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 A Town Called Malus wrote:
Power level is points. It is just worse at doing the job of measuring a units ability.

This.
You need to precisely cut something. PL is an axe, points a knife. What do you want?
Obviously, it's years that we are asking GW for a scalpel, but that's another story entirely.

Bharring wrote:
This idea also demands that tons of current models just get thrown out. Any Sarge without upgrades is trash. Or even just an inferior option.


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If you want upgrades to see more use, change their points cost. If you think Sarges don't take weapons often enough, drop their points.

This doesn't work well with A La Carte pricing. Whatever points value is the breakeven to mean that sometimes a Captain takes a powersword, sometimes he does not; that pricepoint means a Squad Sarge never takes it.

it may take some modeling changes, but I would not say an unupgraded model needs to be thrown out. maybe one needs to add a plasma pistol bit or a powersword but that can easily be done by replacing hands on a model not the whole thing.

your second point is kind of one of the reasons I want PL or barring that points to make sense.

a power sword on a space marine captain or a power claw on an ork warboss is a no brainer. but when it costs the same points for that wargear on a worse platform it does not. nobz for example are good as an elite unit but you would never put power fists on them as they cost to much for a 2w 4+ save model.

The most extreme example i can think of here is the Imperial guard codex. how is a lascannon suppossed to cost the same on a heavy weapons team as it does on the hull of a Leman russ.


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 Grimtuff wrote:
Uh oh, OP has lit the Perri beacon.

Time to pull up a chair...

not sure i have a peril beacon, just wanting to see people's opinions on my thoughts on the matter. mostly responding when an actual question exists or a ___ might not work so thinking on how it might be made to work. I am quite enjoying reading people's thoughts.

No. PL is the exact same as points, just on a less refined scale. GW really needs to do the opposite if anything. Increase the points of everything across the board to allow more gradations in balance

Ie how do you adjust balance on a 4pt guardsman when a single single point in either direction is a 25% cost change? If they were base 10pts or even 20pts you could make smaller adjustments as needed

 G00fySmiley wrote:
I know, I know, but hear me out here.

currently it seems silly to me that so many squads go in with no upgrades, or if they do it is because a weapon is just that much better for the points. like... i could give this guard squad a plasma gun but it hits on 4's and they don't have a great leadership, ditto the power sword on the sarg. do i bother with a power sword or axe on a WS4+ S3 T3 5+ save model?

As an example lets look at the 5 man space marine tactical squad

currently you have the options of 1 heavy or special weapon, that heavy weapon can cost between 8 and 28 points (flamer vs grav cannon w/ amp)

what is instead of just saying one weapon cost more you brought more of a parity in the weapons. Also imagine where in say a tournament you bring your list saying tactical squad and then choose the special or heavy weapon upon deploying, it would bring the concept of a sideboard a lot of game systems already use in where you get to react to the opponents army but by only so much.

Just spit balling here, but say profiles for weapons were in some cases increased and others decreased a bit to make them more on the same level for example

flamer - assault 4 auto hits within 8" str 4 ap0 D1
grav cannon with grav amp heavy 3 str 5 ap-2 d1 , when target has a 3+ or better save increase Ap by 1

basically make every weapons option have about the same "power" but a more defined role, then let the general choose said weapon upon deployment to lessen paper rocks sissors matches. Currently if i bring a green tide list with my orks and you can ready to fight imperial knight spam you probably lost, but this would let a person keep the same list but deploy with some anti horde to maybe stand a chance.

I think this is a fantastic idea. I have been playing some PL games lately, and aside from some minor balance issues, I find it to be quite superior to points in every way. Adding in the option to basically build half your list table side, and giving your opponenet to ability to do the same is brilliant!

How about this:

Keep the "points" the same, but make the cost of wargear relatively the same. I mean, most weapons are pretty close already with only a 2-3ppm difference.

If 5 Bolter Marines cost 65pts, add 10pts to give 1 model any Special or 15pts for any Heavy (buffing the Heavy Bolter & Flamers a bit to match those points).
X will ALWAYS be better than Y, so why bother trying to make the points matter that much?
You want a "vanilla" unit? Pay 65pts.
You want some uprades? Pay 10 pts for a Special or 15pts for a Heavy.
But deciding which upgrades to take no longer needs to account for points. Take the best weapon for your needs. Isn't that what people are already doing?

