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 Sim-Life wrote:

TeAXIIIT13 wrote:
"What makes a bad game?" 8th edition as a whole is a bad game so it's kind of a given that is what you'll get

I love it when people come into topics to take swipes at 8th even though it's unrelated to the conversation. Your salt energizes me.

40k forum post talking about 8th edition and bad games, I believe 8th edition had made 40k a bad game, how is my comment not relevant? Or is it just because you disagree?

 ross-128 wrote:
I also wonder where people get the idea that being locked into an assault on turn 1 is somehow more "interactive" than being shot off the table. In my view 40k's melee system is a good deal less "interactive" than a good firefight, though the addition of rules to get you *out* of melee is an improvement at least.

I mean you get to roll dice, right? I mean, if you live through the first wave of an attack... I guess...

Yeah seriously though. Being in a perma-CC scrum isn't any more fun than being shot to death - and without Fall Back, perma-CC scrum is the best case outcome for CC for a shooty army. That's not fun at all.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

TeAXIIIT13 wrote:

 Sim-Life wrote:

TeAXIIIT13 wrote:
"What makes a bad game?" 8th edition as a whole is a bad game so it's kind of a given that is what you'll get

I love it when people come into topics to take swipes at 8th even though it's unrelated to the conversation. Your salt energizes me.

40k forum post talking about 8th edition and bad games, I believe 8th edition had made 40k a bad game, how is my comment not relevant? Or is it just because you disagree?

Because the question is "what makes it bad" not "is it bad."

It's like "What makes you think tacos are bad?"
"Tacos are bad."

... yes. Thank you.

TeAXIIIT13 wrote:

 Sim-Life wrote:

TeAXIIIT13 wrote:
"What makes a bad game?" 8th edition as a whole is a bad game so it's kind of a given that is what you'll get

I love it when people come into topics to take swipes at 8th even though it's unrelated to the conversation. Your salt energizes me.

40k forum post talking about 8th edition and bad games, I believe 8th edition had made 40k a bad game, how is my comment not relevant? Or is it just because you disagree?

This also isn't about 8th edition specifically, or even 40k specifically. I've played games similar to this in past editions. (Conscript spam just seems like a new version of Screamerstar in a lot of ways - Meh damage output, but impossible to actually kill or do anything about unless you manage to snipe out the character in the middle of the squad, which is an unlikely proposition.)

 DarknessEternal wrote:

Waaaghpower wrote:

At one point, I tried to charge a couple units of conscripts, meaning he had to fire well over a hundred dice in Overwatch, and since Yarrick was nearby that meant he also had to re-roll all ones. It took about fifteen minutes to check range, count up shots, roll all the attacks, re-roll 1s, roll wounds, and then roll saves, and it literally didn't do any damage.

If you're being hyperbolic, stop, it makes you lose credibility. If you're not, what's wrong with you guys? That's a one minute activity.

Having played against guard a lot I can tell you that conscript spam does slow the came down considerably. Maybe not 15 mins per overwatch as described above but easily multiple minutes in each phase are taken up by each squad, which rapidly adds up.

I think in a lot of ways, this is a pattern. Certain games are not fun, either because you're alphastriked before you can meaningfully interact with the game proper, or one (or both) opponents are running "all defense, no offense", and the end result is both players focusing less on combat, and more on not dying.

I remember reading a 6e FLG article about what made a competitive CSM army, and it was nothing but Typhus, Plague Zombies, and Heldrakes. Most of the army did nothing except walk on objectives and be a pain to kill. That's not exactly a fun army. 8th gives us Conscriptspam and Brimstones in this samw manner too.

Likewise, 8e WHFB was also known as hordehammer, as maneuver and flanking and marchblocks and charge redirects all became secondary to having the largest unit blocks and anti-block vortexes.

pm713 wrote:

 ross-128 wrote:
I also wonder where people get the idea that being locked into an assault on turn 1 is somehow more "interactive" than being shot off the table. In my view 40k's melee system is a good deal less "interactive" than a good firefight, though the addition of rules to get you *out* of melee is an improvement at least.

If I'm in an assault I do something other than die.

Well, disliking shooting because you refuse to bring guns seems almost like a tautology.

But how interactive is assault when you stay in it, really? You roll some dice, some dudes die. Your opponent rolls some dice, some dudes die. If not all the dudes died, you have to skip your entire next turn and go straight to the dice-rolling part again.

