Hey Everyone, Reecius here from Frontline Gaming to talk about the 40K champs after the dust has settled at Adepticon.
Most of you know already that Nick Nanavati took the top spot once again, which is a feat only previously done once by Bill Kim. Congratz to Nick! Well played, buddy. You have certainly cemented your place as a top level player.
The championships was again a great event. The fun, the competition, the gorgeous armies, the friends. It really is a celebration of the hobby we all love. Adepticon is an event any lover of miniatures gaming should go at least once.
The meta though, as predicted, was a bit stale. Over 50% of the armies there used Eldar, Tau or Space Marines in some fashion. And, Daemons were also a force, just as predicted. Lastly, as I called (to no one’s surprise) Inquisition was everywhere. In the finals, nearly every list that could take Inquisition, did. So am I bringing this up to pat myself on the back? No, not at all. Just pointing out that the imbalance in the game is at an all time high, currently. Yes, there have always been power lists. We all know this. But what we have now is unit combinations that become SO points efficient that it approaches absurdity. TinBane posted the numbers to explain this concept to those less mathematically inclined over at FLG, which you can read here.
The data there explains concretely what most of us already know intuitively: that some units are unfairly good for their points cost. A unit that becomes almost invincible due to rerolled saves, is fast, fearless, hard hitting and in general an order of magnitude better at everything than anything else in the game is not only good, it is too good. These units should cost many, many more points than they do to justify their power, but don’t. Thus they obviously become the competitive choice as they are hyper points efficient.
7/16 players took Eldar in some way, 4 of those were Beastars. 9/16 took Inquisition. It’s like Grey Knights from two years back, all over again. And it’s not just here, either. The UKGT had 7/10 Eldar in the finals. 5 of them were Beaststar lists. The writing is on the wall. It’s not to say that these players are not good (they are) but that these specific Deathstars are too powerful.
One of the keys to writing a good list in 40K is reducing variables. Chance is just that: chance. It is fun and creates exciting moments, but it is totally outside of player influence. Too much of it and the game feels like it is playing itself, and that skill in the game takes a backseat. The more variables you take out of the game, the more the outcome is determined by player choice. While that is good in general terms in my mind (I don’t want to play a game that is totally random), if you go too far down that road you end up with Chess. Chess is a great game, but the craziness of 40K is part of its charm. The key though, the art of the design process, is to strike the right balance between randomness and player determination of outcomes. We want enough of the random element to create the tense, fun moments we all love, but not so little of it that the game becomes overly predictable.
This is exacerbated when only one of the armies in a game are subject to randomness and the other is not. It creates a grossly imbalanced situation. When my Riptide rerolls to hit at BS9 due to marker lights, wounds on a 2, possibly with rerolls, ignores cover, armor saves, etc. it’s shot becomes many, many, many times more powerful than my opponent’s shooting that might miss, might not wound, and might bounce off of my armor or cover, etc. Even if that weapon is more powerful than my Riptide’s, it isn’t as good because it may not do what you want it to but often, costs the same or less points. That is imbalance.
The same goes for rerolling saves. If I can reroll my 2+ save it is not just twice as good as your 2+, it is SIX TIMES as good. Shouldn’t it then, cost 6 times as many points? They don’t. And therein lies the problem.
The top players will take Deathstar lists often to stay competitive with one another. I understand that 100%. If you are a player that is driven to win, then you will take the best tools available to you. However, now more than ever the result for the overall scene is games that are often foregone conclusions before they begin. Now, I am not saying Deathstars can’t be beaten. Highly skilled players can and do beat them. In fact, many of us enjoy the challenge. I do. But a casual player that doesn’t come to the table with the skillset they need to handle these lists gets utterly steamrolled. I have watched the impact it has on players many times and it isn’t pretty. It is also one of the root causes for the ongoing migration of 40K players to other games that has been slowly increasing over the past two years.
So what to do?
It’s time for some self restraint in order to have more enjoyable, more challenging, and more accessible tournaments for everyone. The best players will win in any meta. It really doesn’t matter. They are wired to find the most points efficient lists that exist and have the experience to master them relatively quickly. No matter the tools available to them, they will build the best possible lists. They will also almost always be the guys at the top tables as they have been, year after year. Changing the meta as a group really doesn’t impact them. Who it does impact is everyone else at the event that wants fun, fair games.
What we’re doing to limit some of the craziness is the following:
- Only two detachments in a list. What that means is you can take a primary and secondary detachments, but no more. Space Marines+Inquisition. Space Marines+Imperial Guard. But not all three. You can take add-ons that fit in your primary detachment such as Be’Lakor that won’t count towards your limit. This cuts back on the cherry picked Inquisitor that sits around throwing magical grenades and adding Servo Skulls randomly into lists as well as less of the ubiquitous Coteaz. You can still take Inquisition if you want, just not all of it at once. You have to make choices instead of just taking the best of everything. Too many Inquisitorial allies cuts down on variety as if you go to an event knowing 70% of the field will be able to totally shut down your Scouts/Infiltrators/Deep Strikers/Etc. people will choose not to bring those types of units. Plus, it is stupid to see an all Xenos army led by a Coteaz against Imperial armies…also led by a Coteaz. Yeah.
- Formations are in, but count as a detachment. This means you can take Skyblight or the Tau formation but at the cost of an ally. We find this to be quite fair and it makes Nids a top tier build who bring anti-Deathstar ability to the game to help balance the meta. Plus, it opens up some cool, fun lists.
- Imperial Knights are in. We would have done this anyway as Knights are super fun, but Imperial Knights can do sufficient damage to Deathstars with support to crack them and make them not so ludicrously durable. It will force players to think twice about taking a Star if Knights are on the prowl.
- Missions. Missions fundamentally change the game. By using the right missions in the right ratio, you can make units like Deathstars less viable by altering win conditions.
- Nerf the 2+ reroll save, which we have already done to a 2+/4+ -ed
These look like good ideas but what might these additions do to the top 16?
Less Inquisition/Coteaz certainly but the Eldar/Deldar armies will be just as powerful. Knights can hurt an inexperienced deathstar player but this will just widen the gulf between them and the top 16. Also, I wouldn’t expect a Knight army itself to reach the top 16, they’re a speed-bump at best.
I’m concerned that formations might harm even more the lower-tier players. Since Skyblight has a completely unique rule which impacts the way you play all missions I can see a player thinking they’ve secured a victory only to be informed that this formation ignores the contesting rules they’ve been playing for years.
