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 Aenar wrote:

 Daedalus81 wrote:

 Ordana wrote:

We're past that stage with IH's. We looked at the rules, wondered if it was broken and... reasoned that it very likely is. And now we are starting to get real results that back that up.

And yet they're not from the lists that the internet deemed to be, are they?

Because IH are even more broken than we thought they would be.
Everyone lost their mind on the Iron Father and the Ironstone, but the super-doctrine (reroll 1s and move+shoot heavy with no penalty) is what makes them broken. Take that away and then IH would become the static gunline the internet thought they'd be.
And they would still be broken even then.

Yes on the podcast by fontline gaming it was advised that GW take away all offensive buffs the IHs received, but I also think, just like you, that they would still be broken.

Perhaps if all there offensive buffs (first and foremost moving with no penalty when shooting heavy weapons) were removed AS WELL AS the Ironstone (easier to just remove itn but you could just make it reroll 1s on feel no pain rolls on vehicules within aura range) , then balanced would be restored.

addnid wrote:

 Aenar wrote:

 Daedalus81 wrote:

 Ordana wrote:

We're past that stage with IH's. We looked at the rules, wondered if it was broken and... reasoned that it very likely is. And now we are starting to get real results that back that up.

And yet they're not from the lists that the internet deemed to be, are they?

Because IH are even more broken than we thought they would be.
Everyone lost their mind on the Iron Father and the Ironstone, but the super-doctrine (reroll 1s and move+shoot heavy with no penalty) is what makes them broken. Take that away and then IH would become the static gunline the internet thought they'd be.
And they would still be broken even then.

Yes on the podcast by fontline gaming it was advised that GW take away all offensive buffs the IHs received, but I also think, just like you, that they would still be broken.

Perhaps if all there offensive buffs (first and foremost moving with no penalty when shooting heavy weapons) were removed AS WELL AS the Ironstone (easier to just remove itn but you could just make it reroll 1s on feel no pain rolls on vehicules within aura range) , then balanced would be restored.

Ahh so you want to take the meta straight back to all elder flyers again?
While also fething over IH to be the worst marines again.

What you talk about is not returning balance it is returning the status quo.

As for frontline they just want to protect there itc cash cow because the main thing IH does is show that ITC is the issue. If you play the game as intended with real objectives IH's have issues as the castle is too static and flyer spam struggles with objectives so a more balanced force is needed.
However IH are the hard counter to ITC in which in most cases all that matters is tabling your opponent as quickly as possible, most armies are designed around dmg output almost exclusively and when the run into an army that cannot table in a couple of turns hilarity breaks out.
That they also destroy spam lists like elder flyers is just a bonus, go watch a few battle reports if you don't believe me theres a couple linked in these forums.

A mech Harli and CW elder army wins easily by playing the objectives and tying up the all ready static IH castle, where in another a RG army goes balls to the wall trying to kill a repulsor blob and because its itc just feeds the IH player VP despite the blob being in a limited position to shoot or actually do anything.

It just seems to me that a lot of people don't want to adapt from the ITC mind set of kill everything turn 1 to having to play the game.

Many players have never opened the CA18 mission section, since their local scene is all ITC.

The same can be said for CA18 players though, many never actually played an ITC game and only suppose how it works from the ruleset.

Imagine changing:
- IH super-doctrine to: re-roll 1s to hit when stationary (while in Dev Doctrine)
- Ironstone: max 1 target per turn
- Character Dreadnought stratagem: max 1 per game
- double repair stratagem: on unit not already repaired this turn
- IH Chapter tactic: take away Overwatch on 5s and 6s
- Feirros: up his cost to 150-160

This would bring them down a bit while still making them very good.
You’d have a Chapter with:
- FnP 6+ across the board
- double wounds on damage chart
- reroll 1s to hit when stationary and -1 Ap on Heavy weapons while in Dev Doctrine (basically all game anyway)
- 5++ area thanks to a very good character (Feirros), albeit correctly costed
- same psychic powers as now
- basically same stratagems as now (two exceptions stated above)
- access to the widest range of miniatures, both GW and FW (Space Marines)
- access to the widest pool of stratagems, relics, WT, options, etc (Space Marines)
- etcetera

Iron Hands would still be very good imho.

