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.

If there isn't any meaningful difference between the sides because the game is perfectly balanced, all you'd be playing is chess without squares. I'm not arguing for op and up stuff, but I think that's a little far.

 CREEEEEEEEED wrote:
If there isn't any meaningful difference between the sides because the game is perfectly balanced, all you'd be playing is chess without squares. I'm not arguing for op and up stuff, but I think that's a little far.

That's not how balance works. For the 1,000th time.

 ross-128 wrote:
Across the board?

And why is it that every instance of "AM winning every event" is actually Ultramarines with AM allies? If AM as a whole was that strong surely someone could win with a pure AM force?

It'd actually be fairly unlikely for a given IG army to not include at least a few of the better units from the index, unless you ran mechanized veterans backed by leman russes and valkyries. The guard index was very strong, and a contender for single strongest index army without a doubt.

As to your second point, it's actually not true. See RG did always run with guard, but guard didn't always run with RG. You saw a lot of variations in imperial soup, including assassins, psykers, admech (Cawl+kastalens), SoB (particularly with Celestine), or just FW guard units supplementing the core, which was conscripts and plasma scions (or elysians). Many of those variations also won tournaments, or at least placed high in them, though the RG combo was more common than most. But the constant between them was always the guard portion, it was present across every imperial soup army and variation.

So while RG may have been the flashy centerpiece to many winning lists, guard was always the workhorse.

 CREEEEEEEEED wrote:
If there isn't any meaningful difference between the sides because the game is perfectly balanced, all you'd be playing is chess without squares. I'm not arguing for op and up stuff, but I think that's a little far.

On a pure theoretical level you could be right but this is disingenuous. People clearly want an acceptable compromise between variety and reasonably equal chances to win for each side (adjusted for skill).

I concede that is not easy to quantify (or to implement.. at least for GW).

 CREEEEEEEEED wrote:
If there isn't any meaningful difference between the sides because the game is perfectly balanced, all you'd be playing is chess without squares. I'm not arguing for op and up stuff, but I think that's a little far.

You also shouldn't have armies that are other army+1. Which is honestly what guard looks like to a lot of us. It has almost anything you could possibly need in it somewhere.

If different armies have different strengths/weaknesses, what is the weakness of guard currently? Lower BS seems irrelevant when you can take it in bulk to the point you still outdamage more accurate armies. They aren't weak against assault hilariously, as many imperial armies take IG infantry specifically to protect from assault, and I actually think IG infantry can put out more damage in melee than orks now, if you wanted to build your army that way, which is just hilarious to me. They've got numerous options for anti infantry and tank, as well as both fragile glass cannons and tough bastions. They can generate CP more easily than anyone else to boot, and have no difficulty fitting in whatever they need due to the cheap HQ options.

Tell me the weakness of guard right now, because I can tell you the weakness of each and every existing codex army.

Addressing points from the OP:

1) The Cadian trait to reroll all failed to hits makes units insanely to good especially when paired with the ability to spread the order for free on a 4+. In addition, the stratagems and relics that also allow for rerolling failed wounds or add +1 to hit rolls.

Cadian armies have to build around this heavily for it to work. Firstly, they must stand still to reroll 1s, so there's a real tradeoff when there's numerous tactical objectives scattered around the table. Also, either full reroll orders will only affect 1 heavy weapon in an infantry squad or they're in a HWS and very easy to just, y'know, shoot?

2) Regimental traits work on everything to include tanks and infantry. In contrast, these buffs only work on infantry/dreads in other armies

Sure, that one does seem pretty unfair.

3) Basilisks able to reroll hits and now being -3 AP makes it insane to say the least for 108pts and even better with other buffs

Because they weren't zomg broken when they insta-gibbed MEQs on 2+ with no questions asked in previous editions? Now, MEQs still get a save, and 5+ in cover.

4) Hellhound now gaining 2D6 shots with their 16” inferno cannon for only 101pts makes way to good at multiple roles.

Yep, and they used to be 20" range that ignored cover and hitting fewer than 8 guys was an utter misplay on the controlling player's part. For a slightly lower cost they're returning to their original capability.

