If Not Points, Then What?

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**EviscerationPlague**

ccs wrote:
EviscerationPlague wrote:
Insectum7 wrote:
Knights can work fine in 40k, there's no inherent problem with the scale there.

To an extent they can work, but the problem comes from then being their own army rather than something you can tack 1-3 of in an army.

Except you CAN tack 1-3 onto armies....

Which is when it's fine. The baby Knights and making Knights into their own army was a problem for 7th and it's still a problem right now, as it forces design around beating able to fight entire Knight armies.

**ccs**

EviscerationPlague wrote:
ccs wrote:
EviscerationPlague wrote:
Insectum7 wrote:
Knights can work fine in 40k, there's no inherent problem with the scale there.

To an extent they can work, but the problem comes from then being their own army rather than something you can tack 1-3 of in an army.

Except you CAN tack 1-3 onto armies....

Which is when it's fine. The baby Knights and making Knights into their own army was a problem for 7th and it's still a problem right now, as it forces design around beating able to fight entire Knight armies.

1) you can include a larger knight as an aux detachment.
I've got an Abominant in my Chaos Marine force.

2) baby knight armies are not a problem. You can already field all dreadnought, all crisis suits, all ork dread/kan etc lists.

**Insectum7**

I agree that entire armies made of Knights make things a little harder than 1-3 Knights plus supporting assets like infantry.

**vict0988**

Hecaton wrote:
vict0988 wrote:
Having both Wraithlords and Wraithknights available as single-entity units that are optional to include in a list makes the game imbalanced, points minimize this imbalance.

Nah, this statement is not accurate.

So would you rather use 6 Wraithknights or 6 Wraithlords?

**Blndmage**

ccs wrote:
EviscerationPlague wrote:
ccs wrote:
EviscerationPlague wrote:
Insectum7 wrote:
Knights can work fine in 40k, there's no inherent problem with the scale there.

To an extent they can work, but the problem comes from then being their own army rather than something you can tack 1-3 of in an army.

Except you CAN tack 1-3 onto armies....

Which is when it's fine. The baby Knights and making Knights into their own army was a problem for 7th and it's still a problem right now, as it forces design around beating able to fight entire Knight armies.

1) you can include a larger knight as an aux detachment.
I've got an Abominant in my Chaos Marine force.

2) baby knight armies are not a problem. You can already field all dreadnought, all crisis suits, all ork dread/kan etc lists.

Many factions, xenos especially, have no knight options.

**Tsagualsa**

EviscerationPlague wrote:
ccs wrote:
EviscerationPlague wrote:
Insectum7 wrote:
Knights can work fine in 40k, there's no inherent problem with the scale there.

To an extent they can work, but the problem comes from then being their own army rather than something you can tack 1-3 of in an army.

Except you CAN tack 1-3 onto armies....

Which is when it's fine. The baby Knights and making Knights into their own army was a problem for 7th and it's still a problem right now, as it forces design around beating able to fight entire Knight armies.

Knights are a prime example of a thing you often see in (web-)design and engineering: What the customer thinks or says they want is often very different from what they actually want, and that may yet be different again from what they need.

Knights are, no question, extremely popular, to the point that 'Imperial Knight' used to be the most common scratchbuilding project after true-scale/heresy marines for a long time, and especially after the Nemesis Dreadknight got released and brought a serviceable pair of plastic legs into the mix. People wanted Knights, and at some point, when technology allowed it, they got Knights. There's no getting the genie back into the bottle, even if their existence as a standalone army is probably hurting the game.

**ccs**

Blndmage wrote:

Many factions, xenos especially, have no knight options.

Other than Drukhari, and Votaan, none come to mind.

**Mixzremixzd**

ccs wrote:
Blndmage wrote:

Many factions, xenos especially, have no knight options.

Other than Drukhari, and Votaan, none come to mind.

Does it have to be plastic? From the Necron side of things the Seraptek Heavy Construct is our cleanest Knight equivalent but it's FW resin.

**Commissar von Toussaint**

Blndmage wrote:

Many factions, xenos especially, have no knight options.

This brings to mind the other design flaw: too many factions. One can only pull so many variations out of a d6-based game before the mechanics start to break down.

If you go back to the original configuration of the game, there were a half-dozen factions: Imperial Guard, Space Marines, Orks, Tyranids, Chaos and Eldar (I'm not counting Squats, which quickly fell by the wayside).

