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I'm planning on heavily magnetizing my army, which brings up an etiquette question. What is the point of no return for customizing your army? Is it OK to see people arriving at my FLGS with lots of aircraft and quickly swap in some AA onto my team, or see a fleet of tanks and load up on anti-armor? It sounds a bit like cheating to me, but I'm not sure. If I play against someone who I saw playing earlier, can I customize my team according to that? Is adaptation to your opponents just another part of the game?

Thank you.

While list tailoring isnt inherently cheating. (like you can bring a counter meta army to an event if you really feel like it if you know that a majority of players will run a particular set up) but why are you bothering on stuff like this during pick up games and stuff? once people start figuring out you are going for cheap wins there will be social consequences.

and if its an actual event or tournament then changing your list mid game is 100% cheating.

List tailoring to that extent really isn’t a thing anymore like it used to be in earlier editions. Most people usually show up with a list already made and play that. While you certainly can do so, the way weapons and damage works now makes it less of a big deal to tech against armor vs infantry and your probably doing yourself a disservice by changing your list based on your opponent.

List tailoring is frowned upon, BUT GW is also including more and more sideboarding options.*

*If you're Imperial or Chaos.

 inirlan wrote:
List tailoring is frowned upon, BUT GW is also including more and more sideboarding options.*

*lf you're Imperial or Chaos. follow the true, four armed emperor.

Really it depends on your local meta. List tailoring is encouraged among the WAAC segment in my area, and the rest of us really don't pay it much of an attention.

Do you usually play Power Level at your FLGS?

If you're talking about casual pick-up games I can see taking advantage of magnets for on-the-fly list tailoring to potentially be really fun or really off-putting, depending on your intentions and how well you communicate them.

If for instance you had a list with lots of anti-infantry and your opponent showed up with an IG Armored Company, asking your opponent if you could swap a few heavy bolters for lascannons might go over well as it could give you both a better game.

On the other hand if in the same scenario you just start switching every single heavy bolter for a lascannon without saying anything I can see that being received very poorly.

My local meta is to play the list you brought. If you want to tailor for next time no one has a problem (because they probably won't be playing the same list either). I will also hedge this by saying my meta is generally take on all comers.

We commonly build our lists at the store after getting there and finding out who we're going to play.

And if I know who I'm going to play, I'll make a point to also know what they're probably going to bring and make sure I can handle in. In general, I try to appraise my local meta and produce a list that is designed to effectively defeat the things that generally exist in it.


The only reason I see to fix your list [other than, "I'm really happy with it"], would be if the specific case requires it be the same between matches, such as a tournament.

as someone who has a big collection I will almost always set my list up dependent on my opponent to shoot for a close game. If I know what they generally play I will bring things I know won't make the game boring or uninteractive for either player (won't bring a big screened gunline vs an all melee opponent, won't bring tons of psykers vs an army with no antipsyker protection, won't bring super fast melee vs an unscreened non-flying armor list, etc).

IMO life's too short and games take too long to guarantee yourself a win by tailoring your list vs your opponent. If you know you're up against all tanks, sure, you can bring all lascannons and the game iwll be done in 2 turns. Great. Do you feel like you earned that? Does it really improve your day? Now you just have to go home early when you could have spent an enjoyable afternoon playing the game.

List tailoring is pretty TFG behavior. It gives a huge advantage to the player with the most cash to spend on having all of the options it requires, a huge advantage to the player who gets to tailor second after seeing what everyone else has, and generally gives you cheap wins at the cost of making a fair and enjoyable game. Bring a TAC list and stick with it, use your magnets to give you options in building that list before you get to the store/club/whatever.

 Peregrine wrote:
List tailoring is pretty TFG behavior. It gives a huge advantage to the player with the most cash to spend on having all of the options it requires, a huge advantage to the player who gets to tailor second after seeing what everyone else has, and generally gives you cheap wins at the cost of making a fair and enjoyable game. Bring a TAC list and stick with it, use your magnets to give you options in building that list before you get to the store/club/whatever.

Agreed.

Only time tailoring would be acceptable is if both players were trying to create a narrative or battle from a story and wanted to build the lists around that.

