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Khalan wrote:
Hi All

Jim Here.

For those comparing itc vs adepticon, I won a really hard ITC GT 3 weeks ago (Dicehammer GT) with a super tough field using the exact same list I won adepticon with. So just thought i'd throw fuel onto the debate.

Thanks! Keep on kicking ass.

I am curious if GW is going to use any thing from the adapticon tournament for the spring FAQ. I know Pete foley was hanging out at the tournament and I saw him talking to the TO's.

 clodax66 wrote:
I am curious if GW is going to use any thing from the adapticon tournament for the spring FAQ. I know Pete foley was hanging out at the tournament and I saw him talking to the TO's.

They delayed it specifically to consume the Adepticon results. I don't think Adepticon revealed and "real" issues though.

Khalan wrote:
Hi All

Jim Here.

For those comparing itc vs adepticon, I won a really hard ITC GT 3 weeks ago (Dicehammer GT) with a super tough field using the exact same list I won adepticon with. So just thought i'd throw fuel onto the debate.

Heard your army is sweet. Got any nice pics to share?

Khalan wrote:
Hi All

Jim Here.

For those comparing itc vs adepticon, I won a really hard ITC GT 3 weeks ago (Dicehammer GT) with a super tough field using the exact same list I won adepticon with. So just thought i'd throw fuel onto the debate.

Well call me TS hatter, but i really think TS smite mechanic is broken and should not be allowed.
I play to often vs TS player and receiving 3-6 smite per turn is not really fun and getting through cheap daemon bodies is not easy as people think and you can`t use flyers to snipe characters since daemon princes hit like truck.
Congrats on your performance, but you need to train your Canada anthems singing more

Pain4Pleasure wrote:

 Galas wrote:
So... is this the final final top?

I'll take me seat to wait for the "No Narrative, ITC Only, Final Destination" crown to come and explain why all of this results are garbage and mean nothing.

(And 4 orks in top 10 ... )

Nice joke lol. However since it wasn’t ITC, we have to take it all with lots of pillars of salt. Orks are ok without the competitive aspects of ITC missions, rules, and objectives thrown into the mix.

So orks are OK if you simply play WH40K - but get screwed up when you go adding house rules.

ccs wrote:

Pain4Pleasure wrote:

 Galas wrote:
So... is this the final final top?

I'll take me seat to wait for the "No Narrative, ITC Only, Final Destination" crown to come and explain why all of this results are garbage and mean nothing.

(And 4 orks in top 10 ... )

Nice joke lol. However since it wasn’t ITC, we have to take it all with lots of pillars of salt. Orks are ok without the competitive aspects of ITC missions, rules, and objectives thrown into the mix.

So orks are OK if you simply play WH40K - but get screwed up when you go adding house rules.

Unfortunately I don't see ITC changing that house rule any time soon as it's supposed to counter the problem child that is infantry spam, though in all honesty I think clocks do a far better job of that than secondary missions ever will.

ccs wrote:

Pain4Pleasure wrote:

 Galas wrote:
So... is this the final final top?

I'll take me seat to wait for the "No Narrative, ITC Only, Final Destination" crown to come and explain why all of this results are garbage and mean nothing.

(And 4 orks in top 10 ... )

Nice joke lol. However since it wasn’t ITC, we have to take it all with lots of pillars of salt. Orks are ok without the competitive aspects of ITC missions, rules, and objectives thrown into the mix.

So orks are OK if you simply play WH40K - but get screwed up when you go adding house rules.

Orks are fine if your opponent doesn't get to shoot them for 5+ turns. The game is supposed to last 5 turns though, so this isn't actually a good thing.

It means orks are actually kind of weak and only get good results if the game is played slowly.

 clodax66 wrote:
I am curious if GW is going to use any thing from the adapticon tournament for the spring FAQ. I know Pete foley was hanging out at the tournament and I saw him talking to the TO's.

