Warhammer 40K Tabletop Thread XLI: Secondary Opinions

[AdmiralCheez]

Alright, well, I tried to find a positive common thread in this conversation. Guess I was wrong.

[Blackhawk748]

Alright, well, I tried to find a positive common thread in this conversation. Guess I was wrong.

The light at the end of the tunnel here is that the next edition will probably be better. 6th wasn't amazing or anything, but it was a considerable improvement over 5th.

8th was miles better than 7th on army diversity.

So 10th SHOULD be better.

Of course, the annoying part is sitting around waiting two years for it to happen while GW does nothing to deal with the systemic imbalance. Cuz we pretty much all want what Lans said, for everything to be useable. Not 10/10 or even 9/10. But for it to be at least 7/10, because then you aren't questioning why you're using this thing, you know it's worse but it at least does it's job, and does it reasonably well.

[AdmiralCheez]

Of course, the annoying part is sitting around waiting two years for it to happen while GW does nothing to deal with the systemic imbalance. Cuz we pretty much all want what Lans said, for everything to be useable. Not 10/10 or even 9/10. But for it to be at least 7/10, because then you aren't questioning why you're using this thing, you know it's worse but it at least does it's job, and does it reasonably well.

Yeah, like a cheap unit that does something pretty well, but not as well as a more expensive unit. That's exactly what I want too! That's how it should be, at any rate.

[Avaris]

Alright, well, I tried to find a positive common thread in this conversation. Guess I was wrong.

Welcome to my world. Trying to get any positive agreement here on anything is unfortunately like getting blood from a stone.

[Blackhawk748]

Yeah, like a cheap unit that does something pretty well, but not as well as a more expensive unit. That's exactly what I want too! That's how it should be, at any rate.

That's what all of us want, and what a healthy game looks like.

Hell, a great example of this is from Kings of War. All the playerbase agrees that Zombies and units like them (Peasant Mobs, Goblin Mobs etc) are great. Tons of Nerve, Cheap, enough attacks to do something. Well in a Legion anyway.

However, despite this they weren't being used much in tournaments. Originally this was because of Dragon Lords, but after those got (justly) nerfed, they still didn't get into that meta because it went heavy on ranged, and they get shot to pieces.

Now,the counter to that was heavily durable units and Cavalry, and so we got this back and forth between which army style was in zenith, with several other broad variants of army popping up. Now, at no point where melee infantry armies necessarily bad or anything, multiple would top in fact, this was just a broad trend brought about by Goblin Archers and Rat Gunners.

And through it all, Zombie Legions are still regarded as good, just not in that meta. To me, that's a pretty healthy game. There's a lot of stuff going on, there's fluidity in lists and army styles, and a broad mix of factions in the top lists.

[Renegade Paladin]

There's light at the end of the tunnel sooner than a new edition, I believe. What changed, really, between 8th and 9th that caused the difference? Victory conditions in the missions. What are GW doing annually? New mission packs in Chapter Approved. All they'd have to do is take a new approach to mission design and this could be fixed with CA 2021 here in a few months.

As for me, once I can start holding tournaments again (which is going to be further out than I like since I'm not allowed to check vaccination status; I'll have to rely on community transmission data for the whole Midwest since I bring in players from surrounding cities) I'll do one on the official mission pack and then (if it doesn't change) come up with a new custom format with varying mission types.

[LansXero]

Welcome to my world. Trying to get any positive agreement here on anything is unfortunately like getting blood from a stone.

So did I lie, exaggerate or in any other way falsified anything I wrote?

The option is there, to put it in kinder words, to just enjoy yourself and find cool stories and interactions within the context of the game without worrying about theoretical OP units or factions that nobody around you even has. The setting is amazing and absurdly deep; you can engage with the huge almost-over Heresy storyline, the new ongoing Dawn of Fire saga or any in between, with still enough left unexplored to make your own narrative if you so wish. Alterna-systems for all kinds of things exist: city fights, running battles across wastelands, fights under heavy bombardment, fights with no atmosphere. You can adapt zone mortalis to play 'fighting inside a hive / ship corridors' if you dislike Kill Team. You can get as much from the game as you want!

