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.

 JohnHwangDD wrote:
40k skill is in list building, not on the tabletop, and a big component of list building is buying the new, expensive shiny.

To that end, SM exist as an army that is cheap to acquire and easy to play, forgiving of minor mistakes. That's why they're in the starter box. But they should never be competitive against an army that a player has to spend more money on. Hell, they shouldn't even be fun or good. Their entire point of existing is as a gateway to selling the players a better, more expensive army.

If anyone hasn't figured that out, they are kinda slow.

I think you forgot to point out that marines are also very easy to paint to ok/good tabletop quality, which is even more reason for them to suck because some tournaments award painting points. Therefore marines' current point cost is about right, or alternatively should be slightly increased like you suggested earlier.

But I tend to agree with your cynical attitude.

Nothing wrong with Eldar being categorically better than SM in every edition. That's their role in the meta.

Of course, IG (and Orks) are better than Eldar, but fortunately, tournament constraints on time and board space make both of those unplayable competitively. SM have no right to complain when Eldar push their gak in when there's no IG or Orks around.


Also,. Not cynical - just calling out the GW business model, which is more subtle than most players recognize.

At top tournaments levels there's actually very little skills in 40k games.

Playing with semi-competitive or casual lists require skills, spamming supercheesy units and copy-pasting overpowered lists from the internet does not. It may require money, not skills.

 Blackie wrote:
At top tournaments levels there's actually very little skills in 40k games.

Playing with semi-competitive or casual lists require skills, spamming supercheesy units and copy-pasting overpowered lists from the internet does not. It may require money, not skills.

This isn't true. The skills are essentially the same. The difference is in the results.

Just a thought here:power armor may serve purposes not covered in the actual tabletop game. It allows marines to fight in all sorts of environments that normal forces canct fight in. It protects them from mass gassing weapons and diseases.

Those factor would matter a lot in the 40k reality while not showing up on the tabletop.

 JohnHwangDD wrote:
Nothing wrong with Eldar being categorically better than SM in every edition. That's their role in the meta.

Of course, IG (and Orks) are better than Eldar, but fortunately, tournament constraints on time and board space make both of those unplayable competitively. SM have no right to complain when Eldar push their gak in when there's no IG or Orks around.


Also,. Not cynical - just calling out the GW business model, which is more subtle than most players recognize.

Plenty of Ork and IG players would disagree with that assessment.
Eldar have always been jumping around the number one army sport for 7 editions or more, though it's hard not to when you get to break the rules because space elf.

If their is 1 edition where some other army than eldar were top and eldar actually had a hard counter in the meta it would be amazing what it would do to the game, eldar are a dead race they just need to except it and die already.

With all this talk of sisters 4++ bubbles it does raise the question as to who is shooting at battle sister infantry blobs with anti-tank weapons. So far in actual testing it's proven pretty pointless in that role - good for tanks digging in on turn 1 with the 5++ exorcists but the sisters don't have any high toughness deathstars to protect (at best they have the seraphim but no jump canoness), nor doesn't it help the penitents.

Ice_can wrote:
If their is 1 edition where some other army than eldar were top and eldar actually had a hard counter in the meta it would be amazing what it would do to the game

5th edition. Had many issues but eldar weren't one of them.

 JohnHwangDD wrote:
OMG. Just recost SMs at 15 pts per model as in 3E, and be done.

Yeah, agreed. 15 points would be a fair price to an Intercessor.

Ice_can wrote:

 JohnHwangDD wrote:
Nothing wrong with Eldar being categorically better than SM in every edition. That's their role in the meta.

Of course, IG (and Orks) are better than Eldar, but fortunately, tournament constraints on time and board space make both of those unplayable competitively. SM have no right to complain when Eldar push their gak in when there's no IG or Orks around.


Also,. Not cynical - just calling out the GW business model, which is more subtle than most players recognize.

Plenty of Ork and IG players would disagree with that assessment.
Eldar have always been jumping around the number one army sport for 7 editions or more, though it's hard not to when you get to break the rules because space elf.