Probably not, they always seem to be like few mounts behind. In Adepticon no new assassins were allowed and i`m sure assassins will have impact of the metta since most list are depending heavily on characters.

This was all I could find of the pictures I took of Jim's army. This is from Michigan GT the bright stuff is his, the dark stuff is my friends.

 Ordana wrote:

 vaklor4 wrote:
I am really taken back by how good the Orks did! Glad to see so much diversity compared to what hyperbole spewers say online about 'whats meta'.

ITC vs non-ITC.
Very different Meta's.

Wait! So all these people complaining about Games-Workshop rules in tournaments, should actually have been directing their ire at Frontline Gaming this whole time?

Oh no worries there, plenty of people are directing their Ire at FLG already.


They are mad because they don't do well using ITC format and more people are playing with it.

Of course certain rules in the ITC packet are better for some armies than others, and a lot of the meta relies on good list building and picking secondaries over actual decisions on the tabletop, but they forget that since a majority of tournaments are using the ITC format then it obviously means a majority of the players like it.

The guys at FLG have always said that their format is optional on the circuit and that your free to run your own tournaments however you want and they would still allow your scores to effect the overall ITC standings, but many people don't use that option and just stick to their format.

 Eihnlazer wrote:
Oh no worries there, plenty of people are directing their Ire at FLG already.


They are mad because they don't do well using ITC format and more people are playing with it.

Of course certain rules in the ITC packet are better for some armies than others, and a lot of the meta relies on good list building and picking secondaries over actual decisions on the tabletop, but they forget that since a majority of tournaments are using the ITC format then it obviously means a majority of the players like it.

The guys at FLG have always said that their format is optional on the circuit and that your free to run your own tournaments however you want and they would still allow your scores to effect the overall ITC standings, but many people don't use that option and just stick to their format.

I dont like ITC b.c its just mostly Kill points and many of the Kill point secondaries literally makes some units unplayable that shouldnt be b.c of Kill points and kill more, (AKA, Headhunter , Kingslayer, MoD, Big Game, Titian Slayer, Butchers, Reaper, etc..) It doesnt let MSU armies work well as well and if you are trying to play a MSU army, you need to make up Kill more in other ways by denying other points and gaining a different point every turn, so it heavily effects the list in a way i dont like. Look at units like Piranhas, there is no way they are playable in ITC without giving up Kill more and Butchers Bill.

If ITC Had more secondaries, equal to the Kill points at least, or just re-work some of them, b.c as of right now there is only 3, b.c King of the hill is completely stupid IMO, 2 units units not counting character/single man units WHOLLY within 6".

So its 9 to 3. If you focus on just killing and not getting off 2 objectives, then you just need to kill them off their 2 and get kill more and hold more at the same time with other secondaries.

Drager wrote:

Pain4Pleasure wrote:

Drager wrote:

Pain4Pleasure wrote:
Not really. IMO the ITC does a very good job in making sure that competitive aspects are included into their missions so that the more skilled player takes utmost advantage of them. This is why ITC is favored

IMO ITC is a lot less skill testing of in game skill and more dependant on list build and pregame strategy than several other formats. This is why ITC is disfavoured in Europe. This seems to be in part down to low mission variability and secondary selection.

I can see why it might be thought of that way, but let’s take for example a ynnari list. Put a competitive build in the hands of a newer player and you will see the List crumble. The list was built for top performance pre game. The strategies with simple rules knowledge and unit category are somewhat obvious. So why did the list crumple to let’s say, en masse ork boys? Because the player wasn’t skilled. Itc still takes skill to play. Moving around LOS blocking first levels (which is amazing) attempting to score objectives even if your forces are dwindling faster than your opponent. It gives each army a chance. I’m sorry but I have to disagree with your opinion

I didn't mean to imply ITC takes no skill, just less. Ynarri is also a naturally skill testing army as its tricky to make the correct selections. It's easier in ITC than other formats though. A new player with a net list is highly unlikely to beat any competetive player in any format. What I'm interested in is the level of in game skill test between top players. Other formats also give each army a chance. So I don't so much disagree with your comment as your conclusion. And no need to apologise, happy to see dissenting views.

