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 auticus wrote:

And the reason any of that matters is balance. Not structure.

If that were really true, that balance was so important to people, then 40k wouldn't be 1/10th as popular as it is. If that were really true then forums and twitterverse and facebook wouldn't be crammed full of people trying to break the game and make a 2000 point list operate like it was 4000-5000 points to purposely IMBALANCE the game. The game has never been balanced, and honestly feels like the past ten years it has gone the polar opposite direction of balance. And people line up to throw money at the company anyway, and will on this forum and others say very loudly they don't care about the imbalance, thats not why they play the game.

Same in AOS land.

I find the most ardent defenders of 40k's "balance" and the degree to which it isn't important are people who picked an army at its height and have never had an army squatted or nerfed out from under them.

I find the most ardent defenders of 40k's "balance" and the degree to which it isn't important are people who picked an army at its height and have never had an army squatted or nerfed out from under them.

Fair observation.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

That's because what people want is the illusion of balance, rather than the actual thing.

I agree - which is what I call structure as opposed to balance. That structure gives the illusion of balance. No one here with a straight face thinks the game is balanced.

 auticus wrote:

I find the most ardent defenders of 40k's "balance" and the degree to which it isn't important are people who picked an army at its height and have never had an army squatted or nerfed out from under them.

Fair observation.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

That's because what people want is the illusion of balance, rather than the actual thing.

I agree - which is what I call structure as opposed to balance. That structure gives the illusion of balance. No one here with a straight face thinks the game is balanced.

No one here has the same definition of balance.

You use whatever definition of balance makes the game seem worse than it is; usually go with 'every option should be equally as good as every other option in all circumstances' which sounds good until you realize it just means 'it doesn't matter what anything does'. Other people just think it means 'eh, close enough' which is honestly a much better state for a game to be in.

Does anyone else find it laughable that a MODEL company is trying to get us to downsize our games?

 Unit1126PLL wrote:

Tycho wrote:

You are absolutely right, that's what this point update is all about. No rebalances, just simple rescaling. And probably not even from the most recent point values from the last CA.

So, not that I'm defending them here, but I'm kind of confused by the response to this. Agree or disagree with the results, but GW was pretty up front from day 1 that the new points were about trying to rescale the game. They never really mentioned anything about balance. When the company literally says "This is about rescaling the game", I'm not sure how people were caught off guard when the points come out and they just ... rescale the game?

I would argue they don't REALLY accomplish that either, but regardless, they were pretty up front about their intentions with these.

Also - to the GSC players - I feel your pain. The start of this edition is going to be brutal for you on so many levels. From the new force org to some of these points issues, you have a long road ahead ...

The problem is exactly that they don't accomplish this. Rescaling the game, if that's literally all GW wanted, was to say "Multiply the current points cost of the unit by 10, standard game sizes are now 17,500." That's rescaling the game, and took me less effort than whatever wretched abomination of a methodology they used here.

It's clear they have some other agenda than the simple rescale.

You mean the explicitly stated one to allow more granularity in future? That was they key objective behind the new points as they’ve stated.

And the reason any of that matters is balance. Not structure. The only reason Havocs with bolters cost less than Havocs with lascannons pointswise is because they're worse - i.e. balance. Power Level provides structure, but not balance. Points have (the assumption of) balance, back to my original point.

And GW really stuck their penis into the puppy with this one.

I'm with you here. I'm not sure I understand what Auticus means about points being about "structure" vs balance.

 harlokin wrote:
And it's not just a failure to balance wildly different unit types. Take this example of Venoms vs Starweavers; basically the same unit from related codexes (Drukhari and Harlequin):

A Venom with 2 Splinter Cannons has:
- A capacity of 5 models
- Subtract's 1 from shooting attacks against it.
- A 5++ against shooting
- 12 S- AP- D1 Poison 4+ shots at 18" (half that many further away).