Each one of these factions quickly expanded within its design space to create additional variations (such as Sisters of Battle, which started as Imperial auxiliaries) to the point where one can (and people do) field armies of the same faction that are so disparate as to make them feel like they come from entirely different books (and sometimes they do).

But in addition to these rapidly expanding six, GW added even more to the point where I'm not sure what the exact count of factions is these days.

This in turn requires ever more faction-unique items and weapons, and since GW is chained to the d6, there are only so many combinations of ROF, strength, armor penetration, etc. one can squeeze out of it. Hence special rules, which are inherently difficult to quantify, particularly when they can affect factions in wildly different ways.

Thus we arrive at a place where - due to design decisions - what you have often matters more than how you use it. No amount of massaging points can fix that.

**Daedalus81**

Tyel wrote:
I'm sure people will have examples from other games - but I think its hard to make movement/positioning feel key in a turn-based game.

It always ends up boiling down to:
"Do you know the trick? No? Then learn the trick."
"Can you do the trick? If yes, do the trick. If no, possibly because your opponent is aware of this functionality, then you are out of luck."

This is a bit reductive - and its the sort of logic that goes "40k is easy, its always obvious exactly what the right decision is" (which in turn produces: "okay then, go win the LVO if its that straightforward.") But it holds up a bit I think. Like Tri-pointing was essential to make assault work in 8th edition. But it wasn't really "skillful" or feel good/fluffy.

Basically if you buff marines so they can melta-bomb Knight legs, don't you then need to buff Knights so they can do something without being insta-melta'ed?

Its the difference between say "I can shoot you in the back because I spent 3 turns patiently luring you into an ambush" and "I can shoot you in the back because I can pin-point DS anywhere on the board, so I set up right behind you".

It works with alternating activation, but only sometimes. That system can be gamed so that more activations is just better thereby leaving your expensive tank that ate points AND activations to be kind of useless.

Automatically Appended Next Post:

Commissar von Toussaint wrote:
Again, show me the final product at launch. For 20 years I've watched the "THIS time we will make it the best one ever!" promos.

Well, GW never really did marketing / PR until 2016 so the only time you've really heard that tag line has been pretty recent.

WHFB was burned to the ground and remade as a game with no points by the predecessor. The guy who said they're a model company first. Then the new guy takes over and they add points back. And then they add a big book of magic items and other crap. Then they did a bunch of books with different ideas they had about the game and started to filter it down and improve the rules make detachments, etc.

I don't think I'll ever play AoS, but I can clearly see the progression.

8th was the first edition under new management. It did a lot of things the community was talking about - particularly vehicles with wounds. And they threw in stratagems. The strats were horribly managed under 8th. The wording was inconsistent. The effect stacking was not considered. CP generation control was an after thought. Then 9th comes. Stratagems get consistent. They receive restrictions. CP generation is limited. But here comes traits and traits are cool. Look at all this awesome stuff we can do! And it was awesome, but it was too much. So now we're at 10th and they're distilling those ideas even further among many other things.

How is this not visible progression? How many people expected GW to condense primaris weapons? Probably damn near zero.

If we said this about any an entity that you admire how would you judge it?

We're all sitting here wondering what madness will they introduce that up-ends it? And that's where GW's major problem lies - releasing books so fast before an idea can even be thought about at length and having to fix it in the next go around. I don't expect this to change, but in yet ANOTHER set of things that progressed they have a clearly defined vehicle to allow points and rules updates to fix things they goof on.

Automatically Appended Next Post:

Gadzilla666 wrote:

Ok, the "cheerleading and kool-aid" remarks were completely out of line, and I fully apologize for those, Daed. I'm sorry.

But you can't both point out that I "lord" another gw game and claim that I'm on the "GW hate train". I like some of the things that gw does, and dislike others.

And that gw game that I "lord"? I actively play it. I'm not just reacting to gw "hype" articles (read: advertisements). Every edition is the "best edition", and fixes everything wrong with the previous edition. It's marketing.

And how am I "you people"? Are you counting the voices in my head? Or just venting on me for everyone else that you've argued with about this? If it's the former, then stay away from them, they're MINE! If it's the latter? Then I hope you feel better.

Apology accepted, you bum. And I apologize for my edge-lord comments, too.

I would play 10th if it was out.

On "marketing" When someone says, "buy the new Coke!" I have to go and buy it to actually see what it is like. With this particular marketing I can see what the game is like. I can contextualize it. And when it's out I'll have access to all the USRs and data cards without spending any money to make a proper judgement.