I feel like the problem with tournaments isn’t at the top – these 16 players have the resources, mindset and sense of fun that allows them to compete and win within any set of rules you might throw at them.
The top real problem is the high-bar for entry – the average, non-competition player will be in for a bad time if they want to come to a tournament, unless they take a net-list… then they will get grilled for being a “net-lister” and ruining the scene.
The second major problem is the “low-bar for exit” – an average person without the time, money or inclination to buy and learn the current army-of-the-month has little incentive to stick with competitive play.
I don’t really agree with your analysis, honestly. You have some good points, but I think your conclusions are a bit off.
Some players will be taken off guard by Skyblight at first, but not a second game. It is difficult to stop it but, in comparison to say, Seercouncil, it is pretty dang mild. You can actually kill it. Given the choice, I think most players would choose to face Skyblight.
And yeah, less Inquisition in the specific context of the top 16 at Adepticon may have made little difference, it would have mad it harder for them to get there in the first place. And, limitations make for more diversity. I see it only as a positive.
To be honest my concerns with Skyblight and other unique formation rules are relatively minor – only that they’d have a (slight) negative impact on the lower tier players whilst not addressing the concerns with the current meta.
I assume you’d have to declare upfront if you’re using a Formation? Do you have any tournament rules requiring players to explain their armies before a game?
Yeah, we’re open list, meaning you have to say what does what in your list if your opponent asks.
Nerfing rerollable 2++ saves is a pretty significant nerf to Eldar/DE.
Not significant enough apparently (see LVO champ).
The only real problem with 6th ed is teh fact that far too many tUSRs are carried over from characters to units. With the addition of allies the number of possible broken combos are legion. I mean why would 50 jarheads suddenly gain hit and run because a white scar libby joined them? Why do SM centurions befome better shooters when a fishhead xenos ( sorry tau buffcommander) joins them?
Eliminate battle bros and you will hurt most stars.
After that nerf the 2+++ saves some way and the age or the absurdly unrealistic nonsense star is ogone
We do nerf the 2+ reroll saves to 2+/4+. It helps a great deal.
The issue with the stars though, is that most of them can be made within their own book. Allies make them better, but taking allies away doesn’t get rid of the stars themselves.
Keeping battle brother IC’s from joining units outside their codex keeps things like hit and run being applied to units that shouldn’t have it. Jetseers are a lot less painful to deal with when you can properly tar pit them.
Reecius,
I think the blame for the current mess that is 40k is solely the fault of GW. they could care less about creating a fun balanced game and are blindly stumbling around in the dark trying to grab as much cash as they are starting to tank. The financials demonstrate players are voting with their wallets and it will only get worse until they take ownership of the situation.
Every solution you create can be undone by some data slate put out two weeks before your event. Planning or play testing for anything is impossible. The game is stupid, imbalanced, and unenjoyable. Did you catch the critical strike team at the team tournament this year?
Their theme was Games Workshop corporate greed edition and the were pretending to be GW executives and stockholders. They had a scathing pamphlet about GW and their board was covered in money. The gist of the point they seemed to have been making was GW has ruined the game in their fumbling efforts to grab cash and us, the players, are suffering. The theme must have resonated, because I was told they were in the running for best spirit day two.
I think it’s really sad 40k players hate and despise GW that much but keep playing this unfun and poorly balanced game. In my opinion no matter what you do as a TO, you are going to be working at cross purposes with GW, who is doing their best to unbalance the game.
It seems that GWs general attitude towards the game (besides their money-grab mentality) is very laid back. Sure, we all know that they are happy sitting back to rack in the money, and spend less time on actual rules that make sense.
But from the beginning of the BRBs, it says to play with whatever rules you like.
At some point, like a child finally leaving the home after 18+ years, we (as a community) need to make decisions on our own and not expect Mom and/or Dad to tell us what to do (or how to play the game).
FLG knows this, and is working with other TOs to set common ground rules for competitive play. I am just waiting for them to output something more “official” than their tournament FAQ. I would love to see a run down of every misinterpreted rule, with the common agreed upon interpretation, in a single document. Call it the “Competitive Play FAQ”.
In 23+ years of the military I have found that all it takes is for someone to step up and lead, and the rest will follow.
The game can be very, very enjoyable. And is, for 90% of the playerbase. It is literally only tournament players and those who are unfortunate enough to have utter powergaming arseholes in their local clubs that have a problem with the ruleset.
Now i’m not saying that the rules are perfect, or good even. but its completely possible to have great, fun games using this system. People like you shooting your mouths off that GW is for some reason deliberately screwing with us and that you can never play a fair game of 40k do nothing to help the problem and turn new players away from a fantastic casual game.
There are many games out there for casuals that are better designed, cheaper, and more fun than 40k. I’m not sure why a new player casual would bother.
Infinity is a lot more fun as a semi-casual game in the slot that 40k fills for most people, and the armies are much cheaper (though you need a lot more terrain, but at the same time, the infinity terrain looks awesome). Warmachine is a better competitive game. And, really, if you’re getting drunk with friends, it really doesn’t matter what game you’re playing. So where does that leave 40k? It has momentum going for it, and that’s it.
It still has the best models I guess
The best models ever made were Rackham metals. Too bad the game was poorly marketed & the company poorly run. RIP 🙁
Hmm that sounds familiar…
Fun is something subjective to the individual. You can say 40k isn’t fun for you, and that you know people who don’t have fun playing it, but you can’t make a blanket statement that it isn’t fun. I find 40k very enjoyable, and my FLGS just started a 40k league with several new players.
The problem is that 40k is a casual game. If there are rules issues, you handle them with courtesy and maybe even a dice-off. 6th isn’t meant to be a cut-throat competition. To be fair, this is GW’s fault. 5th was fairly balanced and GW had their own tournament and tournament support back then. They’ve since pulled out, re-written/randomized the rules, and left competitive players flapping in the wind.
IMO it’s a terrible business decision.
Judging by the Atlanta 40k scene, I would say that the GW customer base follows the Pareto Principle (also known as the 80-20 rule), which is a common business rule that most of your sales comes from a small proportion of your customers.
In Atlanta, with only a few exceptions, the tournament players are also the players who drop ridiculous amounts of money on the game. The players who have game rooms in their house, who own 6 different armies, who buy every single supplement … are also the players who care deeply about rule balance and travel across the country for tournaments. They’ll buy an entire new army just to keep up with the meta. Reece has backed this up before by observing the sales patterns in his store.
