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.

8th is all but here and I've been scrolling through the various leaks (although I'm looking forward to getting my grubby mitts on the real book ASAP) as well as watching many battle reports on YouTube. It's really looking as though 8th is the most balanced edition ever made. What seems to be transpiring (and I'm liking) is that there doesn't seem to be any 'point-n-click' options when it comes to list building. All factions have the good, bad and ugly and the idea of a particular unit being 'OP' doesn't seem to hold much water as all factions are able to counter each other. Things tend to be a lot more situational. As a Tau player (mainly) everything seems to have it's use, or can find itself being quite useless if used in the wrong way. My view is that the days of auto-pick, point and click powerful TAC lists are over.

I hope you're right. People said the same about Age of Sigmar and it has some very powerful, point and click type armies that take advantage of spammed units and powerful combos.

Hopefully we won't see the same with 8th. In 7th, way too many games were won during list building. You either obeyed a strict meta or you didn't.

 Kriswall wrote:
I hope you're right. People said the same about Age of Sigmar and it has some very powerful, point and click type armies that take advantage of spammed units and powerful combos.

Really? Do you have any examples of this? Looking at tournaments, forums, online and playing anecdotally this doesn't seem to be the case.

I recall ogres being trouble.

but yeah so far nothing is point and click and i like it.

More or less yeah. If you look closely a lot of people complaining are either stuck thinking in 7th edition thinking (where you just plop down a model and run it forward to kill people, then double back to cap objectives) or are just salty that their previous "I win" buttons are no longer valid.

Some of the things that I noticed a lot of people ignoring are:

1.) Everyone dies easily. I'd say "a lot of people" say that their units die too easily, but it's quite literally "everyone". Most of the naysayers don't seem to realize that survivability went down across the board, so while a unit is less survivable than compared to their 7th ed counterpart, they are still more or less just as durable relative to everything else.

2.) Costly Anti-vehicle weapons. This one is another one of those "seeing it in a vacuum" things. A lot of people I've seen have had problems with previously anti-vehicle weapons going up in price, without realizing that they now can also be used to kill multiwound models much easier. While stuff like the Lascannon could always do that (due to a combination of good AP and high strength to trigger ID), now weaker weapons can do the same, giving them much more utility (and a reason why their costs have to be raised). In addition to that, vehicles in general have gotten a lot tougher and a lot more expensive. if they could be taken out by cheap, widely available weapons then no one would ever take them, hence why more expensive heavy guns are necessary.

3.) Strategy and Tactics; This is the last one that no one seems to get and is mostly with the "7th" people. A lot of people only evaluate individual units based on their maximum stats during army creation and nothing else (and usually ignoring ancillary abilities that happen during the game) including buffs. This edition is shaping up to be far more about tactics (as in, in-game on-the-fly game decisions) over Strategy (where you just bring the optimum list loadout, point in a direction and go). Strategy isn't completely out the window (listbuilding is still going to be a very important part of a good general) but this edition will rely far more on tactics than before, which simple mathhammer isn't going to do a whole lot for. Right Tools for the Right Job isn't simply going to cut it, you'll also need to know how to use said tools.

 Hollow wrote:
8th is all but here and I've been scrolling through the various leaks (although I'm looking forward to getting my grubby mitts on the real book ASAP) as well as watching many battle reports on YouTube. It's really looking as though 8th is the most balanced edition ever made. What seems to be transpiring (and I'm liking) is that there doesn't seem to be any 'point-n-click' options when it comes to list building. All factions have the good, bad and ugly and the idea of a particular unit being 'OP' doesn't seem to hold much water as all factions are able to counter each other. Things tend to be a lot more situational. As a Tau player (mainly) everything seems to have it's use, or can find itself being quite useless if used in the wrong way. My view is that the days of auto-pick, point and click powerful TAC lists are over.