The articles are a hype train and that's about it.

**ccs**

Mixzremixzd wrote:
ccs wrote:
Blndmage wrote:

Many factions, xenos especially, have no knight options.

Other than Drukhari, and Votaan, none come to mind.

Does it have to be plastic? From the Necron side of things the Seraptek Heavy Construct is our cleanest Knight equivalent but it's FW resin.

Doesn't matter to me what material it's made of.
It just needs rules in the current edition.

**Daedalus81**

Mixzremixzd wrote:
Does it have to be plastic? From the Necron side of things the Seraptek Heavy Construct is our cleanest Knight equivalent but it's FW resin.

The monolith exists.

**Tyel**

Daedalus81 wrote:
The monolith exists.

Not really a knight imo - and GW presumably made it a LoW because they had a master plan to not sell as many.
Gorkanauts/Morkanauts could potentially get there if GW ever showed them significant love - but I'm not betting on it.

Part of the issue with Knights is their expense. They are 400-600 point models. Playing 40k with 4 models inevitably skews the game - even if it produces loads of problems for say scoring.

**Lord Damocles**

You'd have thought that larger models, which you'll inevitably have fewer of in an army, would have had more detailed rules for damage and means of interacting with them (targeting specific elements, damage control, etc.). But in classic GW fashion, when they brought out Knights, they actually had less

**Insectum7**

Daedalus81 wrote:
Mixzremixzd wrote:
Does it have to be plastic? From the Necron side of things the Seraptek Heavy Construct is our cleanest Knight equivalent but it's FW resin.

The monolith exists.

Yeah I agree. Different factions having other items in the Superheavy category is perfectly fine, they don't have to be Knights/Big Walkers. In fact I'd prefer they take on different forms appealing to the nature of the faction. The Monolith is a great example. The Stormsurge works for Tau as well.

Automatically Appended Next Post:

Lord Damocles wrote:
You'd have thought that larger models, which you'll inevitably have fewer of in an army, would have had more detailed rules for damage and means of interacting with them (targeting specific elements, damage control, etc.). But in classic GW fashion, when they brought out Knights, they actually had less

Agree. The lack of detail for ooerating Knights is dissappointing.

Automatically Appended Next Post:

Commissar von Toussaint wrote:
Blndmage wrote:

Many factions, xenos especially, have no knight options.

This brings to mind the other design flaw: too many factions. One can only pull so many variations out of a d6-based game before the mechanics start to break down.
. . .

I disagree with that. I don't think there's a compelling reason to limit factions. For one, there are numerous ways of expressing difference, even when based on a D6. But also, there's not a huge reason for factions to be tremendously different from one another, and one could cite many a historical game as evidence for that. (Or just Horus Heresy, I suppose)

**Karol**

If the monolith is too small, then there is still its p cousin the Obelisk. That thing may not be used, because it is probably one of the worse units in w40k, but it does exist.

**Insectum7**

Karol wrote:
If the monolith is too small, then there is still its p cousin the Obelisk. That thing may not be used, because it is probably one of the worse units in w40k, but it does exist.

The Monolith, at least the old one, is massive. Far bigger than a Knight/Wraithknight in that it's about the same height, but wider and a solid brick.

**Commissar von Toussaint**

Insectum7 wrote:

I disagree with that. I don't think there's a compelling reason to limit factions. For one, there are numerous ways of expressing difference, even when based on a D6. But also, there's not a huge reason for factions to be tremendously different from one another, and one could cite many a historical game as evidence for that. (Or just Horus Heresy, I suppose)

Historical games are under no pressure to make each faction "feel" different. Depending on the era, much of the time the difference will be purely organizational. The whole point of 40k is that the factions have different stats and equipment, which leads to massive (and ongoing!) requirements for new special rules to separate them since simply having different core stats isn't enough.

Automatically Appended Next Post:

Daedalus81 wrote:
Well, GW never really did marketing / PR until 2016 so the only time you've really heard that tag line has been pretty recent.

Wait, White Dwarf was only founded in 2016?

It is possible that 10th Edition will be the one where GW's design staff is lauded by the gaming industry with an innovative and ground-breaking system that is held up as a model of balance and playability, I give you that.

I think I have ample reason for skepticism, though.

**Daedalus81**

Commissar von Toussaint wrote:
It is possible that 10th Edition will be the one where GW's design staff is lauded by the gaming industry with an innovative and ground-breaking system that is held up as a model of balance and playability, I give you that.

