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Made in gb
Stubborn White Lion




So everyone brings TAC armies? Yay!
   
Made in dk
Loyal Necron Lychguard






Dai wrote:
So everyone brings TAC armies? Yay!

Nobody does. It doesn't exist. The exact same list, with a different paintjob will do better in one mission than the same army with a different paintjob. Are IF players going to turn down their anti-vehicle to get more melee to get a rounded list? No that would be silly because on average they will have a better chance at winning games and winning tournaments playing to their strengths, rather than trying to fill out their weaknesses. So unless you force everyone to play the same Chapter, the same list then no. It's painful to read that some people think that mission variance will magically bring about TAC lists, that has not been the case in previous GW GTs.
   
Made in au
Owns Whole Set of Skullz Techpriests






Versteckt in den Schatten deines Geistes.

 vict0988 wrote:
Against a predetermined opponent with a predetermined list? Yes. But that is not how tournaments work. Let's say you've determined the players will play CA19 EW1, 3 and 6 in your tournament. Now I arrive, my army might be strong in 1 and 6 and weak in 3, now if I meet up with someone who has a bad matchup into my army in EW1 game 1 I might be favoured, but if I instead meet that same person playing that same army in game 2 playing EW3, then the mission could decide the outcome of that match.
Holy gak dude... that almost sounds like playing the game, where you can't control every situation and expect your army to perform well in every circumstance.

And we can't have that now can we?

Your comments remind me of the type of players who will move their stuff, go around and check all of your LOS, then go back and adjust, come back and check your LOS, and keep doing this until everything is in the perfect position. Sometimes you have to just play the game, and if you make a mistake or something ends up slightly out of position, deal with it. Do what real armed forces do. Adapt.

Industrial Insanity - My Terrain Blog
"GW really needs to understand 'Less is more' when it comes to AoS." - Wha-Mu-077

 
   
Made in de
Ork Admiral Kroozin Da Kosmos on Da Hulk






I haven't had single game of CA2019 or CA2018 where the mission decided the game if both players brought a TAC list.

The only time the mission decides the game for you is when you bring a skew list with no or little troops, characters or mobile units. Which is perfectly fine IMO.

7 Ork facts people always get wrong:
Ragnar did not win against Thrakka, but suffered two crushing defeats within a few days of each other.
A lasgun is powerful enough to sever an ork's appendage or head in a single, well aimed shot.
Orks meks have a better understanding of electrics and mechanics than most Tech Priests.
Orks do not think that purple makes them harder to see. They do think that camouflage does however, without knowing why.
Gharkull Blackfang did not even come close to killing the emperor.
Orks can be corrupted by chaos, but few of them have any interest in what chaos offers.
Orks do not have the power of believe. 
   
Made in dk
Loyal Necron Lychguard






 H.B.M.C. wrote:
 vict0988 wrote:
Against a predetermined opponent with a predetermined list? Yes. But that is not how tournaments work. Let's say you've determined the players will play CA19 EW1, 3 and 6 in your tournament. Now I arrive, my army might be strong in 1 and 6 and weak in 3, now if I meet up with someone who has a bad matchup into my army in EW1 game 1 I might be favoured, but if I instead meet that same person playing that same army in game 2 playing EW3, then the mission could decide the outcome of that match.
Holy gak dude... that almost sounds like playing the game, where you can't control every situation and expect your army to perform well in every circumstance.

And we can't have that now can we?

Your comments remind me of the type of players who will move their stuff, go around and check all of your LOS, then go back and adjust, come back and check your LOS, and keep doing this until everything is in the perfect position. Sometimes you have to just play the game, and if you make a mistake or something ends up slightly out of position, deal with it. Do what real armed forces do. Adapt.

You sound like you should play narrative if you are not concerned with trying to play to the best of your abilities and getting as good at the game as possible. If you knew about my posting history you would know that my one of my favourite mission sets was CA18 Maelstrom because of its unpredictability and being able to just let stuff explode, great for a casual game. But I'm not a one-note anime-character, I like different things at different times. I believe having to react to my opponent's and the inherent randomness of the dice rolls in the game is enough for a competitive game, adding a large chunk of randomness on top with pre-game rolls is too much for me. I was also heavily on the fix going second train until I learned that it is largely balanced in ITC because I perceived it as being too great a deciding factor for games. I still think it's a problem if you don't have end of battle round objectives and you don't play with ITC ruins.
 Jidmah wrote:
I haven't had single game of CA2019 or CA2018 where the mission decided the game if both players brought a TAC list.

The only time the mission decides the game for you is when you bring a skew list with no or little troops, characters or mobile units. Which is perfectly fine IMO.

Considering I have been actively avoiding EW I find it strange that I had one of the few games I played decided by objectives floating in my direction and another game decided by having 15 units against a 5 unit list and in a mission about getting VP for each unit destroyed. Now, you can say Knights aren't TAC, Imperial Fists aren't TAC, BA aren't TAC and end up with such a narrow definition of TAC that you basically have to dictate lists to the players attending your tournament, that's not what I am interested in. I want list and faction diversity and fairly matched games. You can't craft a mission set that incentivises TAC enough that people will wholly ignore the game design GW has implemented which massively favours skew lists. That means more games decided by which mission you happen to be playing when against BA vs when against Orks vs when against Craftworlds.
   
Made in au
Owns Whole Set of Skullz Techpriests






Versteckt in den Schatten deines Geistes.

Did someone just tell me to "Git Gud" at 40k?

Industrial Insanity - My Terrain Blog
"GW really needs to understand 'Less is more' when it comes to AoS." - Wha-Mu-077

 
   
Made in dk
Loyal Necron Lychguard






 H.B.M.C. wrote:
Did someone just tell me to "Git Gud" at 40k?

No, I told you to do whatever you think is fun and it sounds like you want to be bad at the game and play against other people that want to be bad at the game. Checking LOS is kind of basic if you want most of your army to be able to shoot, although knowing you play SM you can get around that with Whirlwinds and TFCs. I don't feel like I am denigrating myself by stooping down and checking LOS if I am not 100% sure it has LOS. I'll often do the same for my opponents to see how many of their models can see and allow my opponent to get an extra shot or two.
   
