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 Peregrine wrote:

the_scotsman wrote:
..hitting on 2s? You said this was 3 LRBTs, which hit on 4s, or 5s if damaged.

Tank commanders are BS 3+ and aimed fire gives +1 to hit.

Sure. Do Supreme Command detachments exist in Apocalypse (I don't remember seeing them in the detachment list). Is there any detachment that includes 3x HQ slots?

Understand that at the moment, I haven't read all the rules involved here, and you're invoking two separate cards that you've only given a brief summary of and several core rule interactions. Does Aimed Fire apply to all shoot actions you take during the turn, or does the Aimed Fire order give you a shoot action with a +1 to hit or a fight action with -1 to hit? Does the card specify any restrictions beyond models with the LEMAN RUSS keyword, or does it specify as you initially said, Leman Russ Battle Tanks (which is the profile with the 4+ ballistic skill).

Let's assume the pure nightmare scenario: The rules interact in exactly the way you say they do, and my full detachment of Leman Russ Vanquisher/lascannon tank commanders can double tap with 2+BS on turn 1, before you get to tie me up, and I'm playing a low point 100PL game with a big old battalion detachment with 3x tank commanders and 3x infantry squads and that's 48 of my 100pl.

I have a roughly 1% chance of those 2 particular cards appearing in my turn 1 draw assuming I can get 5 draws into my detachment in my 100pl game (not too hard with IG commanders), and I've got a 50% chance of going first before any opposing deep strikers get to possibly close to melee range. If I do draw that perfect combo, I can dish out an enormous 15 blasts from 24 vanquisher shots on average to enemy Heavy units.

That does seem legitimately fairly crazy. 7.5, round it up to 10 extra blasts from 2 cards if you include the lascannon fire.

5 blasts for one card definitely seems like an edge case when you look at some of the other cards we've been shown. Only a 3.6% chance to get 5 or more blasts out of Doombolt. You need 9 units within 6" of a point on the battlefield to deal 5 blasts on average with infernal gateway.

You need to have a particular combination of 3 fairly glass cannon units (12PL for W2 Sv6+ and LD5 seems fairly flimsy for apoc) built one particular way and a combination of two particular cards to achieve an edge case result like that. And while it seems pretty crazy, it doesn't seem head and shoulders higher than other direct damage cards' edge-case results. With the high model counts and clumped formations in apoc, I can see getting 9 units clumped up together within 24" of one of your tzeentch psykers being something that's not totally unheard of.

Damn,

I need to tell my Termies and just about everything else that I don't need to roll for them if they are a 2+ because they are invulnerable!

I also need to tell everyone I play that I can't fail with rolling ones because Xenomancer said so.

Its a good thing my Termies can't fail because with 2 wounds even 1 wound would make them suck.......wew!

the_scotsman wrote:
I have a roughly 1% chance of those 2 particular cards appearing in my turn 1 draw assuming I can get 5 draws into my detachment in my 100pl game (not too hard with IG commanders)

This is the important part of why it's a bad, if not unbalanced, mechanic. First of all, it's more than a 1% chance. You have about a 2% chance of getting both cards in your opening hand of five cards assuming blind draws, but then you also have to consider the fact that there are two cards (Inspired Tactics and Strategic Brilliance) that let you search for any card you want. Now you're up to a 40% chance of drawing either card, and a 14.5% chance of drawing both. That takes it well out of the realm of "never going to happen" and into "does RNG say I win or not". And if you consider a second-turn attack a valid threat...

Of course the dual card combo is pretty theoretical when in reality if you're making an Armageddon list you aren't wasting your stratagem on a squadron of LRBTs. You're taking a whole detachment full of artillery or LoW. For example, if you think you can get within 30" 5x Macharius Vulcan will give you 40 free shots, delivering 22 blast markers against infantry or 15.5 against anything else. Or maybe let's take some Baneswords with 70" rapid fire range. 20 free attacks, for 22 blast makers against vehicles or 13 against infantry (isn't Destroyer great?) plus whatever the secondary weapons get you. Or I suppose if you really hate the idea of being out of range you could buy 18 Basilisks (with 3x masters of ordnance to buff them and add more artillery) and drop 21 free artillery shots anywhere on the table. Less firepower, but shrug, at least there's nowhere to hide.

