you get, the worse discrepancies in actual utility between equally-pointed units get. If that is the case, a system of measure that's less granular with more wiggle-room built into it might actually be more accurate in measuring relative utility.

No, it isn't reasonable at all. It's completely absurd, on the level of saying "this ruler marked in 1mm increments is less accurate than the one that is otherwise exactly identical but marked in 1cm increments, depending on the size of the object you're measuring". There is no conceivable situation where making point costs less accurate makes them work better.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

Lythrandire Biehrellian wrote:
Power levels allow people to field the models they feel look cool without being penalised for taking sub optimal choices.

Uh, no. This is just hilariously wrong. Making all upgrades cost zero points doesn't change the fact that some units/upgrades will be more point-efficient than others, and it doesn't change the fact that someone who takes point-efficient units will have an advantage over someone who takes less-efficient units.

Heavy bolters lover isn't choosing the weakest option in the arsenal in 8th edition, he is choosing a weapon to threaten hordes. Weapons have more definitive targets now with the advent of multiple damage per hit in the game.

This has nothing to do with making all weapon upgrades cost zero points, it's about making the relative value of weapons equal. This kind of thing is easily reflected by having heavy bolters cost the same number of points as the weapons they are equivalent to.

 Inquisitor Lord Katherine wrote:
Oh by the Emperor and all His saints, you are dense.

Given timing and placement, this seems to directed at yours truly. But I'm going to assume it's not since I completely agree with the thrust of what you're saying.

 Peregrine wrote:

 Inquisitor Lord Katherine wrote:
List building is a fundamentally challenging process, and the difficulty increases with detail. It's natural to us, we have years and years, some of us decades, of experience. But when you're stepping into the hobby, and the most complicated game you've previously played is Risk, it's daunting. It's not that selecting upgrades is a fundamentally different process than selecting units, but it does present an added degree of complexity. Power Level dis-entwines the two: you select your units, then you select upgrades for them to specialize them. With Points, you do this together, since a unit can be exchanged for an upgrade or an upgrade exchanged for a unit. How many times have you been building a list and wondered whether to spend the last 40 points of a set of Tank Sponsons, or to drop a Meltagun from a Vets squad and buy a squad of Guardsmen, or to drop the Meltagun and buy another set of guns for the Baneblade, etc. With power level they come from a different pool of "currency", if you would. Taking a Leman Russ Tank doesn't deny the opportunity to buy Meltaguns for a Veterans squad, so there aren't as many opportunity costs to consider when picking units and picking upgrades. The cost of picking Plasma Cannon sponsons is not having Heavy Bolter Sponsons.

No, you don't get it. You do the exact same thing with the less-accurate point system. You still have to evaluate which upgrades you want to take. You still have to evaluate which units are powerful enough for their point cost to be justifiable. Taking sponsons on your LRBT may not deny the opportunity to take melta vets, but you'd better correctly identify the optimal sponson choice or your LRBT is going to be paying too many points for its guns. Having to add up the point cost of your upgrade choices is trivial once you reach the level of understanding of the game required to identify the correct upgrade choices, even under the assumption that all upgrades cost zero points.

And making point increments come in whole-unit blocks makes it harder to finish building a list, not easier. If you're 5 points over in a 1500 point game you can say "plasma vets are good, but I can take melta vets instead and save 15 points, bringing me below the point limit". If you're 5 power over you have no choice, you have to remove an entire unit and be significantly under the point limit. Now you have to re-shuffle everything else about your unit choices, hoping to find the right combination that gets to the point limit without going over.

Just to illustrate the point, my Leman Russ tanks are not modeled with any kind of sponson. I consider the cost to equip the tanks with sponsons at all to not be worth the opportunity cost of more Guardsmen [or a Wyvern]. I do not consider the Leman Russ tank to be a desirable platform for any of the weapons it's eligible to equip as sponsons.