Made in gb
Regular Dakkanaut



Cymru

Karol wrote:
how is more varied fun? a structure and repentivness are what is good. If two identical armies played in identical ways don't give the same result, just because of random rolls one has no influence on it is the definition of unfun.

It is like losing a match,that went to time twice, to a referee coin toss.


You mean like the LVO semi-final match?

Because if you want to do the maths the chances of that one Intercessor Sargeant killing 4 Shining spears so that the unit could not be wrapped was less than 1%. Pure luck.

If you want repetitive games then go right ahead, why you are not playing chess is a slight mystery to me but you are free to try to make a goofy game of toy soldiers into something repetitive and lacking in surprising outcomes if you like. Count me out - sounds utterly dull to me.

   
Made in de
Ork Admiral Kroozin Da Kosmos on Da Hulk






 vict0988 wrote:
Considering I have been actively avoiding EW I find it strange that I had one of the few games I played decided by objectives floating in my direction

That mission has a roll-off for each of four objectives at the beginning of the battle round and the winning player can move the objectives by up to 3". The objectives are scored at the end of the battle round. You didn't win the mission because the objectives "floated in your direction" (you moved them there), they were decided by your opponent being unable to hold their objectives and you defending them properly. I have literally held those floating objectives with units of pox walkers against an army of eldar jetbikes. The only thing the floating does is forcing heavy weapons to move if they want to keep holding the objective.
Oh, and it also has been replaced in CA2019.

and another game decided by having 15 units against a 5 unit list and in a mission about getting VP for each unit destroyed.

That mission would be "four pillars" which rewards 1VP per battle round for killing more units than your opponent and 1VP for holding more objectives than your opponent, with only troops being able to score. You get 3 VP if you hold all objectives. There is zero advantage for the 5 models list here - since you are most likely lacking troops, the mission will be decided by whether the knights will be able to wipe out the enemy troops fast enough without failing to kill the most units each turn.
In my experience, four pillars is one of the most balanced missions to play, and it's also still around for CA2019.

Now, you can say Knights aren't TAC,

An army bringing with just 5 titanic models with identical strengths and weaknesses is a skew list, and you will lose if the mission that exposes your weaknesses. You literally can't take all comers.
And even then, you have traits and stratagems to capture objectives despite more enemy models sitting on them, and you can prioritize killing objective holders to improve your odds.

Imperial Fists aren't TAC, BA aren't TAC and end up with such a narrow definition of TAC that you basically have to dictate lists to the players attending your tournament, that's not what I am interested in.

https://yourlogicalfallacyis.com/slippery-slope
The requirements for CA2019's missions are:
- You need troops
- You need units that can reach your opponent's deployment zone
- You need some mobile units
- You need 3-4 characters
Neither Imperial Fists nor BA have any trouble building a TAC army. Both have access to literally the largest amount of options in the game, if you fail to build an army that can tackle all six CA missions, that's on you.

I want list and faction diversity and fairly matched games. You can't craft a mission set that incentivises TAC enough that people will wholly ignore the game design GW has implemented which massively favours skew lists.

So you're saying that by playing the missions designed by GW you are not playing the game as GW designed it?

That means more games decided by which mission you happen to be playing when against BA vs when against Orks vs when against Craftworlds.

BA, Orks and Eldar can all build armies which have an equal shot at winning all of those CA missions. Unlike ITC, where orks and BA can't do jack, while eldar rely in skew lists to win.

This message was edited 3 times. Last update was at 2020/02/07 11:06:13


7 Ork facts people always get wrong:
Ragnar did not win against Thrakka, but suffered two crushing defeats within a few days of each other.
A lasgun is powerful enough to sever an ork's appendage or head in a single, well aimed shot.
Orks meks have a better understanding of electrics and mechanics than most Tech Priests.
Orks do not think that purple makes them harder to see. They do think that camouflage does however, without knowing why.
Gharkull Blackfang did not even come close to killing the emperor.
Orks can be corrupted by chaos, but few of them have any interest in what chaos offers.
Orks do not have the power of believe. 
   
Made in gb
Regular Dakkanaut



Cymru

 vict0988 wrote:
Dai wrote:
So everyone brings TAC armies? Yay!

Nobody does. It doesn't exist. The exact same list, with a different paintjob will do better in one mission than the same army with a different paintjob. Are IF players going to turn down their anti-vehicle to get more melee to get a rounded list? No that would be silly because on average they will have a better chance at winning games and winning tournaments playing to their strengths, rather than trying to fill out their weaknesses. So unless you force everyone to play the same Chapter, the same list then no. It's painful to read that some people think that mission variance will magically bring about TAC lists, that has not been the case in previous GW GTs.


You are exactly precisely wrong. I am going to a CA19 tournament tomorrow with my Crimson Fists. Guess what - I am putting in a more diverse set of tools into my list even if that means I lose some of my anti-vehicle brutality. It's no good tabling 2/3 opponents if you do not have the tools to win the third game. So I modify my list to be more TAC because I want to win and because after playing at this store for a couple of years now I have learned how to list-build to win in this format.

The perfect CA19 list is one that can consistently win each game, even if by a narrow margin, by having the tools to play to each of the missions against any likely opponent. That is very much a TAC list. Skew lists are great if you just want to table a couple of opponents and maybe podium.
   
Made in fr
Focused Dark Angels Land Raider Pilot






This may be my ignorance and that I tend to not use slang. But what is a TAC list and a skew list?

To myself You either have a list that it written specifically for the META i.e. ITC missions. Or you write a lists that is well rounded and balanced so it has a better chance of overcoming a varied amount of missions or possibilities (which some could argue thats the point of the game?) i.e. Chapter Approved missions.

Skew lists and TAC lists both seem to get referred to as being negative.

This message was edited 1 time. Last update was at 2020/02/07 11:20:06


5500
2500 
   
Made in ch
The Dread Evil Lord Varlak





TAC: Take all comers.