But that is the thing: YOU have to do it. Gentleman pacts, alternative modes, narrative games, etc. won't come well balanced pre-packaged, plop down a book and go. Much like Crusade's or Power Level wonkyness, you need to comb over the broken stuff and agree not to do it so you have a good time. Paint, build, play, tell random odd stories about random odd events, who will stop you? But also, it'll be unique to you and your game group, so its hard to relate and hard to share.

For example. for the duration of 8E I always used Rangers to cap far away objectives because they could only be hit on 6s. Oddly though, they always ended up in melee. Once I charged a Knight with Wraithblades; the Knight was debuffed but still they couldn't finish him and he stomped them in return. But piling in he went into a unit of Rangers, so in their Melee, 1 hit landed and wounded... and a Jinxed knight failed its save and died. To a ranger in melee :v.

Then one day a guy charged his Vindicare assassin into my farseer and her ranger escort. They slapped each other for a round then the Vindicare shot my farseer dead with his pistol. And proceeded to die, in melee... to Rangers. We started making anime-fueled tales of how the guy was the classical lazy ass overachiever: he is a ranger because he is too lazy for anything but watching the fight from afar, but when its time he gets shonen protagonist plot armor. Which was then confirmed as a squad of DW veterans charged into them, doing the usual 'surround them' strat so they couldn't fall back and I would shoot the guys dead. First oddity: losing a wound on overwatch. Ok, on the 2W terminator model so I dont lose models and can surround. Melee happens. 2 rangers survive. Ranger puts a wound through. Failed save. It. Goes. Into. A. Terminator. Dead Terrminator in melee vs a gdamn ranger. Surround failed. Unit shot to pieces. Because of the freaking shonen ranger :D.

It was super cool, but also, extremely irrelevant to anyone who just read it. See? Its not a lack of positivity, its just the difficulty of sharing these things online.

By the way, Tabletop Simulator is on sale currently; like less than 10$. So if anyone wants to play, they can, with anyone in the world. Solutions exist, see?. Now, making use of them... thats another thing entirely.

[Avaris]

So did I lie, exaggerate or in any other way falsified anything I wrote?

The option is there, to put it in kinder words, to just enjoy yourself and find cool stories and interactions within the context of the game without worrying about theoretical OP units or factions that nobody around you even has. The setting is amazing and absurdly deep; you can engage with the huge almost-over Heresy storyline, the new ongoing Dawn of Fire saga or any in between, with still enough left unexplored to make your own narrative if you so wish. Alterna-systems for all kinds of things exist: city fights, running battles across wastelands, fights under heavy bombardment, fights with no atmosphere. You can adapt zone mortalis to play 'fighting inside a hive / ship corridors' if you dislike Kill Team. You can get as much from the game as you want!

But that is the thing: YOU have to do it. Gentleman pacts, alternative modes, narrative games, etc. won't come well balanced pre-packaged, plop down a book and go. Much like Crusade's or Power Level wonkyness, you need to comb over the broken stuff and agree not to do it so you have a good time. Paint, build, play, tell random odd stories about random odd events, who will stop you? But also, it'll be unique to you and your game group, so its hard to relate and hard to share.

For example. for the duration of 8E I always used Rangers to cap far away objectives because they could only be hit on 6s. Oddly though, they always ended up in melee. Once I charged a Knight with Wraithblades; the Knight was debuffed but still they couldn't finish him and he stomped them in return. But piling in he went into a unit of Rangers, so in their Melee, 1 hit landed and wounded... and a Jinxed knight failed its save and died. To a ranger in melee :v.

Then one day a guy charged his Vindicare assassin into my farseer and her ranger escort. They slapped each other for a round then the Vindicare shot my farseer dead with his pistol. And proceeded to die, in melee... to Rangers. We started making anime-fueled tales of how the guy was the classical lazy ass overachiever: he is a ranger because he is too lazy for anything but watching the fight from afar, but when its time he gets shonen protagonist plot armor. Which was then confirmed as a squad of DW veterans charged into them, doing the usual 'surround them' strat so they couldn't fall back and I would shoot the guys dead. First oddity: losing a wound on overwatch. Ok, on the 2W terminator model so I dont lose models and can surround. Melee happens. 2 rangers survive. Ranger puts a wound through. Failed save. It. Goes. Into. A. Terminator. Dead Terrminator in melee vs a gdamn ranger. Surround failed. Unit shot to pieces. Because of the freaking shonen ranger :D.

