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EviscerationPlague wrote:

Skill only comes to play in a deep game, otherwise we wouldn't have the constant tourney winners say some codices are just bad. Hell, one said not too long ago they wouldn't bother running AdMech.

Skill comes to play each and every time players are similarly matched in list building. You can find and buy a netlist on the internet, but in a tournament you will run into similarly optimized lists run by players that actually have experience and skill running such lists. And if you don't have similar experience and skill you will lose as you will make suboptimal choices and mistakes.

The relatively balanced nature of the meta currently after the last balance efforts is why the community went beserk at Votann. It is still a work in progress, but it finally feels like there is someone at GW trying to balance the game. But, the Votann rules were clearly written by the other someone at GW who has underpants on his head, two pencils up his nostrils and likes to say "wibble".

Dudeface wrote:
I'm looking forwards to all the people telling us how GW can't balance a game and they're lying/data is incorrect etc when by all accounts it does look like they're doing a good job and Marines are in need of a shot in the arm, but that's not a shock.

I've not watched the video yet, but the written article is significantly better than the previous metawatch articles in 9th, which had a heavy "you're playing the game wrong" vibe, and a rather selective way of looking at and showing the statistics.

Karol wrote:
I don't go to tournaments at all, but I have never heard or seen anyone who just bought a 2000pts army, much less random collection of models go and play in an event.

What I get from article is the feeling that GW is trying to say that the good factions aren't as good as they are , and that the bad factions aren't as bad as they are. Because there is a potantial 5% error in win rates.

I don't care if the win rates of an army is 49% or 51%.

What I do care about is armies being in theri 30% win rates for years now. Or armies being above 55%. I know that people are used to seeing armies and much higher win rates then that, but at the same time I don't think people know what 55% win rates for a faction in a game played by thousands of players means. In chess white are considered OP and they sure as hell don't have a 55% win rate. In sports if a group or player has a 30 something win rate and the other one is a 55%, then the chance of the first one winning is close to zero. And it doesn't mean if it is a team game or a single person event.

That particular person will have been building and painting their army over months most likely. Some buy an army from someone getting out of the game or w/e. Dropping into a 5 round is a whole different experience if you've only had a handful of games at an FLGS. 40K takes a long time to play. I probably play more than most people here and my max is like 8 games in a month with an average of about 3.

I don't think armies have labored much since they started doing dataslates. Things are moving faster than they used to in that regard.

One other possible metric we can look at is representation of armies. So, when one army does really well we see a lean into people playing that army. This is the representation last week. No one goes above 8% of the total players and that's probably a good litmus test. Obviously not all armies would see an equal share due to cost, preference, etc. What it tells us is when you get play rates 10% or more you're probably also seeing balance issues. If you go back to when the game was more troubled you'll see Nids / Tau / Custodes between 10 and 15% and the rest of the armies drop off pretty quickly.

Someone with a data science background could probably analyze it better than I though.

What do people think should be done about Harlequin win rates? I think Harlequins need a slight nerf... but what, exactly? Just cost increase on Troupes?

EviscerationPlague wrote:

 Insectum7 wrote:
^People can find "broken gak", sure. But they can't win tournaments unless they're actually skilled. Very different things.

Skill only comes to play in a deep game, otherwise we wouldn't have the constant tourney winners say some codices are just bad. Hell, one said not too long ago they wouldn't bother running AdMech.

Some codexes being bad is zero evidence that player skill is moot.

Regarding Space Marines, there is the further issue that the community and GW consider each subfaction as a full faction, and yet all Loyalists Marines minus Grey Knights share 99% of the same rules and point costs.

To further complicate it, many Marine subfactions are doing way better than the vainilla, with many of them even managing to win the occasional tournament.

It would be very easy for a buff to the vainilla codex to lead to an overpowered subfaction.

 Insectum7 wrote:

EviscerationPlague wrote:

 Insectum7 wrote:
^People can find "broken gak", sure. But they can't win tournaments unless they're actually skilled. Very different things.

Skill only comes to play in a deep game, otherwise we wouldn't have the constant tourney winners say some codices are just bad. Hell, one said not too long ago they wouldn't bother running AdMech.

Some codexes being bad is zero evidence that player skill is moot.

It is when player skill can't hold up a codex. 40k isn't a skill-less game but let's not pretend the skill cap is high or anything.

