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I always thought it would be neat if the units in Platoons needed to be a certain distance from each other. The 2nd edition command rules would give modern players the fritz too.

Maybe the rule of 3 should be an exclusive for tournament play? I mean narrative play might incentivize skew lists but it seems to be a place for messing around with different flavors. Want to run an armored column of leman russes? Awesome. I don't play guard but I think we can have some fun with that. We could pit heavy weapons teams and tanks against that to see what would happen and come up with a cool story. How about a chaos space marine army of possessed, greater possessed, master of possession, daemon engines and other daemons? Heck orks absolutely should be able to make armies of speed freaks. Let your imagination run wild.

 catbarf wrote:

Spoiler:

PenitentJake wrote:
But at Stikeforce, you get 12 + 1/turn. 3CP is NOT a huge deal in this context- especially if you include CP generation in your army.

If your army is so skewed into a single slot that you can still fit everything you want into a single detachment, sure.

Which basically means you can build alternative forces so long as they're one-note. So, provided my opponent is okay with me ignoring Rule of 3, I can take a Vanguard detachment so as to take Veterans as troops- and then no more than two each of Fast Attack or Heavy Support. You can have your Spearhead of tanks, but no more than two HQ choices or Fast Attack. Want two units of Sentinels and a Hellhound alongside your tank company? Too bad, can't do it unless you take another detachment. At 1500-2000 points, that means you're down to half the CP of anyone with a Battalion.

The supposed advantage of this system is that it gives you more freedom and less restriction. I see more freedom, but with a laundry list of caveats that disincentivize actually taking advantage of it for fluffy reasons.

In practice, I've seen far more players opt to just take a Battalion or two and fit their theme into the limitations of that structure, with 'tax' Troops as needed. It's not as egregious as in 8th, but the extra CP in return for taking a few Troops you wouldn't otherwise is an enticing carrot. You can still cram a whole ton of Leman Russes into a single Battalion anyways, 3 HS slots and Ro3 be damned.

PenitentJake wrote:
Perhaps it isn't the FOC that you liked, but the bespoke exceptions to it?

And if that's the case, the bespoke exceptions could be added to the detachment system just as easily as the FOC.

That only achieves half of the goal.

Let me try to boil this down to its bare essentials: Restrictions are good for the game. Exceptions are good for player choice.

I liked the FOC because it imposed restrictions on listbuilding that ensured armies fit within a general mold of what a 40K army should look like. There were broken lists in every edition, and there was skew that worked even within the FOC (part of the reason why I do actually like percentage-based systems better), but it generally ensured that you would see an army with some mix of the various unit types. The expected 40K army was an HQ or two, some troops, and then a varying amount of other stuff. The game was designed around that expectation.

I then liked the exceptions to the FOC because they provided characterful and fluffy alternatives where appropriate. Not wild west do-whatever-you-want bring-twenty-seven-Carnifexes, but someone put real thought into how a Guard army should work and how it should be structured. They were curated exceptions to the default army structure, and by that nature tended to work better than a more free-form but one-size-fits-all system that applies the same restrictions equally (with some armies being more equal than others- again, three squads of Veterans max versus twenty-seven Carnifexes).

Maybe the new Guard codex will make Veterans troops again and that particular example will go away. Maybe it'll also bring back the Platoon structure, too. Maybe they'll even get rid of multiple tanks per slot, so I can't take 12 Leman Russes in a single Battalion anymore. Those would all be positive changes (aside from killing the armored company outright). But it'll still be a core system that purports to offer ultimate choice (take whatever you want!) while imposing hard restrictions (but you better not want more than three of the same thing, or the same CP as everyone else!). And then you still get competitive lists that fall through the cracks by skewing without taking too many of any one unit.

Let me be clear about this: I never loved the old FOC as a mechanic. I just think the purported superiority of 9th's system is questionable, and the idea that everyone who doesn't overwhelmingly prefer the new system is a selfish grognard who resents atypical armies beating their FOC-compatible dinosaur is absolute garbage.

This was a great response- totally clarifies your POV and makes a lot of sense.

Who would call the Platoon rules "trash"? Honestly...

 Sim-Life wrote:
Why do people keep trying to tell catbarf that he doesn't like what he said he likes?

You know that scene in Liar Lair?

"Objection your honour!"
"On what grounds?"
"It's devastating to my case!"

That's how I see those arguing against Catbarf.

This is somewhat tangential, but w/r/t armies of Veterans - I wonder if this could be solved by having Vets be cut from the 'dex and replaced by a Veterancy upgrade (eg "for +X ppm [based on model], increase WS/BS and Ld by 1") available to some units and Platoons (+1 in favor of bringing them back). It always kind of irked me that we couldn't have Veteran HWTs or SWTs (or Veteran vehicle crews outside of Tank Commanders and the odd named character/FW model...).

