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 ClockworkZion wrote:

the_scotsman wrote:

 ClockworkZion wrote:
Most arguments for the massed chaff were because they were more points efficient, not because of durability or killing power. Any buffs they had there were just bonuses.

I'm sorry, is there a definition of "points efficiency" that I haven't heard of that doesn't have to do with durability *for the points* or killing power *for the points?*

Or wait, was it because they generated CP so much more efficiently? Certainly I don't think it could have been so common a phenomenon that people would take the absolute bare minimum number of cheap chaff infantry units to generate themselves CPs such that we'd have a half dozen cute little names for those minimum detachments.

If only one of the baseline changes in 9th ed solved that issue before ever needing to hand down any other nerfs.

CP for the cost was the big argument in 8th.

Actions for the cost would be more the argument for 9th since cheap units who take up board space fill that role in an army well.

We'll see once we start getting games in how the army shapes up of course, but my point was more about why GW might have needed to do a points rejiggering to hordes, even when it doesn't seem immediately obvious.

Heck, it only takes 3 rounds to max our your primary. In a 5 round game, how many armies can kill 360 of anything fast enough to ensure they don't max their primary, and possibly some of their secondaries? Being tabled doesn't matter in 9th after all, points do.

You will have an infinitely easier time stopping a guard army from performing actions (with their, remember, MAX SIZED squads of 10 guardsmen) than you will ANY space marine army, whether classic marines or primaris. 5 MEQs sitting on cover with their 2+ saves that say "ok, I'm gonna perform an action now" is going to be much harder to deal with than 10 little t3 5+ mookers.

even the most extreme cases, like 30 ork boyz, it's going to be a lot easier to remove that unit of ork boyz than an equivalent points value of intercessors.

Cultists max at 20-man squads, right? I can't recall if it's 20 or 30, let's say 30 since the math is nice and clean. You've got 30 cultists on one side, and 9 intercessors on the other at their new points values, and they are each going to perform an action.

Assume you're going to shoot them at BS4+. To remove the cultists, you'll need:
90 lasguns (45 if youve got FRFSRF)
36 heavy bolters
4 wyverns
43 autocannons
6 LR battlecannons
3 LR Punishers


To remove the marines, you'll need:
321 lasguns (161 with FRFSRF)
55 heavy bolters
20 wyverns
41 autocannons
7 LR battlecannons
8 LR Punishers

To get to a weapon that actually more efficiently removes intercessors, you have to get into gak like plasma guns - and even then, oldmarines are nearly as durable vs non-overcharged plasma as cultists at their new points value. A heavy cannon with flat damage 2 is almost identically able to take out piddly little cultos as the target it is seemingly designed to efficiently remove.

 Galas wrote:
People spent all of 8th complaining about elite units not being worth it because cheap was better... now cheap is not better and we complaint?

Like. Didn't thousand sons players wanted to play rubrics instead of Tzaangors?


I understand. All units should have a place. But I believe people is overeacting. And even if they aren't, who cares? In tops 4-5 months things will change and the "meta" will shake again just like in 8th.

There was a time were it was worth the shoot to buy the most OP stuff because it would be OP 4-6 years. Now it is at most 8 months before it gets nerfed. Is much more productive to try and improve your skill as a player, and not care that much about the power spikes of certain units.

I agree it's probably a bit of a kneejerk reaction overall, the root of the problem stems in that they've not made the rubrics better, they just make a blob of tzaangors worse. If you got 2nd to last in a race of 100 people, the guy who got 50th position being disqualified doesn't make you any more likely to be on the podium.

 Kanluwen wrote:
The "why" of the change is because people whined, and now that they got their wish they'll whine again.

It's an endless cycle of whining.

In the grim darkness of the far future there is only salt.

 Galas wrote:
People spent all of 8th complaining about elite units not being worth it because cheap was better... now cheap is not better and we complaint?

Like. Didn't thousand sons players wanted to play rubrics instead of Tzaangors?


I understand. All units should have a place. But I believe people is overeacting. And even if they aren't, who cares? In tops 4-5 months things will change and the "meta" will shake again just like in 8th.