With the high model counts and clumped formations in apoc, I can see getting 9 units clumped up together within 24" of one of your tzeentch psykers being something that's not totally unheard of.

Sure. And IG also have an artillery barrage stratagem that drops a blast marker on everything within 12" on a 9+. Not a bad consolation prize if RNG gives you that one instead of buffing your artillery parking lot. Which is really demonstrating the problem, some of the effects are absurdly powerful and some of them are pretty weak. And it's pure RNG whether you get an opening salvo of powerful assets or a bunch of filler you had to take to bring your deck up to 30 cards.

 Peregrine wrote:

the_scotsman wrote:
I have a roughly 1% chance of those 2 particular cards appearing in my turn 1 draw assuming I can get 5 draws into my detachment in my 100pl game (not too hard with IG commanders)

This is the important part of why it's a bad, if not unbalanced, mechanic. First of all, it's more than a 1% chance. You have about a 2% chance of getting both cards in your opening hand of five cards assuming blind draws, but then you also have to consider the fact that there are two cards (Inspired Tactics and Strategic Brilliance) that let you search for any card you want. Now you're up to a 40% chance of drawing either card, and a 14.5% chance of drawing both. That takes it well out of the realm of "never going to happen" and into "does RNG say I win or not". And if you consider a second-turn attack a valid threat...

Of course the dual card combo is pretty theoretical when in reality if you're making an Armageddon list you aren't wasting your stratagem on a squadron of LRBTs. You're taking a whole detachment full of artillery or LoW. For example, if you think you can get within 30" 5x Macharius Vulcan will give you 40 free shots, delivering 22 blast markers against infantry or 15.5 against anything else. Or maybe let's take some Baneswords with 70" rapid fire range. 20 free attacks, for 22 blast makers against vehicles or 13 against infantry (isn't Destroyer great?) plus whatever the secondary weapons get you. Or I suppose if you really hate the idea of being out of range you could buy 18 Basilisks (with 3x masters of ordnance to buff them and add more artillery) and drop 21 free artillery shots anywhere on the table. Less firepower, but shrug, at least there's nowhere to hide.

With the high model counts and clumped formations in apoc, I can see getting 9 units clumped up together within 24" of one of your tzeentch psykers being something that's not totally unheard of.

Sure. And IG also have an artillery barrage stratagem that drops a blast marker on everything within 12" on a 9+. Not a bad consolation prize if RNG gives you that one instead of buffing your artillery parking lot. Which is really demonstrating the problem, some of the effects are absurdly powerful and some of them are pretty weak. And it's pure RNG whether you get an opening salvo of powerful assets or a bunch of filler you had to take to bring your deck up to 30 cards.

Have you actually played a game of Apocalypse, or is this just theory?

So wait....the big complaint is that there is a chance that someone can get a powerful first turn and destroy a lot?

I am confused, for three reasons:

1 - I am always confused!

2 - Isn't this the very same condition in every table top game out there.

3.- If you removed the cards and then someone rolls really well while the opponent rolls poorly, don't you have the same problem with a first turn wipe out?

I say grow a pair and stop whining about every gosh darned angle of every game on Earth! Jeeez! :-)

Having given it a read-through, it does seem like there are a few command asset cards that are a little nutty when scaled up to monster - size detachments. Like if you cram a harlequin detachment with like 120pl of harlequins and get the Prismatic Blur card, gak gets dumb.

One thing to consider though is that there is a blanket rule against using a card before another card is fully resolved, and free actions are not affected by the modifiers granted by orders, most notably Aimed Fire. So some of the combo potential is limited. That Armageddon strat is truly goofy when applied to bane blades though.

If my biggest complaint about the cards can be that they seem inordinately stacked towards giant over the top army detachments and superheavies in an apocalypse game....well....

I think if you want to play small games of Apoc, maybe try to play with either a very limited card set or drop the mechanic. If you only have 100pl in 2 detachments and uou get the "oops I'm changing your detachments order trololol" card, you're gonna have a bad time.