As much as this sub-thread of conversation, is a little off topic, I'm still interested in the debate. I myself play approximately a 50 / 50 mix of ITC and ETC mission styles, and while I dont personally find myself at the top tables very often, I have a pretty reliable top 3rd average in both event formats. I am interested in Dragers points to back up his assertion that the ETC mission type is more skill based.

I find ETCs reliance on maelstrom cards as a significant portion of its scoring to be the very antithesis of skill, and have found myself both winning and loosing etc style event games purely due to the draw of impossibly difficult cards for one player, and rediculously easy cards for the other.

I find both styles have a focus on killing (with the ETC style 6KP differential being significant, and also of course the primary swing, and many of the secondaries in the ITC also making this a priority).

Both styles also have interesting board control mechanics, with the ITC encouraging ongoing board control for its primary, and its board positioning based secondaries being ones that strategic army design can favor, even when faced with point denial style lists.

While the ITC focuses on, on going board control, the ETC has scoring for end of game with its eternal war portion, and I like this feature, as it brings back memories of the objective rusing final turn of 5th, however as more and more eternal war missions move to a progressive scoring system, this will bring the ITC and ETC into closer parity on these.

So overall I see both systems as relatively similar. The biggest differential probably being the ITC ruin standard, however, I find many ETC style events implementing that now also.

So I'm interested, what specific reasons would one person consider either game type, to be more skillful than the other?


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Amishprn86 wrote:

 Eihnlazer wrote:
Oh no worries there, plenty of people are directing their Ire at FLG already.


They are mad because they don't do well using ITC format and more people are playing with it.

Of course certain rules in the ITC packet are better for some armies than others, and a lot of the meta relies on good list building and picking secondaries over actual decisions on the tabletop, but they forget that since a majority of tournaments are using the ITC format then it obviously means a majority of the players like it.

The guys at FLG have always said that their format is optional on the circuit and that your free to run your own tournaments however you want and they would still allow your scores to effect the overall ITC standings, but many people don't use that option and just stick to their format.

I dont like ITC b.c its just mostly Kill points and many of the Kill point secondaries literally makes some units unplayable that shouldnt be b.c of Kill points and kill more, (AKA, Headhunter , Kingslayer, MoD, Big Game, Titian Slayer, Butchers, Reaper, etc..) It doesnt let MSU armies work well as well and if you are trying to play a MSU army, you need to make up Kill more in other ways by denying other points and gaining a different point every turn, so it heavily effects the list in a way i dont like. Look at units like Piranhas, there is no way they are playable in ITC without giving up Kill more and Butchers Bill.

If ITC Had more secondaries, equal to the Kill points at least, or just re-work some of them, b.c as of right now there is only 3, b.c King of the hill is completely stupid IMO, 2 units units not counting character/single man units WHOLLY within 6".

So its 9 to 3. If you focus on just killing and not getting off 2 objectives, then you just need to kill them off their 2 and get kill more and hold more at the same time with other secondaries.

I hear this complaint often regarding ITC dissuading MSU styles. While I agree, that the Kill more primary does indeed dissuade this style. I would argue that this is a good thing. MSU is inherently a superior option to larger units in a purely non objective based analysis. It increases choices, it reduces the effect of morale, and it provides greater access to CP, I believe that missions should have some inherent disadvantage to MSU, to balance out the inherent advantages that the play style offers in the game, when divorced from the mission.

The problem is what exactly is MSU spam?
Is 5 scouts msu or is 10 Guard infantry MSU?
Because 1 suffers alot more than the other under a kill more system.

The Malestrom cards while in many ways are toi random they do give players unplanned events they have to adjust to on the fly in game with what they have. Which would demonstrate an ability to replan and adapt in a way that ITC's 100 percent known objectives doesn't.

