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 CKO wrote:
I think the gap between player skill is at an all time high, which is the root of this frustration. Good players rather say, "Its the codex" instead of breaking down the true reasons why the lesser skilled player lost. "Its the codex" is an easier pill for the lesser skilled player to swallow and the good player doesn't want to come off as a jerk so they agree. Better choices lead to victory but when the choices are to buy all the new good stuff vs the cool looking things I want to go on the table the result is predetermined

Do you have any evidence for that? Or is it just a random assumption?

That's not a random one it's a major ASSumption.

 CKO wrote:
I think the gap between player skill is at an all time high, which is the root of this frustration. Good players rather say, "Its the codex" instead of breaking down the true reasons why the lesser skilled player lost. "Its the codex" is an easier pill for the lesser skilled player to swallow and the good player doesn't want to come off as a jerk so they agree. Better choices lead to victory but when the choices are to buy all the new good stuff vs the cool looking things I want to go on the table the result is predetermined

Yeahhh, because between Tau hover tank with big gun (140 pts, 12 damage per shot ignoring and and all saves plus a bucket of mortal wounds built in) and SM one (190 pts, ~5 damage gun that does not ignore ++ or better armour, can roll low whiffing damage, is disproportionately affected by damage reduction abilities, one-shots far less units in one turn, and is weaker in lots of other ways) is ZERO difference and only player skill matters, eh?

It's funny, because what you wrote sounds just like excuse of a player who knows opponent is very much more skilled, but your OP army carried you to easy win, and is now desperately trying to twist the situation around. Skill matters, yes, but DE wouldn't cruise to 65% winrate among equally skilled opponents with such laughable ease if the army wasn't broken.

Also, what you wrote made no sense in another way because good player saying 'it's the codex' instead of teaching weaker player what to improve is not good guy, but in fact an a-hole jerk clutching at straws to keep his advantage for next time. Literally not a single good player I know would hide behind codex, they would turn the game into teaching one or, if their codex is really so much better, limited their army to what would give both sides a fair fight, not lie.

 Irbis wrote:

 CKO wrote:
I think the gap between player skill is at an all time high, which is the root of this frustration. Good players rather say, "Its the codex" instead of breaking down the true reasons why the lesser skilled player lost. "Its the codex" is an easier pill for the lesser skilled player to swallow and the good player doesn't want to come off as a jerk so they agree. Better choices lead to victory but when the choices are to buy all the new good stuff vs the cool looking things I want to go on the table the result is predetermined

Yeahhh, because between Tau hover tank with big gun (140 pts, 12 damage per shot ignoring and and all saves plus a bucket of mortal wounds built in) and SM one (190 pts, ~5 damage gun that does not ignore ++ or better armour, can roll low whiffing damage, is disproportionately affected by damage reduction abilities, one-shots far less units in one turn, and is weaker in lots of other ways) is ZERO difference and only player skill matters, eh?

It's funny, because what you wrote sounds just like excuse of a player who knows opponent is very much more skilled, but your OP army carried you to easy win, and is now desperately trying to twist the situation around. Skill matters, yes, but DE wouldn't cruise to 65% winrate among equally skilled opponents with such laughable ease if the army wasn't broken.

Also, what you wrote made no sense in another way because good player saying 'it's the codex' instead of teaching weaker player what to improve is not good guy, but in fact an a-hole jerk clutching at straws to keep his advantage for next time. Literally not a single good player I know would hide behind codex, they would turn the game into teaching one or, if their codex is really so much better, limited their army to what would give both sides a fair fight, not lie.

And this is basically my personal opinion on 9th and why im not a fan. Most of the 'skill' is in list building at this point. 9th feels more like MTG then it does 40k. The odds of you winning a match are more weighted by the list you bring rather then the skill. Just like MTG is more weighted by the deck you make, and how lucky you are to draw what you need.

40k any more i feel like i show up to a table, and get put on auto pilot while the game plays itself out.

There's loads of player skill in 9th. I don't really see the point in denying this.

But the reason "good players" congregate to a faction is because they want to win - and you are more likely to win with an overpowered codex. People didn't just suddenly realise big men in gold armour and Gundam was the way forward in the last 6 weeks.

Tyel wrote:
There's loads of player skill in 9th. I don't really see the point in denying this.

But the reason "good players" congregate to a faction is because they want to win - and you are more likely to win with an overpowered codex. People didn't just suddenly realise big men in gold armour and Gundam was the way forward in the last 6 weeks.

