LVO is in the bag & soup is still on the menu

[H311fi5h]

 

I absolutely think guardsmen should be 5ppm, there aren't that many arguments as to why they aren't deserving of a price hike IMO. 

 

Let me give you some then:

- Guardmen are capped to 10 men units. Which is a massive disadvantage compared to cultists. Quite a number of well performing lists at the lvo already had some much worse conscripts at the same price per model for that very reason. At 5 ppm regular guardsmen may disappear in favor of Valhallan conscript spam. At that point there will be even more crying. (By the way I'm not saying the Cultist nerf was correct. I would have preferred taking away VotlW and reducing the maximum unit size down to 20 or 30 like they did with conscripts.)

- Guardsmen don't do much without orders. Orders are often given as the reason for why guardsmen should cost 5 points. Well in fact they already do - 5.5 to be exact because 15 points is the (minimum) price for one order. If you really think orders are too strong, the right move would be increasing cost for officers, not guardsmen.

- Comparable infantry units are so much more capable than guardsmen: Kroot cost 5 ppm. They get -1 armor save, but +1 Strength, both in melee and shooting, +1 M, +1 WS and a scout move. Making guardsmen cost the same as a unit that much better is ridiculous. Or Kabalite Warriors: Better gun, +1 WS, +1 BS, +1 LD and +1 M. That is 5 points of improvement over a Guardsmen. Are you trying to tell me that is worth only a single point?

- By nerfing guarsmen you rip out the core of pure guard armies. Which is something you almost never see on tournaments, and when you do it isn't a problem. So don't punish what is isn't at fault.

- By making guardsmen 5 ppm you would see MORE loyal 32 detachments. Why? All the people who currently play larger guard armies with lots of guardsmen (which is what Guard armies should look like btw) will start to reduce their number of guarsmen to the bare minimum they need for the detachment. Therefore 5 point guardsmen don't solve anything. Castellans are just going to have different friends. 

- Veterans cost 5 points and are better than guardsmen. Yet no one is calling them overpowered, and almost no one is playing them. The reason is quite obvious of course, they aren't troops anymore. So are we now pricing units higher for being troops? If so lets make tactical marines more expensive too please.

 

Or to sum everything up: Don't punish the guard just because they happen to have the best synergy with some OTHER codex. The real issue is how factions with different strengths and weaknesses can be combined at exactly NO cost.

[BLACK BLΠFLY]

A lot of what you just said isn’t really true like the fact you can blob your squads.... and you must take some of their cheap HQ.

[chapter master 454]

 

 

I absolutely think guardsmen should be 5ppm, there aren't that many arguments as to why they aren't deserving of a price hike IMO. 

 

Let me give you some then:

- Guardmen are capped to 10 men units. Which is a massive disadvantage compared to cultists. Quite a number of well performing lists at the lvo already had some much worse conscripts at the same price per model for that very reason. At 5 ppm regular guardsmen may disappear in favor of Valhallan conscript spam. At that point there will be even more crying. (By the way I'm not saying the Cultist nerf was correct. I would have preferred taking away VotlW and reducing the maximum unit size down to 20 or 30 like they did with conscripts.)

- Guardsmen don't do much without orders. Orders are often given as the reason for why guardsmen should cost 5 points. Well in fact they already do - 5.5 to be exact because 15 points is the (minimum) price for one order. If you really think orders are too strong, the right move would be increasing cost for officers, not guardsmen.

- Comparable infantry units are so much more capable than guardsmen: Kroot cost 5 ppm. They get -1 armor save, but +1 Strength, both in melee and shooting, +1 M, +1 WS and a scout move. Making guardsmen cost the same as a unit that much better is ridiculous. Or Kabalite Warriors: Better gun, +1 WS, +1 BS, +1 LD and +1 M. That is 5 points of improvement over a Guardsmen. Are you trying to tell me that is worth only a single point?

- By nerfing guarsmen you rip out the core of pure guard armies. Which is something you almost never see on tournaments, and when you do it isn't a problem. So don't punish what is isn't at fault.

