Chapter Tactics is a 40k podcast which focuses on promoting better tactical play and situational awareness across all variations of the game. Today Peteypab grabs Geoff, Val and a Special Guest to talk about the powerful combinations for Chaos in the wake of the new Vigilus book. The guys also go over chess clock etiquette, and speculate on the Adepticon meta and April FAQ.
Show Notes:
- Head on over to 40kstats.com for more faction stats for all major ITC tournaments!
- Support us on Patreon, this month and get a chance to win a free Shadowspear Box Set!
- Click here for a link for information on downloading best coast pairings app where you can find lists for most of the events I mention.
- Check out the last episode of Chapter Tactics here. Or, click here for a link to a full archive of all of my episodes.
- Commercial music by Music by: www.bensound.com
- Intro by: Justin Mahar
Not sure why people keep squirming that GW should make weird rules changes to summon fortifications or use fortifications in Battalions or whatever …
Why not just not use the 3 detachment “event recommendation”? Or not apply it to fortification detachments?
It seems really backwards that GW should change rules to accommodate a (somewhat dated, tbh) event recommendation that isn’t even a “rule” to begin with.
Just drop it and have fortifications, allow people to use the 6 patrol-detachment Dark Eldar thing, etc.,. etc..
>Why not just not use the 3 detachment “event recommendation”?
Because this has TONS of consequences beyond affecting how fortifications work. That you are even suggesting in such an offhand manner doesn’t really speak well to your understanding of the game.
>Or not apply it to fortification detachments?
Because there is little rationale to making a special exception for one type of detachment but not others. At that point, the Drukhari players will start arguing that they need a special exception for Patrols because of the special rules in their codex, and other players will say that Auxiliary Support detachments shouldn’t count, etc, etc. Not to slippery slope fallacy this, but unless you can provide a rationale why the Fortification Network should be exempted from the three-detachment limit (and “because it opens up options” doesn’t count), you’re kinda walking on empty air.
I understand it has other ramification.
But it’s still weird you demand GW change rules, because you feel constraint by something that isn’t actually a rule in their game.
If you feel constraint or unduly limited by what is essentially a personal houserule (even if it is among the houserules GW suggests people might wanna play around with), change the houserule. Don’t ask GW to change the game to accomodate the houserule. That just doesn’t make sense and it certainly starts the same slippery slope: ETC doesn’t allow FW, but I feel I should play Deredeos, so GW put em in the Codex. Format X doesn’t allow superheavies but I feel I should play Knights, so GW make Knights normal heavy support. Etc..,etc…
I don’t have the perfect answer. All I am saying is that it’s not GWs job to fix that, because it’s not a problem that actually exists in the rules as written.
If you feel like a fortification slot in the Battalion detachment is the way forward, just do it. Adepticon uses their own detachment types instead of the BRB detachments, no? Maybe a set of ITC detachments to go along with ITC missions (where you aren’t relying on the normal 40K rules either) is something to consider?
>because you feel constraint by something that isn’t actually a rule in their game
The fact that it is included in their Matched Play rules indicates it’s a little more than a “house rule” as you suggest. I mean, if you’re taking that perspective, then playing with specific points values are also a “house rule”- just let people bring as many models as they want!
Geoff, Josh, Pablo, and Val suggest the change to fortifications because they think it will result in a better player experience, not because you have decided that some of GW’s rules are only “house rules.”
>All I am saying is that it’s not GWs job to fix that,
It literally is their job. Fixing problems with the game by updating the core rules- and yeah, detachment limits are a core rule- is in fact the _definition_ of their job.
>If you feel like a fortification slot in the Battalion detachment is the way forward, just do it.
So here’s the thing: people absolutely can do it, but that doesn’t actually solve the problem as a whole. We could “fix” the Castellan by simply deciding to not allow it in tournaments, but that sort of individualized and arbitrary decision was exactly the problem that caused fragmentation of the community back in 4E and 5E. The reason ITC has been as successful as it has is because it avoids making those kind of sweeping changes to the game- because organizations that do very rarely manage to convince anyone outside of their small circle of friends to use their weird variation on things. So ITC could certainly announce such a change to their format, but doing so would be entirely self-defeating.