5) Baneblades and in particular Shadowswords, getting a price reduction, more shots (3D3), the ability to move an shoot with no penalty, and benefits from regimental abilities, strategems and new psychic powers.

SHV having a move and shoot penalty was a massive oversight. Going down to a 5+ BS at full strength, and worse when weakened, made them basically not worth taking from the index.

6) The AM previously capable of having the most command points now can generate more on both players turn giving them seemingly an an infinite amount.

As others have mentioned, pure hyperbole. And it's typically only going to be 1 reroll per phase, with maybe the +1 save on a single unit in your shooting phase.

7) Leman Russ tanks getting double shots if they only move half distance, a price reduction, and new plasma vents, orders, and chapter trait buffs makes Executioners just stupid. 2D6 shots of plasma overcharged from the turret makes it just to good. The punisher upgrades on Pask is leaves nothing alive.

Index Leman Russes were watery hot garbage. Trust me. They needed this. A lascannon or fusion gun can still cripple them in short order, anyways.

8) The ability to now make a unit (i.e. a baneblade), +2 save and -1 to hit was badly designed. How was were some of these not infantry only

SHV not having 2+ was pretty ridiculous, I guess terminators and marines in cover are the only ones deserving of that save stat? -1 to hit on such a big model, on the other hand, is admittedly very questionable.

SilverAlien wrote:

 ross-128 wrote:
Across the board?

And why is it that every instance of "AM winning every event" is actually Ultramarines with AM allies? If AM as a whole was that strong surely someone could win with a pure AM force?

It'd actually be fairly unlikely for a given IG army to not include at least a few of the better units from the index, unless you ran mechanized veterans backed by leman russes and valkyries. The guard index was very strong, and a contender for single strongest index army without a doubt.

As to your second point, it's actually not true. See RG did always run with guard, but guard didn't always run with RG. You saw a lot of variations in imperial soup, including assassins, psykers, admech (Cawl+kastalens), SoB (particularly with Celestine), or just FW guard units supplementing the core, which was conscripts and plasma scions (or elysians). Many of those variations also won tournaments, or at least placed high in them, though the RG combo was more common than most. But the constant between them was always the guard portion, it was present across every imperial soup army and variation.

So while RG may have been the flashy centerpiece to many winning lists, guard was always the workhorse.

So if you consider just one unit in a codex to be OP, that's enough to claim that "the entire codex is OP across the board" and nerf everything, even jokes like the PC sentinel that can blow themselves up on a 1-2, because hey they're sure to bring the one strong unit so everything else doesn't count?

Something tells me you'd never apply the same standard to your own codex.

There were only four really strong units in the Index: conscripts, plasma scions, taurox primes, and manticores.

Of those only the first two really drew complaints, and they were both nerfed. So how does this make "the entire codex OP across the board"? What would massive across-the-board nerfs accomplish here other than giving you warm and fuzzy feels?

Solution: Add more Line of Sight-blocking Terrain so the AM player is forced to move. Don't use Kill Points in your games, but instead focus on Objectives.

When AM armies have to move to get to objectives or to line up a shot on the enemy, they are forced to make decisions. When AM armies make decisions, they have to give up certain things, such as being in range of an officer for orders, or being able to shoot heavy weapons and the like.

During your next games, use some LARGE LOS-blocking pieces. Cover up any holes in terrain or simply say that if there is a wall between one model and another, then it blocks Line of Sight.

I have a feeling you'll notice something very different happen with AM games when the players must focus entirely on objectives instead of kill points, and when more elite focused armies can focus their energy on taking objectives and killing only a few of the AM's units in order to secure them, instead of having a lop-sided, cross-table shoot-out, which the AM always win.

I CANNOT STRESS THIS ENOUGH.

The Astra Militarum EXCEL at sitting in one spot and shooting you to death. They are the army that does that the best, but the game is not meant to be played like that! This is why Tau gunlines, Ultramarine gunlines, AdMech gunlines, and other GUNLINES THAT DON'T MOVE are so hard to beat! Games and Tournaments aren't using enough Line of Sight Blocking terrain to force those gunlines to MOVE OUT OF POSITION.