- By making guardsmen 5 ppm you would see MORE loyal 32 detachments. Why? All the people who currently play larger guard armies with lots of guardsmen (which is what Guard armies should look like btw) will start to reduce their number of guarsmen to the bare minimum they need for the detachment. Therefore 5 point guardsmen don't solve anything. Castellans are just going to have different friends. 

- Veterans cost 5 points and are better than guardsmen. Yet no one is calling them overpowered, and almost no one is playing them. The reason is quite obvious of course, they aren't troops anymore. So are we now pricing units higher for being troops? If so lets make tactical marines more expensive too please.

 

Or to sum everything up: Don't punish the guard just because they happen to have the best synergy with some OTHER codex. The real issue is how factions with different strengths and weaknesses can be combined at exactly NO cost.

 

 

Well ain't someone using the noodle.

 

Nailed it exactly right on all accords as people seem to not be listening. Yea, I'm fed up of this topic but by all the emperor it is a GREAT discussion of balance and what not to do. One of them is witch hunting (and I ain't talking the duck hunt kind for psykers. Those are much more fun).

Each time someone de-bunks a unit for the chopping block someone steps up to the plate with a new victim and by all that is terra's lack of oceans for an actual atmosphere to exist it doesn't help anyone. We keep cycling round and round and round and it is getting dizzying. Next up will be the smash masters, watch this spot!

 

Really the question is to be asked: Why are allies a bad thing? Honestly. Give me a straight, good long thought out post where you list the NEGATIVES of allies because I can tell ya, if anything we are seeing positives over negatives my dear power armoured brothers of various beliefs and scientific pursuit. To be honest, the more and more we go round I have advocated some changes but only in a way to spur discussion really or make someone think about it and see if it sticks.

I DO agree, let me make that double clear, I DO agree, that there needs to be a price for allies or a benefit for mono-dexing. It would certainly be nice to have something to build around on top of the new layers that specialist detachments will give us. Oh and don't tell me special detachments will end the game, Eldar will do that WITHOUT them anyway. Don't believe me? Take yonder gaze at prior formats and look who is always kicking top tier with votes in their favour. Space elfs.

 

Going to plug I would like to see a small amendment to chapter tactics for marines to apply to tanks but hey, quick plug over.

 

However the question then becomes one of the ball in whose court and whose court we are playing in and are we playing tennis, rugby or golf. Because there is a million dollar question for you all: What aspect of the game did GW undertune and/or overtune in 8th edition and sorry for all those anti-CP stratagem haters but those are good to stay 100%. They add a nice valve to certain abilities and keep things in check because I certainly would comment that we would never see sternguard as good as they are now without that stratagem and if they had it as a raw ability then HO boy would that make them god-tier. The act of stratagems let us not only control abilities but push the boat too because now we have a new gate on them we control how many times you can do it and thus can control how easy to use it is via CP cost. "Oh but CP is so easy to get, throw in some loyal 32 and boom. 5 CP". Yea, good point but then again I would say something...isn't that an inherent strength of those imperial guardsmen? Expendable, Cheap, plentiful and by the emperor they sure do make a GREAT sandbag. So they can naturally give us access to things we couldn't in the first place. After all, don't they fuel the smash captain? He sure does it all huh, smashing, smashing, smashing oh and he does make a great conversationalist! Not to mention that castellan sure is an amazing centre piece with some serious kick, that lance certain gets the job done and the decimator doesn't hurt either at handling some pesky armoured targets or those harder to hurt sorts.

 

Hmmm...I wonder what do they all share? Oh right weaknesses! Smash Captain rarely can bring his hammer to bare on enough targets and certainly doesn't have the time to get those game winning objectives. The castellan is big and intimidating so not only does it struggle to move around tighter spaces but like the captain can't really get those objectives so easily and on top of that can't hide with character keyword so thus is the numero uno important to die target for those who has a lascannon and batteries to burn! Talking of batteries there is the ever famous Battery Battalion; the loyal 32! These 180 point wonders are the pride of the imperial guard...pfft, who we kicking these gets get made target practice by their own side more than the enemy. Only real question is who has a higher kill count of their own men: Inquistion or Commissars! Thus they have little to no bite.