 Burnage wrote:

 Nitro Zeus wrote:

 Burnage wrote:

 Daedalus81 wrote:

 Ordana wrote:


We're past that stage with IH's. We looked at the rules, wondered if it was broken and... reasoned that it very likely is. And now we are starting to get real results that back that up.

And yet they're not from the lists that the internet deemed to be, are they?

Quite a lot of the tournament winning lists from this weekend alone used Repulsors and Leviathans, which were the units everyone was theory crafting to be A Problem. It was really only Battle for Salvation that didn't see them do well.

Not a SINGLE event of the many that were won by Iron Hands over the weekend, were won by a list with a Leviathan in.

24 Adeptus Astartes lists placed highly over the weekend. That's 72 possible slots for Leviathans. Out of those 72 slots, ONE list took ONE single dread - and placed at the very bottom of recorded lists for it's event.


So no, it wasn't just BFS and no the theorycraft did not measure up. Repulsors were played, yes, but also in less than half the lists so they didn't match the hype, but if we are going to base our opinion on the results then the theoryhammer was definitely wrong about Leviathans.

Stop propagating misinformation. This stuff is so easy to look up before you speak.

The first place list in the Michigan GT this weekend had a Leviathan in it? I'll admit they didn't make anywhere near as many appearances as Repulsors and they certainly weren't universal, but they were present.

You’re right, that’s the one single leviathan I was talking about in all those SM lists. Your post implies the forum was right about their predictions concerning Leviathans dominating the game but I cannot for the life of me see how. Repulsors were the wave and even that Leviathan list had two of them.

JFC, let it go! It was never solely about Leviathans, it was just one obvious example of brokennness. People pointed out other builds as well. Repulsors were often mentioned, as well as flyers. I specifically said IH do not need to be immobile, that was just one build among many and they could play mobile if needed. The truth is that IH rules massively benefit a wide variety of units.

SeanDrake wrote:

addnid wrote:

 Aenar wrote:

 Daedalus81 wrote:

 Ordana wrote:

We're past that stage with IH's. We looked at the rules, wondered if it was broken and... reasoned that it very likely is. And now we are starting to get real results that back that up.

And yet they're not from the lists that the internet deemed to be, are they?

Because IH are even more broken than we thought they would be.
Everyone lost their mind on the Iron Father and the Ironstone, but the super-doctrine (reroll 1s and move+shoot heavy with no penalty) is what makes them broken. Take that away and then IH would become the static gunline the internet thought they'd be.
And they would still be broken even then.

Yes on the podcast by fontline gaming it was advised that GW take away all offensive buffs the IHs received, but I also think, just like you, that they would still be broken.

Perhaps if all there offensive buffs (first and foremost moving with no penalty when shooting heavy weapons) were removed AS WELL AS the Ironstone (easier to just remove itn but you could just make it reroll 1s on feel no pain rolls on vehicules within aura range) , then balanced would be restored.

Ahh so you want to take the meta straight back to all elder flyers again?
While also fething over IH to be the worst marines again.

What you talk about is not returning balance it is returning the status quo.

As for frontline they just want to protect there itc cash cow because the main thing IH does is show that ITC is the issue. If you play the game as intended with real objectives IH's have issues as the castle is too static and flyer spam struggles with objectives so a more balanced force is needed.
However IH are the hard counter to ITC in which in most cases all that matters is tabling your opponent as quickly as possible, most armies are designed around dmg output almost exclusively and when the run into an army that cannot table in a couple of turns hilarity breaks out.
That they also destroy spam lists like elder flyers is just a bonus, go watch a few battle reports if you don't believe me theres a couple linked in these forums.

A mech Harli and CW elder army wins easily by playing the objectives and tying up the all ready static IH castle, where in another a RG army goes balls to the wall trying to kill a repulsor blob and because its itc just feeds the IH player VP despite the blob being in a limited position to shoot or actually do anything.

