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PoorGravitasHandling wrote:


Every army that lacks a CP discount ability should have their worst, 10point enhancement made into that. It's just bonkers mismatches in power.

Its deeper than that. They need to synergize.

SM can put a Phobos Captain in a unit of Infiltrators - freebie repeat strat, 5+ to gain 1CP. That's 1.33+ CP per battle round.

UM can put a Phobos Libby in Infiltrators around Guilliman - itself a worth-its-points gimmick for No-shooting-within-12, and No Deep Strike within 12+ for the whole mini formation AND get 2.67+ CP of value because he can do it per turn.

Tzeentch Marked CSM can do it on a Leadership Test after a Dark Pact. Abby potentially does it even easier.

Cypher's special ability helps disrupt the CP Battery combo, depending on a FAQ for Set to Zero vs Set to X+1 as his wording is a little ambiguous compared to the Rules Commentary.

Tau have Shadowsun for the generation, but not much for the freebie.

The Ethereal is slower than most other just Gain 1 CPs - though also not an Epic Hero where most of the Just Gain Ones are located.

World Eaters are way behind, having no generation beyond one Enhancement that only gives 0CP Heroic Interventions.

Tsons Cultists have some generation of somewhat dubious value.

The Tallyman is roughly on par with the Ethereal for CP every other turn.

The Lictor/Deathleaper has some potential for CP Generation.

IG may have better access to CP Gen/Batteries than UM.
Leontus adds a straight 1CP per battle round,
Ursula is the only Freebie Strat source.
Infantry Squads, Shock Troops, DKOK, Catachans, Kasrrkins, and Tempestus Scions (basically any INFANTRY with a Vox Caster both so the 5+ trick. Conversely a lot of their Strats are 2CP to cast.

Chaos Knights have nada.

Imperial Knights have a few- Freebie on Canis Rex, and 1 time 3CP gen from Oath's Deed.

GSC have some pretty hefty POTENTIAL between the Freebie, get a point gimmick, and Hybrids just giving you (Max 1) a 4+ roll per controlled objective, plus freebies from the Nexos.

Orks have only 1, but its a decent one the 4+ per Objective Controlled Max 1 Generated

Imotek is a Take-One

OVerlords have the Freebie as do (sort of) Hexmark Destroyer(s) - limited to one Strat but one that works well for them.

Drukhari get an enhancement for the Use a Strat get a CP on a 4+ with a big bonus for the one you want to use a lot - but other than that no real freebie/duplicative choices.

Epidemius is likely going to generate a lot of CP

Skulltaker some, but less so.

Kairos potentially even less so.

AM Get the 5+ on multiple Aircraft.
And the Ironstrider, Dunecrawler, Raiders, Rangers, Vanguard, Disintegrator, Dunerider, and Dragoons - but they have zero access to the Freebie half of the battery combo.

Coteaz can generate almost as many free CP as your opponent does - so swings wildly.
Generic Inquisitors have the best Target Strat - Gain CP on a Die Roll I've seen so far.
But Agents don't really have access to the Freebie - Target - Gain CP combo.

CP Generation above and beyond auto-generation swings wildly. Guard may have the best setup for a farm/generating, but they also have the most expensive strats (at a quick glance) - Loyalist and Chaos SM are probably in a virtual tie for second and third, Chaos Daemons, IG and Mechanicus probably shake out to 4, 5 and 6th place depending on build and work put in in a moderate slide behind the SM, while a whole lot of armies are sitting around wondering what happened. At least from a quick glance.

The Freebie is just the trigger to the combo. Also need to look at the Freebie - 5+, gain a CP for a Strat that was free to start with.

nemesis464 wrote:

PoorGravitasHandling wrote:

ERJAK wrote:

PoorGravitasHandling wrote:
GW just wasn't thinking about things when writing this indices. Eldar are bad but boy howdy are people sleeping on GSC combos.