The only things remotely interesting about assault are getting to it and getting out of it, and only if your army is bad at the former and good at the latter. If it's the other way around you just start swinging on turn 1 and end up stuck there all game, hardly interesting at all.

At least with shooting you still have a movement phase, with all the various special rules that can affect your movement, terrain to play with, and LoS shenanigans to engage in. And if you bring guns you can shoot back.

 Klowny wrote:

 DarknessEternal wrote:

Waaaghpower wrote:

At one point, I tried to charge a couple units of conscripts, meaning he had to fire well over a hundred dice in Overwatch, and since Yarrick was nearby that meant he also had to re-roll all ones. It took about fifteen minutes to check range, count up shots, roll all the attacks, re-roll 1s, roll wounds, and then roll saves, and it literally didn't do any damage.

If you're being hyperbolic, stop, it makes you lose credibility. If you're not, what's wrong with you guys? That's a one minute activity.

Having played against guard a lot I can tell you that conscript spam does slow the came down considerably. Maybe not 15 mins per overwatch as described above but easily multiple minutes in each phase are taken up by each squad, which rapidly adds up.

It was an overwatch against two separate squads of conscripts, plus one character who gives orders (Can't remember his name) lined up across most of the board, and he had to roll dice in batches because he only had like 30. (I think it ended up being like six sets of rolls.)
So, first he had to check distances on about a hundred models, seeing who had range, who had Line of Sight, who was in Rapid Fire, and double checking that they were still within Buff range of Comissar Yarrick.
Then he had to decide how to divide up the roll into batches,
count out the dice he was using,
roll six times,
pull out all of the 1s,
re-roll them,
and then pull out all of the 6s.
We counted those up, made a counter, and then repeated until all six rolls were done.
Then he had to roll wounds. (Fortunately all just in one batch.)
Then I had to roll saves.

I didn't time it, but it certainly took over ten minutes by a good margin, fifteen is my best, most accurate guess.

 ross-128 wrote:

pm713 wrote:

 ross-128 wrote:
I also wonder where people get the idea that being locked into an assault on turn 1 is somehow more "interactive" than being shot off the table. In my view 40k's melee system is a good deal less "interactive" than a good firefight, though the addition of rules to get you *out* of melee is an improvement at least.

If I'm in an assault I do something other than die.

Well, disliking shooting because you refuse to bring guns seems almost like a tautology.

But how interactive is assault when you stay in it, really? You roll some dice, some dudes die. Your opponent rolls some dice, some dudes die. If not all the dudes died, you have to skip your entire next turn and go straight to the dice-rolling part again.

The only things remotely interesting about assault are getting to it and getting out of it, and only if your army is bad at the former and good at the latter. If it's the other way around you just start swinging on turn 1 and end up stuck there all game, hardly interesting at all.

At least with shooting you still have a movement phase, with all the various special rules that can affect your movement, terrain to play with, and LoS shenanigans to engage in. And if you bring guns you can shoot back.

This assumes that all armies are equally capable in the shooting phase. The assault phase is much more interactive than in the past, pile in moves matter, spacing of units, choosing order of assaults, interrupting with CP. Shooting is only tactical at all, if LOS blocking terrain exists, otherwise mobility is negligible right now.

As to the OP what makes a good game is if the game itself is enjoyable to you. If your opponent spending 15 min rolling dice is frustrating, maybe he needs to figure out a way to roll those dice faster. That is something many people playing hordes fail to do.

IMHO

A lot of good games are turned bad just because of the community that plays it

in the sense that a game can turn sour REALLY quickly by TFG WAACs and the like.

It can also turn pretty sour because of ambiguous rules, Lack of terrain and the lists being played.

"Blue and Brimstone Horrors simply scrabble at any foe that gets too close!"

"Does this mean i get to throw Scrabble tiles at your army? This game is literally unplayable!"

Waaaghpower wrote:

 Klowny wrote:

 DarknessEternal wrote:

Waaaghpower wrote:

At one point, I tried to charge a couple units of conscripts, meaning he had to fire well over a hundred dice in Overwatch, and since Yarrick was nearby that meant he also had to re-roll all ones. It took about fifteen minutes to check range, count up shots, roll all the attacks, re-roll 1s, roll wounds, and then roll saves, and it literally didn't do any damage.

If you're being hyperbolic, stop, it makes you lose credibility. If you're not, what's wrong with you guys? That's a one minute activity.

Having played against guard a lot I can tell you that conscript spam does slow the came down considerably. Maybe not 15 mins per overwatch as described above but easily multiple minutes in each phase are taken up by each squad, which rapidly adds up.