 NurglesR0T wrote:

 Peregrine wrote:
List tailoring is pretty TFG behavior. It gives a huge advantage to the player with the most cash to spend on having all of the options it requires, a huge advantage to the player who gets to tailor second after seeing what everyone else has, and generally gives you cheap wins at the cost of making a fair and enjoyable game. Bring a TAC list and stick with it, use your magnets to give you options in building that list before you get to the store/club/whatever.

Agreed.

Only time tailoring would be acceptable is if both players were trying to create a narrative or battle from a story and wanted to build the lists around that.

This.

Also, it's kind of a corner case, but escalation leagues. If you see a definite trend (or if the league is structured so you know who you will be playing against week to week) then building your list to account for that is totally okay, since it's an advantage all players can participate in.

Usually a good idea to run it by your opponent. I’ve found the general etiquette is to bring a list and play it.

But I’ve also had excellent games where my oppponent and I told each other what we were going to play (IG Tank Spam, Eldar Wraith Host, SM Gladius, that sort of thing) and then we tailored to each other’s archetype. They were fun games too. I liked that both of our forces were “competent”. Nothing like bringing a Flamer against a Knight list to take the wind out of your sails. If you and your opponent both have the means, it’s also fun. Just talk about it before you play.

I have simple way to ensure nobody can do any list building vs me. They know my list only when game starts ;-)

Not that it's issue here anyway. Store is only open for so long so people come with list premade anyway to ensure max time for gaming. And seeing I have to leave earlier than others(home is in other town so need to catch up last train) if somebody starts designing list in front of me from scratch I'll pass game anyway. Even though he can't tailor yet not knowing my list anyway.

Building using Power Levels lets you do that, even if you write down your list of models beforehand. The "may swap X for Y" if the PL datasheets is just what you need.
But, making a TAC list is more polite.

If your group has a mix of power-gamers and casuals, treat tailoring on a player-by-player basis.
Will your casual opponent mind, or are they playing the only list their models allow for?
Does your power-gamer want a tough game, and an army they have to struggle against? Tailor away.
Against a new player, keeping the list the same will show them the benefits of a rounded list against a tailored one.

This is one of those topics that can get oddly rather heated when debated online between people who play in very different local communities.

In general I would say talk to your opponent about it.


My view:

1) List Tailoring is NOT bad, its simply playing the game well at the army building phase of the game not just the tabletop phase of the game. If you know you're going to play against a certain army and certain type of army there is no shame in designing your list to counter it.
Of course if you've agreed to a game and know your opponents army its fair that they know what army you are bringing too. In most clubs this would just be "hey I'm playing marines" type situations - ergo you're not telling them every unit just the faction. Of course if Dave always brings 3 land raiders in his Marine army you already know what is highly likely to be brought. Similarly if you were playing Tyranid and always took flying hive tyrants you'd expect Dave to use that information as well as a likely component of your army.

2) Army lists are made before the game and are not tailored during the game. Ergo make your list when you do but don't suddenly start editing it if you see your opponents army/boxes/list right before the match. Certainly you won't be changing things at the deployment phase

UNLESS you both agreed to do so prior to the match and are both given equal access to your opponents information.

3) Your local meta and individual opponent might well result in differences. For example if you know your opponent is a beginner, or has a very limited pool of models you might well tailor your list far less or not at all. Just as if your opponent is a powerful player with a lot of choices you might tailor more so.

Ergo context of the game is going to be critical and the big deciding factor and it might be that you won't know this information until you've played someone more than once or twice.


Most of these questions and issue happen in the pre-game phase. Ergo when you're basically talking with your opponent about setting up a game.
You might also have a generic list or two that you just throw down whenever you've got a random match to play. Esp if you didnt' pre-arrange a game and its just a pick up match at the store.





Remember most people will project their own desires for a match into discussions like this. Power games will encourage you to tailor whilst those who want a more casual air will demean it and look down on you for doing so and expect you to take more generic armies. And there's a whole rafter of variations between the two extremes.

And yes on one level there is a cost factor; those with more money and more transport can get more to the club to pick from than those with less of either or both. But that's the same in any game of this nature from magic the gathering to kings of war to warhammer etc... Again context is everything and any healthy club will have a variety of members and skills and backgrounds so there's rarely ever one best approach save to talk to your opponent about the game you're both going to play.

