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.

So after the big FAQ came out a few weeks ago now, what are peoples feelings on the changes to battalions and brigades command point values now we've all had time to play with them?

Personally, I'm not a fan. The GW reasoning of helping out elite armies who struggle for CPs isn't solved by the changes they made. From the games that I've played since, it's only widened the CP gap between hordes and elites and really made most other detachments pretty unappealing. I get that Command Points aren't the be-all and end-all, but there were better fixes available. I'd have thought altering the +3 for being battleforged was a good place to start, changing that to +5 or even +6 and leaving battalions and brigades where they were. I'd also like to see patrol detachments give +1 CP. Elite armies who's troops are expensive and very strong anyway, wouldn't have to run 3 units with 2 HQ's for a battalion. They could run a patrol and a vanguard for example, without feeling like they are shooting themselves in the foot. As it stands, the changes have forced elite armies into a battalion when things like Astra Militarum can reasonably easily put out brigades or multiple battalions and take advantage of those changes multiple times.

Thoughts, opinions?

And for what it's worth, I don't actually play an elite army so I'm not just being salty

Yellabelly wrote:
So after the big FAQ came out a few weeks ago now, what are peoples feelings on the changes to battalions and brigades command point values now we've all had time to play with them?

Personally, I'm not a fan. The GW reasoning of helping out elite armies who struggle for CPs isn't solved by the changes they made. From the games that I've played since, it's only widened the CP gap between hordes and elites and really made most other detachments pretty unappealing. I get that Command Points aren't the be-all and end-all, but there were better fixes available. I'd have thought altering the +3 for being battleforged was a good place to start, changing that to +5 or even +6 and leaving battalions and brigades where they were. I'd also like to see patrol detachments give +1 CP. Elite armies who's troops are expensive and very strong anyway, wouldn't have to run 3 units with 2 HQ's for a battalion. They could run a patrol and a vanguard for example, without feeling like they are shooting themselves in the foot. As it stands, the changes have forced elite armies into a battalion when things like Astra Militarum can reasonably easily put out brigades or multiple battalions and take advantage of those changes multiple times.

Thoughts, opinions?

And for what it's worth, I don't actually play an elite army so I'm not just being salty

Yes it widened the gap. But it also increased the average CP count for elite armies. Generally speaking, 20 CP is just as useful as 12 CP in a 2000 point game. You only have so many ways to spend CP, so unless you REALLY have bad dice, or want to autopass morale a lot, that 20 CP isnt that vital.

The issue that elite armies were barely getting 5 or 7 CP was FAR harsher than hordes getting more. Because usually you only need about 11-13 CP to function, and anything above that is just extra padding.

The changes have been OK in the sense they have provided more incentive to go for a Battalion or Brigade if you didn't already, and allowed access to more Stratagems for more armies. Having said that, I think the whole CP concept is just wrong at the moment.

Smaller, more elite armies and those that aren't allied should have more CPs than other armies, IMO. This would represent an elite army, or one comprised entirely of a mono-faction force being better able to take advantage of a unified command structure and also help balance out the current horde/elite problem. I'd have preferred GW to have a system that starts with a certain number of CPs and this gets reduced for various reasons, rather than the current system where more (in terms of detachments) is strictly better.

Yellabelly wrote:
So after the big FAQ came out a few weeks ago now, what are peoples feelings on the changes to battalions and brigades command point values now we've all had time to play with them?

Personally, I'm not a fan. The GW reasoning of helping out elite armies who struggle for CPs isn't solved by the changes they made. From the games that I've played since, it's only widened the CP gap between hordes and elites and really made most other detachments pretty unappealing. I get that Command Points aren't the be-all and end-all, but there were better fixes available. I'd have thought altering the +3 for being battleforged was a good place to start, changing that to +5 or even +6 and leaving battalions and brigades where they were. I'd also like to see patrol detachments give +1 CP. Elite armies who's troops are expensive and very strong anyway, wouldn't have to run 3 units with 2 HQ's for a battalion. They could run a patrol and a vanguard for example, without feeling like they are shooting themselves in the foot. As it stands, the changes have forced elite armies into a battalion when things like Astra Militarum can reasonably easily put out brigades or multiple battalions and take advantage of those changes multiple times.

Thoughts, opinions?

And for what it's worth, I don't actually play an elite army so I'm not just being salty

The thing isn't about giving them equal amount. IG is still going to get more. That's given. But do they actually BENEFIT from all that surplus? IG takes 3 battalions. 18 CP. Yey. Then even that regenerate so average is more akin to 26 or so. Amazing! Your elite bat+spearhead for 9 looks in jealous yes?

But then issue for IG comes they can't actually USE that much meaningfully. Especially as 8th ed games are basically decided by 3rd turn often enough.

IG finds himself with more CP than he can actually use. Meanwhile elite army is in no such issue. So end result is amount of meaningful CP armies can use gap decreases.

Of course big problem is still CP farm allies. IG having tons of CP isn't issue with IG army. But when you can cheaply generate tons of CP to support elite army it is bigger issue. IG strategem's aren't that super awesome nor power hungry so using 15 CP is much harder than for say blood angels. Before change I already found myself with pile of unused CP at the end of games. What you think happens now? Even more. I might even use other warlord traits now as the CP regeneration isn't as powerful as it used to be.