Personally, I'd prefer we not bleed any more units than we've already lost since the start of 9e, and I'd be fine retaining Vets as a separate one-off unit in the Elites slot if you only want to have one or two squads of badasses as support (think back to that old unit fluff from the 6e 'dex where Harker's Hellraisers ambush some Orks attacking a trench line manned by regular units), but since my lists don't use Vets I have the luxury of feeling like it might be worth trying.

macluvin wrote:
Maybe the rule of 3 should be an exclusive for tournament play? .

When it was introduced in 8th Ed thats what it was. But for some reason a majority of the 40k community seems to use standard tournament play as the standard play for ALL 40k games. Hence why most discussion revolves around Matched 2000pts BRB table sizes being the assumed format being discussed.

 H.B.M.C. wrote:
Who would call the Platoon rules "trash"? Honestly...

 Sim-Life wrote:
Why do people keep trying to tell catbarf that he doesn't like what he said he likes?

You know that scene in Liar Lair?

"Objection your honour!"
"On what grounds?"
"It's devastating to my case!"

That's how I see those arguing against Catbarf.

Did you also not see the F#cking question mark- EVEN AFTER I pointed it out to Sim?

J3sus! Cartbarf got it- he answered the question, and knocked it out of the park to boot. And I told him so.

 waefre_1 wrote:
This is somewhat tangential, but w/r/t armies of Veterans - I wonder if this could be solved by having Vets be cut from the 'dex and replaced by a Veterancy upgrade (eg "for +X ppm [based on model], increase WS/BS and Ld by 1") available to some units and Platoons (+1 in favor of bringing them back). It always kind of irked me that we couldn't have Veteran HWTs or SWTs (or Veteran vehicle crews outside of Tank Commanders and the odd named character/FW model...).

Real-talk, I think the only way we're getting "Platoons" back is as a Stratagem that lets us deploy a set number of things all in one go for situations like Unit described.

Anything more is going to be bookkeeping, something GW's been kinda moving away from.

I definitely expect Veterans to be a stratagem though. The Skitarii Veteran Cohort was a top-notch bit of Legendary Army and it's just a shame they didn't have it in the main book.

Personally, I'd prefer we not bleed any more units than we've already lost since the start of 9e, and I'd be fine retaining Vets as a separate one-off unit in the Elites slot if you only want to have one or two squads of badasses as support (think back to that old unit fluff from the 6e 'dex where Harker's Hellraisers ambush some Orks attacking a trench line manned by regular units), but since my lists don't use Vets I have the luxury of feeling like it might be worth trying.

Would be okay with losing Veterans as a unit if we saw Regimental splatbooks with unique units dropped. Rumour mill right now is pointing towards Kasrkin as part of a Cadian themed release(four kits) next year and Grenadiers+Death Riders accompanying the Krieg release whenever it fully happens.

More books to add in units we already have? No thanks...

 catbarf wrote:


Let me try to boil this down to its bare essentials: Restrictions are good for the game. Exceptions are good for player choice.

I liked the FOC because it imposed restrictions on listbuilding that ensured armies fit within a general mold of what a 40K army should look like.

I think choices in listbuilding are good for the game. In older editions lower points formats were common, rosters had 4-5 at most for each FA, HS or elite and in most cases the game pushed for large squads. Not to mention that GW almost never released FAQs, and OP units could stay OP for years. So the old FOC had some sense to limit skewing.

Now we play huge games of 2000 points, we have tons of datasheets to choose from, MSU are king of the edition so restricting slots is not the answer I think. Also some armies have squadrons, which could bypass the limitation. Some armies also have units that would fit different slots in other codexes: Heavy Intercessors would be Heavy Support or Elites in any other book, Eradicators would be Heavy Support in any other book, Tyranid Warriors would be Elites in any other book, Deff Dreads would be Elites in a SM book, some transports have the same firepower of other FA/HS vehicles etc...

With 9th edition codexes I feel armies are finally looking like proper collection of models as codexes are pretty balanced internally, and there's much less spam than in older editions even in competitive gaming.

If you really want restrictions on listbuilding try to play 1500 games. Now you really have to take decisions about what to take.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 catbarf wrote:


And 15-30 Terminators may work as 3 slots if you're okay with maxing out unit sizes- can't do 6 units of 5 each. But it doesn't work so well for a Guard Veteran army, where three squads of infantry isn't enough for even 1000pts.

You are against skew lists but sometimes push for playing skew For starters, terminators have so many datasheets that you can definitely run 6 units of 5 each, probably even more.

Then complete that guard veteran army with other stuff from the same book. It's like complaining that an ork army made only by nobz couldn't work under rule of 3 limitation. And why shouldn't those guard veterans be elites (so limited to max 3 with the FOC) in the first place?

You're calling a Deathwing army 'skew'.

Not unless you play chaos. Then you only get 1 Type of terminators. (2 if dg if i member correctly).

