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 Stevefamine wrote:
Tyranid Horde / Running 60 stealers with 120 gaunts seemed pretty bad. Tried a game with 3x20 Stealers and was not happy with that.

I guess its back to trying shooty heavy bugs for events, and swarm for casual

The way of the bug

how did the gaunts do? I was thinking run some leviathan warrior blobs with a few 30 man termagant units to hold objectives pretty nicely.

 Kanluwen wrote:
The stupidest thing about the whole "Horde" concept is that there's a fix that would have been ridiculously easy.

Keywords.
For units that are meant to be run as Hordes(Horma/Termagants, Ripper Swarms, Cultists, Conscripts, Necron Warriors apparently are shaping up to be that)...the "Horde" keyword could have been added.

Weapons could have had a rule that they interact differently firing at a "Horde" keyworded unit.

Problem is then the keyword is always on, even if the unit isn't actively a horde. If the keyword needs to work around unit sizes, then Blast handles that cleanly.

Phenatix wrote:

 Stevefamine wrote:
Tyranid Horde / Running 60 stealers with 120 gaunts seemed pretty bad. Tried a game with 3x20 Stealers and was not happy with that.

I guess its back to trying shooty heavy bugs for events, and swarm for casual

The way of the bug

how did the gaunts do? I was thinking run some leviathan warrior blobs with a few 30 man termagant units to hold objectives pretty nicely.

A lot of tyranid players I talk to think Levi Warriors will be pretty integral to this edition's strategy. They're multiwound, have a FNP as Levi, and are immune to morale. At 9 models with 3 venom cannons... they're pretty killey with deathspitters on the rest.

I think they'll be fun.

 Kanluwen wrote:
The stupidest thing about the whole "Horde" concept is that there's a fix that would have been ridiculously easy.

Keywords.
For units that are meant to be run as Hordes(Horma/Termagants, Ripper Swarms, Cultists, Conscripts, Necron Warriors apparently are shaping up to be that)...the "Horde" keyword could have been added.

Weapons could have had a rule that they interact differently firing at a "Horde" keyworded unit.

That sounds extremely stupid. Your way 2 gretchins should suffer more hits than 10 Intercessors against blast weapons despite SM dudes being way easier to hit in real life due to their size and number. Actual number of models makes sense but 11+ is just too low: many horde units get their bonus when they are 20+ models not just 11+ so the full shots that blast get should be against units of 20+ models. The minimum of 3 shot for units of 10-19 instead of 6-10.

The keyword would be probably conditional, up to 10 cultists/horms etc. No blast effect. More then 10 blast applies

F.e.

Not Online!!! wrote:
The keyword would be probably conditional, up to 10 cultists/horms etc. No blast effect. More then 10 blast applies

F.e.

So it's the same thing as the blast keyword then, but applied on the unit and not on the weapon?

Honestly I like blast as is. 6-10 gives us the small blast template effect of the past, while 11+ gives us the large blast. It's not about horde units, it's about replicating the effect those plastic templates had when hitting a unit.

Oh for sure, but if he 'd want to Make it work he'd have to add it in conditional terms.

Vice versa one could go further and add buffs to high rof weapons Like heavy bolter and stubber to gain Bonus Shots aswell, representing the old surpression rule.

You do that over the whole system, the game is suddenly 2nd edition again. I may not think GW does perfect rules, but I can understand why they try to keep them as simple as they think they can.

 Trickstick wrote:
You do that over the whole system, the game is suddenly 2nd edition again. I may not think GW does perfect rules, but I can understand why they try to keep them as simple as they think they can.

You can keep an expansive Deep System simple by applying Stuff with well writen rules and common sense.
That gw failed at it with usr's and decided to pull a netherlands in the sea of play is just the pendulum swinging they are Prone to.

I love the interaction that, when Infantry squads get a Heavy weapon, they're no longer subject to being hurt by blasts as much.

Slayer-Fan123 wrote:
I love the interaction that, when Infantry squads get a Heavy weapon, they're no longer subject to being hurt by blasts as much.

Uh, no they're not. 6-10 gives a minimum of 3 hits. 9 is between 6 and 10.

