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 Unit1126PLL wrote:
Insectum, you're hitting on a point I've been trying to make for a while.

40k is now a (war)game in which plastic models stand on a table, their owners roll dice.

It is no longer a war(game), in which assembled armies of hostile foes engage each-other in a pitched battle (abstracted by models and dice).

You're gonna have to fill me in as I started playing earnestly in 6th (or 7th?), when was 40k ever portrayed that way and how?

Rock paper scissors balancing is lame for competitive games. It just increases the chances that matches are determined at the list-building stage, rather than based on how each player performs once the models hit the table.

Varying efficiency of weapons based on profile makes sense, but the game is already varied enough in profiles. There's no competitive reason to make hard counters stronger than they already are. The game didn't need more 2W infantry in order to further increase the bonuses for having just the right weapon in your list to perfectly counter an opposing unit.

 Mixzremixzd wrote:

 Unit1126PLL wrote:
Insectum, you're hitting on a point I've been trying to make for a while.

40k is now a (war)game in which plastic models stand on a table, their owners roll dice.

It is no longer a war(game), in which assembled armies of hostile foes engage each-other in a pitched battle (abstracted by models and dice).

You're gonna have to fill me in as I started playing earnestly in 6th (or 7th?), when was 40k ever portrayed that way and how?

It's been an uphill and downhill struggle between editions but Epic was pretty good and 4th edition was pretty good. HH is also pretty good, and though it uses the 7th edition architecture, it does a bit better in the 'modeling strategic maneuver/communications/etc.' department. It's more "realistic" in general.

Realistic like armour facings on vehicles and weapons locked to degrees of movement? Not trying to be snarky just genuinely curious if that's what you mean.

 Daedalus81 wrote:

 Insectum7 wrote:
Actually less relevant to me than the comparative resilience of units from a non-pointed/lore standpoint. The question I ask is, where do I think Immortal Resilience should be in relation to most Marines, and my answer to that is "at least equal, preferably better". The circumstance now is "depends on the weapons, but generally worse, especially when it comes to small arms." Which I find quite irritating.

There's a gravitas in the identity of the unit that is eroded.

Fair point. I can't argue that.

It's a sort of thing which seems to be happening even more at the moment. For Necrons, when I started with Necrons their design space was sorta "Tougher than Marines, but with rigid options". And now they're just really not tougher. There's a core faction identity that's gone missing.

Aspect Warriors are the other big thing for me. "As Elite as a Marine, except more specialized." And now they often seem to underperform in their specialty against Marines. It hurts the identity of the units in question, and they suddenly seem less cool from a lore/conceptual standpoint.

I worry about Tyranids. I hope Tyranid Warriors get some goood upgrades.

 Mixzremixzd wrote:
Realistic like armour facings on vehicles and weapons locked to degrees of movement? Not trying to be snarky just genuinely curious if that's what you mean.

Among other things, yes. Realistic like having to point guns at targets, cover and line of sight making more sense (esp. 4th edition) than it has since, the way reserves function (you don't have to have a special rule to be held off the table, so you can have Tactical Marines in mechanized transports as a reserve maneuver element for example), the way Daemons deploy makes more sense in 30k than they ever did in 40k for how daemons are in "reality" (of the 40k setting), all sorts of stuff.

yukishiro1 wrote:
Rock paper scissors balancing is lame for competitive games. It just increases the chances that matches are determined at the list-building stage, rather than based on how each player performs once the models hit the table.

Varying efficiency of weapons based on profile makes sense, but the game is already varied enough in profiles. There's no competitive reason to make hard counters stronger than they already are. The game didn't need more 2W infantry in order to further increase the bonuses for having just the right weapon in your list to perfectly counter an opposing unit.

Hard counter system diminishes the effectiveness of 'all-eggs-in-one-basket' type of lists. Such system further promotes 'healthier' lists where one needs to bring a good balance of units rather than focusing on single aspect, namely, the killyness.

It's a nice bump to elite armies. Now the game can become 'expendable fodders vs. lumbering warmachines... and elite infantries'.

Also, due to the plethora of 2D weapons, taking 2W models were always a liability. In practice, 2W models died faster than 1W models because 1W models could be ignored for the most part of the game, and all these 2D weapons you brought needed to be pointing at something - and no one in their right mind will choose to target 1W model over 2W model.