Otoh, you can field an army out of chaos lords and daemonprinces.... Because Ro3 is well designed and functional...

 H.B.M.C. wrote:
You're calling a Deathwing army 'skew'.

Probably, an army with nothing but termies is the book definition of skew. But I'm also calling a full buggy list a skew army and not a proper fluffy Speed Freaks one for example.

Are Deathwings supposed to run only terminators or should they simply be based on a significant number of terminators? Because Speed Freeks aren't supposed to run only buggies, but any vehicles plus other fast stuff like stormboyz or even squigriders.

And according to the DA supplement there are 3 different datasheets for terminators in that book alone so even bringing 9 squads of termies is still legal with rule of 3.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

Not Online!!! wrote:
Not unless you play chaos. Then you only get 1 Type of terminators. (2 if dg if i member correctly).

Otoh, you can field an army out of chaos lords and daemonprinces.... Because Ro3 is well designed and functional...

Yeah, you can still bring 15-30 terminators, which IMHO is a MASSIVE amount of terminators . I'm in the same boat with meganobz and despite the fact that they're my favorite models I can't even think of a list based on that many bodies, it disgusts me.

Ro3 shouldn't exist in the first place, as people should avoid spamming units and play a bit of everything, more display armies than overly optimized ones. It's a patch to limit skew. Of course it doesn't remove it completely but still better than nothing. I'd definitely merge all those chaos lords, daemon princes, ork buggies, ork flyers, battlewagons etc into a single datasheet, don't get me wrong.

 Blackie wrote:
Probably, an army with nothing but termies is the book definition of skew.

I call it "themed". You seem too preoccupied with looking at thematic forces through the lens of how they break the game.

 H.B.M.C. wrote:

 Blackie wrote:
Probably, an army with nothing but termies is the book definition of skew.

I call it "themed". You seem too preoccupied with looking at thematic forces through the lens of how they break the game.

I hate mono-unit armies, themed or not, that's it. A speedfreaks army is still very themed if it has 4-5 buggies and then a bunch of koptas, infantries in trukks and/or wagons, bikers, stormboyz etc... It doesn't have to be 9-18 buggies and 3-5 planes to be "themed".

A deathwing is still a deathwing based army when it has 15-30 termies, vehicles, characters and eventually even a few non termy infantries since a DA battallion/patrol/whatever detachment + Deathwing Vanguard is still 100% fluffy.

 Blackie wrote:
I think choices in listbuilding are good for the game. In older editions lower points formats were common, rosters had 4-5 at most for each FA, HS or elite and in most cases the game pushed for large squads. Not to mention that GW almost never released FAQs, and OP units could stay OP for years. So the old FOC had some sense to limit skewing.

Can you point me to what FOC you're looking at? The standard one I know from 3rd-5th was up to 2 HQs, 3 Elites, 6 Troops, 3 Fast Attack, 3 Heavy Support for 1500-2000 points. Just making sure we're talking about the same thing.

 Blackie wrote:
Now we play huge games of 2000 points, we have tons of datasheets to choose from, MSU are king of the edition so restricting slots is not the answer I think. Also some armies have squadrons, which could bypass the limitation. Some armies also have units that would fit different slots in other codexes: Heavy Intercessors would be Heavy Support or Elites in any other book, Eradicators would be Heavy Support in any other book, Tyranid Warriors would be Elites in any other book, Deff Dreads would be Elites in a SM book, some transports have the same firepower of other FA/HS vehicles etc...

Like I said, using percentages like 2nd Ed did is one way to deal with MSU and cheap units being unfairly penalized.

Also, having certain units occupy certain slots in an army is one way of reinforcing themes. What constitutes Heavy Support for Eldar might be Fast Attack if it were Guard. There's nothing wrong with that; it helps define the strengths and limitations of each race.

 Blackie wrote:
With 9th edition codexes I feel armies are finally looking like proper collection of models as codexes are pretty balanced internally, and there's much less spam than in older editions even in competitive gaming.

If you really want restrictions on listbuilding try to play 1500 games. Now you really have to take decisions about what to take.

Being 'pretty balanced internally' and 'less spam than in older editions' means a tournament-winning Ork list composed of two characters, nine buggies, nine bikes, three artillery guns, and four aircraft that then was able to kill 1800pts of models in a single turn. That seems pretty spammy to me and not any more like a 'proper collection of models' in comparison to any prior edition. I guess if you ignore the static artillery and pretend the Boyz in Trukks are just off-table, you could call it Speed Freeks.

And having to make decisions about what to take doesn't prevent skew. Lower points limits plus freeform army construction easily makes skew worse since your opponent is less likely to have tools to deal with it. That's a big part of why the game doesn't work well at 500pts, whereas a game like Chain of Command (similar size to a 500pt 40K game, but much more restricted army composition) does.

 Blackie wrote:
You are against skew lists but sometimes push for playing skew For starters, terminators have so many datasheets that you can definitely run 6 units of 5 each, probably even more.