The exemptions are for Admech and DG. DG, who have been given the silliest restrictions on stratagems working fully (-1 AP, or -2 AP if you critically wound an enemy near an infected objective on a prime numbered Tuesday), I think the least ability to generate or save CP in the entire game, and flattened boring weapons with anti-synergy to their army rule counteracting the free weapons that are costed into their base points.

DG could get -1 damage on every unit and probably just about limp to a 50% win rate right now. A huge, incredible army wide buff and they maybe become average.

Sisters are in a similar boat. Our detachment ability is mid in IDEAL scenarios, our CP generation options are 2 characters and gets nullified by playing tactical objectives (We have ZERO do a stratagem for free abilities) our units have statlines on par with grots but are priced WORSE than marines, our Leader setups make no sense, and we have 0 useful anti-armor.

Every army that lacks a CP discount ability should have their worst, 10point enhancement made into that. It's just bonkers mismatches in power.

I’m convinced the edition wasn’t properly playtested at all and the various army writers had zero communication throughout the entire process.

If there had been any worthwhile playtesting that was listened to we would not have the Eldar Fate Dice

Breton wrote:
IG may have better access to CP Gen/Batteries than UM.
Leontus adds a straight 1CP per battle round,
Ursula is the only Freebie Strat source.
Infantry Squads, Shock Troops, DKOK, Catachans, Kasrrkins, and Tempestus Scions (basically any INFANTRY with a Vox Caster both so the 5+ trick. Conversely a lot of their Strats are 2CP to cast.

Just to note that the vox is 4+ if within 6" of an officer, which is nice. You are never taking vox casters on dkok though, as you have to give up your plasmaguns and 3rd special per 10, which is a big ask.

Also, vox casters depend on your interpretation of Leontus and the "start of the command phase" restriction on the cp cap. I think it is obviously meant that any "start of the command phase" ability does not count towards the cap, but am experiencing a lot of pushback againt this interpretation.

You could be sisters where your only free strat is Stern getting to heroically intervene.

PoorGravitasHandling wrote:
Every army that lacks a CP discount ability should have their worst, 10point enhancement made into that. It's just bonkers mismatches in power.

What use case are you seeing that makes you think this?

Are you serious?

ERJAK wrote:

Sisters are in a similar boat. Our detachment ability is mid in IDEAL scenarios, our CP generation options are 2 characters and gets nullified by playing tactical objectives (We have ZERO do a stratagem for free abilities) our units have statlines on par with grots but are priced WORSE than marines, our Leader setups make no sense, and we have 0 useful anti-armor.

So first, let me agree with the point of this post- I agree that Sisters aren't in a great place, and we could use some help; I'm on the same page with here. But I have to ask some questions about your post, just in case I got things wrong.

So if Junith Eruita is on the table at the beginning of our command phase, we gain a CP. Tactical objectives do not cause her to not be on the field at the beginning of the command phase. Am I correct, or are you?

The Rod of Office allows a Canoness to gain a CP on a roll of 4+ every time her unit is the target of a strat. Obviously, this is conditional- first, you have to take the Rod, then you need the 4+, and you only get to do it when her unit performs a strat... But tactial objectives (from what I know) don't cancel that either. Am I right or are you?

The Daemonifuge can use the heroic intervention strat for 0 CP. Am I right or are you?

Are grots really 3+bs, 4+ws, 7+ld, oc2+, 3+ save, 6+ invul?

Also curious about what you mean by "leader setups" not making sense. From my perspective, I think certain synergies could have been more helpful, but I don't recall seeing anything I would say didn't make sense. The Canoness having a once per game ability to give herself a 2+ invul for a phase isn't a great ability for either her or her unit... But I wouldn't say it doesn't make sense.

The leadership setups issue is probably alluding to:

Canoness: Can only lead Battle Sisters Squads and Celestian Sacresants. So she cannot lead Dominions nor Retributors.

Palatine: Can lead those two units along with Dominions and Sisters Novitiates. Unlike Space Marine Lieutenants and Captains, she can't join a squad along with the Canoness.

