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That's likely true of your area but certainly not of mine. There's a GW store, 3 other stores that sell GW stuff and they have hundreds and hundreds of customers but a given gaming night at a store will have 10 or so people and the biggest local tournaments have 20ish people. The vast majority of people play in people's houses and seem to do some sort of hybrid thing where they might use points but then play some narrative battle plan or try the open war cards or whatever. Points for structure, but not necessarily all the other matched play rules.

I think GW dug a bit of a hole for themselves with the Faction Terrain. On the one hand, it is awesome looking stuff on the whole and great for people without the time or inclination to make themed terrain for their armies. I would have been very happy if it was released without rules.

But in an effort to sell the terrain kits, GW seem to have been sticking to the strategy of "Got a model? Gotta have rules."
This is pretty logical, plastic kits are not cheap to make and putting rules on the model is a way to add value and therefore make more players purchase the miniatures. It is part of the reason why GWs stuff costs more than generic stuff - the rules help justify part of the value.

However, this means they need to constantly consider terrain in their design in a way they did not previously, and given how unprofessional and incompetent GWs design team are, this extra challenge will likely prove a continual stumbling block.

Keeping these kits "in the game" moving forward will be a challenge, and I expect at some point in the next few years the kits will get dropped, some of them at least, with a lot of people getting very butthurt about it.

Now that GHB 2019 is in the wild, what are people's opinions on it?

I liked most of the ghb. Lot of ideas for my campaigns. Lot of ideas for outside of the box non-tournament play. It was worth the money to me.

 auticus wrote:
I liked most of the ghb. Lot of ideas for my campaigns. Lot of ideas for outside of the box non-tournament play. It was worth the money to me.

I agree, lot of nice stuff in it.

 auticus wrote:
I liked most of the ghb. Lot of ideas for my campaigns. Lot of ideas for outside of the box non-tournament play. It was worth the money to me.

Pretty much this.

I am also liking this new approach of having the new points in a separate booklet. If they could just add the Core Rules and Rulebook missions to GHB2019 it could easily become the only book to take with you beside your battletome.

Haven't gotten a chance to look at the points changes. Anything standing out yet?

Well two of our daughters of khaine players put their stuff on ebay this weekend citing that the points increases makes them "unplayable".

Looking at the point increases to hags and witch elves, I would disagree they are unplayable but they certainly can't take as many as they used to so from a busted standpoint they are probably "unplayable".

Stormcast vanguard are more popular here now. Evocators seem to be being binned as "unplayable" now that they are not steeply discounted. Their points cost fit on the bell curve that I have so I think they are more balanced now.

Flesh Eater courts are still laughing in Flesh Eater Court. At least right now.

There is the faq update coming in July that has more points changes so we don't know the full picture yet.

I like the Meeting Engagements rules. Having to divide your list in three contingents that come at different times depending of the scenario played actually lead to different strategies/tactics we see in "normal" Ranged Battle games.

And I agree, this year's General Handbook has plenty of nice ideas. Points are definitely a minor part in this book.


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 auticus wrote:
Well two of our daughters of khaine players put their stuff on ebay this weekend citing that the points increases makes them "unplayable".

Looking at the point increases to hags and witch elves, I would disagree they are unplayable but they certainly can't take as many as they used to so from a busted standpoint they are probably "unplayable".

Stormcast vanguard are more popular here now. Evocators seem to be being binned as "unplayable" now that they are not steeply discounted. Their points cost fit on the bell curve that I have so I think they are more balanced now.

Flesh Eater courts are still laughing in Flesh Eater Court. At least right now.

There is the faq update coming in July that has more points changes so we don't know the full picture yet.

Do you remember the guy who burned his whole dark elf army on a video when AoS was announced ? It was the new plastic one at that time. That makes me think of him when I read what you described.

Games may change, but players stay the same.

Tournament guys chase the meta. Thats part of being a tournament player, churn and burn baby.

Remember to your competitive player, if it's not broken, it's garbage. Doesn't matter if it's still good if it's not undercosted/overpowered/etc. with something that can be abused, it's "uncompetitive"

Auticus could make a comic detailing the exploits/comments of his local competitive community, literally with exact quotes and no exaggeration, and it would be hilarious.

 NinthMusketeer wrote:
Auticus could make a comic detailing the exploits/comments of his local competitive community, literally with exact quotes and no exaggeration, and it would be hilarious.

