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Wayniac wrote:

 waefre_1 wrote:
Also, I'd like to point out that the correct way for GW to incentivize us taking non-meta options is to make those options worth taking. It's never going to be perfect since there will always be people who only take the "optimal" choices, and it does take actual work to pull off, but "work" is what they're (allegedly) being paid to do. Part of the reason the switch to free upgrades rubbed me wrong is that it felt like GW saw that trying to balance paid upgrades would take work, told an intern to fix it over their lunch break, and when the intern couldn't come up with a solution GW just threw their collective hands up and decided to burn it all down. That'd be bad from an indy studio running on a shoestring budget, it's contemptible from a company with GW's funding and reach.

it feels like just another symptom of not being able to deal with the competitive players breaking the game, so just giving up and acting as though everyone will do it. Just assume everyone always takes the best option and the "problem" goes away.

Same thing happened in world of warcraft; despite the best efforts players keep optimizing 100% of everything so rather than try to stop it or change that mentality, they just gave in and design around it as though everyone will do it.

The big difference is that GW wouldn't have as much of an issue if they didn't re-write their game every 3 years. They just start to get balancing properly and then BOOM it all gets thrown out the window for a new edition. If they actually stuck to a single core set of rules that were updated perhaps every 10 years; and then updated individual armies every 3 years with revised codex (updated with newly added models, FAQ/Errata etc...) then who knows

 Overread wrote:

Wayniac wrote:

 waefre_1 wrote:
Also, I'd like to point out that the correct way for GW to incentivize us taking non-meta options is to make those options worth taking. It's never going to be perfect since there will always be people who only take the "optimal" choices, and it does take actual work to pull off, but "work" is what they're (allegedly) being paid to do. Part of the reason the switch to free upgrades rubbed me wrong is that it felt like GW saw that trying to balance paid upgrades would take work, told an intern to fix it over their lunch break, and when the intern couldn't come up with a solution GW just threw their collective hands up and decided to burn it all down. That'd be bad from an indy studio running on a shoestring budget, it's contemptible from a company with GW's funding and reach.

it feels like just another symptom of not being able to deal with the competitive players breaking the game, so just giving up and acting as though everyone will do it. Just assume everyone always takes the best option and the "problem" goes away.

Same thing happened in world of warcraft; despite the best efforts players keep optimizing 100% of everything so rather than try to stop it or change that mentality, they just gave in and design around it as though everyone will do it.

The big difference is that GW wouldn't have as much of an issue if they didn't re-write their game every 3 years. They just start to get balancing properly and then BOOM it all gets thrown out the window for a new edition. If they actually stuck to a single core set of rules that were updated perhaps every 10 years; and then updated individual armies every 3 years with revised codex (updated with newly added models, FAQ/Errata etc...) then who knows

Exactly. But then you couldn't sell overpriced rulebooks and codexes to people who just bought them...

I have no problem with GW deciding that Tacticals should have 1 special and 1 heavy weapon, or Scourges should have 4 special/heavy weapons as the standard loadout. It makes sense for some units to be configured that way. There are a couple of problems with the GW approach that make it utterly moronic, however.

1. You can either cost the unit as if it's taken the cheapest options and then charge extra for the better ones, or make all options equally valid so it doesn't matter which one you take from an in-game effectiveness POV. GW did the worst of both worlds here.

2. Some units simply can't work this way. DW Kill Teams - especially the Proteus one - are a great example. If units have too many options with wildly variable power levels you just can't condense that unit down into 1 cost. The Proteus Kill Team is paying for the ability to take multiple Terminators instead of just regular Veterans, even if you'd rather not take them. Worse still, the 5-man unit that can't even take Terminators is still charged as if it is.

3. Some units have "options" that are just clearly upgrades. This isn't even a case of something arguably being situationally better, it's literally just one option being literally superior at all times. Death Company with power swords and plasma pistols and Tomb Blades with shield vanes are the most obvious ones for my army. If you want evidence that GW half-assed the points system in 10th that's the most obvious example.

Bringing this back to the original question, I find a lot of the soul of the game has been lost in that points shift. There's not as much room for tinkering and experimentation in list building when it's so obvious that some options are just better than others, or some configurations simply don't work. On top of that, actually building lists is infuriating. My Emperor's Children list is frustratingly sat at 1960 points. I could just live with a 40 point deficit but that feels like a little too much to me. What about adding an Enhancement? Great idea, except I've decided to be fluffy and dedicate myself to a single god in my CSM list, so I only get access to a single Enhancement. Previously I'd maybe add a couple of combi-weapons, or maybe drop one Chosen to get another unit of Cultists, or downgrade a character's weapons to do the same. Now I have to cut entire units. You often can't even cut characters because they're now intrinsically tied to the units they were bought for, so you often end up thinking you might as well remove both. It's the same problem with my Deathwatch. When building lsits previously, or for other games, usually you get to the end and have to tinker a bit to add some things here or remove some things there. Now it just feels like a chore where you might have to abandon the entire concept of your army because you end up with 50-60 points free that you can't spend.

It's always been obvious what's best and what's bad. It takes one reading through codex and you know them. Well okay can't say about 1999 and before as I didn't play 40k then but since 2000 when I started 40k it's been easy enough to spot what's good and bad.

That's the whole point of it...GW makes damned sure you know what's good and what's bad. They are shouting it our with the sound of 155mm artirelly company firing at full speed

In Finland kids have learned all they need to sort out best by the time of 3rd grade bar english.

If you are looking at hard to spot good stuff in list building...Look at game from some other company.

tneva82 wrote:
It's always been obvious what's best and what's bad. It takes one reading through codex and you know them. Well okay can't say about 1999 and before as I didn't play 40k then but since 2000 when I started 40k it's been easy enough to spot what's good and bad.