Other Leaders: Dogmata, Imagifier, Dialogus, and Hospitaller can be a second leader with only with Canoness or Palatine only on the Battle Sister Squad.

 alextroy wrote:
The leadership setups issue is probably alluding to:

Canoness: Can only lead Battle Sisters Squads and Celestian Sacresants. So she cannot lead Dominions nor Retributors.

Palatine: Can lead those two units along with Dominions and Sisters Novitiates. Unlike Space Marine Lieutenants and Captains, she can't join a squad along with the Canoness.

Other Leaders: Dogmata, Imagifier, Dialogus, and Hospitaller can be a second leader with only with Canoness or Palatine only on the Battle Sister Squad.

And again, some of that is suboptimal, and not as good as it could be, but I wouldn't say that any of it "doesn't make sense".

It makes perfect sense to me that a Palatine with a Scout move can lead a unit with a Scout move and that a Canoness without a scout move cannot.

It makes perfect since to me that a Canoness might think her Palatine's skill set would be better used to lead an additional unit, rather than assist with the leadership of a unit the Canoness herself is leading. She might want to bring along a different character who' role is less tactical leadership, and maybe more Medical or Spiritual expertise.

I'm not saying it's good for the army's performance- like I said, I agree we're weak, and I agree that tweaking some of these interactions could be a part of the solution to improving the army's performance. I don't dispute that at all, and I don't know of many people who would. I'm just saying that in isolation, there's nothing that really strikes me as "not making sense."

PenitentJake wrote:

ERJAK wrote:

Sisters are in a similar boat. Our detachment ability is mid in IDEAL scenarios, our CP generation options are 2 characters and gets nullified by playing tactical objectives (We have ZERO do a stratagem for free abilities) our units have statlines on par with grots but are priced WORSE than marines, our Leader setups make no sense, and we have 0 useful anti-armor.

So first, let me agree with the point of this post- I agree that Sisters aren't in a great place, and we could use some help; I'm on the same page with here. But I have to ask some questions about your post, just in case I got things wrong.

So if Junith Eruita is on the table at the beginning of our command phase, we gain a CP. Tactical objectives do not cause her to not be on the field at the beginning of the command phase. Am I correct, or are you?

The Rod of Office allows a Canoness to gain a CP on a roll of 4+ every time her unit is the target of a strat. Obviously, this is conditional- first, you have to take the Rod, then you need the 4+, and you only get to do it when her unit performs a strat... But tactial objectives (from what I know) don't cancel that either. Am I right or are you?

The Daemonifuge can use the heroic intervention strat for 0 CP. Am I right or are you?

Are grots really 3+bs, 4+ws, 7+ld, oc2+, 3+ save, 6+ invul?

Also curious about what you mean by "leader setups" not making sense. From my perspective, I think certain synergies could have been more helpful, but I don't recall seeing anything I would say didn't make sense. The Canoness having a once per game ability to give herself a 2+ invul for a phase isn't a great ability for either her or her unit... But I wouldn't say it doesn't make sense.

You can only generate 1 CP per battle round. If you generate a CP from a tactical objective, that counts towards your 1 CP per battle round generation. Therefore, it shuts off Junith and the Canoness. Also, Junith shuts off the Canoness.

Daemonifuge can use the Heroic intervention strat. There's just no reason to ever do so. While it technically counts, it will come up once every 10000 games. Stern is there to score with Lone Operative, not fight.

Point for point that's closer to Grots than Marines.

A bunch of leader abilities/combos make no sense.

'Celestians only get their 2+ save back with an Imagifier, but don't get their unit ability unless attached to a canoness,?'

'Celestian's are the army's primary bodyguard unit, who has inbuilt synergies for equipping multiple leaders, but can't have multiple leaders attached?'

'Canonesses and Palatines can't equip to Retributors or Dominions for...reasons?

'Preachers and Missionaries can attach to Arcos, but not Repentia...for reasons.'

'Missionaries give two buffs to the units they're attached to, but both units already have one of those abilities making him wasteful no matter who he's with.'

