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 Galas wrote:
I will pray to a god I don't believe in that the 0-3 restriction isn't true. Not because it actually affects me, but because its sucks and it does not fix anything.

8th Edition GW does not appear to understand nuance. It's sledgehammer or nothing.

Maybe for 9th edition they can make the points of units scale with the number of duplicate you take ?

Manticore : 1 for 150pts, 2 for 160pts each, 3 for 170pts each, 4 for 180pts each.

If you only take 1, you get a "discount". 2 gets you the real cost, 3 or more and you're paying a tax.

The Shadespire FAQ dropped earlier this morning, I think?

What are the odds that this means we'll get the 40k FAQ today?

VoidSempai wrote:
The Shadespire FAQ dropped earlier this morning, I think?

What are the odds that this means we'll get the 40k FAQ today?

From what i gather, some event organisers are expecting it this week. Previous unofficial rule of thumb for 40k FAQs was tuesdays... So... hopefully we'll see it drop tomorrow, but, at least we should be hopeful for sometime this week.

I highly doubt any rumors on 4chan are accurate, except maybe by accident.

That said, of the top 16 lists from Adepticon, 9 of them featured unit spamming of more than 3 of the same unit. Some were particularly egregious, like Jason Sparks' Dark Angels list with 8 Dark Talons, and there were 4 Tyranid lists that spammed flying Hive Tyrants (and one that fell under the more-than-3 threshold still had 3 of them).

Another interesting tidbit - the contents of the top 16 armies' starter boxes are not well represented in their respective army lists. Of the Tyranid lists, only 2 contain anything from their starter box, and those were the 2 with Malwocs. None of the contents of the Chaos Marines starter box made it into any of the Chaos lists, the only thing from the Eldar starter box that made it into the Eldar list was Farseers, and even half the contents of the IG starter box was absent from the top Adepticon lists - nary a Leman Russ or Commissar to be had.

It strikes me that having high-profile tournament lists feature repetitions ad nauseum of one particular unit while there being a notable absence the units that GW promotes as the starting building blocks of their respective armies is probably not the best situation for GW. One would think the company would like all of their products to be attractive to their target audience, not just a narrow selection of them.

 Earth127 wrote:
I was repsonding directly to Malfunctbot who said that no one ever plays non-narrative. I consider entirely possible that GW might make it hard to play certain undersupported factions in matched play in the name of balance. That said I'm still not a fan o universal highlander-esque restrictions. these should be limited to massive force multiplier centerpieces or specific trouble cases.

And if you look at tourneys what is winning? Spam and soup, would make sense if you tried to get rid of/ restrict those 2 principles for matched play.

Of course you are free to believe gw tries for balance. You just forget gw is company with priority on profit. Balance goes against that

tneva82 wrote:

 Earth127 wrote:
I was repsonding directly to Malfunctbot who said that no one ever plays non-narrative. I consider entirely possible that GW might make it hard to play certain undersupported factions in matched play in the name of balance. That said I'm still not a fan o universal highlander-esque restrictions. these should be limited to massive force multiplier centerpieces or specific trouble cases.

And if you look at tourneys what is winning? Spam and soup, would make sense if you tried to get rid of/ restrict those 2 principles for matched play.

Of course you are free to believe gw tries for balance. You just forget gw is company with priority on profit. Balance goes against that

ITT:
Games sell better when they are unbalanced, because everyone likes buying bad games.

tneva82 wrote:

 Earth127 wrote:
I was repsonding directly to Malfunctbot who said that no one ever plays non-narrative. I consider entirely possible that GW might make it hard to play certain undersupported factions in matched play in the name of balance. That said I'm still not a fan o universal highlander-esque restrictions. these should be limited to massive force multiplier centerpieces or specific trouble cases.

And if you look at tourneys what is winning? Spam and soup, would make sense if you tried to get rid of/ restrict those 2 principles for matched play.

Of course you are free to believe gw tries for balance. You just forget gw is company with priority on profit. Balance goes against that

That literally makes no sense. Balance is exactly what they should want. If everything in an army is playable then people will want to own units of everything. I doubt there's been a massive rush on people buying lictors or whirlwinds.