It was an overwatch against two separate squads of conscripts, plus one character who gives orders (Can't remember his name) lined up across most of the board, and he had to roll dice in batches because he only had like 30. (I think it ended up being like six sets of rolls.)
So, first he had to check distances on about a hundred models, seeing who had range, who had Line of Sight, who was in Rapid Fire, and double checking that they were still within Buff range of Comissar Yarrick.
Then he had to decide how to divide up the roll into batches,
count out the dice he was using,
roll six times,
pull out all of the 1s,
re-roll them,
and then pull out all of the 6s.
We counted those up, made a counter, and then repeated until all six rolls were done.
Then he had to roll wounds. (Fortunately all just in one batch.)
Then I had to roll saves.

I didn't time it, but it certainly took over ten minutes by a good margin, fifteen is my best, most accurate guess.

Checking distance and LOS should really not take all that long, there are times as an opponent where I will grant a couple extra models range to save time. measure 24" away from the closest model, find out how many are in that range. Have him roll all those dice. While he does that you measure who is in 12" for rapid fire. Then he rolls those extra dice. Checking a bubble that is granted by unit is a quick check.

Breng77 wrote:

 ross-128 wrote:

pm713 wrote:

 ross-128 wrote:
I also wonder where people get the idea that being locked into an assault on turn 1 is somehow more "interactive" than being shot off the table. In my view 40k's melee system is a good deal less "interactive" than a good firefight, though the addition of rules to get you *out* of melee is an improvement at least.

If I'm in an assault I do something other than die.

Well, disliking shooting because you refuse to bring guns seems almost like a tautology.

But how interactive is assault when you stay in it, really? You roll some dice, some dudes die. Your opponent rolls some dice, some dudes die. If not all the dudes died, you have to skip your entire next turn and go straight to the dice-rolling part again.

The only things remotely interesting about assault are getting to it and getting out of it, and only if your army is bad at the former and good at the latter. If it's the other way around you just start swinging on turn 1 and end up stuck there all game, hardly interesting at all.

At least with shooting you still have a movement phase, with all the various special rules that can affect your movement, terrain to play with, and LoS shenanigans to engage in. And if you bring guns you can shoot back.

This assumes that all armies are equally capable in the shooting phase. The assault phase is much more interactive than in the past, pile in moves matter, spacing of units, choosing order of assaults, interrupting with CP. Shooting is only tactical at all, if LOS blocking terrain exists, otherwise mobility is negligible right now.

As to the OP what makes a good game is if the game itself is enjoyable to you. If your opponent spending 15 min rolling dice is frustrating, maybe he needs to figure out a way to roll those dice faster. That is something many people playing hordes fail to do.

I disagree with posts like this. Here's what I do in my turn, and I play a shooting army (superheavy tank company):

Maneuver with the shooting target priority in mind. This means getting LOS that denies cover or gets around LOS blocking terrain. It means trying to get closer to characters than other units. It means keeping my own units in cover while denying it to the enemy, as mentioned. It can mean blocking transports or avoiding assaults to prolong my shooting. Also get in position for some strategic charges, because even as a shooting army I must recognize the value of close combat at denying powerful enemy shooting.

Begin the shooting phase with a specific targeting and unit priority in mind; I have to pick the greatest threat, then the weapons I want to use in the order I want to use them. This is all affected by on-table situations, such as a unit having multiple possible targets making it want to shoot last vs. having a good chance of destroying the necessary target in one go but leaving another, less capable unit nothing to do. I also have to keep in mind target declaration for my superheavies, as they must declare all at once, making their firepower oftentimes unwieldy and awkward for the uninitiated. I also must have units in reserve to account for statistical anomalies that result in predicted outcomes going awry - these reserve units should not be accounted for in the original shooting plan, for if they are allocated to a target they are hardly reserve! Then I must conduct my shooting in the optimal order given these considerations.

In the charge phase I pick my charges carefully with an eye and an ear to how it will hamper enemy shooting.

In the assault phase I roll some dice, and then have dice rolled at me, and usually nothing happens because we're both shooting armies and CC is more like standing around awkwardly than actual fighting. So tactical!