A Starweaver with 2 Shuriken Cannons has:
- A capacity of 6 models
- Subtract's 1 from shooting attacks against it.
- 4++
- Always Advances 6"
- 6 S6 AP- D1 Rending shots at 24" (Can still be fired after the model Advances).

As of the points changes, the Venom costs 90pts, while Starweaver costs 80pts.

The only thing I can tell you to help you is that GW is making you pay a tax because 5 Kalabites can be in it, despite the shooting not being that amazing even compared to Harlequin shooting, which says a lot.

ERJAK wrote:
No one here has the same definition of balance.

You use whatever definition of balance makes the game seem worse than it is to; usually go with 'every option should be equally as good as every other option in all circumstances' which sounds good until you realize it just means 'it doesn't matter what anything does'. Other people just think it means 'eh, close enough' which is honestly a much better state for a game to be in.

I notice you've added a clause to my definition of balance there. I don't think everything should always be identical. I want everything to be usable instead of making some things always worthless.

I'm with you here. I'm not sure I understand what Auticus means about points being about "structure" vs balance.

Let me break it down.

Most 40k gamers I know don't give a damn about balance. They try to actively make a 2000 point list into a 5000 point list so that they can win based off of their list. Thats normal behavior pretty much everywhere.

When AOS dropped in 2015 there was no points and there was a lot of rage. People felt bad that while they could bring their 3 keeper of secrets and gate in their entire model collection and win, it didn't feel clever or good because there was no structure.

Then AOS put points in. And you could play your 3 keeper of secrets. And gate in your entire model collection. And that was great. Because you had the structure the points provided and you could then go about making your 2000 point structure function like a 5000 point list again.

The same experience was had either way. One had no points the other had points. Same basic armies. One was bad. One is good. The difference is the structure.

Neither example has any balance in it. At all. One example is slagged. The other is celebrated and worshipped as the most fun evah.

Same deal in 40k. People aren't after balance. They are after the structure. They want the 2000 points to min max within. The structure is the 2000 points to build the most powerful list they can that functions as a 5000 point list.

Listbuilding games where listbuilding is the primary focus cannot exist with balance, otherwise listbuilding is not as important. The more balance that exists, the more viable exists, and the more viable exists, the less your clever listbuilding and powerlisting matters.

@Auticus-

I think the issue is that the "lack of structure" in AoS was directly contributing to a lack of balance. Yes, I see what you mean by structure now, but honestly, in this case, "balance" is a key pillar in that "structure" imo.

Tycho wrote:
@Auticus-

I think the issue is that the "lack of structure" in AoS was directly contributing to a lack of balance. Yes, I see what you mean by structure now, but honestly, in this case, "balance" is a key pillar in that "structure" imo.

Except its not and you have no data to support that position. You, me, and everyone else who has ever played the game has never seen a balanced 40k. The structure pays lip service to the concept of balance without ever actually doing anything (on its own) to achieve it. And GW has never taken the necessary steps to take that structure and move it towards balance. The lip service is enough for the people that keep playing. And the negative nancys who quit and rage about 40k are the ones where the lip service isnt enough.

Except its not and you have no data to support that position. You, me, and everyone else who has ever played the game has never seen a balanced 40k. The structure pays lip service to the concept of balance without ever actually doing anything (on its own) to achieve it. And GW has never taken the necessary steps to take that structure and move it towards balance. The lip service is enough for the people that keep playing. And the negative nancys who quit and rage about 40k are the ones where the lip service isnt enough.

Really not sure what you're actually getting at or why I would need data? I think the fact that GW went back to AoS and added points was more than enough data to say what was going wrong ... When even GW says they made a mistake, it's likely that there is a mountain of data supporting it.

The argument from Auticus wasn't necessarily that the points in 40k are balanced, the argument was that they weren't about balance at all. They clearly are about balance, so I'm not sure where you're coming from? Did GW do it right? No. In this case I think they very clearly tried to use the points to do something the core rules should have been doing and totally forgot about the real meaning for even having points. Have they done it right in the past? Yep. There have been times over the 30 years that the game was in a fairly decent over-all balance. But if you're also trying to argue that points aren't about balance, I'm just not sure what to do with that.

 auticus wrote:

Most 40k gamers I know don't give a damn about balance. They try to actively make a 2000 point list into a 5000 point list so that they can win based off of their list. Thats normal behavior pretty much everywhere.