Sorry.
But the 3 detachment limit is not a matched play rule and not a core rule or any kind of rule in the 40K rules.
And it is itself just arbitrary. It’s a fine number, but it’s not in any shape or form superior or more rational or less arbitrary or less individualised than saying the magic number is 4.
Or 7.
Or 2.
Or one of each type of detachment.
Or whatever.
> So here’s the thing: people absolutely can do it, but that doesn’t actually solve the problem as a whole. We could “fix” the Castellan by simply deciding to not allow it in tournaments, but that sort of individualized and arbitrary decision was exactly the problem that caused fragmentation of the community back in 4E and 5E.
Than why does ITC change things like missions or terrain? Unlike the 3 detachment limit, those ARE actual rules in the rulebook.
Seems counter-intuitive to me, that you are worried about “changing too much” when you’re talking about an optional footnote recommendation, but have no qualms changing things far more integral to the game without a second thought?
Clearly, faithfulness to the rules isn’t a principle the ITC applies in all cases, and changing an event recommendation that isn’t even part of the rules would strike me as a significantly “lower tier” change than changes to things like terrain or win-conditions of missions.
Re-reading the event-guidelines on 3 detachments, GW even writes in this “rule” very explicitly, quote:
“Of course, if you are organising such an event, you should feel free to modify these guidelines to better suit your event’s own needs, schedule, etc.”
GW literally encourages you to modify this specific thing about 3 detachments, if you feel like it isn’t working. Allowing people to take, say, an additional fortification detachment would be precisely such a modification directly linked to the verbatim text of the 3-detachment-guideline which explicitly encourages tinkering with it.
Come on AP, the ITC changes rules all the time, enclosed buildings? Fixed game length? Missions? Wobbly model to solve the assault up levels problem, etc. In past editions we made wholesale changes to rules, via either top down push from the TO committee or by player vote (it is true that most of the changes ITC made were eventually canonized through GW changing to match). But to claim that ITC plays a pure version of the game is just crazy.
The issue is a Fortification detachment is much weaker than any of the others. If you let people bring 4 detachments, most are going to add another Battalion for CP or something else that provides a larger benefit than 1-3 fortifications. But if you make a Fortification detachment free then any faction with good fortifications gets a buff while everyone else gets nothing.
Other TO/ITC rules deal with issues GW hasn’t dealt with (Eg. ruins with 4 walls and a roof, time limits), not with unit balance and list construction. Matched play was designed for a variety of missions, so using ITC missions is not modifying a “core rule”.
@AllHail
There is no ruins with 4 walls.
That’s another artefact of ITC house rules.
A non-ruined, building in 40K rules is embarked and disembarked from like a vehicle and can be interacted with, for example with Imperial Fist rules.
If it’s a ruin, it has holes in it and can never ever fully block line of sight (not even on the first floor). Because it’s a ruin. That’s kinda the definition.
Pretty straightforward actually.
That sounds like a house rule you just made up Zweischneid.
Please cite the main rule book page where I can find these ruin rules for
“There is no ruins with 4 walls.”
“If it’s a ruin, it has holes in it and can never ever fully block line of sight (not even on the first floor). Because it’s a ruin. That’s kinda the definition.”
That’s kind of a made up house rule, doesn’t appear in the rules as far as I can tell.
It is a rule. Just because it’s “suggested” doesn’t make it less of a rule. All the rules are suggested and events can change any of them.
>GW literally encourages you to modify this specific thing about 3 detachments
Sure, sure. But what are they asking you to modify? That’s right- a _rule of the game_. Now, you might consider this rule optional, but GW tends to regard ALL of the rules as optional, so I don’t think this makes it particularly noteworthy in that respect.
>And it is itself just arbitrary.