Waaaghpower wrote:

It was an overwatch against two separate squads of conscripts, plus one character who gives orders (Can't remember his name) lined up across most of the board, and he had to roll dice in batches because he only had like 30. (I think it ended up being like six sets of rolls.)
So, first he had to check distances on about a hundred models, seeing who had range, who had Line of Sight, who was in Rapid Fire, and double checking that they were still within Buff range of Comissar Yarrick.
Then he had to decide how to divide up the roll into batches,
count out the dice he was using,
roll six times,
pull out all of the 1s,
re-roll them,
and then pull out all of the 6s.
We counted those up, made a counter, and then repeated until all six rolls were done.
Then he had to roll wounds. (Fortunately all just in one batch.)
Then I had to roll saves.

I didn't time it, but it certainly took over ten minutes by a good margin, fifteen is my best, most accurate guess.

Try and video this next time it happens. I can't even imagine how this took more than 2 minutes unless someone was handicapped in some capacity.

Pull tape out slightly over 12" and put it on your closest guy. Sweep that in an arc and count the guys inside. Pull it out slightly over 24" and do the same, but count the guys outside. Now you have your dice total and that took maybe 30 seconds.

Breng77 wrote:

Checking distance and LOS should really not take all that long, there are times as an opponent where I will grant a couple extra models range to save time. measure 24" away from the closest model, find out how many are in that range. Have him roll all those dice. While he does that you measure who is in 12" for rapid fire. Then he rolls those extra dice. Checking a bubble that is granted by unit is a quick check.

Sure it shouldn't take that long, if his models are all sitting in a nice, convenient block that's equidistant from my charging unit with consistent Line of Light. But that's not the case - His two squads were wrapped around buildings, arranged in vague squiggly lines to block my movement and screen off his more valuable options, and generally arranged in a broad, unfocused, and varied manner.

Your suggestions to speed things up are all things that don't fly in a competitive setting, by the way. Fudging the actual number of rolls is not something I prefer to do. I like watching my opponent roll, both because it's (usually) fun and because it ensures that no mistakes are made... As well as no "Mistakes". In the same token, I don't like doing all the work for my opponent, and a lot of players aren't going to be happy with letting their opponent just decide how many shots that they get.

It also doesn't help speed up movement, or in the shooting phase when he's deciding how he wants to split up shots between targets.

Not to mention, what you're describing sounds a whole heck of a lot like work, and not at all like playing a game. I don't want 40k to be 'Let's figure out the best way to assembly-line a process to save a couple of minutes because your army comp makes things take ages.'

Sounds like OP's opponent was doing it wrong. And if you play guard or orks, it's VERY rude to bring 30 dice. 150 minimum, sorted in bags.

 DarknessEternal wrote:

Waaaghpower wrote:

It was an overwatch against two separate squads of conscripts, plus one character who gives orders (Can't remember his name) lined up across most of the board, and he had to roll dice in batches because he only had like 30. (I think it ended up being like six sets of rolls.)
So, first he had to check distances on about a hundred models, seeing who had range, who had Line of Sight, who was in Rapid Fire, and double checking that they were still within Buff range of Comissar Yarrick.
Then he had to decide how to divide up the roll into batches,
count out the dice he was using,
roll six times,
pull out all of the 1s,
re-roll them,
and then pull out all of the 6s.
We counted those up, made a counter, and then repeated until all six rolls were done.
Then he had to roll wounds. (Fortunately all just in one batch.)
Then I had to roll saves.

I didn't time it, but it certainly took over ten minutes by a good margin, fifteen is my best, most accurate guess.

Try and video this next time it happens. I can't even imagine how this took more than 2 minutes unless someone was handicapped in some capacity.

Pull tape out slightly over 12" and put it on your closest guy. Sweep that in an arc and count the guys inside. Pull it out slightly over 24" and do the same, but count the guys outside. Now you have your dice total and that took maybe 30 seconds.

As I said in the other reply: That only really works if you don't need to check Line of Sight and if your models are arranged in a neat, orderly fashion. This game had neither.

Waaaghpower wrote:

 Scott-S6 wrote:
Excessively slow play, whether because of you or your army composition, is annoying in casual play and basically cheating in tournament play.

That's something that I have to disagree with a bit, at least the second half. If you're just really bad at keeping things going, sure, but saying that you can't bring large, bulky armies to tournaments because it's 'Cheating' is tantamount to saying that you can't bring Ork boyz, Conscripts, many forms of Nids, and some other options I'm sure I'm forgetting. In a tournament, denying several armies their most powerful unit is basically the same as barring them from playing - Or at least winning.