An Army that is balanced and can take and take on all unit types more or less.

Skew, is the inverse:
There are multiple version but in general Skew relies on spam.
An exemple for a Skew List, is R&H mass Assault, spamming cheap bodies with t3/4 and Morale immunity, attempting to box you in and deny your list targets for specific anti weaponry, in this case tanks.
Vice versa, Knights are on the opposite spectrum of skew, relying on their fully Amored vehicles to ignore all your infantry and anti infantry fire more or less.


Skew lists therefore rely one specific unit type to get the job done . Tac list rely on a balanced list building approach.



This message was edited 2 times. Last update was at 2020/02/07 11:53:35


https://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/list/0/766717.page
A Mostly Renegades and Heretics blog.
GW:"Space marines got too many options to balance, therefore we decided to legends HH units."
Players: "why?!? Now we finally got decent plastic kits and you cut them?"
Chaos marines players: "Since when are Daemonengines 30k models and why do i have NO droppods now?"
GW" MONEY.... erm i meant TOO MANY OPTIONS (to resell your army to you again by disalowing former units)! Do you want specific tyranid fighiting Primaris? Even a new sabotage lieutnant!"
Chaos players: Guess i stop playing or go to HH.  
   
Made in fr
Focused Dark Angels Land Raider Pilot






Not Online!!! wrote:
TAC: Take all comers.

An Army that is balanced and can take and take on all unit types more or less.

Skew, is the inverse:
There are multiple version but in general Skew relies on spam.
An exemple for a Skew List, is R&H mass Assault, spamming cheap bodies with t3/4 and Morale immunity, attempting to box you in and deny your list targets for specific anti weaponry, in this case tanks.
Vice versa, Knights are on the opposite spectrum of skew, relying on their fully Amored vehicles to ignore all your infantry and anti infantry fire more or less.
Skew lists therefore rely one specific unit type to get the job done . Tac list rely on a balanced list building approach.


Thank you this helps me understand comments.

Why do I see some comments then that seem to be stating that TAC lists are bad and you shouldn't have to write TAC lists? In my head the game is designed to write balanced lists that can overcome a varied list of challenges.

This message was edited 1 time. Last update was at 2020/02/07 11:53:14


5500
2500 
   
Made in ch
The Dread Evil Lord Varlak





Simple:

TAC lists are often more liked due to making no army feel obsolete or hard countered. (they are more liked to play against )

Skew lists are either hard counters or hard countered often, makin for not particulary interesting or fun matches.

Skew is therefore in general a lot less liked in the community overall (atleast over here that beeing said dakka also has a rather high competitive streak, not something bad in itself but may taint the perception torwards tac lists, beeing jack off all trades and therefore underperfomring.)

https://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/list/0/766717.page
A Mostly Renegades and Heretics blog.
GW:"Space marines got too many options to balance, therefore we decided to legends HH units."
Players: "why?!? Now we finally got decent plastic kits and you cut them?"
Chaos marines players: "Since when are Daemonengines 30k models and why do i have NO droppods now?"
GW" MONEY.... erm i meant TOO MANY OPTIONS (to resell your army to you again by disalowing former units)! Do you want specific tyranid fighiting Primaris? Even a new sabotage lieutnant!"
Chaos players: Guess i stop playing or go to HH.  
   
Made in dk
Loyal Necron Lychguard






happy_inquisitor wrote:
 vict0988 wrote:
Dai wrote:
So everyone brings TAC armies? Yay!

Nobody does. It doesn't exist. The exact same list, with a different paintjob will do better in one mission than the same army with a different paintjob. Are IF players going to turn down their anti-vehicle to get more melee to get a rounded list? No that would be silly because on average they will have a better chance at winning games and winning tournaments playing to their strengths, rather than trying to fill out their weaknesses. So unless you force everyone to play the same Chapter, the same list then no. It's painful to read that some people think that mission variance will magically bring about TAC lists, that has not been the case in previous GW GTs.


You are exactly precisely wrong. I am going to a CA19 tournament tomorrow with my Crimson Fists. Guess what - I am putting in a more diverse set of tools into my list even if that means I lose some of my anti-vehicle brutality. It's no good tabling 2/3 opponents if you do not have the tools to win the third game. So I modify my list to be more TAC because I want to win and because after playing at this store for a couple of years now I have learned how to list-build to win in this format.

The perfect CA19 list is one that can consistently win each game, even if by a narrow margin, by having the tools to play to each of the missions against any likely opponent. That is very much a TAC list. Skew lists are great if you just want to table a couple of opponents and maybe podium.

Caledonian Uprising, everyone's favourite example of CA19 being better than Champions, but does it promote TAC lists?
Edit: I cannot even keep my own definitions straight. I meant non-skew not TAC.

#1 https://tabletop.to/caledonian-uprising-2020/list/anthony-chew All characters and screens.
#2 https://tabletop.to/caledonian-uprising-2020/list/james-mackenzie No vehicles or monsters, only 3W and 1W Infantry.
#3 https://tabletop.to/caledonian-uprising-2020/list/mani-cheema Possessed bomb, 3 Crawlers, CSM and Nurglings for CP. A balanced list.
#4 https://tabletop.to/caledonian-uprising-2020/list/markus-hinson IF flyer spam with 3x TFC. 5 Tactical Marines for the old-school achievement badge and 10 bolter scouts make up the entirety of the non-heavy weapons.
So what can we conclude? Most of the people that did well at Caledonian Uprising did so with skew lists.

The skew vs TAC thing is kind of complicated because they aren't really opposites. TAC is a term of offensive output, you can build a Knight army that is good vs Knights, one that is good vs Marines or one that is good vs Orks by taking high S medium AP, high AP and high ROF weapons respectively. Those would be counter lists, which is the actual opposite of a TAC list, a TAC list would just be a Knight list that is equally good against Orks, Marines and Knights.