There was a time were it was worth the shoot to buy the most OP stuff because it would be OP 4-6 years. Now it is at most 8 months before it gets nerfed. Is much more productive to try and improve your skill as a player, and not care that much about the power spikes of certain units.

Because I do not enjoy a game state where for a unit to be cheap enough to be usable, it needs to be less than 1 point per USD spent. What you get when you make a space marine army cost 300$ and any GEQ army cost 2500$ is yet another edition where everyone just plays marines.

Obviously GW could just drop the points back down below where they are in 8th and every GEQ unit would be fine in 9th. My problem is, that still sucks. That sucks now. I'd much prefer, and was hoping for, a 9th edition where a cultist was 6ppm and an intercessor was 20ppm and that made actual goddamn sense.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 ClockworkZion wrote:

 Kanluwen wrote:
The "why" of the change is because people whined, and now that they got their wish they'll whine again.

It's an endless cycle of whining.

In the grim darkness of the far future there is only salt.

When your logic is bad, just accuse your opponent of whining! In future, please just save everyone time and start the argument with "ur just salty". Don't pretend to make arguments first and make people take the time to disprove you.

Dudeface wrote:

I agree it's probably a bit of a kneejerk reaction overall, the root of the problem stems in that they've not made the rubrics better, they just make a blob of tzaangors worse. If you got 2nd to last in a race of 100 people, the guy who got 50th position being disqualified doesn't make you any more likely to be on the podium.

No, the root of the problem is that people insist upon copy/pasting netlists and riding the coattails of people that are deemed as "good" because of tournament performances and crap like that. They insist upon getting things in one initial swoop for starting an army, rather than playing slowgrows and building things up while experimenting with what they like.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

the_scotsman wrote:

 ClockworkZion wrote:

 Kanluwen wrote:
The "why" of the change is because people whined, and now that they got their wish they'll whine again.

It's an endless cycle of whining.

In the grim darkness of the far future there is only salt.

When your logic is bad, just accuse your opponent of whining!

"Conscripts are overpowered!"
--Conscripts and Commissars get nerfed into the ground
"Guard are overpowered!"
--Guard get nerfed with a points bump to BS3+ unit weapons

all the while people are outright explaining that the issue is the Command Point generation being handed out to other factions via Guard and that a simple fix is forbidding Guard from granting CPs to other factions...whole thing is ignored.

So yeah, you can keep saying "when your logic is bad, just accuse your opponent of whining!"...but it is not necessarily wrong.

the_scotsman wrote:

 Galas wrote:
People spent all of 8th complaining about elite units not being worth it because cheap was better... now cheap is not better and we complaint?

Like. Didn't thousand sons players wanted to play rubrics instead of Tzaangors?


I understand. All units should have a place. But I believe people is overeacting. And even if they aren't, who cares? In tops 4-5 months things will change and the "meta" will shake again just like in 8th.

There was a time were it was worth the shoot to buy the most OP stuff because it would be OP 4-6 years. Now it is at most 8 months before it gets nerfed. Is much more productive to try and improve your skill as a player, and not care that much about the power spikes of certain units.

Because I do not enjoy a game state where for a unit to be cheap enough to be usable, it needs to be less than 1 point per USD spent. What you get when you make a space marine army cost 300$ and any GEQ army cost 2500$ is yet another edition where everyone just plays marines.

Obviously GW could just drop the points back down below where they are in 8th and every GEQ unit would be fine in 9th. My problem is, that still sucks. That sucks now. I'd much prefer, and was hoping for, a 9th edition where a cultist was 6ppm and an intercessor was 20ppm and that made actual goddamn sense.

I have always proposed to make everythign more expensive and more powerfull. And I always wanted changes to units rules and stats instead of making everything better by making them cheaper, like in 8th.

The truth is, thats not what people wants. People wants to have as many models on the table as possible. And if you give it better rules but make it more expensive they won't like it. So I can totally understand why GW does what it does even if I don't like it. At the end of the day we are on the minority, the internet vocal one. At least in my store most people is like that: They hate when their units become more expensive even if it was a deserved nerf because they fell like they are being punishet, they love when things become cheaper because they can have more and more toys on the table, etc... and not many people is willing to have a broader perspective of whats healthy for the game even if is detrimental to how they play or like to play.