It just seems to me that a lot of people don't want to adapt from the ITC mind set of kill everything turn 1 to having to play the game.

To be fair it's a moving rolling blob supported by flyers so it's hardly like a static gun line.

But I was replying more to address the flyer comment. Maybe the eldar flyers should get toned down as well? Then what would your thoughts of the meta be because something will always be on top or more popular.

 Crimson wrote:
JFC, let it go! It was never solely about Leviathans, it was just one obvious example of brokennness. People pointed out other builds as well. Repulsors were often mentioned, as well as flyers. I specifically said IH do not need to be immobile, that was just one build among many and they could play mobile if needed. The truth is that IH rules massively benefit a wide variety of units.

>Someone says Leviathans won a bunch of events, and it proves that the internet was right in their predictions
>uhhhh no they actually didn't
>"JFC what is WITH you and caring about the truth! It was never ABOUT the Leviathans!"

 Nitro Zeus wrote:

>Someone says Leviathans won a bunch of events, and it proves that the internet was right in their predictions

Who did?

Can....can we move on from that particular topic?

 Crimson wrote:

 Nitro Zeus wrote:

>Someone says Leviathans won a bunch of events, and it proves that the internet was right in their predictions

Who did?

The post that I initially responded to?

Technically Repulsors and/or Leviathans would have been accurate. But the overall predictions were correct.

Your whole stitch of claiming that 'oh, it is just impossible to know anything without tournament results' is just laughable. You can know a lot, and a good (or even a half-decent, really) game designer should.

Now, I can perfectly understand if some specific combos slip past the designers. This sort of thing can happen. Or the balancing is slightly off and requires fine tuning. But anyone with half a brain should see that piling this amount of bonus rules that affect practically every unit in the army would be a problem, and a person who could not see it shouldn't be anywhere near the rules design department.

Look what I found!

 Nitro Zeus wrote:
The funny thing is that the people saying that anchoring around a buff bubble with "unkillable" vehicles might not be a strategy that can actually win events, and people should play it out before whining about it... were entirely correct, based off these results.

Not a single Iron daddy, Leviathan, or Executioner in all those lists that placed high. Iron Hands are still very strong clearly, but not for any of the reasons you guys were complaining about, which is an excellent example of why we should wait to these things hit tournament before changing them, and why mathhammer and theorycrafting isn't equivalent to actual play experience. A the very least you get to know what to ask for changes to, if any, though I still say lets get a bit of a clearer picture first. And yeah, Iron Hands look very strong, but honestly Drukhari was putting up similar results after release and they have a playerbase the fraction of the size of marines.

So, can we please not move that goalpost for another six pages?

 Crimson wrote:
Technically Repulsors and/or Leviathans would have been accurate. But the overall predictions were correct.

Your whole stitch of claiming that 'oh, it is just impossible to know anything without tournament results' is just laughable. You can know a lot, and a good (or even a half-decent, really) game designer should.

Now, I can perfectly understand if some specific combos slip past the designers. This sort of thing can happen. Or the balancing is slightly off and requires fine tuning. But anyone with half a brain should see that piling this amount of bonus rules that affect practically every unit in the army would be a problem, and a person who could not see it shouldn't be anywhere near the rules design department.

They post unmistakably lists Leviathans as one of the units they were right about - they weren’t. It would be just as incorrect if he had said Repulsors and tactical marine squads were winning a bunch of events - you don’t get to list the second part as a correct prediction lol

Game designers should know, because they should play test. The rest of your post isn’t even related to the post you are quoting, you are the person bringing that up, not me? I’m correcting misinformation.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Jidmah wrote:
Look what I found!

 Nitro Zeus wrote:
The funny thing is that the people saying that anchoring around a buff bubble with "unkillable" vehicles might not be a strategy that can actually win events, and people should play it out before whining about it... were entirely correct, based off these results.