Is that what you think I'm saying?

It's not going to be that. Nothing they're going to do will win awards. The best outcome is where they produce a system that has fewer big swings and more controlled updates. 40K will NEVER see perfect balance. There's too much stuff and GW isn't going to stop making new models.

**Breton**

I'd say the problem is the counter system(s) usually only go one way. The Melta Gun is very good at Tanks. But its also very good at characters. Going to a competitive skill for BS like they used to do with WS - i.e. BS vs Initiative. Tanks with I 2 are very easy to hit with a BS3 Meltagun, but an I7 HQ is very hard to hit with a BS3 Meltagun. I probably wouldn't use Initiative (at least not the same I we used to have - But some sort of scaling system that merges size, speed etc.

Tyel wrote:
Skew is a function of a counter system. The issue I think is that a counter system is necessary for power fantasies and... a feeling of skill. (There must be a better word for this but I'm failing to find it).

The obvious counter to skew (if you aren't going to limit list-building) is to produce a soft-counter system as said. I.E. shooting your preferred target you expect to get a 40% return, shooting a non-preferred target you expect to get a 15% return etc. This would compare with say a "hard counter" system, where shooting your preferred target gets you a 100%+ return (think guard squads with melta guns one-tapping a tank costing far more points) but you can't hurt non-preferred targets at all.

Taken to the extreme, you could math things out AoS style (clearly its not this skewed in practice) so there is no-counter system at all. Lascannons and lasguns have the same "damage output" whether targeting tanks or termagants. We would be in a world where 500 grots=a knight etc.

But as said, the issue is how far you want to go. A no-counter system as said would seem lame at various levels. I think "Tough units" like say tanks, should be tough. Having anti-tank units be good into tanks, and regular units not be, is a design goal, not a flaw. It feels "fluffy", "realistic", and "skillful" to shoot tanks with lascannons, not lasguns.

Moreover, if most units can look at a Knight and say "I fancy my chances to take out its kneecaps" - that's severely stepping on the toes of the Knight fantasy. Which is presumably to tap dance across whole armies (because its completely out of scale of 40k and should just be banned the end.) See similar complaints about people swatting planes (that should be over the battlefield for about 3 seconds and so shouldn't really be in game either) out of the sky with flamers.

At the other extreme however, I think a hard counter system has major problems in an IGOUGO system. If you've bought 3 anti-tank units, and my "all-tanks army" just alpha-strikes them turn one, then you have none. And we are back to a game where you can't interact with my units. A possible counter to this is making rules such that tanks expect to do almost zero damage to explicitly "anti-tank" units. This would arguably be fair/balanced on the premise that non-anti-tank units can do zero damage to them. But I suspect people would accuse that of being overly gamey. Why for example would a Leman Russ happily chew through a tactical squad, but do nothing to Devastators?

I think skew hasn't really been a problem in 9th partly because of mission design - but also because GW massively upped the damage on everything. This sort of turned 40k into checkers. Aside from when factions have been head and shoulders above everyone, its been relatively balanced because almost everything counters everything. To make an army that couldn't scratch tanks, you really had to deliberately spam units with nothing but S3/S4 AP- weapons. The issue hasn't been massed lasguns - but the fact anything with a decent number of at least S5, AP-2/3 and 2+ damage can contribute. Psychic powers and stratagems to chuck in a few mortal wounds etc.

That may change in 10th. My concern is that its very frustrating to just "fail". And if say melta guns are wounding on 5s, they'll have a high chance to do nothing. I don't think this will mean the counter to vehicles is getting 1000 grots into 12". But making luck the biggest determinant of outcomes is as frustrating as list building being the main determinant of outcomes.

As an example, people really didn't like that brief moment in late 8th when massed Plague Bearers+Tzeentch Psykers was a thing. It wasn't a 70% win rate tournament warping list, but various "casual" armies would use whole shooting phases to kill 20 Plague Bearers. Everything eventually got tied up in these go-nowhere fights, while you got mortal wounded to death.

**Karol**

Such a system would end up the same as the minus to hit did in 8th. Most armies would have that I stats at something between 3 and maybe 6-7 on characters, when eldar would be zipping around with 12+ unhitable by range weapons and still protected by high invunerable saves.

