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Let people play the way they want

Yeah, I agree with U02dah4. Restrictions are less fun. I think the current system is pretty well balanced in principle (though obviously the Forgeworld rules themselves need an update). There's less opportunity for self-expression and creativity if you restrict the game to only what the designers envision. However, I agree that it's better for game balance (and thus healthier for the game over-all) if there are strong incentives for single faction detachments. Essentially, it's better to give players the opportunity to play whatever they want at a minor disadvantage.

As long as there is a tradeoff, I think it's fine to give people the option to do unconventional builds.

I mean, Mars and Data-hoard+Stygies is still more common than Forgeworld Soup right now.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Techpriest_ wrote:
I think the "Super Friends" style of play may have a lot of merit to it as all you give up is the dogma really, but you pick up a lot of options in terms of stratagems. The biggest issue is it becomes incredibly CP taxing, but you're by no means obligated to use all of the abilities.

Obviously the Graia ability is very strong on a couple Vanguard squads, and the Ryza ability is still completely fine. Lucius and Stygies both have different methods of deploying into battle, and even Agrippina can see some use.

I actually started a guide for new players getting Admech recently, and the newest video is about Forge Worlds, but it only covered the top 4. The rest will be covered in the next video including building mixed detachments. If you're interested it can be found here, criticism is always welcome: https://youtu.be/rAqT15ShC1U

This is a pretty good video. One thing that I would point out though is that the Stygies VIII Canticle is underestimated. It is very useful to fall back and still shoot. Especially if you are spamming Plasma Vanguard. The recent change to plasma actually makes them stronger in this situation.

I respectfully disagree. The only reason this opinion becomes valid is if ignoring the bigger picture doesn't affect the game as a whole. It does. Otherwise, all we're doing is exploiting a bad system because of poor rules writing. We should be advocating for better.

If the rules were flexible we wouldn't have a need for absurd arrangements where members of 3 Forgeworlds within the same detachment is considered acceptable under the guise of it being "unconventional" and "people should be able to play (read: abuse the rules) how they want". It's bad for the game as a whole: Unclear detachments, it makes it overly complex for your opponent to visually know what you can and can't do. Slows the game down. Increases 'paperwork', it's just bad for the game to keep it how it is.

I'm not advocating restrictions for the sake of it, we already have those, I'm advocating structure that currently doesn't exist. The choices we have to make at the moment when building a list are horrible. They're not the choice between being better at one thing and worse at another, they are between having a fundamental ability/construct of the game and not. Not one of them considers our army as a whole, every choice is "make this one unit better" instead of choosing an impactful thematic playstyle. We can already see this is where they're heading in the Necron and SM codexes, Necron Warlords have to be the most senior HQ choice, SM detachments can only include one captain and 2 lieutenants. It's all measured choices to encourage a balanced way of playing. We can already expect our warlord hierarchy to be Cawl > Dominus > Manipulus > Enginseer based on current options.

That's what our codex is missing, structured thematic choices. If they ever want to streamline the way this game plays mixed detachments need to go, they are a necessity borne of how restrictive the current rules are. Nobody chooses to have a mixed detachment because it's fluffy or because it makes any sense at all, it's purely because of how badly the rules interact.

I can see both sides of the argument on this one, as on one hand I like having the ability to mix and match, especially when mixing doesn't create an over powered list. I can also see the argument that it does make things messy and can sometimes be hard to distinguish in a game with so many rules as is.

That being said, in terms of theme and lore, it's not abnormal for forge worlds to mix to some extent. For example, Triplex Phall has several Mars legions that follow their expeditions around and pester them. Luckily for Triplex Phall these Mars legions are often kept occupied with the many threats that Triplex Phall faces from Tyranids to Daemons. During the Heresy a lot of Admech also fled Mars and hid out on Ryza, then fought along side Ryza during the invasion from Dark Mechanicus forces.

More so, I believe in the game Mechanicus most of the tech priests are Mars based but Scaevola is actually a Stygies VIII representative, which is why she tends to be an outcast due to her Xenorite views. So there is precedence for members of different Forge Worlds to join forces, whether out of necessity, mistrust, or mutual benefit.

@Suzuteo: Thanks for the kind words, the reception the series has received so far has really made it worthwhile.

I do agree I may be under valuing the Stygie's canticle as I haven't played around with it much.

 Techpriest_ wrote:
I can see both sides of the argument on this one, as on one hand I like having the ability to mix and match, especially when mixing doesn't create an over powered list. I can also see the argument that it does make things messy and can sometimes be hard to distinguish in a game with so many rules as is.