Though I would prefer system like where you start with X CP and reduce them with different detachments though that would now mess with some armies having hard time getting CP but boast awesome strategems and others having reverse of that.

As I say... after the update my armies went up 2 or 3 CP i think but my friends went up by 18. XD

I dunno, I run a Battalion in all of my armies. I am definitely liking the added CP. I am actually considering changing my Crimson Fists army to be 2x Battalions rather than 1 Battalion/Vanguard/Spearhead.

 lolman1c wrote:
As I say... after the update my armies went up 2 or 3 CP i think but my friends went up by 18. XD

And how many of those 18 they use? My ig doesn't actually use meaningfully any spare they got

I think its pretty obvious at this point we will be getting themed detachments ala 7th, but these give extra CP for a themed army, so for example a Deathwing one that can only use the Deathwing keyword, has 6 elite slots, a special rule and more CP...


Mark my Words... its coming

So far I have found myself taking boring units for the CP. It does mean more troops though so my armies are more "realistic".

Mark.

To me the weird thing about this "fix" is that it doesn't really help mono elite armies in terms of spacemarines*, greyknights and custodes. Their troops are still too expensive and lacking in damage output to be able to compete against IG and dukari infantry.
If anything it punishes them more for just saying forget troops tax and actually building an army of viable units.

I don't think its true intention is to rebalance between hordes and elite armies. Honestly I believe it was brought in as GW didn't realise how many people would build armies with 0-3 troop choices total at 2k points, and they changed the rules to get players to include more troops.

Rebalancing hordes vrs elite troops needs changes at the model level not formation/detachment levels, be that points, stats or rules changes.

Also it has actually increased the amount of competative soup lists springing for that IG CP farm battalion, it's not actually helped the mono elite armies half as much as soup has benefited.

* I admit 1-2 units of scouts is good for board control, but post beta deepstrike they lost some of their must take status and having more than 3 units gives little additional benifit and they start to get less from the ability that makes taking 2/3 units so worth while in points.

I agree with OP.

This is the way I'd like to see it designed:

Battle-forged: +5 CP
Patrol: +1 CP
Battalion: +3 CP
Brigade: +6 CP

I’m very happy with the changes. They’ve been a very welcome boost to my World Eaters.

I think they're a huge improvement overall. The stratagem system really works better with armies running around 10 or so to begin with.

If everyone got 12 command points regardless of how you build your list, and just tone down the freedom in regards to unit choice in each detachment and also alleviate the HQ burden, that might make things interesting.

For instance, battalion might be good as: 2-3 HQ, 3-4 Troop. That's it. Then you'd have a spearhead, which would be 2-3 heavy. Period. Done. I would also want to see an allied detachment, which would be 1HQ, 1Troop, 1Heavy/Elite/Fast.

Ultimately how open list building is makes this game really difficult to balance. And command points are clearly rewarding armies that can bring cheap bodies. It's just another way to get "free stuff."

I think it's a major improvement, but it does narrow the gap and erase some of the reason to have a brigade.

Yeah, yeah, now IG can have even more CP, but... what are we going to do with all of them? In my league game this week, I started with 13 CP, and ended with 9. I spent 6 total on re-rolls and overlapping fields of fire, and got 2 back. I could easily have been way more liberal with my spending, and still ended with a surplus.

By comparison, with my SW, I consistently use all of my CP, I now have a meaningful number of CP left after hiding away my outflanking units, Once we get the rest of the SM strategem list [and hopefully a few good unique ones like the BA], the ability to use them more freely should definitely show.

It's a matter of having things to use them on. Each army has a different optimum demand, but in general, it's around 10, and once you're there you'll have pretty much all the CP you need.

I'm not sure it's widened the gap between elite and non-elite armies; it feels like it's opened up CP levels that were only really achievable with lots of Guard before to the rest of us. Going from 9CP to 13CP with double-Battalion lists makes the game feel like I've got some flexibility to experiment with Stratagems now rather than having most of them locked up in a couple of mandatory core Stratagems and the rest saved for clutch rerolls.

Raising the CP is a fix to a problem that they created, and didn't need to be created in the first place.

IG shouldn't have so many CP that they can't use them. It's silly. And other armies shouldn't be so CP starved that they can't compete.

There is no reason to incentivize bringing troops. They are some of the most powerful units in 40k, and people would still bring them even if they didn't award bonus CP, because of how strong they are in terms of utility (screening, board control, defense, etc.)

I'm a fan of flat CP for everyone, without the ability to regenerate them. Age of Sigmar seems to recognize this problem in some capacity and have a very specific fixed way to get CP and it's equal across all armies.

Wish they would have added some for the 3x Lords of war formation.

I'm a big fan of the change. It really helped out my Necrons and TS armies which are starved for CP. It gave a few more to my Nids which was nice, but they didn't need it near as much as my more elite armies.

I will echo what everyone saying, and that IG getting more CP is not that big of a deal. It helps the elite armies a lot more.

