Prediction Time

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**Canadian 5th**

Dudeface wrote:
Like... TTS? Since it'd be literally the exact same but maybe prettier?

No. It would have a matchmaker; frequent balance updates; a ranked ladder with unique skins for players that reach [insert rank] or higher; a battle pass that rewards players with loot boxes; controls designed around 40k's needs; the ability to resolve attacks, movement, stratagems, etc.; animations, voice-over, and detailed play areas; lobbies that have odds calculated and displayed; side modes that give you a randomized 250-point army from a set pool and then drops you into a 4-player free for all match; emotes so Ork players can spam WAAAAGH! 10,000 times per match (You can mute it but they still get to press the button and see it on their end). There's a ton that a digital 40k game could offer (and monetize) that the physical game and TTS can't.

**Tyel**

I guess it will be interesting to see if Bloodbowl 3 encourages any take up of the physical plastic.

**Breton**

Canadian 5th wrote:

The thing is, companies are going to fold because they aren't software companies.

Oh man. Eggland folding is not going to be good news for Kroger.

**Sim-Life**

Can people stop encouraging Canadian 5ths weird alternate world where everyone just abandons in person games in favor of a vidya game versions purely because it exists. GW can't even make their army building app work. How are they going to make a working virtual version of the game? If I wanted to read some reddit tech bros delusions I'd go reddit.

**Canadian 5th**

Sim-Life wrote:
Can people stop encouraging Canadian 5ths weird alternate world. If I wanted to read some reddit tech bros delusions I'd go reddit.

The world where GW decides they want to make more money for little risk, so strange but I guess I should let people get back to arguing if Marines are going to be OP now for another 50 pages, lord knows Dakka needs more of that.

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Sim-Life wrote:
Can people stop encouraging Canadian 5ths weird alternate world where everyone just abandons in person games in favor of a vidya game versions purely because it exists. GW can't even make their army building app work. How are they going to make a working virtual version of the game? If I wanted to read some reddit tech bros delusions I'd go reddit.

I'm still confused as to where you get the idea that I'm suggesting people stop playing physical games comes from? I haven't ever suggested it.

**Sim-Life**

Canadian 5th wrote:
Sim-Life wrote:
Can people stop encouraging Canadian 5ths weird alternate world. If I wanted to read some reddit tech bros delusions I'd go reddit.

The world where GW decides they want to make more money for little risk, so strange but I guess I should let people get back to arguing if Marines are going to be OP now for another 50 pages, lord knows Dakka needs more of that.

If GW thought it would make money they would have done it by now. They're an international corporation, they've considered it and passed on it. Hell, they launched A STREAMING SERVICE before they launched a virtual version of the game. Does that tell you nothing?

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Sim-Life wrote:
Can people stop encouraging Canadian 5ths weird alternate world where everyone just abandons in person games in favor of a vidya game versions purely because it exists. GW can't even make their army building app work. How are they going to make a working virtual version of the game? If I wanted to read some reddit tech bros delusions I'd go reddit.

I'm still confused as to where you get the idea that I'm suggesting people stop playing physical games comes from? I haven't ever suggested it.

**Canadian 5th**

Sim-Life wrote:
If GW thought it would make money they would have done it by now. They're an international corporation, they've considered it and passed on it. Hell, they launched A STREAMING SERVICE before they launched a virtual version of the game. Does that tell you nothing?

GW also made 7th edition, fought a stupid battle with Chapterhouse, and created finecast. I don't believe them to be paragons of good business so much as they're barely competent enough to coast off skilled model makers and a popular IP.

Automatically Appended Next Post:

Sim-Life wrote:
You literally said that you think 90% of players would start playing the virtual version of the game over the physical.

That's not what I said at all. I said 90% of games would be played online and given the ease of play, the ease of finding a match, and faster match times that could easily be true even if the physical game maintains 100% of its current player base and keeps growing. I'm sorry that you have issues with reading comprehension even after I pointed out that I never said the physical game should die multiple times. If you were thinking that I said that 90% of 40k players would abandon the tabletop for virtual tables that's on you.