That being said, in terms of theme and lore, it's not abnormal for forge worlds to mix to some extent. For example, Triplex Phall has several Mars legions that follow their expeditions around and pester them. Luckily for Triplex Phall these Mars legions are often kept occupied with the many threats that Triplex Phall faces from Tyranids to Daemons. During the Heresy a lot of Admech also fled Mars and hid out on Ryza, then fought along side Ryza during the invasion from Dark Mechanicus forces.

More so, I believe in the game Mechanicus most of the tech priests are Mars based but Scaevola is actually a Stygies VIII representative, which is why she tends to be an outcast due to her Xenorite views. So there is precedence for members of different Forge Worlds to join forces, whether out of necessity, mistrust, or mutual benefit.

@Suzuteo: Thanks for the kind words, the reception the series has received so far has really made it worthwhile.

I do agree I may be under valuing the Stygie's canticle as I haven't played around with it much.

Having multiple Forgeworlds, though I dislike from a personal point of view, I have no objection to and it's perfectly well represented by having multiple detachments. You can clearly show this with different paint schemes etc. and it makes sense to have a Forgeworld specialising in mech infantry and one in Artillery, for example, to work together in a single conflict. But even when forces fight alongside each other it's unlikely a Ryza force would be led by a Stygies Dominus and have a contingency of Mars tanks with a few squads of Lucius robots. Narratively they might end up like that during a large conflict due to combat losses but it would never be planned that way. You can attach any kind of narrative to explain why it might happen but to balance a complex game system with multiple overlapping and interacting rules, simplicity is king. And i'd rather the general rules were written with structure in mind rather than just letting everyone run wild for the sake of a minority narrative.

So as you say you can narrative anything even if you look at material such as the mechanicus computer game you have techpriests from multiple forgeworlds on the same ship. So there's no problem narratively. Common no but if your gonna pick holes based on what common the biggest hole is how many battles in the lore feature identical armies. I'm sorry guilliman I know we have a titan legion on the planet but there's only 2000pts of tanks so they won't fight.

From a mechanics perspective are there benefits yes otherwise people wouldn't do it are there draw backs yes loss of dogma and loss of synergy is any of that a problem no. Its not like mechanicus are winning 80% of games.

So really its preference. However I will always side with the person playing the way they want to and having fun over the person wineing that people are having fun the wrong way.

I do recognise that no one does this to be fluffy. However no one takes a battle company of tac marines from a single chapter just because it fits the lore (as it doesn't match the game rules in a functional way). Take a look at 99%of lists and they mot that fluffy. E.g. a circle of guard artillery around commissar yarick in an open position not fluffy at all but viable

Fluffy alternative bastions full of infantry with the artillery behind simulating a defensive position but it doesn't work because the games rules won't let you deploy the bastions as they are too near terrain.

New video is up in the starting Admech series, this one covers the remaining Forge Worlds: https://youtu.be/DxDFF2pKk8E

I think I covered most things in regards to the Forge Worlds and ranked them fairly. Do you agree with my rankings and opinions or would you argue I overlooked something?

 Techpriest_ wrote:
New video is up in the starting Admech series, this one covers the remaining Forge Worlds: https://youtu.be/DxDFF2pKk8E

I think I covered most things in regards to the Forge Worlds and ranked them fairly. Do you agree with my rankings and opinions or would you argue I overlooked something?

I liked it. Really covered the Forgeworld Soup concept well. One bit of feedback is that it is probably hard for newcomers to visualize how a list like that would look like. Furthermore, the undefeated list at that European tourney was notable because of how it showed thoughtful consideration on what to sacrifice to make the list greater than the sum of its parts.

Some quick points:
1) Mixing all of those Forgeworlds into one detachment saves 2 CP, which is important because the list is CP hungry.
2) Because your list is not all Mars, they won't all benefit from the Canticle, nor will they all be inside that big 9" bubble for rerolls. So you don't need to have Cawl. Taking a Dominus saves 120 points.
3) When you play such a list, you pick your Canticle every turn, Shroudpsalm, Mars, and the RR1 aura are what you use to have a strong opening.

Also, the partner of choice for Data-hoard is actually Stygies, since they struggle with early game mobility and actually are not very CP hungry.

You also forgot to mention that Luminary Suffusion allows the debuff to apply to vehicles, which is a big improvement.

Expansionist Forgeworld is one of the better options if you want to splash Raiders as allies into an Imperium Soup army.

Hi everyone.