For one thing, I've been pretty consistent in saying that I liked curated exceptions to the normal FOC/army composition. The problem with skew lists isn't that being different is inherently bad, it's that they're usually constructed to either minimize defensive profiles or spam particular kinds of offensive fire, without any real tradeoffs, and that makes them overpowered and not fun to play against. If they've been designed with in-built tradeoffs or just aren't that egregious to begin with, then it's fine. Dark Angels being allowed to take Belial and then count Deathwing as Troops wasn't overpowered. Deathworld Veterans armies being able to take Veterans as Troops wasn't overpowered. Knights being able to spam Castellans was.

For another, having to exploit how Ro3 interacts with near-identical datasheets in order to take a bunch of units of them is downright stupid. Being allowed to take 3 Thornbacks and 3 Screamer-Killers but not 6 Carnifexes is stupid. Being able to take twelve different Daemon Princes in the same army is stupid. This is not a good system for player choice or mitigating spam, and the fact that some units/armies can exploit it is not a redeeming feature.

 Blackie wrote:
Then complete that guard veteran army with other stuff from the same book. It's like complaining that an ork army made only by nobz couldn't work under rule of 3 limitation. And why shouldn't those guard veterans be elites (so limited to max 3 with the FOC) in the first place?

So basically, your resolution to this conundrum is to give up on the idea of using Veterans as troops in a Guard army altogether and accept that Ro3 says no, making it no more viable now than when they were Elites under the old FOC. But if I want to spam six different Heavy Support choices, that I can do.

You're telling me that 9th Ed affords more freedom in army composition than ever before, and that anyone who prefers the old way is just a salty grognard who doesn't appreciate the newfound freedom, but when I suggest 'hey so can I run a Guard army using Veterans as my infantry like I could in 5th?' your reaction is 'What? Why would you want to do that? Just take a normal list, it wouldn't be fair if you could have more than 30 BS3+/T3/5+ Guardsmen on the field. Now, here's how you can abuse Ro3 to take 60 Terminators in one list'.

Can you understand why I'm unconvinced?

Also, just to reiterate a point from upthread: If catbarf were to ask to run a hypothetical previous Veteran IG list, RO3 says "No, you can't".

If catbarf were to run a hypothetical previous general Infantry list with more than three total Platoons/Company Command Squads, RO3 says "No, you can't (unless you give up on having Command Squads and potentially pay some extra CP for a Vanguard detachment to put them in)".

However, if catbarf were to run a hypothetical previous Armoured Company list, RO3 would say "Sure! Just be sure to mix in a few of the cheaper Russes if you want to stay under 2kpts".

Why is that? What about the Armoured Company makes it an acceptable skew list where both of the infantry-focused lists are unacceptable?

You get that the Armoured Company bit works because of LRBT Squadrons being 1-3 models per unit, right?
Veterans aren't giving you 3 "squads" per slot. Command Squads have been hit several times in 8E already, we know there's problems there. It sucks but it is what it is. Blame the metachasing goons who would spam plasma command squads of the Scion and Veteran varieties.

I'm genuinely not sure which "Deathworld Veterans" bit he's referencing. There was a Codex: Catachans for 3E and 4E(where it was a PDF), but both of those still used Infantry Platoons as Troops from what I can find.

 Kanluwen wrote:
You get that the Armoured Company bit works because of LRBT Squadrons being 1-3 models per unit, right?
Veterans aren't giving you 3 "squads" per slot.

Right, that's the point. The system considers thirty T3/5+ troopers to be equivalent to nine MBTs in terms of skew. It restricts 65-100pts of infantry exactly like it restricts 480-600pts of tanks. It says that four individual tanks is unfair, but eight tanks is fine as long as they're split into three units. It used to say eighteen tanks was just fine, then overnight Mars-Alpha variants were deleted from the game, and now only nine is okay and more than that is verboten.

Again, I'm not saying the old system avoided all these issues. It still had the same slot limitation issue, and the same ability to exploit units that allowed multiple expensive vehicles (or very large infantry squads) in a single slot. But at least it didn't have inconsistent, seemingly arbitrary loopholes where near-identical units could be spammed, or the capacity to build skew lists by maxing out on one section of the FOC so long as you don't take more than three of any one unit. It feels like what we have now is a lot of the same limitations on thematic armies, but with more opportunity for abuse.

Veterans are a good example of the constraints of the current listbuilding system, but they're far from the only one, because...

 Kanluwen wrote:
Command Squads have been hit several times in 8E already, we know there's problems there. It sucks but it is what it is. Blame the metachasing goons who would spam plasma command squads of the Scion and Veteran varieties.