Aestrid, Imagifiers, and Dogmata not being able to attach to Novitiates when Hospitallers, Preachers, and Dialogus can? (it's because Aestrid might be GOOD with Novitiates)

Aestrid being a melee buff and attaching to 3 shooting units and only 1 melee unit?

The index is utterly arbitrary on whose allowed to do what where, for purely gameplay reasons. Which would be fine, if the decisions weren't almost universally terrible. I can HEAR the writer at GW huffing in outrage when his editor told him that he should probably include at least 1 character who has scout.

The Castigator Battle Cannon is only Strength 10, and has a bonus against Vehicles and Monsters...to reroll HITS. And BLAST for some ungodly reason. Why? We hit on 2s a lot of the time with vehicles, and how many vehicles or monsters are you hitting that have 5+ models in the unit?

Meanwhile, they gave the Autocannon twin linked. So the Autocannon is better against vehicles and Monsters T11 or higher, and the battlecannon is better against big units. Their bonuses cancel themselves out. Why even give them different rules? It's so asinine.




Automatically Appended Next Post:

PenitentJake wrote:

 alextroy wrote:
The leadership setups issue is probably alluding to:

Canoness: Can only lead Battle Sisters Squads and Celestian Sacresants. So she cannot lead Dominions nor Retributors.

Palatine: Can lead those two units along with Dominions and Sisters Novitiates. Unlike Space Marine Lieutenants and Captains, she can't join a squad along with the Canoness.

Other Leaders: Dogmata, Imagifier, Dialogus, and Hospitaller can be a second leader with only with Canoness or Palatine only on the Battle Sister Squad.

And again, some of that is suboptimal, and not as good as it could be, but I wouldn't say that any of it "doesn't make sense".

It makes perfect sense to me that a Palatine with a Scout move can lead a unit with a Scout move and that a Canoness without a scout move cannot.

It makes perfect since to me that a Canoness might think her Palatine's skill set would be better used to lead an additional unit, rather than assist with the leadership of a unit the Canoness herself is leading. She might want to bring along a different character who' role is less tactical leadership, and maybe more Medical or Spiritual expertise.

I'm not saying it's good for the army's performance- like I said, I agree we're weak, and I agree that tweaking some of these interactions could be a part of the solution to improving the army's performance. I don't dispute that at all, and I don't know of many people who would. I'm just saying that in isolation, there's nothing that really strikes me as "not making sense."

Why can't Celestine or Morvenn attach to regular troops? They're all about inspiring leadership, Celestine fights alongside basic battle Sisters all the time in the books. In fact, she's only escorted by Seraphim or Zephyrim in Fall of Cadia.

Why can't Preachers or Missionaries attach to all squads? They're all ecclesiarchy, aren't they?

What about a Novitiate makes it so that a Dialogus wants to chill with them but an Imagifier thinks they're icky?

Even if it's fine for preachers and missionaries to not join BSS, why can't they join repentia? They can join Novitiates so it's not because they're sisters and they can join Arcos so it's not because they're repentant. Are Repentia Superiors that selfish?

Why does the Triumph only hang out with regular battle sisters? Celestians not good enough for them?
Why are Missionaries cool to hang out with BSS, but Preachers not?

Who can lead what, where is 100% gameplay based with 0 thought to fluff.

ERJAK wrote:


Why can't Preachers or Missionaries attach to all squads? They're all ecclesiarchy, aren't they?

The answer to most of these questions is because GW really screwed the pooch on what can and can't join what squads. I'm betting you and I could write

Why can't X join Y, like the fluff/previous editions/books say?