GW’s sales have roughly mirrored what you would expect from their decisions. When they ramped up their rules releases in the Spring of 2013, sales went up because competitive players needed to keep up with the rapidly changing meta. This also caused the non-competitive big spenders to be some of the first to switch systems. They weren’t having as much fun playing the new power lists. One guy around here stopped the first time he played against Necron air force.
Now sales are dropping because the competitive players are fed up with the terrible balance of the game. The decision makers at GW might justify their decisions by saying that “the majority of 40k players aren’t really competitive and just play for fun”, but I would bet money that GW’s biggest customers are also in the minority that *do* care about game balance, and GW will be feeling this financially over the coming months.
Who are the players that GW is catering to? Who are these people that buy thousands of dollars of miniatures, but just like to throw them on the table, chug beers, and go LOL when their weak theme army gets annihilated. I only know one or two people like this, but there aren’t many out there.
^yup
I wouldn’t say that the game is enjoyable for 90%. In my area we’ve seen probly 50%+ of the player base move to other games or just drop out over the last 3-5 years. I’d guess that other areas are seeing significant loss as well since my area is a quintessential melting pot.
That was a pretty brutal, but, unfortunately, pretty accurate, too.
I’d recommend an additional rule:
Use the 1.1 Eldar FAQ ruling that says that neither Guiden or Conceal can be cast on Dark Eldar allies. In conjunction with p39 of the 40k BRB (IC rules), this means that Beast Stars should never have received a 4++ re-rollable…
That is one solution.
In games, things should have a resource cost that represents the item’s usage in its most powerful state. Anything that generates a 2+ re-rollable (or, for that matter, a 3+ re-rollable) should be astronomical in points cost regardless of what it does in a non-broken list.
Again, I submit that re-rolling saves is way too volatile in its current state. It is an exponential bonus, not a flat bonus. The better your save is, the more powerful the ability becomes. That makes re-rolling saves far too powerful in a general sense and unless we can rein it in at a fundamental level, I don’t think we can fix the problem.
The 2+ re-roll certainly is bad for the game, but I don’t think its the crux of the issue (looking at the info posted here and other places, that wasn’t the top Star, or at least that mechanic was the desired mechanic that was repeatedly exploited). IC BB look to be the top issue, that along with every army suddenly viewing all others as heretics.
the 2+ re-roll is only one among many
2+ re-roll
BBICs
Everyone and their Uncle is a heretic
360 degree arc torrent that has range of the entire board
Abundance of Flyers
among others
but the top two are what put most players off, FLG already did a good job nerfing the first one, we just need to nerf the second one
While I agree there are other problems, I don’t think the FLG solution goes far enough.
We do nerf the 2+ reroll, also.
Reece,
I for one applaud your efforts to rebalance competitive 40k. Based on the comments here and on BOLS, it seems to me like many players have no interest in taking steps to self-regulate the game, they just want to bitch about GW. Yes, we all know GW is not making a balanced game. If we want to play a more balanced game, we must take matters into our own hands or ragequit. Simply complaining about it and attacking GW (or you, for that matter) just creates a self-sustaining feedback loop of frustration.
All of your restrictions/modifications seem great to me. One thing I would add is to limit the amount of buffs a unit can have placed on it to one. Increased invulnerable or rerolled failed saves, but not both, etc.
Don’t let the unwashed masses dirty your efforts with their constant complaining. Thanks for stepping up and actually trying to do something constructive.
That’s not a bad idea, Pindlehaven, to have only a single buff at a time. That really cuts back on the stacked USRs that create game breaking units.
And thanks for the support!
Limiting it to buffs from only 1 IC at a time (or per turn or something) is another possibility that could be less restrictive – something like you can choose 1 IC (or normal character) per turn to be “leading” a unit, and they are the only one that can pass on any special rules to the whole unit for that turn. This could either encompass buffs from psychic powers too, or could allow for any one model in the unit to cast a single buff on it in addition to whoever is passing on special rules from wargear or whatever.
I may not have phrased it perfectly for what I’m thinking, but something similar to that could be a good idea to try out.
I really don’t see how you can let GW off the hook for their bad behavior. Basically they are creating an epic mess and the community is responsible for cleaning it up. TOs such as Reecius are faced with a herculean tasks of pulling all of this stuff togehter and balancing the game while GW is only concerned with selling more kits and releasing new rules/ dataslates that further create more imbalance. I think pressure needs to be applied to GW so they get the message. I have been sending a weekly email to the GW FAQ box explaining my concerns with the game. It is probabbly quickly deleted, but at some point enough people are going to stop playing “rage quit” as you say and their sales are going to to just completely tank.
Face it 40K is no longer a game that you can begin to play at your FLGS and have a basic army that can compete. If you have a few tactical squads, rhinos, dreadnought, and commander…the sort of army we all started with, you are going to get roflstomped by tau eldar etc etc. ….You can’t completely take balancing a gaming into your own hands when the designers of the game are continually putting out more content to cause further imbalance…like I have said a few times, you are working at cross purposes. I appleaud the effort on Reecius’ part he is a true saint and so is Frankie for that matter, but if the company that makes the game has no desire to create balanced rules trying to pick up the pieces after the fact is a very difficult task.
I agree with pretty much everything here. I’m glad to hear you are bombarding GW with complaints. I personally am just of the opinion that they will never listen.
I didn’t mean for it to seem that I was letting GW off the hook. Their behavior is concerning, especially to someone like me who has loved and appreciated their product for half of my lifespan. I’m just really tired of reading constant negativity about the game. We all know GW are being assholes, but we also know they are pretty much ignoring us as consumers. Complaining on internet forums has zero productivity. In my opinion, either do something about it, like Frontline gaming, or stop purchasing products from GW. Not directed at you (or anyone) personally, just expressing my opinion. Cheers.
Reecius
I think you hit the nail on the head. After talking to a lot of TO’s this past weekend I believe a lot of events are planning on doing what you just said.
Hey Jay, and thanks! Yeah, it is time we let go of our 5th ed “hands off the game” approach as if we don’t, it’s going to be pretty lame.
Reece,
I agree and if I did not live in South Carolina I would come to your events all the time LOL. The community must fix 40k. I also totally agree about the player restraint issue. If people felt bad about/ stopped running the obviously broken stuff the game would be much better.
I suggest changing the rules about rerolls so that you can only reroll UNMODIFIED saves. It is really strong but not over the top. The stacking of powers on top of each other is the real problem.
Keep it up Reece, people (TO’s) like you are the only way the community will ever overcome what GW has done to the game.
