Reecius and the Rhino discuss the updating ITC Season, community news and tell bad jokes!
Join us for the live show on our Twitch channel by following this link! The show starts at 11am, PST. The podcast and YouTube video-cast air at 9am, PST every Friday.
Show Notes
Date: 2-12-20
Intro
- Follow us on Twitter, Facebook, Twitch, and YouTube! If you would like to be a guest on the show, email Reece at Contact@FrontlineGaming.org
- We sell tabletop games and supplies at a discount! Hit us up for your next gaming order at Orders@FrontlineGaming.org or visit our webstore at store.FrontlineGaming.org.
News
- This week’s GW pre-order is up and has a variety of cool goodies including Adeptus Titanicus units, the Kelermorph, the new Shadownsun and the latest Psychic Awakening book! You can get all of these goodies and more in our Web-cart at discounted prices with FREE shipping options!
- You only have 2 days left to get those discounted BAO 2020 tickets! The prices go up on the 15th of February. So be sure to jump in and grab them now. Also, many of the non main event tickets go up for sale in March. So if you are looking for the Long War Doubles, 40k RTTs, etc. you can expect to see those tickets at that time.
- Dates for the SoCal Open have been set, mark your calendar for October 24th and 25th, 2020! This event has in a very short time become quite the beast and we expect this year to be even bigger and better. Time for some gamin’ by da beach, mon! Join the FB group to stay a part of the conversation.
- You will be seeing Frankie and my lovely faces broadcasting with GW from Adepticon! Be sure to tune in for the fun.
- We’re rolling into the new ITC season, let’s chat a bit about some of the changes and methodologies behind the decisions we make.
- Added in Super Major officially.
- Decided on the new deployment type.
- Adding in 3 new missions to the existing 6, these will deviate from the main 6 to provide some variety.
- Officially recognizing Chapter Approved missions as ITC missions for those that want to use them.
- Refining the bonus point for ITC missions and secondaries.
- Almost done! Hope to have them ready to rock by Friday the 14th, so events this weekend can use them, baring that, for sure by Sunday the 16th.
Upcoming ITC Events
Upcoming 40k ITC Events
- Itzacon, Galway, Co. Galway, Ireland, February 14th, 2020 Sponsor: Dungeons-and-Donuts-Galway
- Fizzy Warhammer 40,000 Prevernal Tournament #8, Chiang Mai, Thailand, February 14-15th, 2020 Sponsor: Fizzy Games & Hobby Store
- Brains N Gore ,Orange, NSW, Australia, February 15th, 2020 Sponsor: gamesnmore.com
- Warhammer 40,000 RTT #1, Västerås, Västmanland, Sweden, February 15th, 2020
- Torneo por Parejas WarHammer 40k, Cochabamba, Bolivia, February 15th, 2020 Sponsor: Last trick
- 40K ITC Maelstrom Tourney (2K), Battle Creek, MI, USA, February 15th, 2020 Sponsor: Perfect Storm Comics and Games
- MAJOR: The Wargaming Guild Open: Winter Warfare 2020, London, England, UK February 15th 2020, Sponsor: Dark Sphere
- Wheres the free beer event, Germantown, MD, USA, February 16th, 2020
- ITC RTT #15, vasteras, Sverige (Sweden) February 16th, 2020
- Dogma V 3.0, Granada, Spain, February 16th, 2020
- Potiguar Open, Natal, RN, Brazil, Sponsor: Vem pra Mesa, February 15th, 2020
Upcoming AoS ITC Events
- Age of Sigmar February 2019, Grognard Games & Hobbies, Roselle, IL, February 16th, 2019
- BWG: AoS RTT – 2/17/2019, Phoenixville, PA, February 17th, 2019
- At Ease Games Monthly ITC Tournament, San Diego CA, February 23rd, 2019
- February Haven AOS RTT, Spokane Valley, WA, February 23rd, 2019