GW is trying to exert hypercontrol over who can do what - even when its stupid to do so. Lieutenants can join Captains and they can join Chapter Masters as a second leader. Lieutenants generally provide LETHALT HITS. Chaplains generally provide +1 to Wound - which is bypassed by LETHAL HITS - this is generally (I can think of one case) not an over the top wombo combo even for a Lieutenant with Bolter Drill making the same 6's LETHAL and SUSTAINED. But Lieutenants cannot be a second leader behind Chaplains. Heck I would love to see Judiciars be the "Chaplain Lieutenant" and able to be second leader behind the Captains/chapter masters, while the Lieutenants are the Captain Lieutenants and can join behind Chaplains so it's always a mix-n-match

Why do the Firstborn get Basic Veteran Marine statband Company Command that are all tied into one squad, while Primaris Company Command are all SuperDudes and more often than not cannot even attach to their Company Commander because they lack a second/third/etc leader permission?

Nothing can join Devastators and their 4 Heavy Weapons, but they can join Desolation Squads. and their 20?

In many ways, it feels like we're in the 10th Edition Beta Test as we wonder why Gretchin are T5 instead of Runtherds being T2 in the shooting phase. When it comes to what can attach to what, it feels like we're in the Alpha test.

ERJAK wrote:
You can only generate 1 CP per battle round. If you generate a CP from a tactical objective, that counts towards your 1 CP per battle round generation. Therefore, it shuts off Junith and the Canoness. Also, Junith shuts off the Canoness.

You can only gain 1cp per battle round, outside of cp gained at the start of the command phase. Junith's cp is gained at the start of the command phase, so does not count towards the cap.

 Trickstick wrote:

ERJAK wrote:
You can only generate 1 CP per battle round. If you generate a CP from a tactical objective, that counts towards your 1 CP per battle round generation. Therefore, it shuts off Junith and the Canoness. Also, Junith shuts off the Canoness.

You can only gain 1cp per battle round, outside of cp gained at the start of the command phase. Junith's cp is gained at the start of the command phase, so does not count towards the cap.

I don't think your interpretaion is going to survive the FAQ - I'm pretty sure when they say:
"Outside of the CP players gain at
the start of the Command phase,
each player can only gain a total of
1CP per battle round, regardless of
the source"

they mean The CP you collect for "Passing Go" at the Start of the Command Phase - ergo your cap for a 5 turn game is 5 for your command phase, 5 for their command phase, and 5 for any other source - for a total of 15 - though most factions won't get close to that.

Breton wrote:
they mean The CP you collect for "Passing Go" at the Start of the Command Phase

I don't really see that as the case. It is putting a very specific definition on "the cp", which is not backed up by any other wording. Plus, how would that work with a rule like Knights' Code Chivalric? It says to gain 3cp at the start of the command phase. If your interpretation was true, then that 3cp would be limited to 1cp only, which is madness.

Edit: But this is a bit off-topic for this thread anyway. I made a ymdc thread about it yesterday:

https://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/list/810591.page

Sisters aren't an army I will likely ever play and I did think ERJAK was exaggerating their problems when we just had the preview article.

But the more I look at their full rules, the worse they look. They seem to have similarities with Necrons but they must have had different writers, one was being careful, the other was just making "bwaum" noises while imagining an alien invasion.

Necrons - Overlord plus a Cryptek plus 2 Cryptothralls can join 20 Warriors, 10 Immortals or 10 Lychguard. There are so many different combinations to try whether you want bodies, shooting or combat.

Sisters - Canoness can join 10 Sisters (not 20), not join 5 Retributors, can join 10 Sacresants. But can only bring the second character to the Sisters unit. Few interesting combos to be found, needless. The drop from 20 Sisters to 10 feels very unfun.

Necrons - 1CP bring back a character.

Sisters - 1CP bring back a character, but throw away some of your miracle dice for funsies.

Also, as an aside, the Sisters strat has this line "You can use this Stratagem on that unit even though it was just destroyed" but the Necrons strat doesn't, so does the Necrons one not work?

One thing I would suggest when looking at the PDF indexes is doing a find/search for the following:
- lone operative
- scouts
- infiltrators
- stealth
- not within
- anti
- devastating wounds
- a stratagem

You do have to read the context surrounding these rules, but you quickly get a sense of whether the index is playing with the full 10th rules or just half.

Sisters do not come out well from those searches. Although I will note they have access to Agents and Knights, but that is not much use for someone who wants to play actual Sisters.