I’d love to see this. It would be in the spirit of doubling before adding which is a similar issue… if multiplicative modifiers came after additive modifiers, it would cause a situation where a doubling would become exponentially effective as the base number increased. Treating the re-roll as “multiplicative” and only allowing the re-roll number to be equal to the model’s base, unmodified save would be a really great step in the right direction.
We would just have to be very clear as to what constituted a base save. That’s easy to do with an armor save since it’s in a model’s profile, but other saves it’s a bit tougher.
For cover saves, perhaps it would be your single, best source of a cover save. For example, if you’re standing in open terrain and you’re both Stealthed and Shrouded, your cover re-roll would be 5+ because Shrouded is +2 and the best bonus you have. If, in this same example, you were obscured by a ruin as well, your re-roll would be a 4+ instead because that is the best bonus you’re getting.
This would still create situations where your save is 2+/4+ or even 2+/3+, but you would have to set it up to do so and players could still exploit your armor or invulnerable save depending on the situation. This methodology would ADD strategy to the game rather than reduce it.
Hey Baal Viper, thanks!
That’s an interesting idea, only unmodified saves. That really does solve a lot of issues.
Some of these comments are just making my point…if the designer of the game does not care about game balance and is consistently putting out new material that makes the worse and worse, your job as TO to make a competative and balanced FAQ is only going to be harder and harder. Your FAQs will have to be constantly updated and you will have to continually review cut off dates for new data slates. Not only that, but to be a TO and allow data slates, someone is going to have to buy all of them and read them…if you are running a small event good luck with buying all of them. GW is at fault for making this poor game and saying the community has to fix the mess after the fact is akin to saying GM makes terrible cars that kill people it is the responsibility of private mechanics to fix them after they are purchased…do you actually buy any other products with this mentality?
The difference though John is that 40K isnt killing anyone (that I know of). And if GM had something in their owners manual (i.e. 40K BRB) that stated, “use this vehicle as you like, just have fun with it”, than people would be less-angry when they started dieing due to improper use. 9-)
That’s a terrible analogy. The game is only broken because people are abusing the rules. Its more like buying 10 GM cars and bodging them together to get the fastest car with the best handling, then everyone else complaining that its faster than theirs.
How is making a perfectly legal army using the battle brothers “abusing the rules?” All of the death stars complained about are 100% legal and the result of GW’s failure to playtest….my point and the one that people seem to be missing is GW is making a defective product and we somehow think it is the responsibility of the consumer to fix it…you buy other defetice products and think it is your responsbility to fix them? I take them back to the place I purchased them and ask for my money back.
Abuse doesn’t mean cheating. Just because it’s legal doesn’t make it correct or ethically “right”.
There are a collection of rules (battle bros, Fortune, Hit and Run, Eldar Jetbikes, Tzeentch daemons, Grimoire etc.) that, in isolation, are perfectly fine, balanced and fun but when combined (abused) produce something that’s unbalanced and not fun.
You’re correct that it’s GWs responsibility to fix the rules. Will they though? I think we could get very old waiting for that answer! 🙂
Yeah, but is it ethically “wrong” to combine units in such a way as to win a game? Isn’t the goal of each player to build an army that can win? Every army I have ever built for 40K or deck for magic has been designed to win the game…I don’t really see how making a list that has improved odds of winning the game is an ethical decision? IMO… it becomes an ethical decision when I break the rules of the game to win. Then what is the point? I think the reason we all enjoy these games is trying to match wits with our opponents using the framework of the game rules. Trying to say certain lists that are permissable by the rules are illegal really only works to move the goal posts. If you ban all the death stars etc then Eldar wave serpents and flying circus becomes the new awesome..really you are just deciding where you want to draw the comp line.
But outside that, I totally agree with you that all of the aforemetnioned rules are fine in isolation especially the mark of tzeentch in the daemon book etc…all this stuff shows is no one at GW playtests their prodcuts (also there is no proofreading them either), so I also agree it looks like we are going to be the one’s making the changes ourselves. However, I think there needs to be more pressure placed on GW to make a quality product is all I am getting at with my comments.
I totally get where you’re coming from and I don’t blame tournament gamers for taking these lists if they’re allowed to.
The “ethics” of the situation are, of course, a grey area. However, it’s common knowledge that deathstars have power/efficiency way beyond the power curve. The top 16 certainly know that their lists are unbalanced so are making the conscious choice to take units that breaks the power curve and will crush the average player. That’s where it becomes unethical.
You’re right about it only moving the goal posts but that could be enough to make tournaments fun and accessible again. Let’s say the bottom tier armies are currently 50% as powerful as the top tier deathstars – closing that gap through tactics, skill and even a bit of luck is basically impossible. Now, if the proposed changes made the power difference only 10% then the tactically skilled but compulsive ork player would have a fighting chance to compete.
40k allows for broken combos. It doesn’t matter who’s fault it is. What matters is that GW isn’t fixing it. Not rocket science.
With all this talk, I haven’t seen anyone propose to make a National League for 40K. The league will conist of several TOs from around the nation, maybe even make it a global league. The League will make all the FAQs and Rule changes after GW releases them. You can even have FLGS join the league and have their TOs register. All this can open new posibilities. Imagine League nights with sanctioned games created by the League. All your games scores recorded. This will take the idea that the INAT FAQ had to a whole new level.
Once everyone is in the league, we can start casting votes for changes. At least then everyone will be on the same page when it comes to rules and FAQs. We can also make templates for missions and scoring for those missions. This will most likely remove uniqueness that LVO, Adepticon, NOVA, etc have. Yet it’s one of the few ways to get everyone on the same page. Look at NFL, NHL, NBA, MLB, etc they all came together in their own sports and came up with rules and how to run things. Now everyone follows those rules no matter what state your in. I feel we can do the same, at least GW gave us a foundation. Granted that foundation is uneven and full of cracks, but thats where we come in and fix it from the ground up.
Hey Kayto,
That is a GREAT idea, one we have been trying to implement for years. The only issue is that all of the various TOs want things to be their way and often are not willing to compromise. The end result is that no one comes together to create a better system.
That said, we have finally gotten a lot of the West Coast on the same page, which is a start!