Bringing an army that cannot be played in half of the allotted time (or bringing an army that can and then dragging your heels) is definitely bad sportsmanship and if done for that purpose is cheating. You are taking time from the other player for them to accomplish their actions. 40K is not designed to be played with a time limit and this has to be accommodated by the players.

 Scott-S6 wrote:

Waaaghpower wrote:

 Scott-S6 wrote:
Excessively slow play, whether because of you or your army composition, is annoying in casual play and basically cheating in tournament play.

That's something that I have to disagree with a bit, at least the second half. If you're just really bad at keeping things going, sure, but saying that you can't bring large, bulky armies to tournaments because it's 'Cheating' is tantamount to saying that you can't bring Ork boyz, Conscripts, many forms of Nids, and some other options I'm sure I'm forgetting. In a tournament, denying several armies their most powerful unit is basically the same as barring them from playing - Or at least winning.

Bringing an army that cannot be played in half of the allotted time (or bringing an army that can and then dragging your heels) is definitely bad sportsmanship and if done for that purpose is cheating. You are taking time from the other player for them to accomplish their actions. 40K is not designed to be played with a time limit and this has to be accommodated by the players.

Dragging your heels is definitely bad sportsmanship, but what is your alternative when it comes to armies that only work by bringing hordes? Am I not supposed to play Orks at all?

 Unit1126PLL wrote:

Breng77 wrote:

 ross-128 wrote:

pm713 wrote:

 ross-128 wrote:
I also wonder where people get the idea that being locked into an assault on turn 1 is somehow more "interactive" than being shot off the table. In my view 40k's melee system is a good deal less "interactive" than a good firefight, though the addition of rules to get you *out* of melee is an improvement at least.

If I'm in an assault I do something other than die.

Well, disliking shooting because you refuse to bring guns seems almost like a tautology.

But how interactive is assault when you stay in it, really? You roll some dice, some dudes die. Your opponent rolls some dice, some dudes die. If not all the dudes died, you have to skip your entire next turn and go straight to the dice-rolling part again.

The only things remotely interesting about assault are getting to it and getting out of it, and only if your army is bad at the former and good at the latter. If it's the other way around you just start swinging on turn 1 and end up stuck there all game, hardly interesting at all.

At least with shooting you still have a movement phase, with all the various special rules that can affect your movement, terrain to play with, and LoS shenanigans to engage in. And if you bring guns you can shoot back.

This assumes that all armies are equally capable in the shooting phase. The assault phase is much more interactive than in the past, pile in moves matter, spacing of units, choosing order of assaults, interrupting with CP. Shooting is only tactical at all, if LOS blocking terrain exists, otherwise mobility is negligible right now.

As to the OP what makes a good game is if the game itself is enjoyable to you. If your opponent spending 15 min rolling dice is frustrating, maybe he needs to figure out a way to roll those dice faster. That is something many people playing hordes fail to do.

I disagree with posts like this. Here's what I do in my turn, and I play a shooting army (superheavy tank company):

Maneuver with the shooting target priority in mind. This means getting LOS that denies cover or gets around LOS blocking terrain. It means trying to get closer to characters than other units. It means keeping my own units in cover while denying it to the enemy, as mentioned. It can mean blocking transports or avoiding assaults to prolong my shooting. Also get in position for some strategic charges, because even as a shooting army I must recognize the value of close combat at denying powerful enemy shooting.

Begin the shooting phase with a specific targeting and unit priority in mind; I have to pick the greatest threat, then the weapons I want to use in the order I want to use them. This is all affected by on-table situations, such as a unit having multiple possible targets making it want to shoot last vs. having a good chance of destroying the necessary target in one go but leaving another, less capable unit nothing to do. I also have to keep in mind target declaration for my superheavies, as they must declare all at once, making their firepower oftentimes unwieldy and awkward for the uninitiated. I also must have units in reserve to account for statistical anomalies that result in predicted outcomes going awry - these reserve units should not be accounted for in the original shooting plan, for if they are allocated to a target they are hardly reserve! Then I must conduct my shooting in the optimal order given these considerations.

In the charge phase I pick my charges carefully with an eye and an ear to how it will hamper enemy shooting.

In the assault phase I roll some dice, and then have dice rolled at me, and usually nothing happens because we're both shooting armies and CC is more like standing around awkwardly than actual fighting. So tactical!