Not a single Iron daddy, Leviathan, or Executioner in all those lists that placed high. Iron Hands are still very strong clearly, but not for any of the reasons you guys were complaining about, which is an excellent example of why we should wait to these things hit tournament before changing them, and why mathhammer and theorycrafting isn't equivalent to actual play experience. A the very least you get to know what to ask for changes to, if any, though I still say lets get a bit of a clearer picture first. And yeah, Iron Hands look very strong, but honestly Drukhari was putting up similar results after release and they have a playerbase the fraction of the size of marines.

So, can we please not move that goalpost for another six pages?

What on earth? What part of any of that conflicts with what I’ve said? The initial results hadn’t proved the claims when people were acting like they had. What point are you trying to make here? I even specifically said, if we are basing everything “on these results”, it’s right there in the quote. I already said right next to it that basing everything on a single events results is silly, but if we are going to go down that route, clearly your predictions were wrong. I PERSONALLY said Repulsors were going to be the scariest thing in the dex - what I didn’t do was then look at an event where Repulsors didn’t even place and start trumpeting about how right I was - because that would be a ridiculous thing to do.

Are you alright?

 Crimson wrote:
Technically Repulsors and/or Leviathans would have been accurate. But the overall predictions were correct.

Your whole stitch of claiming that 'oh, it is just impossible to know anything without tournament results' is just laughable. You can know a lot, and a good (or even a half-decent, really) game designer should.

Now, I can perfectly understand if some specific combos slip past the designers. This sort of thing can happen. Or the balancing is slightly off and requires fine tuning. But anyone with half a brain should see that piling this amount of bonus rules that affect practically every unit in the army would be a problem, and a person who could not see it shouldn't be anywhere near the rules design department.

If you had asked the forum last week if 3 Invictors, 9 Eliminators, and 3 Land Speeders could beat IFF, Stalkers, Eliminators, Ironstone, Levi, and Repulsors what do you think they reaction would have been? It's a mirror match - arguments about "IH being too strong" is circular logic.

Now, maybe, it happened because of ITC rules. Or its because the initial concerns were misguided. Or both. Or luck. We just don't really know. So, yes, tournament results START to give us a picture, but a lot of unanswered questions remain.

Thank you, this really shouldn’t be that hard. It’s like people make an early speculative prediction and then leave all sense at the door trying to avoid looking foolish when it doesn’t pan out. Repulsors were proven strong guys, you don’t have to try warp these results into says something they else that they didn’t about the other half of your predictions, just to defend your ego. You don’t get to point at these results and claim THAT proved you right. I actually suspect Leviathans are pretty good as well and will show up more when people work out the correct amount of resources to invest in them and to push the most out of it. But again, that’s another example of where experience will draw a clearer picture

 Aenar wrote:


Iron Hands would still be very good imho.

Wouldn't that just nerf the IH flyer lists, and the more mobile stuff some people run and limit them to castels, because moving anywhere would drop the IH efficiency a lot?

Karol wrote:

 Aenar wrote:


Iron Hands would still be very good imho.

Wouldn't that just nerf the IH flyer lists, and the more mobile stuff some people run and limit them to castels, because moving anywhere would drop the IH efficiency a lot?

Exactly, it would leave SM units untouched but it would address the IH issues on their own.
The IH super-doctrine makes them the most mobile SM chapter, as you can move and shoot with every weapon with no penalty and every model is efficient even on its own, with the natural reroll 1s to hit. Take those away and IH flyer spam is no more and they become an army which needs to choose wheter to shoot well by staying stationary or move to get those objectives. Like basically every other faction.

The problem right now is that they are insanely durable (fluffy-wise it is correct), deadly (thanks to new SM doctrines) and mobile (thanks to the super-doctrine). Out of those three qualities the one I'd address to balance them is mobility.

that would be strange, why have army with draw backs, when there are armies with no draw backs, other then army cost.

Plus this way eldar lists would have no hard counter, and ultramarines would be the better army to play. And I doubt anyone besides people playing those two armies wants that.

Karol wrote:
that would be strange, why have army with draw backs, when there are armies with no draw backs, other then army cost.

What army has no drawbacks?