 

However, any army is a sum of their parts and not the single cogs. Put these three together and what do you get? I'll let yous figure the rest. After all, the problem isn't really a problem but it is a fun discussion!

[USNCenturion]

Chapter master 454, whenever I read your posts, I always imagine you typing them out while smoking a pipe in a giant study with a roaring fireplace nearby. And an owl perched on your chair named Cedric. With a monocle.

 

It makes me smile.

[Panzer]

Another thing is when people say it’s not fair for a pure AM list that is obvious they are just being selfish really.

 

Ehm no. I don't even play AM and as I said in my previous post it would really just add 30p to the usual soup list so it really just affects AM players, not soup players.

[Panzer]

 

- Comparable infantry units are so much more capable than guardsmen: Kroot cost 5 ppm. They get -1 armor save, but +1 Strength, both in melee and shooting, +1 M, +1 WS and a scout move. Making guardsmen cost the same as a unit that much better is ridiculous.

 

What you forgot to mention about Kroot is that they get pretty much zero utility from their own Codex because they are just auxiliary. The +1WS is worthless as they suck in melee and don't really get there anyway with their T3 Sv6+. Kroot are definitely not better than Guardsmen.

[sairence]

 

 

 

 

If you take a SHA with a baneblade, and no other AM detachments, you are correct that you cannot use defensive fire or Crush em.

 

 

Which is why if you made IK SHA work the same way, even a freeblade Castellan is much less deadly and survivable.

So if I take a baneblade in a marine army the only strat I can use on the baneblade is Command Re-roll? Seems a bit off personally.

That's how it is, yeah.

I know this discussion went on for a while, but that's unfortunately (or fortunately) not correct. A SHA blocks one thing for a Guard superheavy: the regimental trait. So it would not get the benefit of rerolling 1s for born soldier or rerolling random shots for brutal strength, etc.

 

The thing would not lose its keywords though. It would be still be both Astra Militarum as well as Cadian or Catachan or whatever and therefore unlock access to the strategems that come with that.

[Slasher956]

Something said in the past... cut down the amount of force org charts (formation) that are in the main rule book to 2 or 3 CAS formations.

 

Then give several formation to each codex which is geared to the units & the background of the codex that gives differing CP ammounts!

 

eg Patrol, battalion & brigade stay in the rule book

 

IK /RK get a LoW formation (current super heavy detachment)

Marines get a demi-company formation that requires a captain, lt, 2-4 SM troops, and give X CP

 

etc etc

[Happy-inquisitor]

 

 

I absolutely think guardsmen should be 5ppm, there aren't that many arguments as to why they aren't deserving of a price hike IMO. 

 

Let me give you some then:

- Guardmen are capped to 10 men units. Which is a massive disadvantage compared to cultists. Quite a number of well performing lists at the lvo already had some much worse conscripts at the same price per model for that very reason. At 5 ppm regular guardsmen may disappear in favor of Valhallan conscript spam. At that point there will be even more crying. (By the way I'm not saying the Cultist nerf was correct. I would have preferred taking away VotlW and reducing the maximum unit size down to 20 or 30 like they did with conscripts.)

- Guardsmen don't do much without orders. Orders are often given as the reason for why guardsmen should cost 5 points. Well in fact they already do - 5.5 to be exact because 15 points is the (minimum) price for one order. If you really think orders are too strong, the right move would be increasing cost for officers, not guardsmen.

- Comparable infantry units are so much more capable than guardsmen: Kroot cost 5 ppm. They get -1 armor save, but +1 Strength, both in melee and shooting, +1 M, +1 WS and a scout move. Making guardsmen cost the same as a unit that much better is ridiculous. Or Kabalite Warriors: Better gun, +1 WS, +1 BS, +1 LD and +1 M. That is 5 points of improvement over a Guardsmen. Are you trying to tell me that is worth only a single point?

- By nerfing guarsmen you rip out the core of pure guard armies. Which is something you almost never see on tournaments, and when you do it isn't a problem. So don't punish what is isn't at fault.