EviscerationPlague wrote:

 Insectum7 wrote:

EviscerationPlague wrote:

 Insectum7 wrote:
^People can find "broken gak", sure. But they can't win tournaments unless they're actually skilled. Very different things.

Skill only comes to play in a deep game, otherwise we wouldn't have the constant tourney winners say some codices are just bad. Hell, one said not too long ago they wouldn't bother running AdMech.

Some codexes being bad is zero evidence that player skill is moot.

It is when player skill can't hold up a codex. 40k isn't a skill-less game but let's not pretend the skill cap is high or anything.

Players are exerting their relative skills to take the books with best odds of winning. So no, when better players take better books, the weaker books will not be "held up by player skill".

Edit: Sorry, on reread, I think you need to explain your definition of depth. What it sounds like you're trying to say is if there were some factions with a lot of nuanced play, then the skilled players could take those and win with them where as the average player wouldn't.

What you exclude from your own example is its the skilled players calling books bad because, they're bad, they can have plenty of depth but if they're fundamentally worse, then it doesn't change that.

Dudeface wrote:

EviscerationPlague wrote:

 Insectum7 wrote:

EviscerationPlague wrote:

 Insectum7 wrote:
^People can find "broken gak", sure. But they can't win tournaments unless they're actually skilled. Very different things.

Skill only comes to play in a deep game, otherwise we wouldn't have the constant tourney winners say some codices are just bad. Hell, one said not too long ago they wouldn't bother running AdMech.

Some codexes being bad is zero evidence that player skill is moot.

It is when player skill can't hold up a codex. 40k isn't a skill-less game but let's not pretend the skill cap is high or anything.

Players are exerting their relative skills to take the books with best odds of winning. So no, when better players take better books, the weaker books will not be "held up by player skill".

Edit: Sorry, on reread, I think you need to explain your definition of depth. What it sounds like you're trying to say is if there were some factions with a lot of nuanced play, then the skilled players could take those and win with them where as the average player wouldn't.

What you exclude from your own example is its the skilled players calling books bad because, they're bad, they can have plenty of depth but if they're fundamentally worse, then it doesn't change that.

To comment on EPs point - i think they are saying in a 'deeper' game like warmachine for example, player skill counts for more.

He's not wrong, at least to an extent. Back in mk2 (when i played...), while a player with lower skill ceiling could go much further with a 'better' faction like cryx or legion, a good player could still catch them.

That said there are a lot of caveats and nuances to the statement so don't take it as gospel. And a good player with a powerful faction like cryx or legion would probably still trounce a good player with a weaker faction, let alone a weaker player with any faction.

40k? Far shallower game than wmh. And while it is not without some skill, the list you play crutches an awful lot more than in wmh if you ask me.

Karol wrote:

Only the data isn't from store noob events, but tournaments. The new marine players can't be the deciding factor in draging the factions down, because the same would be happning to other factions, and the win/lose curve would be more smooth. There would also be some genius marine players who would take IF or CF and win events with them somewhere. That does not happen. That has not happned through out the entire 9th ed.

Uh you realize right that those new players are coming to tournaments as well?`

(checks who posted. Oh...Nevermind)


Automatically Appended Next Post:

Dudeface wrote:

 Kcalehc wrote:
Perhaps a small piece of the puzzle as for Marines doing somewhat badly, is that a majority of players seem to, in part, tailor their armies to kill/beat Marines. Many discussions on here around lethality focus on how to kill Marines and how to combat AoC (and thus how to kill Marines). They are the most common faction, and I would imagine a common opponent, so tooling up to beat them specifically makes sense.

I think that's likely a good explanation, the issue is they don't deserve to be squashed down to sub-desired rates just because they're common.

How you are going to combat it though? Make them so powerful even the new players whose results are dragging them down and so that even when opponents tool against marines they still win?

That results in horribly overbroken army though if opponent doesn't tool up vs marines and marine player happens to be more experienced one...

Marines are so high % of armies and especially popular for newer players so they will always drag down. You probably need different way to look how much help marines get. How much they appear at the top for example might be more useful.

Also wonder do they filter out mirror matches?


