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I guess I'm not the only one who finds a terrible lack of internal balance in Kill Team. I mean, don't misunderstand me, I like the game a lot and I don't perceive a bad external balance, most army lists seem to have similar power level.

What bothers me is, the units in a certain faction have very different power levels, what makes some options never be on the table. It actually becomes a spam of 1-2 ranged weapons (see misile launcher, plasma guns, rail rifles...). Having to choose between a regular soldier with poorer weapon vs a bit more expensive gunner with a so sweet weapon doesn't seem balanced. Some options get shiet done, others do nothing.


For example:
- why would you make a ranged weapons list for Astra Militarum if the only usable ones are plasma gun and flamer? Why would anyone ever use a regular soldier with lasgun??
- why would an astartes ever play a single basic sm/csm with bolter? Having missile launchers every other option seems bad.
- why would I play a single fire warrior if I can have instead 3 pathfinder gunners with rail rifle?

To be honest? The upgrades are so cheap and useful that it is hard to justify anything without.

Exception being, 2-3 of your cheapest grunts for objective camping / “Comms” specialist.

Orks also benefit, in my opinion, by having a few screening models to soak Overwatch.

I would consider a handful of Gaunts plus 4 big Nids to be a solid list as well, Gaunts run and hide on objectives while the Big boys get the work done.

“Basic” troops aren’t there to battle, they’re there to take hits, get in the way, carry buff effects like the Comms specialist, and hide out of LOS to hold objectives.

* Edit * I’m enjoying Meltaguns, as well. Yes, you basically need to be on top of them, but that d6 Damage is fantastic.

I think is less a external/internal balance issue and more of a over powered/under powered weapon thing. The reason being those weapons you mention (and a few others) take en masse is they are just far better than drawback to field them in Kill Team. The only thing limiting there use is the number of units total that can carry them.

I don't agree with the factions being on a similar power level. There is a clear advantage to the factions that not only have over powered weapons but can also take them multiple times. Admech with a combination of 6 plasma cavilers/arc rifles, Space Marines with Missile Launchers, Deathwatch with Frag Cannons, Tau with Rail Rifles, and on and on. These aren't really weapons with specialized use or just too expensive to field only one, they are just better the rest of that faction's weapon options.

I will agree that Kill Team would probably be better balanced if the game limited the kill team itself on the number of gunner/special weapon units instead of the Data Sheets. I play a lot of factions that have very few data sheets to spread the special weapons around, and I feel the effect of not having them versus opponents that don't have the same restriction. The problem with limiting special weapon within a deployed Kill Team two fold: 1) Kill Team does not like to deviate far from 40k rules. I mean it still does sometimes based on what you get when you buy that unit's models or are Chaos Space Marines. But you can tell the designers definitely tried not to do that often. 2) Kill Team has already been out half a year and many players have already modeled their kill team a certain way. This hasn't stopped GW before, but it should be a concern. Besides which it still doesn't address some weapons are just the best choice anyways. However, I think many weapons are fine-ish if a team could only field one of them.

As for better balance for the weapons themselves, this also has the issue of Kill Team not wanting to deviate from 40k rules. Some of these best weapons in Kill Team aren't great in 40k proper already. It is only due to the restricted unit choices, close engagement range and special Kill Team only rules these weapons are good. Even ignoring the Kill Team should stay close to the same as 40k, there isn't a lot of design space even in Kill Team to completely balance things out. I certainly think things could use a balance overhaul as I get the impression somethings are not working as intended or with six months of exponentially more games of Kill Team played compared to before launch some aspects of game are better known to be too good/too bad to not take/take.

One such aspect is 'hordes' in Kill Team. I think the designers felt that horde lists in Kill Team could easily dominate since their are a few factions that can easily field 20 (or more if there wasn't the restriction). At the same time, there are a few factions that can't field more than 5-6 models. And without a substantial number of games under one's belt in Kill Team fighting a 4 to 1 battle seems like a losing proposition for the out numbered. I think Kill Team over corrected this issue as most factions capable of creating a horde are the lower tier ones. Again, the game simply has weapons that are more than capable of blowing large chunks out of a horde team. While the horde team is a bit of one-trick pony since their roster is their list or just about.

to answer your question, you may encounter missions where elite weapons aren't as important as extra bodies. As fun as it is to blow your opponent's models off the table, you will lose if you are not playing the actual objectives... unless of course the objective is to blow your opponent's models off the table. Case in point, the Ambush mission. Normally my main Death Guard list is 2 fighters, 2 gunners, & a leader + 2 or 3 pox walkers. As the objective is to march units off the table, it makes sense to downgrade some weapons for the purpose of spending more points on pox walkers. That is not to say you don't want the ability to remove threats entirely, but most importantly you need more bodies advancing than your opponent can remove per turn. I will absolutely agree that Kill Team has balance issues & it seems like GW would prefer that you buy a commander to make up for your faction's shortcomings, or purchase the Arena set (doorhammer 40k) rather than address their overall lack of playtesting.