EightFoldPath wrote:

One thing I would suggest when looking at the PDF indexes is doing a find/search for the following:
- lone operative
- scouts
- infiltrators
- stealth
- not within
- anti
- devastating wounds
- a stratagem

Done most of those - I'd also suggest looking for:
CP
Even If or Already Been (for the Repeat Strat skills)
Feel No Pain
Deep Strike
Leader (and check to what)

EightFoldPath wrote:
Sisters aren't an army I will likely ever play and I did think ERJAK was exaggerating their problems when we just had the preview article.

But the more I look at their full rules, the worse they look. They seem to have similarities with Necrons but they must have had different writers, one was being careful, the other was just making "bwaum" noises while imagining an alien invasion.

If it helps you at all, the Necron army rule is largely non-functional. The thing that makes Necrons unique, RP, is easily ignored.

Necron RP is incredibly powerful in 10th I have no idea what you're talking about.

The armies that can bruteforce it currently, like spamming deso marines, are problems that need to be addressed.

On the flipside I think for a lot of non-broken army lists or factions in general Necron RP presents a reverse balance problem; they might actually be a little too tough.

 Bosskelot wrote:
Necron RP is incredibly powerful in 10th I have no idea what you're talking about.

You get it once during your own Command Phase. Any army, besides Death Guard and AdMech, can brute force it squad to squad. The people that say it's good only say that after attaching a bunch of characters to squads. Outside doing 1 "invincible" Warrior blob you can't commit a lot of points to building around it. Mark my words on that.

 Bosskelot wrote:
On the flipside I think for a lot of non-broken army lists or factions in general Necron RP presents a reverse balance problem; they might actually be a little too tough.

From my experience, the unkillable super-units have surprisingly little killing power, so as long as you avoid getting unfavorable charges, you can just dodge them and win the game by outscoring the necron player.

EviscerationPlague wrote:

 Bosskelot wrote:
Necron RP is incredibly powerful in 10th I have no idea what you're talking about.

You get it once during your own Command Phase. Any army, besides Death Guard and AdMech, can brute force it squad to squad. The people that say it's good only say that after attaching a bunch of characters to squads. Outside doing 1 "invincible" Warrior blob you can't commit a lot of points to building around it. Mark my words on that.

My first game was against a Tau army with Shadowsun that failed to wipe a shieldguard squad. Necrons are pretty durable in this edition.

 Jidmah wrote:

 Bosskelot wrote:
On the flipside I think for a lot of non-broken army lists or factions in general Necron RP presents a reverse balance problem; they might actually be a little too tough.

From my experience, the unkillable super-units have surprisingly little killing power, so as long as you avoid getting unfavorable charges, you can just dodge them and win the game by outscoring the necron player.

That sounds like it's skillful play, with possible counterplay.
That's a good thing.

 JNAProductions wrote:

 Jidmah wrote:

 Bosskelot wrote:
On the flipside I think for a lot of non-broken army lists or factions in general Necron RP presents a reverse balance problem; they might actually be a little too tough.

From my experience, the unkillable super-units have surprisingly little killing power, so as long as you avoid getting unfavorable charges, you can just dodge them and win the game by outscoring the necron player.

That sounds like it's skillful play, with possible counterplay.
That's a good thing.

I'm not disagreeing with that


Automatically Appended Next Post:
In general, in my 10th edition games the decisions taken by me and my opponents have mattered much more than the lists we have built.

That said, I see many veterans being frustrated by no longer being able to decide games at the list building stage and the lack of obvious "good against everything" units they can just bring 3 of to solve all possible problems. Quite a few are unwilling to relearn a game they have played for decades.

 JNAProductions wrote:

 Jidmah wrote:

 Bosskelot wrote:
On the flipside I think for a lot of non-broken army lists or factions in general Necron RP presents a reverse balance problem; they might actually be a little too tough.

From my experience, the unkillable super-units have surprisingly little killing power, so as long as you avoid getting unfavorable charges, you can just dodge them and win the game by outscoring the necron player.