Engine war brought a glimmer of hope. Renewed optimism and a spark of excitement for many.

9th is settling in now and covid restrictions aside, I don’t see Admech doing that well amongst the rest of the pack.

Anyone got an idea of what a competitive Admech list looks like aside from clearing the shelf and purchasing a car load of breachers?

Aside from the obvious problems with our 8th codex(poor units and terrible relics/warlord traits etc) what do you all think the army needs when it gets a refresh

 Suzuteo wrote:

 Techpriest_ wrote:
New video is up in the starting Admech series, this one covers the remaining Forge Worlds: https://youtu.be/DxDFF2pKk8E

I think I covered most things in regards to the Forge Worlds and ranked them fairly. Do you agree with my rankings and opinions or would you argue I overlooked something?

I liked it. Really covered the Forgeworld Soup concept well. One bit of feedback is that it is probably hard for newcomers to visualize how a list like that would look like. Furthermore, the undefeated list at that European tourney was notable because of how it showed thoughtful consideration on what to sacrifice to make the list greater than the sum of its parts.

Some quick points:
1) Mixing all of those Forgeworlds into one detachment saves 2 CP, which is important because the list is CP hungry.
2) Because your list is not all Mars, they won't all benefit from the Canticle, nor will they all be inside that big 9" bubble for rerolls. So you don't need to have Cawl. Taking a Dominus saves 120 points.
3) When you play such a list, you pick your Canticle every turn, Shroudpsalm, Mars, and the RR1 aura are what you use to have a strong opening.

Also, the partner of choice for Data-hoard is actually Stygies, since they struggle with early game mobility and actually are not very CP hungry.

You also forgot to mention that Luminary Suffusion allows the debuff to apply to vehicles, which is a big improvement.

Expansionist Forgeworld is one of the better options if you want to splash Raiders as allies into an Imperium Soup army.

Thanks, I'm glad you liked it. To address some of your points:

1.) I agree, and I also agree with your points about having example lists. The intent is to have future videos being about the first 500 point list, the first 1,000 point list, and first 2,000 point list, each one being a full Video to help the player from building their first list to their final list. Granted, I could have probably thrown a quick example out there in this video as well which may have been useful.

2.) Correct me if I'm wrong, but doesn't everyone benefit from the canticle? As I understood it, all units benefit from a canticle as long as you chose to replace it, but the stratagem, dogma, and certain abilities like Cawl's rerolls are locked to a Forge World. I also agree about the Dominus point, and I could have mentioned it but the following parts of the series are intended to go into each unit type (HQ, Troops, etc) in more depth than covered in the Forge World section.

Good point on the Luminary buff, and what makes Expansionist good for the Raider splash? I haven't seen it too often yet so I haven't given it too much thought, and the list that placed in a top 4 that did it ran Lucius raider spam next to Knights.

 Ideasweasel wrote:
Hi everyone.

Engine war brought a glimmer of hope. Renewed optimism and a spark of excitement for many.

9th is settling in now and covid restrictions aside, I don’t see Admech doing that well amongst the rest of the pack.

Anyone got an idea of what a competitive Admech list looks like aside from clearing the shelf and purchasing a car load of breachers?

Aside from the obvious problems with our 8th codex(poor units and terrible relics/warlord traits etc) what do you all think the army needs when it gets a refresh

Admech has done pretty well, but the majority has been mostly Breacher spam. That being said, something like Rickard Nilsson's list avoided Breachers and did place 3rd in the Hanseatic Open which had 101 players: https://www.40kstats.com/top-4s

 Techpriest_ wrote:
2.) Correct me if I'm wrong, but doesn't everyone benefit from the canticle? As I understood it, all units benefit from a canticle as long as you chose to replace it, but the stratagem, dogma, and certain abilities like Cawl's rerolls are locked to a Forge World. I also agree about the Dominus point, and I could have mentioned it but the following parts of the series are intended to go into each unit type (HQ, Troops, etc) in more depth than covered in the Forge World section.

Mars Canticle only affects Mars units. So the idea is that you pick Canticles based on what you intend to do that turn. I usually do Mars/Shroudpsalm, RR1s to hit, Mars/Shroudpsalm.

 Techpriest_ wrote:

Good point on the Luminary buff, and what makes Expansionist good for the Raider splash? I haven't seen it too often yet so I haven't given it too much thought, and the list that placed in a top 4 that did it ran Lucius raider spam next to Knights.