The weapon, rule or unit type X being the king of an edition isn't that much of a problem as long as all factions have access to them. Problems start when GW comes out and says that this edition will be about X, your faction doesn't have or doesn't do X, and suddenly you end up with knight players waiting around 2 years for a codex update with their army being disfunctionaly bad in 9th ed. Those are the real problem. Melta and plasma switching, who ever is the best in an edition is a minimal problem comparing to having a set of rules not ment for given edition or sesonal rules. Or at least it is a problem, for people who play one faction or one army. GW would probably love for everyone to start their w40k expiriance with buying 4-5 2k+ armies, and just picking what ever is optimal at given time.

**Breton**

Karol wrote:
Such a system would end up the same as the minus to hit did in 8th. Most armies would have that I stats at something between 3 and maybe 6-7 on characters, when eldar would be zipping around with 12+ unhitable by range weapons and still protected by high invunerable saves.

Why would they have that? I mean they didn't even have I that high when Initiative was a thing, let alone when/if it got brought back as an opposing stat with this specifically in mind.

The weapon, rule or unit type X being the king of an edition isn't that much of a problem as long as all factions have access to them. Problems start when GW comes out and says that this edition will be about X, your faction doesn't have or doesn't do X, and suddenly you end up with knight players waiting around 2 years for a codex update with their army being disfunctionaly bad in 9th ed. Those are the real problem. Melta and plasma switching, who ever is the best in an edition is a minimal problem comparing to having a set of rules not ment for given edition or sesonal rules. Or at least it is a problem, for people who play one faction or one army. GW would probably love for everyone to start their w40k expiriance with buying 4-5 2k+ armies, and just picking what ever is optimal at given time.

What does that have to do with making it so anti-tank weapons can't hit Infantry very easily, and anti-infantry weapons can't do more than scratch tank paint very easily?

**Commissar von Toussaint**

Daedalus81 wrote:
Is that what you think I'm saying?

It's not going to be that. Nothing they're going to do will win awards.

One this at least we agree.

The best outcome is where they produce a system that has fewer big swings and more controlled updates.

Okay, and how do you measure any of that? If the miniatures line continues to expand, balance will continue to suffer. What counts as a "big" swing? What's the difference between a "controlled" update and an uncontrolled one? Do you mean there are spontaneous, uncontrolled updates that take the staff by surprise?

40K will NEVER see perfect balance. There's too much stuff and GW isn't going to stop making new models.

This sounds like you actually agree with me: it doesn't matter whether you use points or not because the sprawl of the system and the need for ever-increasing product lines means that balance is inherently impossible to achieve.

If GW was willing to merely slow down the product cycle and take a hard look at limiting factions and unit types, certain improvements could be made, but we all know that will never happen.

**Unit1126PLL**

It would be neat if units could interact with other units in ways other than killing things.

My tanks blew up all your AT? Blind them with smoke/obscurants, forcing it to relocate to be effective.

Your AT was too tough for my tanks to kill? Good on you, digging them in like that. I guess I will have to pin or suppress them with Covering Fire while the rest of my squadron tries to speed out of danger...

Of course, you would need system with greater verisimilitude to get stuff like this. But if you asked me "how would my Armageddon Steel Legion deal with knights" the answer probably isn't "spam multilasers and lasguns and pray my meltaguns get in range" - it is probably "utilize obscurants, the mobility of the Chimera, and the Company's doctrine to bypass rather than directly engage enemy resistance to circumvent the Knights, leaving them for the Imperial Navy or heavier, dedicated forces to engage".

**Mad Doc Grotsnik**

Some of that existed in 2nd Ed, with smoke and blind grenades.

Plasma and Vortex grenades also remained active on the board, and could move, contract or expand depending on the roll, creating new threats. And Rad Grenades now I think about it.

It was fun, but added quite significant bookkeeping as it was.

**Unit1126PLL**

Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote:
Some of that existed in 2nd Ed, with smoke and blind grenades.

Plasma and Vortex grenades also remained active on the board, and could move, contract or expand depending on the roll, creating new threats. And Rad Grenades now I think about it.

It was fun, but added quite significant bookkeeping as it was.

I suppose it depends on how you instantiate such things. The games I am familiar with that employ obscurants and whatnot manage to do so without making it a problem.

**Karol**

Breton 809475 11522878 wrote: Why would they have that? I mean they didn't even have I that high when Initiative was a thing, let alone when/if it got brought back as an opposing stat with this specifically in mind.