Ice_can wrote:
The problem is what exactly is MSU spam?
Is 5 scouts msu or is 10 Guard infantry MSU?
Because 1 suffers alot more than the other under a kill more system.

The Malestrom cards while in many ways are toi random they do give players unplanned events they have to adjust to on the fly in game with what they have. Which would demonstrate an ability to replan and adapt in a way that ITC's 100 percent known objectives doesn't.

As much as I'm not a fan of Maelstrom (they are a bit TOO random), that's what I like. They make you NOT just focus on listbuilding and knowing everything beforehand. You need to bring a tactically flexible force to account for changes in objectives. Now I think they go too far (should be like one set for the whole game or something, like the old 2e mission cards), but that alone makes them interesting.

IMHO the CA2018 missions though are the sweet spot. They have a good bit of twist to encourage flexible lists not netlisting like ITC, but are still relatively straightforward.

Don't the cards often create situations where a ton of armies just can't react, or worse their opponent get a really good set of cards and just win turn 1-2 by gaining a ton of points with mechanics that can't really be countered?

Again am not in favour of any of the system, but the adepticon one seems to be just as unbalanced, but just different. Plus from a casuals point of view, there seem to be an overlap in armies between the two systems. Eldar flyer lists seem to be doing good in both, as do chaos smite soups. So clearly some armies seem to deal with the game better no matter what is being played.

Ice_can wrote:
The problem is what exactly is MSU spam?
Is 5 scouts msu or is 10 Guard infantry MSU?
Because 1 suffers alot more than the other under a kill more system.

The Malestrom cards while in many ways are toi random they do give players unplanned events they have to adjust to on the fly in game with what they have. Which would demonstrate an ability to replan and adapt in a way that ITC's 100 percent known objectives doesn't.

Whether one "suffers a lot more" or not, it really isn't a "problem" to define what it is.

Multiple units of 5 scouts? That's MSU.
Multiple units of 10 Guard Infantry? That isn't.

Scouts can be taken in 5-10 model units.
Guard can't. You get 10 models, period, for Guard Infantry or Veteran Squads. Only Scions and Conscripts have variable unit sizes for GEQ or Scout equivalent units.

Karol wrote:
Don't the cards often create situations where a ton of armies just can't react, or worse their opponent get a really good set of cards and just win turn 1-2 by gaining a ton of points with mechanics that can't really be countered?

Again am not in favour of any of the system, but the adepticon one seems to be just as unbalanced, but just different. Plus from a casuals point of view, there seem to be an overlap in armies between the two systems. Eldar flyer lists seem to be doing good in both, as do chaos smite soups. So clearly some armies seem to deal with the game better no matter what is being played.

Yes, and that's the reason why people dislike them. It's the "Hold an objective in your own deployment zone" that your opponent gets while you get the one that's hold an objective in your opponent's deployment zone that you can't reasonably achieve. There is the issue of drawing ones you can't accomplish, and while the CA18 Maelstrom missions limit this by letting you remove like 6 cards, it really should be if you draw a card that you can't possibly complete because it doesn't exist (e.g. kill a psyker and you're playing against Tau) it immediately gets discarded and redrawn.

Oh damn, the psyker card is brutal. Kind of a sucks if you get that, hold opponent objective and your opponent rolls up with the same kill psyker card and take his home objective, and he is playing vs GK. Maybe the system in itself isn't bad. Dynamic objectives as an idea seem great. I just thing the tournament orgs should just create a deck of objectives of their own.


Again neither system is perfect, but it doesn't mean it can't be made better.

The more randomness in the game, the more times you'll get screwed by randomness. In theory, though, the skew should be normally distributed - so sufficient number of equally-skewing unbiased independent random factors should result in the "better" player winning more often than the "worse" one by a reasonable margin.

Good luck making the system:
-Normally distributed
-Unbiased
-Reasonable number of independent random factors

Any one of those 3 is hard.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
I had a tourny where each Objective was worth d3 VP.

The two in my DZ were 1 and 2 VP. The two on the other side were 3 VP each. Random chance screwed me hard on that.