I like the action resolution/reduced fldowntime, LOVE the terrain and ditching of almost all TLOS crap, like the damage mechanic and I'm pretty lukewarm on the cards.

 Da-Rock wrote:
3.- If you removed the cards and then someone rolls really well while the opponent rolls poorly, don't you have the same problem with a first turn wipe out?

You do, but the odds of having dice luck skew that much are greatly reduced by the number of dice rolled and completely one-sided games become an extreme outlier. The Apocalypse CCG has a small number of RNG events with disproportionately large impact and therefore games being decided by luck will be much more common.

I say grow a pair and stop whining about every gosh darned angle of every game on Earth! Jeeez! :-)

I see, so apparently in the thread asking about balance issues the only acceptable answer is "GW is perfect and everything is great".

 Peregrine wrote:


I see, so apparently in the thread asking about balance issues the only acceptable answer is "GW is perfect and everything is great".

Yeah that would seem to be the case so far



Tell me more about the stuff removing terrain, this sounds like that short lived marine expansion with the insane psychic powers that let you move terrain with models on it. The garrisoning terrain thing seems like a pretty limited concept unless infantry like garrisoning a cactus's when ruins aren't available.

I remember playing dropzone commander and while the game was ok the cards really did just mess things up and really detracted from the games they were used in. That and alternating activation is overrated and honestly really complicated when the equiv of formations were spread out all over the board.

 Crablezworth wrote:
Tell me more about the stuff removing terrain

It's specific assets, not a general rule. There may be others, but the Demolitions asset has you treat a single terrain feature as a superheavy transport for that turn and if it has 3+ large blast markers at the end of the turn the terrain is removed and any units garrisoning it must leave as if disembarking from a destroyed transport. So it's a one-time thing that requires you to draw the card and commit non-trivial resources to destroying the terrain, and it lets the unit(s) using the terrain continue to do so for the rest of the turn and then get a chance to react on the following turn before you can blow them away (if you choose to activate them early). I think it's a thematic option that probably won't be a balance issue, especially compared to other assets.

 Peregrine wrote:

 Crablezworth wrote:
Tell me more about the stuff removing terrain

It's specific assets, not a general rule. There may be others, but the Demolitions asset has you treat a single terrain feature as a superheavy transport for that turn and if it has 3+ large blast markers at the end of the turn the terrain is removed and any units garrisoning it must leave as if disembarking from a destroyed transport. So it's a one-time thing that requires you to draw the card and commit non-trivial resources to destroying the terrain, and it lets the unit(s) using the terrain continue to do so for the rest of the turn and then get a chance to react on the following turn before you can blow them away (if you choose to activate them early). I think it's a thematic option that probably won't be a balance issue, especially compared to other assets.

I'm always weary of anything like that because it's untenable for any board with fixed terrain elements like some of the cooler boards at warhammer world. Glad it's no a core thing.

 Crablezworth wrote:
I'm always weary of anything like that because it's untenable for any board with fixed terrain elements like some of the cooler boards at warhammer world. Glad it's no a core thing.

Yeah, it's a minor thing. And TBH if you have fixed terrain elements you could just say "this is destroyed, no more units may enter it and we'll pretend it doesn't block LOS" as a solution. It's not perfect, but it's probably good enough in the rare case where someone really wants to destroy a particular terrain feature.

Suffice to say the data sheets need massive overhaul, just judging by the Eldar alone. For example there's no reason to take a Scatter Laser when a Missile Launcher is better in every way. The Autarch doesn't even have a pistol at 5PL? Warlocks probably need the "Character" keyword.

Just to name a few...

Warlocks for sure do not need the character keyword.

What would a pistol do? There are no rules for pistols.

The scatter laser thing is an issue I have seen on any unit that has that many options. Too many options not enough design space. Just take the missiles and carry on.

 Crablezworth wrote:

 Peregrine wrote:


I see, so apparently in the thread asking about balance issues the only acceptable answer is "GW is perfect and everything is great".

Yeah that would seem to be the case so far



Tell me more about the stuff removing terrain, this sounds like that short lived marine expansion with the insane psychic powers that let you move terrain with models on it. The garrisoning terrain thing seems like a pretty limited concept unless infantry like garrisoning a cactus's when ruins aren't available.