SO because you have not CC units CC doesn't matter? Honestly, cover is such a minor thing in this edition, you can try to deny it but for many units you cannot (either they are in terrain or they aren't). If your AP is high enough it doesn't matter at all. If LOS blocking terrain (which I noted) is prevalent it movement matters, assuming you don't have units that ignore LOS, otherwise units pretty much don't need to move to shoot whatever they want. Target priority is usually pretty easy (shoot the biggest threats to your units), especially with super heavies (last one I faced was picking one thing each turn and destroying it at will). I can tell you most shooting armies I have faced this edition don't move much, they set up a screen for their shooting units and then pick targets and kill them. So it is my opponent rolling dice, and me rolling dice and removing models.

For me in the assault phase I frequently interrupt charge order from my opponent, I try to move during pile in to engage other units, deny fall back etc. I'm not saying fall back should not exist, but the idea that the assault phase is just a dice roll fest is a falsehood propagated by people that want the game to be shooting only. lets put it this way , my assault phase has the option of being much more tactical for my opponent than my shooting phase ever does. Further unless LOS blocking terrain is prevalent on the table, it has more chance to be tactical than the rest of the game, because if there is not enough terrain, which ever shooting army goes first wins the game.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

Waaaghpower wrote:

Breng77 wrote:

Checking distance and LOS should really not take all that long, there are times as an opponent where I will grant a couple extra models range to save time. measure 24" away from the closest model, find out how many are in that range. Have him roll all those dice. While he does that you measure who is in 12" for rapid fire. Then he rolls those extra dice. Checking a bubble that is granted by unit is a quick check.

Sure it shouldn't take that long, if his models are all sitting in a nice, convenient block that's equidistant from my charging unit with consistent Line of Light. But that's not the case - His two squads were wrapped around buildings, arranged in vague squiggly lines to block my movement and screen off his more valuable options, and generally arranged in a broad, unfocused, and varied manner.

Your suggestions to speed things up are all things that don't fly in a competitive setting, by the way. Fudging the actual number of rolls is not something I prefer to do. I like watching my opponent roll, both because it's (usually) fun and because it ensures that no mistakes are made... As well as no "Mistakes". In the same token, I don't like doing all the work for my opponent, and a lot of players aren't going to be happy with letting their opponent just decide how many shots that they get.

It also doesn't help speed up movement, or in the shooting phase when he's deciding how he wants to split up shots between targets.

Not to mention, what you're describing sounds a whole heck of a lot like work, and not at all like playing a game. I don't want 40k to be 'Let's figure out the best way to assembly-line a process to save a couple of minutes because your army comp makes things take ages.'

If measuring distances, and helping your opponent play faster is work to you, then don't complain when they take a long time. My suggestions have and do fly in competitive settings. I do them all the time. Quick measure of range, and LOS check, those first 10 guys are in range, and 5 have rapid fire. If you want your opponent to individually measure each and every model when it is clear that they are in range then you are slowing the game down. Also if all the shooting (as you say) is doing nothing, letting him have 2 additional shots that are iffy on LOS, aren't making or breaking the game, so speed things up.

 Unit1126PLL wrote:
See, this is a weird paradox.

I see people say gunlines are boring, so I play a superheavy tank company, which has a load of firepower but it's not in very many shots (comparatively) so not too much dice. The tanks are at home in melee so I shove them forwards, jockeying for the best position to tie up as many units as possible while still simultaneously staying in support range of my lesser units and other tanks...

... it's really quite fun, and for my opponents as well (or so I am told).

But then people say that army is boring, and I sometimes wonder if IG can ever be played without being labeled as boring.

Ig is one of the harder armies to make interesting, just like Tau, because so much is frontloaded into just shooting firepower. I don't think a baneblade-focused list is the worst, tbh its probably decent now that they work in melee, but people will get disinterested for the same reason they don't like Imperial Knights - you're playing a miniatures game and your opponent is playing with a few action figures.

The most fun guard army I've ever played is a friend of mine who runs Catachans. He's got a mix of mechanized, shooting, and melee elements, which is never really that competitive, but is usually what people consider the most fun, because the game is usually more about on-the-table tactics than the list checks that you have with most skew lists.

Guard and Tau are hard to do this with because you can still choose a variety of units and come up with something very skewy and one-note. "Look how much variety I have! I have fire warriors, sniper drones, hammerheads, longstrike, skyrays, riptides, ghostkeels, broadsides and a stormsurge! This will be fun and interactive!"

It isn't an impossible task, like you get when you try to make a non-skewed Imperial Knight army or khorne daemon army, but it isn't super easy. But yeah, if you want to never get complaints about a boring army, you're going to have to do a little extra work with Guard, Tau, Khorne, Grey Knights, etc.