And none of this biz about "but you could list tailor". Yeah, people do that now anyway, and to avoid it, you should have a premade list ready to go rather than thrown together on the fly once you know your opponent's faction.
This change would not change that at all.

-

So now a Boltgun is just as good as a Plasma Gun or Heavy bolter; just better in different ways.

It gets even worse; a Shuriken Catapault needs to be as good as a Melta Gun, Flamer, Fire Pike, or even an Avenger Shuriken Catapault.

And then we get silly. A Power Sword needs to be as good as a Shuriken Catapault. Or an Avenger Shuriken Catapault.

And then we just get dumb. That ASC, that's just as good as a Power Sword? Well, it also needs to be just as good as *two* ASCs. How do you make an ASC as good as two ASCs?

In view of the simplification of the game further and further, having only PL available is an option.
I'm sure that GW will think about this seriously.

Bharring wrote:
So now a Boltgun is just as good as a Plasma Gun or Heavy bolter; just better in different ways.

It gets even worse; a Shuriken Catapault needs to be as good as a Melta Gun, Flamer, Fire Pike, or even an Avenger Shuriken Catapault.

And then we get silly. A Power Sword needs to be as good as a Shuriken Catapault. Or an Avenger Shuriken Catapault.

And then we just get dumb. That ASC, that's just as good as a Power Sword? Well, it also needs to be just as good as *two* ASCs. How do you make an ASC as good as two ASCs?

It basically means that you're moving toward a game where the variation between armies isn't based on stats but upon visuals. That's not a bad thing, in fact it (in theory) makes balance a lot easier because there are far fewer variables flying around. However for Warhammer it would be a very bad approach because of the decades that we've had it as it currently is. Rock the boat too much and it can backfire hard and 40K has decades of a very popular build type. Changing all that on the fly can be a huge risk.

 G00fySmiley wrote:

 FezzikDaBullgryn wrote:
So, how do I tell which models have the HBs and which have the LCs when I am looking at your models that physically have MLs?

I agree that power levels fix certain issues, but models are still models, and if you are deciding what a model "has" before you plop it down, you better have a damn good way of pointing that out, otherwise you are actively attempting to cause confusion on the board.

I can see this getting downright SILLY with deathwatch, where every single troop model can take a different load out.

wysiwyg still applies. If i want my 30 man unit or orks to have the option of 3 rokkits or 3 big shootas I need to have 33 models available to make that 30 man unit when it hits the board (or have magnitized to swap weapons)

likewise if I want a tactical squad to have a melta gun, missile launcher, heavy bolter, or flamer options then that is either, and if i want the sarg to have options for a power fist or power sword I am bringing 10 models (2 sarg options 1 with power fist, 1 with power sword, 4 bolter marines, and either 1 magnetized body and 4 weapons options, or 4 models with different weapons options.)

realistically I think most people will just end up magnetising weapons options for a quick swap out of bits. I already have my nobs magnetized to have either a power claw or big choppa, it takes just a few min between drillign with a pin vise and setting 3 magnets, 1 in the arm, 1 in big choppa, 1 in pk. both fit into the same slot as the model in my foam tray

I don't think it's fair to expect new players to suddenly learn to magnetize their models. It's difficult on things like tanks, it's tedious and stupid to expect players to do it for all 120 of their gaunts or Infantry.

Point is, magnetizing is an advanced technique that hardcore people use to better suit adaptability in high level games. Which is like 10% of the hobby.

How does PL only benefit the other 90%?

Bharring wrote:
So now a Boltgun is just as good as a Plasma Gun or Heavy bolter; just better in different ways.

It gets even worse; a Shuriken Catapault needs to be as good as a Melta Gun, Flamer, Fire Pike, or even an Avenger Shuriken Catapault.

And then we get silly. A Power Sword needs to be as good as a Shuriken Catapault. Or an Avenger Shuriken Catapault.