At the end of the game, my clutch DA unit only survived because it fell back at exactly the right time. And only got to the objective because it regrouped. Random chance screwed my opponent hard there.

Ice_can wrote:
The problem is what exactly is MSU spam?
Is 5 scouts msu or is 10 Guard infantry MSU?
Because 1 suffers alot more than the other under a kill more system.

The Malestrom cards while in many ways are toi random they do give players unplanned events they have to adjust to on the fly in game with what they have. Which would demonstrate an ability to replan and adapt in a way that ITC's 100 percent known objectives doesn't.

Scouts suffer more.

First MSU is you take the smallest size the unit can take and lots of them, so 10x5 man scouts would be the same as 10x10 IG, thats both MSU.

The problem is damage went up 300% and survivability didnt go up, a Scout is no tougher than a IG for many of the weapons in game, a HB shooting 100x kills 30 scouts, but it also kills 37 guardamsn, thats not that much of a difference at all when it comes to bodies, BUT is a huge difference in units, thats actually worst for the Scouts as its 6 scout units vs 3 IG units. Looking at 100 Bolter shots 30 IG die but only 17 Scouts die, again, not bettr for the Scouts as it is 3 dead units each with extra scouts dead.


Now in theory Scouts should be harder to kill, it "Should" take "More" due to T4/4+ vs T3/5+ but there is so much "overkill" in the game atm they act the same. Go back to 5th edition Damage chart, AP, cover, TL, etc.., system and it for sure will take a lot more to kill the Scouts.

 Eihnlazer wrote:
Oh no worries there, plenty of people are directing their Ire at FLG already.


They are mad because they don't do well using ITC format and more people are playing with it.

Of course certain rules in the ITC packet are better for some armies than others, and a lot of the meta relies on good list building and picking secondaries over actual decisions on the tabletop, but they forget that since a majority of tournaments are using the ITC format then it obviously means a majority of the players like it.

The guys at FLG have always said that their format is optional on the circuit and that your free to run your own tournaments however you want and they would still allow your scores to effect the overall ITC standings, but many people don't use that option and just stick to their format.

Oh good. I thought the Castellan & IS were too strong, but really it was just ITC this whole time. Who knew?

I guess we'll see reduced complaints about them now?

 Amishprn86 wrote:

Ice_can wrote:
The problem is what exactly is MSU spam?
Is 5 scouts msu or is 10 Guard infantry MSU?
Because 1 suffers alot more than the other under a kill more system.

The Malestrom cards while in many ways are toi random they do give players unplanned events they have to adjust to on the fly in game with what they have. Which would demonstrate an ability to replan and adapt in a way that ITC's 100 percent known objectives doesn't.

Scouts suffer more.

First MSU is you take the smallest size the unit can take and lots of them, so 10x5 man scouts would be the same as 10x10 IG, thats both MSU.

The problem is damage went up 300% and survivability didnt go up, a Scout is no tougher than a IG for many of the weapons in game, a HB shooting 100x kills 30 scouts, but it also kills 37 guardamsn, thats not that much of a difference at all when it comes to bodies, BUT is a huge difference in units, thats actually worst for the Scouts as its 6 scout units vs 3 IG units. Looking at 100 Bolter shots 30 IG die but only 17 Scouts die, again, not bettr for the Scouts as it is 3 dead units each with extra scouts dead.


Now in theory Scouts should be harder to kill, it "Should" take "More" due to T4/4+ vs T3/5+ but there is so much "overkill" in the game atm they act the same. Go back to 5th edition Damage chart, AP, cover, TL, etc.., system and it for sure will take a lot more to kill the Scouts.

This math misses out on the issue of overkill on the scouts. There is not a unit of 30 scouts, or 50 Guardsman, nor is there a unit putting out 100 Heavy bolter shots. For an example lets look at Heavy bolter devs who put out 12 shots each, to get 100 shots, that is shooting from those squads ~8 times (96 shots). So each time one of those units shoots it does damage.