Now, with Points, the opportunity cost of equipping my Leman Russ Battle Tank with a set of Plasma Cannons could be:
A set of Heavy Bolters for this tank
A set of Multimeltas for this tank
A set of Heavy Flamers for this tank
Any set of sponsons for a different tank
2 Plasmaguns for infantry units
3 Meltaguns for infantry units
A Lascannon for infantry units
A Sentinel
Meltabombs and a Demolition charge for Veterans
Upgrading the tank to be a Tank Commander
A Priest
A Commissar
Their cost could also go towards affording another Wyvern or Manticore or squad of Troopers.

By comparison, the opportunity cost of buying a Leman Russ a set of Plasma Cannons under Power Level is:
A set of Heavy Bolters
A set of Multimeltas
A set of Heavy Flamers


That's a dramatic decrease in the opportunity cost of equipping the tank with sponsons. Now, instead of having to consider all the things you could get instead to tank sponsons, it's only relevant to consider the tank's purpose. Multimeltas help it hunt tanks, Heavy Bolters help it kill infantry from far away, Heavy Flamers help it kill infantry better than Heavy Bolters but only work up close, and Plasma Cannons help it kill both tanks and infantry but not better than the other options at either. Most of this time, this is answered anyway by the question: "Why did I bring a Leman Russ?" You don't have to consider if a pair of Multimeltas on this Leman Russ you brought to attack enemy tanks would be better at attacking enemy tanks than a pair of Meltaguns in a Veterans squad, or a Lascannon in a Heavy Weapons squad.

That's significantly reduced critical decision making when building your list.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Lobukia wrote:

 Inquisitor Lord Katherine wrote:
Oh by the Emperor and all His saints, you are dense.

Given timing and placement, this seems to directed at yours truly. But I'm going to assume it's not since I completely agree with the thrust of what you're saying.

No! It's not directed at you.

Lythrandire Biehrellian wrote:
You don't have to correctly identify anything with power level, that is what YOU don't understand.

Power level doesn't punish you for taking an under powered unit, it allows you to field what you want without worrying if it is too weak for the cost. If someone wants to make all of their units bare bones with no upgrades, then that is on them. But I have never once, in any format, in any battle report or table seen a person field un-upgraded units that weren't simply filling up points, or ran out of them and wanted to field something else.

Power levels allow people to field the models they feel look cool without being penalised for taking sub optimal choices.

Heavy bolters lover isn't choosing the weakest option in the arsenal in 8th edition, he is choosing a weapon to threaten hordes. Weapons have more definitive targets now with the advent of multiple damage per hit in the game.

I run a great many of my units un-upgraded. A Basilisk, Manticore, or Wyvern doesn't benefit from any upgrades, and any upgrades on a Leman Russ Demolisher or Leman Russ Battle Tank would be wasted. I also like bare-bone guardsmen squads, because a Plasmagun doesn't benefit from FRF-SRF and costs 15 points.

 Inquisitor Lord Katherine wrote:
That's a dramatic decrease in the opportunity cost of equipping the tank with sponsons.

Only because you're including false options to make the first list longer. There's a basic rule in 40k that you never leave primary weapon slots (IOW, stuff related to a unit's role, not random things like an IG sergeant's power fist option) empty, unless there's some special rule (like the ordnance rule) that prevents you from using them. Even a basic understanding of the LRBT tells you that you're always taking sponsons now that 8th has removed the ordnance rule, so the only question is identifying which sponsons are best. And that is the same question under both point systems.

(And yes, there might be rare edge-case situations where you have to drop a unit's primary weapon to gain a huge benefit elsewhere, but that kind of fine-tuning is way beyond the scope of a newbie's first "get something vaguely reasonable on the table" attempts.)

 Peregrine wrote:

 Inquisitor Lord Katherine wrote:
That's a dramatic decrease in the opportunity cost of equipping the tank with sponsons.

Only because you're including false options to make the first list longer. There's a basic rule in 40k that you never leave primary weapon slots (IOW, stuff related to a unit's role, not random things like an IG sergeant's power fist option) empty, unless there's some special rule (like the ordnance rule) that prevents you from using them. Even a basic understanding of the LRBT tells you that you're always taking sponsons now that 8th has removed the ordnance rule, so the only question is identifying which sponsons are best. And that is the same question under both point systems.