It was super cool, but also, extremely irrelevant to anyone who just read it. See? Its not a lack of positivity, its just the difficulty of sharing these things online.

By the way, Tabletop Simulator is on sale currently; like less than 10$. So if anyone wants to play, they can, with anyone in the world. Solutions exist, see?. Now, making use of them... thats another thing entirely.

This is very much what I've been saying all along. I very much see 40k as a toolbox: that you have to adapt it for your own play group is a feature, not a bug. It's a way of telling these sorts of stories, however suits you and the people you play with. And the reason I like what 9th is trying to do is that it is adding tools to that toolbox, stuff like Crusade.

And, honestly, I WANT to hear people's stories from games. It's irrelevant to me, yes, but also it's someone sharing what they enjoy. That's cool!

But someone new to the hobby doesn't get that here. Instead, they hear that it is all irrelevant because the game is broken in some way. AdmiralCheez is new here, and has been trying to get an understanding of the game from us, what we enjoy about it. And judging from their responses, they feel rather shot down by the reaction they've been getting, even when trying to get agreement about what could be improved. That's not exactly a good impression to give someone new to this.

[LansXero]

But someone new to the hobby doesn't get that here. Instead, they hear that it is all irrelevant because the game is broken in some way. AdmiralCheez is new here, and has been trying to get an understanding of the game from us, what we enjoy about it. And judging from their responses, they feel rather shot down by the reaction they've been getting, even when trying to get agreement about what could be improved. That's not exactly a good impression to give someone new to this.

He plays Drukhari. I, and other posters, have given him our views on the codex, to the best of our understanding. He can look for online reviews as well, but what else can be done? Pretend 4+ or +1A on Kabalites is an actual buff? Not point out its becoming melee-centric around Cults with some Coven support?

I already explained, with tournament data to back it up, how Primary objectives (which is all he uses) shape the game. You need to live standing on top of them through your opponents turn. But you only need to do it on 2, at most 3 of them. So either be an unkillable tank, or run so fast they cant reach you, while shooting anything of theirs standing on one. That Ynnary list? Good look capping anything if you depend on living through Wraithseer-backed Dark Reapers. Good luck chazing multi-wound razorwing flocks with the usual slow bricks the meta favors. Its how it works, and I've told him, in my own, often negative words, but there is no lie there.

If he dislikes it, someone already suggested to him using a different mission set. They can also try the Goonhammer suggested VP handicap per faction. But, whatever he moves, what we say literally doesn't matter. Because he wont play with us (unless its on TTS), he has to get his game group to agree, and what HE doesnt like and what THEY dont like doesnt necessarily agree, and it certainly has nothing to do with what WE think. Also, because his focus is "the game comes second, playing with my friends comes first", what exactly can anyone suggest to him? Entertaining friend based activities? His focus aren't the rules, so talking about how bad or good the rules are should fly over him, no?

The flipside, the positive side, would see him getting models he probably wouldnt enjoy or wont help him win or will cost him more than they're worth. So Im personally averse to doing that, but luckily there is plenty of positivity around to temper my grumpyness. So he is lucky this community is as varied and open as it is, not sure why he should feel discouraged.

[Gwynchan'rGwyll]

See, Lans, you say that those stories aren't relevant to anyone else, but I really enjoyed reading that! You told a story really well, and you framed it not only as entertainment, but you told us really clearly WHY it was important: because this is unexpected, and normally you wouldn't expect a Ranger to do SQUAT in melee. You also used the story to tell us a bit about how melee tactics work with the locking out of fall-backs, and how all you need sometimes is a single kill to fall back and win tactically.