You have it backwards. People gravitate towards the best lists so that they can compete on the same level as other strong lists and use them competently.

No one wants to go to the table gimped and almost no one has fun tabling their opponent. A list based win happens more at lower levels of play when both people don't have equal power.

1) you are giving gw and companies in general too much credit. They dont need a mountain of data. People yelled at them about points so they gave them points. Thats the whole equation.

2) i am saying that the point changes here were not about balance. They were about structure. GW applied what amounts to a formula (maybe) to a set of points that were already unbalanced to shift the entire playing field into a new structure. In part, to sell people new boxes with battlefield tiles. If it was about balance they either a) needed to balance it first bwfore applying the formula or b) needed to hand craft the changes because no formula would work.

3) points CAN be about balance. But just because points can be about balance doesnt mean points ALWAYS are about balance. Sometimes they are just a placating gesture.

Points system is about selling models. The point value of a model can make or break how many of that model you sell. I'm sure GW has very detailed information on how points values for their products affect their sales/profits/bottom line.

They don't want balance, they want sales.

1) you are giving gw and companies in general too much credit. They dont need a mountain of data. People yelled at them about points so they gave them points. Thats the whole equation.

You're the one saying "data was needed" lol It wasn't about "people yelling at them". In the best of times, when GW is doing almost NOTHING wrong there is still a MOUNTAIN of people screaming at them about something. People yelling at them has almost no bearing on what they do. And most large companies use data based decision making pretty heavily. Honestly, in this case, the fact that AoS wasn't selling at all, and that it was doing so bad, some retailers were suddenly refusing to carry it was all the data they needed.

2) i am saying that the point changes here were not about balance. They were about structure. GW applied what amounts to a formula (maybe) to a set of points that were already unbalanced to shift the entire playing field into a new structure. In part, to sell people new boxes with battlefield tiles. If it was about balance they either a) needed to balance it first bwfore applying the formula or b) needed to hand craft the changes because no formula would work.

You and I are saying the same thing here. My point the whole time is that GW never said the increae for 9th was about balance, but were rather pretty clear about simply wanting to rescale the game. This is fundamentally different from what Auticus was saying - IE points are never about balance. Balance is the whole reason they exist. The fact that this was ignored by GW while up-pointing everything has no bearing on this fact.

3) points CAN be about balance. But just because points can be about balance doesnt mean points ALWAYS are about balance. Sometimes they are just a placating gesture.

This just doesn't make sense imo.

 Unit1126PLL wrote:

 auticus wrote:

And the reason any of that matters is balance. Not structure.

If that were really true, that balance was so important to people, then 40k wouldn't be 1/10th as popular as it is. If that were really true then forums and twitterverse and facebook wouldn't be crammed full of people trying to break the game and make a 2000 point list operate like it was 4000-5000 points to purposely IMBALANCE the game. The game has never been balanced, and honestly feels like the past ten years it has gone the polar opposite direction of balance. And people line up to throw money at the company anyway, and will on this forum and others say very loudly they don't care about the imbalance, thats not why they play the game.

Same in AOS land.

That's because what people want is the illusion of balance, rather than the actual thing. In philosophy, it's essentially perception vs. reality. People want the perception that a game is balanced - indeed, this perception is why they try to break it, because if you can break something that's perceived to be balanced, then "WOW! Aren't you clever!?" The reality of balance has to be close enough only that the perception can do the rest of the work.

When a shoddy job like this is done, it pulls back the veil - the reality of balance tears away from the perception of balance - and demonstrates that it's not really balanced at all and that ruins the perception of balance, which makes the game-breakers feel less smart and dissolves the casual's (mistaken) belief that the game is winnable if they just learned to up their skills and try harder.