I remember playing dropzone commander and while the game was ok the cards really did just mess things up and really detracted from the games they were used in. That and alternating activation is overrated and honestly really complicated when the equiv of formations were spread out all over the board.

It's a problem of time.
Before at least 3 months have passed, any discussion about balance is void.
"But math!!! You don't need time when math is obvious!!!"... no. This mantra has been repeated many times, in many threads, in many games, in many editions. It turns out to be false most of the time.
Even in the rumors thread of apoc there where those that said "X, Y and Z are obviously OP, you don't even need to play the game! The math is so obvious!! GW designers suck!!11!!" and they were proven wrong no less than 2 hours later.

So, take your time, it could possibly be that the cards are a bit too swingy, but for now we cannot tell, even if it seems obvious.

Spoletta wrote:
It's a problem of time.
Before at least 3 months have passed, any discussion about balance is void.
"But math!!! You don't need time when math is obvious!!!"... no. This mantra has been repeated many times, in many threads, in many games, in many editions. It turns out to be false most of the time.
Even in the rumors thread of apoc there where those that said "X, Y and Z are obviously OP, you don't even need to play the game! The math is so obvious!! GW designers suck!!11!!" and they were proven wrong no less than 2 hours later.

So, take your time, it could possibly be that the cards are a bit too swingy, but for now we cannot tell, even if it seems obvious.

Disagree strongly. In some cases it's very obvious that two things are not balanced because the math is so blatantly in favor of one of them. To give an obvious example a LR Executioner has zero reason to exist and a standard LRBT is better in every conceivable situation. You don't need experience to know that GW screwed up the math and made the battle cannon strictly better than the plasma cannon. You don't need experience to know that the LR Vanquisher is, while not better in every conceivable way, vastly better against vehicles in a game where vehicles are the dominant threat and only slightly less effective against infantry because GW apparently doesn't understand that having twice the number of shots makes up for the poor SAP. The various options are so similar except for the math differences that the only thing that matters is the math.

Likewise, it doesn't take a ton of playtesting to realize that shooting twice with an entire IG artillery parking lot is better than getting to re-roll 1s to hit. It doesn't take a ton of playtesting to look at the IG datasheets, do the math on what guns will be shooting twice, and see that dropping 20+ blast markers on stuff is vastly out of line with the effects of most other cards. And this is not a case of rumor threads where we're trying to do analysis on blurry pictures of half the rules, we have the full rules for Apocalypse available and there is nothing left hidden that could change the analysis.

Surely this is just the to be expected GW level of well this effect sounds perfectly fluffy add to game without actually having considered the extent to which is can be gamed.

The reason that LR tanks overlap so much is because GW have gone overboard with trivial different versions that left 0 design space to differentiate between the options.

This may also be that they are trying to resolve issues from 40k in Apocolyse ie vanquishers in 40k never seen tables, atleast now they have a game system in which they are worth playing.

 Peregrine wrote:

Spoletta wrote:
It's a problem of time.
Before at least 3 months have passed, any discussion about balance is void.
"But math!!! You don't need time when math is obvious!!!"... no. This mantra has been repeated many times, in many threads, in many games, in many editions. It turns out to be false most of the time.
Even in the rumors thread of apoc there where those that said "X, Y and Z are obviously OP, you don't even need to play the game! The math is so obvious!! GW designers suck!!11!!" and they were proven wrong no less than 2 hours later.

So, take your time, it could possibly be that the cards are a bit too swingy, but for now we cannot tell, even if it seems obvious.

Disagree strongly. In some cases it's very obvious that two things are not balanced because the math is so blatantly in favor of one of them. To give an obvious example a LR Executioner has zero reason to exist and a standard LRBT is better in every conceivable situation. You don't need experience to know that GW screwed up the math and made the battle cannon strictly better than the plasma cannon. You don't need experience to know that the LR Vanquisher is, while not better in every conceivable way, vastly better against vehicles in a game where vehicles are the dominant threat and only slightly less effective against infantry because GW apparently doesn't understand that having twice the number of shots makes up for the poor SAP. The various options are so similar except for the math differences that the only thing that matters is the math.