Do you have links to battle reports

MechaEmperor7000 Well said. I think your second point is incredibly valid and I find my self asking "relative to what" when you see the inevitable "X,Y,Z costs way too much/little" One such unit as been Broadsides which have side a significant hike. Although, I'd argue that within the entirety of the new setting, what they can do, their survivability, they are appropriately costed.

These are my favourite channels on Youtube at the moment.

TABLETOP TACTICS
https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC_KbSd9fby8UeLU7M6eXeRQ

WINTERS SEO
https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCWVwkGrdqVEGkU3LNlp70fw

 Hollow wrote:
My view is that the days of auto-pick, point and click powerful TAC lists are over.

Huzzah! Praise the Emperor! Now I can take my Rough Riders, Ogryns, and Dreadnoughts and not be a total scrub!

 Hollow wrote:

 Kriswall wrote:
I hope you're right. People said the same about Age of Sigmar and it has some very powerful, point and click type armies that take advantage of spammed units and powerful combos.

Really? Do you have any examples of this? Looking at tournaments, forums, online and playing anecdotally this doesn't seem to be the case.

The Ogre army that was really scary was the Beastclaw Raiders, because they can take an army of entirely big scary monsters that dish out a tremendous amount of ranged damage and ranged Mortal Wound damage. This army is not near as scary since some game modes require numbers to score on objectives.

Another scary one is the Kunnin' Rukk list, in which Savage Orks in a formation with particular leader can dish out HUNDREDS of shots in a single Shooting Phase. So much Dakka....

For a while, it was Sylvaneth, who could take a big monster as the army General, which could be equipped with a 1+ Armor Save, re-rolling 1s, combined with the Kurnoth Hunters, who are one of the strongest individual units in the game, and can be good at shooting or melee, and the fact that they can deploy trees around the board and "teleport" between the woods they just set up without any real restriction. Not really game breaking anymore with the latest army updates, but still a potential threat that can mess with your army hard.

The current big scary army is the Tzeentch shooting list, with strong magic, powerful shooting, and good mobility. It is currently the "favorite" to win.

These armies have also had army books releases that showcases them and gives them extra rules. That said, due to the nature of Random Initiative in each game turn, any army can swing back and stand a decent chance against any other. I mean, Seraphon (Lizardmen) placed 4th in a recent big tournament, because they have some special rules that give them an advantage over Chaos, and NOBODY was expecting them to place that high at all.

Here's a thread discussing one of the biggest AoS tournaments, the SCGT. Take a look at it and see what you think:

http://www.tga.community/forums/topic/9070-scgt-rankings-and-top-three-lists/

You will notice the top three lists contain either the Tzeentch shooting (first and second place) or the Orks and Ogres shooting (third place). The WAAC mindset exists in AoS, sadly. But for a while, it was really nice to not worry about it. Thankfully, everything is at square one in 40K, and it will be a few months before we see a "meta" forming up.

Yeah, The Beastclaw Raiders was never something I really encountered as we use objectives and they couldn't deal with it.

Point taken on the zeentch stuff though.

I think the meta is already looking to be hordes with buff characters. Most cheap horde units cant be cost effectively killed so if they can ignore or limit moral damage they become incredibly strong
This is mainly (imo) due tp blast weapons being nerfed so hard vs hordes

 Hollow wrote:

 Kriswall wrote:
I hope you're right. People said the same about Age of Sigmar and it has some very powerful, point and click type armies that take advantage of spammed units and powerful combos.

Really? Do you have any examples of this? Looking at tournaments, forums, online and playing anecdotally this doesn't seem to be the case.

Bloodletter bomb with Sayl, Stormfiends from the clan Skryre and spamming Tzeentch Tzaangors archers in flying discs that I don't remember how they are called.

The list of the winner of Adepticon, if I remember correctly, was a Chaos list with all of that
But one thing is sure: You have some broken combos, but the balance of the rest of the armies is much better than before.