All of the rules of the game are arbitrary. GW wrote them whole cloth. Space Marines hitting on 3+s is an arbitrary rule of the game, but it doesn’t make it any less a rule of the game.
And ITC has changed some rules of the game- to great resistance, I will add. Enclosed ruins were quite recent- do you remember the uproar that caused? That was a very minor rules change in the scheme of things, since the “1st floor ruin” rule was already in effect and Enclosed Ruins merely modified that further, but it still garnered an incredible amount of antipathy. Larger changes would get exponentially greater pushback, I’m fairly sure.
As for missions, those are something of a different animal. There is a long tradition of changing the core missions because they’re bad, or simply to make things different. You can’t really point a finger at ITC in particular on that one because there’s hardly a tournament out there that uses the core missions unchanged.
>But if you make a Fortification detachment free then any faction with good fortifications gets a buff while everyone else gets nothing
This guy right here, he gets it.
I have to comment on one point
“>But if you make a Fortification detachment free then any faction with good fortifications gets a buff while everyone else gets nothing
This guy right here, he gets it.”
Making fortifications more accessible through any means will have the outcome of “army with good fortifications gets a better outcome”. It doesn’t matter if it’s by having free Fortification slots or it is instead available in a Battalion or something else, it will always end that way.
Don’t get me wrong, I have no qualms with advocating for changes to existing detachment force org. slots (or however that sentence should be written) to make fortifications easier to field, but the argument that making the existing ones free to use (detachment-wise) would benefit more than adding them another way doesn’t make sense.
I don’t think that’s entirely accurate- allowing to take a fortification for “free” (i.e. without a slot) carries a far, far lower opportunity cost than many of the other potential solutions. All of the solutions have upsides and downsides, of course, but just letting players take another detachment- or increasing the detachment limit itself- is a larger change than most of the others.
Also, while I am not aware of Adepticon FAQs/Houserules, normally you wouldn’t be able to move a Jackel unit with Drive-by-Demolitions if it arrived as reinforcements, just like you aren’t able to move something that arrived as reinforcements with Warptime or Fire and Fade or Move! Move! Move!, etc.. in the same turn (The D6″ move in Perfect Ambush is explicitly and exception, I believe).
Good catch. I was actually thinking of trying something involving that. Glad I saw this before I did it on the table.
Solid catch, I didn’t even think of that limitation. Glad I saw this before I went there this weekend. Thank you.
I was thinking the same thing.
Also, the +1 to hit and to wound strat starts saying “Use this Stratagem before a RUSTED CLAW BIKER unit from your army shoots in your Shooting phase”, so you could use it at the actual Shooting phase, but not at the movement phase when poping the “A PERFECT AMBUSH” stratagem.
The combo is still very good, though. Let’s see how it performs!
I wondered that as well, the only thought on that was the Perfect Ambush stratagem using the terminology that “shoot as if it was your shooting phase” and I thought that had been supported via previous FAQ’s, I would have to verify for sure though.
Yeah there is precedence as long as the ability and the strat are tied to a phase and work “as if its” that phase. For example Swarmlords move ability is done “as if its the movement phase” and the errata specifically gives option to use the kraken double advance strat in that case which is done “in the movement phase”. I don’t think a blanket errata has been made for those types of interactions, but seems common enough to make a ruling.
“As if” has never been defined by GW. There are rulings that suggest it is “exactly as” and other that indicate that you follow the rules for the phase but are not considered “in” the phase.
Yeah, there has been a lot of back and forth on that for a while. With Zweischneid’s nice catch above about not actually being able to use the move part of the strat on the turn it pops out of ambush, it would be better to just keep the unit as a 5 man unit and only focus on the shooting phase aspect of it, a lot less CP intensive that way as well.
Great show guys. Geoff was savage as usual and everyone bouncing good ideas and options off each other. This groups has a really good chemistry.
Listened to the show at last, fantastic.
Banter was great, constant laughter really added to it.
Great episode. Had me laughing out loud a couple of times.