 Unit1126PLL wrote:

 Mixzremixzd wrote:
Realistic like armour facings on vehicles and weapons locked to degrees of movement? Not trying to be snarky just genuinely curious if that's what you mean.

Among other things, yes. Realistic like having to point guns at targets, cover and line of sight making more sense (esp. 4th edition) than it has since, the way reserves function (you don't have to have a special rule to be held off the table, so you can have Tactical Marines in mechanized transports as a reserve maneuver element for example), the way Daemons deploy makes more sense in 30k than they ever did in 40k for how daemons are in "reality" (of the 40k setting), all sorts of stuff.

Can't speak for Daemons but hasn't 9th already addressed these issues? TLOS aside aren't the current terrain rules and strategic reserve exactly what you're referencing here?

 Insectum7 wrote:

I worry about Tyranids. I hope Tyranid Warriors get some goood upgrades.

Definitely need a major overhaul. I remember hating taking them. I felt I absolutely had to have the backup synapse coverage, but they always fell over to a stiff breeze. (this was 4th/5th editions).

 Mixzremixzd wrote:

 Unit1126PLL wrote:

 Mixzremixzd wrote:
Realistic like armour facings on vehicles and weapons locked to degrees of movement? Not trying to be snarky just genuinely curious if that's what you mean.

Among other things, yes. Realistic like having to point guns at targets, cover and line of sight making more sense (esp. 4th edition) than it has since, the way reserves function (you don't have to have a special rule to be held off the table, so you can have Tactical Marines in mechanized transports as a reserve maneuver element for example), the way Daemons deploy makes more sense in 30k than they ever did in 40k for how daemons are in "reality" (of the 40k setting), all sorts of stuff.

Can't speak for Daemons but hasn't 9th already addressed these issues? TLOS aside aren't the current terrain rules and strategic reserve exactly what you're referencing here?

Not really. Armor facings and gun traversing is still not relevant (except to hurt you if you want to move your gun, since a Vanquisher Tank traversing its turret ~60 degrees or more now moves further than half its move and can only shoot once). Reserves aren't uncertain like they are in earlier editions (back in the day and in Horus Heresy, if you /do/ hold something in reserve, its arrival is uncertain by default. Different rules can make it more or less uncertain - enhanced communications arrays for example make it much more likely for reserves to operate in a coordinated fashion, while communications jamming or Air Interdiction strikes on the part of your foe can make their arrival timing less certain, etc).

The terrain rules for 9th are in a weird hybrid space, which makes them less realistic in my view than if GW had gone one way or another. For example, in 4th edition, woods blocked LOS. In HH, woods can be seen through with TLOS but shooting through the terrain grants a cover save. In 9th edition, Woods never block LOS, and you can fire through them with impunity. If your opponent and you agree they're "Dense" (by some arbitrary metric), then you have -1 to shoot through them, but only if you have less than 18 wounds (so a Land Raider benefits but not a Malcador, despite the fact that the Malcador is a smaller, more compact, more easily hidden tank).

the_scotsman wrote:
what the hell is a kabalite for?

Carrying a blast pistol?

Tbh it just sort of feels like powerlessness.
Okay, lets bring Kab's back to something sensible - like 7 points.
But... so what? It still takes a horde of them to kill a Marine.
Stick the Marine in cover - and, assuming no flayed skull, it takes twice the horde. (Even more if we chuck in obscuring.)

So I guess all you have is hoping GW get drunk and make blasters assault 3, or shredders are upgraded to disies.

Bad drug load out versus Marines perhaps - but it would take 5.4 wyches with 5 S3 attacks to kill 1 tactical Marine. Which seems kind of terrible.
But hey, maybe Hekatarii blades will get +1S, 1A, -1AP because things gotta be better.

I can see the argument - if everyone's packing all the D2 then hordes of Orks and Acolytes might be hard to put down. (Its kind of what you got under the Marine domination, although definitely Orks not GSC). But it seems such a rock/paper/scissor sort of development, and people who don't fit are just going to be terrible.

 skchsan wrote:
I for one think this is a healthy rock-paper-scissor change.