- Age of Sigmar ITC Tournament, The Portal, Manchester, CT, February 23rd, 2019
- Age Of Sigmar 2k ITC RTT Tournament, Fredericksburg, VA, February 24th, 2019
40k ITC Top 10
| Rank | First Name | Last Name | Points | Events |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Vik | Vijay | 586.78 | 3 of 5 |
| 2 | Colin | McDade | 361.55 | 2 of 5 |
| 3 | Gregory | Westwood | 327.84 | 2 of 5 |
| 4 | Patrick | Wyllie | 314.64 | 2 of 5 |
| 5 | Phil | Barfoot | 310.64 | 2 of 5 |
| 6 | James | Kelling | 305.24 | 2 of 5 |
| 7 | Ryan | Snyder | 303.73 | 2 of 5 |
| 8 | Ryan | Williams | 289.76 | 2 of 5 |
| 9 | Reed | Sto | 287.98 | 2 of 5 |
| 10 | Jack | Lord | 278.62 | 2 of 5 |
40k ITC Hobby Track Top 10
| Rank | First Name | Last Name | Points | Events |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | John | Lennon | 180.56 | 1 of 5 |
| 1 | Andrew | Gonyo | 180.56 | 1 of 5 |
| 1 | Richard | Siegler | 180.56 | 1 of 5 |
| 1 | Nick | Nanavati | 180.56 | 1 of 5 |
| 1 | Colin | Sherman | 180.56 | 1 of 5 |
| 6 | Charles | Arnett | 174.32 | 1 of 5 |
| 7 | Patrick | Rocca | 172.03 | 1 of 5 |
| 8 | Jeffrey | Merrick | 169.5 | 1 of 5 |
| 9 | Torey | Peet | 162.85 | 1 of 5 |
| 9 | Nicholas | Blackburn | 162.85 | 1 of 5 |
AoS ITC Top 10
| Rank | First Name | Last Name | Points | Events |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Mathew | Jones | 322.56 | 3 of 5 |
| 2 | Gareth | Thomas | 310.66 | 2 of 5 |
| 3 | Justin | Costello | 258.4 | 2 of 5 |
| 4 | Daniel | Velazquez | 253.91 | 2 of 5 |
| 5 | Matthew | Anderson | 246.15 | 2 of 5 |
| 6 | Jarrett | Zazuetta | 214.76 | 2 of 5 |
| 7 | Josh | Rodriguez | 208.94 | 2 of 5 |
| 8 | Michael | McLean | 201.53 | 1 of 5 |
| 9 | Michael | Schwartz | 193.16 | 1 of 5 |
| 9 | Sergio | Ortiz | 193.16 | 1 of 5 |
AoS ITC Hobby Track Top 10
| Rank | First Name | Last Name | Points | Events |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Brian | Blickle | 155.37 | 1 of 5 |
| 2 | Ryan | Burwell | 146.79 | 1 of 5 |
| 3 | Joseph | Halfacre | 114.89 | 1 of 5 |
| 3 | Josh | Lara | 114.89 | 1 of 5 |
| 5 | Russ | Tanner | 108.31 | 1 of 5 |
| 6 | Philip | Verduzco | 89.17 | 1 of 5 |
| 7 | Chandler | Torres | 84.51 | 1 of 5 |
| 8 | Jenna | Norman | 75.74 | 1 of 5 |
| 9 | Hunter | Olsen | 66.32 | 1 of 5 |
| 10 | Albert | Gatton | 64.53 | 1 of 5 |
Shadespire ITC Top 10
| Rank | First Name | Last Name | Points | Events |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Christopher | Avalos | 272.22 | 2 of 5 |
| 2 | Peter | Rivera | 204.9 | 1 of 5 |
| 3 | Aman | Khusro | 188.42 | 1 of 5 |
| 4 | Victor | Szafranski | 181.78 | 1 of 5 |
| 5 | Rob | Howard | 172.84 | 1 of 5 |
| 6 | Robert | Schuxhardt | 172.14 | 2 of 5 |
| 7 | Even | Skjervold | 171.73 | 1 of 5 |
| 8 | Derek | Traquair | 166.22 | 1 of 5 |
| 9 | Tony | Field | 165.06 | 2 of 5 |
| 10 | David | Cutts | 161.42 | 1 of 5 |
Kill Team ITC Top 10
| Rank | First Name | Last Name | Points | Events |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Kyle | Fjerstad | 192.69 | 1 of 5 |
| 2 | Álvaro | Lorenzo | 178.99 | 1 of 5 |
| 3 | Will | Reinbold | 173.87 | 1 of 5 |
| 4 | Sergio | Sedano Canitrot | 165.98 | 1 of 5 |
| 5 | Hamm | Samitch | 161.19 | 1 of 5 |
| 6 | Naryn | Davar | 156.6 | 1 of 5 |
| 7 | Dakotah | luster | 153.7 | 1 of 5 |
| 8 | Ángel | Álvarez | 153.65 | 1 of 5 |
| 9 | Alberto | Chaparro | 148.66 | 1 of 5 |
| 10 | Shane | Watts | 145.56 | 1 of 5 |
Tactics Corner
Completed Commissions
And remember, Frontline Gaming sells gaming products at a discount, every day in their webcart!
I look forward to have the new ITC season already! Thanks a lot for the continuous good work!