"List-tailoring" - in the sense of bringing lots of flamers because you've got an Ork army - is fine by me. I know what armies my friends have,m they know what I've got, and we'll let each other know when we arrange a game; "Fancy a game next week? I'll bring Space Wolves." "OK, I'll use Tyranids". It can backfire if I think he's bringing a swarm of gaunts and tool up for that, only to get stuck fighting a few huge monsters instead. In that situation, both sides are in the same boat, so there's no real advantage.

In the case of seeing what exact army list my friend is using, then designing mine to counter it exactly with him having no opportunity to reply? That's not really on.

You make a list before you get there and do not change it unless there's an obvious issue*, but you should both be reasonable people looking for a fun game so it shouldn't be an issue*

*Obvious issues involve when you show each other your set lists you just KNOW it's not going to be fun or even remotely close, discuss it between yourselves. I've had games where I rocked up with unknowingly the perfect counter to my opponents list and we just winged it and the game was a real nail biter, the way I like it!

Overread,

A thoughtful post - exalted!

@ the OP,

Magnets are great if you can manage them for units with options. As for list-tailoring, it all depends. Without knowing your local scene, I think that it is perfectly acceptable to tailor your list before you come to the store based on your best guess of the "meta." It's dodgy, though, to tailor after you arrive at the store and see what your opponent has brought. There will be exceptions - if you are open about it with your opponent and it gives him a better game then I suppose it's cool.

To me, the fun of list building is making a decision and living with it.

Cheers,

T2B

Of course if you've agreed to a game and know your opponents army its fair that they know what army you are bringing too. In most clubs this would just be "hey I'm playing marines" type situations - ergo you're not telling them every unit just the faction

That is not true. It would mean that not only everyone would have to own huge collections of models that are way above the size of a 2000pts army, but also transport them somehow. Also there are very few armies were saying the faction name doesn't tell most, if not all the units being run. Eldar soups are like that, maybe some IG builds. But everyone else? BAs without smash captins and scouts. No hellblasters in DAs, no cultists of some sort in chaos lists. It just doesn't happen.

Your local meta and individual opponent might well result in differences. For example if you know your opponent is a beginner, or has a very limited pool of models you might well tailor your list far less or not at all.

That is like saying that if you find a large sum of money on the street, you may return in to the police station. Not saying it doesn't happen, when it does there is always TV showing it, and here people always deem the person stupid. Plus again it requires people to have a huge collection. If one person picked a good army and has a standar IG with castellan, and the other thought that primaris look cool, the IG player has no way to nerf his army to not walk over the primaris player. Unless he on purpose plays bad, but why play at all then, if people have to let you win. Just tell the primaris player he won, and play a real game vs someone with a real army.

tneva82 wrote:
I have simple way to ensure nobody can do any list building vs me. They know my list only when game starts ;-)

Not that it's issue here anyway. Store is only open for so long so people come with list premade anyway to ensure max time for gaming. And seeing I have to leave earlier than others(home is in other town so need to catch up last train) if somebody starts designing list in front of me from scratch I'll pass game anyway. Even though he can't tailor yet not knowing my list anyway.

I still tell the story about that time I was playing in an escalation league and had to go up against a guy I usually avoided because he was so blatant with the list tailoring. He played Guard and had a list that was essentially just infantry squads with special weapons, heavy weapon teams, and leman russes, and he had every option magnetized and if you told him the faction you were playing you'd be met with an absolutely cartoonishly tailored list. Like, you say you're playing space marines, it'd be a list of 10 triple plasma executioners and a tiny infantry screen. Nids? there'd be 40 flamers, 4 triple-HB punishers, and 5 heavy bolter HWTs.

So I said "I'm bringing my orks!" and showed up with a dredd mob list of 6 deff dreads, 12 killa kanz, spanna boyz in a battlewagon and a stompa. Turns out I was up against about 60 flamers in special weapon squads, 3 hellhounds, and 5 leman russ punishers - how bout that?

 Overread wrote:

1) List Tailoring is NOT bad, its simply playing the game well at the army building phase of the game not just the tabletop phase of the game. If you know you're going to play against a certain army and certain type of army there is no shame in designing your list to counter it.
Of course if you've agreed to a game and know your opponents army its fair that they know what army you are bringing too. In most clubs this would just be "hey I'm playing marines" type situations - ergo you're not telling them every unit just the faction. Of course if Dave always brings 3 land raiders in his Marine army you already know what is highly likely to be brought. Similarly if you were playing Tyranid and always took flying hive tyrants you'd expect Dave to use that information as well as a likely component of your army.
.