Then dosnt that just sort of confirm what i was saying?
Most of the weight of winning is based upon the army you flock to because its clearly overpowered?

 CKO wrote:
I think the gap between player skill is at an all time high, which is the root of this frustration. Good players rather say, "Its the codex" instead of breaking down the true reasons why the lesser skilled player lost. "Its the codex" is an easier pill for the lesser skilled player to swallow and the good player doesn't want to come off as a jerk so they agree. Better choices lead to victory but when the choices are to buy all the new good stuff vs the cool looking things I want to go on the table the result is predetermined

The reverse is more true. The less skilled will almost always blame the Codex - theirs & definitely the opponents. If they aren't winning such phrases as "That's OP", "That's broken", "something something something balance something something something." start flying.

Tyel wrote:
Given full vent, Trajann would go to something like 50 points and other characters would go up 10-20 points. Bikes would be up 15, all the infantry would be up 5 points a model, and Forgeworld stuff would get an arbitrary 20% hike because screw Forgeworld that's why. You'd then hike all the 1 CP stratagems to 2 CP, and nerf Emperor's Chosen and Shadowkeepers just in case.

It's comments like the bit in bold that make me very glad that none of the people on this forum will actually be contributing to the quarterly balance patches.

While FW made whichever models you're salty about, blame the Studio for the rules.

So I know this thread has been hashing a bunch of things out over the past few weeks, and there is no doubt that "balancing" the game of 40k (or whatever "balance" can be reasonably achieved in a wargame like this when the parent company just wants to push models and sales because hey it's a business) has many nuances that really are not as cut and dry or as straight forward as most would like. But now that Craftworlds, and by extension Harlequins, are joining the "top tier" again (just like 7th edition) in addition to Custodes, Tau, Dark Eldar and AdMech, how exactly SHOULD GW handle it? I have no proof to back that up, but as of this moment from what I have seen from the Eldar book it really looks like the power creep is about to get a worse before it gets better.

I am not being facetious, honestly I am not. I am genuinely curious as to how GW can reasonably balance this game with its myriad of factions while still pushing its agenda of "sell books and models and rules and the game and the hobby etc." in order to make a profit. How can the business aspect of it and the game itself remain healthy? I understand the book bloat could easily be solved by a living ruleset with multiple free pdfs's available and all that, but the internal/exeternal balance of the game is mostly what I am talking about.

Just for some context, I have been playing this game for about 14 years now (think I started in 4th or 5th) and I also happen to run a small business myself on the side (though it is a nonprofit so the goal of it is definitely "different" than the general "make a fuckton of money" approach companies like GW are going for). Not in any edition did the game ever truly feel "balanced" to me especially since I have been a Sisters player for my entire time in this game and was using an outdated 3rd edition book to play most of my games in 4th and 5th (didn't even really touch the White Dwarf codex and just was glad when the digital one hit). I am incredibly grateful for all the "love" we as a faction have received since circa 2019, but it doesn't change the fact that back over the summer of 2021 WE were one of the culprits of being a bit "unbalanced" as well.

So, again, does anyone actually have a way for GW to reasonably "balance" this game while still making all the money they want/need to make? Or is this just an impossible endeavor unless GW shifts its focus or there is some other change? Again, genuinely curious about all of this.

"While still making all the money" is not relevant to the discussion I believe.

I have never seen any actual evidence that imbalance = profit. For every FOTM player rushing to buy Tau there are other people that stop buying new stuff or stop playing all together because their army has been creeped into being dogshit.

WHFB had really bad balance in the run up to its death. Don't think that helped profit.

More factions being able to compete and more units being 'good' is not going to hurt GW's bottom line.

Toning down the game so armies aren't getting tabled in turn 2-3 so we can actually play with the models we bough isn't going to hurt GW's bottom line.

Well, they need to put out fewer books. They can't handle this pace. And frankly the pace is kind of nuts right now. Custodes, GSC, Tau, Nids, and Eldar in 3 months. CSM won't be far behind. Orks seem like a distant memory, but they were just 6 months ago. There's just no way for them to write it all without tripping over themselves.

People say they should have done a get you by supplement, but what would that look like exactly? GW likely has no roadmap for incoming mechanics and so such a book would be useless. Simply making all the other armies cheaper based on unknown info is also really bad for the player and collecting.

The best scenario is that they recognize the nature of the releases and quickly address issues - ideally in a digital ruleset.