 Kanluwen wrote:

Dudeface wrote:

I agree it's probably a bit of a kneejerk reaction overall, the root of the problem stems in that they've not made the rubrics better, they just make a blob of tzaangors worse. If you got 2nd to last in a race of 100 people, the guy who got 50th position being disqualified doesn't make you any more likely to be on the podium.

No, the root of the problem is that people insist upon copy/pasting netlists and riding the coattails of people that are deemed as "good" because of tournament performances and crap like that. They insist upon getting things in one initial swoop for starting an army, rather than playing slowgrows and building things up while experimenting with what they like.

A skewed game state that heavily penalizes one type of unit (infantry) and heavily rewards another type of unit (heavy tanks) does not advantage people who slow-grew to 2,000pts and got a mixture of different stuff.

It advantages people who have competitive copy/pasted competitive netlists.

Come on, you think the guys with the Intercessors+Chaplain Dreadnoughts+Leviathan lists are UNHAPPY with 9th? Really?

the_scotsman wrote:

 ClockworkZion wrote:

 Kanluwen wrote:
The "why" of the change is because people whined, and now that they got their wish they'll whine again.

It's an endless cycle of whining.

In the grim darkness of the far future there is only salt.

When your logic is bad, just accuse your opponent of whining!

Or maybe don't take things so seriously? I freely admit why my thought on why the change was done could be wrong, but the arguements against it haven't been very sound. Everyone keeps circling back to a single unit versus unit basis. I never said a single unit of anything was strong, I was saying that with current points costs hordes could really mess with the new missions if taken in very large numbers.

the_scotsman wrote:

 ClockworkZion wrote:

the_scotsman wrote:

 ClockworkZion wrote:
Most arguments for the massed chaff were because they were more points efficient, not because of durability or killing power. Any buffs they had there were just bonuses.

I'm sorry, is there a definition of "points efficiency" that I haven't heard of that doesn't have to do with durability *for the points* or killing power *for the points?*

Or wait, was it because they generated CP so much more efficiently? Certainly I don't think it could have been so common a phenomenon that people would take the absolute bare minimum number of cheap chaff infantry units to generate themselves CPs such that we'd have a half dozen cute little names for those minimum detachments.

If only one of the baseline changes in 9th ed solved that issue before ever needing to hand down any other nerfs.

CP for the cost was the big argument in 8th.

Actions for the cost would be more the argument for 9th since cheap units who take up board space fill that role in an army well.

We'll see once we start getting games in how the army shapes up of course, but my point was more about why GW might have needed to do a points rejiggering to hordes, even when it doesn't seem immediately obvious.

Heck, it only takes 3 rounds to max our your primary. In a 5 round game, how many armies can kill 360 of anything fast enough to ensure they don't max their primary, and possibly some of their secondaries? Being tabled doesn't matter in 9th after all, points do.

You will have an infinitely easier time stopping a guard army from performing actions (with their, remember, MAX SIZED squads of 10 guardsmen) than you will ANY space marine army, whether classic marines or primaris. 5 MEQs sitting on cover with their 2+ saves that say "ok, I'm gonna perform an action now" is going to be much harder to deal with than 10 little t3 5+ mookers.

even the most extreme cases, like 30 ork boyz, it's going to be a lot easier to remove that unit of ork boyz than an equivalent points value of intercessors.

Cultists max at 20-man squads, right? I can't recall if it's 20 or 30, let's say 30 since the math is nice and clean. You've got 30 cultists on one side, and 9 intercessors on the other at their new points values, and they are each going to perform an action.

Assume you're going to shoot them at BS4+. To remove the cultists, you'll need:
90 lasguns (45 if youve got FRFSRF)
36 heavy bolters
4 wyverns
43 autocannons
6 LR battlecannons
3 LR Punishers


To remove the marines, you'll need:
321 lasguns (161 with FRFSRF)
55 heavy bolters
20 wyverns
41 autocannons
7 LR battlecannons
8 LR Punishers

To get to a weapon that actually more efficiently removes intercessors, you have to get into gak like plasma guns - and even then, oldmarines are nearly as durable vs non-overcharged plasma as cultists at their new points value. A heavy cannon with flat damage 2 is almost identically able to take out piddly little cultos as the target it is seemingly designed to efficiently remove.