2 issues with that. Either you have situation where the big model collection player will basically win everytime short of extreme luck by customizing perfect anti list. That or it will become "Here's my list. Here's my perfect counter. Okay so I change and here's perfect counter for your pefect counter. Ok I change to be perfect counter for your perfect counter of perfect counter". Basically list is never ending. And why one player should be allowed to tailor like that but not give other chance to do same? And if you limit numbers that you can only change once you make the one who has to tailor first be facing the perfect counter.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

the_scotsman wrote:

tneva82 wrote:
I have simple way to ensure nobody can do any list building vs me. They know my list only when game starts ;-)

Not that it's issue here anyway. Store is only open for so long so people come with list premade anyway to ensure max time for gaming. And seeing I have to leave earlier than others(home is in other town so need to catch up last train) if somebody starts designing list in front of me from scratch I'll pass game anyway. Even though he can't tailor yet not knowing my list anyway.

I still tell the story about that time I was playing in an escalation league and had to go up against a guy I usually avoided because he was so blatant with the list tailoring. He played Guard and had a list that was essentially just infantry squads with special weapons, heavy weapon teams, and leman russes, and he had every option magnetized and if you told him the faction you were playing you'd be met with an absolutely cartoonishly tailored list. Like, you say you're playing space marines, it'd be a list of 10 triple plasma executioners and a tiny infantry screen. Nids? there'd be 40 flamers, 4 triple-HB punishers, and 5 heavy bolter HWTs.

So I said "I'm bringing my orks!" and showed up with a dredd mob list of 6 deff dreads, 12 killa kanz, spanna boyz in a battlewagon and a stompa. Turns out I was up against about 60 flamers in special weapon squads, 3 hellhounds, and 5 leman russ punishers - how bout that?

That's actually rather funny. Touche.

Well these days killa kans and stompa are so bad you would lose anyway.

the_scotsman wrote:

tneva82 wrote:
I have simple way to ensure nobody can do any list building vs me. They know my list only when game starts ;-)

Not that it's issue here anyway. Store is only open for so long so people come with list premade anyway to ensure max time for gaming. And seeing I have to leave earlier than others(home is in other town so need to catch up last train) if somebody starts designing list in front of me from scratch I'll pass game anyway. Even though he can't tailor yet not knowing my list anyway.

I still tell the story about that time I was playing in an escalation league and had to go up against a guy I usually avoided because he was so blatant with the list tailoring. He played Guard and had a list that was essentially just infantry squads with special weapons, heavy weapon teams, and leman russes, and he had every option magnetized and if you told him the faction you were playing you'd be met with an absolutely cartoonishly tailored list. Like, you say you're playing space marines, it'd be a list of 10 triple plasma executioners and a tiny infantry screen. Nids? there'd be 40 flamers, 4 triple-HB punishers, and 5 heavy bolter HWTs.

So I said "I'm bringing my orks!" and showed up with a dredd mob list of 6 deff dreads, 12 killa kanz, spanna boyz in a battlewagon and a stompa. Turns out I was up against about 60 flamers in special weapon squads, 3 hellhounds, and 5 leman russ punishers - how bout that?

We've always done that in my group. And I'm generally aware of what people play and how they play them, so that I can prep my list. There was a period where a friend and I were in a perpetual escalation of power to answer what each other were bringing [deny their answer's effectiveness]. I think it's important to understand what your opponent brought last time, what it did well and what it didn't do, and predict what they're going to field and how they're going to try to win next time [and plan to defeat that]. You should never change your list after they tell you theirs, though.

That said, that much firepower skew is asking for trouble. You want a uniform defensive profile but a diverse offensive profile, otherwise you're asking for trouble.

My list is actually pretty fixed, because I'm pretty happy with it's ability to confront and defeat most lists that my meta will produce for it to face. There is, at best, only a couple of things that will change if I know I'm about to face specific people who run lists that are very different from the meta. Always being on the end of drawing up answers isn't entirely a good thing; you've also got to be presenting threats to control the way the game plays.