And then we just get dumb. That ASC, that's just as good as a Power Sword? Well, it also needs to be just as good as *two* ASCs. How do you make an ASC as good as two ASCs?

bolter would not be as good as a plasma or heavy bolter, in a tactical squad those 4 bolters are the same, ditto for Avenger shuri catipults, shootas, lasguns etc. only thing that would be reworked is special weapons beign taken in said unit. The only thing affected in a guardian squad would be the heavy weapons platform option. storm guardians would just be storm guardians that choose flamer or melta gun as its already baked in the cost

on the exarchs for say avengers you could have the dual catipult, diresword, and catipult or shimmer shield and power sword options

your choice is double the shots, a good cc weapon and a gun, or a inv save for the whole unit and a ok close combat weapon. that is my thoughts anyway.

its all jsut fun herory crafting anyway, i do doubt GW will actually do this.


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 FezzikDaBullgryn wrote:

 G00fySmiley wrote:

 FezzikDaBullgryn wrote:
So, how do I tell which models have the HBs and which have the LCs when I am looking at your models that physically have MLs?

I agree that power levels fix certain issues, but models are still models, and if you are deciding what a model "has" before you plop it down, you better have a damn good way of pointing that out, otherwise you are actively attempting to cause confusion on the board.

I can see this getting downright SILLY with deathwatch, where every single troop model can take a different load out.

wysiwyg still applies. If i want my 30 man unit or orks to have the option of 3 rokkits or 3 big shootas I need to have 33 models available to make that 30 man unit when it hits the board (or have magnitized to swap weapons)

likewise if I want a tactical squad to have a melta gun, missile launcher, heavy bolter, or flamer options then that is either, and if i want the sarg to have options for a power fist or power sword I am bringing 10 models (2 sarg options 1 with power fist, 1 with power sword, 4 bolter marines, and either 1 magnetized body and 4 weapons options, or 4 models with different weapons options.)

realistically I think most people will just end up magnetising weapons options for a quick swap out of bits. I already have my nobs magnetized to have either a power claw or big choppa, it takes just a few min between drillign with a pin vise and setting 3 magnets, 1 in the arm, 1 in big choppa, 1 in pk. both fit into the same slot as the model in my foam tray

I don't think it's fair to expect new players to suddenly learn to magnetize their models. It's difficult on things like tanks, it's tedious and stupid to expect players to do it for all 120 of their gaunts or Infantry.

Point is, magnetizing is an advanced technique that hardcore people use to better suit adaptability in high level games. Which is like 10% of the hobby.

How does PL only benefit the other 90%?

I think in this case more people would magnitize, but yes I doubt everybody would. That said for new players and the other players they might just pack a few extra weapons options they like. say for each tac squad they bring a lascannon and a flamer, or whatever they prefer as a few types. and heck mos tplayers would probably be cool with "ok all my special weapons are plasma guns" or "all my heavy weapons are missile launchers"

Is this another episode of my favorite warhammer show "It worked for decades but it doesn't work in 8th so throw it all out"?

 Ratius wrote:
I personally prefer the granularity of points and agree with Martel that they could just spend some time balancing them across the board.

You know, I think I actually kind of liked the idea the OP brought up about the special and heavy options in certain units acting like a mini sideboard. That seems fun and I'd love to explore that a bit more. As if the units are tooling up for the fight at hand rather than always being the 'flamer guy'. I think that would allow a bit more specialization of weapon purposes above and beyond what we have now.

Compelling idea.

Lemondish wrote:

 Ratius wrote:
I personally prefer the granularity of points and agree with Martel that they could just spend some time balancing them across the board.

You know, I think I actually kind of liked the idea the OP brought up about the special and heavy options in certain units acting like a mini sideboard. That seems fun and I'd love to explore that a bit more. As if the units are tooling up for the fight at hand rather than always being the 'flamer guy'. I think that would allow a bit more specialization of weapon purposes above and beyond what we have now.