**Mad Doc Grotsnik**

Canadian 5th wrote:
Sim-Life wrote:
If GW thought it would make money they would have done it by now. They're an international corporation, they've considered it and passed on it. Hell, they launched A STREAMING SERVICE before they launched a virtual version of the game. Does that tell you nothing?

GW also made 7th edition, fought a stupid battle with Chapterhouse, and created finecast. I don't believe them to be paragons of good business so much as they're barely competent enough to coast off skilled model makers and a popular IP.

Look at their takings and then try to say they’re “barely competent” and “coasting” with a straight face.

Because I hate to break it you duder, but chances are GW know more about their market and business than you or I do. Because despite decades now of folk predicting their demise, saying they’ve no clue what they’re doing? They’re still here. They’re still the dominant market force. And they are most definitely still growing.

**Canadian 5th**

Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote:
Look at their takings and then try to say they’re “barely competent” and “coasting” with a straight face.

Because I hate to break it you duder, but chances are GW know more about their market and business than you or I do. Because despite decades now of folk predicting their demise, saying they’ve no clue what they’re doing? They’re still here. They’re still the dominant market force. And they are most definitely still growing.

I exaggerated for effect there. GW is good at being a popular IP holder and playing big fish in a small pond, but much like a WWE for example, they also show that they are willing to fire rounds into both feet and are very slow to change even when their format isn't working as well as it could be. I also suspect that they, as do many companies in the physical gaming space, have a serious blindspot when it comes to all things digital and that they would enable themselves to be more successful if they found better ways to leverage their IP in that realm. I don't think 40k has ever done especially well licensing its IP outside of its traditional mediums and would like to see them change that.

Is a VTT thing something they're likely to do? No, it's not their MO. They can barely handle the rules updates needed for a niche wargame let alone what gamers would expect of them. Could they do it and be successful at it? I think they could and that doing so isn't much of a risk and has the potential for a high upside.

**Tyran**

To be honest if you are going to have a virtual version of 40k, it makes more sense to expand games like Battlesector, Gladius or Dawn of War that actually take advantage of being a videogame rather than having a virtual version of the TT, because the TT has so many abstractions meant to facilitate physical play that don't make much sense in a virtual game while a virtual environment provides far more tools than a physical one.

**Canadian 5th**

Tyran wrote:
To be honest if you are going to have a virtual version of 40k, it makes more sense to expand games like battlesector, Gladius or Dawn of War that actually take advantage of being a videogame rather than having a virtual version of the TT, because the TT has so many abstractions meant to facilitate physical play that don't make much sense in a virtual game while a virtual environment provides far more tools than a physical one.

I think that exposes them to more competition and has issues with not capturing existing 40k players to build an initial fanbase.

**Dudeface**

This thread has been a wild ride, but let's face it, its not going to happen and Canadian 5th you've outright said you don't want to buy GW products due to price. It strongly suggests you're not going to go dump hundreds into a F2P digital 40k that isn't needed and GW aren't capable of managing.

But yes I think the point of predicting whether marines will dominate the meta with free wargear, no longer correlates to the conversation.

**Tyran**

If nothing else, if Marines truly dominate the meta, I expect GW to panic and quickly nerf them like the last time Marines dominated the meta.

Marines are so common that they dominating the Meta tends to have a far larger impact than any other faction dominating the meta.

E.g. even before the nerfs Tyranids were something like 10% of the player base and had a 20% representation on the top tables. Clearly an issue, but with Marines that already have around a 50% play rate, a similar overrepresentation on the top tables means 99% of the top tables are Marines.

**Dudeface**

Tyran wrote:
If nothing else, if Marines truly dominate the meta, I expect GW to panic and quickly nerf them like the last time Marines dominated the meta.

Marines are so common that they dominating the Meta tends to have a far larger impact than any other faction dominating the meta.

E.g. even before the nerfs Tyranids were something like 10% of the player base and had a 20% representation on the top tables. Clearly an issue, but with Marines that already have around a 50% play rate, a similar overrepresentation on the top tables means 99% of the top tables are Marines.

This is very true, if Iron Hands have truly come back from the apology tour, I don't think it'll be for long.

**Mad Doc Grotsnik**

Dudeface wrote:
This thread has been a wild ride, but let's face it, its not going to happen and Canadian 5th you've outright said you don't want to buy GW products due to price. It strongly suggests you're not going to go dump hundreds into a F2P digital 40k that isn't needed and GW aren't capable of managing.