That's the whole point of it...GW makes damned sure you know what's good and what's bad. They are shouting it our with the sound of 155mm artirelly company firing at full speed

In Finland kids have learned all they need to sort out best by the time of 3rd grade bar english.

If you are looking at hard to spot good stuff in list building...Look at game from some other company.

Thanks for showing you either didn't read or didn't understand what I posted. It's not about spotting what's good and bad, it's about making different choices equivalent.

Slipspace wrote:

tneva82 wrote:
It's always been obvious what's best and what's bad. It takes one reading through codex and you know them. Well okay can't say about 1999 and before as I didn't play 40k then but since 2000 when I started 40k it's been easy enough to spot what's good and bad.

That's the whole point of it...GW makes damned sure you know what's good and what's bad. They are shouting it our with the sound of 155mm artirelly company firing at full speed

In Finland kids have learned all they need to sort out best by the time of 3rd grade bar english.

If you are looking at hard to spot good stuff in list building...Look at game from some other company.

Thanks for showing you either didn't read or didn't understand what I posted. It's not about spotting what's good and bad, it's about making different choices equivalent.

You negated your whole point when you veered into hyperbolic nonsense about having to scrap your whole army concept because you couldn't spend the last 50pts or such.

No he didn't.

And he's right: tnev completely missed the point, and posted something essentially unrelated.

This isn't about "best" and "worst". It's about options. It's about the fact that most of the weapon options in the game aren't sidegrades, and thus they are upgrades, and therefore should be paid for.

I don't want to always pay for Lascannon/2x Plasma Cannons on my Russes, especially when 26 out of my 30 Russ hulls don't have Plasma sponsons. I don't want to pay for double Baneblade sponsons when not a single one of my Baneblades has double sponsons. There should be a difference between taking 10 Death Company w/ BPs & CCWs vs 10 Death Company w/ Plasma Pistols & Power Weapons.

Whether someone "should" be taking naked squads is besides the point: You always had the choice, and taking better weapons meant you had to use points and sometimes sacrifice in other areas. This is also why the set squad sizes are bull gak as well. What good is my unit of 5 Inceptors w/Plasma Guns? I'm always paying for 6 to bring them. That's stupid.

... Sponsons should come with a penalty to save and/or thoughness (or AV if you prefer that)

You are basically adding a giant weakpoint to your armor by drilling a gun hole on it.

Point costs would still be needed to differentiate bolters from plasma cannons/lascannons, but I do prefer if options come with a downside beyond just points.

Slipspace wrote:

2. Some units simply can't work this way. DW Kill Teams - especially the Proteus one - are a great example. If units have too many options with wildly variable power levels you just can't condense that unit down into 1 cost. The Proteus Kill Team is paying for the ability to take multiple Terminators instead of just regular Veterans, even if you'd rather not take them. Worse still, the 5-man unit that can't even take Terminators is still charged as if it is.

The Proteus Kill team just shouldn't allow for 4 Terminators. None of the other KTs have a 4x option. Make Terminators 2x like the rest and cut the points significantly to reflect this and the options available become far more interesting.

Slipspace speaks truth. I was just fighting with a list 2 days ago and had about 60pts left over which you cant do anything with so I spent probably another 30mins trying to change my list enough that I can hit the points limit. Thereby taking stuff I didn't want to; not fun. GW can kiss my ass for removing the granularity from the points. List building now is more like playing tetris but every piece is an over sized S; nothing fits together. Also quick shout to the poor admech players. Looks like they got the strongest player in their clique to play test Admech vs the noobs playing the Space Marine book and decided they don't need buffs. The sheer amount of Ls admech players will accumulate (I hope I'm wrong) will be on par with Dark Eldar.

 Gibblets wrote:
Slipspace speaks truth. I was just fighting with a list 2 days ago and had about 60pts left over which you cant do anything with so I spent probably another 30mins trying to change my list enough that I can hit the points limit. Thereby taking stuff I didn't want to; not fun. GW can kiss my ass for removing the granularity from the points. List building now is more like playing tetris but every piece is an over sized S; nothing fits together. Also quick shout to the poor admech players. Looks like they got the strongest player in their clique to play test Admech vs the noobs playing the Space Marine book and decided they don't need buffs. The sheer amount of Ls admech players will accumulate (I hope I'm wrong) will be on par with Dark Eldar.

Slipspace does speak the truth, however most armies can fill 60pts with something if you feel aggrieved by it. The take on Admech however is the typical knee jerk sky is falling nonsense that has always been a negative around the game and does more to kill any excitement or discussion than having 3% of an army spare.

Wyldhunt wrote:

Okay, but Tactical Marines?? It baffles me that someone could see Tactical Marines and think "yep, this unit is designed to be barebones and no squad weapons". And I think that GW encouraging people to actually use the cool toys they have is great for that - shaping the idea of how they see the game being played. Not with barebones units and scrimping for points, but with cool upgrades and taking a variety of options. Now, of course, as players are oft to be, there's the idea of "disadvantage" if you're not taking full advantage of the ability to take what you like, but, well, that's a personal thing. GW could try and create a way where, say, all Sergeant weapons were balanced against eachother, and all upgraded weapons were all sidegrades of eachother, but actually TAKING upgraded squad weapons? Sorry, I believe that should be a given. Gone are the days of a barebones unit, and I think that's for the best. Again, YMMV.

Granted, tactical squads without any special weapons does seem slightly unusual. But I feel they're more the exception than the rule. Taking kabalites with just splinter rifles should be valid. Taking guardians without the support platform should be valid. Taking marine vehicles without hunter-killer missiles should be valid.

Pardon me for asking, but why? Why is there a difference between Tacticals being "meant" to take specials weapons and Kabalites not? Guardians without a support platform is simple - introduce a rule pertaining to the platform where it, say, prevents the unit moving. Or, have a compulsory support platform, but you choose which kind that best suits what you want.