Compelling idea.

thanks not my idea though many games use sideboards or reserves that can change.

heck we have demon summoning with reserves so there is that too.

it does seem odd to me though that you build a list then just show up with that list. like the army is not changing a single piece of equipment or adapting at all based on the opponent.

tac marine to captain "sir we are engaging the ork green tide on planet ____ are you sure dropping in with my lascannon is a good plan, likewise the devistators have 3 multimeltas, and the stormraven is loaded up with a multtmeltas, lascannons and no sponsons attached"
captian to tac marine "damn it we arrive in 2 weeks there is no time to stop by the armory and change weapons now" and changing the guns on the stormraven will take days, the empiror will just protect"

 G00fySmiley wrote:


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Grimtuff wrote:
Uh oh, OP has lit the Perri beacon.

Time to pull up a chair...

not sure i have a peril beacon, just wanting to see people's opinions on my thoughts on the matter. mostly responding when an actual question exists or a ___ might not work so thinking on how it might be made to work. I am quite enjoying reading people's thoughts.

PERRI beacon. Keep that final sentence in mind when Peregrine is drawn to this thread like a moth to a flame.

Don't say I didn't warn you.

 Grimtuff wrote:

 G00fySmiley wrote:


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Grimtuff wrote:
Uh oh, OP has lit the Perri beacon.

Time to pull up a chair...

not sure i have a peril beacon, just wanting to see people's opinions on my thoughts on the matter. mostly responding when an actual question exists or a ___ might not work so thinking on how it might be made to work. I am quite enjoying reading people's thoughts.

PERRI beacon. Keep that final sentence in mind when Peregrine is drawn to this thread like a moth to a flame.

Don't say I didn't warn you.

i didn't know perri was a user >_< i thought it was a reference to the .gif that i didn't understand

 G00fySmiley wrote:

Bharring wrote:
So now a Boltgun is just as good as a Plasma Gun or Heavy bolter; just better in different ways.

It gets even worse; a Shuriken Catapault needs to be as good as a Melta Gun, Flamer, Fire Pike, or even an Avenger Shuriken Catapault.

And then we get silly. A Power Sword needs to be as good as a Shuriken Catapault. Or an Avenger Shuriken Catapault.

And then we just get dumb. That ASC, that's just as good as a Power Sword? Well, it also needs to be just as good as *two* ASCs. How do you make an ASC as good as two ASCs?

bolter would not be as good as a plasma or heavy bolter, in a tactical squad those 4 bolters are the same, ditto for Avenger shuri catipults, shootas, lasguns etc. only thing that would be reworked is special weapons beign taken in said unit. The only thing affected in a guardian squad would be the heavy weapons platform option. storm guardians would just be storm guardians that choose flamer or melta gun as its already baked in the cost

But then every single squad must take a Special/Heavy. No Captain/Sarge/other HQ with a Boltgun is viable. Every Vet/Command Squad with a boltgun is garbage (or must be remodelled/repainted).

on the exarchs for say avengers you could have the dual catipult, diresword, and catipult or shimmer shield and power sword options

your choice is double the shots, a good cc weapon and a gun, or a inv save for the whole unit and a ok close combat weapon. that is my thoughts anyway.

While that sounds good, the current rules give you more and more comparable options. Maybe you want to save the points by taking a single ASC. Maybe taking a sword and pistol over 2xASC is worth the points saved (note: they can't take a CCW and a Catapult, just a pistol).

You lose cost effectiveness as an additional balancing axis.

its all jsut fun herory crafting anyway, i do doubt GW will actually do this.

It'd be almost as crazy as 10 basic dudes with spears being the same number of "points" as a Greater Demon or a giant Dragon or a Carnesaur. I'm sure they'll *never* do that....

I'd prefer PL as long as they change how unit loadouts work.

It'd even be interesting if a unit has a set PL, but then one of their stats is some kind of "Equipment Allowance" that lets you spend up to a certain number of "Equipment Points" on the unit.

 LunarSol wrote:
I'd prefer PL as long as they change how unit loadouts work.

It'd even be interesting if a unit has a set PL, but then one of their stats is some kind of "Equipment Allowance" that lets you spend up to a certain number of "Equipment Points" on the unit.

Yeah, this is basically what I'm getting at. "Vaniila" units costs XxPL, upgrades cost YPL. But it doesn't matter what equipment

-

 G00fySmiley wrote:

currently it seems silly to me that so many squads go in with no upgrades, or if they do it is because a weapon is just that much better for the points. like... i could give this guard squad a plasma gun but it hits on 4's and they don't have a great leadership, ditto the power sword on the sarg. do i bother with a power sword or axe on a WS4+ S3 T3 5+ save model?