A skew list is mostly in terms of defensive profiles, as other posters have explained you can create a list that can ignore lascannons by not taking any good targets, that's a skew list. The opposite of that isn't exactly TAC, it's more like get destroyed by all comers list since skew is generally effective against TAC because the TAC list will have some weapons that are ineffective against your skew list.
 Jidmah wrote:
 vict0988 wrote:
Imperial Fists aren't TAC, BA aren't TAC and end up with such a narrow definition of TAC that you basically have to dictate lists to the players attending your tournament, that's not what I am interested in.

https://yourlogicalfallacyis.com/slippery-slope
The requirements for CA2019's missions are:
- You need troops
- You need units that can reach your opponent's deployment zone
- You need some mobile units
- You need 3-4 characters
Neither Imperial Fists nor BA have any trouble building a TAC army. Both have access to literally the largest amount of options in the game, if you fail to build an army that can tackle all six CA missions, that's on you.

It's not about being able to win, it's about the mission not creating an unfair advantage to any player in any specific game. Overall both EW and Champions advantages certain armies and lists, that is inevitable. The question is whether an Imperial Fist player would prefer fighting certain opponents in certain missions and what happens when they do vs when they don't. GW missions have in the past given massive advantages to one player over the other based on lists, minimizing the amount of impact the player choices have in the game due to huge impacts from an individual mission being in you or your opponent's favour.

I cut out a bunch of your comment because I didn't like the tone of my intended response and it was ultimately not worth arguing about for me, please bring it back up if you feel it was important to the discussion.
I want list and faction diversity and fairly matched games. You can't craft a mission set that incentivises TAC enough that people will wholly ignore the game design GW has implemented which massively favours skew lists.

So you're saying that by playing the missions designed by GW you are not playing the game as GW designed it?

No, I am saying GW wants skew lists with the rules set in the codexes and supplements, no mission set is going to remove that. I personally don't want what GW wants. I want rainbow or highlander-like lists which is why I think internal balance is important. Necrons are relatively close, Psychic Awakening will probably make Necrons OP and ruin any semblance of internal balance that has been achieved. Allow DDAs to shoot twice or something similarly silly.
That means more games decided by which mission you happen to be playing when against BA vs when against Orks vs when against Craftworlds.

BA, Orks and Eldar can all build armies which have an equal shot at winning all of those CA missions. Unlike ITC, where orks and BA can't do jack, while eldar rely in skew lists to win.

Do you have any stats to back up the fact that every faction and list has an equal chance of winning any of the CA missions, because from a theoretical standpoint it doesn't make sense. You don't have any missions you'd prefer to play vs BA jump spam and maybe another one you'd prefer against IF flyer spam? That seems incredible to me.

This message was edited 4 times. Last update was at 2020/02/07 14:13:30


 
   
Made in fr
Focused Dark Angels Land Raider Pilot






Not Online!!! wrote:
Simple:

TAC lists are often more liked due to making no army feel obsolete or hard countered. (they are more liked to play against )

Skew lists are either hard counters or hard countered often, makin for not particulary interesting or fun matches.

Skew is therefore in general a lot less liked in the community overall (atleast over here that beeing said dakka also has a rather high competitive streak, not something bad in itself but may taint the perception towards tac lists, being jack off all trades and therefore underperfomring.)


So this seems to be a problem with the way people play then? If people know the standard fixed missions before hand then they will write those boring skew lists.

If they want to actually enjoy their games then the TAC lists seem to be the way to go. And to get the most enjoyment out of them play the matched play CA missions which would require same amount if not more skill to be reliably good at.

It seems to me skew lists are good for fixed mission sets and whoever has the biggest wallet to whomever can buy the best skew lists for said mission set. (which i don't know how that sounds enjoyable)

But TAC lists are good for varied mission sets like CA that require skill and on the go thinking and adaptation. And overall seem to get the most out of the hobby.

Least that's how I am understanding it?


5500
2500 
   
Made in de
Ork Admiral Kroozin Da Kosmos on Da Hulk






TAC = take all comers. In this context, a TAC list would one that can reasonably expect to win any of the missions and has tools to handle anything thrown at it - be it vehicles, hordes, elite infantry or planes.

A skew list is a list which overly focuses on one aspect in order to create a rock-paper-scissors scenario, where you aim to get easy wins through list building. Usually this is facilitated with the rock being too powerful or the paper not being viable in the current meta. Examples of this would be pure knights lists, ork green tides, eldar flyer spam or imperial tank companies.

7 Ork facts people always get wrong:
Ragnar did not win against Thrakka, but suffered two crushing defeats within a few days of each other.
A lasgun is powerful enough to sever an ork's appendage or head in a single, well aimed shot.
Orks meks have a better understanding of electrics and mechanics than most Tech Priests.
Orks do not think that purple makes them harder to see. They do think that camouflage does however, without knowing why.
Gharkull Blackfang did not even come close to killing the emperor.
Orks can be corrupted by chaos, but few of them have any interest in what chaos offers.
Orks do not have the power of believe. 
   
Made in ch
The Dread Evil Lord Varlak





 SeanDavid1991 wrote:
Not Online!!! wrote:
Simple:

TAC lists are often more liked due to making no army feel obsolete or hard countered. (they are more liked to play against )

Skew lists are either hard counters or hard countered often, makin for not particulary interesting or fun matches.

Skew is therefore in general a lot less liked in the community overall (atleast over here that beeing said dakka also has a rather high competitive streak, not something bad in itself but may taint the perception towards tac lists, being jack off all trades and therefore underperfomring.)


So this seems to be a problem with the way people play then? If people know the standard fixed missions before hand then they will write those boring skew lists.

If they want to actually enjoy their games then the TAC lists seem to be the way to go. And to get the most enjoyment out of them play the matched play CA missions which would require same amount if not more skill to be reliably good at.

It seems to me skew lists are good for fixed mission sets and whoever has the biggest wallet to whomever can buy the best skew lists for said mission set. (which i don't know how that sounds enjoyable)

But TAC lists are good for varied mission sets like CA that require skill and on the go thinking and adaptation. And overall seem to get the most out of the hobby.