nerf frag cannon wrote:
to answer your question, you may encounter missions where elite weapons aren't as important as extra bodies. As fun as it is to blow your opponent's models off the table, you will lose if you are not playing the actual objectives... unless of course the objective is to blow your opponent's models off the table. Case in point, the Ambush mission. Normally my main Death Guard list is 2 fighters, 2 gunners, & a leader + 2 or 3 pox walkers. As the objective is to march units off the table, it makes sense to downgrade some weapons for the purpose of spending more points on pox walkers. That is not to say you don't want the ability to remove threats entirely, but most importantly you need more bodies advancing than your opponent can remove per turn. I will absolutely agree that Kill Team has balance issues & it seems like GW would prefer that you buy a commander to make up for your faction's shortcomings, or purchase the Arena set (doorhammer 40k) rather than address their overall lack of playtesting.

I haven't really seen an issue with Ambush of elite vs. horde forces at least if the horde player is the one to get off the table. I haven't seen/played horde trying to prevent elite from leaving though. What I have seen is the elite team can usually kill/shake enough of the horde team to win. If the horde player tries to make a run for it, the elite player can try to catch bunch in choke points in close combat tar pitting them. Remember, this mission has the attacker tactic: You're Going Nowhere which prevents those units from falling back, and it isn't impossible to catch a good 4 horde units in melee combat. As long as the elite team can keep their pretty standard remove/wound 4-5 models a round they should be fine getting a few points early on, preventing a large chunk escapees from going anywhere and mopping up the near-perma shaken ones. They just need to remember that multi-wound weapons can hit additional targets within 2". I am also pretty sure this allows the weapon to go beyond its range and even hit completely out of sight units as long as the initial target is within range and not completely hidden.

I will say that the Assassinate mission favors a defending horde team. I did an Aspiring Champion (the target) and an all cultist list as a CSM warlord and his hanger-ons type team. My friend's scout team just couldn't reach the CSM in time. The CSM stayed hidden or used the Staying Low mission tactic most of the game. The scouts did clear out some dozen cultist trying though. There just wasn't enough rounds for him to cut a path through the horde.

- why would you make a ranged weapons list for Astra Militarum if the only usable ones are plasma gun and flamer? Why would anyone ever use a regular soldier with lasgun??

because 3 guardsmen can take that objective off a plague marine fighter by virtue of having more models within 3" than the death guard. Or provide the plasma gunner with cover. Or block off a charging stealer by charging first with something expendable.

- why would an astartes ever play a single basic sm/csm with bolter? Having missile launchers every other option seems bad.

1) Chaos Marines can take chainswords, which is a much better option, and can't take missile launchers.
2) The bolter marine is only 2/3 the cost, and at close range can put out nearly the same pain with grenades - wounding on a 4 rather than a 3 is a downside but otherwise a frag grenade is identical to the missile variant.

why would I play a single fire warrior if I can have instead 3 pathfinder gunners with rail rifle?

Pathfinder gunners with rail rifles get you only 2/3 the models, with detectably worse armour. With a team with poor Ld, the extra models make it easier to increase the number of injuries or kills you need before you take break tests!

Khellendr0s wrote:

For example:
- why would you make a ranged weapons list for Astra Militarum if the only usable ones are plasma gun and flamer? Why would anyone ever use a regular soldier with lasgun??
- why would an astartes ever play a single basic sm/csm with bolter? Having missile launchers every other option seems bad.
- why would I play a single fire warrior if I can have instead 3 pathfinder gunners with rail rifle?

In my genestealer cultist list, I would only ever take 1 flamer. Why? Because I only got 1 flamer! I would only ever take 1 heavy stubber. Why? Cause I only got 1 heavy stubber. And you can continue that for all the other weapons. Except autoguns and shotguns. I got 2-3 each of those.

Special weapons prices seem very broken in kill team.

nerf frag cannon wrote:
& it seems like GW would prefer that you buy a commander to make up for your faction's shortcomings,

How do commanders make up for anything when you can only use commander in 30 of 93 missions and some of most elite armies are more elite when forced to take a commander?

In fairness to the design team, I don't think the appeal of special weapons is by accident. I'm pretty confident that they wanted the game to feel more like a band of hand-picked commandos than a bog standard squad of nine faceless grunts and a special weapon, so lowered the costs of the fancy gear significantly (toys before boys). They weren't allowed to deviate much from the exact kits sold, though, which is why a SM scout can't grasp the concept of using a knife and wearing a cloak at the same time, but the much stealthier option of a missile launcher goes hand in hand with the camo cloak (no bolters/knives/shotguns in the sniper scout box, which has the only cloaks, but there is a ml). Without the option to give us the ability to really get in there and customize our guys, having a spread of special weapons/kit available was the best they could do.

I doubt you'd see a lot of the fancier gear if they cost what they do in 40k (even accounting for the lack of ablative wounds), as a kombi-skorcha, just to pick an example, that eats up almost a fifth of your points by itself is pretty much never going to be worth it. Once the cool weapons are down to just a few points, though, you start splashing them around a lot more freely and suddenly have a choice as to what you'll arm your guys with instead of everyone having a lasgun+frags, pulse rifle+photon grenades, shuriken catapult+plasma grenades, galvanic rifle+nothing, bolter+double grenades (fancy!), etc..