We're dealing with the Wargamer's New Clothes, huh?

 Dysartes wrote:
We're dealing with the Wargamer's New Clothes, huh?

Yes, of course. Competitive 40k has always existed, therefore there has always been pressure to conform to the perception that the game is balanced and that player skill is the prime determination of victory.

topaxygouroun i wrote:

 Yarium wrote:

topaxygouroun i wrote:
Brave of you to assume that Nids will get better.

Oh, I know this song and dance. Been playing since 3rd edition with Nids. But over time we honestly do get cool new and powerful stuff, and what it is just changes. 8th edition wasn't the first time Genestealers were good. Wasn't even the second time. Most of the codex will always be bad (we'll never get an "everything is good!" codex), but we have had times where we've had multiple good builds.

We get strong stuff at times but none of them ever was a product of planning or intention, it's just that GW did not realize that Nids don't follow the normal rules of power level of the other armies. GW never thought or intended that kraken stealers could slingshot 50" in a single turn. They never thought that Doom of Malantai could siphon more wounds than the enemy could do to it. They never planned that it was an actual posibility that people would field 7 flyrants.

Next time we get something strong, it's going to once again be a byproduct of a mistake and we will be paying the penalty for 3 more editions after that.

You missed the Tervigon - part of the 5th ed book, no model, staple of lists.

 catbarf wrote:
Given the inexplicable reversions on Scions and Killa Kans, I suspect this is the case.

They took the base points cost, said 'we don't see these models much, let's not increase their cost now', and ignored all the changes that had been made over the course of 8th.

Design in a vacuum, as always.

Looks like my Orks are going on the shelf until a new Codex. At least my Necrons and Death Guard didn't get hit way too hard.

 H.B.M.C. wrote:

 catbarf wrote:
Given the inexplicable reversions on Scions and Killa Kans, I suspect this is the case.

They took the base points cost, said 'we don't see these models much, let's not increase their cost now', and ignored all the changes that had been made over the course of 8th.

Design in a vacuum, as always.

No sure I understand why people are confused about scions with all the stuff they picked up on top of cheaper special weapons in an edition that values mobile units. Why is that wrong?

I haven't looked at KKs though. What happened to them?

I think it would be helpful to look at other competitive games when thinking about what a balanced game should look like. Forgive me if I make any truly obvious mistakes here in my reasoning that don't apply well to 40k, as I haven't played a game in ages. I'm here because I'm dusting off my old 3rd edition Tyranids to keep myself occupied while socially distancing, and modeling seems like a great option.

Magic the Gathering is a trading card game that can be seen as largely analogous to tabletop games in the sense that your chances of success depend on what you decide to bring to the table (deckbuilding and listbuilding, respectively) and how you play during the game itself. Further, MTG has multiple avenues of play for both competitive and casual gamers, and with new sets releasing every few months balance is in need of constant evaluation.

The game can be played multiple ways, broken down into different formats which have their own specific deckbuilding restrictions and dictate the size and scope of the card pool from which you can select cards for your deck. Most formats have a role in MTG's highest level of competition, while simultaneously appearing in more casual, weekly sanctioned events.

Every format has a "best deck". Every single one, without exception. A format is considered unhealthy when that "best deck" is so dominating that other strategies are simply not viable, and in the most competitive events that particular deck begins to occupy upwards of around 40% of lists registered for the event. A format is healthy when there are multiple viable strategies, and even though one deck will be the "best" option, players are still presented with a real choice about how they want to approach the event and attack the meta. Please note, this explanation is simplistic and ignores MTG specific nuances, but should be sufficient to help illustrate my overall point.

Outside of competition, there will be dozens (even hundreds) of other functional decks in any given format you may encounter in more casual play. These decks have successful strategies, can win games without luck, and can even win games against the truly competitive decks from time to time. They're just not as consistently powerful as the best options in the format, so you don't see them impact the competitive meta.