(And yes, there might be rare edge-case situations where you have to drop a unit's primary weapon to gain a huge benefit elsewhere, but that kind of fine-tuning is way beyond the scope of a newbie's first "get something vaguely reasonable on the table" attempts.)

Really? All my Leman Russ tanks, including my Vanquishers, are modeled without sponsons. I never use them at all. I'd say not taking them is an incredibly valid option.

Also, I'm not going to be mounting sponson in 8th. Just because you can have them doesn't mean you should have them. They're not a primary weapon, and if I bought the Leman Russ for it's sponson options, I could have bought a Hellhound variant for half the price.

As an aside I wonder if there are enough 8th lists posted over in that section to see if we can't analyze the discrepancy between PL-cost and points-cost on a large scale, maybe get a concrete figure for just how inexact they are.

After reading through the rulebook a few more times and playing 3 games, it's obvious that GW is really pushing power levels as their primary system. If anything, it reads like matched play and points are kind of tacked on and a nuisance to them. I imagine it wasn't part of the original plan but they grudgingly decided to support it.

Currently there is no reason you can't simply use points instead of power levels, but it is interesting that for most of the book they assume you're using power levels. I didn't really pick up on it the first time through.

Now that I've used both, I'm fine with the idea of power levels, although it would be worlds better with a slightly more granular approach. If units just had 1-2 tiers of upgrades each costing a power level or two (as a handful already do), it would be so much better. Considering just how important having heavy weapons are in this edition, you need those upgrades. Despite the fact that nothing is immune to anything now, it's functionally not much different. Yeah, I can shoot bolters at your knight and at least have a chance of doing a damage, but that's not going to take it down.

Basically, I'm fine with not worrying about the difference between a meltagun, plasma gun, or grav gun. But having a tactical squad cost the same when one has all the bling the squad and the sergeant can bring and the other has nothing just doesn't jive with me. There's a massive difference in some units concerning their upgrades, which really hits home when you play with the new rules.

 Inquisitor Lord Katherine wrote:
Really? All my Leman Russ tanks, including my Vanquishers, are modeled without sponsons. I never use them at all. I'd say not taking them is an incredibly valid option.

It really wasn't a valuable option in 7th, because of how the Heavy USR worked. Since you could move and fire all of your weapons at full BS (except with ordnance LRBTs) those sponson guns were one of the best deals in the codex, and you'd have to have an incredibly good reason not to take them. Even basic HBs were going to out-perform pretty much any other use of those points over the length of a full game. So maybe there's some weird edge case where you are so absurdly tight on points that you're willing to consider cutting the sponsons to get a vital unit/upgrade elsewhere, but that kind of obsessive fine-tuning is beyond the scope of what a newbie is going to be dealing with.

Also, I'm not going to be mounting sponson in 8th. Just because you can have them doesn't mean you should have them. They're not a primary weapon, and if I bought the Leman Russ for it's sponson options, I could have bought a Hellhound variant for half the price.

Then you're really making a mistake. Now that the LRBT's main guns have been nerfed so heavily you have to make up for it with the sponson and hull guns (which now have a 360* arc) or you're taking a garbage unit that isn't worth anywhere near its cost. Every single LRBT should have sponsons of some kind, the only question is which ones to pick. If you don't want to take sponsons then yes, take a Hellhound or Manticore or whatever instead.

 Peregrine wrote:

 Inquisitor Lord Katherine wrote:
Really? All my Leman Russ tanks, including my Vanquishers, are modeled without sponsons. I never use them at all. I'd say not taking them is an incredibly valid option.

It really wasn't a valuable option in 7th, because of how the Heavy USR worked. Since you could move and fire all of your weapons at full BS (except with ordnance LRBTs) those sponson guns were one of the best deals in the codex, and you'd have to have an incredibly good reason not to take them. Even basic HBs were going to out-perform pretty much any other use of those points over the length of a full game. So maybe there's some weird edge case where you are so absurdly tight on points that you're willing to consider cutting the sponsons to get a vital unit/upgrade elsewhere, but that kind of obsessive fine-tuning is beyond the scope of what a newbie is going to be dealing with.