...It's not just the command squads that get limited, but the officers too. If you're taking a lot of infantry, six Troops slots in a Battalion gets to be quite limiting. So if I want to play an infantry-heavy Guard list I'm generally taking two Battalions, but I also can't meet my HQ requirements with just infantry officers thanks to Ro3. Taking my max number of officers caps out at 9 orders per turn, so it's very possible in a 2000pt list for Ro3 to be the single barrier to having enough Orders coverage for my army. At 3K I have 50% more points to work with but can only take 33% more of each unit, making it worse.

And, of course, thanks to Ro3 I can't have a command squad for each of my officers. I'm not going to blame the players, I'm going to blame Ro3, as it was GW's knee-jerk reaction to the wholly unsurprising revelation that total freedom in army composition is easily abused. Even if GW took away special weapons from command squads now, I still wouldn't be able to take more than three.

To be clear, I single out the Guard for examples because their low individual cost makes them run into these limits quickly, and because the old FOC provided a bespoke platoon system specifically to solve this issue, but they're not the only army to run into odd RO3 limits. Like, why is four Trygons too much, but three Trygons and three Mawlocs and three Trygon Primes is fine? Why is it that if I want to make an army based on flying Tyranid forms, I have to cram my Gargoyles into just three units, but if I want to make a nidzilla list, thirty fething Carnifexes (across 12 units) is A-OK?

 Kanluwen wrote:
I'm genuinely not sure which "Deathworld Veterans" bit he's referencing. There was a Codex: Catachans for 3E and 4E(where it was a PDF), but both of those still used Infantry Platoons as Troops from what I can find.

Deathworld Veterans followed the Platoon structure, but had army-wide Infiltrate, WS4, a whole bunch of bonuses relating to terrain, and could be taken as five-man squads to max out on special and heavy weapons. All this could be yours for, in 3E, just a single point more per-model than a regular Guardsman. It was an infantry-focused skew list by design, with some pretty significant upgrades on those infantry, but the deliberate limitation of not allowing them to take anything heavier than a Sentinel (plus no lascannons) kept it in check (and actually made the army pretty weak on the whole, unless you played on a deathworld board).

Skew is only an issue when it provides advantages without disadvantages. Ideally a game system should allow skew but make it inherently no more advantageous compared to a more typical/expected/balanced force composition, but given that GW has never actually managed to achieve that, I would prefer to have a little more structure with curated exceptions as appropriate.

 catbarf wrote:

 Kanluwen wrote:
You get that the Armoured Company bit works because of LRBT Squadrons being 1-3 models per unit, right?
Veterans aren't giving you 3 "squads" per slot.

Right, that's the point. The system considers thirty T3/5+ troopers to be equivalent to nine MBTs in terms of skew. It restricts 65-100pts of infantry exactly like it restricts 480-600pts of tanks. It says that four individual tanks is unfair, but eight tanks is fine as long as they're split into three units. It used to say eighteen tanks was just fine, then overnight Mars-Alpha variants were deleted from the game, and now only nine is okay and more than that is verboten.

12. Tank Commanders are a separate unit entry.

Again, I'm not saying the old system avoided all these issues. It still had the same slot limitation issue, and the same ability to exploit units that allowed multiple expensive vehicles (or very large infantry squads) in a single slot. But at least it didn't have inconsistent, seemingly arbitrary loopholes where near-identical units could be spammed, or the capacity to build skew lists by maxing out on one section of the FOC so long as you don't take more than three of any one unit. It feels like what we have now is a lot of the same limitations on thematic armies, but with more opportunity for abuse.

Veterans are a good example of the constraints of the current listbuilding system, but they're far from the only one, because...

 Kanluwen wrote:
Command Squads have been hit several times in 8E already, we know there's problems there. It sucks but it is what it is. Blame the metachasing goons who would spam plasma command squads of the Scion and Veteran varieties.

...It's not just the command squads that get limited, but the officers too. If you're taking a lot of infantry, six Troops slots in a Battalion gets to be quite limiting. So if I want to play an infantry-heavy Guard list I'm generally taking two Battalions, but I also can't meet my HQ requirements with just infantry officers thanks to Ro3. Taking my max number of officers caps out at 9 orders per turn, so it's very possible in a 2000pt list for Ro3 to be the single barrier to having enough Orders coverage for my army. At 3K I have 50% more points to work with but can only take 33% more of each unit, making it worse.

And, of course, thanks to Ro3 I can't have a command squad for each of my officers. I'm not going to blame the players, I'm going to blame Ro3, as it was GW's knee-jerk reaction to the wholly unsurprising revelation that total freedom in army composition is easily abused. Even if GW took away special weapons from command squads now, I still wouldn't be able to take more than three.

Ro3 literally was created because of players spamming crap. Even without Ro3, Command Squads saw an early limitation of "1 per Officer" to curb the trash that metachasers were engaged in.

Blame the players. Blame the tourney folk who gave the feedback that led to that kind of nonsense being necessary in the first place.