Likewise, it doesn't take a ton of playtesting to realize that shooting twice with an entire IG artillery parking lot is better than getting to re-roll 1s to hit. It doesn't take a ton of playtesting to look at the IG datasheets, do the math on what guns will be shooting twice, and see that dropping 20+ blast markers on stuff is vastly out of line with the effects of most other cards. And this is not a case of rumor threads where we're trying to do analysis on blurry pictures of half the rules, we have the full rules for Apocalypse available and there is nothing left hidden that could change the analysis.

I heard the same exact argument that you are making now in many many other cases, as i told you.

It may seem absolutely obvious now, doesn't mean that it will prove to be true.

I do agree though that GW put herself in a bind spot with some of those weapons, simply not enough design space to represent them all correctly.
Should have gone the way of the tyranids, instead of trying to represent all weapon choices on a warrior she went "Generic Ranged weapons" and "Generic melee weapons". I prefer it that way.

Spoletta wrote:
It may seem absolutely obvious now, doesn't mean that it will prove to be true.

Could you provide some ideas about what missing information would make "remove a Warhound titan from the table" a balanced effect for a single card? Because that's the kind of firepower buff you're talking about with that card, from the extra shots alone. The detachment's normal shooting is another 20+ blast markers.

Spoletta wrote:

 Peregrine wrote:

Spoletta wrote:
It's a problem of time.
Before at least 3 months have passed, any discussion about balance is void.
"But math!!! You don't need time when math is obvious!!!"... no. This mantra has been repeated many times, in many threads, in many games, in many editions. It turns out to be false most of the time.
Even in the rumors thread of apoc there where those that said "X, Y and Z are obviously OP, you don't even need to play the game! The math is so obvious!! GW designers suck!!11!!" and they were proven wrong no less than 2 hours later.

So, take your time, it could possibly be that the cards are a bit too swingy, but for now we cannot tell, even if it seems obvious.

Disagree strongly. In some cases it's very obvious that two things are not balanced because the math is so blatantly in favor of one of them. To give an obvious example a LR Executioner has zero reason to exist and a standard LRBT is better in every conceivable situation. You don't need experience to know that GW screwed up the math and made the battle cannon strictly better than the plasma cannon. You don't need experience to know that the LR Vanquisher is, while not better in every conceivable way, vastly better against vehicles in a game where vehicles are the dominant threat and only slightly less effective against infantry because GW apparently doesn't understand that having twice the number of shots makes up for the poor SAP. The various options are so similar except for the math differences that the only thing that matters is the math.

Likewise, it doesn't take a ton of playtesting to realize that shooting twice with an entire IG artillery parking lot is better than getting to re-roll 1s to hit. It doesn't take a ton of playtesting to look at the IG datasheets, do the math on what guns will be shooting twice, and see that dropping 20+ blast markers on stuff is vastly out of line with the effects of most other cards. And this is not a case of rumor threads where we're trying to do analysis on blurry pictures of half the rules, we have the full rules for Apocalypse available and there is nothing left hidden that could change the analysis.

I heard the same exact argument that you are making now in many many other cases, as i told you.

It may seem absolutely obvious now, doesn't mean that it will prove to be true.

I do agree though that GW put herself in a bind spot with some of those weapons, simply not enough design space to represent them all correctly.
Should have gone the way of the tyranids, instead of trying to represent all weapon choices on a warrior she went "Generic Ranged weapons" and "Generic melee weapons". I prefer it that way.

Yeah. I am super happy with my nid wargear. My models are all wysiwyg and super customizable without having to nit pick wargear. Win Win.

 Lance845 wrote:
Warlocks for sure do not need the character keyword.

What would a pistol do? There are no rules for pistols.

The scatter laser thing is an issue I have seen on any unit that has that many options. Too many options not enough design space. Just take the missiles and carry on.

Warlocks are 3 points for 1 model, the argument can be made for character keyword, too early to tell though.