GFdoubles wrote:
...I am not being facetious, honestly I am not. I am genuinely curious as to how GW can reasonably balance this game with its myriad of factions while still pushing its agenda of "sell books and models and rules and the game and the hobby etc." in order to make a profit. How can the business aspect of it and the game itself remain healthy? I understand the book bloat could easily be solved by a living ruleset with multiple free pdfs's available and all that, but the internal/exeternal balance of the game is mostly what I am talking about...

GW can't reasonably do anything to the game because their business model is running on pure inertia. They don't understand their customers particularly well (they overproduce starter content, basic Space Marines, and basic Stormcast, underproduce resculpts of classic models that have boatloads of fans ready to come out of the woodwork to grab every last box they can, underproduce things that are powerful in the game, and the whole idea of using Sigmar to make a more distinctive IP that prevents people from using third-party models in their game completely turns the relationship people who would consider using third-party models have with GW on its head, they're making it harder for people to buy their models and use them in different, better-designed games), the frantic Codex release model is good for pretty much nobody, including their sales figures (in my local community access to the Internet wasn't the thing that started pushing people to pirated material, it was the printed materials being valid as-written for about six months), and while the constant wheel of escalating power creep is great for squeezing money out of the whales who buy a new army every six months it's terrible for player retention and produces a lot of people like me who float around the fringes of the hobby complaining about how it used to be better. I have nothing positive to say about their rules or their business model. They're propped up right now by the fact that they make cool models, and the network effects of online content/what's on the shelf at game stores, which means their sales aren't particularly sensitive to the fact that they don't really know what they're doing from a business or game design standpoint.

 Ordana wrote:

WHFB had really bad balance in the run up to its death. Don't think that helped profit.

I don't think that GW learned from that, though - their response was to enter a disinvestment cycle with WHF. Like maybe now they're going to enter a disinvestment cycle (even harder) with Orks and IG?

 CKO wrote:
I think the gap between player skill is at an all time high, which is the root of this frustration. Good players rather say, "Its the codex" instead of breaking down the true reasons why the lesser skilled player lost. "Its the codex" is an easier pill for the lesser skilled player to swallow and the good player doesn't want to come off as a jerk so they agree. Better choices lead to victory but when the choices are to buy all the new good stuff vs the cool looking things I want to go on the table the result is predetermined

Some days I wonder if my signature has run its course and I should change it, but then I see arguments like these.

 Flipsiders wrote:

 CKO wrote:
I think the gap between player skill is at an all time high, which is the root of this frustration. Good players rather say, "Its the codex" instead of breaking down the true reasons why the lesser skilled player lost. "Its the codex" is an easier pill for the lesser skilled player to swallow and the good player doesn't want to come off as a jerk so they agree. Better choices lead to victory but when the choices are to buy all the new good stuff vs the cool looking things I want to go on the table the result is predetermined

Some days I wonder if my signature has run its course and I should change it, but then I see arguments like these.

Yeah. While it's true that better players will be better able to perceive which faction has advantage, especially when it's marginal, the win/loss ratios are so far out of whack that it's very clear that the most salient issue is that GW IS FAILING AT BALANCE.

Its kind of weird that Death Guard was actually really good when they first came out. But so many of the new codices that have come out since have been so powerful that they have pushed DG far down the tier list.

Its like they were the first 9th ed codex and they were actually A tier. But then quite a few of the codices coming since in 9th ed were literally S tier, SS tier or SSS tier. lol

Feels like GW is really going for the case of "When every faction is OP, then no faction is OP"

 Dysartes wrote:

Tyel wrote:
Given full vent, Trajann would go to something like 50 points and other characters would go up 10-20 points. Bikes would be up 15, all the infantry would be up 5 points a model, and Forgeworld stuff would get an arbitrary 20% hike because screw Forgeworld that's why. You'd then hike all the 1 CP stratagems to 2 CP, and nerf Emperor's Chosen and Shadowkeepers just in case.

It's comments like the bit in bold that make me very glad that none of the people on this forum will actually be contributing to the quarterly balance patches.

While FW made whichever models you're salty about, blame the Studio for the rules.

Agree with this. Even besides the FW nerf, most of the stuff they were proposing is just outrageous. The goal should not be to dumpster the faction into the trash heap.

Dysartes wrote:

Tyel wrote:
Given full vent, Trajann would go to something like 50 points and other characters would go up 10-20 points. Bikes would be up 15, all the infantry would be up 5 points a model, and Forgeworld stuff would get an arbitrary 20% hike because screw Forgeworld that's why. You'd then hike all the 1 CP stratagems to 2 CP, and nerf Emperor's Chosen and Shadowkeepers just in case.