Force the AM and other gunlines to move and they have to get closer to assaults, get closer to enemy rapid fire weapons, get closer to grenades, and get further away from the safety of their deployment zone, their precious buffing HQ's and Elites, and other things besides. It also opens up their back line to be deployed in for enemy deep strikers and flankers.

Proper terrain and LOS blocking rules NERF GUNLINES IMMEDIATELY without changing ANY RULES.

Just going to repost this:

IG lists were not winning tournaments. Conscripts, Scions and Forgeworld Earthshakers in conjunction with some soup were winning tournaments. The Codex toned down 2/3 of those units (the only two it had access to) with Scion plasma guns taking a very large point cost increase. Other IG units, which had no competitive presence at all, were buffed and a bunch of very fun looking and useful rules and stratagems were added.

I think part of the problem with the perception of this Codex being "WAUW OP" is that Guard have been bad for so long that people simply are not used to them being on the same level as actual competitive armies. This includes some Guard players who seem to have some kind of imperial stockholm syndrome where they've come to love being a garbage underdog after so many years of it and think that having some kind of list building freedom, on a competitive level, is a bad thing worthy of self flagellation.

The other issue is that people erroneously equated Scions, Conscripts and Earthsakers with "all of the IG" and, seeing as the Codex has numerically more buffs than nerfs, their thought process is "IG was crushing tournaments. IG was given more buffs than nerfs. More buffs than nerfs makes IG stronger, therefore, IG is stronger than before making them OP". The problem of course is what we already established, namely that "all of the IG" was not crushing tournaments, only Scions, Conscripts and FW. Even though the book contained more buffs than nerfs, the nerfs hit the units that mattered in a competitive sense. The end result is that we have no idea how IG will perform in the tournament scene yet seeing as their tournament level units were nerfed, and we will just have to wait and see.

edit: Another very significant nerf is the limit of one command squad per regimental detachment in matched play. This is an enormous change that the "IG OP before proven OP" camp seems to be glossing over, perhaps innocently as it hasn't been discussed very much. That is a big deal though, no more spamming plasma command squads, which were a big part of the Scion issue.

 ross-128 wrote:

SilverAlien wrote:

 ross-128 wrote:
Across the board?

And why is it that every instance of "AM winning every event" is actually Ultramarines with AM allies? If AM as a whole was that strong surely someone could win with a pure AM force?

It'd actually be fairly unlikely for a given IG army to not include at least a few of the better units from the index, unless you ran mechanized veterans backed by leman russes and valkyries. The guard index was very strong, and a contender for single strongest index army without a doubt.

As to your second point, it's actually not true. See RG did always run with guard, but guard didn't always run with RG. You saw a lot of variations in imperial soup, including assassins, psykers, admech (Cawl+kastalens), SoB (particularly with Celestine), or just FW guard units supplementing the core, which was conscripts and plasma scions (or elysians). Many of those variations also won tournaments, or at least placed high in them, though the RG combo was more common than most. But the constant between them was always the guard portion, it was present across every imperial soup army and variation.

So while RG may have been the flashy centerpiece to many winning lists, guard was always the workhorse.

So if you consider just one unit in a codex to be OP, that's enough to claim that "the entire codex is OP across the board" and nerf everything, even jokes like the PC sentinel that can blow themselves up on a 1-2, because hey they're sure to bring the one strong unit so everything else doesn't count?

Something tells me you'd never apply the same standard to your own codex.

As someone who took pains to bring balanced 6/7E Eldar lists to friendly games, I've got to say - the irony here is real. Something about fate repeating itself.

 ross-128 wrote:
So if you consider just one unit in a codex to be OP, that's enough to claim that "the entire codex is OP across the board" and nerf everything, even jokes like the PC sentinel that can blow themselves up on a 1-2, because hey they're sure to bring the one strong unit so everything else doesn't count?

Something tells me you'd never apply the same standard to your own codex.

There were only four really strong units in the Index: conscripts, plasma scions, taurox primes, and manticores.

Of those only the first two really drew complaints, and they were both nerfed. So how does this make "the entire codex OP across the board"? What would massive across-the-board nerfs accomplish here other than giving you warm and fuzzy feels?