To be clear, I single out the Guard for examples because their low individual cost makes them run into these limits quickly, and because the old FOC provided a bespoke platoon system specifically to solve this issue, but they're not the only army to run into odd RO3 limits. Like, why is four Trygons too much, but three Trygons and three Mawlocs and three Trygon Primes is fine? Why is it that if I want to make an army based on flying Tyranid forms, I have to cram my Gargoyles into just three units, but if I want to make a nidzilla list, thirty fething Carnifexes (across 12 units) is A-OK?

Mate, you're preaching to someone who had 3 Onager Squadrons get invalidated overnight. I get it. I'm sitting on 6 bloody spider-tanks that I can't really do anything with outside of make 'em look pretty on my shelf these days.

Guard are, as you and I have butted heads about in years past, a mess of a book. There's too much going on and they're shackled to the past too heavily. Scions being a Troops choice was a good move no matter what...but we're going to have to Wait And See where we go from here.

 Kanluwen wrote:
I'm genuinely not sure which "Deathworld Veterans" bit he's referencing. There was a Codex: Catachans for 3E and 4E(where it was a PDF), but both of those still used Infantry Platoons as Troops from what I can find.

Deathworld Veterans followed the Platoon structure, but had army-wide Infiltrate, WS4, a whole bunch of bonuses relating to terrain, and could be taken as five-man squads to max out on special and heavy weapons. All this could be yours for, in 3E, just a single point more per-model than a regular Guardsman. It was an infantry-focused skew list by design, with some pretty significant upgrades on those infantry, but the deliberate limitation of not allowing them to take anything heavier than a Sentinel (plus no lascannons) kept it in check (and actually made the army pretty weak on the whole, unless you played on a deathworld board).

Okay, so you're referring to the Catachan splatbook version right? The one with traps and the like?

I can't comment much on that one, since I never had interest in Catachans and it's a book that is long out of availability in a format I'm comfortable with. My understanding is that they were actually meant to represent a "Veteran" Regiment in general, right? Like D99 was?

Because that kinda thing goes great with these Armies of Legend that GW's been doing. Stratagem to upgrade the basic units and give them traits, restrictions on what can or can't be taken, and an armywide rule, etc.

Skew is only an issue when it provides advantages without disadvantages. Ideally a game system should allow skew but make it inherently no more advantageous compared to a more typical/expected/balanced force composition, but given that GW has never actually managed to achieve that, I would prefer to have a little more structure with curated exceptions as appropriate.

And I think the crux of it is that you're wanting something that's a bit more narrative oriented. Which is awesome! I love narrative stuff.

But unfortunately, everyone else seems to want to play with Matched Play rules in most pick-up games.

 Kanluwen wrote:
Blame the metachasing goons who would spam plasma command squads of the Scion and Veteran varieties.

Ah. Yes. Blame the players. As always.

 Kanluwen wrote:
Blame the players.

Heh. At least you're not being coy about it.

 Kanluwen wrote:
Okay, so you're referring to the Catachan splatbook version right? The one with traps and the like?

I can't comment much on that one, since I never had interest in Catachans and it's a book that is long out of availability in a format I'm comfortable with. My understanding is that they were actually meant to represent a "Veteran" Regiment in general, right? Like D99 was?

Because that kinda thing goes great with these Armies of Legend that GW's been doing. Stratagem to upgrade the basic units and give them traits, restrictions on what can or can't be taken, and an armywide rule, etc.

 Kanluwen wrote:
And I think the crux of it is that you're wanting something that's a bit more narrative oriented. Which is awesome! I love narrative stuff.

But unfortunately, everyone else seems to want to play with Matched Play rules in most pick-up games.

You misunderstand, I'm not asking for more narrative content. I'm saying if someone's objection to stricter force org for Matched Play is that it won't allow them to do themed skew armies, those spin-off lists and force org variants (eg Belial allowing Terminators as Troops) are examples of how to support thematic skew armies in a curated/balanced manner.

If someone wants to run a hard skew army that isn't supported by the fluff, well, maybe it ought to stay in Open/Narrative. I can't force people to accept that there's more to the game beyond Matched Play, but player choice has to be weighed against balance, and I never felt the old FOC was any more limiting than the current system for reasonably themed and balanced armies.

 catbarf wrote:


So basically, your resolution to this conundrum is to give up on the idea of using Veterans as troops in a Guard army altogether and accept that Ro3 says no, making it no more viable now than when they were Elites under the old FOC. But if I want to spam six different Heavy Support choices, that I can do.

Yes, with armies having 10+ units for each slot limiting those slots to max 3 is a concept that doesn't make sense anymore, while limiting spam always makes sense. I agree that with the current rules the limitations to reduce spam can be bypassed somehow though, that's why I'd remove most of the squadrons (making those units single models) and merge all similar datasheets into a single one. About Ro3 I'd go even further, making it rule of 2 or even rule of 1 is some cases, and I'm glad that at least commanders are getting limited to max 1 per detachment, although I think they should be limited to 1 per army.