There's also a degree of reduced values in their vulberability. Missile launcher in a 40k scout squad - I'm going to have to kill most or all of the squad to get him.
Missile launcher in a kill team is potentially eating three venom cannon slugs, personally, as the first shot of the game.

 Scott-S6 wrote:

nerf frag cannon wrote:
& it seems like GW would prefer that you buy a commander to make up for your faction's shortcomings,

How do commanders make up for anything when you can only use commander in 30 of 93 missions and some of most elite armies are more elite when forced to take a commander?

nerf frag cannon wrote:

 Scott-S6 wrote:

nerf frag cannon wrote:
& it seems like GW would prefer that you buy a commander to make up for your faction's shortcomings,

How do commanders make up for anything when you can only use commander in 30 of 93 missions and some of most elite armies are more elite when forced to take a commander?

Spoiler:

you're gonna have to buy them & find out

The point still stands - how do commanders "make up for your faction's shortcomings" when they are permitted in less than 1/3 of missions and, noteably, are not permitted in arena.

locarno24 wrote:
There's also a degree of reduced values in their vulberability. Missile launcher in a 40k scout squad - I'm going to have to kill most or all of the squad to get him.
Missile launcher in a kill team is potentially eating three venom cannon slugs, personally, as the first shot of the game.

Great point!

Perfect internal balance in any game using missions and fixed point cost is impossible, because the "worth" of a model type changes with mission and opponent - don't get me started on synergy and value changing with army composition, or player ability. All that some players can do is running towards the enemy and try to get in cc. Somebody who is able to make use of mixed weapons will value troop type differently from the "charging bull".

So how to judge internal balance ?

My take would be:
Select as many different missions and as many opponents as possible and create the perfect list (your fraction only, but not restricted to the models you own or like) for any combination of mission and opponent. If you come up with the same list for all combinations, then there is no internal balance or the mission design is bad (as in 40k, where you always win, when you table your opponent or Commanders where you always win, if you break your opponent without being broken.).

Of course you could start with groups of missions and opponent. Like objective oriented missions, model hunting, or movement missions or any other mission types that you feel play differently from others. And as opponents hordes, elites, Death Guard, Harlequins etc.

I'm most comfortable playing T'au
I have a main list which is good against Elites and not too bad in all other situations. If I have to restrict myself to one list, that's the one.
And a list against Hordes.
And a list against Harlies.
And a list if my opponent insists on playing annoying lists.

As you can see the choice is opponent driven. For that reason there might be some changes depending on mission or terrain, so in fact there are more than 4 lists, but only 4 basic lists.
4 different basic lists is IMHO ok, regarding internal balance.


I'm still trying out the guard, but are already using three different lists and there will be more.

I played Deathwatch only twice, but already there are lists against hordes and elites and for different missions.

Of course there are choices I may never use, because I dislike the model or I find something else is doing a better job, but it doesn't mean that somebody else uses them.


Another method would be to judge how different the lists are, that people play. Of course there will be some lists being played more often than others. Tournament lists, especially with Arena, will get more similar, because the number of variables is reduced and people talk about successful lists and copy them.


If the "team composition" I would like to play is not well suited for a given situation than that is not a problem of internal balance, but of me choosing the wrong tool.

I think most of this is solved in Arena?

The "good" ranged weapons that dominate normal KT do so because of board control. They can reach out and wombo combo you via comms, drones, etc from across the map. While terrain set up and objective placement can mitigate this, Arena just nukes it from space. If (IF, and that's a big if) the map has two "lanes" without doors blocking stuff, that's a really good map for a shooty list.

But wait, won't a good assault army murder stomp? No! Because a single model can block someone trying to charge through a door. Stuff fluff in front of buff duffs.

And it's only 4 rounds! So if the shooty army stood far enough back to avoid getting grabbed in melee, they probably aren't on the objectives (and frankly, if you have the option to charge a generic guardsman into a plasma skitarii, do it. Odds are that plasma is stuck for two turns, which is half the game). Grab, score, survive to round 4.

Arena makes KT (in my opinion) way more a game about hunting objectives than it is blowing up the other guys golden gun before your's dies.

Deathguard can take guy with mace and axe which costs 5pts. This option is worse than great cleaver or flail which costs both 4pts.

So why mace and axe are more expensive? Because in "big" 40k they are. In big 40k they have "vector of something" rule which gives them one more attack if plague marine have two CC weapons. Issue is that in Kill team they do not get this rule...
Nobody looked into that, kill team is simply broken cause nobody cared

I think you're wrong.
The
Axe is 2 points
Mace is 3 points
Flail is 4 points
Cleaver is 4 points

Which is ok. IMHO you might argue about the flail being overpriced.

The thing about Axe and Mace being more expensive than the Cleaver is that you pay for each part separately not for the combo. That's not a "don't care", that's a "modus operandi" somebody decided on.