Across the board implies a generalization. It does not mean literally every possible unit with every possible loadout is OP. Just that it isn't isolated to a single or even 2-3 builds.

Also, it wasn't so much "needed nerfs on everything" as much as didn't need 2-3 buffs on the majority of units. Seriously, between doctrines on everything, even super heavies, point drops on a ton of units and improved rules on many, this codex handed out more buffs than any other when many units were already compareable in effectiveness to other options (that didn't receive doctrines) in their army.

Plus again the directly superior warlord traits and relics.

Lastly, no the conscripts did not receive significant nerfs they are overall better post codex than pre codex.

Actually I find the Cadia trait pretty mediocre in objetive games. They need to stand still to allow for those bonuses to apply. If they need to move 1-2 turns, in a game that last 3-4 turns normally, thats half of the game that they aren't using those bonuses, ignoring artillery.

If that's the worst of the traits (and I can't remember all of them) I think they still win that overall. I mean, it is way more versatile than idk night lords and more useful than word bearers for example. I don't even remember most of the alternative forge world dogmas they had so many duds.

Oh yeah I'm not gonna discuss that. Personally, I think the fact that Regiment doctrines apply to superheavys isn't innecesary. I can understand applyng them to vehicles, but superheavys is a bit to much.
Theres a reason why Admech Forgeworld Dogmas doesn't apply to Imperial Knights but it applys to vehicles.

So... I play in the ITC for one of the teams currently in the top 5. We have talked long and hard about the IG codex and even to some of the guys that received review copies. The IG codex is very strong and has the possibility to shift the meta slightly. The strongest army is Chaos soup currently with Imperial soup second. Where this codex shines is at your local shop with those guys that where running pure IG armies to begin with. This book really helps with running different styles of IG beyond the Artillery/conscript spam we are all used to. Don't scream the the sky is falling just yet because we are getting some rapid fire codex releases right now. We have no clue what will happen then.

 Howscat wrote:
So... I play in the ITC for one of the teams currently in the top 5. We have talked long and hard about the IG codex and even to some of the guys that received review copies. The IG codex is very strong and has the possibility to shift the meta slightly. The strongest army is Chaos soup currently with Imperial soup second. Where this codex shines is at your local shop with those guys that where running pure IG armies to begin with. This book really helps with running different styles of IG beyond the Artillery/conscript spam we are all used to. Don't scream the the sky is falling just yet because we are getting some rapid fire codex releases right now. We have no clue what will happen then.

Wise words.

IG will get hit hard with nerfs when sales go flat.

 Purifier wrote:

 SideshowLucifer wrote:
I like the new book. It provides a lot of variety to the army. Yes, some things are a little over the top but not so much that I worry that I can't compete with it.
I still think conscripts should lose the ability to score objectives, but otherwise, I don't really see many problems with the codex. Like most fights when you have an index army against a codex army, your going to suffer until yours comes out.

Don't get me wrong, I like the book. It's just way overtuned and some things, like conscripts, still need a proper fix, not just a variable nerf that you might fail an order (or not) and a unit size one. Those are way too small to nerf something that at the same time is getting buffs.

I wonder what you think is buffing Conscripts so much in terms of the tactics? The three I can see that would really benefit conscripts would be Vostroya and Armageddon (both range buffs basically) and Catachans (making them S4).

Valhalla seems like the one people are talking about the most, but Commissars are so ubiquitous and so easy to hide I wouldn't even consider that one. Mordia comes with such a high drawback (having to have ALlllllllllllllllllllll your conscripts in a base-to-base daisy chain instead of covering the massive footprint you can with 30 models) I would also never really see use for it. Same with Cadia, not moving is real crappy and the whole "reroll all misses" sounds great until you realize it never makes sense for lasgunners, FRFSRF is still better. All the orders, obviously the nerf applies there, and I didn't see anything I'd rather use than FRFSRF/Move Move Move/Get Back in the Fight if you fall back.