But yes I think the point of predicting whether marines will dominate the meta with free wargear, no longer correlates to the conversation.

We also need to be realistic.

Once that box of models is sold? GW, as a company, don’t really care what we do with them. They’ve got their bit. Maybe it’ll end up painted to Golden Daemon Standard. Maybe it’ll languish in its shrink wrap, gathering dust on the pile of shame. Maybe it’ll be the star unit in an army which crushes all at multiple tournaments.

GW is solely interested in selling us more models, books, paints, brushes etc.

So with this hypothetical Code In The Box? What does that actually gain GW, other than the running and maintenance costs of a digital platform they’ve done perfectly well without this far?

As others have said, for those like myself with zero interest in digital 40K gaming, the codes would be sold or given away. And nobody is going to pay for a GW kit just to play online.

So where’s the additional revenue stream from which further profits can be derived? How does GW make this idea make more money than their current model already brings in? Because so far as I can see, it’s just A Further Production Cost for no discernible gain.

**Daedalus81**

Sim-Life wrote:
Can people stop encouraging Canadian 5ths weird alternate world where everyone just abandons in person games in favor of a vidya game

I was a hardcore video gamer for the longest time. Now in my older age I just truly appreciate the non-digital even though computers are still heavily prominent for me.

You can see how people reacted after being able to get out once COVID had calmed down. Last year, literally all the camp sites booked in February in this area for the oncoming season. People ultimately want to be with other people.

Even the best conceivable digital presence one could imagine still leaves out being able to meet up with a dozen or more buddies, witness the care they took in painting up their models, sharing battle stories, etc. You can't replicate that very easily online.

**Breton**

Canadian 5th wrote:

I think that exposes them to more competition and has issues with not capturing existing 40k players to build an initial fanbase.

Are you unfamiliar with those games?

**Aecus Decimus**

Canadian 5th wrote:
a battle pass that rewards players with loot boxes

Lolwut.

How exactly did we get two pages deep in a discussion of "GW should make a F2P loot box version of 40k" as a solution to anything? 40k is a horribly designed game that lives because it's the rule set attached to the amazing models and fluff GW produces. If you take away the miniatures you have nothing left and no reason to ever play that game, outside of a handful of competitive players grinding through playtesting matches (which have zero value in balancing discussions) for their next tournament. The idea that a digital version of 40k is going to somehow magically be 90% of matches is, to put it politely, not at all in touch with reality.

(And yes, you could make a popular and successful video game with the IP, but that has nothing to do with the idea of getting balance data from digital games.)

**Tyel**

Dudeface wrote:
Tyran wrote:
If nothing else, if Marines truly dominate the meta, I expect GW to panic and quickly nerf them like the last time Marines dominated the meta.

This is very true, if Iron Hands have truly come back from the apology tour, I don't think it'll be for long.

Eh... I'd tend to agree. But pedantry insists I kick off at "like last time". Marines were top tier OP from the 2.0 release - so August 2019, until lets say the DE 9th edition release, March 2021. (And its not as if Marines immediately became crap into everyone else just because DE were better.) That's about 18 months. Really Marines were still winning tournaments (and certainly regularly placing) for at least another 6 months, if not the rest of 2021.

Now admittedly, before Karol comes sprinting in, this period was clearly majorly disrupted significantly by Covid and many people were locked down for months. But I mean, it wasn't exactly quick.

Marines will probably be top tier through the end of 9th, get a new codex and be top tier for the first year or so of 10th. Then start to drift down as other books come out. Then get some love for the end. As happens essentially uniquely for them every edition.

**H.B.M.C.**

GW want to sell an entire eco-system of products (miniatures, paint, glue, tools, brushes, terrain, the surface you play on, the rules you use, the dice you use, etc.).

They have no interest in transferring that over to digital.

**NurglesR0T**

Tyel wrote:
Dudeface wrote:
Tyran wrote:
If nothing else, if Marines truly dominate the meta, I expect GW to panic and quickly nerf them like the last time Marines dominated the meta.