12 shots at the scouts kills 3.5 scouts (so 3 or 4), leaving just one scout remaining. To kill the remaining scouts you will need to shoot the squad again with some amount of shots which will likely lead to wasted wounds. 24 shots is 7 wounds meaning you lose 2 kills on average, but likely you won't chance shooting just 1 or 2 heavy bolters trying to fish for wounds all the time.

Conversely those same 12 shots kill 4.4 guardsman so 4-5, but there are still 5 left in the squad, so a second set of 12 shots, does not likely go to waste and morale will finish the squad.

SO if we look at these numbers with 24 shots killing 5 scouts, you end up only killing 20 scouts with 96 shots

where as you likely kill all 10 guardsman with those same 24 shots, and so kill closer to (8.8 per squad pre morale, which auto fails at that point) 40 guardsman when morale is included.

Even if you allow for split firing, you need on average 6 heavy bolters (18 shots) to finish a scout squad. If that works out every time, you kill 25 scouts

Now this is not a great an advantage as it was in older editions thanks to the ability to split fire, you could throw only a portion of shooting at the remaining scouts, but all in all you are much more likely to waste wounds.

Wayniac wrote:

Karol wrote:
Don't the cards often create situations where a ton of armies just can't react, or worse their opponent get a really good set of cards and just win turn 1-2 by gaining a ton of points with mechanics that can't really be countered?

Again am not in favour of any of the system, but the adepticon one seems to be just as unbalanced, but just different. Plus from a casuals point of view, there seem to be an overlap in armies between the two systems. Eldar flyer lists seem to be doing good in both, as do chaos smite soups. So clearly some armies seem to deal with the game better no matter what is being played.

Yes, and that's the reason why people dislike them. It's the "Hold an objective in your own deployment zone" that your opponent gets while you get the one that's hold an objective in your opponent's deployment zone that you can't reasonably achieve. There is the issue of drawing ones you can't accomplish, and while the CA18 Maelstrom missions limit this by letting you remove like 6 cards, it really should be if you draw a card that you can't possibly complete because it doesn't exist (e.g. kill a psyker and you're playing against Tau) it immediately gets discarded and redrawn.

This is in effect in ETC missions. So you remove 6 AND discard and redraw any that are impossible for free, which makes the format less swingy than standard maelstrom.

I prefer ETC to ITC and find it to be more skill testing because the missions (ignoring the maelstrom) are different to each other and force a more varied style of play, where mission + match up causes you to need to play differently (whereas in ITC only matchup does and then only a little). This means you need to practice being good at the game, not just against the top 5 lists (as you won't face such a static field) and you also tend to get a wider variety of lists as people are more experimental, both to catch people off guard and to try to compensate for the variety in the missions. Look at the lists brought by the likes Josh Roberts, Nathan Roberts, Tony Chew and Gaz Jones, they are all very different to what the ITC crowd would suggest as best, yet they are some of the best generals in ETC.

Personally, I wish the ETC would just drop the Maelstrom and Kill Points components (possibly replace kill points with 'Every full hundred points you have remaining in excess of your opponent scores a point, max 6, like it used to be.) With the new CA18 style maelstrom is unnecessary for forcing movement and progressive scoring (the reason it was added to ETC format in the first place) and is the primary thing I think reduces the skill test of this mission packet.

Essentially I think the best option available currently is CA 2018 straight out of the box. Adding in the old points based kill swing from ETC of years gone by would improve this I think as it adds a tie break without punishing a play style, but Ic ould be worng and that would need testing.

Drager wrote:
This is in effect in ETC missions. So you remove 6 AND discard and redraw any that are impossible for free, which makes the format less swingy than standard maelstrom.

The latter part I've done forever and it not the source of the complaints about maelstrom.
The former part is irrelevant as you would not remove cards that are for a numbered objective and so does not solve the complaints about maelstrom.