It's comments like the bit in bold that make me very glad that none of the people on this forum will actually be contributing to the quarterly balance patches.

While FW made whichever models you're salty about, blame the Studio for the rules.

Exactly. I'm surprised how often I have to remind people of this, but again: gw handled every errata and points adjustment for fw units after the initial 8th edition Indexes, and wrote all of the rules for fw units in 9th edition. Don't like the rules? Blame gw, not fw. And I'd be interested to know which fw units warrant statements like "screw Forgeworld", as the majority of the units in the Compendium have been power creeped on by the units in the newer codexes just as much as everything else from that early in the edition.

Daedalus81 wrote:Well, they need to put out fewer books. They can't handle this pace. And frankly the pace is kind of nuts right now. Custodes, GSC, Tau, Nids, and Eldar in 3 months. CSM won't be far behind. Orks seem like a distant memory, but they were just 6 months ago. There's just no way for them to write it all without tripping over themselves.

People say they should have done a get you by supplement, but what would that look like exactly? GW likely has no roadmap for incoming mechanics and so such a book would be useless. Simply making all the other armies cheaper based on unknown info is also really bad for the player and collecting.

The best scenario is that they recognize the nature of the releases and quickly address issues - ideally in a digital ruleset.

They absolutely should have a "roadmap for incoming mechanics". Gw's habit of changing their mind, or incorporating "cool new ideas" is one of the biggest factors in codex creep. These "paradigm shifts" in newer books have a tendency to leave "old paradigm" books behind. For example: in early 9th edition codexes Dd6 was considered "fine" for AT weapons. Then, gw decided that it wasn't reliable enough, and began rolling out things like Dd3+3, while leaving older units in older books with the "old paradigm" Dd6 weapons, thus making them weaker in comparison. Now we're seeing this same trend for "big guns" on tanks and MCs, while earlier books were more conservative with similar weapons on similar platforms, and those older units again look lackluster in comparison. The same can be said for defensive abilities: -1 damage rules and 4++ saves are now becoming more commonplace, while in earlier codexes they were rare. All of this contributes to making older codexes feel bad in comparison to newer ones.

Gw needs to pick a design plan, and stick with it. And if they decide to veer away from it, they should adjust older codexes to compensate, either through points or rules updates. And yes, it should absolutely be done quickly, and preferably through digital means.

 vict0988 wrote:

Breton wrote:

 Blackie wrote:


Of course, 10ppm intercessors would be a problem.

Intercessors only sure, but I'd like to see what lists look like if all or almost all troops units are 25% - 50% off - probably need some sort of mechanic to keep people from doing 3 empty Tac Squads i.e., you only get the discount on max size units, or something. Blobs of 30 boyz for 135 points or 7PL? 10 Heavy Intercessors for 7PL or 140points? Unit upgrades like Heavy Bolters, or Guardian Weapon Platforms etc. should probably still be full price above the half price bodies. Combine that with the variable cost strats being cheaper for max size instead of the other way around, and it could push people into taking more BLAST-able units.

You could just make it an elites choice or make 3 unique named units.

Um, what? I'm talking about making Troops choices - the thing we want to see fielded in greater numbers as the backbone of most armies - cheaper enough people get rewarded for doing it.

Eldenfirefly wrote:
Its kind of weird that Death Guard was actually really good when they first came out. But so many of the new codices that have come out since have been so powerful that they have pushed DG far down the tier list.

Its like they were the first 9th ed codex and they were actually A tier. But then quite a few of the codices coming since in 9th ed were literally S tier, SS tier or SSS tier. lol

Feels like GW is really going for the case of "When every faction is OP, then no faction is OP"

It's an effect of weapons and damage. -1D is amazing when the best weapons in the meta are D2. Now that people have moved past D2 it becomes harder for that to shine.

DG should do really well in melee versus Custodes with D2 T5 and suits with their T5. And Tau suits being multiples of 2 for wounds ( drones included ) promotes D2 weapons, which favors DG. The problem is DG tend to lean a lot on terminators, CusTau are still super strong, and most D2 stuff is probably less efficient than D3+3 when Custodes bikes are W5.




Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Gadzilla666 wrote:

They absolutely should have a "roadmap for incoming mechanics". Gw's habit of changing their mind, or incorporating "cool new ideas" is one of the biggest factors in codex creep. These "paradigm shifts" in newer books have a tendency to leave "old paradigm" books behind. For example: in early 9th edition codexes Dd6 was considered "fine" for AT weapons. Then, gw decided that it wasn't reliable enough, and began rolling out things like Dd3+3, while leaving older units in older books with the "old paradigm" Dd6 weapons, thus making them weaker in comparison. Now we're seeing this same trend for "big guns" on tanks and MCs, while earlier books were more conservative with similar weapons on similar platforms, and those older units again look lackluster in comparison. The same can be said for defensive abilities: -1 damage rules and 4++ saves are now becoming more commonplace, while in earlier codexes they were rare. All of this contributes to making older codexes feel bad in comparison to newer ones.

Gw needs to pick a design plan, and stick with it. And if they decide to veer away from it, they should adjust older codexes to compensate, either through points or rules updates. And yes, it should absolutely be done quickly, and preferably through digital means.

For sure, but I feel like the whole thing is more a passion project without a ton of effective direction from management.

I'm not sure DD6 wasn't intended as D3+3 exists in both Marine and Necron codexes. Something like the Lancer could do with a S boost to get them wounding T6 or T7 on 2s. As it stands two Lancers kill a HH 23% of the time. Two unbuffed HH kill a Lancer 42% of the time, so, the gap isn't immense. If the Lancer was S14 it'd be 40%.

Some light taps could make things a bit better. CSM will for sure have DD6 lascannons.

ccs wrote:

 CKO wrote:
I think the gap between player skill is at an all time high, which is the root of this frustration. Good players rather say, "Its the codex" instead of breaking down the true reasons why the lesser skilled player lost. "Its the codex" is an easier pill for the lesser skilled player to swallow and the good player doesn't want to come off as a jerk so they agree. Better choices lead to victory but when the choices are to buy all the new good stuff vs the cool looking things I want to go on the table the result is predetermined

The reverse is more true. The less skilled will almost always blame the Codex - theirs & definitely the opponents. If they aren't winning such phrases as "That's OP", "That's broken", "something something something balance something something something." start flying.

GW could've given Cultists Assault 10 Autocannons at the same point cost and y'all would defend it via "player skill matters".

EviscerationPlague wrote:

ccs wrote:

 CKO wrote:
I think the gap between player skill is at an all time high, which is the root of this frustration. Good players rather say, "Its the codex" instead of breaking down the true reasons why the lesser skilled player lost. "Its the codex" is an easier pill for the lesser skilled player to swallow and the good player doesn't want to come off as a jerk so they agree. Better choices lead to victory but when the choices are to buy all the new good stuff vs the cool looking things I want to go on the table the result is predetermined

The reverse is more true. The less skilled will almost always blame the Codex - theirs & definitely the opponents. If they aren't winning such phrases as "That's OP", "That's broken", "something something something balance something something something." start flying.

GW could've given Cultists Assault 10 Autocannons at the same point cost and y'all would defend it via "player skill matters".

It's true! A skilled player would have simply realized that including cultists with autocannons is the most logical choice when building an army, and played around it in an appropriate fashion.

GFdoubles wrote:
...does anyone actually have a way for GW to reasonably "balance" this game while still making all the money they want/need to make? Or is this just an impossible endeavor unless GW shifts its focus or there is some other change? Again, genuinely curious about all of this.

Yes, they just need to make better use of their playtesters by doing a regimented balance test after rules have been finalized. It's clear that is not currently something GW is doing, between what we've heard from playtesters and the results we see get published.

Ideally before playtesting begins GW should have hired a guy to do some basic math on how efficient a unit is at killing X, Y, Z and how durable the unit is versus A, B, C. Going further there should be a range of acceptable costs for units and permanent anchors for balance. Let's say you anchor the most useless model in the game at 5 points, you're never going to change this model's cost. Then you change the points costs of models in relation to this model, models that should be good against this model cannot be too expensive, otherwise they will be inefficient counters to this model, models that should be bad against the useless model cannot be too cheap, otherwise, they will counter everything. Now you can start to build a web of units that should be better and worse than each other. Maybe an Intercessor should be 15-25 points or something like that, now you have ensured that Intercessor prices never get so good they are the only thing Space Marine players ever take or so bad that they never take them.

Making the MFM pts update digital would enable a shorter turn-around time to fix more mistakes and avoid making changes that might have been reasonable in the past, but turn out to be bad because of new releases.

Releasing codexes at the same time as MFM updates would mean that the armies are meant to be balanced at a point in time instead of the designers having a running battle with balance as a new codex is released once every two months.