Marines will probably be top tier through the end of 9th, get a new codex and be top tier for the first year or so of 10th. Then start to drift down as other books come out. Then get some love for the end. As happens essentially uniquely for them every edition.

This is also my expectation. Marines and the first 5 or so books of any new edition always get outshined and suffer by codex power creep towards the end of the edition.

**SemperMortis**

Canadian 5th wrote:

GW also made 7th edition, fought a stupid battle with Chapterhouse, and created finecast. I don't believe them to be paragons of good business so much as they're barely competent enough to coast off skilled model makers and a popular IP.

There it is folks, Canadian and I finally agree on something! I've always said that GW is successful in spite of itself rather than because of itself

Tyran wrote:
If nothing else, if Marines truly dominate the meta, I expect GW to panic and quickly nerf them like the last time Marines dominated the meta.

Marines are so common that they dominating the Meta tends to have a far larger impact than any other faction dominating the meta.

E.g. even before the nerfs Tyranids were something like 10% of the player base and had a 20% representation on the top tables. Clearly an issue, but with Marines that already have around a 50% play rate, a similar overrepresentation on the top tables means 99% of the top tables are Marines.

Marines Dominated 8th for about the first 6 months and only changed the Bobby G gunline because they were tabling opponents at the Cyclic rate, then they finished the edition off by being the most OP codex ever, no offense, but I highly doubt at this late juncture that GW would do anything besides sit on their hands until 10th.

Breton wrote:
SemperMortis wrote:

Why are beer and pretzel games less worthy of being balanced? Shouldn't these lists be equally plausible targets for balance and synergy? Especially if they're fluffy?

If you balance the game at the pointy end (Tournament play) it will filter down into the casual setting. And there isn't really a scenario where every single unit should be balanced against each other. If you run 3 maxed squads of eradicators and Multi-melta Devastators into my Green Tide, I expect to win 99x out of 100. Conversely, if I run my DreadWaaagh straight into that anti-tank list I expect to lose 99 out of 100 times. And having played my fair share of Beer and Pretzel (Mostly whiskey and Meat) games I can tell you that sometimes the lists are just so ridiculous that they shouldn't ever stand a chance except against a similarly silly list.

Breton wrote:
SemperMortis wrote:
I'm on board with the concept here, but I'm still unclear on why the Beer and Pretzel Stompa isn't worthy of buffing until it goes to a tournament. I'd also like to know why Trajann needs to be toned down instead of additional options need to be added. How many Datasheets is Trajann fighting for space with? How many of them are a named Special Character which usually provide better-for-cheaper or unique-shenanigan-potential?
And this is an example of my first response, if you balance the Stompa at the competitive level then when you bring it down to the casual level it won't feel pathetic by comparison. As far as "adding more options" thats a whole other rabbit hole we don't need to go down. The point being that if a unit is universally taken regardless of how many other options there are, it should be examined and possibly nerfed a bit while buffing its competitor units.

Breton wrote:
SemperMortis wrote:

Which free wargear and points cuts specifically do you think are a problem? Centurion Assault Squads went down 10ppm. Did you see a lot of them before? Will you see a lot of them now? But they get Meltaguns and Hurricane Bolters for free. Devastators went up about 5PPM and a 10 model squad now likely costs more than it did before they got free heavies. The obvious units to cheer about getting free wargear actually didn't. Vanguard Vets (etc.) still pay for jump packs and Thunderhammers. A price dropped Gladiator Valiant averages 88% of the anti-tankish shots, for roughly 80% of the points after the Centurion Devastator Squad got its freebie upgrades AND points drop. So even though their price per model drop was impressive IF that drop makes them viable is still questionable. Should this test balloon have been expanded to the rest of the factions? Probably. And in some ways it was. Look at your Predator price now. Your sponsons are cheaper/free just like the loyalists. Your Havoc Missile too. Your Plague Marines are freebie Upgrades now. Your Foetid Bloat Drones. Strangely the base Chaos Havoc's and bikers still pay, as do the TS Terminators and Vindicators. I'm kind of hoping they come out with another one of these on the 19th with the rest of the things they forgot. It feels like this release was not the final draft. Or Not Supposed to be the final draft.