Automatically Appended Next Post:

Dudeface wrote:

 catbarf wrote:

Dudeface wrote:

 Kcalehc wrote:
Perhaps a small piece of the puzzle as for Marines doing somewhat badly, is that a majority of players seem to, in part, tailor their armies to kill/beat Marines. Many discussions on here around lethality focus on how to kill Marines and how to combat AoC (and thus how to kill Marines). They are the most common faction, and I would imagine a common opponent, so tooling up to beat them specifically makes sense.

I think that's likely a good explanation, the issue is they don't deserve to be squashed down to sub-desired rates just because they're common.

What's the alternative? Deliberately making them overpowered to offset the tournament meta only further reinforces list-tailoring to kill Marines.

The best thing GW can do is encourage non-MEQ armies so that the meta contains a more diverse range of defensive profiles, and to their credit they've been doing exactly that.

By encouraging you mean codex creeping none marine armies? I don't know what the correct answer is, but I know it isn't to have a game where a new player is told "don't buy Marines if you want to get a fair game, they're meant to lose more".

Thing is if you are looking just win rates they don't neccessarily mean they lose more. The result is almost certainly artificially lower due to higher % of less experienced players.

Aka between equal skilled players win rate is going to be higher. How much higher? That's trickier to measure. But less experienced players are less likely to play GSC/Harlequins for example so those are dragged lower less than marines are.

EviscerationPlague wrote:

40k isn't the most complex game, exactly. Your argument only works on a deeper game.

I present to you the counter argument. Richard Siegler winning LVO with Admech while they had a ~40% winrate.
Or more recently, Erik going undefeated with GSC at WTC and other non-team tournaments after.

Anyone that thinks there is no room for skill in 40k has clearly never played high level competitive games and players.

 Ordana wrote:

EviscerationPlague wrote:

40k isn't the most complex game, exactly. Your argument only works on a deeper game.

I present to you the counter argument. Richard Siegler winning LVO with Admech while they had a ~40% winrate.
Or more recently, Erik going undefeated with GSC at WTC and other non-team tournaments after.

Anyone that thinks there is no room for skill in 40k has clearly never played high level competitive games and players.

Which is the other metric you can use - top 3/5/X finishers at an event. And look at those armies. Do some dominate? (Well yes.) Far more stark results there.

 Ordana wrote:

EviscerationPlague wrote:

40k isn't the most complex game, exactly. Your argument only works on a deeper game.

I present to you the counter argument. Richard Siegler winning LVO with Admech while they had a ~40% winrate.
Or more recently, Erik going undefeated with GSC at WTC and other non-team tournaments after.

Anyone that thinks there is no room for skill in 40k has clearly never played high level competitive games and players.

Not consistent. In 6th edition there was a guy that almost won using a Thousand Sons based list, and then was never heard from again.

Would you argue that was an important data point?

 Ordana wrote:

Or more recently, Erik going undefeated with GSC at WTC and other non-team tournaments after.

As I understand it you get some say in the match-ups in the WTC so in general it's not a great indicator of a faction's power. The picks system introduces a whole new meta. He's clearly a very good player though if he's doing the same thing at non-team events too.

EDIT: Misplaced quote

I'm compelled to caution... Do not confuse gimmick with skill.

Skill is too often falsely attributed to players who rely on gimmicks to win. Players taking advantage of unintended rules interaction or players who have figured out some movement and/or model placement oddity. For example, tri-pointing or the charging into ruins debacle or using Artillery crew and their nonsensical rules to affect board control, untouchable screening, area denial, etc.

These things are gimmicks, not skill and can just as easily alter game outcome.

They have:

Space Marines: 39%
Grey Knights: 46%
Thousand Sons: 49%
Chaos Knights: 51%

I don't play enough with my Ultramarines, but they do always lose. I win with TSons and Chaos Knights more than I win with GK. So I guess it broadly matches my experience.

 oni wrote:
I'm compelled to caution... Do not confuse gimmick with skill.

Skill is too often falsely attributed to players who rely on gimmicks to win. Players taking advantage of unintended rules interaction or players who have figured out some movement and/or model placement oddity. For example, tri-pointing or the charging into ruins debacle or using Artillery crew and their nonsensical rules to affect board control, untouchable screening, area denial, etc.

These things are gimmicks, not skill and can just as easily alter game outcome.

The skill comes in spotting the gimmicks/loopholes etc & then exploiting them 1st/best.