Also, I'm not going to be mounting sponson in 8th. Just because you can have them doesn't mean you should have them. They're not a primary weapon, and if I bought the Leman Russ for it's sponson options, I could have bought a Hellhound variant for half the price.

Then you're really making a mistake. Now that the LRBT's main guns have been nerfed so heavily you have to make up for it with the sponson and hull guns (which now have a 360* arc) or you're taking a garbage unit that isn't worth anywhere near its cost. Every single LRBT should have sponsons of some kind, the only question is which ones to pick. If you don't want to take sponsons then yes, take a Hellhound or Manticore or whatever instead.

I got most of my Russes in 5th. I built my tanks without sponsons, because I didn't see a compelling reason to have them, and they've forever been without them.

I argue with the assertion that buying sponsons on a Leman Russ is a must. I've never equipped my Leman Russ tanks with sponsons, and it's worked out really well. Multimeltas don't mesh with the Vanquisher's range, nothing meshes with the Battle Cannon or Demolisher Cannon, the Punisher doesn't need additional Heavy Bolters, the Executioner is crap and sponsons only exacerbate it's problem, the Eradicator is crap so it doesn't matter, the Annihilator is just like the Vanquisher, and I don't like the Exterminator because it never does anything, like the Eradicator.

If you're not taking the Russ for it's primary gun, don't take it. A Hellhound is 110 points and a Leman Russ with Heavy Flamers is slightly over 200. A Devil Dog is 130, a Leman Russ Vanquisher with Multimeltas is 217. Hellhounds and Devil Dogs are fast enough to use their Inferno Cannon/Melta Cannon on the opening round, Russes aren't.

Anyway, this is besides the point. Russes are bad, and they've been bad since 6th happened.

 Inquisitor Lord Katherine wrote:
I argue with the assertion that buying sponsons on a Leman Russ is a must.

Too bad, because you're wrong. It's unfortunate that you bought some tanks in 5th and they won't be WYSIWYG with the correct setup in later editions, but sponson guns are an amazing deal and mandatory on the non-ordnance* tanks. Vanquishers wanted multimeltas because of the vast increase in anti-tank firepower (and range isn't a huge issue when everyone wants to get up close against IG tanks) and mitigation of the fatal "one BS 3 shot" problem, Executioners wanted plasma cannons if you took them at all, Punishers and Exterminators wanted heavy bolters for maximum volume of fire. Nowhere else in the IG codex were you going to get the level of firepower that LRBT sponsons offered for that low a point cost.

*Yes, the ordnance ones skipped the sponsons, but a rule that says "you can only fire one weapon" is one of those really obvious things that even a newbie can get without much trouble.

A Hellhound is 110 points and a Leman Russ with Heavy Flamers is slightly over 200. A Devil Dog is 130, a Leman Russ Vanquisher with Multimeltas is 217. Hellhounds and Devil Dogs are fast enough to use their Inferno Cannon/Melta Cannon on the opening round, Russes aren't.

Then take Hellhounds instead of LRBTs. Seriously, look at the math people have done, a LRBT without sponson guns averages a pathetic number of wounds against pretty much any target. If you aren't buying the sponson guns you have a slightly cheaper tank that does nowhere near enough damage for its cost, and doesn't belong in any sensible list.

And of course this demonstrates my point nicely: figuring out how to use the complete point system is easy, figuring out the best strategy is hard. You're an experienced player struggling to understand basic IG strategy, what point system you use to add up your army list is pretty much irrelevant. Using power levels instead of points may force you to make the correct choice because there is no other option available, but that still doesn't fix the underlying problem of not knowing why it is the correct choice.

 Peregrine wrote:

 Inquisitor Lord Katherine wrote:
I argue with the assertion that buying sponsons on a Leman Russ is a must.