If GW is saying "yes, this is what they're supposed to do and act like", then I don't have an issue with them making systems where that's what they have. In much the same way that Tactical Marines are supposed to have bolters, so they're armed with bolters.

In the case of tacticals, if the intention really, really is for them to always have 1 special weapon per 5 dudes, you could basically make the special weapons "package" I pitched earlier into a mandatory part of their unit. Basically, don't pretend a squad of 5 bolters is a valid way to build the unit if it really isn't. But also, my pitch above leaves it up to the player. If you *do* have a reason for wanting to field all bolters, you can do so without effectively wasting points. If you do spend the points on special weapons, they should presumably be valuable enough and costed appropriately to be a viable option.

I agree with the first part! If GW wants the unit's intention to be "hey, the special weapon MEANT to be part of this unit, so its a compulsory addition - now choose which weapon you want", then they should do it, and I'd prefer if they did! However, then you'd run into people complaining that they're "forced" into it - like right now.

I think ultimately that this is more a case of established players not liking that their weapon choices are sub-optimal from previous editions, and being resistant to that change.

I find it much more fun to have a Sergeant with an interesting weapon, even if it never really gets used, rather than "yeah, here's my fourth sergeant with barebones weapons because I was trying to make my points stretch".

See, I'm one of those guys who will put cool equipment on the sergeants even when it's not optimal, but I still like having the chocie of fielding a "naked" sergeant because it helps the other sergeants stand out more. My bolter sergeant is pragmatic and uses his bionic eye to get the most out of the humble bolter. My lightning claw + meltabombs guy is a little more of a reckless glory hound who relies on his squadmate's flamer to help thin the hordes he often throws his squad at. My power fist guy is also a glory hound but likes to go straight toward the biggest target on the battlefield with his meltagunner squad mate.

In 10th edition, a lot of that personality is soured by the knowledge that I'm being charged points for gear I'm not taking or for assumptions that I'm optimizing my squad's loadout when I'm not.

I'm just the same - all my Guardsmen sergeants only use chainswords and laspistols (or other CCWs that fit in for the chainsword), because they're not privy to the fancy toys for the higher ranks. I prefer them that way, as opposed to having plasma pistols and power fists on every one - but the difference is that I don't care about the fact I'm not taking the "optimal" option. GW has always had options that were more optimal, even with points. I don't see why this changes anything for me, personally.

Slipspace wrote:On top of that, actually building lists is infuriating. My Emperor's Children list is frustratingly sat at 1960 points. I could just live with a 40 point deficit but that feels like a little too much to me. What about adding an Enhancement? Great idea, except I've decided to be fluffy and dedicate myself to a single god in my CSM list, so I only get access to a single Enhancement. Previously I'd maybe add a couple of combi-weapons, or maybe drop one Chosen to get another unit of Cultists, or downgrade a character's weapons to do the same. Now I have to cut entire units. You often can't even cut characters because they're now intrinsically tied to the units they were bought for, so you often end up thinking you might as well remove both. It's the same problem with my Deathwatch. When building lsits previously, or for other games, usually you get to the end and have to tinker a bit to add some things here or remove some things there. Now it just feels like a chore where you might have to abandon the entire concept of your army because you end up with 50-60 points free that you can't spend.

On the other hand, not being able to field your army because it was 10 points over because you're actually playing WYSIWYG and you gave your models the cool weapons, even if they weren't the "optimal" ones, also sucks. Or, taking upgrades for the sake of it because you can't add any more units, even though you really don't care for taking them at all, and they probably won't change the trajectory of the game in any meaningful way.

Having awkward points has always been a thing. And, yes, when the numbers are too large that you can't add or remove anything without compromising your list, that SUCKS. But, well, there's always been an element of compromise. It's really just a case of what's considered acceptable.

Now, I wanna make clear, that's not me saying that you're overreacting or your concern isn't valid! But it is me saying that this has always been a factor - and that I feel that the reason it's been highlighted now is that now the way the game is now intended/designed now differs more drastically from what people have come to expect, and that's what's causing the conflict. How people have previously internalised the way the game works, and therefore is "supposed" to work, is now not matching how the game is currently "supposed" to work.
(And that's not a statement to endorse or condemn the state of the game)

H.B.M.C. wrote:Whether someone "should" be taking naked squads is besides the point:

Not really. If GW are trying to incentivise moving away from naked squads, then the point very much matters. Now, is this the BEST way to do it? No. But the point stands - I believe that GW are trying to encourage actually using the cool weapons on the sprues, instead of leaving players feeling like they can't use them without breaking the bank.

This is also why the set squad sizes are bull gak as well. What good is my unit of 5 Inceptors w/Plasma Guns? I'm always paying for 6 to bring them. That's stupid.

Just curious, but did you have the same issue with Guardsmen being locked into units of 10? Or Conscripts as units of 20?

Or would you have preferred if GW said you can ONLY bring units of 3 or 6?

 Sgt_Smudge wrote:
Pardon me for asking, but why? Why is there a difference between Tacticals being "meant" to take specials weapons and Kabalites not? Guardians without a support platform is simple - introduce a rule pertaining to the platform where it, say, prevents the unit moving. Or, have a compulsory support platform, but you choose which kind that best suits what you want.

If GW is saying "yes, this is what they're supposed to do and act like", then I don't have an issue with them making systems where that's what they have. In much the same way that Tactical Marines are supposed to have bolters, so they're armed with bolters.

Fair question. I think that removing the option to take cheaper, smaller versions of those units makes it feel like I've sorta kinda lost one of the units from my codex. Like, taking a 5-man kabalite squad with a single blaster or even just a dirt cheap naked kabalite squad for scoring purposes or to fill a transport, was a satisfying unit option that played very differently from a 10-man unit rocking multiple darklight weapons. I actually like the 10th edition version of kabalites (well, I like their sticky objectives rule), but it would have been so easy to just keep the option for a smaller, humbler squad without sticky objectives. Similarly, I used to enjoy running guardians without a platform to make them slightly cheaper and to save space in a wave serpent. Just making the platform an add-on that costs X points regardless of the gun on it would have been simple enough, so the absence of choice rankles.