30 cultists need 140 lasgun shots to kill (that's 180 points worth of cultists), 9 intercessors (also 180) need 324 lasgun shots.

However those same marines kill a mighty 8 cultists a turn outside of 15"

the_scotsman wrote:


Come on, you think the guys with the Intercessors+Chaplain Dreadnoughts+Leviathan lists are UNHAPPY with 9th? Really?

Hopefully they will be when Chaplain Dreads go Legends.

Dudeface wrote:

the_scotsman wrote:

 ClockworkZion wrote:

the_scotsman wrote:

 ClockworkZion wrote:
Most arguments for the massed chaff were because they were more points efficient, not because of durability or killing power. Any buffs they had there were just bonuses.

I'm sorry, is there a definition of "points efficiency" that I haven't heard of that doesn't have to do with durability *for the points* or killing power *for the points?*

Or wait, was it because they generated CP so much more efficiently? Certainly I don't think it could have been so common a phenomenon that people would take the absolute bare minimum number of cheap chaff infantry units to generate themselves CPs such that we'd have a half dozen cute little names for those minimum detachments.

If only one of the baseline changes in 9th ed solved that issue before ever needing to hand down any other nerfs.

CP for the cost was the big argument in 8th.

Actions for the cost would be more the argument for 9th since cheap units who take up board space fill that role in an army well.

We'll see once we start getting games in how the army shapes up of course, but my point was more about why GW might have needed to do a points rejiggering to hordes, even when it doesn't seem immediately obvious.

Heck, it only takes 3 rounds to max our your primary. In a 5 round game, how many armies can kill 360 of anything fast enough to ensure they don't max their primary, and possibly some of their secondaries? Being tabled doesn't matter in 9th after all, points do.

You will have an infinitely easier time stopping a guard army from performing actions (with their, remember, MAX SIZED squads of 10 guardsmen) than you will ANY space marine army, whether classic marines or primaris. 5 MEQs sitting on cover with their 2+ saves that say "ok, I'm gonna perform an action now" is going to be much harder to deal with than 10 little t3 5+ mookers.

even the most extreme cases, like 30 ork boyz, it's going to be a lot easier to remove that unit of ork boyz than an equivalent points value of intercessors.

Cultists max at 20-man squads, right? I can't recall if it's 20 or 30, let's say 30 since the math is nice and clean. You've got 30 cultists on one side, and 9 intercessors on the other at their new points values, and they are each going to perform an action.

Assume you're going to shoot them at BS4+. To remove the cultists, you'll need:
90 lasguns (45 if youve got FRFSRF)
36 heavy bolters
4 wyverns
43 autocannons
6 LR battlecannons
3 LR Punishers


To remove the marines, you'll need:
321 lasguns (161 with FRFSRF)
55 heavy bolters
20 wyverns
41 autocannons
7 LR battlecannons
8 LR Punishers

To get to a weapon that actually more efficiently removes intercessors, you have to get into gak like plasma guns - and even then, oldmarines are nearly as durable vs non-overcharged plasma as cultists at their new points value. A heavy cannon with flat damage 2 is almost identically able to take out piddly little cultos as the target it is seemingly designed to efficiently remove.

30 cultists need 140 lasgun shots to kill (that's 180 points worth of cultists), 9 intercessors (also 180) need 324 lasgun shots.

However those same marines kill a mighty 8 cultists a turn outside of 15"

This is one of those moments online where I'm not sure, but I think you're either misunderstanding the argument, or agreeing with me?

The argument, to be clear, was "horde units will be fine, because they will be harder to remove from Objectives when performing actions, the basis of the new missions with the score at the beginning of the turn thing"

I was showing that many elite units, in general, are HARDER to remove from objectives at equivalent points. We can run the same numbers for like, custodes, or CSMs vs cultists, or whatever if you want. Cheap units in 9th are easier to kill with weapons that require less investment to get, weapons that generally are the ones that come by default on your Troops choice units.