(I dunno if whirlwinds are crap, I just never see them get mentioned.)

tneva82 wrote:

 Earth127 wrote:
I was repsonding directly to Malfunctbot who said that no one ever plays non-narrative. I consider entirely possible that GW might make it hard to play certain undersupported factions in matched play in the name of balance. That said I'm still not a fan o universal highlander-esque restrictions. these should be limited to massive force multiplier centerpieces or specific trouble cases.

And if you look at tourneys what is winning? Spam and soup, would make sense if you tried to get rid of/ restrict those 2 principles for matched play.

Of course you are free to believe gw tries for balance. You just forget gw is company with priority on profit. Balance goes against that

That's one of the most idiotic things I think I've heard in quite some time, cheers to you bub

A game system that does not strive to be sufficiently balanced will never make money. Consumers reject spending money on broken unfun things.

 Sim-Life wrote:

tneva82 wrote:

 Earth127 wrote:
I was repsonding directly to Malfunctbot who said that no one ever plays non-narrative. I consider entirely possible that GW might make it hard to play certain undersupported factions in matched play in the name of balance. That said I'm still not a fan o universal highlander-esque restrictions. these should be limited to massive force multiplier centerpieces or specific trouble cases.

And if you look at tourneys what is winning? Spam and soup, would make sense if you tried to get rid of/ restrict those 2 principles for matched play.

Of course you are free to believe gw tries for balance. You just forget gw is company with priority on profit. Balance goes against that

That literally makes no sense. Balance is exactly what they should want. If everything in an army is playable then people will want to own units of everything. I doubt there's been a massive rush on people buying lictors or whirlwinds.

(I dunno if whirlwinds are crap, I just never see them get mentioned.)

It should be what they want but they obviously aren't trying. If they were trying - wed have a balanced game - it is not that hard to do.

 Xenomancers wrote:
It should be what they want but they obviously aren't trying. If they were trying - wed have a balanced game - it is not that hard to do.

I eagerly await your fan rewrite that will supplant Warhammer 40k's BRB as the preferred rules in the setting.

In fact, I'll even pay good money for it.

 Xenomancers wrote:

 Sim-Life wrote:

tneva82 wrote:

 Earth127 wrote:
I was repsonding directly to Malfunctbot who said that no one ever plays non-narrative. I consider entirely possible that GW might make it hard to play certain undersupported factions in matched play in the name of balance. That said I'm still not a fan o universal highlander-esque restrictions. these should be limited to massive force multiplier centerpieces or specific trouble cases.

And if you look at tourneys what is winning? Spam and soup, would make sense if you tried to get rid of/ restrict those 2 principles for matched play.

Of course you are free to believe gw tries for balance. You just forget gw is company with priority on profit. Balance goes against that

That literally makes no sense. Balance is exactly what they should want. If everything in an army is playable then people will want to own units of everything. I doubt there's been a massive rush on people buying lictors or whirlwinds.

(I dunno if whirlwinds are crap, I just never see them get mentioned.)

It should be what they want but they obviously aren't trying. If they were trying - wed have a balanced game - it is not that hard to do.

"its not hard"
And there goes any point you might have wanted to make.

I expect you will be able to produce a balanced version of 40k that is fun to play in about a months time? After all, its not hard.

Really? It's not that hard to do? I'd love to see you try to balance everything in every codex and have it all come out balanced. It should be easier for you since you don't have to consult other people or worry about what is coming out in the next few months.
I expect a complete list of all units and options by the end of April since it's so easy.

Yikes, double ninja'd. And I agree I'd pay good money for a truly balanced game.

The number one complaint I have heard most often leveled at GW both on the internet and IRL is their lack of balance.

How is that driving sales? Perfect imbalance is a nice theory in moba's but even there it has to be kept on a tight leash, hence perfect.