- By making guardsmen 5 ppm you would see MORE loyal 32 detachments. Why? All the people who currently play larger guard armies with lots of guardsmen (which is what Guard armies should look like btw) will start to reduce their number of guarsmen to the bare minimum they need for the detachment. Therefore 5 point guardsmen don't solve anything. Castellans are just going to have different friends. 

- Veterans cost 5 points and are better than guardsmen. Yet no one is calling them overpowered, and almost no one is playing them. The reason is quite obvious of course, they aren't troops anymore. So are we now pricing units higher for being troops? If so lets make tactical marines more expensive too please.

 

Or to sum everything up: Don't punish the guard just because they happen to have the best synergy with some OTHER codex. The real issue is how factions with different strengths and weaknesses can be combined at exactly NO cost.

 

 

I am going to pick you up on that Kroot comparison. Sure Kroot have a decent statline for the points but they get almost no synergy anywhere, hence why you only see the odd unit of Kroot as disposable screens expected to kill nothing before they die. If Kroot get their own codex with worthwhile synergies and stratagems that are not garbage-tier then we can talk about whether Kroot are comparable to Guard infantry and whether they should be more expensive. Right now they are not - and that is why you see Guard infantry all over the place in tournament lists while Kroot are a rarity. GW intentionally took away most synergies from Kroot in 8th and dropped their points cost to reflect this, the rarity of Kroot on tournament tables says all you need to know about how much most T'au players think that worked out. Oh and claiming that Kroot have better Strength than infantry in a competitive setting is just silly. Catachans exist and are seen everywhere for exactly this reason; whereas Kroot never benefit from Sept traits so they get no equivalent boost nor do they have any way to increase their numbers of attacks. Competitive list Catachans utterly wreck Kroot in the fight phase.

 

I honestly think that if there is going to be a fix for the Loyal 32 it should be handled differently, put back in some sort of platoon rule where there is a minimum number of infantry units before they function fully. That would not bother real guard players but it would be awkward for the min-maxing CP battery list build.

[Marshal Reinhard]

 

 

I absolutely think guardsmen should be 5ppm, there aren't that many arguments as to why they aren't deserving of a price hike IMO. 

 

Let me give you some then:

- Guardmen are capped to 10 men units. Which is a massive disadvantage compared to cultists. Quite a number of well performing lists at the lvo already had some much worse conscripts at the same price per model for that very reason. At 5 ppm regular guardsmen may disappear in favor of Valhallan conscript spam. At that point there will be even more crying. (By the way I'm not saying the Cultist nerf was correct. I would have preferred taking away VotlW and reducing the maximum unit size down to 20 or 30 like they did with conscripts.)

- Guardsmen don't do much without orders. Orders are often given as the reason for why guardsmen should cost 5 points. Well in fact they already do - 5.5 to be exact because 15 points is the (minimum) price for one order. If you really think orders are too strong, the right move would be increasing cost for officers, not guardsmen.

- Comparable infantry units are so much more capable than guardsmen: Kroot cost 5 ppm. They get -1 armor save, but +1 Strength, both in melee and shooting, +1 M, +1 WS and a scout move. Making guardsmen cost the same as a unit that much better is ridiculous. Or Kabalite Warriors: Better gun, +1 WS, +1 BS, +1 LD and +1 M. That is 5 points of improvement over a Guardsmen. Are you trying to tell me that is worth only a single point?

- By nerfing guarsmen you rip out the core of pure guard armies. Which is something you almost never see on tournaments, and when you do it isn't a problem. So don't punish what is isn't at fault.

- By making guardsmen 5 ppm you would see MORE loyal 32 detachments. Why? All the people who currently play larger guard armies with lots of guardsmen (which is what Guard armies should look like btw) will start to reduce their number of guarsmen to the bare minimum they need for the detachment. Therefore 5 point guardsmen don't solve anything. Castellans are just going to have different friends. 

- Veterans cost 5 points and are better than guardsmen. Yet no one is calling them overpowered, and almost no one is playing them. The reason is quite obvious of course, they aren't troops anymore. So are we now pricing units higher for being troops? If so lets make tactical marines more expensive too please.