Tacticals are slightly different in that, to my knowledge, it's pretty odd for a codex compliant chapter to carry around 5 bolters instead of mixing in a flamer or whatever.

In the case of tacticals, if the intention really, really is for them to always have 1 special weapon per 5 dudes, you could basically make the special weapons "package" I pitched earlier into a mandatory part of their unit. Basically, don't pretend a squad of 5 bolters is a valid way to build the unit if it really isn't. But also, my pitch above leaves it up to the player. If you *do* have a reason for wanting to field all bolters, you can do so without effectively wasting points. If you do spend the points on special weapons, they should presumably be valuable enough and costed appropriately to be a viable option.

I agree with the first part! If GW wants the unit's intention to be "hey, the special weapon MEANT to be part of this unit, so its a compulsory addition - now choose which weapon you want", then they should do it, and I'd prefer if they did! However, then you'd run into people complaining that they're "forced" into it - like right now.

I think ultimately that this is more a case of established players not liking that their weapon choices are sub-optimal from previous editions, and being resistant to that change.

I'm not sure that's quite accurate. As I mentioned, I tend to take sub-optimal choices for the sake of giving my units a little personality. I'll splurge on the melee weapon for a sergeant so I can imagine that they're a little more eager to get in close than their brothers. That sort of thing. With the new rules, I don't feel irritated that some of my sergeants are built suboptimally. Between my fist guy and my claw guy, one of them is probably straight up more efficient against targets I'd reasonably throw them at. But I'm not irked about the fist guy or the claw guy. I'm irked about the basic bolter sergeant.

Previously, it was suboptimal to give my fist and claw guys their toys, but I felt like I was getting something in return for that suboptimal investment. (Their improved offense.) If taking those toys had been optimal, then my basic bolter sergeant would at least feel like he was saving me points that I could put to use elsewhere. In both cases, there's a silver lining to my suboptimal build. In contrast, there's no longer a silver lining. I'm just playing at a disadvantage.

I think part of it is also that building optimally now means making your squad leaders look really same-y. Like, of course all my sybarites have blast pistols and grenade launchers and sybarite weapons because why wouldn't they? Previously, the minutia of having a grenade guy vs a rifle guy could be a source of personality for the models, and you'd save a few points for having those distinctions. Now, if you ever find yourself in a situation where you wish you had a blast pistol, you've screwed yourself if you didn't take one. You can't shrug and go, "Well, I put those points towards an upgrade for my raider." You're just getting punished for fielding variety.

I'm just the same - all my Guardsmen sergeants only use chainswords and laspistols (or other CCWs that fit in for the chainsword), because they're not privy to the fancy toys for the higher ranks. I prefer them that way, as opposed to having plasma pistols and power fists on every one - but the difference is that I don't care about the fact I'm not taking the "optimal" option. GW has always had options that were more optimal, even with points. I don't see why this changes anything for me, personally.

See above. Basically, the new system creates FOMO where the old system provided a silver lining for taking the suboptimal build.

Or would you have preferred if GW said you can ONLY bring units of 3 or 6?

Weirdly enough, I think I might prefer the stricter unit size. I'm in a similar position with several of the units I own. Not to make too big a deal of it, but fretting over whether to pay 5 models worth of points for 3 models worth of value is oddly stressful and doesn't feel great. So requiring a specific unit size would at least mean I wouldn't find myself considering the larger unit size at all when I sit down to list build. But maybe I'm wrong.

Personally fixed unit sizes are something I am 100% okay with. I always took either the min or the max (usually the max). Taking weird unit sizes like 7 guys in this one specific squad when all the other squads have 10 in them because I didn't have enough points to pay for dudes #8, 9, and 10 always felt icky to me and is not something I did. I usually silently judged others who were in the practice of doing so when I came across them. The fact that its been standard design practice since like 5th edition to base the number of weapon upgrades in a unit around the number of models in it meant that realistically the majority of players would only ever field units in fixed increments based on the ability to access those weapons. I'd prefer it though if GWs implementation was fixed (ie 5 models, 10 models, 15 models, 20 models) and not ranges (5 models, 6-10 models, 11-15 models, 16-20 models). I think theres a perception issue with folks looking at the option to field 6-10 models and going "well why the hell would I ever field anything less than 10 if it will cost me the same, this is fething dumb", whereas if GW was just honest about it and said "you can take 5 guys for y points, and 10 guys for z points" then that might be a bit less of a point of contention.

 Sgt_Smudge wrote:

chaos0xomega wrote:
The problem is that for so long they pushed the vision of "your dudes" and basically infinite customizability (which admittedly they have been reversing the last couple editions of the game), that people feel like they are basically having choices taken away from them, even though the system is really intended (hypothetically) to try to make it easier for players to enjoy the variety and customizations that GW has offered.

Do we think it's maybe a case of newer players being the focus of GW's attentions, and not already established armies?

Maybe. GW seems to be increasingly coming around to the idea of player retention, and not just recruitment which has been there modus operandi in the past. Their business model was previously built on the idea that they would draw x many new players in, and y of them would quit the hobby within z months or whatever, so they were all about trying to maximize that churn and get as many kids with mommy and daddy's money in through the door for whatever they could get, and then move on to the next. The shift to the short edition cycles and rapid fire release pace is an effort to keep players more engaged and interested and prevent them from falling out, as GW has evidently recognized that there is a way to keep customers long term and maximize their lifetime value to the company and get them spending more, etc. I think to some extent though they have pushed it too far to the point that I think they are alienating a growing number of customers because the pace of their release schedule and edition churn is unsustainable.