-2D weapons get a boost as it will have a greater pool of units it invalidates (2W models).
-2W models do better against 1D weapons (has double wound pool).
-1D weapons have higher rate of return on its points expenditure against 1W models (opportunity cost of 2D weapons are wasted).

So, 2-wound models are countered by 2 damage weapons, and it 'counters' 1D weapons; 1D weapons 'counter' (more efficiently) 1W models than 2D weapons and gets countered by 2W models; 2D weapons counter 2W models but gets 'countered' by hordes.

So the best weapon is one that can be both effective against 1W and 2W (for a bit of risk) infantry. So, basically, if it remains 10 ppm: Plasma is king.

 Gadzilla666 wrote:

 skchsan wrote:
I for one think this is a healthy rock-paper-scissor change.

-2D weapons get a boost as it will have a greater pool of units it invalidates (2W models).
-2W models do better against 1D weapons (has double wound pool).
-1D weapons have higher rate of return on its points expenditure against 1W models (opportunity cost of 2D weapons are wasted).

So, 2-wound models are countered by 2 damage weapons, and it 'counters' 1D weapons; 1D weapons 'counter' (more efficiently) 1W models than 2D weapons and gets countered by 2W models; 2D weapons counter 2W models but gets 'countered' by hordes.

So the best weapon is one that can be both effective against 1W and 2W (for a bit of risk) infantry. So, basically, if it remains 10 ppm: Plasma is king.

Right, plasmas are kind of like 'knife' in RPS.

I think plasma now has the qualities to be a truly double edged weapon where it blows up on unmodified roll of 1's and can't be mitigated by +hit abilities. Do plasmas still have double profile?

P.S. Making the entirety of the space marine army (except scouts and servitors) 2W+ also does the opposite of expanding possible profiles for targets. It means that for the faction 50% of people play, 1W targets effectively don't exist. That's not opening up greater design space, it's diminishing it.

I'm concerned about the bump. Doubling the wounds of Tactical Marines with only a 20% increase in cost feels odd. My Sisters at S3, T3, 1W at 11pts compared to a Tactical at S4, T4, 1W, 15pts still felt fair, but now that they're 2W at 18 points? Suddenly my ability to kill them has halved, and they kill me just as easy.

And while I know we're not talking about weapon buffs, etc, the general increase in damage output and resilience, combined with the smaller board size, makes me concerned about Turn 1. Shooting dominated the later meta in 8th, and while terrain helps, in practice you can only hide so much of your army. First turn is going to be a bloodbath until other factions get their rebalance.

I like this changed but it should apply to everybody.

Necron warriors with 1 wounds, inmortals with 2 and T5, Lychguard/Praetorians with 3 wounds, Ork boyz with 1, nobs with 3, meganobz with 4

With Eldar I would probably give aspect warriors 2 and their sargeants 3 with guardians at 1 wound. Because I can't come up with a defensive buff for "agile" units that isn't just minus to hit or invulnerable saves.

Archebius wrote:
I'm concerned about the bump. Doubling the wounds of Tactical Marines with only a 20% increase in cost feels odd. My Sisters at S3, T3, 1W at 11pts compared to a Tactical at S4, T4, 1W, 15pts still felt fair, but now that they're 2W at 18 points? Suddenly my ability to kill them has halved, and they kill me just as easy.

And while I know we're not talking about weapon buffs, etc, the general increase in damage output and resilience, combined with the smaller board size, makes me concerned about Turn 1. Shooting dominated the later meta in 8th, and while terrain helps, in practice you can only hide so much of your army. First turn is going to be a bloodbath until other factions get their rebalance.

Those marines now have 20% less army/guns to shoot you with.

yukishiro1 wrote:
P.S. Making the entirety of the space marine army (except scouts and servitors) 2W+ also does the opposite of expanding possible profiles for targets. It means that for the faction 50% of people play, 1W targets effectively don't exist. That's not opening up greater design space, it's diminishing it.

You mean 50% of player base (since about 50% players play SM flavor of the month), not 50% of the factions that gets played.

Also, if reg tac marines get bumped to 18 ppm, then those 1W scouts with infiltrate looks pretty promising prospect.