 

Or to sum everything up: Don't punish the guard just because they happen to have the best synergy with some OTHER codex. The real issue is how factions with different strengths and weaknesses can be combined at exactly NO cost.

 

 

Oh hey, It's almost like it comes down to not punishing one faction, but instead adding a restriction to, say CP, when numerous different factions are combined, currently without downsides.

 

So it doesn't just make sense from a fluff point of view but in an ingame sense too? It's almost strange this solution doesn't have more traction

[Focslain]

 

 

 

If you take a SHA with a baneblade, and no other AM detachments, you are correct that you cannot use defensive fire or Crush em.

 

 

Which is why if you made IK SHA work the same way, even a freeblade Castellan is much less deadly and survivable.

So if I take a baneblade in a marine army the only strat I can use on the baneblade is Command Re-roll? Seems a bit off personally.

That's how it is, yeah.

I know this discussion went on for a while, but that's unfortunately (or fortunately) not correct. A SHA blocks one thing for a Guard superheavy: the regimental trait. So it would not get the benefit of rerolling 1s for born soldier or rerolling random shots for brutal strength, etc.

 

The thing would not lose its keywords though. It would be still be both Astra Militarum as well as Cadian or Catachan or whatever and therefore unlock access to the strategems that come with that.

 

Actually the SHA for guard do lose access to the guard strats if they are not paired with a standard guard detachment. I checked the codex when i got home last night and it was right there at the top of the page for the guard strats. 

 

Mind you I was doing this wrong when I used a baneblade to support my marines during konor, luckily in the two tourny I did use the super heavy I was fielding a tank company of guard.

 

Also didn't realize leman russes got obsec if in a spearhead detachment. The things you learn by carefully reading your codex.

[Progenitor]

In AoS you only get a limited amount of allies points (400pts in a 2k army). There are some Warscroll Battalions that also include allies for specific benefits. While 40k currently enjoys more or less unrestricted allies adding in this limit (you Warlord determining your primary faction) would still allow allies lists, but also possibly remove the most egregious additions. It wouldn't require any tweaking of Codices, nerfing of points or CPs or Strategems. It also would have no effect on mono-armies so they'd not be unduly punished by changes. 

 

I'm not a tournament gamer though. 

[Schlitzaf]

Here what I think allies are non issue. Why? I have yet to here how they take away from the game. Beside on a “my gut tells me it shouldn’t.” It MonoDex elitism. Second?

 

Loyal 32 and Rusty 17. Are ‘bad’. To include those units simply for a CP. You are paying 165-180 points for 5CP. In other words you start the game down 150-200 point lists. Best variants on the loyal 32 are the Loyal Brigade, which is 700+ Points. And that is not something I am gonna be angry about.

 

Lists that are good and have the loyal 32, USE the loyal 32. They are core component of the armies tactical plan of engagement. And often it’s worth Speeding 200-400 more points for that investment. To create something that can do SOMETHING.

 

(Armies) + Loyal 32/Rusty 17 are playing down almost 200 points. How would I fix soup?

 

Simply put, I would say, “you can only have 1 other Detachment that doesn’t share your two or more keywords with your warlord (Chapter/Regiment).”

[BLACK BLΠFLY]

Lucky 32 is great it is not bad .

[H311fi5h]

Here what I think allies are non issue. Why? I have yet to here how they take away from the game. Beside on a “my gut tells me it shouldn’t.” It MonoDex elitism. Second?

 

Loyal 32 and Rusty 17. Are ‘bad’. To include those units simply for a CP. You are paying 165-180 points for 5CP. In other words you start the game down 150-200 point lists. Best variants on the loyal 32 are the Loyal Brigade, which is 700+ Points. And that is not something I am gonna be angry about.

 

Lists that are good and have the loyal 32, USE the loyal 32. They are core component of the armies tactical plan of engagement. And often it’s worth Speeding 200-400 more points for that investment. To create something that can do SOMETHING.

 

(Armies) + Loyal 32/Rusty 17 are playing down almost 200 points. How would I fix soup?

 

Simply put, I would say, “you can only have 1 other Detachment that doesn’t share your two or more keywords with your warlord (Chapter/Regiment).”