A pistol would just be another weapon in this case, so it would do whatever it's stats would say it does, no extra rules. But it doesn't have to be a pistol, I'm just saying the guy is walking around a battlefield without a gun, even his jetbike doesn't have one...

Not sure what you mean about the options, but the Scatter Laser stats make no sense, it should have 2 attacks or something. Yes I will take missiles, thank you, but that wasn't the point...

 Peregrine wrote:

Spoletta wrote:
It may seem absolutely obvious now, doesn't mean that it will prove to be true.

Could you provide some ideas about what missing information would make "remove a Warhound titan from the table" a balanced effect for a single card? Because that's the kind of firepower buff you're talking about with that card, from the extra shots alone. The detachment's normal shooting is another 20+ blast markers.

I can think of quite a few scenarios where that armageddon card is straight out bad.

For example, the one i find more likely is that we discover with experience that competitive IG plays with multiple small detachments to maximize the production of cards, because many cards are better than few cards used on big detachments. So all cards that require a big detachment become automatically bad.

See? It was easy.

I think certain command cards are a legitimate issue, but I think throwing out the command card mechanic in response is tossing the baby out with the bathwater and I don't think the game will function the same without them.

For one thing, Psykers are inextricably tied to command cards. Units pay for the privilege of being psykers and their cards are going to be a significant amount of their damage output. Rubrics just look straight up bad compared to other units for their cost until you realize you can dump witchfires out of every small squad you've got.

For another, Perri, you noted the low deadliness of the game overall which I think is intended to work with the cards. A huge percentage of cards fall in the "Deals 1-3 extra blasts normally, 4-5 blasts if you hit a great use case" category. A few like Prismatic Blur and the Armageddon card create problems usually owing to the fact that they can theoretically scale up to enormous effects to an entire detachment.

I think a smarter course of action is, if you're already going the houserule route because you're a CAAC whinelord who has to change the rules because you're bad at winning the game (Sorry Perri, I couldn't resist) you should just identify which cards are clear mathmatical outliers, and remove them until GW rebalances them.

Some cards are definitely better than others, but for the most part they seem balanced on the basis of applicability: Subfaction limited cards are slightly more powerful because they may be only limited to a single detachment your opponent could kill. Ditto for psychic powers, your opponent could just shoot your psykers. The faction-specific cards are for the most part very on-par or often identical to generic cards.

 Peregrine wrote:

This is the important part of why it's a bad, if not unbalanced, mechanic. First of all, it's more than a 1% chance. You have about a 2% chance of getting both cards in your opening hand of five cards assuming blind draws, but then you also have to consider the fact that there are two cards (Inspired Tactics and Strategic Brilliance) that let you search for any card you want. Now you're up to a 40% chance of drawing either card, and a 14.5% chance of drawing both. That takes it well out of the realm of "never going to happen" and into "does RNG say I win or not". And if you consider a second-turn attack a valid threat...

Of course the dual card combo is pretty theoretical when in reality if you're making an Armageddon list you aren't wasting your stratagem on a squadron of LRBTs. You're taking a whole detachment full of artillery or LoW. For example, if you think you can get within 30" 5x Macharius Vulcan will give you 40 free shots, delivering 22 blast markers against infantry or 15.5 against anything else. Or maybe let's take some Baneswords with 70" rapid fire range. 20 free attacks, for 22 blast makers against vehicles or 13 against infantry (isn't Destroyer great?) plus whatever the secondary weapons get you. Or I suppose if you really hate the idea of being out of range you could buy 18 Basilisks (with 3x masters of ordnance to buff them and add more artillery) and drop 21 free artillery shots anywhere on the table. Less firepower, but shrug, at least there's nowhere to hide.

With regards to the basilisk bit, 18 basilisks + 3 MoOs is 141 power into a single detachment which is worthless in melee - for that cost it'd better do something spectacular. If someone wants to take something like that I suspect it's their funeral, even if the shooting is impressive. Incidentally though, unless I'm miscalculating I reckon that, using aimed fire for 3 MoO blasts at 2+, 36 earthshaker cannon shots at 3+ reroll 1's and 36 heavy bolter shots at 3+, you get (rounding up to be generous) 28 blast templates, which is 14 large blasts. That's 13 after void shields and a warhound has a 5+ save, so will save one third of those, so takes 8.67 wounds on average. So, if you take a ridiculously unbalanced detachment which eats as much power as a decked out Reaver Titan, get the ideal cards and then fire at a Warhound, you can almost take of 3 quarters of it's health. That's... not impressive at all. Sure, you can do it from outside line of sight but also they can take 2 Titans with change for the same cost.