Edit: I'm also not sure where 140 lasguns is coming from. I'm using BS4+, and cultists are in cover. 2 shots, 1 hit, 0.5 wounds, 0.333 failed saves from one lasgun. 30 wounds on the unit of cultists/0.333 failed saves per lasgun = 90 lasguns needed on average.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 puma713 wrote:

the_scotsman wrote:


Come on, you think the guys with the Intercessors+Chaplain Dreadnoughts+Leviathan lists are UNHAPPY with 9th? Really?

Hopefully they will be when Chaplain Dreads go Legends.

And then those become lascannon vendreads, which now move and shoot without penalty and got a nice little points drop in the new edition while everything else got more expensive.

People who have top-tier tournament netlists, by and large, are still going to have top-tier tournament netlists after 9th. There is no "aha, you get what you deserve" going on here. Slow-grow collectors' armies are not getting a buff and competitive netlist-buyers are not getting a nerf.

They are also more expensive. No one is going to have 9 intercessors sitting in their backfield doing nothing but scoring when a cheap unit can do the same.

The largest advantage of the slow grow approach is your tend to end with a larger collection that weathers meta shifts more easily.

The trade off is how long it takes to do so, which is a downside when you want to get your wins in really fast, but the perk is still a perk.

 Tyran wrote:
They are also more expensive. No one is going to have 9 intercessors sitting in their backfield doing nothing but scoring when a cheap unit can do the same.

The exact reason I used 9 was to compare them to a 30-man cultist unit. They cost the exact same.

Again, the argument was that because of the "Action" scoring system, and the fact that command points will be easier to deny by killing the units holding the objectives, cheap units will still be superior because they are harder to remove when spammed.

That is the particular claim I was demonstrating to be untrue.

This isn't even mentioning the fact that a unit of intercessors sitting in your backfield on an objective...is playing optimally, intercessors have 30" range guns that rapid fires at full range if they remain stationary. This is like saying "aha, the Tau are sitting at range and doing nothing but scoring objectives while we engage in a stationary firefight - they've fallen right into my trap!!!"

Intercessors sitting on your backfield shooting is good strategy. Intercessors sitting on your backfield hoisting the banner? Less so.

 ClockworkZion wrote:
The largest advantage of the slow grow approach is your tend to end with a larger collection that weathers meta shifts more easily.

The trade off is how long it takes to do so, which is a downside when you want to get your wins in really fast, but the perk is still a perk.

Cool, coolcoolcool, so I've got a really large, slow-grow collection of GSC, maybe you can tell me what I can do to build a successful list for 9th. I've got, let's see:

-40 Acolytes with various melee weapon options
-40 neophytes with various heavy and special weapon options
-40 Purestrain Genestealers
-2 goliath trucks
-1 goliath rockgrinder
-1 Achilles
-10 jackal bikers
-1 of each of basically every character
-30 brood brothers infantry squads
-2 scout sentinels with heavy flamers
-10 aberrants

but darn, wouldn't you know it, it sure seems like nearly all my units ended up light infantry hordes, probably because that's the only kind of troop my army has. it sure does seem like pretty much everything in my army besides the goliaths and rockgrinders gets penalized by those new rules in some significant way. If having a variety of stuff is the solution that would keep me from getting hosed by the edition change, it's weird that having access to every single unit in the codex barring one or two characters I don't have still leaves me feeling like I have eaten a nerf on basically every model I own for the army, and GW seems to have handed out my army's one big advantage to every other faction in the game as a core strat.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 ClockworkZion wrote:
Intercessors sitting on your backfield shooting is good strategy. Intercessors sitting on your backfield hoisting the banner? Less so.

So then how is a large spammed unit of cultists sitting in your backfield ENTIRELY OUT OF THE RANGE OF THEIR GUNS hoisting the banner somehow a good strategy, according to you?

Why is that a potential balance problem that needs to be addressed by an insane number of nerfs?

the_scotsman wrote:

 Tyran wrote:
They are also more expensive. No one is going to have 9 intercessors sitting in their backfield doing nothing but scoring when a cheap unit can do the same.

The exact reason I used 9 was to compare them to a 30-man cultist unit. They cost the exact same.