Moving Chapter Tactics, Relics, WL traits, Stratagems and Relics to Chapter Approved and away from codexes would make it easier to balance and compare the content instead of having it strewn across 40 publications.

Most importantly the designers should just have a think about what people might take if they were trying to win and how they might use things. You don't put a flamer Stratagem that increases number of shots in the same book where you put a flamer Stratagem that increases damage without considering how they might combo together.

 Ordana wrote:
WHFB had really bad balance in the run up to its death. Don't think that helped profit.

As I understand it End Times was more profitable than the rest of the last edition, it was probably a little more broken. But if people really wanted to play a broken game they would be playing the Storm of Magic expansion and nobody did.

 Gadzilla666 wrote:
For example: in early 9th edition codexes Dd6 was considered "fine" for AT weapons. Then, gw decided that it wasn't reliable enough, and began rolling out things like Dd3+3, while leaving older units in older books with the "old paradigm" Dd6 weapons, thus making them weaker in comparison.

Fake news, Necrons got a Dd6 weapon upgraded to D3d3, 3d3

It wasn't a problem and the unit just recently got buffed twice in quick succession. The only thing that matters is points efficiency, broken rules don't exist outside Relics and WL traits which have no adjustable cost.

Breton wrote:
Um, what? I'm talking about making Troops choices - the thing we want to see fielded in greater numbers as the backbone of most armies - cheaper enough people get rewarded for doing it.

A Full Force Tactical Squad that has to include 10 Tactical Marines at the cost of 15 PPM instead of 5-10 at 18 PPM enables you to take more Tactical Marines (the backbone of the army), what battlefield role they have is kind of irrelevant isn't it? Making Asyxis, Nephritis and Johnny unique Tactical Squads was also an option I mentioned, but then you could use these cheap squads to fill out your Troops requirements so you don't see radically more troops. Another option would be a free super Sergeant upgrade for 10-man units, like getting a WL trait or Relic for the Sergeant. I'd prefer to give Sergeants a points increase and reduce the cost of the regular guys in the squad.

As I understand it End Times was more profitable than the rest of the last edition, it was probably a little more broken. But if people really wanted to play a broken game they would be playing the Storm of Magic expansion and nobody did.

Wasn't it because it was WFB content for the first time for multiple armies in years, and the fact that no one told any of the players that AoS was comming soon, meaning ton of players were expecting their game to get a second life with new rules and maybe new models?
I know that the backlash for AoS, besides it being a bad game in its initial form, came from the fact that the only info people got about AoS was in a WD with the GW usual secrecy telling people that something new coming soon. And then next month WFB was dead.

Karol wrote:

As I understand it End Times was more profitable than the rest of the last edition, it was probably a little more broken. But if people really wanted to play a broken game they would be playing the Storm of Magic expansion and nobody did.

Wasn't it because it was WFB content for the first time for multiple armies in years, and the fact that no one told any of the players that AoS was comming soon, meaning ton of players were expecting their game to get a second life with new rules and maybe new models?

Yes.

 Dolnikan wrote:

 Jidmah wrote:

 Aenar wrote:
Again, comparing single units is pointless.

Trajann could cost 5 points (FIVE) and be (externally) balanced if the resulting Custodes lists were (externally) balanced (ie 45-55% wr) across the field.
The internal balance of the Custodes book in this example would be bad, as every single list would include him. But that's an internal balance issue.

As for external balance, across different factions, both the point costs of individual units and their comparison are pointless. What matters is the end result, the balance that comes out of lists as a whole, especially now that we have the rule of three.
You don't play 2000 pts of Intercessors vs 2000 pts of Tyranid Warriors, you play 2000 pts of SM vs 2000 pts of Tyranids.

Absolutely agree, though if the points are off by too much the bad internal balance tends to become an external balance issue. Trajan is kind of safe here since he can't be spammed, but if something else is too much below the curve costwise, it tends to warp the game in one way or another.

That's why good listbuilding restrictions are necessary. But unfortunately, those seem to disappear more and more.

Ah yes the old "it's fine that unit is broken good because it's 0-1" argument which fails big time.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

Karol wrote:

Slipspace 803732 11321886 wrote: Custodes may just be the FOTM army right now and Eldar may end up being equally or more busted. That's still not a reason to leave Custodes as they are. Even if Eldar turn out to be more broken than Custodes that doesn't help anyone playing any of the other armies when they come up against the still-busted Custodes. Pointing at another army and claiming everything's fine because you're not as broken as them is spectacularly missing the point.