Least that's how I am understanding it?



Preetty much, however, you need to regard this in context.
Gw most of the time sucks in the Mission department or rules department, this is why ITC garnered such a following and was in many ways necessary.

Both sides have decent arguments, but imo you should never be able to totally controll the missions and setups ,due to my understanding and Look at 40k beeing a wargame.

But again, focus on imo.

This message was edited 1 time. Last update was at 2020/02/07 12:22:19


https://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/list/0/766717.page
A Mostly Renegades and Heretics blog.
GW:"Space marines got too many options to balance, therefore we decided to legends HH units."
Players: "why?!? Now we finally got decent plastic kits and you cut them?"
Chaos marines players: "Since when are Daemonengines 30k models and why do i have NO droppods now?"
GW" MONEY.... erm i meant TOO MANY OPTIONS (to resell your army to you again by disalowing former units)! Do you want specific tyranid fighiting Primaris? Even a new sabotage lieutnant!"
Chaos players: Guess i stop playing or go to HH.  
   
Made in gb
Regular Dakkanaut



Cymru

 vict0988 wrote:


You are exactly precisely wrong. I am going to a CA19 tournament tomorrow with my Crimson Fists. Guess what - I am putting in a more diverse set of tools into my list even if that means I lose some of my anti-vehicle brutality. It's no good tabling 2/3 opponents if you do not have the tools to win the third game. So I modify my list to be more TAC because I want to win and because after playing at this store for a couple of years now I have learned how to list-build to win in this format.

The perfect CA19 list is one that can consistently win each game, even if by a narrow margin, by having the tools to play to each of the missions against any likely opponent. That is very much a TAC list. Skew lists are great if you just want to table a couple of opponents and maybe podium.

Caledonian Uprising, everyone's favourite example of CA19 being better than Champions, but does it promote TAC lists?

#1 https://tabletop.to/caledonian-uprising-2020/list/anthony-chew All characters and screens.
#2 https://tabletop.to/caledonian-uprising-2020/list/james-mackenzie No vehicles or monsters, only 3W and 1W Infantry.
#3 https://tabletop.to/caledonian-uprising-2020/list/mani-cheema Possessed bomb, 3 Crawlers, CSM and Nurglings for CP. A balanced list.
#4 https://tabletop.to/caledonian-uprising-2020/list/markus-hinson IF flyer spam with 3x TFC. 5 Tactical Marines for the old-school achievement badge and 10 bolter scouts make up the entirety of the non-heavy weapons.
So what can we conclude? Most of the people that did well at Caledonian Uprising did so with skew lists.



To me that tyranid list is a great example of a TAC list - it has a variety of units to handle shooting, combat and objective grabbing. Yet by not having certain keywords you think it is a skew list.

The winning list has a mix of Infantry and Monster units and you call that one out as a skew list as well. The 3rd place list is also a gimmick list leaning in heavily to one game mechanic, yet you do not think that is a skew list.

You think the 4th place is list is skewed for having a lot of heavy weapons. Another new definition of skew which I had not met before.

I think at this point your definition of TAC is so narrow that it is meaningful only to you.
   
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happy_inquisitor wrote:
 vict0988 wrote:
happy_inquisitor wrote:


You are exactly precisely wrong. I am going to a CA19 tournament tomorrow with my Crimson Fists. Guess what - I am putting in a more diverse set of tools into my list even if that means I lose some of my anti-vehicle brutality. It's no good tabling 2/3 opponents if you do not have the tools to win the third game. So I modify my list to be more TAC because I want to win and because after playing at this store for a couple of years now I have learned how to list-build to win in this format.

The perfect CA19 list is one that can consistently win each game, even if by a narrow margin, by having the tools to play to each of the missions against any likely opponent. That is very much a TAC list. Skew lists are great if you just want to table a couple of opponents and maybe podium.

Caledonian Uprising, everyone's favourite example of CA19 being better than Champions, but does it promote TAC lists?

#1 https://tabletop.to/caledonian-uprising-2020/list/anthony-chew All characters and screens.
#2 https://tabletop.to/caledonian-uprising-2020/list/james-mackenzie No vehicles or monsters, only 3W and 1W Infantry.
#3 https://tabletop.to/caledonian-uprising-2020/list/mani-cheema Possessed bomb, 3 Crawlers, CSM and Nurglings for CP. A balanced list.
#4 https://tabletop.to/caledonian-uprising-2020/list/markus-hinson IF flyer spam with 3x TFC. 5 Tactical Marines for the old-school achievement badge and 10 bolter scouts make up the entirety of the non-heavy weapons.
So what can we conclude? Most of the people that did well at Caledonian Uprising did so with skew lists.



To me that tyranid list is a great example of a TAC list - it has a variety of units to handle shooting, combat and objective grabbing. Yet by not having certain keywords you think it is a skew list.

The winning list has a mix of Infantry and Monster units and you call that one out as a skew list as well. The 3rd place list is also a gimmick list leaning in heavily to one game mechanic, yet you do not think that is a skew list.

You think the 4th place is list is skewed for having a lot of heavy weapons. Another new definition of skew which I had not met before.

I think at this point your definition of TAC is so narrow that it is meaningful only to you.

It is skewed towards infantry with 1 or 3 wounds, any weapons that are designed to kill anything different will be weak against the list. Haywire cannons, lascannons, meltaguns, all designed to take out vehicles, particularly heavily armoured ones and all relatively weak against Warriors. It might not be a counter list though, it might not be built to take out any specific list or build, but it you have to notice the lack of vehicles and monsters.

It's a skew list because the Monsters are all characters with less than 10 wounds if the list included Magnus or a Bloodthirster I would not call it a skew list. Again, haywire, lascannons and meltaguns are useless until you get rid of all the chaff.

Sorry but I have not played against the Possessed bomb so I am not familiar with how it operates, I also believe there are several ways to field the bomb depending on which mark they take. The Crawlers do present a target for a type of weapon that would be worse against Possessed, if the player had instead brought three units of Havocs his list would not have any vehicles to target with haywire weapons for example and the list would be more skewed.