Again, the argument was that because of the "Action" scoring system, and the fact that command points will be easier to deny by killing the units holding the objectives, cheap units will still be superior because they are harder to remove when spammed.

That is the particular claim I was demonstrating to be untrue.

This isn't even mentioning the fact that a unit of intercessors sitting in your backfield on an objective...is playing optimally, intercessors have 30" range guns that rapid fires at full range if they remain stationary. This is like saying "aha, the Tau are sitting at range and doing nothing but scoring objectives while we engage in a stationary firefight - they've fallen right into my trap!!!"

Speaking of points parity, I'll note that Zion's scenario of 360 cultists is 2160 points with 9e points. You only get 240 for 1440 in 9th; still a lot, but eminently more killable. Maybe I'm just mathhammering badly in my head but I think these arguments for mass Cultist swarms really underestimate the sheer volume Aggressors can put out.

the_scotsman wrote:

 Tyran wrote:
They are also more expensive. No one is going to have 9 intercessors sitting in their backfield doing nothing but scoring when a cheap unit can do the same.

The exact reason I used 9 was to compare them to a 30-man cultist unit. They cost the exact same.

Again, the argument was that because of the "Action" scoring system, and the fact that command points will be easier to deny by killing the units holding the objectives, cheap units will still be superior because they are harder to remove when spammed.

That is the particular claim I was demonstrating to be untrue.

This isn't even mentioning the fact that a unit of intercessors sitting in your backfield on an objective...is playing optimally, intercessors have 30" range guns that rapid fires at full range if they remain stationary. This is like saying "aha, the Tau are sitting at range and doing nothing but scoring objectives while we engage in a stationary firefight - they've fallen right into my trap!!!"

Don't take the cultists as one 30 man unit but as 3 10 man units, now for the same cost you can score 3 different objectives and is far less vulnerable to blast. Moreover units making actions cannot do anything else.

 Gene St. Ealer wrote:

the_scotsman wrote:

 Tyran wrote:
They are also more expensive. No one is going to have 9 intercessors sitting in their backfield doing nothing but scoring when a cheap unit can do the same.

The exact reason I used 9 was to compare them to a 30-man cultist unit. They cost the exact same.

Again, the argument was that because of the "Action" scoring system, and the fact that command points will be easier to deny by killing the units holding the objectives, cheap units will still be superior because they are harder to remove when spammed.

That is the particular claim I was demonstrating to be untrue.

This isn't even mentioning the fact that a unit of intercessors sitting in your backfield on an objective...is playing optimally, intercessors have 30" range guns that rapid fires at full range if they remain stationary. This is like saying "aha, the Tau are sitting at range and doing nothing but scoring objectives while we engage in a stationary firefight - they've fallen right into my trap!!!"

Speaking of points parity, I'll note that Zion's scenario of 360 cultists is 2160 points with 9e points. You only get 240 for 1440 in 9th; still a lot, but eminently more killable. Maybe I'm just mathhammering badly in my head but I think these arguments for mass Cultist swarms really underestimate the sheer volume Aggressors can put out.

Or heck, any dedicated anti-horde weapon. A GEQ-spam army with 9th ed point values would seem to be insanely easy to table given 5 turns with the new blasts rule or some move-and-fire-heavy antiinfantry shooting vehicles like punisher russes.

What the heck are you going to do with a 300-cultist list? Those things chew up 14 cultists per turn, plus whatever you lose from morale, each.

 ClockworkZion wrote:
Intercessors sitting on your backfield shooting is good strategy. Intercessors sitting on your backfield hoisting the banner? Less so.

So we're back to the argument that units that are useless for anything besides scoring are good because they're useless for anything but scoring? Because why would I want a unit that can score and kill my opponent's scoring units when I'm not using it to score.

 Tyran wrote:

the_scotsman wrote:

 Tyran wrote:
They are also more expensive. No one is going to have 9 intercessors sitting in their backfield doing nothing but scoring when a cheap unit can do the same.

The exact reason I used 9 was to compare them to a 30-man cultist unit. They cost the exact same.

Again, the argument was that because of the "Action" scoring system, and the fact that command points will be easier to deny by killing the units holding the objectives, cheap units will still be superior because they are harder to remove when spammed.