Honestly at what point are we even playing 40k anymore if we need 50 pages of erratas and FAQs to hold a tournament…we may as well start over and create a game that uses the GW figures and fluff…Remember when Stelek tried doing that over on YTTH.. he wanted to create a tournament rule set for 6th….that went over about as well as a turd in a punch bowl. I am not a big fan of his at all, but I will give him a minor nod for one thing… he saw the writing on the wall about 6th edition some time ago and I didn’t want to accept it,…When everything started getting out of hand in December of last year with the dataslates, escalation, and stronghold assault then I came to accept that my days in this hobby are numbered. You can’t fight the company that makes the actual game…I have been playing since 1994, which is why I have stuck around so long and want GW to fix things. I really want them to listen to their fanbase and the community and playtest and proof read their products. I feel as if being a loyal consumer for 20 years entitles me to these simple courtesies..lol…you should also.
The difference is nobody likes or respects Stelek.
I quit 40k recently and started playing dropzone commander for these exact reasons. It feels great!
It’s like getting out of a bad long term relationship. It’s scary because you’ve already committed so much, but once you’re out, you’re really glad you did it. You need to find someone (a game company) that treats you better. I kind of wonder why anybody plays 40k anymore!
Unfortunately that is not the first time I have heard a vet say this to me. We are bleeding players, right now.
40K is still really healthy, no doubt, but we can see the writing on the wall.
Clearly I still care about the game because I’m keeping up with the new rules and the news. I want it to be good!
I feel like there’s some sort of dating analogy I could make here.
Stalking your ex on facebook?
I still play 40k, but mostly only at tournaments and similar events. Otherwise, infinity and maybe soon to be warmachine again as well.
I also just switched to warmahordes & having a great time so far. Thinking maybe I can trade most of my 40k for some historicals or FoW.
With all this talk, I haven’t seen anyone propose to make a National League for 40K. The league will conist of several TOs from around the nation, maybe even make it a global league. The League will make all the FAQs and Rule changes after GW releases them. You can even have FLGS join the league and have their TOs register. All this can open new posibilities. Imagine League nights with sanctioned games created by the League. All your games scores recorded. This will take the idea that the INAT FAQ had to a whole new level.
Once everyone is in the league, we can start casting votes for changes. At least then everyone will be on the same page when it comes to rules and FAQs. We can also make templates for missions and scoring for those missions. This will most likely remove uniqueness that LVO, Adepticon, NOVA, etc have. Yet it’s one of the few ways to get everyone on the same page. Look at NFL, NHL, NBA, MLB, etc they all came together in their own sports and came up with rules and how to run things. Now everyone follows those rules no matter what state your in. I feel we can do the same, at least GW gave us a foundation. Granted that foundation is uneven and full of cracks, but thats where we come in and fix it from the ground up.
I agree this could help but it would take an unprecedented amount of cooperation between people who have vastly different ideas about how the game should be fixed. I just don’t see enough people caring to cooperate that much and in all likelihood the ones who do care enough will feel so strongly they will be fairly uncompromising. Not to mention the fact they would still need to cater to what the public wants and often members of the public want things that are actively counter productive and lack the specialized knowledge to realize they want mutually exclusive things. Also don’t think for a minute that GW wouldn’t try to stop a large league from forming, that large of a power base outside of their company that could influence their largest product line is too scary an idea for the archaic business practices to cope with, just look at how they treat social media. While I think it could be great I just don’t see it as attainable in what is already a highly fractured community.
I also want to add that when I say fractured community I don’t just mean different TOs who have different opinions on what is and isn’t acceptable in their tournaments. 40ks online fanbase itself is an incredibly fractious group. This is about the only online 40k community I’ve been to where people are willing to accept that local metagames are not all whatever their local metagame is.
On sites like Librarium and /tg/ you can literally see people raging at the notion that not everyone plays in tight-nit groups of 3-6 friends and claiming that 40 and 50 member gaming clubs are works of fiction when these people have never lived in a city with a million or more people and have no idea what they are talking about.
As long as their are people spewing this kind of bile into the collective 40k (or any wargaming) community, any kind of standard not set by the owners of the IP is going to be tenuous at best.
Not to get technical, but in the MLB, the National League and American League actually have and play by different rules. The MLB is not nearly as standardized as the NFL.
Anyway..
Adepticon has been around for a long time now. Some reasons for other larger events coming along is precisely because those TO’s want to play the game differently then the way others (Adepticon) do it. Heck, even Adepticon was started because they knew they could put on a better event then the ones GW were doing at the time.
Point is, even if all the current TO’s got together and hammered something out (which was kind of attempted with the final versions of the INAT FAQ. But not all involved TO’s then chose to use even though they helped make it), some other group would come along and create their own new take on playing the game and want nothing to do with the current “standard”.
Unlike professional sports, where players get paid to participate, we as the players in this “sport” are doing the paying to participate. When hard earned money and vacation is on the line, people will chose to go to the events that most closely fit the way they like to play the game. If that way doesn’t exist, some, like the many TO’s now, will create their own in hopes to draw like minded players. With that the process starts all over again of wishing we could “standardize” the game.
Agree. That is all.
Well written.. I think your suggestions dont go far enough to fix the meta but its a start
First step on a difficult path =)
I totally understand that it will take a lot for this community to get together and achieve this. If the public wants an opinion in the matter they will have to get together and have their local store and TOs become part of the league. I get that the player base is split down the middile from the beer and pretzel players and the Tournament Goers. My target audience will be the Tournament Goers, it will be easier to just tell the Tournament Goers suck it up and conform. We do it now. Between all the major tournaments, the particpants have to change their lists and strategies to conform to the missions, points, and FAQs set by eachtournaments. At least with this League idea, the change will be consistant throughout and all you might need ot change is the point values. I personally will feel a bit less stressed out if all I had to do was worry about what to fit in my list at what point value. Instead now you have to worry about is my list good for table quarters, can my list handle a missions using both Crusade and Empowers Will. One place I can reroll 2s on 2s, while another place I can reroll 2s on 4s.
I’d expect GW to get involved one way or another. If this League idea gets stood up and manges to workout. GW will have to react either postivie or negatively (most likely negatively). I don’t know the legal side of creating your own houses on a national level.