I really do understand where you're coming from here. I find it kinda sad that a lot of weapons never see play because they're just not worth it (even for a few points) on ranged units with just 1 or 2 attacks.

However, I don't think Power Level is the answer. It just means going from one extreme to the other - rather than seeing most units with no/minimal upgrades, you instead see every unit taking ALL the upgrades because there's no reason not to.

I've got a couple of alternative ideas but I'm not sure they're any good either.

I'm wondering if it's possible to give each army a number of 'Upgrade Points'. These are basically just extra points but they can only ever be spent on upgrades. Would that help at all, or would they just be eaten by Lascannons and such?

Alternatively, perhaps the point cost of melee weapons could be looked at again? It seems silly that a WS2+ 70pt character with 5 attacks pays as much for an Agoniser as a WS3+ 6pt squad sergeant with 2 attacks. The former is paying a little under 6% of his base cost, whilst the latter is paying ~67% of his base cost.

I often wonder if a Power Level with a sideboard would improve balance over straight points. The Power Level being there largely to make calculating the agreed upon max total a little easier after determining which units will be fielded. The sideboard being used after determining the opposing faction, mission and table terrain layout.

I think for this to work units with weapon load out options should probably be better defined in the role they are intended with a reduction of just better weapons. Take the weapon options a tactical squad can equip. Most of those weapons have pretty obvious roles that I don't think are as well defined on the tabletop. I think for this to work, that would have to be sorted out a little better without using points as a system to try and fine tune.

I also think this wouldn't affect factions with less options since they still have the same sideboard but can use that to also tailor for this mission. The bigger issue would probably be that even after decades I don't know if every faction has the tools to adjust.

Ultimately, I think it would just shift issues to somewhere else. I have seen sideboards used for pretty good effect in Kill Team especially with the inclusion of Elites which has players picking a roster for both 100 and 125 points if the missions in Elites are included. At the same time, I still encounter many Kill Team players locked into lists to the point I feel like I have an unfavorable advantage with a roster. And that is a small game where it is easy to have that side board. In 40k, I am still working on my Primaris space marine army just cracking 1,000 points of painted. It might be sometime before I have have enough for a sideboard in addition to full army at the size I think most gamers play.

The side boarding concept is interesting... though I do still stand with those opposed- if you can get the perfect tool for any situation, it does take a lot of the fun, strategy and challenge out of list building.

But where this really falls apart for me is the cost.

Buy one devastator squad for every tactical squad in order to be able to sideboard every load out?

Buy four devastors for every devastator squad you actually want to field?

Now I know, that's an extreme, and you say nobody would ever do it. You might be right. But if even one person did it, in your group or at your store or in your tourney, they would never lose to anyone who wasn't prepared to do the same thing.

Broken.

Furthermore, if you leave the game as it is, you can still play pl. So what you actually want isn't to play PL; it's to prevent everyone else from playing points.

This game is more flexible in this edition than it has ever been. Too many of those eager for a 9th edition can already get exactly what they want out of this one, but they want EVERYONE to be forced to play their way so badly that they're willing to buy their codices of choice for the ninth time rather than just chilling and letting GW break even more new ground than they already have this time around.

Personally, I hope there never is a ninth edition. I can go 8.5- minor changes that fix some of the weak spots- I'm not denying the game has them, nor am I saying they shouldn't be addressed. Some codices do need to be redone, but many are fine as they are.I want at least 3 years to play the crap outta my new sisters dex.

 G00fySmiley wrote:

Martel732 wrote:

 G00fySmiley wrote:

Martel732 wrote:
"sure, but that still doesn't change that if you decide to bring a bunch of las cannons vs a horde its going to be a pretty one sided game"

How does power level fix this?

did you read the post attached?

your list would just be "tactical squad, __ power level"

then at deployment (so you have some idea what you are facing as units are put down) you declare what gear that unit has as it hits the table.

so facing my orks you might decide instead of that lascannon that tac squad with heavy weapon has a heavy bolter instead and that tac squad you wanted out front now has a flamer instead of a melta gun.

likewise i might as the ork player realise you are doign mostly power armor and deploy with rokits instead of useless big shootas because hey at least if i hit i will probably take out a marine.