Macharius Vulcans do better cost wise, at only 105 power, so a mere 1.75 times the cost of a Warhound. If they used aimed fire, you switch both heavy stubbers out for the heavy bolters because they're strict upgrades and you fire from stationary, I think you get 20 heavy bolter shots at 3+, 20 twin stubber shots at 3+ and 80 vulcan shots at 3+. That gives you 39 blast templates, 38 after void shields so hurray! You actually kill a Warhound. And all you needed was perfect card draws, the enemy to set up in range, you to not move and to take 105 points of units that will still die in melee.

So, while there's no doubt its a strong combo, I have my doubts that it's actually an issue. I think for the cost I would rather take 4 knights which have less impressive shooting, but don't die to melee. or, if you particularly hated life, 52 tarantula sentry guns with twin lascannons for 104 lascannon shots a turn. There are several balance issues with Apoc, but I really don't think these scenarios are one of them.

Main one I worry about is Space Marine soup vs Others.

This of course applies predominantly in multiplayer games, and it's based on the Command Card things.

See, if one side is predominantly Astartes, and the opponents a hodge podge of Chaos and Xenos, the Astartes have a distinct Deck Building Advantage. Simply put, whether or not they go for Chapter Specific ones, it's harder for them as a collective to end up with duff cards which might only benefit a single player, compared to the Hodge Podge Alliance.

Only way I can think round that is to veto specific cards for the side with the advantage - or for their deck to be created randomly, rather than hand selected.

 Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote:
Main one I worry about is Space Marine soup vs Others.

This of course applies predominantly in multiplayer games, and it's based on the Command Card things.

See, if one side is predominantly Astartes, and the opponents a hodge podge of Chaos and Xenos, the Astartes have a distinct Deck Building Advantage. Simply put, whether or not they go for Chapter Specific ones, it's harder for them as a collective to end up with duff cards which might only benefit a single player, compared to the Hodge Podge Alliance.

Only way I can think round that is to veto specific cards for the side with the advantage - or for their deck to be created randomly, rather than hand selected.

I mean...do they, though?

Iirc there are a couple generic astartes cards and powers, but not many, and many are VERY close to generic cards if not identical which you could use with your hodgepodge.

Honor the Chapter, Only in Death, and hunter killer missile or whatever aren't particularly bonkers cards even compared to stuff like Look out Sir, go to ground or vox net subverted which anyone can take and use.

And I think thats important. The more generic a card is the weaker it is unless it's something everyone is intended to have.

It's still an advantage though.

As we play through it, my concern will either show it be relatively inconsequential, or one to be addressed.

If the latter, a simple 'we as your opponents choose to veto X, Y and Z' or 'you'll just have to shuffle your collection, then draw your deck at random' should be enough to mitigate

 Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote:
It's still an advantage though.

As we play through it, my concern will either show it be relatively inconsequential, or one to be addressed.

If the latter, a simple 'we as your opponents choose to veto X, Y and Z' or 'you'll just have to shuffle your collection, then draw your deck at random' should be enough to mitigate

The way I see it, it's only an advantage if you can demonstrate that a card you get access to is significantly stronger than a generic card. I don't have all 400 of my cards in front of me, but I believe there was no generic astartes, imperium, heretic astartes or chaos card that looked significantly stronger than the base deck of 36 generic "anyone can use" apocalypse cards.

Psychic powers IMO are always going to be inherently limited, so I'm not really concerned about the 3-4 psychic powers classed as Astartes or Heretic Astartes. Since only 1-2 models per detachment have to stay alive to use them, you're already effectively limiting by a whole tier beyond even sub-faction limited.

If you have stratagem cards roughly balanced on 3 tiers, I think they're alright:

Tier 1: On par with the generic cards, cards that just require you to have any full detachments made up of a particular broad faction.