Lemondish wrote:

tneva82 wrote:

 Earth127 wrote:
I was repsonding directly to Malfunctbot who said that no one ever plays non-narrative. I consider entirely possible that GW might make it hard to play certain undersupported factions in matched play in the name of balance. That said I'm still not a fan o universal highlander-esque restrictions. these should be limited to massive force multiplier centerpieces or specific trouble cases.

And if you look at tourneys what is winning? Spam and soup, would make sense if you tried to get rid of/ restrict those 2 principles for matched play.

Of course you are free to believe gw tries for balance. You just forget gw is company with priority on profit. Balance goes against that

That's one of the most idiotic things I think I've heard in quite some time, cheers to you bub

A game system that does not strive to be sufficiently balanced will never make money. Consumers reject spending money on broken unfun things.

Are you living in Bizaro world? Have you seen 40k? 8th might be a more balanced eddition but it is still extremely unbalanced and the previous editions were hilariously broken. It is clear that consumers do in fact spend lots of money on broken and unbalanced things. True - it doesn't make sense - I would love to get into decision makers heads at GW just to figure out why they believe unbalanced is the way to go?

I'm sure it has something to do with "It's a game of toy soldiers" "why do you take it so seriously".

The very fact that they are coming out with a faq shows they are trying for balance...

I am not sure how I feel about the rumors. On one hand, it will solidly fix the soup issue. It does remove things like Brigade from Matched Play (let's not forget, these changes would ONLY apply to Matched Play), but isn't the intent of matched play to be more balanced for tournaments?

Wayniac wrote:
I am not sure how I feel about the rumors. On one hand, it will solidly fix the soup issue. It does remove things like Brigade from Matched Play (let's not forget, these changes would ONLY apply to Matched Play), but isn't the intent of matched play to be more balanced for tournaments?

How would it remove a bridge?

 Ordana wrote:

 Xenomancers wrote:

 Sim-Life wrote:

tneva82 wrote:

 Earth127 wrote:
I was repsonding directly to Malfunctbot who said that no one ever plays non-narrative. I consider entirely possible that GW might make it hard to play certain undersupported factions in matched play in the name of balance. That said I'm still not a fan o universal highlander-esque restrictions. these should be limited to massive force multiplier centerpieces or specific trouble cases.

And if you look at tourneys what is winning? Spam and soup, would make sense if you tried to get rid of/ restrict those 2 principles for matched play.

Of course you are free to believe gw tries for balance. You just forget gw is company with priority on profit. Balance goes against that

That literally makes no sense. Balance is exactly what they should want. If everything in an army is playable then people will want to own units of everything. I doubt there's been a massive rush on people buying lictors or whirlwinds.

(I dunno if whirlwinds are crap, I just never see them get mentioned.)

It should be what they want but they obviously aren't trying. If they were trying - wed have a balanced game - it is not that hard to do.

"its not hard"
And there goes any point you might have wanted to make.

I expect you will be able to produce a balanced version of 40k that is fun to play in about a months time? After all, its not hard.

I actually have to disagree with you here, and agree with the poster you're mocking.

It actually isn't hard to produce a balanced 40k edition if you are consistent with how you price units across the board with codices.

It can even be asymmetrical consistency, so maybe some codices have cheaper ranged power than others, but this must be counterbalanced in a manner that befits overall equality of strength between the two codices.

Leo_the_Rat wrote:
Really? It's not that hard to do? I'd love to see you try to balance everything in every codex and have it all come out balanced. It should be easier for you since you don't have to consult other people or worry about what is coming out in the next few months.
I expect a complete list of all units and options by the end of April since it's so easy.

Yikes, double ninja'd. And I agree I'd pay good money for a truly balanced game.

You are already paying money for an unbalanced game. Why would they do anything different? Why do you think it is so hard? A lot of work - no doubt - but it's not difficult work.

you can only balance 40k to a point. and doing so requires a lot of playtesting and math. neither of which I have any faith GW is capable of.