If you offered me, a guy who's used Conscripts in tournaments before and knows how good they are, the option between running Index conscripts without doctrines, stratagems, or special Orders, or the opposite, I'd take door number one every time. I was actually all set to move over to Infantry squads as my go-to until I saw that the Combined Squads stratagem is NOT pre-game like I anticipated, which is probably a good thing because allowing me to pay a chunk of CPs to have my infantry squads form Voltron before the game started would've been pretty danged OP.

Conscripts were head and shoulders above the rest because of their versatility and their reliability in winning games. They could use Move Move Move to flood an absolute gak-ton of obsec bodies onto objectives at the end of the game. They could FRFSRF to out-shoot most non-chaff units. They had huge 50-man footprints you could snake across the whole board if you wanted to. They could fall back and be guaranteed to shoot. They could go Khorne Bezerker mode to get 12" of pile-ins in a single turn. Now, they might be able to do all that, and they might not. That is going to be a significant nerf to their ability to secure wins. Is it enough to knock them out of being able to be in tournament lists? I doubt it, you'd have to get a price bump to 4ppm or a removal of the morale ability to have people totally switch over to Infantry Squads

drbored wrote:
The Astra Militarum EXCEL at sitting in one spot and shooting you to death. They are the army that does that the best, but the game is not meant to be played like that! This is why Tau gunlines, Ultramarine gunlines, AdMech gunlines, and other GUNLINES THAT DON'T MOVE are so hard to beat! Games and Tournaments aren't using enough Line of Sight Blocking terrain to force those gunlines to MOVE OUT OF POSITION.

This is why I am leaning towards a Tallarn force. I hate playing gunline as it takes a lot of the dynamic nature out of the game, and gives your opponent all the fun of positioning. Sure, the Cadians are powerful but if I played them there would always be the temptation to sit that russ in place for the +1 to hit. If I take Tallarn I can move as much as I want.

 Galas wrote:
Oh yeah I'm not gonna discuss that. Personally, I think the fact that Regiment doctrines apply to superheavys isn't innecesary. I can understand applyng them to vehicles, but superheavys is a bit to much.

I heard that you don't get doctrines in an auxiliary detachment. That would force someone to take extra HQs if they want Catachan/Cadian or whatever for your SH. I really wish I could remember where I read that though, but I can't, so don't take my word for it. It doesn't really affect Tallarn that much, as "shoot after advancing as if you have assault weapons" isn't great. you would still take the -1 to hit after all. I guess it would be good with 8 flamers and Crush Them!, although I can probably live without it. Then again, the Supreme Command detatchment is only 3hq and you get an extra CP with it. It would depend on the list I think.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

the_scotsman wrote:
...Mordia comes with such a high drawback (having to have ALlllllllllllllllllllll your conscripts in a base-to-base daisy chain instead of covering the massive footprint you can with 30 models...

I know I shouldn't point this out, as it is totally not RAI and makes me feel dirty, but that is not what the rule says. "If the base of every model in an Infantry unit with this doctrine is touching the base of at least one other model from the same unit". So if you put every model in a pair with another one, that satisfies the rule. I wouldn't do it but that is how it is written. Pairs of Mordians with 2" between them.

 Kanluwen wrote:

broxus wrote:
With the release of the new AM codex there has been some playtesting with the new rules. I am an avid AM player and have done exceedingly well with the AM index book never even using conscripts. AM was already the dominating army our local meta for both games and tournaments. In every tournament or event in 8th an AM list has won it.

WIth the previews, reviews, and leaks that have come out my gaming group is very concerned after play games to test out some lists. The new AM codex with unit buffs, points reductions, strategems and new relics just outclasses everything. Even armies with their recent codexes have not survived past turn 3 or 4. Index armies have zero chance of winning. The amount of firepower the Cadians can do by rerolling all hits and the damage the Catachans are capable of doing by rerolling the number of shots is insane. Honestly, it was so bad one player said he would never play AM in its current form again. It was obvious that neither player had fun because the AM player felt bad and his opponent had zero fun.

So now we are now forced to make some hard decisions for our upcoming events. Do we completely ban all new Codex AM from our events and only use the index, or ban several units, or make other changes. We don’t want to ruin both gamers experiences and want everyone to feel they have a chance to win. Our games have shown some AM units/buffs are just to good for what they cost.