I would love to read that. Like his local area seems like a caricature sometimes of the stereotypical competitive community. Then you realize it's not a caricature...

There is a guy I talk to in another fb group that talks about his local group and he says pretty much similar things that I do, so I don't think my area is strange and unusual.

I think its just how competitive communities operate.

There was a twitter discussion about efficiency regarding tournaments that had a lot of guys discussing the same thing - that tournament guys use of the word "unplayable" is a lot different from casual players use of the same word.

Not strange, but you have to admit it has a pretty solid position on the upper side of the bell curve. Like Stormcast; sure it isn't FEC or Skaven, but still. And it's a perfect poster boy.

I think thats just because I talk about it more than others because I try to run narrative events, and I talk about the competitive guys in my area and the shenanigans they pull that capsize my attempts.

To that effort, a lot of folks that try to do narrative events just give up and make them competitive events because its a major hassle otherwise.

 auticus wrote:
Well two of our daughters of khaine players put their stuff on ebay this weekend citing that the points increases makes them "unplayable".

As for the GHB in general, I think it's the best one yet. So much game content! We played a couple games using the open war generator (army, terrain and mission/twist/etc) and had a great time. My friend is doing Tzeentch so we're going to do the Stormcast Chaos campaign in the Alixia section.

I guess the more on topic question though, is that does it do anything for the points in the OP about both balance inside an army where more units are "viable" and balance between armies where more armies are closer to the average.

Hopefully.

I'm actually impressed with how the smaller table size seems to help with the summoning issue in Meeting Engagements. I ended up with my mixed order making it so the only place a unit could be summoned on turn 3 was behind their main line. I need to try it with a lower model count army like with all stormcast.

 auticus wrote:
Well two of our daughters of khaine players put their stuff on ebay this weekend citing that the points increases makes them "unplayable".

Looking at the point increases to hags and witch elves, I would disagree they are unplayable but they certainly can't take as many as they used to so from a busted standpoint they are probably "unplayable".

Stormcast vanguard are more popular here now. Evocators seem to be being binned as "unplayable" now that they are not steeply discounted. Their points cost fit on the bell curve that I have so I think they are more balanced now.

Flesh Eater courts are still laughing in Flesh Eater Court. At least right now.

There is the faq update coming in July that has more points changes so we don't know the full picture yet.

The DoK thing depends entirely on what you were running. Those who were running Witch Aelves en masse got the worst of it(200 point increase on most of those compositions), whereas many Sisters of Slaughter and Snake compositions didn't lose much(Snake part even gained a few points back).

FEC seem to be trailing more and more with each tournament I see. Recently there was AoS Tournament Heat 3 and the highest FEC player only reached 19th place. There were ton of FEC players, but none of them managed to get higher than 19th place.

Top 5 placings were very interesting with:

1. Grand Host of Nagash
2. Bonesplitters
3. Hedonites of Slaanesh
4. Blades of Khorne
5. Skaventide

Of course, the greatest thing from the Heat was that Tomb Kings placed 11th! Settra bringing it back!




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Wayniac wrote:

 NinthMusketeer wrote:
Auticus could make a comic detailing the exploits/comments of his local competitive community, literally with exact quotes and no exaggeration, and it would be hilarious.

I would love to read that. Like his local area seems like a caricature sometimes of the stereotypical competitive community. Then you realize it's not a caricature...

Auticus' exploits with his community remind me of Karol's(in the 40k threads) stories of the playerbase near him(I think Warsaw). Apparently very cutthroat and toxic.


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 auticus wrote:
There is a guy I talk to in another fb group that talks about his local group and he says pretty much similar things that I do, so I don't think my area is strange and unusual.

I think its just how competitive communities operate.

There was a twitter discussion about efficiency regarding tournaments that had a lot of guys discussing the same thing - that tournament guys use of the word "unplayable" is a lot different from casual players use of the same word.

I would almost go as far as that is how localized competitive communities in certain countries operate. We have a much more relaxed meta around me(that can be competitive if it needs be), but then we've had American visitors and they tend to go for the throat, at least in the 40k venue.

 Eldarsif wrote:


FEC seem to be trailing more and more with each tournament I see. Recently there was AoS Tournament Heat 3 and the highest FEC player only reached 19th place. There were ton of FEC players, but none of them managed to get higher than 19th place.