Too bad, because you're wrong. It's unfortunate that you bought some tanks in 5th and they won't be WYSIWYG with the correct setup in later editions, but sponson guns are an amazing deal and mandatory on the non-ordnance* tanks. Vanquishers wanted multimeltas because of the vast increase in anti-tank firepower (and range isn't a huge issue when everyone wants to get up close against IG tanks) and mitigation of the fatal "one BS 3 shot" problem, Executioners wanted plasma cannons if you took them at all, Punishers and Exterminators wanted heavy bolters for maximum volume of fire. Nowhere else in the IG codex were you going to get the level of firepower that LRBT sponsons offered for that low a point cost.

*Yes, the ordnance ones skipped the sponsons, but a rule that says "you can only fire one weapon" is one of those really obvious things that even a newbie can get without much trouble.

A Hellhound is 110 points and a Leman Russ with Heavy Flamers is slightly over 200. A Devil Dog is 130, a Leman Russ Vanquisher with Multimeltas is 217. Hellhounds and Devil Dogs are fast enough to use their Inferno Cannon/Melta Cannon on the opening round, Russes aren't.

Then take Hellhounds instead of LRBTs. Seriously, look at the math people have done, a LRBT without sponson guns averages a pathetic number of wounds against pretty much any target. If you aren't buying the sponson guns you have a slightly cheaper tank that does nowhere near enough damage for its cost, and doesn't belong in any sensible list.

And of course this demonstrates my point nicely: figuring out how to use the complete point system is easy, figuring out the best strategy is hard. You're an experienced player struggling to understand basic IG strategy, what point system you use to add up your army list is pretty much irrelevant. Using power levels instead of points may force you to make the correct choice because there is no other option available, but that still doesn't fix the underlying problem of not knowing why it is the correct choice.

I was the one who did the Leman Russ firepower output simulations. I know that their gun sucks, and as I pointed out, you're not "getting a good deal" on sponsons. You're getting 3 Heavy Flamers and 12 wounds [and a dud for a gun] for 200 points when you could be getting 4 heavy flamers, 2 of which are +1STR and deal double damage, and 22 wounds for 20 points more.

Okay, here's the thing: sticking sponsons onto a tank in 5th isn't the same waste of points it became in later editions. Lumbering Behemoth lets you ignore the Ordnance rule [specifically, it can fire it's turret weapon in addition to any other weapons it would be able to fire, so long as it stayed below 6" move], basically, so a stationary tank can use all it's sponsons and hull gun. When it lost that, it lost the ability to use it's sponsons at all. I didn't build the tanks with sponsons because I didn't see value in adding 6 more S5AP4 shots onto my tank. I have a turret Battle Cannon and hull Lascannon [because, at that time, the Battle Cannon was effective against tanks and infantry, and the 15 point Lascannon would help it kill tanks]. Or a turret Vanquisher Cannon and hull Lascannon. Multimeltas would be out of melta range, so I might as well spend the points on giving vets or guardsmen meltas instead, because they would be in melta range, and would therefore get more value out of the 30 points.

And anyway, clearly, we, experienced IG players with at least hundreds of games played, have to debate the efficacy of upgrade options for our tanks, do you expect a player who has never seen a Leman Russ before to have half a clue what's worth the points to give it? [though it is pretty obvious, on a straight PL comparison, that even a fully upgraded Leman Russ is straight-out worse than 2 Hellhounds PL for PL, just as it is Point-for-Point.]


And, actually, I've had the sponsons argument with other IG players. I maintain no sponsons is the way to run it. First off, if you bought the tank for any weapon other than the main gun, you overpaid. Secondary weapons are niceties. Second off, I don't believe in multirole units. This tank shoots tanks, that other one shoots infantry. Most of my in-person discussion revolve around the fact a Punisher with Las and Multimeltas can attack tanks if it has no target for the Punisher cannon. I say that, if it's shooting tanks, it's not shooting the Punisher cannon, and therefore ~150 points aren't doing the job you brought it for this turn. If it legimitately has no target for the Punisher cannon, fire something else first, crack a transport, then fire the Punisher. If there's no target by the end of the turn, you've either won the game or you've lost the game.