If their is 1 edition where some other army than eldar were top and eldar actually had a hard counter in the meta it would be amazing what it would do to the game, eldar are a dead race they just need to except it and die already.

By 7 editions or more you mean part of 4th, part of 5th, (almost none of either), 6th, 7th, and 8th?

That's four editions, if you're generous, closer to 3.5 editions.

The problem of Space Marines is that weapons are designed to alieviate all sorts of physical disadvantages. What makes a good army in 40K is the capacity to saturate your list with good weapons. Space Marines have better stats then any other infantry in the game, they thus cost more than any other infantry in the game, but they share the same high quality weapons with the Guard and all their enemies have equivalent weapons. The other big problem is that Space Marines have nearly the same proportion of special and heavy weapon saturation then their opponents. This leads their enemies to be able to bring more special and heavy weapon because they can afford more troops and thus more special and heavy weapons. The rest is just a question of force concentration. Eldars being extremely fast and specialised have the easiest time to apply force concentration and place their special and heavy weapons where they need them. That's why they have been, no matter the eddition, pretty much the best faction in 40K. They have a massive structural advantage over the enemy faction.

Eldar also are suppose to be fragil, but thanks to stuff like alaitoc and wave serpents, they are tougher then most marine stuff.

Marines or anything else that doesn't cost 5-6pts needs rules to be good. If dark reapers were dudes with missile lanuchers and s spears were +1str power weapon dudes with guardian stats, they would suck too.

 Mmmpi wrote:
By 7 editions or more you mean part of 4th, part of 5th, (almost none of either), 6th, 7th, and 8th?

That's four editions, if you're generous, closer to 3.5 editions.

Eldar have been top tier or thereabouts in 2nd, 3rd, 4th, 6th, 7th and 8th.

5th is about the only edition where they have genuinely been a "hard to play/fragile so if stuff goes badly, you are so dead" army - and then only against some of the comically overpowered stuff of that edition. (Quite why some people think it was a time of great balance is a mystery to me.)

Tyel wrote:
(Quite why some people think it was a time of great balance is a mystery to me.)

It was the chosen edition, that could have brought balance to the game but instead left it in darkness.

kombatwombat wrote:

That’s a good write up of the situation, but I think it misses something critical: player satisfaction.

The last option, special rules, makes the game big and unwieldy. A good example is Custodes in 30k - they have the rules they need to make them play how they should, but there just so many rules going on that both players lose track of what’s happening. I think we can eliminate this as an option.

The first option, points rescaling, is as you say the path of least resistance. But it also offers the least player satisfaction - Marines end up as a semi-horde army that doesn’t play how people want them to play.

The second option, Primarisising, gives the most player satisfaction by making the army play how people want them to play, without bogging down the army in a mire of special rules.

Realistically, it should be options 2+3. Pretending that the overcomplicated nonsense that is 30k would be necessary here is silly.

Faith in Ceramite:
Models with this rule get to roll if a point of damage is suffered by any weapon with an AP of -1 or less. On a roll of a 4+, that damage is ignored.

That's an easy, simple rule that can be applied to any model with Power Armor.

Tactical Dreadnought Armor:
When models with this rule suffer damage from any weapon with an AP of -3 or higher, reduce the number of Wounds suffered by 1. Additionally, when making "Faith in Ceramite" rolls they ignore the damage on a 3+ instead.

Automatically Appended Next Post:

Karol wrote:
Eldar also are suppose to be fragil, but thanks to stuff like alaitoc and wave serpents, they are tougher then most marine stuff.

This is a thing that we see a lot in Infinity. Developers don't seem to understand that modifiers that reduce your ability to be hit will almost always prevail over being able to "tank" things.

kombatwombat wrote:
Going back to the quote that started this particular line of debate:

Slayer-Fan123 wrote:

ERJAK wrote:
You could try running 120+ model blobs but you'll lose to any army that can quickly lock you into combat, can snipe your 5 wound Canoness, can out maneuver your incredibly slow infantry blob, or can simply outshoot your frankly pathetic offensive output.