I get that everyone isn’t in a major city. Like I said earlier in this post, my target are the Tournament Goers. At least with this league idea these small communties still have the choice to follow these rules or not. If your community is that small then you guys come can come to a conclusion on your own. If your store or TO doesn’t want any part of this league then so be it as well. I just feel sorry for that one or two guys in the store that want to do tournament play style and can’t. I’m kind of on that boat, I want to practice for all the tournaments, playtest, and get practice in. My issue is mostly the people at the store don’t know the rules or don’t provide a challenge. If I beat them they don’t blame the army list they brought or their tactics, they blame everything else (dice, codex, terrain, etc) and then they don’t play me anymore since they don’t want to lose again (shoot I’m playing a Ork/Necron list, nothing to OP about it). Also, they don’t like it when you constantly call them out on rules. I get called a rule nazi since I read all the codexes and FAQs, and I have no shame in calling you out. One guy got offended at me since he landed his drop pod near my orks and tried using the missile launcher that was on. I informed him he can’t since it moved at cruising speed and can’t snap shot a blast. Called me a rule nazi even after the TO got involved.
Good points, Logan. It is difficult to get everyone moving in the same direction. It will hopefully happen though before we hit a crisis point.
The inclusion of Knights fixes Deathstar-hammer. I think a wait-and-see approach may be best here. That being said, I have been a big fan of two-sourcing for some time.
Unfortunately, it doesn’t do that much, seer stars can actually kill knights in melee! Allowing things like shadowswords however would definitely make a ripple.
An unsupported, single Knight will lose, yes. A supported Knight or group of Knights though, will smash a Seercouncil.
I agree, it helps a lot to crack the silly stars that require little skill to play.
And yeah, two-sources seems to be the right mix between fun in list building and balance in game play.
Well written and great points. However, dropping it down to two detatchments from any source only does not fix the meta, it will just remove that random Inquisitor in almost every non-Chaos army (CSM and Daemons). I do agree that it needs to be limited to two and I hope other major events pick up on that and implement it.
Ending the Battle Bothers thing would go a long way toward fixing this whole thing, and I really really hate saying that.
Don’t end battle bros. Ban them from joining allied detachments.
A lot of Stars don’t need BBs, though. It needs to go further than that, I think.
You’re acting as if we’re only allowed to do one single rules modification total, ever.
The several small, simple tweaks they’re implementing or considering are not mutually exclusive.
Hi Reecius, hey Frankie, Geoffrey .
Ok Reece, I like the ideas you come up with so far, however noble of a task your trying to do you have to take it a step further.
There are other things you can do to help this situation for example: no more battle bros is one that would go along way plus levels the playing field for the NIDS. That simple little fix would have a huge impact on the meta. Evaluate it and you will see that it can. I know the argument that we don’t want to change the rules, but for the love of god someone has to since GW is not going to make it so.
Another thing as a side note I would like to see is the relic mission done in a way so it’s equal on all sides of the board.
Simply put you can capture it at the end of the movement phase, it cannot be moved in any other phase except the movement phase and only 6 inches, no running, no turbo boost, no assault pack moves. If you have it it will take 4 turns to move it 24 inches period. Not 2 turns. Honestly looking at the relic as it stands it’s broken and the way people have bastardized the movement of said relic. Stays on the ground no vehicles, and if you can truly own it then by god you win it.
Also we capturing any objective you need to be on it at the start of the movement phase. No last minute contesting unless of coarse your on it at the start of the movement phase in the last turn.
Anything that scores can contest, since if it’s near the objective it’s trying to score it, it’s piss poor rules lawyering that says a heaven can score but not contest so it can loose the objective to a troop unit though the heavy has been on it the whole fricking game.
Pretty much what I’m saying if it’s tricky tac fucking remove it.
Thx bro keep up the hard work, and your all still the bomb in my eyes.
Chas
Washington state
I say no to everything you propose. Getting rid of battle brothers makes my CSM/Daemons non-functional. You can get rid of brostars without banning battle brothers.
Nor are last second objective grabs a problem. Eldar jetbikes that can go 100″ in a turn and cost next to nothing are a problem. Hell most of the problems stem from how ridiculous the Eldar book is. Five dudes piling out of a Rhino to reach that distant objective on Turn 5 is good.
What build are you running? You already can’t join ICs, so the only thing that BB matters for over allies of convenience is casting psychic powers. And the only thing that really matters for is casting Invisibility on Daemon Princes and stuff to make them invulnerable, in which case: https://www.google.com/search?q=world%27s+tiniest+violin&safe=off&rlz=1C1LENN_enUS484US484&espv=210&es_sm=122&tbm=isch&imgil=ImQKS0fqXcUzAM%253A%253Bhttps%253A%252F%252Fencrypted-tbn2.gstatic.com%252Fimages%253Fq%253Dtbn%253AANd9GcRWobJPkxCmQxRqvhdnDN14TULtdG3LtJiQRB8wpVd9TrnDSMvltg%253B550%253B285%253BcUcTB_nk3e9HSM%253Bhttp%25253A%25252F%25252Fwww.militaryphotos.net%25252Fforums%25252Fshowthread.php%25253F207915-Millions-in-SOPA-lobbying-bucks-gone-to-waste&source=iu&usg=__Y5VqVNRUxIbw06v9q6NrDPJeZC0%3D&sa=X&ei=kqhFU5utMKK8yAGI_4HYBA&ved=0CC0Q9QEwAA#facrc=_&imgdii=_&imgrc=ImQKS0fqXcUzAM%253A%3Bmatx_o9y-5GdtM%3Bhttp%253A%252F%252Fcobb.typepad.com%252F.a%252F6a00d834515ae969e2017c35817072970b-pi%3Bhttp%253A%252F%252Fcobb.typepad.com%252Fcobb%252F2013%252F01%252Ftipping-deconstructed.html%3B550%3B285
And, yes, jetbike turbo-boost should be 12″ max or something.
I also like to cast prescience on my units, endurance on my Spawn, mental fortitude on my cultists or Daemon troops who may have gone to ground. If you ban BB, you wreck a lot of non-abusive things that are mostly caused by brostars.
The 2+ rerollable nerf they use takes care of the invis problem.
Thanks, Chas! Those are good ideas on the Relic, actually, I like that a lot. It just makes sense.
The relic, as it exists, is a terrible mission. It should probably just be king of the hill style single fixed objective.
Hey dude, while I agree that something needs to be done, I think it’s important that we make sure the solution addresses the issue. Making formations take up an ally slot is trying to fix something that isn’t broken… How many of those top 16 even had a formation? I would suggest leaving formations alone until they present an issue, rather that trying to fix something that hasn’t been proven to be broken. Too many of the formations are not that great and forcing them into an allies slot will basically ensure that only the best ones ever get some table use, perhaps they only count as an allied formation if they’re of a different army? I just don’t see the reason to punish players who want to take multiple Helbrutes, or a bunch if chosen with cypher, etc.
I do like the special formation = allies though, it should have always been that way.