It is still better to have tau and custodes to be the best armies, then have eldar at the top. Look what happened when ad mecha and orks got nerfed, alongside sisters. DE shot back up to 60%+ win rates in an instant. Any army which keeps eldar win rates down, till at least 10th ed should stay the way it is right now.

Ah yes. Good idea from you to publicly announce "I DON'T WANT GAME TO BE BALANCED!"

 vict0988 wrote:

 Gadzilla666 wrote:
For example: in early 9th edition codexes Dd6 was considered "fine" for AT weapons. Then, gw decided that it wasn't reliable enough, and began rolling out things like Dd3+3, while leaving older units in older books with the "old paradigm" Dd6 weapons, thus making them weaker in comparison.

Fake news, Necrons got a Dd6 weapon upgraded to D3d3, 3d3

Meanwhile Lascannons, Lastalons, Krak Missiles, SuperKraks, Hunter Killer/Slayer, Melta Weapons, KMKs, Smashaguns, Rupture Canons, Quake Cannons, Stormwind Seige Canons, Vanquisher Battle Canons, etc. stayed D6 instead of being changed to D3+3 in a Chapter Approved.

It wasn't a problem and the unit just recently got buffed twice in quick succession. The only thing that matters is points efficiency, broken rules don't exist outside Relics and WL traits which have no adjustable cost.

Breton wrote:
Um, what? I'm talking about making Troops choices - the thing we want to see fielded in greater numbers as the backbone of most armies - cheaper enough people get rewarded for doing it.

A Full Force Tactical Squad that has to include 10 Tactical Marines at the cost of 15 PPM instead of 5-10 at 18 PPM enables you to take more Tactical Marines (the backbone of the army), what battlefield role they have is kind of irrelevant isn't it? Making Asyxis, Nephritis and Johnny unique Tactical Squads was also an option I mentioned, but then you could use these cheap squads to fill out your Troops requirements so you don't see radically more troops. Another option would be a free super Sergeant upgrade for 10-man units, like getting a WL trait or Relic for the Sergeant. I'd prefer to give Sergeants a points increase and reduce the cost of the regular guys in the squad.

What battlefield role TROOPS have when trying to incentivize TROOPS choices with a discount for TROOPS choices does make their battlefield role pretty relevant. And no- making three named 100 point Tactical Squads doesn't do the same thing. It lets you fill the compulsory choices cheaper and max out even more on the "toys". This is one of the reasons they nixed the 3x5 bare bones Scout Squads as troops. By only giving the discount to full size squads: They can't go barebones AND its a MUCH tougher choice between 10 Heavy Intercessors w/ 2 Heavy Bolters for 160 vs 5 Aggressors for 225 How about 20 Assault Intercessors with two seargeants weilding powerfists for 210 or 5 Eradicators for 225?.


The best answer of course is to start at the beginning- first, make a typical Full SM Battle Company
Headquarters:

Captain
Chaplain
Lieutenant
Lieutenant OR Judiciar (depending on what they want to do with a Judiciar- I'd change Lieutenant to Slot Free with a Cap, Jud to Slot Free with a Chaplain, and then give it a Chaplain Lieutenant ability possibly even Captain/Lt bubble shooting, Chap/Jud bubble Fighting)
Company Champion
Company/Primaris Ancient
2 (Primaris and/or Firstborn Apothecary
Company Veterans: 6 that form two squads one for each Cap/Chap.

Line:
Troops: 60 total
10 Intercessors, 10 Assault Intercessors, 10 Heavy Intercessors, 10 Infiltrators, 10 Incursors, 10 Tacticals.

FA: 20 Total
10 Assault Marines, and/or 5-10 Dakka Inceptors and/or 5-10 Plasma Inceptors, and/or 5-10 Outriders.

HS: 20 total
10 Devs, and/or 5-10 Hellbalsters and/or 5-10 Eradicators.