[Renegade Paladin]

Well, the dice do make fools of us all. I once witnessed a Tau Crisis Suit beat a Black Templar Terminator Marshal to death with the butt of his rifle. It was hilarious. Also around that time, I had a squad of Guard veterans with flamers and a heavy flamer (for my old poor man's Hellhound setup) in close combat with Templar Assault Terminators after their Chimera got wrecked. They failed Morale and fell back (this was 5th edition, so that's what failing Morale forced you to do), but only fell back like three inches, then managed to rally on my turn, and they roasted those Terminators to death in their armor.

[Destro_Yersul]

It was super cool, but also, extremely irrelevant to anyone who just read it. See? Its not a lack of positivity, its just the difficulty of sharing these things online.

Speak for yourself, I think that's awesome. I love stories like that. They remind me of stories I have, and some of them have come from games I lost really badly.

For me, the narrative and the hobby aspects are the important part. I don't want to paint anything I don't like the looks of, and I don't want to use anything I wouldn't want to paint. I just want to paint what I like and then go make cool stories with it.

Put another way, if I was playing Imperial Guard, I wouldn't be using 30 bullgryns. I'm not a fan of the look. Course, I also wouldn't be using Cadians. In all likelihood, I'd be using a combination of Anvil Industries and ArtelW, and the only GW stuff would be the tanks. People would look at the army, and go 'where's the 30 bullgryns? don't you know how the game works?' I think I do, it's certainly been explained here enough times. 'Well then why aren't you using 30 bullgryns?' ...Because I don't like them? Isn't that enough?

[Forum Explorer]

The light at the end of the tunnel here is that the next edition will probably be better. 6th wasn't amazing or anything, but it was a considerable improvement over 5th.

8th was miles better than 7th on army diversity.

So 10th SHOULD be better.

Of course, the annoying part is sitting around waiting two years for it to happen while GW does nothing to deal with the systemic imbalance. Cuz we pretty much all want what Lans said, for everything to be useable. Not 10/10 or even 9/10. But for it to be at least 7/10, because then you aren't questioning why you're using this thing, you know it's worse but it at least does it's job, and does it reasonably well.

Honestly, I feel all we need is basically a new 'ITC'. Not literally ITC, they made it very clear they are not involving themselves in rules anymore. But a fan-made set of missions that meaningfully change how the game is played. ITC in 8th was a completely different game from Eternal War or Maelstrom, and in 7th the differences were even more pronounced.

Because I feel like the base game isn't bad. There are a few OP things (Deathwing Terminators, Chief Apothecaries), but overall, I feel like the game is relatively balanced between the new Codexs. The table size isn't bad, the rules aren't bad. Nothing immediately springs to mind as being a big problem.

It's the Matched Play missions that are the problem. They aren't without merit, but they have very clear, very obvious, and very unbalanced win conditions.

But ITC proved that we don't need GW to write mission rules for us. So if the mission set is the problem, that we can fix that. We've fixed it for the last two editions, we can do it for this one.

[Renegade Paladin]

Honestly, I feel all we need is basically a new 'ITC'. Not literally ITC, they made it very clear they are not involving themselves in rules anymore. But a fan-made set of missions that meaningfully change how the game is played. ITC in 8th was a completely different game from Eternal War or Maelstrom, and in 7th the differences were even more pronounced.

Because I feel like the base game isn't bad. There are a few OP things (Deathwing Terminators, Chief Apothecaries), but overall, I feel like the game is relatively balanced between the new Codexs. The table size isn't bad, the rules aren't bad. Nothing immediately springs to mind as being a big problem.

It's the Matched Play missions that are the problem. They aren't without merit, but they have very clear, very obvious, and very unbalanced win conditions.

But ITC proved that we don't need GW to write mission rules for us. So if the mission set is the problem, that we can fix that. We've fixed it for the last two editions, we can do it for this one.

I'll certainly take a crack at it, but I have no ambitions to move into the ITC's old role even if I could. I'll share my draft missions here for feedback, though, so if anyone wants to use them, feel free.

[Fergie0044]

Hi everyone, long time lurker who finally decided to join the forums. Thought I'd introduce myself with my own "Dice make fools of us" story.