 ClockworkZion wrote:

Slayer-Fan123 wrote:
I love the interaction that, when Infantry squads get a Heavy weapon, they're no longer subject to being hurt by blasts as much.

Uh, no they're not. 6-10 gives a minimum of 3 hits. 9 is between 6 and 10.

To be fair, I repeatedly made the same mistake initially. I thought it was 5-9 until I got it right.

 ClockworkZion wrote:

 Kanluwen wrote:
The stupidest thing about the whole "Horde" concept is that there's a fix that would have been ridiculously easy.

Keywords.
For units that are meant to be run as Hordes(Horma/Termagants, Ripper Swarms, Cultists, Conscripts, Necron Warriors apparently are shaping up to be that)...the "Horde" keyword could have been added.

Weapons could have had a rule that they interact differently firing at a "Horde" keyworded unit.

Problem is then the keyword is always on, even if the unit isn't actively a horde. If the keyword needs to work around unit sizes, then Blast handles that cleanly.

It really doesn't though. They picked arbitrary numbers that really don't do jack beyond cap out at 11 models.

If they had actually wanted to do something meaningful, then they would have started at 11+ for them.

 Kanluwen wrote:

 ClockworkZion wrote:

 Kanluwen wrote:
The stupidest thing about the whole "Horde" concept is that there's a fix that would have been ridiculously easy.

Keywords.
For units that are meant to be run as Hordes(Horma/Termagants, Ripper Swarms, Cultists, Conscripts, Necron Warriors apparently are shaping up to be that)...the "Horde" keyword could have been added.

Weapons could have had a rule that they interact differently firing at a "Horde" keyworded unit.

Problem is then the keyword is always on, even if the unit isn't actively a horde. If the keyword needs to work around unit sizes, then Blast handles that cleanly.

It really doesn't though. They picked arbitrary numbers that really don't do jack beyond cap out at 11 models.

If they had actually wanted to do something meaningful, then they would have started at 11+ for them.

I said it a few posts ago, and I'll say it again: the blast change -isn't- about targeting hordes. It's about trying to make those weapons feel meaningful in the game by emulating the effect of the templates and how you could get more hits in against larger units.

Only we don't have templates, and we don't have scatter so instead they count as "attacks" and we have to roll to hit to represent the random scatter chance instead.

The only real things that were done specifically to target hordes this edtion was unit coherency, and points. But at the same time their morale got buffed as well.

 Blackie wrote:

 Kanluwen wrote:
The stupidest thing about the whole "Horde" concept is that there's a fix that would have been ridiculously easy.

Keywords.
For units that are meant to be run as Hordes(Horma/Termagants, Ripper Swarms, Cultists, Conscripts, Necron Warriors apparently are shaping up to be that)...the "Horde" keyword could have been added.

Weapons could have had a rule that they interact differently firing at a "Horde" keyworded unit.

That sounds extremely stupid. Your way 2 gretchins should suffer more hits than 10 Intercessors against blast weapons despite SM dudes being way easier to hit in real life due to their size and number. Actual number of models makes sense but 11+ is just too low: many horde units get their bonus when they are 20+ models not just 11+ so the full shots that blast get should be against units of 20+ models. The minimum of 3 shot for units of 10-19 instead of 6-10.

Did I say my way was perfect? No.

But given that "Horde" units could have been given discounted point values to start with thanks to flamers, grenades, etc interacting differently coupled with a meaningful "horde" threshhold...it's not really a hard thing to see that this whole mess is half-cocked nonsense to appease tourney scrubs to start with.

Also, lol @ 10 Intercessors not being Combat Squadded.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 ClockworkZion wrote:

I said it a few posts ago, and I'll say it again: the blast change -isn't- about targeting hordes. It's about trying to make those weapons feel meaningful in the game by emulating the effect of the templates and how you could get more hits in against larger units.

Only we don't have templates, and we don't have scatter so instead they count as "attacks" and we have to roll to hit to represent the random scatter chance instead.

The only real things that were done specifically to target hordes this edtion was unit coherency, and points. But at the same time their morale got buffed as well.