 Inquisitor Lord Katherine wrote:

the_scotsman wrote:

tneva82 wrote:
I have simple way to ensure nobody can do any list building vs me. They know my list only when game starts ;-)

Not that it's issue here anyway. Store is only open for so long so people come with list premade anyway to ensure max time for gaming. And seeing I have to leave earlier than others(home is in other town so need to catch up last train) if somebody starts designing list in front of me from scratch I'll pass game anyway. Even though he can't tailor yet not knowing my list anyway.

I still tell the story about that time I was playing in an escalation league and had to go up against a guy I usually avoided because he was so blatant with the list tailoring. He played Guard and had a list that was essentially just infantry squads with special weapons, heavy weapon teams, and leman russes, and he had every option magnetized and if you told him the faction you were playing you'd be met with an absolutely cartoonishly tailored list. Like, you say you're playing space marines, it'd be a list of 10 triple plasma executioners and a tiny infantry screen. Nids? there'd be 40 flamers, 4 triple-HB punishers, and 5 heavy bolter HWTs.

So I said "I'm bringing my orks!" and showed up with a dredd mob list of 6 deff dreads, 12 killa kanz, spanna boyz in a battlewagon and a stompa. Turns out I was up against about 60 flamers in special weapon squads, 3 hellhounds, and 5 leman russ punishers - how bout that?

We've always done that in my group. And I'm generally aware of what people play and how they play them, so that I can prep my list. There was a period where a friend and I were in a perpetual escalation of power to answer what each other were bringing [deny their answer's effectiveness]. I think it's important to understand what your opponent brought last time, what it did well and what it didn't do, and predict what they're going to field and how they're going to try to win next time [and plan to defeat that]. You should never change your list after they tell you theirs, though.

That said, that much firepower skew is asking for trouble. You want a uniform defensive profile but a diverse offensive profile, otherwise you're asking for trouble.

My list is actually pretty fixed, because I'm pretty happy with it's ability to confront and defeat most lists that my meta will produce for it to face. There is, at best, only a couple of things that will change if I know I'm about to face specific people who run lists that are very different from the meta. Always being on the end of drawing up answers isn't entirely a good thing; you've also got to be presenting threats to control the way the game plays.

In my experience the larger a gaming group gets, the more this behavior starts to garner you a TFG reputation. Not every faction in the game and not every person's collection has the luxury of tailoring to individual opponents, and it only takes a couple of games where you completely change around your list and hose someone off the table to start the cycle of people politely ignoring you when you try to set up a game.

Warlord Traits, Spells, Relics, and Reinforcements should be the only thing your adding/changing at the table.

With that said though, if I'm playing a pick up game with my knights, I allow people to change up.

Knights are not over powered and all lists have ways to play that can beat them, but if it helps the other person feel better about their chances, let them change.

And realistically, I estimate that well over half the time people change, it actually hurts them, more than it helps them.

Karol wrote:

Of course if you've agreed to a game and know your opponents army its fair that they know what army you are bringing too. In most clubs this would just be "hey I'm playing marines" type situations - ergo you're not telling them every unit just the faction

That is not true. It would mean that not only everyone would have to own huge collections of models that are way above the size of a 2000pts army, but also transport them somehow. Also there are very few armies were saying the faction name doesn't tell most, if not all the units being run. Eldar soups are like that, maybe some IG builds. But everyone else? BAs without smash captins and scouts. No hellblasters in DAs, no cultists of some sort in chaos lists. It just doesn't happen.

That's often not the reality of playing pick-up games at a local store/gaming group. IME, the vast majority of people aren't playing top tournament meta lists 100% of the time. I've played against many, many Chaos lists with no cultists, Eldar that weren't soup and didn't include any Shining Spears or Dark Reapers, Guard with all sorts of weird units you never see at the top tables (because - and this will shock you - not every single entry in that Codex is massively overpowered) to name but a few. My own BA rarely run a smash captain. Local metas are just that - local.

That gets to the heart of the OP's question. The answer, unhelpfully, is "it depends". Some groups are fine with it, others not so much. If you play in a sufficiently small group you'll probably find you end up list tailoring, even sub-consciously. My preference is to try to build good TAC lists for all my armies, mainly to avoid skewing results and therefore not really gaining a good understanding of how the army functions against different enemy types.