I also think, to some extent, its an overcorrection to complaints they likely received in feedback surveys. I know there were complaints about listbuilding building and the detachment system being confusing and to constraining and preventing people from fielding the army they wanted to play, etc.GW likely took that feedback too far and went beyond what most of the people complaining probably imagined they would do.

As for "your dudes", I personally find it easier to do "your dudes" when I'm not feeling like the "cool" option is gonna prevent me from taking the unit because the points don't match. I find it much more fun to have a Sergeant with an interesting weapon, even if it never really gets used, rather than "yeah, here's my fourth sergeant with barebones weapons because I was trying to make my points stretch". My guardsmen sergeants still use barebones kit, because that fits them much better for how I see them, but for my Space Marine sergeants, they have a variety of weapons because I see them as having the luxury to choose them - same for my Sybarites, Alphas and Sister Superiors. They feel much more "mine" then when I was encouraged to not really bother with upgrades on certain units. But, YMMV.

Thats a valid perspective, and one which I think a lot of casual players agree with. More competitive players, or those of us who are held hostage by competitive players, will probably tend to look at it kind of from the opposite perspective which is equally valid, wherein they can't field "your dudes" because their build is suboptimal and will make a difference in performance and potentially game outcome, and doing so will put them at a disadvantage vs their opponent who is trying to maximize value in their own list. For something minor like what pistol do you give a guard sergeant, it probably doesn't matter. If your'e fielding leman russes and "your dudes" don't use sponsons, but your opponents do, then you're in a bit of a pickle.

Okay, but Tactical Marines?? It baffles me that someone could see Tactical Marines and think "yep, this unit is designed to be barebones and no squad weapons".

Why not? Some chapters (and legions) are noted in the fluff for their over-reliance on the humble bolter, and their eschewing of specialist weapons in favor of focusing on massed bolter fire. Its a valid choice from a fluff perspective. Thats been the case for a long time and is nothing new, it was something that inspired me to start (and never finish) a space marine army many editions ago that was based on streamlined tactical squads only equipped with bolters,and then maxing out devastators and other units for heavier supporting fire.

 Overread wrote:

Wayniac wrote:

 waefre_1 wrote:
Also, I'd like to point out that the correct way for GW to incentivize us taking non-meta options is to make those options worth taking. It's never going to be perfect since there will always be people who only take the "optimal" choices, and it does take actual work to pull off, but "work" is what they're (allegedly) being paid to do. Part of the reason the switch to free upgrades rubbed me wrong is that it felt like GW saw that trying to balance paid upgrades would take work, told an intern to fix it over their lunch break, and when the intern couldn't come up with a solution GW just threw their collective hands up and decided to burn it all down. That'd be bad from an indy studio running on a shoestring budget, it's contemptible from a company with GW's funding and reach.

it feels like just another symptom of not being able to deal with the competitive players breaking the game, so just giving up and acting as though everyone will do it. Just assume everyone always takes the best option and the "problem" goes away.
Same thing happened in world of warcraft; despite the best efforts players keep optimizing 100% of everything so rather than try to stop it or change that mentality, they just gave in and design around it as though everyone will do it.

The big difference is that GW wouldn't have as much of an issue if they didn't re-write their game every 3 years. They just start to get balancing properly and then BOOM it all gets thrown out the window for a new edition. If they actually stuck to a single core set of rules that were updated perhaps every 10 years; and then updated individual armies every 3 years with revised codex (updated with newly added models, FAQ/Errata etc...) then who knows

Agreed, we've never really been able to see a mature edition/meta in a long time because of the obsession with the edition cycle + the rapid fire pace of balance updates. It would be nice to have some time to experience an edition as a "complete" package before moving on to the next one and starting over.

ccs wrote:

Slipspace wrote:

tneva82 wrote:
It's always been obvious what's best and what's bad. It takes one reading through codex and you know them. Well okay can't say about 1999 and before as I didn't play 40k then but since 2000 when I started 40k it's been easy enough to spot what's good and bad.
That's the whole point of it...GW makes damned sure you know what's good and what's bad. They are shouting it our with the sound of 155mm artirelly company firing at full speed
In Finland kids have learned all they need to sort out best by the time of 3rd grade bar english.
If you are looking at hard to spot good stuff in list building...Look at game from some other company.

Thanks for showing you either didn't read or didn't understand what I posted. It's not about spotting what's good and bad, it's about making different choices equivalent.

You negated your whole point when you veered into hyperbolic nonsense about having to scrap your whole army concept because you couldn't spend the last 50pts or such.

Not being able to spend the last 50 points is a problem. its one of my biggest personal bugbears. Theres nothing to spend small sums of points on to make up a gap after you've built out your army with "your dudes" the way you want, and find that it fits awkwardly into a 2000 point game and theres no way to fill the gap without compromising your vision and dropping one unit to put a completely different unit in that will get you to 1990 points intstead of 1950. Maybe I'm just OCD or something, but up until I think 9th edition when they started the process of eliminating wargear points for many options, my listbuilding always got me as close to the points limit as possible, I was usually ok being within 5 points of the total if I fell short, more than that and I'd make those small tweaks to my list, often insignificant, to try to get me to 1998 or 1999 or 2000 so I wasn't leaving anything on the table. These days there are lists I have written where I come in 60, 70, 80 points under and theres no unit available to me that will fill that gap, and the enhancements available to me are too limited (don't meet specific model type prerequisites, or otherwise just don't have enough characters in the list to take more than 1) to sufficiently fill in the deficit.

 Tyran wrote:
... Sponsons should come with a penalty to save and/or thoughness (or AV if you prefer that)
You are basically adding a giant weakpoint to your armor by drilling a gun hole on it.
Point costs would still be needed to differentiate bolters from plasma cannons/lascannons, but I do prefer if options come with a downside beyond just points.