That sounds like it's skillful play, with possible counterplay.
That's a good thing.

A unit that can't do anything isn't exactly some wonderful thing for Necrons to have.

As I said, lists relying on getting RP off vs straight buffs and damage aren't going to be good.

Breton wrote:

Why do the Firstborn get Basic Veteran Marine statband Company Command that are all tied into one squad, while Primaris Company Command are all SuperDudes and more often than not cannot even attach to their Company Commander because they lack a second/third/etc leader permission?

Because the First/True/RealMarine characters come is a single box labelled "Command Squad", while the Primaris ones are purchased one at at time for $30 a pop.

It's dumb.

Nothing can join Devastators and their 4 Heavy Weapons, but they can join Desolation Squads. and their 20?

Devastator Marines are notoriously stubborn, rebellious and just plain hard to get along with, and therefore unable to be led. :/

No idea. It's also dumb.

 Insectum7 wrote:

Breton wrote:

Why do the Firstborn get Basic Veteran Marine statband Company Command that are all tied into one squad, while Primaris Company Command are all SuperDudes and more often than not cannot even attach to their Company Commander because they lack a second/third/etc leader permission?

Because the First/True/RealMarine characters come is a single box labelled "Command Squad", while the Primaris ones are purchased one at at time for $30 a pop.

It's dumb.

But wait a minute, that would somehow imply that GW bases decisions on boxes, that can't be right......

EviscerationPlague wrote:

 Insectum7 wrote:

Breton wrote:

Why do the Firstborn get Basic Veteran Marine statband Company Command that are all tied into one squad, while Primaris Company Command are all SuperDudes and more often than not cannot even attach to their Company Commander because they lack a second/third/etc leader permission?

Because the First/True/RealMarine characters come is a single box labelled "Command Squad", while the Primaris ones are purchased one at at time for $30 a pop.

It's dumb.

But wait a minute, that would somehow imply that GW bases decisions on boxes, that can't be right......

Its the other way around. Those characters have always been in the box, yet in 9e they were solo characters like the Primaris - but they didn't rotate out the old kit with a new individual one. But in the past they've generally been pretty good at mirroring Firstborn and Primaris.

EviscerationPlague wrote:

 Bosskelot wrote:
Necron RP is incredibly powerful in 10th I have no idea what you're talking about.

You get it once during your own Command Phase. Any army, besides Death Guard and AdMech, can brute force it squad to squad. The people that say it's good only say that after attaching a bunch of characters to squads. Outside doing 1 "invincible" Warrior blob you can't commit a lot of points to building around it. Mark my words on that.

And through a strat, that you can also double up on with Overlords. And through Rez Orbs. And through Ghost Arks. All the while a Reanimator is boosting all of these rolls.

 Bosskelot wrote:

EviscerationPlague wrote:

 Bosskelot wrote:
Necron RP is incredibly powerful in 10th I have no idea what you're talking about.

You get it once during your own Command Phase. Any army, besides Death Guard and AdMech, can brute force it squad to squad. The people that say it's good only say that after attaching a bunch of characters to squads. Outside doing 1 "invincible" Warrior blob you can't commit a lot of points to building around it. Mark my words on that.

And through a strat, that you can also double up on with Overlords. And through Rez Orbs. And through Ghost Arks. All the while a Reanimator is boosting all of these rolls.

Yeah, reanimation is the definition of a rule that looks weak on paper but in practice it's actually very powerful. This is due to a number of factors including the numerous ways to buff it, powerful defensive abilities on various characters and the generally lower lethality of the game, outside of a few outliers. It just takes more effort to get through 20 Warriors with -1 to hit, or 10 Lychguard with -1 to wound. Res orbs will be common because of the no-cost upgrades and Reanimators are just very strong units now.

 Jidmah wrote:
In general, in my 10th edition games the decisions taken by me and my opponents have mattered much more than the lists we have built.