 Xenomancers wrote:

Lemondish wrote:

tneva82 wrote:

 Earth127 wrote:
I was repsonding directly to Malfunctbot who said that no one ever plays non-narrative. I consider entirely possible that GW might make it hard to play certain undersupported factions in matched play in the name of balance. That said I'm still not a fan o universal highlander-esque restrictions. these should be limited to massive force multiplier centerpieces or specific trouble cases.

And if you look at tourneys what is winning? Spam and soup, would make sense if you tried to get rid of/ restrict those 2 principles for matched play.

Of course you are free to believe gw tries for balance. You just forget gw is company with priority on profit. Balance goes against that

That's one of the most idiotic things I think I've heard in quite some time, cheers to you bub

A game system that does not strive to be sufficiently balanced will never make money. Consumers reject spending money on broken unfun things.

Are you living in Bizaro world? Have you seen 40k? 8th might be a more balanced eddition but it is still extremely unbalanced and the previous editions were hilariously broken. It is clear that consumers do in fact spend lots of money on broken and unbalanced things. True - it doesn't make sense - I would love to get into decision makers heads at GW just to figure out why they believe unbalanced is the way to go?

I'm sure it has something to do with "It's a game of toy soldiers" "why do you take it so seriously".

That'll be why GWs sales reports were on a consistant decline during the Kirby era and suddenly started increasing after he left and the company started actually caring about balance.

jcd386 wrote:

Wayniac wrote:
I am not sure how I feel about the rumors. On one hand, it will solidly fix the soup issue. It does remove things like Brigade from Matched Play (let's not forget, these changes would ONLY apply to Matched Play), but isn't the intent of matched play to be more balanced for tournaments?

How would it remove a bridge?

Maybe I'm thinking of another detachment, I saw an earlier post that said these rumored changes would remove at least one detachment from use because it would require too many options than would be allowed under the FAQ.

jcd386 wrote:
The very fact that they are coming out with a faq shows they are trying for balance...

FAQ are a new thing for GW. I acknowledge they are doing a better job at it in 8th. It's still being handled quite lackadaisical. This edition is already a year old and we are more unbalanced now than when we started. GW's sales are through the roof right now too!

Leo_the_Rat wrote:
Really? It's not that hard to do? I'd love to see you try to balance everything in every codex and have it all come out balanced. It should be easier for you since you don't have to consult other people or worry about what is coming out in the next few months.
I expect a complete list of all units and options by the end of April since it's so easy.

Yikes, double ninja'd. And I agree I'd pay good money for a truly balanced game.

Yes, balancing a game this complex is incredibly hard. Take something that's gone through many iterations of balance (and still is), but is in a pretty decent place - like Starcraft - and consider how simple balancing it is compared to Warhammer. Only 3 factions and 2 resource types, maybe 30 total units in the game. Probably the only thing more complicated in SC is that you have more control over resource management in the form of workers/mining. And still it's not a perfect balance.

Now think about not only units and weapons, but that you have different melee/ranged weapons, detachments, scenario/deployment types, stratagems, psychic powers, and all coming across a couple dozen or so of factions...plus soup, so you have to consider how they'll interplay not only within their codices, but their armies. You also don't have as easy access to data from electronic matchmaking, so you're required to rely on tournament standings.

Now, I don't think it's an impossible task to balance it...or to get close to have like a 90% or so balance, where the most egregious offenders aren't hideous...but it's not nearly as easy as all of the salt here would make one think.

 Galas wrote:
I will pray to a god I don't believe in that the 0-3 restriction isn't true. Not because it actually affects me, but because its sucks and it does not fix anything.

What if it's 0-3 outside of Troops?

The changes don't bother me either, really.

Can still run a Leman Russ Tank Company, can still run Baneblade Company, can still run my Slaanesh daemons, can still run my Adepta Sororitas...
Even so, I hope it doesn't happen, as I can see a lot of themed armies getting killed that don't have the fortune to run tank squadrons for example.

 Xenomancers wrote:

jcd386 wrote:
The very fact that they are coming out with a faq shows they are trying for balance...

FAQ are a new thing for GW. I acknowledge they are doing a better job at it in 8th. It's still being handled quite lackadaisical. This edition is already a year old and we are more unbalanced now than when we started. GW's sales are through the roof right now too!