I like the way you think. Problem is that this is probably a level of complexity beyond what GW wants in its rules, and it would be less complex to just... make the sponsons a points upgrade.

 Wyldhunt wrote:

 Sgt_Smudge wrote:
Pardon me for asking, but why? Why is there a difference between Tacticals being "meant" to take specials weapons and Kabalites not? Guardians without a support platform is simple - introduce a rule pertaining to the platform where it, say, prevents the unit moving. Or, have a compulsory support platform, but you choose which kind that best suits what you want.

If GW is saying "yes, this is what they're supposed to do and act like", then I don't have an issue with them making systems where that's what they have. In much the same way that Tactical Marines are supposed to have bolters, so they're armed with bolters.

Fair question. I think that removing the option to take cheaper, smaller versions of those units makes it feel like I've sorta kinda lost one of the units from my codex. Like, taking a 5-man kabalite squad with a single blaster or even just a dirt cheap naked kabalite squad for scoring purposes or to fill a transport, was a satisfying unit option that played very differently from a 10-man unit rocking multiple darklight weapons. I actually like the 10th edition version of kabalites (well, I like their sticky objectives rule), but it would have been so easy to just keep the option for a smaller, humbler squad without sticky objectives. Similarly, I used to enjoy running guardians without a platform to make them slightly cheaper and to save space in a wave serpent. Just making the platform an add-on that costs X points regardless of the gun on it would have been simple enough, so the absence of choice rankles.

Tacticals are slightly different in that, to my knowledge, it's pretty odd for a codex compliant chapter to carry around 5 bolters instead of mixing in a flamer or whatever.

Strong agreed on the removal of 5 man squads in units that could be both 5 or 10 models. Tactical Squads, Battle Sister Squads, etc - while I always took my Tacticals in 10 man units, having the option for a half-sized squad meant that I could take a small unit to fit into smaller transports or fit into my list better, if I happened to have just enough left over.

Again, I think maybe that's more a lack of 5 model units, as opposed to having special weapons in those units. Again, I want to say I'm not opposed to paying for *some* upgrades, especially ones that do drastically change the entire unit's operation (sponsons on tanks that have the option not to have one, support platforms, embedded heavy weapon teams, etc), but for things like sergeant weapons and squad special weapons, I think it's fair to assume that GW want those to be compulsory/encouraged. I would just hope that those options were all equally balanced around one another.

With the new rules, I don't feel irritated that some of my sergeants are built suboptimally. Between my fist guy and my claw guy, one of them is probably straight up more efficient against targets I'd reasonably throw them at. But I'm not irked about the fist guy or the claw guy. I'm irked about the basic bolter sergeant.

Previously, it was suboptimal to give my fist and claw guys their toys, but I felt like I was getting something in return for that suboptimal investment. (Their improved offense.) If taking those toys had been optimal, then my basic bolter sergeant would at least feel like he was saving me points that I could put to use elsewhere. In both cases, there's a silver lining to my suboptimal build. In contrast, there's no longer a silver lining. I'm just playing at a disadvantage.

I think part of it is also that building optimally now means making your squad leaders look really same-y. Like, of course all my sybarites have blast pistols and grenade launchers and sybarite weapons because why wouldn't they? Previously, the minutia of having a grenade guy vs a rifle guy could be a source of personality for the models, and you'd save a few points for having those distinctions. Now, if you ever find yourself in a situation where you wish you had a blast pistol, you've screwed yourself if you didn't take one. You can't shrug and go, "Well, I put those points towards an upgrade for my raider." You're just getting punished for fielding variety.

I think though that last paragraph could swing both ways. List building "optimally" in previous editions meant that there was no real need for certain upgrades because you were just wasting points. I mean, a plasma pistol on a Devastator Sergeant is very rarely going to be worth, well, anything. And you might well find yourself in a situation thinking "damn, if only I hadn't wasted those points on making my model look cool and have a personality, I should have just taken them with a bog standard chainsword and bolt pistol and give those points to a melta bomb, curse me for wanting my backfield sergeants to look cool".

It's just a different kind of "optimisation" now. Before, you were soft-encouraged not to bother with many upgrades. Now, you're encouraged to take them. And sure, there's a "best" option - but there was beforehand anyways. And people would spam that option if they wanted to.

The way I see it, for us who just want our sergeants to have fun unique wargear, we were always being "suboptimal".

I'm just the same - all my Guardsmen sergeants only use chainswords and laspistols (or other CCWs that fit in for the chainsword), because they're not privy to the fancy toys for the higher ranks. I prefer them that way, as opposed to having plasma pistols and power fists on every one - but the difference is that I don't care about the fact I'm not taking the "optimal" option. GW has always had options that were more optimal, even with points. I don't see why this changes anything for me, personally.

See above. Basically, the new system creates FOMO where the old system provided a silver lining for taking the suboptimal build.

I very rarely ever felt that silver lining, I'm afraid. And, as much as you say you feel disadvantaged now, I always felt disadvantaged for bringing fun weapons which rarely ever did anything different in the course of the game. Now, I finally feel like I can equip my models with the fun stuff now.

Or would you have preferred if GW said you can ONLY bring units of 3 or 6?

Weirdly enough, I think I might prefer the stricter unit size. I'm in a similar position with several of the units I own. Not to make too big a deal of it, but fretting over whether to pay 5 models worth of points for 3 models worth of value is oddly stressful and doesn't feel great. So requiring a specific unit size would at least mean I wouldn't find myself considering the larger unit size at all when I sit down to list build. But maybe I'm wrong.

Again, I think this is more a case of what people are "used" to. People have been used to the idea of taking units with one or two missing models to save on points, and perhaps this has been against what GW has intended. Whereas, with units which have had fixed sizes and so on, there's no such outcry, because people have been used to it.

I can get only so upset about whether my stuff is optimally built. Optimal loadouts even under points would regularly change 2-3 times a year.