Your local meta and individual opponent might well result in differences. For example if you know your opponent is a beginner, or has a very limited pool of models you might well tailor your list far less or not at all.

That is like saying that if you find a large sum of money on the street, you may return in to the police station. Not saying it doesn't happen, when it does there is always TV showing it, and here people always deem the person stupid. Plus again it requires people to have a huge collection. If one person picked a good army and has a standar IG with castellan, and the other thought that primaris look cool, the IG player has no way to nerf his army to not walk over the primaris player. Unless he on purpose plays bad, but why play at all then, if people have to let you win. Just tell the primaris player he won, and play a real game vs someone with a real army.

This may have been mentioned before regarding your rather...unique...locale, but if this is the common attitude of people in your group it's an extremely toxic one and pretty much the definition of TFG behaviour. We're talking about a beginner here, not someone heavily invested in the game. If someone shows up with 1000 points of stuff from various starter sets the correct response isn't to refuse to play them until they man-up and build a proper-sized army and it isn't to take some hyper-competitive list to smash them in 20 minutes flat so you can get back to playing "real" 40k. The correct response is to try to build an army that will give them an interesting game in order to introduce them to the hobby and the game itself. Then, once they've figured out what all the numbers on those statlines actually mean, they might be in a position to figure out if they want to keep playing and may become a valued member of the local community.

My friend and I are in a similar position. We both only play eachother so our army collections over time have naturally evolved to counter eachother. And to an extent, it makes sense. "Brother Marines - this day we shall attack the vile tyranids in their lair. Grab thy flamers."

But yeah, there's a difference between that and picking apart and countering his specific list for a particular battle, that's poor form.

the_scotsman wrote:

 Inquisitor Lord Katherine wrote:

We've always done that in my group. And I'm generally aware of what people play and how they play them, so that I can prep my list. There was a period where a friend and I were in a perpetual escalation of power to answer what each other were bringing [deny their answer's effectiveness]. I think it's important to understand what your opponent brought last time, what it did well and what it didn't do, and predict what they're going to field and how they're going to try to win next time [and plan to defeat that]. You should never change your list after they tell you theirs, though.

That said, that much firepower skew is asking for trouble. You want a uniform defensive profile but a diverse offensive profile, otherwise you're asking for trouble.

My list is actually pretty fixed, because I'm pretty happy with it's ability to confront and defeat most lists that my meta will produce for it to face. There is, at best, only a couple of things that will change if I know I'm about to face specific people who run lists that are very different from the meta. Always being on the end of drawing up answers isn't entirely a good thing; you've also got to be presenting threats to control the way the game plays.

In my experience the larger a gaming group gets, the more this behavior starts to garner you a TFG reputation. Not every faction in the game and not every person's collection has the luxury of tailoring to individual opponents, and it only takes a couple of games where you completely change around your list and hose someone off the table to start the cycle of people politely ignoring you when you try to set up a game.

I'm not sure which of us is abnormal. The outspoke people seem to imply I'm abnormal, but I play in two different places in the nation, one of which has like 55 people who play, and we generally make our lists on-site after pairing off at both locations.

Crispy78 wrote:My friend and I are in a similar position. We both only play eachother so our army collections over time have naturally evolved to counter eachother. And to an extent, it makes sense. "Brother Marines - this day we shall attack the vile tyranids in their lair. Grab thy flamers."

But yeah, there's a difference between that and picking apart and countering his specific list for a particular battle, that's poor form.

I kind of miss the days where I would spend a few days after a battle thinking about what my friend did and how I was going to break it, and what I was going to field that he wouldn't be able to answer, and then put it to the test. The best feeling was after I had lost a couple of games in a row to one of his set ups, then coming up with something that was abnormal and left him with a stupid look on his face like "why'd you do that? That's what I wanted to do? Oh. gak." That said, we don't play multiple times a week anymore [due to practicality], and we've both become more laid back and have much better lists than we had at the time, and fine tweaks are nearly as fun to envision as a whole quarter or more of the army changing.

Well, if you're tailoring based on just what you've got in your bag, theres only so much you can bring with you, so I'd assume it's not as bad. most games are set up at least a few days in advance where I play, since we use an online forum to get our partners setup beforehand.