Tier 2: Sub-faction cards, requiring 1+ model with a particular selected subfaction. These are not the highest tier because there's a baked-in "fallback use" of a re-roll on each card, just in case your opponent targets and destroys your models from that subfaction and prevents their primary use.

Tier 3: Psychic powers or cards that require other particular trigger models but don't have fall-back uses. The Gunners, Kill On Sight card mentioned earlier, I'm kind of OK with being a bit more potent than other cards, because if I see a detachment in the enemy army that includes 3 tank commanders I know I want to target those because that card is probably lurking in their deck. Sure, there is a possibility they get a good draw and pull that card, and they get lucky and score 5 blasts off a card which is maybe 30-40% higher than a normal damage card...but it isn't such a crazy gulf that I think "the card is broken if allowed to be in the deck."

The Armageddon card is a pretty serious power outlier in certain detachment configurations, which Peregrine laid out: some of the ultra high range heavy weapons the Guard have, like Basilisks and superheavy guns, where the card effectively just doubles their firepower out of the gate. That's one card I'd definitely look at putting on a ban list if I were making "ITC apocalypse rules" - not because it's always crazy powerful but because it's powerspike case is based just on how you build your list rather than a circumstance that might happen in the game.

The Harlequin card, Prismatic Blur, I'm on the fence about. Harlequins might just be a serious power outlier in their own right, and I won't know for sure until I try them out on the board a few times. A big detachment with 3 ten-man troupes, a shadowseer and a troupe master for 56 power level seems preeeeeetty dang tough to deal with for most opponents and there are several cards you can throw into the deck that give them the ability to slide right into combat unharmed and start smashing things with 16x attacks that wound on 6s rerolling. If I throw Veil of Tears, Twilight Pathways and Prismatic Blur into my deck I've got a REALLY good chance of having something that will prevent them from taking a lot of punishment turn 1, and even if I don't you need to get through -1 to hit, -1 to wound, and 6+ saves always on D12s on a W2 Ld6 unit.

Prismatic Blur is a detachment-wide 17% durability increase. Plenty of factions have 17% or 33% durability increases in the form of detachment-wide Ignore Damage (5+) stratagems, so it feels like maybe the problem would be the units themselves and not the card. But I don't know, I'll need to test and see if that harlequin detachment feels all that crazy to begin with.

I am trying to read and understand the angst over the Phantom, "Balance" issue that everyone complains about.

Games are not balanced if the end result of the game is one player wins and the other loses. A truly balanced game would result in a tie.

I do agree that if some of the cards become an issue then MTG provides a very easy reference on how to deal with that.

My favorite part is that the real anger always comes from the Tourny players who want the game changed for them and they don't care about anyone else. We have a great time playing a game that functions like this one does and I don't require GW to change it to a casual gamers style and shaft the Tourny players....................to be honest, no game system could EVER appease the Tourny players.

 Da-Rock wrote:
I am trying to read and understand the angst over the Phantom, "Balance" issue that everyone complains about.

Games are not balanced if the end result of the game is one player wins and the other loses. A truly balanced game would result in a tie.

I do agree that if some of the cards become an issue then MTG provides a very easy reference on how to deal with that.

My favorite part is that the real anger always comes from the Tourny players who want the game changed for them and they don't care about anyone else. We have a great time playing a game that functions like this one does and I don't require GW to change it to a casual gamers style and shaft the Tourny players....................to be honest, no game system could EVER appease the Tourny players.

This post really confused me at first. Are you suggesting that the game isn't balanced because it's possible for a player to win? Because if so, you're hilariously wrong.

I will say that, yes, all things being equal would result in draws. But this includes skill level, strategy, and (quite literally) the exact same armies. The first two points are where, in a perfect game, you would win or lose the game. The balance issues with 40k and other systems comes from the amount of variation/customization that these games provide. But even if the various factions were perfectly balanced, you'd still see imbalance due to how 40k awards VP.

In short, there's a lot of room for improvement within the 40k system, but even if it was a "perfect" game, you'd still see imbalance because that's kind of the nature of the beast.