Waaaghpower wrote:

 Scott-S6 wrote:

Waaaghpower wrote:

 Scott-S6 wrote:
Excessively slow play, whether because of you or your army composition, is annoying in casual play and basically cheating in tournament play.

That's something that I have to disagree with a bit, at least the second half. If you're just really bad at keeping things going, sure, but saying that you can't bring large, bulky armies to tournaments because it's 'Cheating' is tantamount to saying that you can't bring Ork boyz, Conscripts, many forms of Nids, and some other options I'm sure I'm forgetting. In a tournament, denying several armies their most powerful unit is basically the same as barring them from playing - Or at least winning.

Bringing an army that cannot be played in half of the allotted time (or bringing an army that can and then dragging your heels) is definitely bad sportsmanship and if done for that purpose is cheating. You are taking time from the other player for them to accomplish their actions. 40K is not designed to be played with a time limit and this has to be accommodated by the players.

Dragging your heels is definitely bad sportsmanship, but what is your alternative when it comes to armies that only work by bringing hordes? Am I not supposed to play Orks at all?

You're going to an event where you're expected to play games to completion in (for example) 3 hours.
You need to take an army with which you can complete 5 turns in 1.5 hours.
Either you shrink the army or learn to play faster.
You don't get to take 2 hours so that I only get 1 hour just because you wanted to take something that you can't play in the timescales allowed.

Breng77 wrote:

If measuring distances, and helping your opponent play faster is work to you, then don't complain when they take a long time. My suggestions have and do fly in competitive settings. I do them all the time. Quick measure of range, and LOS check, those first 10 guys are in range, and 5 have rapid fire. If you want your opponent to individually measure each and every model when it is clear that they are in range then you are slowing the game down. Also if all the shooting (as you say) is doing nothing, letting him have 2 additional shots that are iffy on LOS, aren't making or breaking the game, so speed things up.

Your suggestion isn't any better, though. You are saying that - Because my opponent took a boring, frustrating army comp - That I should do all the not-fun busywork FOR him while he takes care of all the parts that are actually interesting and potentially fun. (And also ensure that I can't actually notice if he's cheating/doing something wrong, and the same problem for him.)

That's still not fun at all.

I guess I'll go point by point.

First of all, I said in my post how I have to be mindful that CC still matters, so your first sentence is garbage.

Second of all, cover matters more than it did before. My superheavies in cover can get a 4+ save against lascannons if I'm playing right. That's kind of a big deal.

For units that ignore LOS... yes that's right. They can shoot wherever they want. You can remove the first few steps of my post. I don't have those and not every shooting army does.

Target priority is absolutely not very easy (because my opponents usually bring more than 1 big threat to my units). Your opponent was playing his superheavy completely wrong if he never got into melee with it and only picked one thing per turn to kill with it. Such a waste of potential!

And if your opponent doesn't move much and rolls dice and you remove models, then it just sounds like you're playing the assault phase, because that's what happens to most shooty armies in the assault phase: people don't move much, their opponent rolls dice, they roll dice, some models are removed. (Btw that's literally how 40k works in one sentence).

Why would a shooting army waste 2 CP to interrupt the opponent's charge order? To get some extra swings with a Fire Warrior Squad? So they can get d3 Leman Russ attacks that hit on 6s? That's not an assault phase tactic for shooting armies any more than 'spend a CP to re-roll a armour save in the shooting phase' is a tactic for Melee armies. You get to roll some more dice, and nothing much really will change.

And you can't 'try to move during pile in' to engage other units if your shooting opponent is smart (what he used tactics as a shooting army omg impossible) - so I suppose that's some tactics shooting armies have to worry about?

Think about it from the perspective of one of the quintessential CC armies (berzerker horde spam in rhinos) vs one of the quintessential shooting armies (Tau). If they zerkers make it, they win, period. Some dice are rolled by both players, just like the shooting phase, and one army gets deleted, just like the shooting phase. wow so much more tactical than shooting omg.

Lastly... yeah, if you play with gakky terrain every miniatures game is pretty gakky, to be fair. Flames of War on planet Bowling Ball isn't too fun either.

 Scott-S6 wrote:

You're going to an event where you're expected to play games to completion in (for example) 3 hours.
You need to take an army with which you can complete 5 turns in 1.5 hours.
Either you shrink the army or learn to play faster.
You don't get to take 2 hours so that I only get 1 hour just because you wanted to take something that you can't play in the timescales allowed.