And oh boy I would like to see the “seize the initiative” removed from competitive play… It’s funny because in my playgroup we never do it, but if we go to tournaments (in a, in theory, more competitive environment) we have to use it, which feels a bit dumb IMO.
Yeah, seize is out! Thank goodness.
Glad you’re having fun with them =)
One of the things I want to see is no secondaries overlapping, especially reaper.
Another is not using power level it’s too out of date.
It seems like there should be bonuses for killing based on number of wounds 1+ is reaper, 3+ is gang busters, titan slayer for the titans. We need something for the 2 wound units.
Why not have a kill by type HQ, Elites, heavies etc, all armies by virtue of detachments have at least 3 of at least one type.
Kingslayer should be 6 wounds for titanic units.
Thanks for the feedback.
What are your thoughts on removing secondaries that directly punish certain lists like titan slayers, big game hunter and gangbusters. I think these should be removed as the are some of the key ones that impact list building.
The other suggestion was upping Reaper to 30 models a point if you wanted to keep it for this season. I don’t necessarily agree with punishing horde armies but if you want it, it’s less auto 4 points.
For titan slayer why is it acceptable that a knight player auto loses 4 points and lets be honest 8 with king slayer.
For big game hunter i feel that marked for death makes up for it in most cases as at least there is some counter play from your opponent as they may try to hide vehicles. BGH just punishes vehicle heavy lists as its just the first 4 to be destroyed.
They are put in for the exact reason you think they should be taken out, haha.
If someone has a tank army, they have denied you a ton of possible secondaries and made a bunch of your weapons highly inefficient if not effectively worthless. In order to be able to score points against them, you need a mechanism to do so, thus targeted secondaries. Otherwise, you’d really struggle to score points against armies that take a list design feature to an extreme.
“they have denied you a ton of possible secondaries”
Well it’s a double edged sword. If those secondaries get removed, neither side get them. The top lists very often don’t give up kill secondaries and remembering 2 of the 3 LVOs, they were Ynnari and Broviathan. Neither of which is a fun army to play against. So if you removed SOME of the specific kill secondaries, wouldn’t that allow more diverse armies to see play. A ton of units are cool but they suffer from giving up secondaries: greater daemons, tyranid warriors, ork buggies, etc, etc. Mostly it’s dudes that have a bunch of wounds and crappy armor save or monster characters. Those secondaries could also be tweaked: kingslayer could be 8 wounds on mosters and knights; gangbusters could have a pts requirement or even a list of excepted units; same with BGH (but it’s less important to fix than the others).
Examples of fine kill secondaries: titanslayer(necessary evil because they dodge the kill primary), head hunter(perfect difficulty to achieve), butchers bill, marked (Creates different interactions where people try to hide them).
Ah, somewhat. For example, if you have a Tank army you can just assume you give up BGH but it is still hard to get other secondaries vs. your list. Sure that one is a slam dunk but the others are still very challenging.
And looking at the champs game itself is not indicative of the overall play experience. It is for sure useful but you’re looking at two masters playing the game and absolutely gaming for the missions which the average player is not doing.
There is room to adjust for things like Tyranid Warriors (not that they were getting taken anyway, lol, and that is not because of Gang Busters, same goes for Ork Buggies, they’re just not very good). But yeah, some of them can use a tune up for sure. Kingslayer at 8 wounds on titanic doesn;t work though, as you couldn’t get it on a Knight, 6 makes more sense though as you have to destroy it to get it.
You get the 4th point for the knight being the warlord/having a warlord trait(add this bit).
And tyranid warriors are being taken. The best nid list had warriors. If ganbusters didn’t punish them unfairly, it could’ve maybe even made top 8, who knows.
First point, sure, if it is the Warlord, still silly.
Second point, cool, I didn’t know that but the other part of it is purely speculative.
Basically make is the Pampreen version 😀
But even moving to 6 is a big step in the right direction.
Kingslayer: well yeah, you kill the warlord knight (or just one that has a warlord trait) and you get 4VP. What’s wrong with that?
Well then would you agree that GW can never balance the game based on ITC mission format?
I am not sure I agree on your tank example. If I choose to build a tank based list I am also more susceptible to lists that can do AT fire and most armies can build against it. Also you reward 1 BGH point for killing a Chimera/Rhino transport and 1 BGH for killing a Repulsor Executioner equally.
If I build a list that has inefficient weapons, I should be punished for it. The reward for killing a tank is already built into the primary objectives.
There are already armies that are built to deny secondaries. I think if you level the playing field by removing the kill secondaries it would appear to me to be fairer. Obviously that requires testing.
Lol, no, I would not agree that GW can or cannot balance the game on ITC format nor are they trying to.