If you had 6 vetoes during the game then you might have something, but otherwise it's just an obnoxious system.

Breng77 wrote:

 Amishprn86 wrote:

Ice_can wrote:
The problem is what exactly is MSU spam?
Is 5 scouts msu or is 10 Guard infantry MSU?
Because 1 suffers alot more than the other under a kill more system.

The Malestrom cards while in many ways are toi random they do give players unplanned events they have to adjust to on the fly in game with what they have. Which would demonstrate an ability to replan and adapt in a way that ITC's 100 percent known objectives doesn't.

Scouts suffer more.

First MSU is you take the smallest size the unit can take and lots of them, so 10x5 man scouts would be the same as 10x10 IG, thats both MSU.

The problem is damage went up 300% and survivability didnt go up, a Scout is no tougher than a IG for many of the weapons in game, a HB shooting 100x kills 30 scouts, but it also kills 37 guardamsn, thats not that much of a difference at all when it comes to bodies, BUT is a huge difference in units, thats actually worst for the Scouts as its 6 scout units vs 3 IG units. Looking at 100 Bolter shots 30 IG die but only 17 Scouts die, again, not bettr for the Scouts as it is 3 dead units each with extra scouts dead.


Now in theory Scouts should be harder to kill, it "Should" take "More" due to T4/4+ vs T3/5+ but there is so much "overkill" in the game atm they act the same. Go back to 5th edition Damage chart, AP, cover, TL, etc.., system and it for sure will take a lot more to kill the Scouts.

This math misses out on the issue of overkill on the scouts. There is not a unit of 30 scouts, or 50 Guardsman, nor is there a unit putting out 100 Heavy bolter shots. For an example lets look at Heavy bolter devs who put out 12 shots each, to get 100 shots, that is shooting from those squads ~8 times (96 shots). So each time one of those units shoots it does damage.

12 shots at the scouts kills 3.5 scouts (so 3 or 4), leaving just one scout remaining. To kill the remaining scouts you will need to shoot the squad again with some amount of shots which will likely lead to wasted wounds. 24 shots is 7 wounds meaning you lose 2 kills on average, but likely you won't chance shooting just 1 or 2 heavy bolters trying to fish for wounds all the time.

Conversely those same 12 shots kill 4.4 guardsman so 4-5, but there are still 5 left in the squad, so a second set of 12 shots, does not likely go to waste and morale will finish the squad.

SO if we look at these numbers with 24 shots killing 5 scouts, you end up only killing 20 scouts with 96 shots

where as you likely kill all 10 guardsman with those same 24 shots, and so kill closer to (8.8 per squad pre morale, which auto fails at that point) 40 guardsman when morale is included.

Even if you allow for split firing, you need on average 6 heavy bolters (18 shots) to finish a scout squad. If that works out every time, you kill 25 scouts

Now this is not a great an advantage as it was in older editions thanks to the ability to split fire, you could throw only a portion of shooting at the remaining scouts, but all in all you are much more likely to waste wounds.

It was to show that MSU are not equal in 8th and its completely unbalanced when looking at point costs, and unit size and that a 10man is still a MSU when taking them so cheaply.
Its math for math sake not "This is what players are taking" to show a point.

If you put a 2 Venoms + Kabal on an objective, they now need to commit to killing 4 squads, 2 you cant even target right away, so split firing isnt even an option.

MSU armies dont always have to have all units out of vehicles, many will have a unit or two in transports.

 Daedalus81 wrote:

Drager wrote:
This is in effect in ETC missions. So you remove 6 AND discard and redraw any that are impossible for free, which makes the format less swingy than standard maelstrom.

The latter part I've done forever and it not the source of the complaints about maelstrom.
The former part is irrelevant as you would not remove cards that are for a numbered objective and so does not solve the complaints about maelstrom.

If you had 6 vetoes during the game then you might have something, but otherwise it's just an obnoxious system.

I agree, as I said in the post you quoted.

If you want to see more of my army check out my instagram @jimbov_paints