Also "sniping" characters is laughable. You can't even snipe Guard Commanders and they're WAY less durable!

With a 170pt Deathmarks unit with zero stratagems, Dynastic Codes or support characters in Rapid Fire range you will kill a Cannoness. Which means ERJAK was right, a Cannoness can be sniped, and sniping characters is not laughable. It’s a steepish points investment (though a 3:1 investment to kill a target in one turn isn’t the worst), but snipers’ value isn’t in the character they kill, but the debuff of the units around the target caused my eliminating a lynchpin character.

The Canonness is maybe 45-50 points. That's not a great investment.

Sorry, Snipers aren't dangerous. Quit pretending they are.

 JohnHwangDD wrote:
Nothing wrong with Eldar being categorically better than SM in every edition. That's their role in the meta.

Of course, IG (and Orks) are better than Eldar, but fortunately, tournament constraints on time and board space make both of those unplayable competitively. SM have no right to complain when Eldar push their gak in when there's no IG or Orks around.


Also,. Not cynical - just calling out the GW business model, which is more subtle than most players recognize.

IG are better than Eldar? Really? When was the last time IG(not knights/BA with the loyal32) was placing above eldar competitively?. I think it was when the IG book first came out.

Orks remain to be seen, they're definitely got a solid book now and they might be better than Eldar overall.

Tyel wrote:

 Mmmpi wrote:
By 7 editions or more you mean part of 4th, part of 5th, (almost none of either), 6th, 7th, and 8th?

That's four editions, if you're generous, closer to 3.5 editions.

Eldar have been top tier or thereabouts in 2nd, 3rd, 4th, 6th, 7th and 8th.

5th is about the only edition where they have genuinely been a "hard to play/fragile so if stuff goes badly, you are so dead" army - and then only against some of the comically overpowered stuff of that edition. (Quite why some people think it was a time of great balance is a mystery to me.)

I've played eldar since 3rd. No it hasn't been top tier.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

Slayer-Fan123 wrote:

kombatwombat wrote:
Going back to the quote that started this particular line of debate:

Slayer-Fan123 wrote:

ERJAK wrote:
You could try running 120+ model blobs but you'll lose to any army that can quickly lock you into combat, can snipe your 5 wound Canoness, can out maneuver your incredibly slow infantry blob, or can simply outshoot your frankly pathetic offensive output.

Also "sniping" characters is laughable. You can't even snipe Guard Commanders and they're WAY less durable!

With a 170pt Deathmarks unit with zero stratagems, Dynastic Codes or support characters in Rapid Fire range you will kill a Cannoness. Which means ERJAK was right, a Cannoness can be sniped, and sniping characters is not laughable. It’s a steepish points investment (though a 3:1 investment to kill a target in one turn isn’t the worst), but snipers’ value isn’t in the character they kill, but the debuff of the units around the target caused my eliminating a lynchpin character.

The Canonness is maybe 45-50 points. That's not a great investment.

Sorry, Snipers aren't dangerous. Quit pretending they are.

Someone seems to not understand how static buffs work.

"'ve played eldar since 3rd. No it hasn't been top tier. "

I've played against them since 2nd. Yes, they have.

 Mmmpi wrote:

Tyel wrote:

 Mmmpi wrote:
By 7 editions or more you mean part of 4th, part of 5th, (almost none of either), 6th, 7th, and 8th?

That's four editions, if you're generous, closer to 3.5 editions.

Eldar have been top tier or thereabouts in 2nd, 3rd, 4th, 6th, 7th and 8th.

5th is about the only edition where they have genuinely been a "hard to play/fragile so if stuff goes badly, you are so dead" army - and then only against some of the comically overpowered stuff of that edition. (Quite why some people think it was a time of great balance is a mystery to me.)