That is the particular claim I was demonstrating to be untrue.

This isn't even mentioning the fact that a unit of intercessors sitting in your backfield on an objective...is playing optimally, intercessors have 30" range guns that rapid fires at full range if they remain stationary. This is like saying "aha, the Tau are sitting at range and doing nothing but scoring objectives while we engage in a stationary firefight - they've fallen right into my trap!!!"

Don't take the cultists as one 30 man unit but as 3 10 man units, now for the same cost you can score 3 different objectives and is far less vulnerable to blast. Moreover units making actions cannot do anything else.

Great, and to stop me from scoring, my opponent has to target the units I've decided are going to perform the Action.

That seems ridiculously easy to do given min squads and 9th ed ranged firepower. Realistically, if you're playing for board control, you'll probably have 4 units trying to perform actions on a given turn? If those units are min cultist squads, min grot squads, or whatever, you're signing yourself up for your opponent denying you any primaries ridiculously easily.

And if you have large expensive units doing actions then those units don't get to do anything else.

And this only applies to actions and scoring that requires a battle round, plenty of objectives and actions only require a turn.

I made a document with all the upcoming changes. If anyone wants it, send me a PM.

Greetings!

the_scotsman wrote:

Dudeface wrote:

the_scotsman wrote:

 ClockworkZion wrote:

the_scotsman wrote:

 ClockworkZion wrote:
Most arguments for the massed chaff were because they were more points efficient, not because of durability or killing power. Any buffs they had there were just bonuses.

I'm sorry, is there a definition of "points efficiency" that I haven't heard of that doesn't have to do with durability *for the points* or killing power *for the points?*

Or wait, was it because they generated CP so much more efficiently? Certainly I don't think it could have been so common a phenomenon that people would take the absolute bare minimum number of cheap chaff infantry units to generate themselves CPs such that we'd have a half dozen cute little names for those minimum detachments.

If only one of the baseline changes in 9th ed solved that issue before ever needing to hand down any other nerfs.

CP for the cost was the big argument in 8th.

Actions for the cost would be more the argument for 9th since cheap units who take up board space fill that role in an army well.

We'll see once we start getting games in how the army shapes up of course, but my point was more about why GW might have needed to do a points rejiggering to hordes, even when it doesn't seem immediately obvious.

Heck, it only takes 3 rounds to max our your primary. In a 5 round game, how many armies can kill 360 of anything fast enough to ensure they don't max their primary, and possibly some of their secondaries? Being tabled doesn't matter in 9th after all, points do.

You will have an infinitely easier time stopping a guard army from performing actions (with their, remember, MAX SIZED squads of 10 guardsmen) than you will ANY space marine army, whether classic marines or primaris. 5 MEQs sitting on cover with their 2+ saves that say "ok, I'm gonna perform an action now" is going to be much harder to deal with than 10 little t3 5+ mookers.

even the most extreme cases, like 30 ork boyz, it's going to be a lot easier to remove that unit of ork boyz than an equivalent points value of intercessors.

Cultists max at 20-man squads, right? I can't recall if it's 20 or 30, let's say 30 since the math is nice and clean. You've got 30 cultists on one side, and 9 intercessors on the other at their new points values, and they are each going to perform an action.

Assume you're going to shoot them at BS4+. To remove the cultists, you'll need:
90 lasguns (45 if youve got FRFSRF)
36 heavy bolters
4 wyverns
43 autocannons
6 LR battlecannons
3 LR Punishers


To remove the marines, you'll need:
321 lasguns (161 with FRFSRF)
55 heavy bolters
20 wyverns
41 autocannons
7 LR battlecannons
8 LR Punishers

To get to a weapon that actually more efficiently removes intercessors, you have to get into gak like plasma guns - and even then, oldmarines are nearly as durable vs non-overcharged plasma as cultists at their new points value. A heavy cannon with flat damage 2 is almost identically able to take out piddly little cultos as the target it is seemingly designed to efficiently remove.

30 cultists need 140 lasgun shots to kill (that's 180 points worth of cultists), 9 intercessors (also 180) need 324 lasgun shots.