Which armies have the lowest representations yet a high win rate? It looks to be Ynnari and Harlequins.

I'm more curious that if we continue down the rabbit hole of shallow game = low skill floor & ceiling, then why are they such low pick rate?

Obviously hobby buy in etc is going to be a factor but I don't imagine it'll be the deciding point. Are these 2 armies simply harder to play with and consequently harder to win with?

ccs wrote:

 oni wrote:
I'm compelled to caution... Do not confuse gimmick with skill.

Skill is too often falsely attributed to players who rely on gimmicks to win. Players taking advantage of unintended rules interaction or players who have figured out some movement and/or model placement oddity. For example, tri-pointing or the charging into ruins debacle or using Artillery crew and their nonsensical rules to affect board control, untouchable screening, area denial, etc.

These things are gimmicks, not skill and can just as easily alter game outcome.

The skill comes in spotting the gimmicks/loopholes etc & then exploiting them 1st/best.

What a fething cancer 40k has become for this to be praised...

^^^Seconded and Exalted.

 Grimtuff wrote:

ccs wrote:

 oni wrote:
I'm compelled to caution... Do not confuse gimmick with skill.

Skill is too often falsely attributed to players who rely on gimmicks to win. Players taking advantage of unintended rules interaction or players who have figured out some movement and/or model placement oddity. For example, tri-pointing or the charging into ruins debacle or using Artillery crew and their nonsensical rules to affect board control, untouchable screening, area denial, etc.

These things are gimmicks, not skill and can just as easily alter game outcome.

The skill comes in spotting the gimmicks/loopholes etc & then exploiting them 1st/best.

What a fething cancer 40k has become for this to be praised...

Yup, as lame as lame can be. 40k is a fething joke(still funny at least)and competitive 40k is an unfunny comedian who thinks they're Redd Fox...and just made an inappropriate joke!

 Grimtuff wrote:

ccs wrote:

 oni wrote:
I'm compelled to caution... Do not confuse gimmick with skill.

Skill is too often falsely attributed to players who rely on gimmicks to win. Players taking advantage of unintended rules interaction or players who have figured out some movement and/or model placement oddity. For example, tri-pointing or the charging into ruins debacle or using Artillery crew and their nonsensical rules to affect board control, untouchable screening, area denial, etc.

These things are gimmicks, not skill and can just as easily alter game outcome.

The skill comes in spotting the gimmicks/loopholes etc & then exploiting them 1st/best.

What a fething cancer 40k has become for this to be praised...

I don't think that a person making a statement about something on which he has no clue about counts as "praising".

Reality check:
You can know all gimmicks/loopholes of all armies. If you meet a good 40k player he will wipe the floor with you.

 Grimtuff wrote:

ccs wrote:

 oni wrote:
I'm compelled to caution... Do not confuse gimmick with skill.

Skill is too often falsely attributed to players who rely on gimmicks to win. Players taking advantage of unintended rules interaction or players who have figured out some movement and/or model placement oddity. For example, tri-pointing or the charging into ruins debacle or using Artillery crew and their nonsensical rules to affect board control, untouchable screening, area denial, etc.

These things are gimmicks, not skill and can just as easily alter game outcome.

The skill comes in spotting the gimmicks/loopholes etc & then exploiting them 1st/best.

What a fething cancer 40k has become for this to be praised...

Nah, this was always the case in competitive 40K.

 Ordana wrote:

EviscerationPlague wrote:

40k isn't the most complex game, exactly. Your argument only works on a deeper game.

I present to you the counter argument. Richard Siegler winning LVO with Admech while they had a ~40% winrate.
Or more recently, Erik going undefeated with GSC at WTC and other non-team tournaments after.

Anyone that thinks there is no room for skill in 40k has clearly never played high level competitive games and players.

The sudden emergence of Ynnari as well. It's not going to be just skill on the table, of course. Someone sitting down and taking the time to think about how the army works in context of the game and making it all come together.

As the representation of armies becomes more and more flat the ability to anticipate the kinds of armies you'll face to win a tournament becomes way more diverse. You can't just sit down like prior years and proclaim that 'my army' will waffle-stomp the 'meta army' and bank on high representation delivering you skew matchups. And with the secondaries it's far more than being able to kill models - you have to know how you're going to score.