I've played eldar since 3rd. No it hasn't been top tier.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

Slayer-Fan123 wrote:

kombatwombat wrote:
Going back to the quote that started this particular line of debate:

Slayer-Fan123 wrote:

ERJAK wrote:
You could try running 120+ model blobs but you'll lose to any army that can quickly lock you into combat, can snipe your 5 wound Canoness, can out maneuver your incredibly slow infantry blob, or can simply outshoot your frankly pathetic offensive output.

Also "sniping" characters is laughable. You can't even snipe Guard Commanders and they're WAY less durable!

With a 170pt Deathmarks unit with zero stratagems, Dynastic Codes or support characters in Rapid Fire range you will kill a Cannoness. Which means ERJAK was right, a Cannoness can be sniped, and sniping characters is not laughable. It’s a steepish points investment (though a 3:1 investment to kill a target in one turn isn’t the worst), but snipers’ value isn’t in the character they kill, but the debuff of the units around the target caused my eliminating a lynchpin character.

The Canonness is maybe 45-50 points. That's not a great investment.

Sorry, Snipers aren't dangerous. Quit pretending they are.

Someone seems to not understand how static buffs work.

Oh look, an Eldar player in denial. Now the posts make sense.

Also you need to include costs with those buffs. That's how the game works.

I've played eldar since 3rd. No it hasn't been top tier.

What....

Have you ever played eldar? Eldar have always been good thats their shtick.

I've played since 3rd too and my eldar have always consistently been powerful. The only time they weren't was during that small time in 3rd when it became hero hammer. but even then they were still great.

You guys really seem to hate Dakka's civility rules. You don't have to try and get threads locked. You can just not post.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Asherian Command wrote:

I've played eldar since 3rd. No it hasn't been top tier.

What....

Have you ever played eldar? Eldar have always been good thats their shtick.

I've played since 3rd too and my eldar have always consistently been powerful. The only time they weren't was during that small time in 3rd when it became hero hammer. but even then they were still great.

Yup, except for most of 7th due to working on other armies.

There's a vast difference between 'good' and top tier.
Sorry dude, that's how it goes.

cmspano wrote:

 JohnHwangDD wrote:
Nothing wrong with Eldar being categorically better than SM in every edition. That's their role in the meta.

Of course, IG (and Orks) are better than Eldar, but fortunately, tournament constraints on time and board space make both of those unplayable competitively. SM have no right to complain when Eldar push their gak in when there's no IG or Orks around.

Also,. Not cynical - just calling out the GW business model, which is more subtle than most players recognize.

IG are better than Eldar? Really?

When was the last time IG(not knights/BA with the loyal32) was placing above eldar competitively?. I think it was when the IG book first came out.

Orks remain to be seen, they're definitely got a solid book now and they might be better than Eldar overall.

Yes, really. Eldar require the same effort to kill an IG dude as a SM dude, being the flipside of killing SM as easily as IG. Same with Orks. Except there are 2x or 3x as many IG / Orks on the tabletop.

As I noted, and you glossed over, IG / Orks are never placing competitively, because the SM players demand high points levels and short rounds, which make it impossible to play a competitive horde army like IG or SM.

40k has a basic Rock > Scissors > Paper balance, where Eldar > SM > IG/Orks, except that the majority SM players effectively banned IG/Orks from the tournament tables via "slow play" penalties. That's not an Eldar problem. That's a tournament problem, one that may be fairly laid at the feet of the SM players themselves for wanting to play with too many models.

Martel732 wrote:
"'ve played eldar since 3rd. No it hasn't been top tier. "

I've played against them since 2nd. Yes, they have.

Once the Starcannon went up in points and dropped in #of shots, their reign from 3rd Ed. ended pretty quick. They were decidedly not top-tier for most of 4th and 5th edition. They had a renaissance again in 6th.

 Insectum7 wrote:

Martel732 wrote:
"'ve played eldar since 3rd. No it hasn't been top tier. "

I've played against them since 2nd. Yes, they have.

Once the Starcannon went up in points and dropped in #of shots, their reign from 3rd Ed. ended pretty quick. They were decidedly not top-tier for most of 4th and 5th edition. They had a renaissance again in 6th.