You're acting as though playtime is somehow linked to the amount of damage you can do.

It's not 'They get two hours, you get one hour'. It's 'You collectively have fewer turns per player'. He's not getting to do twice as much damage as you because his models move slower.
This isn't like previous editions, where dragging your feet can prevent reserves from coming in or otherwise stifle armies that have a long buildup. If your army isn't capable of doing anything until turn 4, you're going to lose regardless of whether your opponent has a slow army.
(I think lengthy armies are still boring, of course, as I've stated above. But they're not cheating.)

Poor sportsmanship and being a dick. That includes both sore losing AND sore winning.

One time, in fifth, I lost a game as Sisters against Marines, via kill points-- their new codex was quite good, and I just couldn't manage the rolls needed to kill that next squad to even us out.

The Marine player whined that he shouldn't even have had to play me in the first place because Sisters aren't a REAL army because they weren't sold in the store, and that marines are underpowered and anyone who gets beaten by them is a stupid loser.

This kind of attitude-- being a whiny bitch even when you win-- is unfortunately fairly common.

 Melissia wrote:
Poor sportsmanship and being a dick. That includes both sore losing AND sore winning.

One time, in fifth, I lost a game as Sisters against Marines, via kill points-- their new codex was quite good, and I just couldn't manage the rolls needed to kill that next squad to even us out.

The Marine player whined that he shouldn't even have had to play me in the first place because Sisters aren't a REAL army because they weren't sold in the store, and that marines are underpowered and anyone who gets beaten by them is a stupid loser.

This kind of attitude-- being a whiny bitch even when you win-- is unfortunately fairly common.

Yeah, Sisters were really underpowered in 5th, and once the codex dropped and Marines became 14ppm, they really got a huge jump in power that Sisters couldn't deal with.
(Unless you were playing at very low point values, because of the whole 'd6 Acts of Faith' things. Thank goodness your number of Acts of Faith actually scales with army size now.
Oh... Wait.)

Marines were the first thing to get released, and their codex added so many new toys, lots of things getting reduction in cost and even terminators were useful for the first time-- you saw hammer termies even in tournament lists at the time.

But several of the local marine players were still salty donkey-caves about it and claimed marines were still super-underpowered.

Waaaghpower wrote:

It's not 'They get two hours, you get one hour'. It's 'You collectively have fewer turns per player'. He's not getting to do twice as much damage as you because his models move slower.
This isn't like previous editions, where dragging your feet can prevent reserves from coming in or otherwise stifle armies that have a long buildup. If your army isn't capable of doing anything until turn 4, you're going to lose regardless of whether your opponent has a slow army.
(I think lengthy armies are still boring, of course, as I've stated above. But they're not cheating.)

And the impact of fewer turns per player is not the same on all armies. Bringing an army that you know full well will not allow you to complete games in the allotted time unless your opponent rushes to accommodate you (and often, not even then) is 100% dick move.

 Scott-S6 wrote:

Waaaghpower wrote:

It's not 'They get two hours, you get one hour'. It's 'You collectively have fewer turns per player'. He's not getting to do twice as much damage as you because his models move slower.
This isn't like previous editions, where dragging your feet can prevent reserves from coming in or otherwise stifle armies that have a long buildup. If your army isn't capable of doing anything until turn 4, you're going to lose regardless of whether your opponent has a slow army.
(I think lengthy armies are still boring, of course, as I've stated above. But they're not cheating.)

And the impact of fewer turns per player is not the same on all armies. Bringing an army that you know full well will not allow you to complete games in the allotted time unless your opponent rushes to accommodate you (and often, not even then) is 100% dick move.

Again, though, you seem to be avoiding the question:
I'm an Ork player.
Hypothetically, I could start playing Guard with little tank support. Or Tyranids that aren't nidzilla.

What exactly do you propose I do? Just avoid the tournament scene entirely, because you might not get to turn five?

I will say that learning to play fast is "the horde player's burden", for lack of a better phrase. And I say that as an infantry guard player.

Basically, I chose to put 200 models on the table, so it's on me to learn how to play them quickly. It's just one of the skills that separates a good horde player from a bad one.

Although at the same time, it is also important to have a reasonable expectation of how long a game should take and that time should be mindful of the fact horde armies exist. For example, outside of maybe Knight armies, nobody expects to finish a 2000 point game in under 45 minutes. That would be silly.