 Inquisitor Lord Katherine wrote:
And anyway, clearly, we, experienced IG players, have to debate the efficacy of upgrade options for our tanks, do you expect a player who has never seen a Leman Russ before to have half a clue what's worth the points to give it?

No, of course they won't get it, and that's my whole point! You, as an experienced player, can't figure it out, so a newbie is still going to be stuck on figuring out how the LRBT works. If upgrades cost points they're going to make the wrong choice because they don't understand. If all upgrades are free they're going to make the correct choice because it's no longer legal to take the LRBT without sponsons, but they're still not going to understand which sponsons are best or why they are mandatory. They're still likely to get frustrated with trying to figure out the right answer and just throw some random upgrades on the table to get the game started. Making the point system less accurate isn't helping the situation because it isn't addressing the core problem.

 Peregrine wrote:

 Inquisitor Lord Katherine wrote:
And anyway, clearly, we, experienced IG players, have to debate the efficacy of upgrade options for our tanks, do you expect a player who has never seen a Leman Russ before to have half a clue what's worth the points to give it?

No, of course they won't get it, and that's my whole point! You, as an experienced player, can't figure it out, so a newbie is still going to be stuck on figuring out how the LRBT works. If upgrades cost points they're going to make the wrong choice because they don't understand. If all upgrades are free they're going to make the correct choice because it's no longer legal to take the LRBT without sponsons, but they're still not going to understand which sponsons are best or why they are mandatory. They're still likely to get frustrated with trying to figure out the right answer and just throw some random upgrades on the table to get the game started. Making the point system less accurate isn't helping the situation because it isn't addressing the core problem.

Okay, in 8th edition, yes, Leman Russes need sponsons. If that's what you're trying to say, I agree. In 6th and 7th editions, they didn't, which is what I'm trying to say. Do you agree? I will also concede that, in 5th, sponsons were efficient at getting guns, but I also found them to be overkill, which make them inefficient.

However, because they need sponsons, they're crap. With sponsons, they're still crap. Compare for yourself 2 Hellhounds versus 1 Leman Russ with Flamer sponsons and you'll see what I mean.

Anyway, goodnight.

 Inquisitor Lord Katherine wrote:
However, because they need sponsons, they're crap. With sponsons, they're still crap. Compare for yourself 2 Hellhounds versus 1 Leman Russ with Flamer sponsons and you'll see what I mean.

Again, demonstrating my point very nicely. Using a less-accurate point system doesn't make it any easier for the newbie to identify that LRBTs are worse than Hellhounds no matter how you equip the LRBTs.

 Peregrine wrote:


No, it isn't reasonable at all. It's completely absurd, on the level of saying "this ruler marked in 1mm increments is less accurate than the one that is otherwise exactly identical but marked in 1cm increments, depending on the size of the object you're measuring". There is no conceivable situation where making point costs less accurate makes them work better.

The measure of a unit's utility isn't universal but relative. Therefore, it is not as simple as measuring length or height. Since GW insists on giving each unit a single score, regardless of opponent, terrain, etc, there is, by necessity, a margin of wiggle-room within each numerical score. And it does you no good to measure out to the hundredths place when your margin of error is plus-or-minus five.

The further you get from the ideal case, the worse your margin of error gets. GW's ideal case is the twelve missions and six deployment charts that are approved for Matched Play. Deviating from those increases your margin of error. And since every measure is relative, that deviation is unequal across the vast range of things that have been given points. In other words, not only do the points become less and less accurate, the lack-of-accuracy is different for each unit, weapon, etc.

If this still sounds absurd to you, all I can suggest is that you get in touch with someone who works in the hard sciences for a living and ask them about standard deviations, significant digits, and how a measurement can be "too accurate" to be useful.