 Sgt_Smudge wrote:
It's just a different kind of "optimisation" now. Before, you were soft-encouraged not to bother with many upgrades. Now, you're encouraged to take them. And sure, there's a "best" option - but there was beforehand anyways. And people would spam that option if they wanted to.

This is technically correct but completely missing the point.

If a laspistol is 0pts, a bolt pistol is 1pt, and a plasma pistol is 2pts, that's not good pricing and the optimization is straightforward. You'll probably see plasma pistols on most characters expected to shoot things, laspistols on characters that won't be fighting, and only WYSIWYG players will have bolt pistols.

And yet it's still better than when the laspistol, bolt pistol, and plasma pistol are all 0pts, and there is objectively no reason whatsoever not to take the plasma pistol on every model. The incentive for optimization is stronger, the actual diversity of unit compositions is reduced, and players who aren't seeking to optimize their lists are at a greater disadvantage.

You're making it sound like if points costs aren't perfect and can be optimized, then it's functionally equivalent if points just don't exist and everything is valued equally. That's a false dichotomy, and a pretty extreme one at that. Setting all costs to 0 isn't fixing the problem of points costs not accurately reflecting value, it's magnifying it.

Besides, letting your sergeants take fun toys was always possible under a points-based system if the costs were set appropriately. The problem highlighted with the Devastator plasma pistol example reflects GW's decision to give wargear items universal costs regardless of what utility they actually provide to the unit in question, but it didn't always work that way. A plasma pistol on a Dev sergeant has less utility than one on an Assault sergeant, so ought to cost less, and I'm sure you could find a non-zero cost where it's worth considering.

And you can certainly make the free-wargear system work through adjusting stats and introducing new rules to establish sidegrades, but it's an awful lot more difficult than adjusting points, and GW didn't even try. They threw the baby right out with the bathwater. For casual players who don't seek to optimize their lists it may not make a massive difference on the whole, but I've seen a tangible difference on the tabletop between armies assembled pre-10th and post-10th, and I now find listbuilding to be a frustrating and railroaded experience.

While true, the point is that when I am fielding suboptimal army lists (which I often do), I still try to maximize the potential of the army list within the theme and concept I'm building around, because I still like to win games occasionally.

If I wanted to field my lasgun infantry guard horde as I did in previous editions, I'm at a big disadvantage, because I am paying for the special and heavy weapons that I am not taking. This leaves me less points available for the heavy weapon squads and artillery units that I used to field alongside them. Before I would shave off/save points by not taking those weapon upgrades in my infantry units so I could field that horde of massed infantry while still fielding a few dozen missile launchers and lascannons via other sources - and sure it was a gakky army, but it was still fun to play. That same army is basically unfieldable now, because everything costs more than it should and I have no way of saving points from one unit to spend on another.

A simple way to fix the left over points issue is to create a small set of universal wargear. They don't even have to be particularly strong or impactful; it would just feel a lot better to get to spend those points.

5 points for +1 leadership on a unit. 10 points to reroll a single hit roll once per game. 15 points to reroll a single save roll once per game. Boom, done.

Agreed. Doesn't even need to be universal, could be a faction specific armory or whatever open to all detachments that has basic upgrades for smaller points costs, with the enhancements being the more expensive "premium" upgrades that are detachment specific.

It's also worth noting that paying points for wargear does not have to mean that taking wargear is discouraged. If you want a game where people err on the side of taking wargear over fielding 'naked' units, you can easily do that by making wargear cheap relative to the units themselves. Points are first and foremost a shaping mechanism for the designer to encourage particular army compositions, a resource for players to consider and make decisions around, not an objective measure of an item's relative value in all circumstances. It's okay if the designer puts their thumb on the scale a bit to ensure that kitted-up units are optimal over naked ones.

And even if the designer does tacitly encourage you to take wargear, having some cost means you still have to consider whether a unit will get any use out of a particular piece of gear, and armies that are built around naked squads can still have a fighting chance even if they're suboptimal.

It's at least more interesting than 'take everything, no downsides'.

You can also make wargear worth spending points on by writing rules which allow for weapons to have a measure of effectiveness that isn't "lethality". That allows for actual sidegrade options, not the "we say these are sidegrades but almost always one is objectively better" situation that we currently have.

Do you take the weapon that increases your damage to a single model, such as a plasma gun, or do you take the weapon that makes you more likely to suppress the enemy you are shooting at, reducing the game effectiveness of an entire unit?

 catbarf wrote:

Besides, letting your sergeants take fun toys was always possible under a points-based system if the costs were set appropriately. The problem highlighted with the Devastator plasma pistol example reflects GW's decision to give wargear items universal costs regardless of what utility they actually provide to the unit in question, but it didn't always work that way. A plasma pistol on a Dev sergeant has less utility than one on an Assault sergeant, so ought to cost less, and I'm sure you could find a non-zero cost where it's worth considering.

I'm not sure I agree. The crux of min-maxing is taking every spare point out of things so they can be spent elsewhere. Even in a 2000.0 point system, plucking every 0.2 point plasma pistol off of your Sgts and other situational bits to add up to the 3 points needed to give some character a combi weapon or such. The bigger issue though is that differentiating by points is so incredibly fragile because the value comparison is easily destroyed by any change to the army. It's not enough to be "worth your cost". You have to be the right cost to fit. This is true of any point system, but that's my issue with granularity. I think locking things to a point value you have in mind gives you a better idea of how it fits into the army and forcing you to make something worth taking at that cost results in forcing designers to provide more meaningful distinctions between similarly priced units. Also, just to be clear, I'd feel very different if Plasma pistols went on every model in the unit and not just a Sgt. Then the lesser weapon truly serves no purpose.

 catbarf wrote:
It's also worth noting that paying points for wargear does not have to mean that taking wargear is discouraged. If you want a game where people err on the side of taking wargear over fielding 'naked' units, you can easily do that by making wargear cheap relative to the units themselves. Points are first and foremost a shaping mechanism for the designer to encourage particular army compositions, a resource for players to consider and make decisions around, not an objective measure of an item's relative value in all circumstances. It's okay if the designer puts their thumb on the scale a bit to ensure that kitted-up units are optimal over naked ones.