Top 5 placings were very interesting with:

1. Grand Host of Nagash
2. Bonesplitters
3. Hedonites of Slaanesh
4. Blades of Khorne
5. Skaventide

Of course, the greatest thing from the Heat was that Tomb Kings placed 11th! Settra bringing it back!

Anywhere I can read up more on Heat 3? Google isn't throwing up anything useful, but I'd like to see how many people were competing, and the TK list of course!

There is this:

https://www.facebook.com/pg/GWWarhammerWorld/photos/?tab=album&album_id=2582939365058861

Can't seem to find the list, but Will Rose is the name of the player.

 Eldarsif wrote:
There is this:

https://www.facebook.com/pg/GWWarhammerWorld/photos/?tab=album&album_id=2582939365058861

Can't seem to find the list, but Will Rose is the name of the player.

Thanks!

I would almost go as far as that is how localized competitive communities in certain countries operate. We have a much more relaxed meta around me(that can be competitive if it needs be), but then we've had American visitors and they tend to go for the throat, at least in the 40k venue.

That could very well be and be why a lot of people overseas are the ones that typically accuse me of using comic book characters to describe my meta lol (that its an exaggeration because in their environment its abnormal)

I do feel US culture comes into it. Something to understand for players from other countries is that we tend to get very competitive very quickly over everything. A balance concern that crops up with the occasional player/instance overseas is likely to be quite common if not the standard over here. The idea of intentionally restraining oneself in a game is unfortunately quite rare for many communities. I've talked about how I do so and had people not believe me.

It's not "US culture" IMO.

It's the culture that's cropped up, period, surrounding some games and the "optimized gamer".

Precisely. People over here compete over everything. That is just built in to our society.

Restraining yourself in a game and not going as hard as possible is often met with at best a mild look of surprise or an eye roll, and at worse a tirade about how people that expect others to restrain themselves in a competitive game are CAAC scum.

Note the at worse, meaning thats not the normal. But it can happen, and has happened in my community facebook a couple of times in the past couple of years.

 Kanluwen wrote:
It's not "US culture" IMO.

It's the culture that's cropped up, period, surrounding some games and the "optimized gamer".

Cropped up? US competitive-ness was around before wargaming.

 NinthMusketeer wrote:

 Kanluwen wrote:
It's not "US culture" IMO.

It's the culture that's cropped up, period, surrounding some games and the "optimized gamer".

Cropped up? US competitive-ness was around before wargaming.

We're kinda/sorta heading into pseudo-political territory here but there's a huge difference between what existed before and what exists now with the "<insert game name here>-crafters". These are the kinds of people that will spend huuuuuuuge amounts of time strictly trying to figure out what minute variation of perks/items gives them some tiny advantage over anyone else.

 Kanluwen wrote:

 NinthMusketeer wrote:

 Kanluwen wrote:
It's not "US culture" IMO.

It's the culture that's cropped up, period, surrounding some games and the "optimized gamer".

Cropped up? US competitive-ness was around before wargaming.

We're kinda/sorta heading into pseudo-political territory here but there's a huge difference between what existed before and what exists now with the "<insert game name here>-crafters". These are the kinds of people that will spend huuuuuuuge amounts of time strictly trying to figure out what minute variation of perks/items gives them some tiny advantage over anyone else.

Yeah this is a person to person thing, stop talking about it as a whole of countries. Its pointless.

 Amishprn86 wrote:
Yeah this is a person to person thing, stop talking about it as a whole of countries. Its pointless.

That is what culture is. And I find the attitudes towards balance and how they differ between countries very relevant to the topic.


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 Kanluwen wrote:

 NinthMusketeer wrote:

 Kanluwen wrote:
It's not "US culture" IMO.

It's the culture that's cropped up, period, surrounding some games and the "optimized gamer".

Cropped up? US competitive-ness was around before wargaming.

We're kinda/sorta heading into pseudo-political territory here but there's a huge difference between what existed before and what exists now with the "<insert game name here>-crafters". These are the kinds of people that will spend huuuuuuuge amounts of time strictly trying to figure out what minute variation of perks/items gives them some tiny advantage over anyone else.

Ah, I get what you mean. I think the internet is responsible for that one by facilitating the accumulation and exchange of data which makes such analysis possible. IMO part of it as the same mentality given new tools to work with; it was not done before because it was not possible. But I also see what you mean about the mentality changing as well, I think that is a good point.