Yeah, no list tailoring. That's right out. No choices made after lists are revealed.

i never said you tailor a whole list, just declare at drop reacting to the other opponents drops so far (first is a gamble of course) I do like sideboards some games have where you can adjust based on each others drops its a whole other element in there.

Ok, if this is the environment you want, then I'll make sure to include a bunch of really cheap units to deploy early so as to run you out of drops & then list tailor against you with impunity with the serious stuff.

Except your not talking about sideboarding 5 or 10% of your list your taking about sideboarding your entire list.

Take repulsors and dev squads, fighting russ spam everything gets a lascannon or lastalon army wide, hope you enjoy taking lascannon shots from an entire list.

Fighting orks well everyones gettibg HB or Onslaught Cannons, enjoy shovelling up units.

Side boarding 1 or 2 units allows adaptability, what your talking about is list tailoring during deployment that a WAAC guy thing and having played against it casually it's a guaranteed way to have people quitting as it's no fun playing ever game against your hard counter choices.

Do the opposite. Increase points by a factor of 10. Guardsmen are now 40 points. This will allow actual balancing of points.
I’d also recommend going to a D12 for everything. This will allow actual balancing of BS, WS, SVs, etc.

Martel732 wrote:
"sure, but that still doesn't change that if you decide to bring a bunch of las cannons vs a horde its going to be a pretty one sided game"

How does power level fix this?

Power Level creates a different kind of headache. While it's certainly arguable the - for example - smash captain is going to become less popular when he has to try and smash three squads of guard with power swords behind 9 ablative wounds each - He's not going away entirely. And the Sergeant with a chainsword is going to become the rarity not the norm (that you'd see from the fluff) unless they rework the chainsword to do two A for every 1A on the profile or some such.

Going straight power level (with the current 40K upgrades cost not the PL Apoc system) is (theoretically) most likely to:
entice people to kit out troops squads as its all but free.
overly benefit squads with multiple upgrade options on multiple upgrade trees - making many options all but standard equipment. Who would take a scout withOUT a free Camo Cloak?
Result in some pretty ridiculous Elite units - 10 man Vanguard Vets with 1Relic Blade/SS, 4 TH/SS and 5 Dual LC
Possibly still see these super units get spanked by horde mobs likewise fully kitted out.
Drastically change the calculation on ablative wounds. The power level cost for 5 bolter Devastator marine ablative wounds, and a 5 man Devastator group with four more heavy weapons will be the same.
Give me a twitch above my right eye as I think about being forced to take 3 or 6 Interceptors when I really want to take 5 to satisfy my 100 Marines, groups of 5 or 10 Obsessive Compulsive tendencies.

Going full PL isn't a BAD idea. It isn't a good idea either. Take the Camo Cloaks I mentioned above: In PowerLevel only, who wouldn't take a camo cloak? It's free, there's no drawback to having a cloak, and it doesn't cost you another choice you could be making. If they go full Power Level they'll have to rewrite all of those unit entries to either include a cost for every upgrade Apocalypse style, or turn every upgrade into an either/or proposition, or a combination of both - i.e. you may take Camo Cloaks and sniper rifles, or bolters and a heavy weapon, or shotguns and a heavy weapon - with an optional for sniper rifles and camo cloaks at 2PL per 5, for bolters and such, at 1PL per 5, for Shotguns and a heavy, that's the basic PL Price - Or Some such.

They'll also have to get much better at balancing those choices for their role. A Heavy Bolter against T3 horde isn't even as good as, let alone better than, a plasma cannon once you factor in ~2 shots wounding on 2's vs 3 shots wounding on 3's with a potential armor save. Few marine players will take auto hit flamers over plasma or melta even with the points difference right now. Even fewer will do so when they're all 0 points. It gets even more complex when you're talking about a unit like Sternguard, why take their special issue bolter? The basic pre-option gear has to be as good as, just different from, their optional gear with the possible exception of 1-2 per squad like special/heavy weapons in a tac squad. To give an example:
The Intercessor squad has both of these types of options:

Auxiliary GL's are 0 points, and limited to 1 per 5 i.e. 1 or 2 per squad. Once all options for a given squad are toss ups, this can and should be points free, like the GL is.