Also don't use tournaments results to back up your points, tournaments always involved spamming stuff and shooting off the board the opponent turn 1 happened in older editions as well. I don't play tournaments but I've never seen in real life 1000+ of stuff removed in one turn in 9th, while I definitely experienced that in the past, including in 5th. Yes the ork list was very spammy, but remove two flyers, 4-6 buggies and take other stuff and that list could still be very competitive. There's no ork codex that has ever been as internally balanced as the current one. A spammy OP list doesn't mean that there's no internal balance, just have a look at all the ork lists that placed in 9th so far, you'll see tons of different units. You'll see tons of different factions as well, there has never been such variety in 40k.

 catbarf wrote:

You're telling me that 9th Ed affords more freedom in army composition than ever before, and that anyone who prefers the old way is just a salty grognard who doesn't appreciate the newfound freedom, but when I suggest 'hey so can I run a Guard army using Veterans as my infantry like I could in 5th?' your reaction is 'What? Why would you want to do that? Just take a normal list, it wouldn't be fair if you could have more than 30 BS3+/T3/5+ Guardsmen on the field.

Never said you're grognard, I respect people's opinions. Always . But you can still run a list that respects the old FOC if you want to, you just want to limit other players' options for some reasons.

But GW decided that those veterans aren't troops. For the same reason why lootas were elites in the 4th book and heavy support in any other codex or ork deff dreads aren't elites like SM ones. You can't run veterans as troops just like I can't run nobz as troops, and in 4th-5th I could have run nobz, meganobz, biker nobz, dreads or bikers as troops. Burnaboyz and tankbustas were troops in 3rd.

I disagree about the role on the detachment system of lots of units, so I may understand your pain for those veterans not being troops.

 Kanluwen wrote:
Even without Ro3, Command Squads saw an early limitation of "1 per Officer" to curb the trash that metachasers were engaged in.

In fairness to GW, the restriction of one Infantry Command Squad or Stormtrooper Command Squad per Infantry Officer or Stormtrooper Officer respectively is one that makes perfect sense to me, and is a restriction I know I have no issue with.

You want to take the Officer without his command squad, that's fine, but I don't think the other way around should be a thing.

 Blackie wrote:

Now we play huge games of 2000 points, we have tons of datasheets to choose from, MSU are king of the edition so restricting slots is not the answer I think.

MSU is king of the edition because you can spam MSU. If you can't spam is it king?

 Blackie wrote:


Also don't use tournaments results to back up your points, tournaments always involved spamming stuff and shooting off the board the opponent turn 1 happened in older editions as well. I don't play tournaments but I've never seen in real life 1000+ of stuff removed in one turn in 9th, while I definitely experienced that in the past, including in 5th. Yes the ork list was very spammy, but remove two flyers, 4-6 buggies and take other stuff and that list could still be very competitive. There's no ork codex that has ever been as internally balanced as the current one. A spammy OP list doesn't mean that there's no internal balance, just have a look at all the ork lists that placed in 9th so far, you'll see tons of different units. You'll see tons of different factions as well, there has never been such variety in 40k.

Theres a lot going on in this paragraph and I wish I hadn't woken up with a migraine so I could tackle it.

I would have even managed to kill 1000pts in turn 1 in mostly melee with Blood Angels this edition if I had not forgotten to move my Lemartes in the movement phase in the last round at a GT(we were both 3-1 so not bottom table). I even went first so he was hunkered down in his deployment zone. Still killed 900+ points, which would have been about 1100+pts if I had moved Lemartes. Sure it was the old BA book and not the current one but the lethality of that book weren't at the level of the current top books. Now you don't even have to enter the opponents half of the table to do such damage since you can do it with range. At least that book needed to commit to get such results. Only had 290/2000 left on my half of the table when his turn started. Now you can do the reverse.

The game is insanely lethal.

tneva82 wrote:

 Blackie wrote:

Now we play huge games of 2000 points, we have tons of datasheets to choose from, MSU are king of the edition so restricting slots is not the answer I think.

MSU is king of the edition because you can spam MSU. If you can't spam is it king?

Then those factions that can bring more MSU (aka effective MSU troops) than the others or more effective MSU will be king. Armies like custodes, harlequins and most of the SM variants for example would still bring the same exact armies with or without the old FOC limitations as they don't really need 4+ units among the elites/fast attacks/heavy support sections anyway. The old FOC still allowed 6 troops and 3 elites, other than 3 FA and HS and armies with expensive units would be totally unaffected by such limitations.