So it's 7th edition and my chaos marines are playing my mates orks. My Demon Prince of Nurgle with black mace has spend most of the game chewing through boyz, so he's only got 1 wound left. An isolated 10 man squad of grots are holding a back field objective that are within his reach. I figure it's worth the VP for him to take them out and spend the last turn on the objective and he easily makes the charge. But first the grots get their overwatch....a single shot hits....wounds.....and he fails his save! My mate and I fall over laughing as he mimics the bewildered grot who just took out a demigod by blindly firing his blaster.

But my turn isn't over. On the other side of the board my Raptor champion lands the killing blow on his Big Mek. Chaos boon table time! And wouldn't you know it, but I roll for him to ascend to demonhood! (the only time this ever happened). Later my mate and I 'forged the narrative' that my Prince had merely warp jumped across the battlefield.

I don't remember the score of that match, or who even won. But I'll never forget that wee story of chaos shenanigans.

[JNAProductions]

Hi everyone, long time lurker who finally decided to join the forums. Thought I'd introduce myself with my own "Dice make fools of us" story.

So it's 7th edition and my chaos marines are playing my mates orks. My Demon Prince of Nurgle with black mace has spend most of the game chewing through boyz, so he's only got 1 wound left. An isolated 10 man squad of grots are holding a back field objective that are within his reach. I figure it's worth the VP for him to take them out and spend the last turn on the objective and he easily makes the charge. But first the grots get their overwatch....a single shot hits....wounds.....and he fails his save! My mate and I fall over laughing as he mimics the bewildered grot who just took out a demigod by blindly firing his blaster.

But my turn isn't over. On the other side of the board my Raptor champion lands the killing blow on his Big Mek. Chaos boon table time! And wouldn't you know it, but I roll for him to ascend to demonhood! (the only time this ever happened). Later my mate and I 'forged the narrative' that my Prince had merely warp jumped across the battlefield.

I don't remember the score of that match, or who even won. But I'll never forget that wee story of chaos shenanigans.

Ooh, I have a story that also involves Daemon Princes!

It's a three way battle, back in 7th, Khorne vs. Slaanesh vs. Nurgle. I'm Nurgle, R is Khorne, N is Slaanesh, and we couldn't find anyone with a Tzeentch army.

Game starts off, and R and N rush one another, while I just kinda waddle onto objectives and devastate them in points. By turn three, Khorne is almost entirely gone, and N only has a few units left-so I'm definitely winning this one.

But N's Daemon Prince of Slaanesh (with Warptime and a couple of abilities netting him something like 14 attacks) gets the charge off on George, my Daemon Prince of Nurgle (who also had Warptime up, as well as Iron Arm maybe and Endurance). So these two Daemon Princes crash into one another, and at the I10 step, literally the exact instant they make contact, we fight.

He has, again, something like 14 attacks. Most hit, couple wounds, and a few failed saves mean George is a goner.
But I strike at the same time! With much less attacks. Many hit... One wound. One failed save. Balesword means it's instant death.

I just remember it well because it's this cool juxtaposition of a Slaanesh prince, with over a dozen attacks and cutting down George with a massive crescendo of blows, while George gets a slovenly one wound, but that's all it takes to make the enemy succumb.

Was a good game.

[Cheesegear]

Page 50.

You Know What To Do.

Would've liked to have used The Game Was Rigged From The Start. But at least the next thread title isn't couched in negativity.

[Blackhawk748]

I remember a time back in 5th, or maybe it was 6th (not like it matters in the context of this story) when my buddies Triarch Praetorians crashed into my Flash Gitz. Except that he forgot that, while shooty units, Flash Gitz are still Nobs. And they had the bog standard Cyber Ork upgrade and a Painboy hanging out with them.

Cue three turns of them wailing on each other to little avail, though the Gitz hedge out a win eventually, while across the board by Grotsnik Bomb of Slugga boys is continually crashing into a Deep Striking Warrior Brick led by Obyron.

It was hilarious.

In HoR Kill Team, I had a Terminator Lord who just walked through most kill teams, constantly racking up Chaos Boons and getting hilarious amounts of stats.

[Renegade Paladin]