You can say it all you want, it literally was said to be targeting large units.
If they actually wanted to "make those weapons feel meaningful in the game by emulating the effect of the templates and how you could get more hits in against larger units"?
They would have made it so successful hits on the unit would chain to nearby units within a certain distance. Go look at the Deathstrike entry for an example of how this works.

It wasn't really the case that "you could get more hits in against larger units" because people would take advantage of coherency and spacing to mitigate templates. That's the whole reason behind scrapping them in the first place. Blast weapons had the advantage, however, of being able to get multiple units tagged with one template.

 ClockworkZion wrote:
Only we don't have templates, and we don't have scatter...

And I'm glad for it every time I remember.

 Kanluwen wrote:

 ClockworkZion wrote:

I said it a few posts ago, and I'll say it again: the blast change -isn't- about targeting hordes. It's about trying to make those weapons feel meaningful in the game by emulating the effect of the templates and how you could get more hits in against larger units.

Only we don't have templates, and we don't have scatter so instead they count as "attacks" and we have to roll to hit to represent the random scatter chance instead.

The only real things that were done specifically to target hordes this edtion was unit coherency, and points. But at the same time their morale got buffed as well.

You can say it all you want, it literally was said to be targeting large units.
If they actually wanted to "make those weapons feel meaningful in the game by emulating the effect of the templates and how you could get more hits in against larger units"?
They would have made it so successful hits on the unit would chain to nearby units within a certain distance. Go look at the Deathstrike entry for an example of how this works.

It wasn't really the case that "you could get more hits in against larger units" because people would take advantage of coherency and spacing to mitigate templates. That's the whole reason behind scrapping them in the first place. Blast weapons had the advantage, however, of being able to get multiple units tagged with one template.

Did the designers say that, or did the tactica articles on Warhammer Commuity that were written by third party playtesters say that they were designed to target hordes?

Because I feel like it's coming from the playtesters and everyone is saying that GW is the one who said the blasts were made to decimate hordes.

Also I've actually done at least -some- math about blasts against different unit sizes against a decent range of targets, and no, blasts aren't cracking hordes half as much as people say they are.

Here's the math if you want to skip the reddit post and it's summary: https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1uSQOcXYIyX7xh1Bzpf2zQRZSrvpOaI2rpcG2JN6hH1o/edit?usp=sharing

I've seen a -lot- of claims about blasts hurting hordes, but so far I'm the only one I've seen to actually check to see what that actually looks like.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Trickstick wrote:

 ClockworkZion wrote:
Only we don't have templates, and we don't have scatter...

And I'm glad for it every time I remember.

You an me both. That's like 30 minutes off of every game of double checking templates, scatter angles, scatter distance, ect.

 ClockworkZion wrote:
You an me both. That's like 30 minutes off of every game of double checking templates, scatter angles, scatter distance, ect.

It was the arguments. Both players would 100% believe that they were right about the angle, although both saw different things. Parallax is a cruel mistress.

 Trickstick wrote:

 ClockworkZion wrote:
You an me both. That's like 30 minutes off of every game of double checking templates, scatter angles, scatter distance, ect.

It was the arguments. Both players would 100% believe that they were right about the angle, although both saw different things. Parallax is a cruel mistress.

No lie. Same for how many models where covered by the template as well. When dealing with some of those "barely in" cases it came down to how close you got to the template to look at the unit below it.

 ClockworkZion wrote:

Slayer-Fan123 wrote:
I love the interaction that, when Infantry squads get a Heavy weapon, they're no longer subject to being hurt by blasts as much.

Uh, no they're not. 6-10 gives a minimum of 3 hits. 9 is between 6 and 10.

Hmm, appears you're correct.

Doesn't fix the next issue of Heavy Weapon squads not functioning as six models though.

Slayer-Fan123 wrote:

 ClockworkZion wrote:

Slayer-Fan123 wrote:
I love the interaction that, when Infantry squads get a Heavy weapon, they're no longer subject to being hurt by blasts as much.

Uh, no they're not. 6-10 gives a minimum of 3 hits. 9 is between 6 and 10.

Hmm, appears you're correct.

Doesn't fix the next issue of Heavy Weapon squads not functioning as six models though.

Should they really? They have large bases and under the old template getting two under a small template was about the best we could usually hope for unless they were in a triangle.