And thats all what I ask for. I don't mind if theres 2-3 broken combos that everyone plays in tournaments, as long as the rest of the units and armies are more balanced and I can play normal lists ones again'st others without being a auto lose or an auto win.

EDIT: BunkhouseBusterMade explaind it much better! Thats one thing that I like of 8th and not so much in AoS. In AoS you have mortal wounds. A TON of mortal wounds. In 8th you have much much less. But AP is higger normally (and units saves too!)

 BunkhouseBuster wrote:

 Hollow wrote:
My view is that the days of auto-pick, point and click powerful TAC lists are over.

Huzzah! Praise the Emperor! Now I can take my Rough Riders, Ogryns, and Dreadnoughts and not be a total scrub!

 Hollow wrote:

 Kriswall wrote:
I hope you're right. People said the same about Age of Sigmar and it has some very powerful, point and click type armies that take advantage of spammed units and powerful combos.

Really? Do you have any examples of this? Looking at tournaments, forums, online and playing anecdotally this doesn't seem to be the case.

The Ogre army that was really scary was the Beastclaw Raiders, because they can take an army of entirely big scary monsters that dish out a tremendous amount of ranged damage and ranged Mortal Wound damage. This army is not near as scary since some game modes require numbers to score on objectives.

Another scary one is the Kunnin' Rukk list, in which Savage Orks in a formation with particular leader can dish out HUNDREDS of shots in a single Shooting Phase. So much Dakka....

For a while, it was Sylvaneth, who could take a big monster as the army General, which could be equipped with a 1+ Armor Save, re-rolling 1s, combined with the Kurnoth Hunters, who are one of the strongest individual units in the game, and can be good at shooting or melee, and the fact that they can deploy trees around the board and "teleport" between the woods they just set up without any real restriction. Not really game breaking anymore with the latest army updates, but still a potential threat that can mess with your army hard.

The current big scary army is the Tzeentch shooting list, with strong magic, powerful shooting, and good mobility. It is currently the "favorite" to win.

These armies have also had army books releases that showcases them and gives them extra rules. That said, due to the nature of Random Initiative in each game turn, any army can swing back and stand a decent chance against any other. I mean, Seraphon (Lizardmen) placed 4th in a recent big tournament, because they have some special rules that give them an advantage over Chaos, and NOBODY was expecting them to place that high at all.

Here's a thread discussing one of the biggest AoS tournaments, the SCGT. Take a look at it and see what you think:

http://www.tga.community/forums/topic/9070-scgt-rankings-and-top-three-lists/

You will notice the top three lists contain either the Tzeentch shooting (first and second place) or the Orks and Ogres shooting (third place). The WAAC mindset exists in AoS, sadly. But for a while, it was really nice to not worry about it. Thankfully, everything is at square one in 40K, and it will be a few months before we see a "meta" forming up.

If I remember right, though, those Tzeentch lists were dependent on a shenanigan with a very loose interpretation of the rules for the Balewind Vortex that shouldn't have been allowed. The new books definitely have an advantage in AoS, but you'll notice that it isn't linear I.E. the powerful armies aren't necessarily just knocked down a rung on the ladder by a newer book. Sylvaneth and Beastclaw fell pretty far after dominating a few tournaments. I think it has more to do with players having to adjust their army lists and strategies to the new releases than it does with power creep (though power creep is definitely there). I expect the same to be the case with 40k going forward. After Space Marines and Death Guard get full codices with new rules, they'll top tournament rankings for a little bit, then competitive players will adjust and bring them back down to earth.

 Desubot wrote:


but yeah so far nothing is point and click and i like it.

Eh, I'm a bit salty about cutodes. 3W, Cheaper than meganobz but have a 3++ invlun, T5, str 5 so they wound at worst on a 5, -3 to saves, and D3 damage. So, they're basically weaker power klaws that hit on 2s and have 4 attacks each (with their banner). But they're still strong enough to wound anything at worst on 5s - they just completely annihilated a orkanaut in CC, for example.