This is just our initial list:

1) The Cadian trait to reroll all failed to hits makes units insanely to good especially when paired with the ability to spread the order for free on a 4+. In addition, the stratagems and relics that also allow for rerolling failed wounds or add +1 to hit rolls.

The Cadian trait is to reroll 1s to Hit when the unit stands still. If the unit receives the "Take Aim!" Order(An Infantry unit only Order that grants Rerolls on to Hit rolls of 1), they instead get to reroll all failed to Hits. Additionally the Cadian Warlord Trait that allows you to spread the same Order for free requires you to be in Order distance, yadda yadda yadda.

If you're going to complain or playtest things, make sure you're playtesting them right.

Umm yea we know and did it correctly.

 Howscat wrote:
So... I play in the ITC for one of the teams currently in the top 5. We have talked long and hard about the IG codex and even to some of the guys that received review copies. The IG codex is very strong and has the possibility to shift the meta slightly. The strongest army is Chaos soup currently with Imperial soup second. Where this codex shines is at your local shop with those guys that where running pure IG armies to begin with. This book really helps with running different styles of IG beyond the Artillery/conscript spam we are all used to. Don't scream the the sky is falling just yet because we are getting some rapid fire codex releases right now. We have no clue what will happen then.

That's a large part of the problem.

Those "soup"-lists don't really exist outside the tournament-biotope. 99.999% of 40K players will never meet one. Most people don't build armies that way and its unlikely some guy's random collection meets the requirement.

More mainstream guard armies are very common though, and they have already dominated normal 40K games with the index. Against some fun mono-Khorne Daemons or your average no-Commander Tau collection or some such, it's almost pointless playing.

That's why this one will be felt much more painfully across the entire community, precisely because it is not an exotic freak-list limited to a specific, very small pool of players in a very specific setting with its own unique rules and etiquette about playing.

 Howscat wrote:
So... I play in the ITC for one of the teams currently in the top 5. We have talked long and hard about the IG codex and even to some of the guys that received review copies. The IG codex is very strong and has the possibility to shift the meta slightly. The strongest army is Chaos soup currently with Imperial soup second. Where this codex shines is at your local shop with those guys that where running pure IG armies to begin with. This book really helps with running different styles of IG beyond the Artillery/conscript spam we are all used to. Don't scream the the sky is falling just yet because we are getting some rapid fire codex releases right now. We have no clue what will happen then.

Yeah, this is kinda the issue. I know you think this sounds fine, but you are kinda confirming a lot of my fears.

From a soup list perspective it isn't a huge deal. From most of our perspectives, soup is now the only solid option because the relatively decent balance we had for each individual army just went away. That doesn't seem like a big deal for you, but our balance pretty much just got shot. It's back to 7e for a lot of us, where many of our armies depended on allies to face on other more broken armies, until our original army basically became vestigial.

If a single army is fine because it's weaker than soup... but you will probably need to run soup to compete with it? That's only balanced at a tournament level. For a lot of us the appeal of 8e was being able to run our stand alone army and not feel crippled. Guard already had some issues, somewhat mitigated by a number of guard players refusing to not run leman russes, but this is a big step backward.

LOS blockers work wonders against things like conscripts though. Have you ever seen a conscript blob try to advance up a 6" street? I'm really thinking about cityfight amounts of terrain here, where having small elite units can really help. Hell, you could even have certain roads where something like a baneblade wouldn't even fit. Of course, you shouldn't go overboard.

I've never seen conscripts try to advance period. They're typically camped on objectives or bubble-wrapping things. The mobility of conscripts isn't really something that concerns anyone. It's the survivability. Adding a ton more LoS blockers means that you will still have to emerge within range of the consrcripts in order to kill them. At which point, you're also taking return fire. On top of that, like I said, in most cases, you aren't likely to be able to hit the Guard player while you're skulking about behind those blockers. Meanwhile, he's raining all sorts of indirect fire down on you. So again, not sure that it really helps like it used to. Better than nothing I guess?

Regardless the opinion one could have about the codex - I say wait and see* but the signs are not good - this comment is spot-on, IMHO.
Terrain and how much is "interesting" is probably the greatest victim of 8th.