The IF list is a skew list because of all the flyers, if you don't have effective anti-flyer units in your army they will be hard to take out. Had he taken 3 instead of 5 it would not be as skewed a list. On top of that IF are a counter list for vehicle-builds, which the player played into by bringing heavy weapons that get +1 damage. So the list is skewed towards flyers and it's a counter list against vehicles.

This message was edited 2 times. Last update was at 2020/02/07 13:35:36


 
   
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The 4th list is clearly a skew. 5 flyers are too many.

The first one is the most TAC you can get in this game. I will just summon whatever i need, beatiful list to play.

The second one is clearly TAC.

The third one is already pushing it, but i would still define it as one.
   
Made in de
Ork Admiral Kroozin Da Kosmos on Da Hulk






 vict0988 wrote:
#2 https://tabletop.to/caledonian-uprising-2020/list/james-mackenzie No vehicles or monsters, only 3W and 1W Infantry.

I'm no expert on GSC, but why do you think this is not a TAC list? Many different units, multiple kinds of troops, and even similar units are equipped differently. This is a perfectly fine example of a TAC list. As you pointed out below, TAC doesn't mean you need to bring a defensive profile to shoot for every enemy gun.

The skew vs TAC thing is kind of complicated because they aren't really opposites. TAC is a term of offensive output, you can build a Knight army that is good vs Knights, one that is good vs Marines or one that is good vs Orks by taking high S medium AP, high AP and high ROF weapons respectively. Those would be counter lists, which is the actual opposite of a TAC list, a TAC list would just be a Knight list that is equally good against Orks, Marines and Knights.

This is correct - Knights are quite limited in their choice of weapons, so they can't really build TAC lists. They heavily rely on people being unable to handle them properly while gunning down whatever is thrown at them with whatever they have.

A skew list is mostly in terms of defensive profiles, as other posters have explained you can create a list that can ignore lascannons by not taking any good targets, that's a skew list. The opposite of that isn't exactly TAC, it's more like get destroyed by all comers list since skew is generally effective against TAC because the TAC list will have some weapons that are ineffective against your skew list.

I agree, but skew lists aren't limited to defensive properties. When you look back to the early months of this edition, there were skew lists focused on spamming deep striking shooting units or massive amounts of smites. Skew is all about putting a lot of weight on a certain aspect of your army and trying to win the game during list building.

It's not about being able to win, it's about the mission not creating an unfair advantage to any player in any specific game. Overall both EW and Champions advantages certain armies and lists, that is inevitable. The question is whether an Imperial Fist player would prefer fighting certain opponents in certain missions and what happens when they do vs when they don't. GW missions have in the past given massive advantages to one player over the other based on lists, minimizing the amount of impact the player choices have in the game due to huge impacts from an individual mission being in you or your opponent's favour.

Right now, ITC is creating an unfair advantage for some players in every game. Having multiple missions who favor different aspects is by default superior to having one mission which favors the same aspects every game.
I'd also like to specify which *massive* advantage a player gains from any of the CA missions. To me it doesn't seem like you have played any of the CA2018/19 missions, because me and my group had the exact opposite impression. Even games again armies like knights or whatever the top dogs were in ITC, it always felt like you had a fair shot at winning.

No, I am saying GW wants skew lists with the rules set in the codexes and supplements, no mission set is going to remove that. I personally don't want what GW wants. I want rainbow or highlander-like lists which is why I think internal balance is important.

I want the same as you. In my experience those recent CA missions have worked towards that. Armies which sit in a corner an shoot across the board precisely according to mathhammer keep losing and losing, so people have started valuing mobility and utility much more and thus lists are changing.

You don't have any missions you'd prefer to play vs BA jump spam and maybe another one you'd prefer against IF flyer spam? That seems incredible to me.

So, since you seem genuinely interested in this, I went through all the missions and checked.
Flyer spam is a skew list though, which means it's actually supposed to be bad in some missions. I'm fairly confident that it would struggle in pillars, ascension and frontline warfare, as it's easy to ramp up VP there if your opponent can't contest the objectives. Even if they table me, I might still win or draw, as SM troops take too long to get across the board after it has been cleared. In the others it would depend on how fast they remove my stuff, so basically regular game.
BA jump spam? It really depends on what exactly you mean but that, but assuming you brought two battalions and something that can kill tanks, I don't think they have an advantage nor a disadvantage against either my DG or my Orks in any of the missions (assuming both built to handle any of the six missions).
DG would probably benefit most from ascension because they have lots of durable characters, and BA are kind of forced to not keep theirs sitting on objectives. In turn, BA would probably win scorched earth because DG suck at removing things quickly, so you might end up razing an objective or two.
As for orks, four pillars would be my choice, since drowning the pillars in gretchin and boyz works good enough against scouts. If I get the 3 VP once, I probably win the game. This could backfire on me though, depending on what you bring - intercessors are pain to remove for orks and infiltrators make jumping on a pillar impossible.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
 vict0988 wrote:
It is skewed towards infantry with 1 or 3 wounds, any weapons that are designed to kill anything different will be weak against the list. Haywire cannons, lascannons, meltaguns, all designed to take out vehicles, particularly heavily armoured ones and all relatively weak against Warriors.

How are lascannons and melta weak against warriors and hive guard?

It might not be a counter list though, it might not be built to take out any specific list or build, but it you have to notice the lack of vehicles and monsters.

It's a skew list because the Monsters are all characters with less than 10 wounds if the list included Magnus or a Bloodthirster I would not call it a skew list. Again, haywire, lascannons and meltaguns are useless until you get rid of all the chaff.

Sorry but I have not played against the Possessed bomb so I am not familiar with how it operates, I also believe there are several ways to field the bomb depending on which mark they take. The Crawlers do present a target for a type of weapon that would be worse against Possessed, if the player had instead brought three units of Havocs his list would not have any vehicles to target with haywire weapons for example and the list would be more skewed.

I think you are mistaking target saturation for skew.