They didn’t have formations because formations weren’t allowed at Adepticon.
Do you think that would have changed the top lists? It seems that the 2++ stars proliferate, I don’t really think that formations that would have stopped that.
If your goal is to limit lists that use the Tau formation, it might be better to address that one specifically, instead of making it so that only the best, most OP formations are worth taking.
I think that your suggestion restricts list diversity, instead of promoting it, it might be fun to try out a Helbrute formation, or even Cypher’s Chosen, but at the cost of my allies slot, I don’t see why I’d do that over my allies slot, or even a better, more competitive formation. When you make sweeping rulings like that, you really just make the most OP option the only option.
No one is going to take Helbrutes in a serious list, Adam. Hate to burst your bubble =P
No, but that’s my point. You’re making the bad options worse and encouraging players to only use the most OP options available.
I think your rerolls are no better than a 4+ is a good house rule. Maybe you can 1 up it a tiny bit to no better than a 4+ or the original unmodified save whichever is worse.
I think the Relic is the perfect mission to nerf battle brothers. Only 1 detachment actually gets to keep the Relic which can erode alliances. On missions that involve the relic battle brothers become allies of convenience. Players like battle brothers so removing them entirely from a tournament would be a bit too drastic, but nerfing them in 1/3 missions is just enough to bring it back in line. It would also discourage cherry picking a very tiny allied detachment like a single inquisitor or buff commander and 1 unit of fire warriors, and be less punitive to those that being a strong allied detachment that can independently operate as allies of convenience.
The relic is a terrible mission for curbing death stars. Eldar can pile their beast star on top of the thing, then go get it with some jet bikes when the time comes.
You weaken death stars with objective missions that force the objectives to be very spread out, limiting the death star’s effectiveness.
We’re keeping the reroll nerf, for sure.
The Eldar beast star would not be able to receive any blessings or fearless from Eldar psykers and would only be a beast pack with the baron and not a “beast star”. Jetseers would have to join windrider squads instead of the beast star. It would nerf beast stars in a mission they would otherwise be overpowering in.
Jetseers other than the FS cant join the Beastback and embolden only works on the unit the warlock is in.
What I think should happen is that you can only benifit from so many defensive or offensive bonuses. Like with the buff mander, you can choose to reroll, ignore cover or tank hunter…not all three.
I also pay 205 points for Eldrad, making one of six of my book powers obsolete isnt an answer but if I can only cast either fortune or another defensive buff on a single unit, makes things more tactical in how you place your benedictions.
This is just a rough Idea but I think it has traction. It still gives you all the options you just cant stack a sick amount of modifiers at any given time. Like back at the fortune thing. I run a shadow council in a unit of blades with eldrad. I can choose to either cast protection or fortune. You also couldnt fortune and make a unit invisible at the same time. Still makes that unit solid and hard to kill either way but not unfun and makes me have to think more. SOme things are not such an issue like quicken or empower and have rules that limit what you can do with them.
What do you guys think?
The beast star is Baron and 2 Jetbike farseers in the pack. One of the farseers has the shard of anaris which gives the entire unit fearless. The 2 farseers focus on trying to obtain fortune so that the Kymera have a 4++ rerollable invo and the Baron has a 2++ rerollable invo. No warlocks or embolden are required.
Maybe Go the Feast of Blades route and drop the points?
Alternate FOC? Require a Unit from each chart?
One thing that can be done to nerf combos but not nerf BB is require all models in a unit to be the same type (all jet Infantry, all Bike, all infantry, all cavalry), goes a long way to addressing the root of the root of the problem but still allows BB. Of course Screamer Star would still be untouched by that.
How would that work for lets say Commanders Joing Broadsides? They are both infantry, but not both jetpack(A subset unit type?) and drones?
How about this? You can only join a unit from your codex?
one is jet infantry the other is infantry, based on what I said they couldn’t join together, but then neither could the Commander join the Riptide any longer
But, what if there are more drones in the squad? Does it change to Jet Pack?
What if there was a “Only the Base type” So infantry can join infantry, because that IMO is more fair.
That is an interesting idea, actually. It may have unintended consequences, though.
Pretty much everything that is a nerf will have unintended consequences. What may seem to be the right thing to do (nerf XYZ), may come back to bite you later on especially with the way the meta is evolving at break neck speeds. Here’s a very scary thought, what if, WHAT IF, GW actually did think about balance and designed all the codices at once, but we are simply unable to really see it because all the dataslates/formations/codices are not yet available to us and we haven’t had a chance to adapt.
I know laughable right!? Although not entirely implausible considering a new rule version may be around the corner anyways that brings this all in line.
I hope that this is a puzzle that we can’t see the end of yet, and that it is a masterstroke of genius in game design. I just have no faith, at all, that that is the case, lol!
I’m not aware of this being a problem, but would it be reasonable to limit a model/unit to only two ‘temporary’ buffs? E.g., a Tau Commander grants Ignores Cover, a Far Seer grants Prescience, and that is all of the temporary (lasting 1 game turn or 1 turn in some cases) buffs that can affect a model/unit.
Or, perhaps if a model/unit has access to more than 2 USRs, you can only choose to ‘express’ two of them? Unnecessarily complicated, most likely. White Scars are popularly, in part, because of the number of USRs they have access to. I imagine this is the same for other models/units.
You know guys that ovessa star is illegal?
Farsight Enclave says that:
” Any character in your army that may select Signature Systems may not select from those listed in Codex: Tau Empire, but may instead select from the Signature Systems of the Farsight Enclaves, at the point costs shown. ”
So supporting Tau Commander in Farsight army does not exsist. So this deathstar is a little bit nerfed already.
That’s why the allied commander brings the toolbox, and possibly the fourth riptide. The primary detachment is Farsight with O’vesa and two Riptides plus all the scoring solo Crisis suits.
Yeah, Ovesa star is Legal.
2+ save is 84% and 2+ reroll is 98% save. That’s 1.17 times better, not 6 times better.
Also, the boosted riptide should factor in the cost of the unit of pathfinders as in your example it’s considerably boosted by the squad, and those abilities are not entirely native to the riptide. Weakens the argument.
Check your math, my friend. Chances of failing a 2+ save are 1/6. Doing that twice is 1/36. The odds of failing the save are six times less likely to occur. You are looking at the numbers the wrong way.
And all of this craziness is due to support units (farseer, libby, Baron, Chapter Master, Buffmander, Marker Lights, etc.) so no, it doesn’t weaken the argument at all, actually. The entire argument is predicated on using support units to create unfair advantages. That is the point.