I think the wargear points cut almost across the board is the problem. I won't argue for the same treatment GW gave my orkz (Here is a 1pt price cut on boyz, now STFU and be happy about it) but they could have gone with something similar to that, instead of 1 make it 3, and reduce the price of upgrades to incentivize taking at least 1 heavy weapon. And of course, have that effect changed a bit but match on other SM units which aren't doing well (AKA Vehicles, etc.) Atm you can literally spam 12 5x Tac Squads with a Multi-Melta and a Sgt with a Combi-Melta and Thunder Hammer for 1,080pts. Not saying that by itself would be good but christ, 60 Marine bodies along with 12 Multi-Meltas, 12 Combi Meltas and 12 Thunderhammers on the field for a bit more than half your points? To fully appreciate how ridiculous that is, a Green Tide ork list can take 12 Squads of 10 and 1 squad of 15 for that same price...no upgrades.... well, I could give each squad a free Big Shoota...but why? its at best a sidegrade to a choppa

I'm just pointing out that in a game primarily focused on taking the midfield objectives and scoring secondaries, its going to be nice as a SM player to be able to take 6-12 Tac Squad troops choices for 25%-50% of your army and fully equip them with hundreds of points of free wargear which gives them a lot of flexibility in how they attack the field of battle. If you need to hold an objective? Camp to your hearts content, and utilize 24' range of your weapons which on short tables and holding the middle means a rather big swathe of the battlefield. Need to tie up a unit? Send in a couple squads of Tac Marines to die valiantly and allow the TH Sgt hidden in the middle to get some swings in. Need to kill an enemy vehicle? Well, each squad has 3 Melta shots a turn, not bad for 90pts. Again, would this be a broken combo? don't know yet, there are probably a hell of a lot better builds that the tourny players will find. But from an outsiders perspective, this isn't going to end well for balance.

Tyel wrote:

Lets say we get a Marine Meta. This will make units that are good into Marines seem good (certainly desirable in any case) while units which are bad into Marines will appear bad. If however Marines are not as common - which may happen in certain tournaments, and certainly if Marines were nerfed - this would change. Which is often why I think you used to see different metas emerge in the US, Europe and perhaps especially Australia. This may have been disprortionately due to different game systems (ITC, ETC etc) in the older editions - but I also think it related to "we just don't build lists like that". List "X" into 5 games of "Y" may do less well than into 5 games of "Z".

The meta is already and almost always has been a "Marine" meta. We've talked about this point in this thread and many others. Marines make up 1/3rd to 1/2 of all players you will encounter in a Tournament. When I say "Marine" I mean Power Armored armies. You have 27 different flavors of Space Marine, you got Chaosy Space Marines you also have Dwarven Space Marines and you have female Space Marines (SoB). Lets not forget the Eggshell White Knights (Grey Knights) and the custard cremes who, while different thematically, are basically the same in practice. And of course you have Xenos armies which favor similar statlines like Tau with their plethora of Crisis battlesuits which are very similar statline to Marines, especially Gravis and Custards. Or how about DE who seem to never leave home with a squad or 3 of Incubi The point i'm making is that weapons are already judged based on how good they are against.....MARINES.

Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote:
There’s also the issue that the meta can be misleading.

I’ve also encountered bad losers who used a Tournament List, got stomped, and because they didn’t really understand the game, or have experience of a non-optimised themed list, they declared my army broken or unfair etc, when the issue was them missing necessarily open goals I had to leave for my daft plans to work. Or worse, when I’ve played an absolute blinder, being told I simply “diced” them, that the sole deciding factor was favourable rolling, and not the strategy, list and tactics I used to good effect.

Had a tourny player lose to my Ork army in 7th when he was playing Wraith Knight/Scatbike spam Eldar. He almost flipped the table and screamed that orkz were OP....or there was that time that Orkz finally had a legitimately competitive tournament build and were 3rd best in the game, only to table a top DE player who didn't bring anywhere close to a list that could deal with the ork list and GW immediately nerfed the entire Ork army multiple different times while leaving DE/AM as still the #1 and #2 best armies in the game.

With that said, my OP is still a guess and could very well be wrong, but i'm becoming more and more certain by the day that I am right. Already had my first game against the new Space Marines and the thing i learned most was Orky vehicles are effectively dead.