So what should we expect to see in a balanced version of 40k? I don't think anybody truly wants a world where all strategies are perfectly equal, and points are so perfect that choices don't really matter. We also want to avoid a world in which a single best strategy (read: list) is so dominant that it occupies an absurdly large percentage of the competitive environment and playing anything else is like playing with a handicap. I think that what we want is a competitive environment where there are a variety of real options spread across most factions, and for EVERY faction to at least have fun and playable options that can win real games even if they aren't going to seriously impact the competitive meta.

Will there still be problems? Yeah. Magic has them all the time. Formats break all the time. Magic has an easier job fixing these problems, though. They get to just ban important cards from the offending deck and let the meta fix itself in response. GW has yet to offer an efficient method of adjusting balance in a reasonable time frame. What's more, in Magic when a particular deck is a problem or on the other end is just weak, that particular deck doesn't have a fanbase rooting for it. You just move on and play a different deck you enjoy. If Orks are useless, though, then you have a whole group of upset collectors.

I think points could be a viable system to properly balance this game, but in order for that to be possible GW would need to be able to update them at regular (and short!) intervals, and make sure all players have easy access to current points at all times. The upcoming app would be ideal for that job. The problems with the recent point update notwithstanding (I have no frame of reference here), if GW committed to analyzing tournament results and playtesting results to issue regular point updates, I think the game could trend towards more balanced over time. So long as we all understand what we mean by balanced, and are clear about whether or not that's what we actually want.

I'm just scratching my head at some of the point changes. For example, hanging Nemesis falchions to 4 points as welll as increasing GK model points AND storm bolter cost makes said falchions essentially a no go.

Also it's so bizarre seeing GW RAISING points so people need less models/buy less models, to play. So bizarre.

I actually don't think that's bizarre at all. It feels simplistic to me to think that more models for a game equals more sales for GW. If you want the game to be more accessible so that you attract more new players, making the model count a little smaller and shortening games seems like an ideal approach. Two new players in a slightly smaller game accounts for more sales than one new player in a slightly larger game.

Whether or not their changes will effectively support this approach is a different matter.

I think it's also likely that more units will find ways to be viable with the new ruleset, and this can encourage expanding model collections even though the model count for a game has shrunk a bit. That said, a rough re-pointing of my army didn't see much depreciation in model count. I'm basically down a single vehicle or so.

I think it's also likely that more units will find ways to be viable with the new ruleset, and this can encourage expanding model collections even though the model count for a game has shrunk a bit. That said, a rough re-pointing of my army didn't see much depreciation in model count. I'm basically down a single vehicle or so.

For me, that's the real crux of it - this didn't do what it was intended to do, but also had sweeping negative effects in other areas, so it's just pure fail IMO. To your point about units seeing the table that would otherwise not - unfortunately, in many cases, those are the units that got hit the hardest ...

One thing that has been mentioned before, is GW likes Power Levels. Any excuse to use it is a good one. The homogenization of points, and the reduction of unit options may be a slow lead into the larger use of PL in the future (10Ed?). If you can reduce the swing of wargear options of a single unit down enough, the PL will start to make sense as a primary list building tool. Sure, now we have units that can more than double their base cost by slapping on extra gubbins - but not that many really; but that does not always mean it will be so in the future. Some options are just never taken, adjust PL for the points of the most common options used, and eliminate/reduce the rest. At some point you can reduce every unit down to a simple PL per model cost and that's your list.
The only part that doesn't fit (and doesn't even now) is the highly variable effect of doctrines, stratagems and certain add on abilities that are un-costed.

chnmmr wrote:
I'm just scratching my head at some of the point changes. For example, hanging Nemesis falchions to 4 points as welll as increasing GK model points AND storm bolter cost makes said falchions essentially a no go.

Also it's so bizarre seeing GW RAISING points so people need less models/buy less models, to play. So bizarre.

Its because falchions were absurdly auto-pick. No reason to do any other weapon when they all do the same thing, but falchions get you +1A.

Removed - Rule #1 please