And even if the designer does tacitly encourage you to take wargear, having some cost means you still have to consider whether a unit will get any use out of a particular piece of gear, and armies that are built around naked squads can still have a fighting chance even if they're suboptimal.

It's at least more interesting than 'take everything, no downsides'.

I feel like you and I have been opposite sides of this discussion in the past, if so I'm glad to see you've finally seen the light. You're spot on. Points only really exist in the context of the rules and the meta, etc. They have no intrinsic objective value of their own, and are instead set in a manner appropriate to create force compositions that fit the vision of gameplay intended by the designer (and then need to be adjusted when the playerbase inevitably skews it in directions that were never intended but are otherwise valid interpretations of how to play the game). Setting a points system that incentives tooling up is a 100% valid interpretation of how to properly use and balance a point system. There is an argument that to be had that "untooled units are underpowered because upgrades are too cheap", but if that was the intended design of the game, then thats a feature not a bug and its up to the players to either accept it and move on or the designer to cave to pressure and compromise their vision.

 A Town Called Malus wrote:
You can also make wargear worth spending points on by writing rules which allow for weapons to have a measure of effectiveness that isn't "lethality". That allows for actual sidegrade options, not the "we say these are sidegrades but almost always one is objectively better" situation that we currently have.
Do you take the weapon that increases your damage to a single model, such as a plasma gun, or do you take the weapon that makes you more likely to suppress the enemy you are shooting at, reducing the game effectiveness of an entire unit?

Yep, this is why I suggested previously that a unit with a bolt pistol maybe gets "always strikes first" in melee rather than a straight lethality buff as an example of something you can do in order to make it a more competitive choice vs the plasma pistol.

Another thought is that most units have some sort of a "Datasheet Ability" in their profile. Perhaps a simple fix to this whole thing is that if you designate certain upgrades (specifically those which are transparently not a sidegrade) as "special", and if you elect one or more special upgrades you lose access to that units Ability. Then it becomes a tradeoff - do I want to give this Leman Russ sponsons, OR do I want to be able to reroll my hit rolls with the basic weapons it is equipped with? You can of course math-hammer that all out and determine that you should always take the plasma cannon sponsons anyway because its better in most cases to have the extra guns than it is the reroll, or something, but its at least a tradeoff and like with any tradeoff there will always be some who will debate the optimization point and say "well, the re-roll is my solution for dealing with this specific corner case scenario that I often encounter in my local meta, so for me I'd rather have the Datasheet Ability than the extra plasma cannons".

GW still knows how to do this, as Enhancements cost points (which makes the limit of 3 really strange... the limit would make sense if they were free, but they're not).

chaos0xomega wrote:
Personally fixed unit sizes are something I am 100% okay with.

...

Not being able to spend the last 50 points is a problem. its one of my biggest personal bugbears.

These two statements are in opposition to one another. Without fixed unit sizes, that leftover point problem wouldn't be a problem.

I could ditch a model or two from a unit and take something else, or maybe even use those last few points to bump a min-sized unit up a few models.

The other thing worth pointing out (again...) is that the strict unit size limitations are box based, and nothing else. It's why Spawn start in units of 2, and why Ripper "Swarms" now come in overwhelming max sized units of... 3.

It's such an awful change for the game.

Nah, you can keep fixed unit size, add larger points to back or a bigger menu of enhancements, and that problem is fixed.

Honestly I don't mind the whole limited unit sizes aspect*. That's not a huge issue to me. If anything yes it means you might get a few point gaps here and there, but if upgrades or at least weapon variety came back as a point based element that would easily balance that out without any qualms.

Honestly that change would have been welcome; it simplifies army building quite a lot and whilst it might cut down on some options; its more streamlining the army building process. Plus it in theory actually makes balancing out things like leader models a lot easier because now they will operate with fixed known sizes of units (in at least two or three unit sizes of fixed values).



*I do mind it when GW does daft things with it. Eg in AoS they use the same unit building format, but they have a strange way of dealing with banners and musicians. Instead of "1 per unit" its "1 per 10 models" with a unit being 10-30 models bought in blocks of 10. So you can end up with 3 banners and 3 musicians which just looks stupid to me (but only ever 1 leader!).

It's even worse for cavalry that come in sets of 5. Slaanesh seekers have an iconbearer; banner and muscian. Which means that at a full unit of 15 you've got:

1 leader
3 musicians
3 banners
3 icons
5 troops

So that's less troops than command

This is why I hate it when product specifications or limitations impact gameplay.

1. Tons of options being removed from characters. This wasn't done for balance reasons. It was done because the models have one weapon combo, so that becomes the only weapon combo (at which point it ceases to be a 'combo' and simply becomes what the unit is armed with).

2. No multiples of special weapons in squads. This wasn't done because of balance reasons. It was done because that's what's on the sprue.

3. Squad sizes being fixed. This wasn't done because of balance reasons. It was done because of how they're boxed.

4. GW's "recommended" table sizes. This wasn't done because of any in-game reason (certainly none of that "average kitchen table size" nonsense people have tried to peddle). It was done because their standard box size couldn't fit 1'x1' (or 1'x2' etc.) tiles, so they just made something smaller and called that "standard" (and everyone fething bought it like GW were doing them a favour).

None of these are game-based. None of them have any place influencing the damned rules of the game.

Table size I completely blame ITC. It was specified as a minimum and then itc went and said it would be the tournament standard so it became the only standard

It spread because of them, but it started because of GW's box limitations.