That said, I see many veterans being frustrated by no longer being able to decide games at the list building stage and the lack of obvious "good against everything" units they can just bring 3 of to solve all possible problems. Quite a few are unwilling to relearn a game they have played for decades.

To move on from Necrons, I kind of feel though that's why (late) 9th was considered to be balanced. If the stuff you take (which was a reasonable portion of most codexes) counters everything, it should be harder to win in the list building stage.

I think in 10th we have what you described in the Ork tactics thread (obviously the solutions will be different):

 Jidmah wrote:
Not just vehicles - IMO there are the following defensive "weight classes" in 10th edition:

1) Light infantry - gretchin, kultists, pox walkers, infantry squads, guardians. You have little requirements in regards to the quality of attacks here, more is better.
2) Medium infantry - marines, flash gits, sisters, beastsnagga boyz, aspects. They have multiple layers of defense and enough armor to benefit from cover. You need decent strength, devastating wounds or amor penetration to kill them efficiently. Weight of low quality attacks can hurt, but not wipe them.
3) Heavy infantry - terminators, MANz, custodes, bullgryns. Usually good toughness, armor and invuls backed up by high wound counts and defensive abilities, characters or stratagems. You need high quality guns to kill them, with good number of shots. They pretty much shrug off low quality attacks, even in high numbers and dedicated anti-tank guns often aren't sufficient to kill them because the low number of shots bounces of the invuls.
4) Mounted/Beasts/light vehicles - bikes, squighogs, spawn, buggies. Durable units similar to medium infantry, but with more wounds, but below the magic T8 threshold. Other than medium infantry, you need high damage weapons to kill them efficiently.
5) Vehicles - trukks, speeders, rhinos, guard artillery. Good armor, wounds and toughness of 8-10, but no further noteworthy defensive layers. Weight of attacks will hurt them, but as these models tend to be cheap there is no way to kill them efficiently without high quality weapons.
6) Monsters/Walkers - dreads, hellbrutes, daemon princes, primarchs, daemon engines. They have great defensive profiles, invuls, defensive abilities but are usually limited to T9 or 10 and around 10 wounds. In theory they could be drowned in attacks, but almost all of them hit hard, you take major losses when trying. PKs can usually take them down during the Waaagh!
7) Tanks/super-heavies - LRBT, battlewagon with 'ard case, morkanaut, landraiders. Unless you can ignore at least one layer of their durability (toughness or armor or high wound counts), don't bother shooting them.
Of course, there are some oddballs which fit nowhere, but the absolute majority of models fit into one of these classes.

Its still early, so some discovery is inevitable - but it seems a lot easier to build lists that are very lethal into each other - or relatively pillowfisted - because they have - or don't have - the right tools for the job.

This is perhaps especially an issue for more casual lists which aren't written with an eye to covering all the bases and working as a tool box. (And I'd argue some factions don't really have great options for that anyway).

From a balance perspective, while its moving into the endless "game vs simulation" argument, it feels like what we have in the indexes is not a rock-paper-scissors system.
So for example if light infantry only have "low quality attacks" - they end up only being good into other light infantry. But they are hardly unique for that purpose, so you can just ditch them. And certainly bringing more of them doesn't seem to impose a question on your opponent in the way taking more stuff from the other categories does.

Which I think is partly an issue of unit size. So maybe a unit of Terminators (especially with an attached character) chasing down a unit of Gretchin (45) or Cultists (55) would be overkill and therefore inefficient. But if you move up the points to say 10 Boyz (85) - let alone Guardians (110), Wyches (110) or Kabalites (120) etc, then it starts to become quite reasonable. Blast on certain already efficient platforms (not just Desolators) already feels too good into 10 man squads, and borderline ludicrous into 20 mans.

I'm also tempted to say that assault needs to be somewhat universalist or it just doesn't work. You can't run reasonably expensive units across the table, make a successful charge roll - only to find yourself going "well on average dice I'd only expect to kill 2 marines anyway" - and completely bounce off TEQ or Rhinos. Maybe that's defeatist - but it seems like how it goes.