I mean, hell, taking out 3 custodoes is about as hard as killing a guilliman, at like a third a price. They're unbelievably cheap and durable, and can reliably take out pretty much anything.

Or maybe I'm just salty about 5 point storm shields. FIVE POINT STORM SHIELDS. Give me a break, that's cheaper than a big shoota. I'd like to know who play tested and thought 5 points for a 3++ was a reasonable cost.

Bobug wrote:
I think the meta is already looking to be hordes with buff characters. Most cheap horde units cant be cost effectively killed so if they can ignore or limit moral damage they become incredibly strong
This is mainly (imo) due tp blast weapons being nerfed so hard vs hordes

IIRC Hordes of cheap grunts is also strong in AoS

im fine with it as troops dont have much going for them anyway.

and on the bright side you can kind of counter moral shenanigan characters with snipers which makes taking them all the more reasonable.

 Kap'n Krump wrote:


Eh, I'm a bit salty about cutodes.

they also arent really a real army. but yeah i get that as they are imperium they have the biggest army. i think that might be my only point of contention in that imperial stuff got really flexible for list building. i cant wait to see everyones codex specific detachments that might give better bonuses for building more specific.

Yeesh, IDK about horde armies. Cover basically doesn't exist in any effective capacity, and while blast weapons were largely nerfed, so many weapons got double shots. A secondary weapon on a land raider gets 12 str 6 shots, for example (twin assault cannon). Storm bolters got double shots for no reason whatsoever, it wasn't even twin linked before.

I mean.....between things getting a ton more shots across the board and cover being almost useless, my hordes o' boyz have been struggling, even with KFF and painboyz.

Don't count your chicks until they've hatched. Give it a few months for the tournament crowd to work out all the kinks and I don't doubt we'll see some easily abusable net lists start appearing.

A lot will also depend on how willing GW is to deal with power creep going forward. They've 'reset the clock' as it were for all of the (now) old stuff, but going forward I'll be very interested in seeing if they care to balance the new Primarchs and Primarine releases.

 MechaEmperor7000 wrote:
stuck thinking in 7th edition thinking .

Good god this drives me crazy, but thankfully it's not as bad as it used to be. When they released the battlecannon rules I wanted to die

I currently have 8 eggs therefore I have 8 chickens. Done.

@Kap'n Krump: Yeah, Orks are in a weird spot - and I don't think it's a good one.

I never really looked at Custodes before, but - , especially comparing them to MegaNobz.

I'd love for MegaNobz to be useful in some edition, but it seems like that'll never be the case. Custodes mop the floor with them in any sort of comparison, and that's before you consider the fact that they're an Imperial unit, so everyone can take them. Add in 5 point Storm Shields (what?) and it gets out of control. But I shouldn't be surprised, they ARE a Space Marine unit after all. Nevermind that they hit on 2+/3+ as opposed to the 4+/5+ for Meganobz; plus 50% faster (during normal movement anyways - at least in charges Orkz can reroll) and T5 Custodes vs T4 Meganobz. Also, 5++/3++ Invuln versus 0 for Meganobz.

Can't have the Xenos come out on top of a comparison with a Space Marine, that's just bad for business.

My is real, haha - I love Meganobz, they're one of my favorite units, but they're never worth it. I never realized how much blatantly better Custodes were either. Power Klaw should at least be a d6 damage, so they have a niche as heavy vehicle hunters; a d3 on a 4+ hit, 3+ wound is nothing; especially since vehicles can get 6+ armor saves if they're 2+.

The problem with Custodes is that nothig buff thems. Really, nothing.

I love the new custodes, they are a powerhouse, but probably they should be more expensive.

I've just been buying a few Mark 4 tactical squads, and some Tataros and Cataphracti terminators on eBay, along with a Contemptor. I'm sure I'll be able to make some sort of army with them. Have to get some Mark 3 some time. The rule changes mean that foot-slogging Marines aren't going to be bad.