 Kanluwen wrote:
The stupidest thing about the whole "Horde" concept is that there's a fix that would have been ridiculously easy.

Keywords.
For units that are meant to be run as Hordes(Horma/Termagants, Ripper Swarms, Cultists, Conscripts, Necron Warriors apparently are shaping up to be that)...the "Horde" keyword could have been added.

Weapons could have had a rule that they interact differently firing at a "Horde" keyworded unit.

how is this any better?

this is the dunning-kruger effect on full display, people. Someone else's way of doing it is "stupid", but the slightly different way that YOU thought of, that brings a bunch of problems of it's own and doesn't address the real issue at all? so much smarter, why didn't they think of it, so easy!


Love how you conveniently didn't include Guardsmen as a horde unit. Sure that's not personal bias at all.

 Nitro Zeus wrote:
Love how you conveniently didn't include Guardsmen as a horde unit. Sure that's not personal bias at all.

It's not an unreasonable point, though - when the initial news about Blasts came out, indicating that they were more effective at hitting large units, people were immediately speculating about how large the minimum threshold would be. Very few people were saying that ten models would qualify as a "horde", and I think most people were surprised when the first part of the Blast rule kicked in at six freakin' models...

 Dysartes wrote:

 Nitro Zeus wrote:
Love how you conveniently didn't include Guardsmen as a horde unit. Sure that's not personal bias at all.

It's not an unreasonable point, though - when the initial news about Blasts came out, indicating that they were more effective at hitting large units, people were immediately speculating about how large the minimum threshold would be. Very few people were saying that ten models would qualify as a "horde", and I think most people were surprised when the first part of the Blast rule kicked in at six freakin' models...

Yeah but the post I responded to was including Tyranid Rippers (who are never taken in more than minimum size, 3x3's, which is even smaller than Guardsmen) and Necron Warriors etc. Yet interestingly, Guardsmen didn't fit his mold of a unit that would be susceptible.

 Nitro Zeus wrote:

 Kanluwen wrote:
The stupidest thing about the whole "Horde" concept is that there's a fix that would have been ridiculously easy.

Keywords.
For units that are meant to be run as Hordes(Horma/Termagants, Ripper Swarms, Cultists, Conscripts, Necron Warriors apparently are shaping up to be that)...the "Horde" keyword could have been added.

Weapons could have had a rule that they interact differently firing at a "Horde" keyworded unit.

how is this any better?

this is the dunning-kruger effect on full display, people. Someone else's way of doing it is "stupid", but the slightly different way that YOU thought of, that brings a bunch of problems of it's own and doesn't address the real issue at all? so much smarter, why didn't they think of it, so easy!

My way at least starts from a better point of declaring "hordes" are 6+ models and throwing cheap troops more or less at 5ppm everywhere.

Love how you conveniently didn't include Guardsmen as a horde unit. Sure that's not personal bias at all.

I included Conscripts. Since you chose to overlook that, just remember this:
Guard Infantry Squads are locked in size. You need to use a stratagem to get them to 20 or more models, and even then you're just taking two different units and effectively doing a reverse Combat Squad, throwing them together. If you want to make it so that doing so adds the "Horde" keyword? I'd be fine with it.

Conscripts are where every horde unit should be starting at from now on: 20 models minimum.

I noticed you include conscripts. I also have noticed all the posts you made complaining about how awful conscripts are, so I know you don't consider this a real impact at all and you deliberately threw them to the wolves, so long as the Infantry Squads that you always crusade for are intact. You chose a rule that means units that are smaller than Guardsmen squads actually get impacted here, whereas this is actually a BUFF to your Guardsmen who are now not even semi-affected by blasts. No, this is just biased writing that you thought was some stroke of genius because it didn't affect you any longer.

 Nitro Zeus wrote:

 Dysartes wrote:

 Nitro Zeus wrote:
Love how you conveniently didn't include Guardsmen as a horde unit. Sure that's not personal bias at all.

It's not an unreasonable point, though - when the initial news about Blasts came out, indicating that they were more effective at hitting large units, people were immediately speculating about how large the minimum threshold would be. Very few people were saying that ten models would qualify as a "horde", and I think most people were surprised when the first part of the Blast rule kicked in at six freakin' models...