Out of the 14 'primary' factions with full roster (excl. knights & custodes) only 2 factions are getting this upgrade (assuming CSM gets equivalent treatment). That's not 50% of the existing factions. Majority of factions will continue to rely on 1W fodders (unless of course, EVERY faction gets bumped up).

Dudeface wrote:

Archebius wrote:
I'm concerned about the bump. Doubling the wounds of Tactical Marines with only a 20% increase in cost feels odd. My Sisters at S3, T3, 1W at 11pts compared to a Tactical at S4, T4, 1W, 15pts still felt fair, but now that they're 2W at 18 points? Suddenly my ability to kill them has halved, and they kill me just as easy.

And while I know we're not talking about weapon buffs, etc, the general increase in damage output and resilience, combined with the smaller board size, makes me concerned about Turn 1. Shooting dominated the later meta in 8th, and while terrain helps, in practice you can only hide so much of your army. First turn is going to be a bloodbath until other factions get their rebalance.

Those marines now have 20% less army/guns to shoot you with.

Right but those 20% fewer guns will have a 100% longer lifespan when being shot back. Just like in video-games, sometimes the best way to tank a room in a dungeon is to DPS it to death before it overwhelms you. Halving your DPS and reducing enemy count by 20% is a good way to find previously clearable rooms suddenly overwhelming.

 Daedalus81 wrote:

 Insectum7 wrote:
Actually less relevant to me than the comparative resilience of units from a non-pointed/lore standpoint. The question I ask is, where do I think Immortal Resilience should be in relation to most Marines, and my answer to that is "at least equal, preferably better". The circumstance now is "depends on the weapons, but generally worse, especially when it comes to small arms." Which I find quite irritating.

There's a gravitas in the identity of the unit that is eroded.

Fair point. I can't argue that.

The two units seem pretty balanced against one another.

It's just weird that the distinction is "The marine is slightly more durable, the Necron Immortal just does more damage and is very slightly better at melee."

Like....huh?

Voss wrote:

 Insectum7 wrote:

I worry about Tyranids. I hope Tyranid Warriors get some goood upgrades.

Definitely need a major overhaul. I remember hating taking them. I felt I absolutely had to have the backup synapse coverage, but they always fell over to a stiff breeze. (this was 4th/5th editions).

At least in 4th edition they had the nice Synapse ability to not die from Instant Death.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

the_scotsman wrote:

 Daedalus81 wrote:

 Insectum7 wrote:
Actually less relevant to me than the comparative resilience of units from a non-pointed/lore standpoint. The question I ask is, where do I think Immortal Resilience should be in relation to most Marines, and my answer to that is "at least equal, preferably better". The circumstance now is "depends on the weapons, but generally worse, especially when it comes to small arms." Which I find quite irritating.

There's a gravitas in the identity of the unit that is eroded.

Fair point. I can't argue that.

The two units seem pretty balanced against one another.

It's just weird that the distinction is "The marine is slightly more durable, the Necron Immortal just does more damage and is very slightly better at melee."

Like....huh?

I don't think they should be balanced at rough equivalents. Also, those Doctrines kick in and push the Tacs further. I like the range boost to the Gauss Blaster, but when my UM can move and fire twice at 24" and get a -1 from Tactical, the Tacs can do great by just kiting the Immortals.

Immortals have fallen far. 3rd Ed Gauss Blaster was Assault 2 24" S5 AP4, an amazing gun at the time. Kicking it to Rapid Fire hurt it a lot.

Game-wise and lore-wise it's awesome and it's how it should've been from the start of 8th.
Balance-wise it's absolutely bonkers if the 20% increase that tacticals get is more or less the average one for MEQ. 100% more durability for +20% in cost is just wrong.
Right now there's simply no way to justify how 2 Fire Warriors are as valuable as a Tac Marine, for example.

 Gadzilla666 wrote:

So the best weapon is one that can be both effective against 1W and 2W (for a bit of risk) infantry. So, basically, if it remains 10 ppm: Plasma is king.

But then terminators are W3 - where is your god now?!

 Aenar wrote:
Game-wise and lore-wise it's awesome and it's how it should've been from the start of 8th.
Balance-wise it's absolutely bonkers if the 20% increase that tacticals get is more or less the average one for MEQ. 100% more durability for +20% in cost is just wrong.
Right now there's simply no way to justify how 2 Fire Warriors are as valuable as a Tac Marine, for example.