However those same marines kill a mighty 8 cultists a turn outside of 15"

This is one of those moments online where I'm not sure, but I think you're either misunderstanding the argument, or agreeing with me?

The argument, to be clear, was "horde units will be fine, because they will be harder to remove from Objectives when performing actions, the basis of the new missions with the score at the beginning of the turn thing"

I was showing that many elite units, in general, are HARDER to remove from objectives at equivalent points. We can run the same numbers for like, custodes, or CSMs vs cultists, or whatever if you want. Cheap units in 9th are easier to kill with weapons that require less investment to get, weapons that generally are the ones that come by default on your Troops choice units.

Edit: I'm also not sure where 140 lasguns is coming from. I'm using BS4+, and cultists are in cover. 2 shots, 1 hit, 0.5 wounds, 0.333 failed saves from one lasgun. 30 wounds on the unit of cultists/0.333 failed saves per lasgun = 90 lasguns needed on average.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 puma713 wrote:

the_scotsman wrote:


Come on, you think the guys with the Intercessors+Chaplain Dreadnoughts+Leviathan lists are UNHAPPY with 9th? Really?

Hopefully they will be when Chaplain Dreads go Legends.

And then those become lascannon vendreads, which now move and shoot without penalty and got a nice little points drop in the new edition while everything else got more expensive.

People who have top-tier tournament netlists, by and large, are still going to have top-tier tournament netlists after 9th. There is no "aha, you get what you deserve" going on here. Slow-grow collectors' armies are not getting a buff and competitive netlist-buyers are not getting a nerf.

I missed the part about being in cover, but I'd count that at 180 shots, it's easier to apply it because the query as to whether they're in rapid fire range etc becomes easier to answer. I was neither agreeing nor disagreeing really though, but both the cultists and marines wear each other down to attrition about the same rate as well, I get it's easier to kill cultists with guardsmen but as you say why kill intercessors with flash lights when you can have warpflame bolters or w/e they're called.

 Tyran wrote:
And if you have large expensive units doing actions then those units don't get to do anything else.

And this only applies to actions and scoring that requires a battle round, plenty of objectives and actions only require a turn.

Nearly all objectives require you to be on the objective at the start of your turn, however. Having units that are harder to remove from objectives is going to become much more vital when those units can get shot off and you don't get to score.

This makes more expensive units more valuable by default, and cheap scorers a liability, since they provide your opponent with a means to deny points that otherwise would have been guaranteed.

If you have a pair of min grot squads holding a backline objective and your opponent yeets them with a wyvern or a stormhawk, you'll be giving up two points you would not have otherwise given up by having your own more durable backline shooting unit on that ojbective.

Blood angel article is up.

When they get their new codex, assault intercessor death company will surely be an option... Though, if GW have their marketing minds on, they will include this unit on the day 1 FAQ.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

the_scotsman wrote:

 Tyran wrote:
And if you have large expensive units doing actions then those units don't get to do anything else.

And this only applies to actions and scoring that requires a battle round, plenty of objectives and actions only require a turn.

Nearly all objectives require you to be on the objective at the start of your turn, however. Having units that are harder to remove from objectives is going to become much more vital when those units can get shot off and you don't get to score.

This makes more expensive units more valuable by default, and cheap scorers a liability, since they provide your opponent with a means to deny points that otherwise would have been guaranteed.

If you have a pair of min grot squads holding a backline objective and your opponent yeets them with a wyvern or a stormhawk, you'll be giving up two points you would not have otherwise given up by having your own more durable backline shooting unit on that ojbective.

I've watched a fair few 9th edition bat reps. Durable units performing actions isn't always required, units have been raising banners from behind LOS terrain.

Set your board up correctly and it won't matter how durable the unit is if you do the actions early and keep them protected from flanking units.

As if the current competitive army isn't built around the idea of dropping a Knight a turn. Expensive units are also going to be deleted from objectives.

I feel like you're making a lot of assumptions about

A) just how much cheaper currently cheap units will be in relation to more expensive, more durable options.

B) just how much the meta isn't going to shift toward long range units and mobile units that can wipe out cheap objective scorers to win games.

Well all we have is assumptions, not even true theory.

And with the pandemic, it will take a while to get empirical data.

Well looky what I found...