**Tyran**

Tyel wrote:
Dudeface wrote:
Tyran wrote:
If nothing else, if Marines truly dominate the meta, I expect GW to panic and quickly nerf them like the last time Marines dominated the meta.

This is very true, if Iron Hands have truly come back from the apology tour, I don't think it'll be for long.

Eh... I'd tend to agree. But pedantry insists I kick off at "like last time". Marines were top tier OP from the 2.0 release - so August 2019, until lets say the DE 9th edition release, March 2021. (And its not as if Marines immediately became crap into everyone else just because DE were better.) That's about 18 months. Really Marines were still winning tournaments (and certainly regularly placing) for at least another 6 months, if not the rest of 2021.

Now admittedly, before Karol comes sprinting in, this period was clearly majorly disrupted significantly by Covid and many people were locked down for months. But I mean, it wasn't exactly quick.

Marines will probably be top tier through the end of 9th, get a new codex and be top tier for the first year or so of 10th. Then start to drift down as other books come out. Then get some love for the end. As happens essentially uniquely for them every edition.

Iron Hands 2.0 were also one of the first examples of GW immediately nerfing a codex. On release Iron Hands 2.0 were dominating the meta so hard that pretty much all tournament wins were an Iron Hand army, and GW panicked and nerfed both Iron Hands and doctrines.

Sure after the nerfs Marines were still a strong army that mostly dominated the meta, but we went from Marines making the entirety of the top placings immediately after the 2.0 codex to "only" having around 60% of them.

**Spoletta**

Tyel wrote:
Dudeface wrote:
Tyran wrote:
If nothing else, if Marines truly dominate the meta, I expect GW to panic and quickly nerf them like the last time Marines dominated the meta.

This is very true, if Iron Hands have truly come back from the apology tour, I don't think it'll be for long.

Eh... I'd tend to agree. But pedantry insists I kick off at "like last time". Marines were top tier OP from the 2.0 release - so August 2019, until lets say the DE 9th edition release, March 2021. (And its not as if Marines immediately became crap into everyone else just because DE were better.) That's about 18 months. Really Marines were still winning tournaments (and certainly regularly placing) for at least another 6 months, if not the rest of 2021.

Now admittedly, before Karol comes sprinting in, this period was clearly majorly disrupted significantly by Covid and many people were locked down for months. But I mean, it wasn't exactly quick.

Marines will probably be top tier through the end of 9th, get a new codex and be top tier for the first year or so of 10th. Then start to drift down as other books come out. Then get some love for the end. As happens essentially uniquely for them every edition.

Hmm this isn't entirely accurate.
Marine domination ended at the start of 9th. The meta at that point was dominated by 8th edition dexes, in particular sisters and harlequins.
Deathguard dex shifted this paradigm a bit, since you needed ways to counter Mortarion. This went on until the Admech/DE age.
Marines have dominated from the IH supplement until their huge nerf in the 9th dex. How long is that?

**Tyel**

Spoletta wrote:

Hmm this isn't entirely accurate.
Marine domination ended at the start of 9th. The meta at that point was dominated by 8th edition dexes, in particular sisters and harlequins.
Deathguard dex shifted this paradigm a bit, since you needed ways to counter Mortarion. This went on until the Admech/DE age.
Marines have dominated from the IH supplement until their huge nerf in the 9th dex. How long is that?

Not sure this is adding much, hence not responding for a while, but lets go.

I don't agree.

Yes, you are right, in terms of win% harlequins, slaanesh daemons, Sisters were all way above Marines. And more likely to win tournaments.
But tournaments were flooded with Marines - and top 4s were flooded them them in turn.
And this would continue through 2021.

Now if you view Marines as this magic faction, that is really 25% of 40k, and so deserving of 25% of positions, this is fine. Certainly that's seemingly how we were uniquely meant to imagine them.
But I think its stupid, and will continue to think its stupid. No other faction gets this.
And so when in mid to late 2021 we still find Marines getting 1/4 or more of top 4 placings, what are we meant to think?
Because its not like other bad factions are doing this. Eldar for instance are not regularly placing. Tyranids before their DLC buffs are nowhere. CSM are nowhere too. Is this somehow fair enough, because marines "should" represent 1/4-1/2 of the playerbase, and get the results to match it, while random other factions should be doing nothing, until GW gives them their 6 months in the sun?