When we started we didn't have THIRTEEN codexes.

 Daedalus81 wrote:

 Galas wrote:
I will pray to a god I don't believe in that the 0-3 restriction isn't true. Not because it actually affects me, but because its sucks and it does not fix anything.

What if it's 0-3 outside of Troops?

I still think its a patch that doesn't actually fix anything. Spam has always been a thing, even in Fantasy when armies where based in %, people spammed. The way to fix spam is to make interesting missions and victory conditions that favour TAC armies, not putting hard-caps.
And balancing units, not to a point where we have PERFECT balance, but a point where, even if you spam a unit that is mathematically more efficient, it will stil loss because they can't compensate the lack of tactical versatility with raw offensive power.

HuskyWarhammer wrote:

Leo_the_Rat wrote:
Really? It's not that hard to do? I'd love to see you try to balance everything in every codex and have it all come out balanced. It should be easier for you since you don't have to consult other people or worry about what is coming out in the next few months.
I expect a complete list of all units and options by the end of April since it's so easy.

Yikes, double ninja'd. And I agree I'd pay good money for a truly balanced game.

Yes, balancing a game this complex is incredibly hard. Take something that's gone through many iterations of balance (and still is), but is in a pretty decent place - like Starcraft - and consider how simple balancing it is compared to Warhammer. Only 3 factions and 2 resource types, maybe 30 total units in the game. Probably the only thing more complicated in SC is that you have more control over resource management in the form of workers/mining. And still it's not a perfect balance.

Now think about not only units and weapons, but that you have different melee/ranged weapons, detachments, scenario/deployment types, stratagems, psychic powers, and all coming across a couple dozen or so of factions...plus soup, so you have to consider how they'll interplay not only within their codices, but their armies. You also don't have as easy access to data from electronic matchmaking, so you're required to rely on tournament standings.

Now, I don't think it's an impossible task to balance it...or to get close to have like a 90% or so balance, where the most egregious offenders aren't hideous...but it's not nearly as easy as all of the salt here would make one think.

Starcraft isn't a great analogy. The problem with a game like Starcraft is that because it's deterministic and because players become so mechanically skilled, it's possible for tiny advantages to be decisive. The worst sorts of imbalances the game has seen concern very early fighting -- it's a huge deal if 2 of race A's thing can beat 3 of race B's thing, even if only barely, if that means that A players can consistently rush down B players. The balance needs to be almost perfect for it to be a viable esport. They additionally have to deal with players who have very different skill levels -- you want the game to be fun and balanced for people just starting out and for people who have been playing for years, but because the game requires so much mechanical skill it's going to play very differently at low levels vs high levels.

You don't need to get anywhere near this in order for 40k to be indistinguishable from perfect balance. Luck plays a huge role in the outcomes of individual games. One unit being 1% too good is just never going to be apparent to people -- you're never going to be able to point to a 100 point unit and say "this is a problem, but at 101 it'll be fine". This is hard even if it's 10%. 40k also doesn't reward skill to nearly the same extent -- a great 40k player will lose to a merely good one much more often than a great SC player will lose to a merely good one -- and balance at all levels looks pretty similar. There aren't really any units that are particularly "hard to use" such that they're hard to balance for all skill levels.

I think it's pretty striking just how good the community has been at spotting overpowered units almost immediately. We've got our share of morons too, sure -- there are people who seem to think that everything they don't play is ridiculously overpowered and everything they do is at best merely adequate -- but it really does seem like it's easy to avoid issues like Alatoic being obviously the best Craftworld and Dark Reapers being too strong -- just about everyone was saying this before they'd even played a game with the codex. Tyranid players were contemplating lists with lots of Hive Tyrants from the previews alone. People were talking up Guardsmen and Celestine before the indexes officially came out. I'm not saying that designing a game from scratch is easy, but they'd have done a whole lot better if they'd put together a small group of competent players and just given them a couple hours to go over each book and point out the particularly glaring issues.