Problem with such old FOC and 9th mechanics is that armies that can bring MSU and the desired toys will change nothing, armies that would have to choose between MSU and toys would be crippled badly.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

Klickor wrote:
I would have even managed to kill 1000pts in turn 1 in mostly melee with Blood Angels this edition if I had not forgotten to move my Lemartes in the movement phase in the last round at a GT (we were both 3-1 so not bottom table). I even went first so he was hunkered down in his deployment zone. Still killed 900+ points, which would have been about 1100+pts if I had moved Lemartes. Sure it was the old BA book and not the current one but the lethality of that book weren't at the level of the current top books. Now you don't even have to enter the opponents half of the table to do such damage since you can do it with range. At least that book needed to commit to get such results. Only had 290/2000 left on my half of the table when his turn started. Now you can do the reverse.

The game is insanely lethal.

Highlighted .

I could do even more damage outside of a GT facing a worse player, wouldn't even need to have such a strong list either. My first few games of 8th with my casual 4th/5th marine army in a more casual environment than a tournament was even worse. I brought useless stuff like a Landraider, a Predator, Assault Marines, Terminators. LC/ML devastator squads, tactical marines etc. Lost insane amount of models due to me bringing overpriced trash even though what I faced wasn't very strong lists. Sure if I had brought a B tier list instead of an F tier list to face my opponents B tier list it would have been more fair.

At least in a tournament most lists are A-S tier and maybe someone who didn't care brought a B tier list but mostly people are playing at the same level. If you don't discuss in depth about what lists to bring to a game and just say "I will bring a toned down lists for a relaxed game" and one of the player plays Drukhari and show up with a casual A- tier list, instead of their SS, and their opponent comes with a casual Z tier Tau list it will be a stomp worse than anything you can expect at a more competitive event. Or someone shows up with 10 overpriced vehicles because there are no build restrictions and you can take whatever you want and face the guy who likes big numbers who chose an 18 Eradicators, 12 MM Devastators, 9 Las Fusil Eliminators, 0 Troop list because 9 anti tank Heavy support choices is Rad. And not even overpowered in a competitive setting, quite awful actually but it will trash some fun vehicle lists.

So much easier to make sure everyone have a good time if you start out with restrictions on what can be fielded and then tweak it a bit here and there to allow certain builds in exchange for disadvantages. Then both the players and the designers have a better grasp on what can be expected and then design their lists(if players) or rules(if GW) to match what will be played.

When I play other games I and my friends usually build whatever list we can come up with. Be it the hardest list we can put together or if it has a fun theme. And for some unfathomable reasons called balance, restrictions and less lethality we still can have fun games even if its a "tournament" list vs a fluffy "casual" list. Might take several turns for the stronger list to come out on top and not something like current 40k with 3 phases to decide the game. Because the games have more restricted list building rules it is easier for the designers to balance the units. They don't have to try to balance extreme skew because you can't build it in the first place.

The old FoC wasn't perfect but it sure was better than what we have now. I don't think anyone wants us to go back to the standard base FoC and do nothing else and be content with it. But using it as a starting point and make it work with the current units and perhaps a faction/subfaction specific version or two in each codex that mimics it but with unique tweaks. So what current army would still be broken under the exact old FoC is meaningless since that isnt really what is being argued. Restrictions are good and can lead to a better game. Restrictions != Only old FoC

 Blackie wrote:

tneva82 wrote:

 Blackie wrote:

Now we play huge games of 2000 points, we have tons of datasheets to choose from, MSU are king of the edition so restricting slots is not the answer I think.

MSU is king of the edition because you can spam MSU. If you can't spam is it king?

Then those factions that can bring more MSU (aka effective MSU troops) than the others or more effective MSU will be king. Armies like custodes, harlequins and most of the SM variants for example would still bring the same exact armies with or without the old FOC limitations as they don't really need 4+ units among the elites/fast attacks/heavy support sections anyway. The old FOC still allowed 6 troops and 3 elites, other than 3 FA and HS and armies with expensive units would be totally unaffected by such limitations.

Problem with such old FOC and 9th mechanics is that armies that can bring MSU and the desired toys will change nothing, armies that would have to choose between MSU and toys would be crippled badly.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

Klickor wrote:
I would have even managed to kill 1000pts in turn 1 in mostly melee with Blood Angels this edition if I had not forgotten to move my Lemartes in the movement phase in the last round at a GT (we were both 3-1 so not bottom table). I even went first so he was hunkered down in his deployment zone. Still killed 900+ points, which would have been about 1100+pts if I had moved Lemartes. Sure it was the old BA book and not the current one but the lethality of that book weren't at the level of the current top books. Now you don't even have to enter the opponents half of the table to do such damage since you can do it with range. At least that book needed to commit to get such results. Only had 290/2000 left on my half of the table when his turn started. Now you can do the reverse.

The game is insanely lethal.

Highlighted .

Can I highlight that you said not to use tournament data as evidence of lethality but you're happy to use it as evidence that the game is the most balanced it's been in terms of unit/list variety? Either its both or neither but can you at least be consistent? Its difficult to argue with someone when they keep changing what counts as vaild evidence of something.