I guess its the bar between OP and competitive. I feel Marines were dominating tournaments - partly as a function of their player % - from their 2.0 release until the DE codex. But Marines "as a faction" got far more results - and would continue to throughout 2021. And to repeat, if you think of them as a special faction that might be justified. I.E. Marines, other imperials, chaos, xenos. But if you view them as just a thing, like GK, Guard, CSM, Eldar, Orks, GSC etc, they are in a league of their own. And they always are.

**Tyran**

Marines have such a massive play rate that even before the recent changes when they were suffering from something like 35% win rates, they were still getting top placings because of sheer attrition.

The sad thing is that they are a special faction, their sheer numbers define meta (hence why everything that is good at killing Marines is spammed) and if we don't want 25%-50% of the top placings being Marines then we need them to be chronically underpowered, but I don't believe that would be fair to Marine players.

**Breton**

Tyel wrote:
.

Now if you view Marines as this magic faction, that is really 25% of 40k, and so deserving of 25% of positions, this is fine.

Are you saying Marines aren't the most popular faction except through magic, or that the 50/50 theory doesn't mean if they are 25% of the armies in a given event they should show up as 25% of the finalists? I mean, depending on how ridiculous you want to get there are a number of ways of interpreting that, but none of them are good.

Automatically Appended Next Post:

Tyran wrote:
we need them to be chronically underpowered,

No we don't. We need them to be the same power level as everybody else. We need them to be a similar price point as everyone else. Even if Marines and Orks and/or Nids were exactly the same power level, Marines would still be more popular for multiple reasons the most difficult to overcome would be price and psychology. And technically when I say the same power level, I was including the boost they'd get for being a non MEQ statline in an MEQ optimized Meta which would go away if this was actually accomplishe- but that's also a benefit they would have in theory. The truth is, You will likely spend more for a 2,000 point Nids army than a 2,000 point Marine army. And competitive play will include some sort of bang-per-point-per-model as well as bang-per-buck math. Especially for as long as Marines are half of every starter set, and W@H moms are parting out starter sets on Ebay for egg money.

And its going to be a non-starter for as long as minority faction players whine about a majority faction just because it is the majority faction.

**Tyel**

Breton wrote:
Are you saying Marines aren't the most popular faction except through magic, or that the 50/50 theory doesn't mean if they are 25% of the armies in a given event they should show up as 25% of the finalists? I mean, depending on how ridiculous you want to get there are a number of ways of interpreting that, but none of them are good.

If 40k was "balanced", then yes, you would expect that if 25% of armies at events (collectively, individual tournaments will inevitably vary) were Marines, then 25% of placing armies would be Marines.
It has however very rarely been balanced. You have had whole periods where other factions, securing say 5-8% of armies at a given event, don't make the finals at all (or did so very rarely).

This idea that Marines get there "by attrition" is sort of odd, because placing positions in 40k tournaments are dominated by the usual suspects, rather than random names. And they don't play random factions for fun - but optimise in order to increase their chances of winning. I.E. if good tournament players were taking Marines to tournaments, its because they fancied their chances. They didn't care that Dave on the other table with his mass tactical marine Imperial Fists was going to go 0-5.

And we can see this ourselves. Compare say 2021 with the first half of 2022. Now you could say the first half of 2022 might have been an odd period - dominated as it was by Tau and Custodes, Harlequins and then Tyranids. All pushing obnoxious 70% win rates before being brought down to earth. But DE and then Ad Mech were doing similar through 2021. And yet throughout 2021 you can find Marines all over the Top 4 placings, even if they rarely outright won events. By contrast, they seemed to have become functionally extinct in 2022. You can look through a dozen big tournaments and find one Marine list at 5th or something like that.

**Breton**

Tyel wrote:
Breton wrote:
Are you saying Marines aren't the most popular faction except through magic, or that the 50/50 theory doesn't mean if they are 25% of the armies in a given event they should show up as 25% of the finalists? I mean, depending on how ridiculous you want to get there are a number of ways of interpreting that, but none of them are good.