This message was edited 1 time. Last update was at 2020/02/07 14:04:12


7 Ork facts people always get wrong:
Ragnar did not win against Thrakka, but suffered two crushing defeats within a few days of each other.
A lasgun is powerful enough to sever an ork's appendage or head in a single, well aimed shot.
Orks meks have a better understanding of electrics and mechanics than most Tech Priests.
Orks do not think that purple makes them harder to see. They do think that camouflage does however, without knowing why.
Gharkull Blackfang did not even come close to killing the emperor.
Orks can be corrupted by chaos, but few of them have any interest in what chaos offers.
Orks do not have the power of believe. 
   
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Thank you for the response Jidmah, I will continue giving EW a shot. I played a lot at the start of 2019, just not feeling it lately so haven't played many CA19 games although I stopped keeping track of my games early 2019. I have played a fair amount of CA18 games but that was 95% casual Maelstrom games. I haven't given competitive non-ITC missions much thought prior to reading this thread and came in as a staunch Champions supporter.

I don't think there is any difference between skew and target saturation. I guess I could call them target saturation lists instead of skew lists. With ITC terrain rules you can easily hide 6 Hiveguard from your opponent's Predators (in 2020 ha). The Warriors are cheap enough that it isn't as bad as having your Carnifex getting shot by lascannons. Lists counter to some degree, but I don't think a lack of TAC lists is ever going to be a problem, target saturation lists are a problem though. It should be possible to have elite infantry, swarms, bikes and vehicles in the same list without tanking your chances of success. On the other hand I don't want to have any one mission favour one player in a competitive game. Maybe if all the missions were played at once I could be happy.
Spoletta wrote:
The 4th list is clearly a skew. 5 flyers are too many.

The first one is the most TAC you can get in this game. I will just summon whatever i need, beatiful list to play.

The second one is clearly TAC.

The third one is already pushing it, but i would still define it as one.

You're totally right, they are TAC lists, they are also skew lists though. I'm certain they are able to compete with anything in the meta, otherwise, they would have gotten worse placements. What I meant to say was that the #1, 3 and 4 lists have one or two weaknesses in terms of defence and not much else. If the lists had more unit diversity in terms of monsters/vehicles (that are not characters with less than 10 wounds) then every list would have somewhere to point their lascannon equivalents, but because the lists are skewed they do not. None of the lists look to me to be obviously built to counter anything, IF are automatically a vehicle counter list.
   
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ITC champions mission promote harder list building "tricks" IMHO than the CA 2019 missions.

Building a list that doesn't give up secondaries is just as important as building a list that can achieve primaries and secondaries where the GW missions take that whole second layer of "balancing" (not giving up secondaries) away.

Building a list that works for CA 2019 is less restrictive than building a list that works for ITC missions which should lead to greater variety at the codex level as well as the units level.

Going first matters a lot in ITC depending on the list you have. Flyer spam, mani cheemas "360 no-scope, Kobe!!" list straight dunk on you if they go first. They can work second as well but if they go first 9/10 games are effectively over.

My big issue with the ITC champions missions is they are actively trying to balance the game and are obviously (LVO results, marine meta) failing at it.

Being locked in for a whole season means they are unable to adapt to the meta (or we would have seen sweeping changes when the marine supplements were released). They are a lever of balance that GW doesn't have their hands on and as bad as GW has been at intentional balance changes they sure are changing the game a lot.

Maybe their approach worked better when GW wasn't breaking the meta every month (codex) or 4 (FAQ). Unless frontline is willing to change up their mission pack every FAQ/CA/Supplement it is just another layer that leads to imbalance.
   
Made in gb
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Cymru

 vict0988 wrote:

It is skewed towards infantry with 1 or 3 wounds, any weapons that are designed to kill anything different will be weak against the list. Haywire cannons, lascannons, meltaguns, all designed to take out vehicles, particularly heavily armoured ones and all relatively weak against Warriors. It might not be a counter list though, it might not be built to take out any specific list or build, but it you have to notice the lack of vehicles and monsters.



Tyranid lists are hardly likely to be bringing vehicles against which you would want haywire rules - its really not their thing. You use your lascannons on the Warriors or Hive Guard if you have any sense, one of the intrinsic problems of units in that mid-range of wounds is that they are OK targets both for the anti-tank and anti-chaff weapons. Killing a termagant with a lascannon is inefficient, killing a Warrior or Hive Guard really is not.

Perhaps more to the point of the discussion look at a unit like Warriors which would give up suicidal amounts of Gang Busters points in ITC and revel in them being on the top tables of a major event.
   
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San Jose, CA

H.B.M.C. wrote:
 vict0988 wrote:
Against a predetermined opponent with a predetermined list? Yes. But that is not how tournaments work. Let's say you've determined the players will play CA19 EW1, 3 and 6 in your tournament. Now I arrive, my army might be strong in 1 and 6 and weak in 3, now if I meet up with someone who has a bad matchup into my army in EW1 game 1 I might be favoured, but if I instead meet that same person playing that same army in game 2 playing EW3, then the mission could decide the outcome of that match.
Holy gak dude... that almost sounds like playing the game, where you can't control every situation and expect your army to perform well in every circumstance.

And we can't have that now can we?

Your comments remind me of the type of players who will move their stuff, go around and check all of your LOS, then go back and adjust, come back and check your LOS, and keep doing this until everything is in the perfect position. Sometimes you have to just play the game, and if you make a mistake or something ends up slightly out of position, deal with it. Do what real armed forces do. Adapt.


Jidmah wrote:I haven't had single game of CA2019 or CA2018 where the mission decided the game if both players brought a TAC list.

The only time the mission decides the game for you is when you bring a skew list with no or little troops, characters or mobile units. Which is perfectly fine IMO.


It is nice to see that feth you lists are hindered in CA19, you should be punished for taking a skew list.

More of this please!
   