The game certainly isn't perfect on all those angles ( some armies score more easily; some kill more easily, etc), but it certainly seems to be getting better.

 jaredb wrote:
I am not too surprised by the data. Surprised Sisters of battle and Necrons are not higher.

They make they the point in the article about marines, that because Marines are so popular, and a lot of inexperienced players play them, all those poor shows from people who are less competitive brings down the score. I feel that Marines are dragged down a bit because of that, but are in a tough place regardless.

also they're common eneugh that a lot of people tradtionally build lists to handle them.

 oni wrote:
I'm compelled to caution... Do not confuse gimmick with skill.

Skill is too often falsely attributed to players who rely on gimmicks to win. Players taking advantage of unintended rules interaction or players who have figured out some movement and/or model placement oddity. For example, tri-pointing or the charging into ruins debacle or using Artillery crew and their nonsensical rules to affect board control, untouchable screening, area denial, etc.

These things are gimmicks, not skill and can just as easily alter game outcome.

Gimmicks have so little to do with the total outcome of a game - especially at high levels. You might have had a burst of melee capable armies when we had the 2" charge debacle, but even GSC are still posting decent wins after it was reversed.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

BrianDavion wrote:

 jaredb wrote:
I am not too surprised by the data. Surprised Sisters of battle and Necrons are not higher.

They make they the point in the article about marines, that because Marines are so popular, and a lot of inexperienced players play them, all those poor shows from people who are less competitive brings down the score. I feel that Marines are dragged down a bit because of that, but are in a tough place regardless.

also they're common eneugh that a lot of people tradtionally build lists to handle them.

I don't think people build armies directly like that any more. People might be concerned about certain skew lists, but if you wanted to approach winning a tournament you have to think about beating Ynnari, Necrons, Sisters, CSM, Nids, Tau, Daemons, and Eldar -- at the very least. All of those offer so many different challenges that checking off the 'can I kill marines' box isn't a useful thought.

And even Knights are heavily tempered by the mission set - taking 4 big knights gets you losses just by virtue of being less flexible.

 Grimtuff wrote:

ccs wrote:

 oni wrote:
I'm compelled to caution... Do not confuse gimmick with skill.

Skill is too often falsely attributed to players who rely on gimmicks to win. Players taking advantage of unintended rules interaction or players who have figured out some movement and/or model placement oddity. For example, tri-pointing or the charging into ruins debacle or using Artillery crew and their nonsensical rules to affect board control, untouchable screening, area denial, etc.

These things are gimmicks, not skill and can just as easily alter game outcome.

The skill comes in spotting the gimmicks/loopholes etc & then exploiting them 1st/best.

What a fething cancer 40k has become for this to be praised...

You mistake a statement of fact for praise.
It's also not a 40k specific skill.

Sgt. Cortez wrote:

 Grimtuff wrote:

ccs wrote:

The skill comes in spotting the gimmicks/loopholes etc & then exploiting them 1st/best.

What a fething cancer 40k has become for this to be praised...

Nah, this was always the case in competitive 40K.

I'd argue that the gimmick and 'gotcha' side of 40k has actually become much less of a factor in recent years. Under 5th/6th/7th editions the game revolved around wombo-combo gimmicks like invisible deathstars to win in an competitive environment. Often these combos would be first identified by the skilled players, but were also quite easy to copy and imitate by the unskilled netlist folks who could use them to win local events. They would also remain indefinitely until GW made major codex or edition changes.

In modern 40k any similar unintended interactions are typically stamped out sooner or later. We just saw the Votann grudge token change implemented before the codex is even available to buy alone. The 2" charge thing lasted longer but still got squashed. Relying primarily on tricks with a limited shelf life aren't going to get you very far these days.

I reckon that modern 40k relies much more heavily on the acquired skills of:
a) Recognising your opponent's units and what they're capable of doing to you.
b) Countering those abilities with the right positioning, target priority, and risk management.
Basically things that can't be easily imitated by netlisters.

What was the 2" charge thing?

 dreadblade wrote:
What was the 2" charge thing?

2" engagement range for Ruins to counter people being silly with placing their units barely 1" behind a wall so a model couldn't fit on their side of the wall, but the thickness of the wall itself meant they couldn't be engaged from the other side, effectively making you immune to charges unless the charging unit went all the way around the Ruin.

It caused a bunch of other gimmick issues and was quickly abandoned by GW.