If 40k was "balanced", then yes, you would expect that if 25% of armies at events (collectively, individual tournaments will inevitably vary) were Marines, then 25% of placing armies would be Marines.
It has however very rarely been balanced. You have had whole periods where other factions, securing say 5-8% of armies at a given event, don't make the finals at all (or did so very rarely).

If they get 5% of the armies at an event - and there are 4 teams per final four, you need 5 events to get 1 5%er. If you're talking about the final 2, you need 10 events.

This idea that Marines get there "by attrition" is sort of odd, because placing positions in 40k tournaments are dominated by the usual suspects, rather than random names. And they don't play random factions for fun - but optimise in order to increase their chances of winning. I.E. if good tournament players were taking Marines to tournaments, its because they fancied their chances. They didn't care that Dave on the other table with his mass tactical marine Imperial Fists was going to go 0-5.

I didn't mention attrition, Nobody mentioned attrition but you. I just questioned why your claims and complaints don't even stand up to your own exemplar math. You complained Marines would have 25% of the spots in the event, and the finals - even though in a 50/50 balance that's exactly how it's supposed to work out. You complained a faction with far fewer spots in the event also had far fewer spots in the finals. That when we pull the factions involved in your opinion out, the numbers make sense, when we leave the Marines in... well your point makes a different kind of sense.

And we can see this ourselves. Compare say 2021 with the first half of 2022. Now you could say the first half of 2022 might have been an odd period - dominated as it was by Tau and Custodes, Harlequins and then Tyranids. All pushing obnoxious 70% win rates before being brought down to earth. But DE and then Ad Mech were doing similar through 2021. And yet throughout 2021 you can find Marines all over the Top 4 placings, even if they rarely outright won events. By contrast, they seemed to have become functionally extinct in 2022. You can look through a dozen big tournaments and find one Marine list at 5th or something like that.

**Tyel**

Breton wrote:

I didn't mention attrition, Nobody mentioned attrition but you. I just questioned why your claims and complaints don't even stand up to your own exemplar math. You complained Marines would have 25% of the spots in the event, and the finals - even though in a 50/50 balance that's exactly how it's supposed to work out. You complained a faction with far fewer spots in the event also had far fewer spots in the finals. That when we pull the factions involved in your opinion out, the numbers make sense, when we leave the Marines in... well your point makes a different kind of sense.

I mean, I don't know if you have Tyran on ignore, but there's a post just above:

Tyran wrote:
Marines have such a massive play rate that even before the recent changes when they were suffering from something like 35% win rates, they were still getting top placings because of sheer attrition.

Admittedly, I perhaps emphasised more than Tyran intended. The issue is that if you assume tournament results were a function of luck, you'd expect every faction to be represented to some degree, and this hasn't been the case.

I'm not complaining that a faction with far fewer spots got far fewer spots in the finals. Clearly if the game was balanced and there was no bias in pick-rate amongst top players you'd expect them to match.
I'm trying to explain that the game *isn't* balanced and factions *don't* place according to their play rate. So if marines are placing its because they are good - and when they stop placing, its because they have become bad.

I disagree with the idea that Marines were not dominant from 9th's release until at least the DE release, and really probably another 3-6 months in 2021. I believe you can determine that by measuring their tournament results. I.E. lots of placings and wins. In terms of win% they were less good yes than certain factions. You see in 2020 for example a lot of larger tournaments (say 40+ players) have just 2-3 Harlequin players, but one of them gets top 4, if not outright wins it. Its hard to claim however it was a Harlequin meta though - with so few players, odds were low you'd even play one before the final. Sisters had a moment before the new Codex but with the upgraded MM ran rampant in win% - but Marines are still all over the placings.

Flash forward to very late 2021, and especially early 2022, and I don't think all the Marine players just spontaneously decided to quit 40k. So the "they make it through attrition" should have continued to apply. But it seems despite still being the most played faction collectively, they essentially ceased to exist on the top tables. So the safe conclusion is that Marines were becoming a lot worse into the rest of the codexes. An age of "There's 1-2 difficult matchups" had given way to "most factions are better, you will need to ride your luck". (Although the BA list seemed to have reliable legs.)