I dare to ask - people perceive and imbalance and I can see why. But how BIG is such imbalance? Are IG the 8th edition Eldar or there is nothing so far that operates at that obnoxious level?


* but then again, I underestimated the conscripts back then, very, very, VERY dumb Kaiyanwang

IMO they are NOT as bad as 7th ed Eldar. Whether you think their units are under-costed, or everyone else's units are over-costed, the Astra-Militarum has a ton of extremely efficient units. The real issue is that conscripts needed a nerf and a lot of the tanks needed some buffs. Instead what it looks like is that everything got a buff. The supposed "fix" for conscripts may actually have made them even better than they currently are. I'm with you in terms of being in the "wait and see" camp, but it does feel a little like classic GW where you have a few solid releases in a row and then BAM! Some crazy nonsense just appears out of nowhere and none of the other books can stand up to it. Fingers crossed that doesn't happen but man, it doesn't look good.

 CREEEEEEEEED wrote:
If there isn't any meaningful difference between the sides because the game is perfectly balanced, all you'd be playing is chess without squares. I'm not arguing for op and up stuff, but I think that's a little far.

You know you can have asymmetrical balance right? Like that is an actual design concept that can work, aka Starcraft.Being balanced doesn't mean everything is the same. It makes it easier to balance, that's a given, but it isn't the only way.

Now I agree 100% balance for 40k would be almost impossible, especially while allies exist. There are simply so many options there's no feasible way one person could have enough knowledge of every single army to balance them. But at the same time some of the changes in the IG codex coming up are pretty blatantly bad ideas, at least in regard to the other armies around right now. For example, with the buffs Leman Russes got, I'm pretty sure they didn't need a points discount, same for Baneblades. I'd also argue that giving our infantry chapter tactics that add very noticeable advantages should've come with point increases as well. These guardsmen at 4pts right now are far and away better than they ever were in previous editions for 5pts. I wouldn't be surprised to see our matched points sheets in the back to be completely redone with chapter approved. Price increases across the board is about the easiest way they'll have to tone the army down. As it sits statswise even infantry squads are easily worth 6pts per model with doctrines, orders, general buffs this edition gives them, strategems, and in general just good old fashioned numbers.

I'm going to play a few test games when the book comes out against the most "powerful" armies in my meta (we're the very definition of casual, most insist on playing powerlevel if that gives you an idea) I'll ask them to bring their most tryhard stuff they have and we'll see what happens. If the IG codex is as good as some people say, I'm just going to straight up take a point handicap, or perhaps make my own match play points sheet with more balanced points built in. As it stands against new players I had already stopped running my index guard because most just didn't have the tools to beat even an average infantry squad list. Most lists and units just completely lack basic tools to deal with infantry this edition, to the point that if I play even remotely intelligently I can pick off the obvious anti horde elements in the first turn and then be invincible for the rest of the game. I didn't know what else to do besides spam veterans, which kind of lacks any point when they lost all the options that made them interesting in the first place.

I don't know if the codex is the end of the world just yet or if we're at 7th edition Taudar level, but I can already tell we're pretty darn powerful. I know the main issue is guard being used as allies for other armies but I honestly think a mono IG build would wreck people on the tournament level as well. I've yet to see a strategem that seemed useless for example, every single one I could immediately come up with a use for (albeit some are desperation tactics, they're absolutely useful), which I've not seen in any other codex so far. Our relics are great, we have one of the best warlord traits in the game, we have armywide buffs that put everyone else to shame, a variety of special tricks through the orders system, and that's just what I've gathered secondhand through reviews. I'm sure I'll find more once I read the book.

It's a shame too, in a vacuum this codex is what every IG player has always wanted. The INTERNAL balance, aka how the units stack up to one another in the same book, is pretty good. It's legitimately difficult trying to find a far and away best regiment trait, as each one has some very good benefits and rewards a certain style of army. Tank regiments are not only possible but pretty flavorful units in and of themselves, and the detachment system makes it possible to create mixed regiments or fluffy combined arms units the way the books always talk about. It's a shame it had to come in a way that infuriates the rest of the community to the point that in competitive areas most IG players will be viewed with a scorn that I haven't seen since Leafblower was at its height. My meta is pretty chill and I don't think I'll run into that problem, but I don't know how people would react if I started winning a whole bunch even with self imposed handicaps in place.