I'd do this with a Generic SM Battle Company because it's the most fluff detailed still-generic(i.e. Not the Spear of Macragge as led by Sgt Chronus on this day in this year vs the Necrons on Damnos) military org out there really. I'd make that. And I'd say that's 2,000 points. Everything in that army gets balanced against itself, then everything in the codex NOT in that list gets balanced against that list in a way to keep the TROOPS units at 6x10 for as long as possible. Next you make the typical army from the other factions balance it against this list, then balance the rest of their codex vs their list. After that I'd get rid of most of the generic detachments - and make more Specialist Detachments in the Codex/Supplement books like the Knight Det from a while back. One Battle Company and One Demi Company Det in the main codex that has 3/6 compulsory troop choices (but gives a bonus vs the 3+ batallion Det which has the advantage of being more flexible) Three Dets for the DA and their Wings - one Death, One Raven, one both Death and Raven. I'd make a couple Dets for Eldar. One Saim-Hann(Wild Rider etc favored), One Iyanden (Wraith favorered) potentially one that just lets you go hog-wild on Phoenix Lords and Aspects and one for all Harlis, one for mixing Harlequinns and Ynarri rules for their specialist Dets, one for Guard to do their Armored Fist Column, One for BA to do their first company with a bunch of Sanguinary Guard, Vangaurd Vets etc - One for all generic SM Chapters to do a First Company (Terminators, Van/Stern/Blade -guard Vets, Veteran Intercessors in a fairly equal mix) Some for Necrons and Tau that (insert fluffy non-standard army here) a couple for Nids that do Big Bugs and Little Bugs focus. Basically recycle those big but faction locked Dets from 6th/7th in a focused thematic prodding non-Monty-Haul manner. The problem with those Dets weren't the concept but the implementation.

@Breton the point of the named squads is for them to be max-sized, so maybe you're only spending 420 pts on Troops but you get 3x10 instead of spending 270 to get 3x5. I don't the big deal whether a unit is a Troops choice or an Elites choice, it's completely arbitrary if what you want to see is more Tactical Squads then cheap 10-man squads as Elites choices would do it better than cheap 10-man squads as Troops since you'd need both the 5-man Troops units and the cheap 10-man Elites units in the first scenario. Do you feel different about someone taking 3x5 Scouts now vs when they were Troops?

I feel like your idea is too restrictive, I know people gravitate towards the same sorts of lists anyway, but I like my freedom to explore and experiment and I don't think I have that freedom within your system.

Meanwhile Lascannons, Lastalons, Krak Missiles, SuperKraks, Hunter Killer/Slayer, Melta Weapons, KMKs, Smashaguns, Rupture Canons, Quake Cannons, Stormwind Seige Canons, Vanquisher Battle Canons, etc. stayed D6 instead of being changed to D3+3 in a Chapter Approved.

Aeldari missile launchers, blasters, blast pistols, daedalus missile launcher, nothing changed between the beginning of 9th and the middle of 9th in terms of codex design, some weapons got better, some didn't, that's true for every codex. Points efficiency is the only thing that matters, I don't care if you have a 6D6 damage weapon, there is a price point at which the weapon looks garbage.

 vict0988 wrote:

Meanwhile Lascannons, Lastalons, Krak Missiles, SuperKraks, Hunter Killer/Slayer, Melta Weapons, KMKs, Smashaguns, Rupture Canons, Quake Cannons, Stormwind Seige Canons, Vanquisher Battle Canons, etc. stayed D6 instead of being changed to D3+3 in a Chapter Approved.

Aeldari missile launchers, blasters, blast pistols, daedalus missile launcher, nothing changed between the beginning of 9th and the middle of 9th in terms of codex design, some weapons got better, some didn't, that's true for every codex. Points efficiency is the only thing that matters, I don't care if you have a 6D6 damage weapon, there is a price point at which the weapon looks garbage.

tournament players care. They want game to be solved enough that the result is known after who goes first is solved.

And now that GW started catering to that it's getting there. You can predict game results with tournament lists after first turn roll with ridiculously high frequency. Spend bit time and can even get pretty close vp result as well.

 Daedalus81 wrote:
Well, they need to put out fewer books. They can't handle this pace. And frankly the pace is kind of nuts right now. Custodes, GSC, Tau, Nids, and Eldar in 3 months. CSM won't be far behind. Orks seem like a distant memory, but they were just 6 months ago. There's just no way for them to write it all without tripping over themselves.

People say they should have done a get you by supplement, but what would that look like exactly? GW likely has no roadmap for incoming mechanics and so such a book would be useless. Simply making all the other armies cheaper based on unknown info is also really bad for the player and collecting.

The best scenario is that they recognize the nature of the releases and quickly address issues - ideally in a digital ruleset.

I mean, GW having no roadmap for the incoming mechanics in a new edition is exactly the problem of why Codex creep is as high as it is.

Designers just make gak up when they work on a new codex and then the next designer for the next codex takes that as a baseline and adds more stuff he made up on top until the edition crumbles under its own weight and needs to be reset.