The Auto/Stalker/Generic Bolt Rifle are neither different enough, nor similar enough, even at Price:Free to prevent an overwhelming player preference. Especially after the Beta Bolter Rules next to nobody was taking Auto Bolt Rifles. Few were going to take the Stalker though it has some appeal, +6 inches, and an extra -1AP for one fewer shots on a backfield objective camper is attractive enough to make that a toss-up to me. And now I need another box of intercessors now that I'm putting that together with Infiltrators. 1 extra shot, only in a 9 inch window, only if I moved and 1 less AP is not a toss up. It needs more shots more often.

Going full Power Level, or either/or options for the same price with different effect such that changing options doesn't change your Points/Power Level does allow for a sideboard, and that's not a bad thing at all, especially given how much list spam there is now. But the side board should also be somewhat double blind. Set up rules to evaluate your own army - if X% of your power level is deep striking, if your model count is Y, and so on. If your list is more than Z% vehicles - The dust cloud our air reconnaissance has followed strongly suggests the approaching army is mechanized. The scoutcraft flyover reports a teeming horde of greenskins massed so tightly together it's impossible to count. Intelligence reports hordes of creatures the size of a tiger from Ancient Terran Myth, or lumbering behemoths drooling on the carapace of their monstrous toes, screaming as they kil, or combined and balanced force (A little bit of everything) . Observers report the force approaching is too small to justify the confidence they're advancing with, be prepared for sudden reinforcements (Heavy Deep Strike) A hint, not 20 minutes with your list to min/max.


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 p5freak wrote:
Its impossible to put the "power" of a unit in one number. SM Company veterans have 14 (!) different weapons where i can choose from. How do you balance all of them in one number ? If you do it for each weapon individually you may as well use points as usual.

You balance the weapons, not the choices. A power lance, power maul, and power sword are all pretty balanced. Start there, pull the TH/SS and Power Fist etc, then move on to the pistols. Then the rest. The trick is to make the Purpose defined weapons that much better at their purpose and that much worse at anything else than the hybrids/multi-role choices.


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 FezzikDaBullgryn wrote:
So, how do I tell which models have the HBs and which have the LCs when I am looking at your models that physically have MLs?

I agree that power levels fix certain issues, but models are still models, and if you are deciding what a model "has" before you plop it down, you better have a damn good way of pointing that out, otherwise you are actively attempting to cause confusion on the board.

I can see this getting downright SILLY with deathwatch, where every single troop model can take a different load out.

I'm assuming sideboard was meant literally, dragging the entire concept from other games. You could have one devastator squad with 16 different Heavy Weapon Devastator models. 4 on the table, and 12 on your sideboard carrying lascannons, heavy bolters, plasma, and so on. And if you decided - through whatever mechanism - that you needed more dakka less AT, you'd put your Devs down with 4 HBs and PC's (from your sideboard) instead of placing some LC and ML Devs (which models then go to your sideboard instead of on the table)


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Bharring wrote:
This idea also demands that tons of current models just get thrown out. Any Sarge without upgrades is trash. Or even just an inferior option.


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If you want upgrades to see more use, change their points cost. If you think Sarges don't take weapons often enough, drop their points.

This doesn't work well with A La Carte pricing. Whatever points value is the breakeven to mean that sometimes a Captain takes a powersword, sometimes he does not; that pricepoint means a Squad Sarge never takes it.

Nah, it demands all the options - including the default option - be equally attractive. The bolter/lasgun/whatever has to put out enough shots at enough range to perform about as well as a bolt pistol and power whatever for the less average time it will be in close combat range.

 G00fySmiley wrote:
do i bother with a power sword or axe on a WS4+ S3 T3 5+ save model?

MAYBE, just MAYBE, you shouldn't. If it's free because of PL, what's your incentive not to take it?