And I have plenty of other Marine parts to build armies out of.

 Galas wrote:
The problem with Custodes is that nothig buff thems. Really, nothing.

I love the new custodes, they are a powerhouse, but probably they should be more expensive.

Sweet jeebus, what kind of buffs do they need? Well, hammerhand, for one, so they wound knights on 4s, not 5s.

Sounds like Custodes are the new "point and click" units.

 Galas wrote:
The problem with Custodes is that nothig buff thems. Really, nothing.

I love the new custodes, they are a powerhouse, but probably they should be more expensive.

The problem isn't that they're minimum 245pts/5, are stuck with 24" range S4 weapons, and need a 364pt Land Raider to go anywhere?

(But yeah, I am really kind of tired of seeing Custodes that are cheaper than Grey Knight Paladins (55pts/model minimum, rather than 49pts/model for Custodes) when they do very similar things, except the Custodes are just kind of better at everything other than shooting single-wound infantry. And Deep Striking.)

 Kap'n Krump wrote:

Or maybe I'm just salty about 5 point storm shields. FIVE POINT STORM SHIELDS. Give me a break, that's cheaper than a big shoota. I'd like to know who play tested and thought 5 points for a 3++ was a reasonable cost.

A storm shield looks good optically, but in this edition it isn't as strong as it used to be. MANZ effectively have a 5++ against a -3. Storm shield only comes into play when being hit by AP2 or better.

The thing is, the points are obviously designed to look like there was some deeper metric or methodology for their formulation given all the odd numbers, but after even a basic point by point comparison between units, its not hard to come up with head scratchers. Here's the classic story of imbalance, find something good and cheap and take a lot of it. This edition isn't doing much to curb spam given the 3 detachments at 2000. It's a good first step to have faction play back, but how long before the marketing department ruins that?

We can only hope that the rules writing team won't be swayed by the marketing department.

Again.

Although in past editions it was more like the marketing department was the rules writing team. Especially with the extensive copypasting and blatant OP-ness of some stuff.

Daedalus81 wrote:

 Kap'n Krump wrote:

Or maybe I'm just salty about 5 point storm shields. FIVE POINT STORM SHIELDS. Give me a break, that's cheaper than a big shoota. I'd like to know who play tested and thought 5 points for a 3++ was a reasonable cost.

A storm shield looks good optically, but in this edition it isn't as strong as it used to be. MANZ effectively have a 5++ against a -3. Storm shield only comes into play when being hit by AP2 or better.

I wholeheartedly disagree, it's stronger than ever before. You are correct that MANZ have an effective invlun now (which is pretty great), however, the rending system can easily take anyone's 2+ save down to a 3 or a 4 or a 5 or worse. Missile launchers, for example, knock saves from a 2+ to a 4+. But with a storm shield, it is never, ever, worse than a 3+. Take it from someone who doesn't have invluns in his entire army, having a set point below which your save can't be reduced, and having that point be as good as a 3+, is AMAZING.

Eh, I've already had my first "Sinking Scatterbike Feeling" with 8th in my fourth game when I first experienced the Kastelan shootybots. 18 shots per model 36" range S6 AP-2 with re-rolls to hit for being next to Belligerent Carl. I played with GSC and 4 of those bots removed 70% of my army in 2 turns, with most of his army just having to fall back and allow them to shoot more.

Now, I wouldn't have had much of a problem with it if I was playing like 100% light infantry and they were just scooping them, but it was like....infantry? Dead. Heavy infantry? Still dead. Transport? Still dead from one bot. Leman Russ? Half healthed by one bot.

Now I'm not saying "Burn your models the game is ruined cus robots" but it's things that that give me a little bit of a "hail the new boss same as the old boss" feeling.

I have already witnessed my "eldar level bs" with Magnus and crew, at 1500 points I watched Magnus, 2 scarab occult terminators and 2 10 man rubric marines just slaughter a tau army. Magnus is terrifying.