 

It's an issue for two reasons:

1) You essentially cannot build an Imperium/Chaos/Aeldari (and probably soon Tyranid) army that draws from a single codex and doesn't put itself at a disadvantage. Ironically, having more choice results in having less choice. I cannot choose to only play Space Marines or only Knights or only Guard and be fully competitive at the same time. There are people who  don't want to collect multiple factions for any number of reasons. The current ally system takes something away from those people: It takes away the option to play the game the way they like to play. Myself, I don't mind - I play a Guard/Blood Angels/Knights mix on tournaments. Just as I don't want that taken away from me, I fully understand that other players don't want to play like this, and they should have that option without handicapping themselves.

 

2) The vast number of unit options available to the large alliances means that for every job there are always multiple units to pick from. As a result the sub-optimal units never get played. 

But sub-optimal units have a place in this game: They are a part of what creates a factions identity, it's strengths and weaknesses. Some factions have :cussty troops but great monsters and tanks. Other factions have great shooting but bad close combat options. The list continues.

It is both a challenge and one of the interesting aspects of creating and playing a competitive army to deal with weaknesses of your respective faction. Do you choose to live with the gap in your abilities and work around it? Or do you choose to use sub-optimal units and make the best of it?

With unlimited and free mixing of allies those questions never come up. For every task you can always just pick the optimal unit. Why should I ever play a Baneblade when I can take a Knight? Why run Reavers when there are Shining Spears? Why should I run CSM psykers when I can use the Thousand Sons variant? 

Again, more choice on paper results in less actual choice because for every job there is one optimal unit and 5 other that don't cut it.

 

Allies only create the illusion of choice, but they really take it away. Allowing allies but at some sort of cost would create real choice. 

[chapter master 454]

The question I think we can now FINALLY all agree on isn't what to nerf or buff in terms of the codexes but actually, how do we create a sense of choice with allies?

 

Well for one, remember folks a very simple thing: people always find the optimal load-out and will get that copy pasted ad infinitum at tournaments. We won't see an end to top tier lists being rampant. People seem to have an odd idea that tournaments need to be turbulent and outright random in results by what I can read from the room but sadly that isn't the case and in fact actually makes tournaments worse by having no predictable elements. Just remember, you are only fighting to rectify a very definite issue: Allies are a no brainer. This inherently means those factions who can are at an advantage so factions like Orks and Tau kind of get left in the dust.

 

So with that in mind why don't we think about what end of the stick we should be handling. Lets run it down.

If we go with dealing with factions that can ally, how does that work? We create a hypothetical fix that somehow makes allying less "viable", they are still really good but now you pay a fair price for it. The problem is you have only brought those options down however the mono-dex armies haven't changed in the slightest and thus don't really get anywhere because they didn't get any boost.

 

However if we work the other way round, we figure out a BONUS for mono-dexing then what happens is you create a much better scenario. All those involved in ally builds do suffer, they are losing out on the choice of having this super sweet buff. Now ofcourse that isn't to say this buff can't also be a nerf to allies in some capacity (for example, the buff could relate to stratagems and availability of them. Similarly to do with relics too) but if we work on the idea of creating an incentive for mono-dexing instead of trying to penalise allies (as the sole objective) then you actually achieve both of what I just said instead of just one as what is clear here is that mono-dexing needs some form of boost.

 

So how can we encourage mono-dexing? CP certainly seems to be one point of contention for it, though I feel it won't be the deciding factor as it also requires the factions to all have worthwhile stratagems though to be honest...only marines really suck at that point really, though to be fair some of our actual good ones are kind of greasy (+1 to wound for sternguard, we have a GENERIC double fight stratagem). However another benefit would be nice for mono-dexing other than just having a boat load of CP. As we have established, that tends to be easy enough to get and in terms of the game we could look at it as effectively giving a 2k army of mono-dex vs. an ally detachment only about a 50 point advantage or there abouts. Not exactly a deal breaker (though smaller games it could be). I pull that number from the air of vague thoughts of how much is a CP worth. That isn't going to even the playing fields.

Hows about I throw a curve ball idea for people out there which may seem a little bizarre: Give benefits instead for Mono-Detachment!