Of course, this is all assuming GW got some folks with strong backgrounds in statistics and quantitative analysis to derive their point values. If all they did was play some games and eyeball the numbers, then all of this is academic. And, again, if GW comes out and says Power Level is just a simplification to aid in pick-up games, it can be easily tossed aside for a narrative campaign where players plan out their armies in advance of each battle.


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dosiere wrote:
After reading through the rulebook a few more times and playing 3 games, it's obvious that GW is really pushing power levels as their primary system. If anything, it reads like matched play and points are kind of tacked on and a nuisance to them. I imagine it wasn't part of the original plan but they grudgingly decided to support it.

Deep in my heart-of-hearts, I fear this is the case. I've been playing these games off-and-on since it was called Rogue Trader and GW has always had, at best, an ambivalent attitude towards the sort of competitive play championed on the interwebs. And sometimes it's been downright hostile.

If, as you suggest, they tacked on a points-system grudgingly, it's probably not terribly good. They likely played some games, eyeballed things, sent it to their playtesters (who, it just so happens, are extremely passionate about competitive play), adjusted according to the feedback they got, and considered that good enough for now. When the online meta decides that x is just not worth the points and y is far too overpowered, they'll nudge the point values and publish the new points in their Chapter Approved. Rinse-and-repeat regularly for each new meta. The appearance of accuracy will be far more valuable than actual accuracy, as will not quite being accurate enough, since that will allow them to keep publishing new Chapter Approveds.

Meanwhile, most of the stuff coming out from White Dwarf and being given away free on their fancy new community website will assume Power Level play, since that's where their hearts are. They'll lean on the tournament organizers to come up with new missions and goodies for Matched Play.

Which wouldn't be a bad thing necessarily, though I suspect it'll drive an even deeper wedge between the "Casual" and "Competitive" fandoms.

Trollsmyth wrote:
The further you get from the ideal case, the worse your margin of error gets. GW's ideal case is the twelve missions and six deployment charts that are approved for Matched Play. Deviating from those increases your margin of error. And since every measure is relative, that deviation is unequal across the vast range of things that have been given points. In other words, not only do the points become less and less accurate, the lack-of-accuracy is different for each unit, weapon, etc.

Yes, I agree that points may be less accurate outside of the official matched play missions, but that doesn't provide any evidence that power levels are more accurate. You can't just assume that a failure of points means that power levels must win by default, all of your criticism here applies just as much to power levels.

Of course, this is all assuming GW got some folks with strong backgrounds in statistics and quantitative analysis to derive their point values.

This is almost certainly an incorrect assumption.

The wedge between casual and competitive has always been deep though. The online forum wars between the two sides has already passed to legend like in 2005.

While I disagree with his extremism, I find the pro-points arguments led by Peregrine to be a bit more logically sound than the pro-powerlevel arguments.

Even for someone who's relatively new to it, I can't really see why power level is somehow easier than points.

Judging by the really weird points values, I think they may have used an algorithm to price stuff, just like people who make homebrew units do. That's worrying, somehow.

auticus wrote:The wedge between casual and competitive has always been deep though. The online forum wars between the two sides has already passed to legend like in 2005.

I was there, the day that Competicus killed the Funperor.

Its like consoles vs PC's, one system is clearly superior in every way but console fanboys will deny the truth against all evidence.

Yeah consoles are easier to use but you'll be stuck at 30fps while the PC master race is on 120 with all settings on ultra a second screen playing a 4k movie as you pwn noobs on your fully programmable keyboard.

Personally, I don't have a problem with power levels per se; seems like a good way to jump in and get a game going without getting bogged down in the fine detail of list building. But having dug into it a bit, it's kind of all over the place. Was throwing some lists together this afternoon and the Ork/GSC lists were running at an average of ~16 pts/PL, whereas the Marine one was skating more around the 21 mark. So obviously there's something of a disparity there (to the tune of about 30% of your points, which is not insignificant). And then you've got things that cost the same amount of points having a 100% PL disparity when you compare their points (looking at you, Tankbustas and Lootas). So while I like the idea of PL in theory, having looked into the implementation I'm less keen.