Nah they were still king in 4th because of the Skimmers being stupidly good.

5th they were simply mid-tier. Very few armies can make the claim they were, at their worst, mid-tier.

CWE were #1 in 6e for *less than half* the edition. For more than half the edition, Eldrad + WW did something, but the rest of the book was garbage.

CWE were Top Tier in 7e. The whole time. Although Demons, Space Marines, and SuperFriends all made it to the same level at different times in that edition. They were undisputed #1 for a time, but most of 7e, the #1 spot was disputed.

CWE is a Top Tier book in 8e. But it's not #1. IG took that honor to start. CWE/Ynnari had a disputed claim on #1 off and on for a few months after both their Codex came out and CA came out, up until DE.

Lets look at some datapoints:
http://bloodofkittens.com/8th-edition-top-army-list-compendium/
-10 random top-placing lists from November: In my sample 1 CWE list.
-10 random top-placing lists from October:1 CWE list, 1 Ynnari CWE list
-10 random top-placing lists from September: 1 CWE list
-10 random top-placing lists from August: 0 CWE lists

Averaging 1/10 is not bad, but nowhere close to dominating the edition.

Slayer-Fan123 wrote:

 Insectum7 wrote:

Martel732 wrote:
"'ve played eldar since 3rd. No it hasn't been top tier. "

I've played against them since 2nd. Yes, they have.

Once the Starcannon went up in points and dropped in #of shots, their reign from 3rd Ed. ended pretty quick. They were decidedly not top-tier for most of 4th and 5th edition. They had a renaissance again in 6th.

Nah they were still king in 4th because of the Skimmers being stupidly good.

5th they were simply mid-tier. Very few armies can make the claim they were, at their worst, mid-tier.

I remember the Skimmers being basically the only thing they could compete with, though. Obnoxious as they were, I don't remember losing to them very much. Their codex was tightly limited in comparison to Chaos 3.5, Space Marines with their custom chapter traits, etc. I remember beating Eldar a lot with Necrons during that time, actually. Back when Necrons were more maneuverable than Eldar, because of teleportation shenanigans.

 Insectum7 wrote:

Slayer-Fan123 wrote:

 Insectum7 wrote:

Martel732 wrote:
"'ve played eldar since 3rd. No it hasn't been top tier. "

I've played against them since 2nd. Yes, they have.

Once the Starcannon went up in points and dropped in #of shots, their reign from 3rd Ed. ended pretty quick. They were decidedly not top-tier for most of 4th and 5th edition. They had a renaissance again in 6th.

Nah they were still king in 4th because of the Skimmers being stupidly good.

5th they were simply mid-tier. Very few armies can make the claim they were, at their worst, mid-tier.

I remember the Skimmers being basically the only thing they could compete with, though. Obnoxious as they were, I don't remember losing to them very much. Their codex was tightly limited in comparison to Chaos 3.5, Space Marines with their custom chapter traits, etc. I remember beating Eldar a lot with Necrons during that time, actually. Back when Necrons were more maneuverable than Eldar, because of teleportation shenanigans.

You can make the argument about needing a particular unit for several different iterations of armies.

I always bring up 6th edition Tyranids for this reason. They were a topping army but with what was possibly one of the worst written codices of all time in the game's history, completely held up by like a couple of units. The army was top tier for bad reasons, if that makes sense.

So just because Eldar relied on the badly written rules for Skimmers means nothing, because they were still strong.

Martel732 wrote:
"'ve played eldar since 3rd. No it hasn't been top tier. "

I've played against them since 2nd. Yes, they have.

I played Eldar exclusively in 3rd. I didnt lose much, and I was 13/14 when I started playing. They were pretty broken back then.

^Strong =/= top tier. I wouldn't call Tyranids top tier in 6th either.

 Insectum7 wrote:
^Strong =/= top tier. I wouldn't call Tyranids top tier in 6th either.

They absolutely were because of Flyrants, and then eventually Mawlocs becoming an anti-meta choice.

Most would agree though that the codex was absolutely god awful for internal balance though.