 Xenomancers wrote:

There is no reason to "give it time" The index AM was already blatantly overpowered accorss to board and winning practically every event. Apart from conscripts - everything is getting better. It's not hard to just write this edition off at this point.

It blatantly wasn't - lots of units were poor and only a very small subset of the codex was seeing use in event winning lists. That has largely been fixed with many of the weaker units getting buffed which is great. However, the problem units have not been properly addressed at all and are still the best units in the codex so that small subset that has been winning events is going to continue to do so.

 Scott-S6 wrote:

 Xenomancers wrote:

There is no reason to "give it time" The index AM was already blatantly overpowered accorss to board and winning practically every event. Apart from conscripts - everything is getting better. It's not hard to just write this edition off at this point.

It blatantly wasn't - lots of units were poor and only a very small subset of the codex was seeing use in event winning lists. That has largely been fixed with many of the weaker units getting buffed which is great. However, the problem units have not been properly addressed at all and are still the best units in the codex so that small subset that has been winning events is going to continue to do so.

I think this is closer to the overall truth of the matter. They have more undercosted units than any other codex, and now they have more viable units on top of it.

broxus wrote:
Honestly, the solution we may have to do is just ban the Catachan/Cadian lists, ban Baneblades, and limit basilisks/hellhounds.

No problem. While we're at it, we first need to perma-ban any army with T4 Sv3+ (or better) along with Necrons, and we're golden.

 malamis wrote:
As a long term guard player with what is essentially going to be the Catachan face stomp army since somewhere near the middle of 5th:

1. I'm going to have to pack SM and AdMech faaaar more often simply because it's going to be more fun for folks and make for longer games.
2. The baneblade variants are going to see *more* play but only as individual, unaugmented models ; they're big and scary but this way they're at least interesting to play against.
3. i'll probably stick to the index anyway given the animosity.

This is Our Time as IG; we should demonstrate we are in fact the better grade of player compared to our forebears in GK and Eldar eras by being upright and gracious about it.

Not least because it's going to go to someone else eventually.

I resent this. I played eldar, and never in my 20 years of 40k have I taken a list that could be seen as spammy, TFG or WAAC.

And the current IG codex seems to be far more relatively powerful than any codex I've known of in past editions, simply because Guard don't seem to have much in the way of bad choices. You could make a variety of armies, and still be powerful. Back when GK or Eldar or Tau were considered "OP", it was because of a single spammy list of one or two units, with the rest of their codex being either average or even sub-par.

And those people saying "waah waah wait until the codex is released and see"... the codex has been released, the rules are out, it's done. No changes will be made now. Guard is overpowered. It's the FAQ or Chapter Approved that will bring any corrections, but I suspect that 8th will simply be the time of Imperial Soup.

Tycho wrote:
but it does feel a little like classic GW where you have a few solid releases in a row and then BAM! Some crazy nonsense just appears out of nowhere and none of the other books can stand up to it. Fingers crossed that doesn't happen but man, it doesn't look good.

Well it feels a bit like the infamous happening in 6th.... DA (ok, bland perhaps) > CSM (helldrake + meh) > Tau (game over balance).


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 MrMoustaffa wrote:

It's a shame too, in a vacuum this codex is what every IG player has always wanted. The INTERNAL balance, aka how the units stack up to one another in the same book, is pretty good. It's legitimately difficult trying to find a far and away best regiment trait, as each one has some very good benefits and rewards a certain style of army.

This is true. Is awesome that there are like..? 2-4 regiments good for selection for just a tank company.

Niiru wrote:

And those people saying "waah waah wait until the codex is released and see"... the codex has been released, the rules are out, it's done. No changes will be made now. Guard is overpowered.

You got some points costs with that? Any games under your belt? Have you tried different types of missions and terrain set ups? Adjusted your army to fight it yet? Seen the meta adjustments from the codexes scheduled to be released in the next few months at all?

No? Oh ok. Knee-jerk gonna knee-jerk.