If you build a list that takes all AT weapons in case you battle a tank list and then you face a horde list, you will likely lose. If you take all AI weapons and you face a tank/monster list, you will likely lose. The mission has nothing to do with that. That’s just the way the game works. The missions seek to mitigate that extreme advantage/disadvantage. If you lose because of one secondary you list was vulnerable to then you probably aren’t very good at the game, quite honestly. That accounts for less than 10% of the total points in a mission.
I feel like secondaries that results in things like “Taking Tyranid Warriors is automatically giving up 4 points but IF Intercessors are fine and dandy” are never gonna be a good idea.
Well, obviously they aren’t built to do that exact thing, those end up being unintended consequences when you have a rule that applies equally to unequal units. It’s impossible to avoid without getting super specific, ie. this rule applies to everything except Tyranid Warriors, etc. or building in a generic exception but that also will inevitably see some unintended consequence with a unit not being affected by it in the way that was hoped for.
I would like to see each mission having its own deployment type rather than rolling. Nothing is more frustrating when rolling same deployment at a event for the last few rounds (especially when you roll hammer and anvil).
I mean, it is also an option to ask your TOs to use fixed deployments each round…
The new version allows the player going second to reroll the deployment type if they want to to avoid situations like that.
Reece, I know you keep saying missions may already be a bit tilted toward “stand somewhere” but that people are complaining they feel like killing is favored. IMO this is because “killing something” is actually a means to an end – you are already improving your game state by removing someone else’s ability to stand somewhere (killing them). Thus, we are double rewarding killing things currently.
Now for more questionable territory: I think we might see more MSU units and mobile stuff if we just got rid of killing secondaries. Or at least reduced the point incentive for doing so. War has always been more about terrain than killing. Killing is just one way to take ground. Another way is to throw bodies into a meat grinder, break morale, or misdirect.
I agree that that is the perception and often the reality in the way the game plays out. However, mathematically the missions currently do favor board position slightly.
Reece, will the supermajors use a different ITC points formula than normal majors?
Nope. They will score more points just on the virtue of how big they are but nothing special outside of that.
What would yall think of a mission with 3 objectives. One in the middle, one placed by each player into their OPPONENT’s deployment zone. The bonus is to NOT be holding the objective placed in your zone. It could force people out of the single ruin In their DZ or face a real consequence, and then you have to weight hold more vs bonus. Could be fun?
Goofy Secondary Idea –
Hostage Taker
Hold an enemy unit in combat after charging it for two consecutive turns. Extra point per extra turn achieved.
Deny the Witch –
Prevent an enemy power from being cast.
You Shall Not Pass –
Destroy an enemy Flyer by denying it a safe place to move. Two points per model destroyed in this manner.
You’re welcome. You can thank me by telling my boss to move me to first shift
I think I am in the minority of people being in favor of seize… Not really a fan of things that promote alpha strikes even more and knowing 100% whether one will go first or second allows to deploy in a way more aggressive fashion. Whereas with a potential seize one has to decide whether one wants to risk frontlining everything.
But as I said I am aware that I am in the minority here and am just happy that you guys work on improving the mission set
But, you have to also consider that you know 100% that you are going second and you counter deploy. It actually works out for the better when you know what you’re doing.
Secondaries
Problem nr 1,
The loophole that is 2wound models. Make them count as 3 models for reaper, since not only do they have more wounds they are much more durable in saves ususally. It’s still easier to kill 3 guardsmen than 1 intercessor.
Problem nr 2
Gangbuster, this is just numerically off. It’s incredibly punishing to low save models. 6 wounds is just very low effort compared to any other secondary. Compare to big game hunter which usually is 1 Point for something with twice the wounds , higher toughness and saves. Change to 9 wounds and include single model noncharacter units such as venoms, carnifexes(need to kill 2 for 1 Point) etc while raising big game hunter to 10+ wounds.
Problem 3
Kingslayer, this one is either super easy or impossible, remove it completely.
Agree with all but the 1st one. Making them count as three fucks over stuff like Nobz and such. 2 is fine.
For whatever my opinion is worth, I think the overarching principle should be that it should always possible to score maximum points without killing anything.
I would remove kill as a primary and make it a secondary, keep most of the secondaries except gangbusters (which while noble in intent catches too many units in the crossfire), and remove any stacking from secondaries. Then instead of making the primary always hold/hold more, make the primary specific to each mission. Then add in modified maelstrom for the bonus.
Thanks for the feedback. That could totally work but it is a much bigger departure from the formula than we are looking to make. However, feel free to run and event and try the ideas out, it sounds a lot like AoS, actually which is fun.