I wouldn't be surprised if they only allow brigades and battalions to apply CP once, or lock CP generated to that faction.

 BaconCatBug wrote:
I wouldn't be surprised if they only allow brigades and battalions to apply CP once, or lock CP generated to that faction.

People keep wanting this, but some of the strongest factions in the game are completely capable of generating their own CP. The farms are really only used to prop up factions that lack the ability to generate CP effectively on their own. The drive to stamp out allies will only result in the game coming down to Eldar vs Guard.

I play ig so i regularly have 21 cp. Plus both reclying relics on 5+. I very rarely have any left over at the end. Once i start using strats on basilisk to reroll misses, double move sentries, defensive gunners and crush em etc they get used quick. Not to mention a rerol in pretty much every shooting phase and sometimes a moral test on d3 instead. Yea, i think the new cp rules are sweet, they allow me to play my army how i like and add another level of thought to the game.

My friend plays tau and he too is thankful for the handful extra to help his riptide survive.

Designers spent time making up all these strats, it would be a shame not to be able to use them.

 Kharneth wrote:
I agree with OP.

This is the way I'd like to see it designed:

Battle-forged: +5 CP
Patrol: +1 CP
Battalion: +3 CP
Brigade: +6 CP

This looks good to me, I'd want to go further though:
Change all forms of "5+ to gain cp back" to a flat +2cp - regen abilities make relic/trait decisions boring since they are normally an auto include
Change Vanguard's, spearheads and outrider to +0cp - being able to take 3 extra special units is already a benefit, having cp as well is silly
Add +3cp for only using units from a single codex
Add +2cp for only using a single flavour/dynasty/chapter/etc

Gets rid of most soup armies as well as toning down extemes. I would also say having a reduced cp amount for the second instance of a detachment would be good.

As previously said, it highlights that an army which isn't a mash up of different forces should be able to work together more easily.

Doesn't do anything to fix horde vs elites, but they need separate fixes. The decrease in CP for using multiple codices allows you to be more flexible with an individual codex because you have less of a worry about op synergies.

It just made Guard more attractive as an ally. 180 points gets you 5 Command Points. It's completely unfair to armies that don't have that access and frankly I shouldn't need a second codex out of principle for my army to function.

It's been ok I guess. It didn't solve what I see as the real problem right now, which is CP farm detachments.
I had an idea for a solution, which I have no doubt will be hugely unpopular in my area. The detachment where your warlord is determines your primary faction. Only detachments with the exact same keyword generate extra command points. Another idea was that CP are detatchment/faction specific. No using AM CP on your space marines, or vice versa.

tneva82 wrote:

 lolman1c wrote:
As I say... after the update my armies went up 2 or 3 CP i think but my friends went up by 18. XD

And how many of those 18 they use? My ig doesn't actually use meaningfully any spare they got

Well outside of great starts they outright get a free reroll every single phase. XD

They had enough for those and some overlappings. Yey. When ig easily had surplus at the end extra cp at the end is hardly a big deal

Personally, I think statagems should be limited to the detachment of your warlord, or CP's for being Battleforged should be awarded to mono-faction armies only. Or, you only generate detachment CP's from detachments that exactly share the faction keywords of your warlord, etc. Something to limit CP farming.

I personally feel it isnt enough, and the full system needs to be changed a bit.

Only your main army (the one with your Warlord) can only take a Patrol, Battalion or Brigade (these will be worth 3/6/15 CP's instead of 0/5/12), your main can still take any detachments of anytype, ally detachments may only be vang/outride/spear/etc.. vanguard/spearhead, etc.. needs to be worth 2 instead of 1 as well.

This will change a few things IMO for the better, you now have nominated a main army, only your main can take a Patrol, Battalion or Brigade, but you still dont have too. Your secondary army can only be specialist, aka outrider, spearhead, vanguard, etc.. this will make your main force the key part of CP's and stopping playings from taking an ally as a CP farm.


outrider, spearhead, vanguard, etc.. can still take more HQ's, more troops, etc.. so you are not fully limiting yourself from an ally standpoint, we could even say a Patrol can be also allowed to use by allies, this will generate 3CP and still able to take those IG units some of you love without much penalty.


The problem with 8th atm is the player base and even GW are split, some like the ability to take any unit from any army and play, where some dont like that and wants a more focus force, i personal like that i can have allies but i also want a main force, i want a main army to be mostly that army, its just better IMO. Resticting Battalion, Brigade and maybe patrol to only your main force will do that, but i also know some armies have a hard time getting CP, giving Patrol 3cp and battalions/brigades more CP should help with that, some armies like Harlequins might be able to be more competitive with a Battalion and Patrol that gives 9CP compare to 5 currently, and wont need to ally in DE Battalions for CP farm. Same for DW and GK's now vanguard/Spear/etc.. are 2CP and patrols are 3CP they should be able to take a better force with 2-3 CP before the free 3CP and still a battalion for a total of 11-12CP with 0 allies.

AM has access to way too much and can virtually have an unlimited amount. I would love to the see the guard cp farm is banned or at least nerfed.