Because I have expirianced 2 editions of GW writing rules for eldar and seen another 4 editions worth in writing. If that "initiative" trait would have impact on how hard it is to hit a unit with shoting, we would get, with eldar rules, the same thing we got when they could stack multiple minus to hit modifires. And having unkillable armies, that are also fast and super efficient in killing stuff is not fun to play against.

What does that have to do with making it so anti-tank weapons can't hit Infantry very easily, and anti-infantry weapons can't do more than scratch tank paint very easily?

Simple. GW would intreduce such rule changes, and it would take them 2+ editions to implement, for most of factions. And for all it would take God only knows how long. The transition period for armies that haven't been update to fit the new setting, and I don't mean the change to weapon stats, GW would just copy paste those, would be a horrible thing to expiriance. To get a true update those factions would have to wait for either a full model line update or pray that at the studio there is someone who REALLY likes the faction and will do the update without a new model line.

A more real life example of it. If weapons were to have a separate or at least different efficiency vs different type of units, then armies with a low unit count or armies where the prior design didn't give them a plathora of weapons, would potentialy struggle again for years potentialy. Especialy if, as I shown in the knights example, the thing they are bad at suddenly becomes the focus of an edition. Plus I worry that GW would make exeptions, to the "good vs only one thing rule" very fast.

**Daedalus81**

Commissar von Toussaint wrote:
Daedalus81 wrote:
Is that what you think I'm saying?

It's not going to be that. Nothing they're going to do will win awards.

One this at least we agree.

The best outcome is where they produce a system that has fewer big swings and more controlled updates.

Okay, and how do you measure any of that? If the miniatures line continues to expand, balance will continue to suffer. What counts as a "big" swing? What's the difference between a "controlled" update and an uncontrolled one? Do you mean there are spontaneous, uncontrolled updates that take the staff by surprise?

40K will NEVER see perfect balance. There's too much stuff and GW isn't going to stop making new models.

This sounds like you actually agree with me: it doesn't matter whether you use points or not because the sprawl of the system and the need for ever-increasing product lines means that balance is inherently impossible to achieve.

If GW was willing to merely slow down the product cycle and take a hard look at limiting factions and unit types, certain improvements could be made, but we all know that will never happen.

Tournament results and the general sense of player satisfaction. You can measure tension in this forum pretty well. Like 9th edition is pretty decent balance-wise ( tournament data ), but there's a big asterisk there, right? The level of dissatisfaction was still pretty high as a result. The games are fun, but even I find myself scrambling through my book from time to time and juggling special rules.

If GW keeps the codex release schedule as it is then there's no way to prevent problems, but as with Votann -- we can force them into quick fixes. I don't think GW will ever be capable of simultaneously writing that many books and if they could they would never release them at the same time so we'll have months long gaps between their ideas. Maybe they'll have a better management process, but honestly that takes really skilled management and I don't think their culture will allow for that yet.

As long as they maintain the regular updates there is a method to hold them accountable.

As for the people who thing GW screwing up balance = sales -- there's a more lucrative avenue. Making the game more accessible to a wider audience. With 40K entering the mainstream in a pretty big way GW needs to capitalize on the interest in the IP.

**Tyel**

I feel if GW wrote books "quicker" there would potentially be less imbalance.

The issue is that GW will write a unit which has X stats and say its 20 points.
And then 6 months later go "we'll write another unit which (effectively) has X stats, but this time it will be 18 points. And have an extra special rule because its fluffy."
And then 12-18 months later, they go "we'll write another unit with X stats, but now its only 15 points and has 3 extra special rules - such fluff, such flavour."

Unsurprisingly the first entry is now hopelessly obsolete, even if it was perhaps the most OP thing in 40k when first released.

GW don't have to do this - but no one will be interested in a codex that goes "yeah, everything is the same as the not-indexes we are going roll out on release, except here's 2-3 extra detachments that give slightly different buffs." Some players clearly like the whole "Faction X feels like Faction X should" buzz when a new book drops (which is almost always code for "everything is viable because its all too powerful and will need urgent fixes").

**nou**

Commissar von Toussaint wrote:

If GW was willing to merely slow down the product cycle and take a hard look at limiting factions and unit types, certain improvements could be made, but we all know that will never happen.

Slow down even more? I’m still waiting to replace my original release Warp Spiders. If they keep the pace, it is not at all obvious, if I’ll even live long enough to see a second iteration of the Falcon chasis.

But you are right of course, that the game size and model range is currently unwieldy, but only in relation to GW size as a company. They are big compared to other miniatures manufacturers, but at the same time, they are too small to handle the popularity of their product.