I think it's a fair trade off.

2x S5 shots at 30" range at the cost of -1 T and Sv.
1x S4 shot at 24" range (after moving) and has +1 T and Sv in comparison.

Note, bolter discipline will usually not come into play (unless otherwise stated) for non-terminator infantries during your turn unless your opponent was kind enough to place his models within 24".

 skchsan wrote:

 Aenar wrote:
Game-wise and lore-wise it's awesome and it's how it should've been from the start of 8th.
Balance-wise it's absolutely bonkers if the 20% increase that tacticals get is more or less the average one for MEQ. 100% more durability for +20% in cost is just wrong.
Right now there's simply no way to justify how 2 Fire Warriors are as valuable as a Tac Marine, for example.

I think it's a fair trade off.

2x S5 shots at 30" range at the cost of -1 T and Sv.
1x S4 shot at 24" range (after moving) and has +1 T and Sv in comparison.

Note, bolter discipline will usually not come into play (unless otherwise stated) for non-terminator infantries during your turn unless your opponent was kind enough to place his models within 24".

The internal balance seems fine, it's the external one that is non-existent right now.
We just have to hope for a similar boost and a quick release of xenos codices. Until then, HH 9th ed.

the_scotsman wrote:

 Daedalus81 wrote:

 Insectum7 wrote:
Actually less relevant to me than the comparative resilience of units from a non-pointed/lore standpoint. The question I ask is, where do I think Immortal Resilience should be in relation to most Marines, and my answer to that is "at least equal, preferably better". The circumstance now is "depends on the weapons, but generally worse, especially when it comes to small arms." Which I find quite irritating.

There's a gravitas in the identity of the unit that is eroded.

Fair point. I can't argue that.

The two units seem pretty balanced against one another.

It's just weird that the distinction is "The marine is slightly more durable, the Necron Immortal just does more damage and is very slightly better at melee."

Like....huh?

His perspective is more around fluff rather than balance.

We've also seen datasheets suggesting basic bolters are moving out to 30" range, with 15" rapid fire. That leaves a bit more room for move and shoot without bolter discipline.
Smaller tables also make the range game nearly a non-issue.

I'm not really keen on the Wounds bloat that's been happening in tandem with increased deadliness in the game as a whole, especially considering the regular marine profile is the baseline against which other units in the game are compared. Also not really sure marines need more buffs atm.

 Banzaimash wrote:
I'm not really keen on the Wounds bloat that's been happening in tandem with increased deadliness in the game as a whole, especially considering the regular marine profile is the baseline against which other units in the game are compared. Also not really sure marines need more buffs atm.

I was under the impression only weapons that got "buffs" were weapons that couldn't be/never taken in 8th ed because they were either cost prohibitive or not cost effective.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

Bluflash wrote:
We've also seen datasheets suggesting basic bolters are moving out to 30" range, with 15" rapid fire. That leaves a bit more room for move and shoot without bolter discipline.
Smaller tables also make the range game nearly a non-issue.

Okay, but S5 is still something worth considering, no? Fire warriors hit harder and gets killed easier, marines hit less hard and are harder to kill.

There is lots of talk about doubling the wounds of the humble tactical marine doubling thier life, and thus more than paying off for the 20% increase in price...

However one of the eternal problems of the T4 1W 3+ set up has been that they are vulnerable both to mass low str low ap anti personel weapons, and high str high AP anti-tank weapons. This move 2 wounds helps differentiate them. In the big picture your standard marine is an elite heavy infantry and will now feel like it. Yes it will now take twice the lasgun (insert weapon of choice) shots to down a tac marine, but those lascannons, thunder hammers, monstrous rending claws, melta shots will pretty much cut through those 2 wounds just as easily as the one.

Plus there are all those changes we are yet to see (with the humble heavy bolter going to D2, what else will?).

Metas are metas, and competitive meta something else again. Marines of some description are a popular army, and lots of people have them... So if someone optimises for a marine meta (lots of antitank/ D2+) then they'll have a harder time with those that can field more plentiful, cheaper models.

So I like the concept but whether overall this is good for the game we'll only be able to tell once we have the fuller picture.