I’ve checked my math. It’s statistical probability. Representing the d6 as a percentage of 100% is roughly 84%. That means you won’t even need a reroll that percentage of the time. Then we are trying to find out what 84% of the remaining 16% brings us to, and it’s roughly 14%. So, the statistical probability of rolling a 1 on 2 consecutive D6 is about 2%. The same as rolling a 6 followed by a 6.
98% / 84% = 1.16 times better.
The reason you’re saying a 2+ save rerollable is 6 times better is because you’re presenting it backwards.
You’re taking the 16% failure rate of a standard 2+ and the roughly 2.5 % failure rate of the 2+ rerollable and saying 16% is 6 times larger than 2.5% so the save is 6 times better! The problem wih this is that it restates the 2.5% as the new 100%. What you’re really saying is that the failure rate is 1/6 the failure rate of a 2+, which is not the same thing as times bette.. If we’re looking at overall statistical improvement in starting value a rerollable 2++ is 1.16 times better than a standard 2+, converting saves from 84% to 98% because a 2+ is 6 times more likely to fail than a 2+ rerollable.
By you’re argument reroll in those saves should actually add a 16% to the cost of a 2+ unit as a tax, but you’re presenting I as a 600% tax.
Remember, you’re six times less likely to fail, but only 1.16 times more likely to save.
In case I really lost things there it gets summed up like this:
2+ = 30/ 36
2+ rerollable = 35/36
30 * 1.16 = 35 = my argument.
6 times less likely to fail a save doesn’t mean 6 times more likely to save (I.e 6 times better).
@Slaede this rule says that any character in your army, it does not differentiate whether it is allied Tau Commander or Tau Commander in primary detachement.
This wording is clear: Any character in your army that may select Signature Systems may not select from those listed in Codex: Tau Empire, Supporting Commander may not take any systems from C:TE 😉
That’s why Ovessa star shouldn’t be played like it is now, army means primary+allied detachment, am I right?
The general consensus has been to assume army means the detatchment which is using the supplement. Otherwise the option to self ally gets a bit borked, in that they can’t take relics of any kind among some other issues if I recall. Its ambiguous though for sure at the very least
I think limiting things would make for more fun games. Use only codex units, no special characters (honestly, they are like allies – lots of cool potential but only used to lock up the most boring units) and no double of anything and we will see lots of people using different type of units in balanced army lists instead of this “let’s find the most over the top combo and hope for the best”-approach.
also, limit all re-rolls of to hit, to wound, amrour saves, cover saves and feel no pain to 5+ no matter what. Lots of things would change of course. But honestly, I think ti would be even more variation in the top than it is today.
The only problem with limiting special characters is that it banishes entire lists such as Ravenwing, Deathwing, etc.
Anyone else notice the GW website came back up and guess what is missing—the FAQS!!!!! GW hates us so much I think this is the absolute end of 40K for me, I am done, out finished…..
The website is brand new, it may just take a while to get the FAQs up.
Honestly I think these are a little extreme to alter rules in the way suggested. The mission changes are fine and I would like to see more variety. I don’t know about the changes to ally detachments and whether or not that restriction will be needed. We don’t know how the meta will shift by allowing formations, it may be enough to let the meta change in an organic way away from heavy imperial allies.
The nerf to 2+ re-roll saves seems excessive. I would not recommend changing gameplay rules like that since it will likely lead to further changes in gameplay in the future. Changing missions and allowing formations are one thing since it keeps the core gameplay the same. But changing stat lines is taking it a step too far and will lead to tournaments and other games in different environments to having drastically different rules.
The real solution to the deathstar meta that were entering(entered) is that more people need to tailor their lists to properly handle deathstars. Deathstar lists tend to just trounce over the typical TAC list since that’s what they are designed to beat. If the meta shifts to include more lists such as the scout army list Reece posted or other lists designed to kill a deathstar such as necrons taking death and despair scythes. If people take these lists designed not to lose to a deathstar then the point of the deathstar will be lost and the meta will organically shift to something else. The problem isn’t the OP nature of a Deathstar but people unwillingness to adjust to counter the meta and either ignoring it or joining the meta with their own Deathstar, solutions exist people are just too stubborn to employ them.
Funny how perspective changes things so much. I feel that these changes proposed are actually not enough, but a middle ground. A compromise.
We have already implemented the nerf to the 2+ reroll saves in our events and it was well received by the community. They wanted to keep it. We have already been using Formations in the store here quite a bit and honestly, they are 95% bad. Only a select few are worth considering in a competitive context and those that are good are REALLY good. So good that they need to be dialed back a hair, honestly. Limiting them to the allies slot helps to do that.
Deathstars really are over powered. I mean, provably, objectively over powered. We posted up some math proving the point a while back. As always, that isn’t to say these lists are unbeatable, just that they break or bend so many rules of the game as to provide an unfair advantage.
Forcing everyone to alter their lists to fight Deathstars, or to join them, isn’t the game I (or many others) wants to play, honestly. At Adepticon everyone (including the Dathstar players) were sick of it. It doesn’t really feel like playing 40K anymore.
Fair enough, I haven’t played with formations much at all so I am not sure how game breaking they are and limiting them to take the ally slot seems fine gameplay wise and lore wise.
The meta shifts slowly in this game and pretty much follows a consistent pattern in that once the meta shifts fully the meta slowly shifts to it’s counter. The cycle generally being that Deathstar meta switches to MSU/counter deathstar which then switches to TAC armies and then it switches back to deathstars. Now this gets changed when GW releases something new be it a codex or a new edition. The meta was very nearly fully switched to TAC armies so that people could deal with flyer spam which stopped those armies from completely dominating and now with so many TAC armies it opens up deathstars to be incredibly effective. It will simply take time or a few big tournaments or a release from GW to switch the meta to MSU.
Forcing the meta to change will simply stop the cycle at TAC, which in my experience are the most fun games, but this isn’t a great thing either since some armies are simply far superior to making these armies. Forcing it to TAC is going to shift the meta heavily back to Tau and wave serpents. TAC armies are fun to play and play against but it will stagnate without consistent releases from GW.The organically changing meta can keep the game fresh when GW goes on it’s long hiatuses without any updates.
Good restrictions. Only need to add – All Battlebrother allies are downgraded to Allies of Convenience.
I really feel limiting it to just 2 army choices just kills more marine lists and forces the marines to only play white scars, since it would gut my clan raukaan, inquisition, iron hands list…