Made in au
Trustworthy Shas'vre






Its funny, because I find that CA missions heavily favor skew lists whereas ITC missions tend to punish them.
Particularly hordes - plaguebearers, ork boyz and termagant spam have dominated the few CA events I have seen because the strategy of "stand on point A until dead, by which time you have an unbeatable lead" turns out to be pretty damn good when that literally the only thing that needs doing.


On the other hand, ITC secondaries were *designed* to screw with skew lists. It's not doing so effectively at the moment due to rules changes outpacing the tournament format changes, but at least the possibility exists for that punishment to be brought in.
   
Made in ie
Battleship Captain





Trasvi wrote:
Its funny, because I find that CA missions heavily favor skew lists whereas ITC missions tend to punish them.
Particularly hordes - plaguebearers, ork boyz and termagant spam have dominated the few CA events I have seen because the strategy of "stand on point A until dead, by which time you have an unbeatable lead" turns out to be pretty damn good when that literally the only thing that needs doing.


We had this discussion a while back and sorry, but unless you're doing something super wrong hordes just don't have the staying power against focussed fire to survive more than a turn or two, assuming you wrote a half decent TAC list and didn't just load up on Heavy X S8 Dd6 weapons.


 
   
Made in us
Humming Great Unclean One of Nurgle





In My Lab

 Sim-Life wrote:
Trasvi wrote:
Its funny, because I find that CA missions heavily favor skew lists whereas ITC missions tend to punish them.
Particularly hordes - plaguebearers, ork boyz and termagant spam have dominated the few CA events I have seen because the strategy of "stand on point A until dead, by which time you have an unbeatable lead" turns out to be pretty damn good when that literally the only thing that needs doing.


We had this discussion a while back and sorry, but unless you're doing something super wrong hordes just don't have the staying power against focussed fire to survive more than a turn or two, assuming you wrote a half decent TAC list and didn't just load up on Heavy X S8 Dd6 weapons.
Pray tell, what focused fire takes out a -1 to-hit, 30 strong blob of Plaguebearers? And the one behind it? And the one behind that?

Clocks for the clockmaker! Cogs for the cog throne! 
   
Made in au
Trustworthy Shas'vre






 vict0988 wrote:
happy_inquisitor wrote:
 vict0988 wrote:
Dai wrote:
So everyone brings TAC armies? Yay!

Nobody does. It doesn't exist. The exact same list, with a different paintjob will do better in one mission than the same army with a different paintjob. Are IF players going to turn down their anti-vehicle to get more melee to get a rounded list? No that would be silly because on average they will have a better chance at winning games and winning tournaments playing to their strengths, rather than trying to fill out their weaknesses. So unless you force everyone to play the same Chapter, the same list then no. It's painful to read that some people think that mission variance will magically bring about TAC lists, that has not been the case in previous GW GTs.


You are exactly precisely wrong. I am going to a CA19 tournament tomorrow with my Crimson Fists. Guess what - I am putting in a more diverse set of tools into my list even if that means I lose some of my anti-vehicle brutality. It's no good tabling 2/3 opponents if you do not have the tools to win the third game. So I modify my list to be more TAC because I want to win and because after playing at this store for a couple of years now I have learned how to list-build to win in this format.

The perfect CA19 list is one that can consistently win each game, even if by a narrow margin, by having the tools to play to each of the missions against any likely opponent. That is very much a TAC list. Skew lists are great if you just want to table a couple of opponents and maybe podium.

Caledonian Uprising, everyone's favourite example of CA19 being better than Champions, but does it promote TAC lists?
Edit: I cannot even keep my own definitions straight. I meant non-skew not TAC.

#1 https://tabletop.to/caledonian-uprising-2020/list/anthony-chew All characters and screens.
#2 https://tabletop.to/caledonian-uprising-2020/list/james-mackenzie No vehicles or monsters, only 3W and 1W Infantry.
#3 https://tabletop.to/caledonian-uprising-2020/list/mani-cheema Possessed bomb, 3 Crawlers, CSM and Nurglings for CP. A balanced list.
#4 https://tabletop.to/caledonian-uprising-2020/list/markus-hinson IF flyer spam with 3x TFC. 5 Tactical Marines for the old-school achievement badge and 10 bolter scouts make up the entirety of the non-heavy weapons.
So what can we conclude? Most of the people that did well at Caledonian Uprising did so with skew lists.


Both the #3 and #4 lists are lists which you could easily have seen rocking the top tables of any ITC event. Calling the possessed bomb a "balanced list" I think is a category error... it exists in its own category of "wombo combo" lists.
The nids list I think gets punished too hard by ITC secondaries.
ANd I have no idea how Anthony Chew won. I know what that list *attempts* to do, but I'm amazed it had the longevity to actually pull it off with the amount of thunderfire cannons and snipers in the game..


Automatically Appended Next Post:
 JNAProductions wrote:
 Sim-Life wrote:
Trasvi wrote:
Its funny, because I find that CA missions heavily favor skew lists whereas ITC missions tend to punish them.
Particularly hordes - plaguebearers, ork boyz and termagant spam have dominated the few CA events I have seen because the strategy of "stand on point A until dead, by which time you have an unbeatable lead" turns out to be pretty damn good when that literally the only thing that needs doing.


We had this discussion a while back and sorry, but unless you're doing something super wrong hordes just don't have the staying power against focussed fire to survive more than a turn or two, assuming you wrote a half decent TAC list and didn't just load up on Heavy X S8 Dd6 weapons.
Pray tell, what focused fire takes out a -1 to-hit, 30 strong blob of Plaguebearers? And the one behind it? And the one behind that?


Exactly.
Rocking a plaguebearer horde I was quite easily able to *table* many of my opponents and still control every objective on the board for 6 turns.
.
Hordes work because most armies can't afford to load up on the amount of firepower it takes to kill 150 plaguebearers or 200 boyz or 300 gretchen AND possibly have a chance at killing Marines.
... that is until nu marines came out at least which seem to have the tools to deal with nearly everything. I think the meta is swinging back to the high damage weapons enough though that hordes have a chance again.

This message was edited 2 times. Last update was at 2020/02/12 16:27:41


 
   
 
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