Yeah but the post I responded to was including Tyranid Rippers (who are never taken in more than minimum size, 3x3's, which is even smaller than Guardsmen) and Necron Warriors etc. Yet interestingly, Guardsmen didn't fit his mold of a unit that would be susceptible.

Because I remember the days of the "Swarm" rule that units like Rippers, Nurglings, and Scarabs had.

Also, Necron Warriors start at 10 and go up to 20. If you would argue they shouldn't have Horde because they're minimum of 10? Fine. Argue that...but it's pretty clear the wind is blowing towards Necron Warriors becoming a 'horde' unit ala Conscripts or Grots.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Nitro Zeus wrote:
I noticed you include conscripts. I also have noticed all the posts you made complaining about how awful conscripts are, so I know you don't consider this a real impact at all and you deliberately threw them to the wolves, so long as the Infantry Squads that you always crusade for are intact. You chose a rule that means units that are smaller than Guardsmen squads actually get impacted here, whereas this is actually a BUFF to your Guardsmen who are now not even semi-affected by blasts. No, this is just biased writing that you thought was some stroke of genius because it didn't affect you any longer.

Then if you've read those posts you would also know that my arguments are usually accompanied with support for tearing the whole damn book that currently exists down, breaking Guardsmen into 3 different categories(heavy armored, skirmishers, conscript-grades) and boosting the points for each unit type accordingly while also putting restrictions in place for specific Regiments and Doctrines.

If we're not going to do that, then having a "Horde" mechanic that doesn't affect units with starting unit sizes of 10 is a far better place to go than "here's a magic number where it does more damage! but don't go below it, then you don't take damage the same way!".

PS:
I don't necessarily say that "Conscripts are awful". I say they should be awful. I say that they should be worse than Infantry Squads, to the point of being a 6+ save with autoguns and no <Regiment> keyword.

I've also said that they were, at the launch of 8th, the biggest problem in that you could take them in squads of up to 50 and make them effectively immune to morale issues...and that people continue to confuse the issue of "blob squads"(which is where you take the Combined Squads stratagem and make two Infantry Squads{important distinction here, as some people like to claim it's any squad with Infantry...which it isn't} into one big squad) and "conscripts".

You can't call it a "horde" mechanic if it's not applicable to "horde" units. What we have is a "blast" mechanic that targets units based on size, not type.

Making up a narrative about hordes being targeted (something I'm blaming Table Top Titans for having a hand in, as well as Front Line Gaming as neither seems to actually looked at how effective blasts -actually- are and instead knee jerked because "look at how many shots a Wyvern has!!!11!one!!!") doesn't really address anything. All it's doing is peddling a fake narrative about hordes being unfairly targetted by a weapon that is the least effective against them.

Because people apparently didn't look at the link I posted that showed an actual breakdown of actual blast weapons aimed at (mainly Craftworlds) units of various sizes, as well as Plasma Cannon Devastators and some more common basic weapons here we go:


Now please note how many blast weapons actually managed to kill even -half- of a unit. That's right. The Wyvern killed 3.11/5 Dire Avengers who were taking their worst save and not soaking any wounds on the Exarch or standing in any kind of cover or with any kind of protection.

The math doesn't support the narrative that blast weapons are going to be regularly wiping out hordes unless you start pouring a large amount of CP, support buffs, psychic powers, or just using a lot of them to shoot at hordes.

The blast weapon is not an anti-horde weapon in the way people have been presenting it as, and it's clear they haven't actually checked their assumptions once.

Let me help: At 6-10 models D6 averages 4 attacks. That's the thing you'll most need to be aware of if you want to crunch your own numbers.

Ok so 3.5 going up to 4 average hits on 6-10 units isn’t so relevant. I think you’re missing the point that firing one Wyvern or Mortar or equivalent at an 11-30 unit, is almost the equivalent of firing two Wyverns at that unit. What does that change? Well, regardless of anything else - people are going to run min sized squads instead of full size just to avoid this, it’s completely detrimental to your own effectiveness for no gain

Yeah, no one cares about shooting sub 10mans, its 11+ that you should math out. You did Boys, but they are T4, show us T3 then we can talk.