Bharring wrote:

Karol wrote:
that would be strange, why have army with draw backs, when there are armies with no draw backs, other then army cost.

What army has no drawbacks?

Iron hands apparently.

Karol wrote:
that would be strange, why have army with draw backs, when there are armies with no draw backs, other then army cost.

Plus this way eldar lists would have no hard counter, and ultramarines would be the better army to play. And I doubt anyone besides people playing those two armies wants that.

Chapter masters are a pretty hard counter to flyer lists on their own, going from only hitting on 5+ to roughly a 3.7+ if my quick head maths is right. Doesn't help non marines except that I think eldar are going to have to move away from flyer spam so everyone benefits as a consequence (including eldar imo).

Tips for beating IH from my experiance.
- High volume damage 1 shooting. for example havocs with reaper chain cannons shooting twice with emperors children strat.
- First turn engage. RavenGuard with infiltrators, invictors, aggressors, and smash captains all charging the castle turn 1, can get to the squishy HQs and mess up their plans bad.
- Use terrain to your advantage. Hide early make them move to get line of sight. this is usually enough to get armor outside of 3 inches for the ironstone effect or prevent executioners from double tapping. If you don't have terrain you cant hid at least a dread behind you need better/ more terrain.
- Play maelstrom (rules/ scenarios that IH was tested for) IH castles are not flexible enough to deal with objectives changing every turn without lucky draws. Make sure your list is tactically flexible and you have a huge advantage.
- Pick off support units. For ITC kill the eliminators so they cant score headhunter, kill the engineers to prevent them from scoring. Once all support units are gone its easy to hold more objectives and pull ahead on points.
- Try new things! sticking to the same dread gunline with 2 damage shoots probably won't work anymore. So adjust tactics and change your list or gun load outs. This of course opens you up to being vulnerable to non IH lists, but if your meta is 50% IH does that matter as much?
- List build with ITC secondaries in mind. Have only 3 units with PL 7 to limit options for marked for death, things like that.
- Play to the objectives. the small bubble size means they most likely will be limited to camping 1-2 objectives.
- Flood the field with dudes. This negates the AT fire, and takes advantage of the comparatively low number of shoots the best IH units use. (compared to other marine options)

Maybe just make each Doctrine only work once per game so people stop building entire lists around abusing a single one of them? Or perhaps you have to change to a different Doctrine every turn?

@Siege19
All good advice in general.

But the problem is IH and SM are disruptive to the established meta and design paradigm of the 8E. They are the problem. Nobody else gets so many army-wide buffs and best-in-class relics and WLTs.

If we got rid of Super Doctrines and just let each Marine detachment start as their preferred Doctrine, the world would be at peace.

 Suzuteo wrote:
Maybe just make each Doctrine only work once per game so people stop building entire lists around abusing a single one of them? Or perhaps you have to change to a different Doctrine every turn?

@Siege19
All good advice in general.

But the problem is IH and SM are disruptive to the established meta and design paradigm of the 8E. They are the problem. Nobody else gets so many army-wide buffs and best-in-class relics and WLTs.

Not a terrible idea actually. And then the sttratagem gives them an extra use of their chosen type.

The FAQ's are up - Iron Hands & Raven Guard.

Okay, that totally fixes this.

So clarification that you first divide damage by 2 and then apply -1 (aka the biggest possible reduction) and Character dread is changed to once only.

overal impact, practically 0.

So much for that rumor that GW is scrambling in the wake of a communication mishap. enjoy your IH supremacy.

 Suzuteo wrote:
Maybe just make each Doctrine only work once per game so people stop building entire lists around abusing a single one of them? Or perhaps you have to change to a different Doctrine every turn?

@Siege19
All good advice in general.

But the problem is IH and SM are disruptive to the established meta and design paradigm of the 8E. They are the problem. Nobody else gets so many army-wide buffs and best-in-class relics and WLTs.

Wait, wait, wait, would such a change mean that GK would have baby smite in one turn out of 6, and for 5 turns would have normal smite? I think such a change would actually be funny to expiriance.