Expansionist + Rugged explorators allows your raiders to advance and fire at no penalty and if they charge or are charged etc get additional AP on their melee. There's quite a few things that benefit from it, Sterylizors, Fulgurites, Ruststalkers are the main beneficiaries, but not really an army-wide benefit like some of the main forgeworlds. If you were going for a melee-centric list it's a good alternative to Ryza and if you're not taking a lot of vehicles Metallica's canticle isn't all that useful so the Expansionist route is better than Metallica's dogma.

corpuscarii, and vanguard also benefit

I cant wait for Hoplites to get the Forgeworld keyword and access to Dogmas. I know they havent got it yet, but i'm projecting positive vibes lol

Trans-node power cores is gonna make them absurd! Though i'm guessing if they do get the keyword they might go up in points slightly.

If Hoplites get the Forgeworld keyword, then Hoplite+Boat spam will be scarier than Breacher spam unless they really neuter them in points.

ap2 on the charge and no penalty to advance and fire would be nice without the boats

U02dah4 wrote:
ap2 on the charge and no penalty to advance and fire would be nice without the boats

Add in an Artisan warlord for mortal wounds in addition against vehicles on a wound roll of 6 as well makes that str 6 and vehicle focus weakness less of an issue as well

Having said that my last Forgeworld purchase was a Knight Styrix, which also used to be pretty awesome...kinda not anymore. They don't appear to have ruined much with the first 2-4 9th books but it's early days given 3 of the first 4 were marine books. We'll see what they do with DG for a better metric of how biased they still are to marines.

hey guys, coming back to admech after a while on orks

does the new Mars canticle let us shoot on the same turn we moved our transuranic snipers and shoot at str8?

 dicerage wrote:
hey guys, coming back to admech after a while on orks

does the new Mars canticle let us shoot on the same turn we moved our transuranic snipers and shoot at str8?

Welcome back !

No it won't work to move and shoot as the rule is written specifically in the weapon sheet. However it'll shoot at S8.

Looks like hoplites are now 12ppm and peltasts are 9ppm, no changes other than them getting a 6" heroic intervention when next to a <titan legion> titanic unit.

I've read that the Termite has become waaaay deadlier too !

Is 3 in a list excessive?

Termites have a base cost of 180 now. Upgraded statline, but it lost the mortal wounds grinder. Press F to pay respects.

On the plus side the Drill did go from D3 shots to 5 shots flat with the Melta weapon and it does D3+3 damage in melee now going up to D3+6 against vehicles.

New video is up as well from my channel, this time we take a deeper dive into HQ choices: https://youtu.be/DSRhQI3sadU

But it also lost 3 of its 6 attacks and went up a lot in points, although going from 2 to 5 melta shots is nothing to laugh at

As a whole though, it's probably too many points now. I know we heard that before with the two Skorpius options, but those went from a must have 3 of, to strong options, whereas the Drill was strong but not mandatory like the Skorpius variants were before the points change.

More so, there's the issue that it's not just a matter of raw points increases but that how much any given unit costs. The Drill is now approaching Cawl in terms of points and comparatively Cawl provides way more to an army than the Drill does. Maybe I'm wrong and it will continue to be a decent choice, as five Melta shots are rather strong, as well as the transport capacity and other abilities.

There is no reason to pay 180 base points just for that stat line. You could get a Stratoraptor for that investment. More durable, more mobile, more firepower at longer range...

180pts is a lot for just a transport. The Termite how ever blurs the line between a transport and a tank. Its like a hyrbid of a Leman Russ with the toughness and the firepower (in shooting and melee). So it all depends on your list really whether it is worth it or not. If you just want a durable vehicle that gets your Skits/Priests into the thick of it, is it more effective at that role than the Dunerider? Or is it shoring up a weakness in your army?

I wouldnt use it for 180pts as a means of transporting my army, id rather have the 2 Duneriders instead. But if my army was lacking some punch, then sure.

I'm pretty disappointed tbh.

Peltasts lose their indirect fire option.
Hoplites go up to 12ppm.
Neither get dogmas.

Styrix goes up to 475, but taking the siege claw and rad cleanser is free. It's stomping feet are now flat 3dmg instead of D3 and the Volkite Chierovile now inflicts 2 MW on a wound of 6 instead of 1

The drill is a mixed bag. Its now too expensive as a pure transport option imo. You almost have to think of it as a Land Raider-sized Dreadnaught thats not quite as good at hitting stuff but can hold 12 infantry in it's belly and deep strike. For 44pts more.

Well, saved me some money at any rate. I think i'd rather take Ruststalkers over Hoplites at 12ppm.