I think it would be perfectly reasonable to try to abstract things to maybe 5 point increments (in a 2k point game, it's got to be near-impossible to identify a 1-point difference in power) or something like that, but there are just so many roles removed by doing power levels as they stand. Jump packs might add 1 PL cost, while a heavy weapon might not add any cost. I like running stripped down units, esp. for troops, and throw my points where I think they'll be most effective; I'd really rather not have the equivalent of building in the price of upgrades and then getting to pick them, rather than the option to take them or not, to begin with.

A few points:

* PL is an idiotic concept. It's just a less-accurate point system that makes balance even worse in exchange for, at best, a trivial savings in time require to write a list. The primary use for it seems to be as a means of virtue signalling for CAAC players, deliberately using a less-balanced rule to prove to everyone how little they care about competitive play. PL should be removed entirely as a waste of what little development time GW is willing to spend on creating rules.

* Pseudo-PL with points for upgrades is even worse. It throws out the simplicity of PL, its one possible minor advantage, and ends up with the same list-building work of conventional points. All it does is take away a very useful design tool: the ability to make options that are more powerful but also more expensive. It's extremely difficult to make several options of equal value, especially in a very shallow system like 40k where there is little difference between unit types and the best ways of killing them. It is much easier to make options that have different purposes and then assign them an appropriate point cost, greatly reducing the chances that you end up with one obvious auto-take option and a bunch of irrelevant rules bloat that nobody will ever use.

* Sideboarding is bad. It drives the game further in the direction of a rock/paper/scissors CCG and it excessively rewards players who have more money to spend on bringing extra models to tailor their list for each opponent. The game should encourage TAC lists, preferably enforced by going back to single-codex armies that must fit a single 5th edition FOC (with a single LoW slot added, since those didn't exist at the time).

I think that about covers it?

 Peregrine wrote:
A few points:

* PL is an idiotic concept. It's just a less-accurate point system that makes balance even worse in exchange for, at best, a trivial savings in time require to write a list. The primary use for it seems to be as a means of virtue signalling for CAAC players, deliberately using a less-balanced rule to prove to everyone how little they care about competitive play. PL should be removed entirely as a waste of what little development time GW is willing to spend on creating rules.

* Pseudo-PL with points for upgrades is even worse. It throws out the simplicity of PL, its one possible minor advantage, and ends up with the same list-building work of conventional points. All it does is take away a very useful design tool: the ability to make options that are more powerful but also more expensive. It's extremely difficult to make several options of equal value, especially in a very shallow system like 40k where there is little difference between unit types and the best ways of killing them. It is much easier to make options that have different purposes and then assign them an appropriate point cost, greatly reducing the chances that you end up with one obvious auto-take option and a bunch of irrelevant rules bloat that nobody will ever use.

* Sideboarding is bad. It drives the game further in the direction of a rock/paper/scissors CCG and it excessively rewards players who have more money to spend on bringing extra models to tailor their list for each opponent. The game should encourage TAC lists, preferably enforced by going back to single-codex armies that must fit a single 5th edition FOC (with a single LoW slot added, since those didn't exist at the time).

I think that about covers it?

One of the few times I 100% agree with someones post without any qualifiers. Good show.

There is a rumour that GW wanted to drop points for 8th entirely, and that the Playtest group threatened to cause an internet storm about it, so GW shoehorned in Matched Play and points. If 9th scraps points GW are going to lose a lot of their undeserved good will.

While I would love to go back to single FoC games that realistically won't happen, thus I wish they would instead harshly "punish" soup and "encourage" mono armies. A complete rework of how CP, Stratagems and Detachments work is needed.

I think the key to getting "competitive" armies to look more like "fluffy" armies is to revise how points are done rather than toss them overboard for Power Level. If some of the value of upgrades was baked into the base cost of the unit and then the upgrade cost were reduced, you would be incentivized to take more upgrades.

For example, let's take a Astra Militarum Infantry Squad. They are 4 points a model for 10 models, so 40 points. They are often fielded barebones or with just a Mortar (5 points). You never see a Vox Caster and rarely a special weapon.

Now change the points cost of the unit to 50 for 10 models. Reduce the cost of the voxcaster, special weapons, and heavy weapons by 5 points each (except for Sargent weapons). I bet you will see a lot more special and heavy weapons and voxcasters under such a point schedule.