 

That's right, give benefits for an army who only brings 1 detachment. Naturally this would likely mean more Battalions or Brigades but really, Battalion is the new FOC standard of ye olde "Boss and Two Helpers" and the other FOCs are really more tailored to the idea of forgoing "weaker" troops for the option of bringing more elites raw instead of being addendum to a battalion so someone can bring even more of an elite/heavy/fast attack. That way people can't dance around faction keywords so easily by using detachments. What sort of benefits...well that would be up for debate. Technically at first I thought "Double the CP bonus" but that ends up the same place we're in now so likely it would require that bonus I just mentioned plus something else. Possibly access to something far more potent say like...a Stratagem! Maybe even certain relics and warlord traits! In relation to the stratagem, have each codex contain a set of 3 stratagems which are unique, you can only use them if you have 1 detachment of the corresponding army and make them something serious. Maybe even thematic, like "Angels of Death. Half your CP. Use before battle. You can call in reserves via "drop pod assault"  in the first battle round at the BEGINNING of your first movement phase".

Something impactful and really game changing. As for relics or traits, you could maybe work with the idea of allowing a free second warlord trait and relic for free but not sure how that would float.

 

Just throwing some crazy ideas out here. Have fun!

[Lexington]

Define “Codex” in game terms that don’t end up making a bunch of models/armies completely unusable in this scenario, and also doesn’t end up creating a bunch of weird gray areas.

 

This is The Problem.

[Biscuittzz]

My opinion of the problem is that GW have a balancing philosophy for Codexes that is different to their philosophy for balancing the game as it currently stands.

 

From what I can see all codexes are based around offence/defence/speed. If you have great offensive potential combined with speed, you're usually a glass cannon ala Drukhari. If you have great offensive power and great durability, you're usually quite slow ala Imperial Guard. This is what is balanced across every codex. Ideally, allies can be brought in to shore up some of the weaknesses but you should also imo lose some of your strengths by doing this.

 

That's where I think the problem is at the moment. There's not enough of a downside to bringing allies that should offset the incredible benefits. Guard have great firepower and durability but lack speed and melee offensive power. Allying in a Supreme Command of 3 dawneagle SCs completely negates the lack of speed and melee for the army, however there is barely a loss in the Guard strengths of firepower and durability.

 

I think there should be certain rules for when allying specific factions together to somewhat limit the CP generation and use, if GW don't want to completely redo the command point system. Ideally and oft recommended around here is the 'Can only use cp on the faction who's detachment has generated the cp' would be the greatest change but I think smaller ones are needed first to test the waters.

 

Faction specific things for factions like Custodes and IK:

 

Custodes

 

"By His Will - The Adeptus Custodes answer to the Master of Mankind Himself, and thus will not stand taking commands from lesser mortals." Adeptus Custodes units can only ever use command points generated from their own detachments.

 

IK

 

"Belligerent Machine Spirits - The machine spirits of the mighty war machines of Knight Houses are belligerent and temperamental anima, taking more care and diligence to maintain than simpler war vehicles." 

Imperial Knight detachments can utilise command points generated by faction detachments other than their own. When using a Knight strategem with allied command points, add 1 point to the cost of the strategem.

 

So my two cents, the last example would need command points to by separated by faction and detachments to have any effect. But it allows for no nerf to mono Knights or Knights using their own cps. It only affects them when they are allied in and are utilising batteries. Obviously this is a quick example and so the full pros and cons can be worked on.

[The Unseen]

If you want to keep allies in competetive 40k (and you shouldn't, but if you do) then CPs need to stop being generated on a unit basis and switch to a points basis, and allies shouldn't grant access to strats, relics, or warlord traits, those should be your warlords faction only.

 

It makes no sense that 1000 pts of marine troops and hqs produces fewer CP's than 1000 pts of guard, or whatever.

Points are how the system is supposedly balanced, so why is a key resource tied to raw unit count?

[Panzer]

My opinion of the problem is that GW have a balancing philosophy for Codexes that is different to their philosophy for balancing the game as it currently stands.

 

From what I can see all codexes are based around offence/defence/speed. If you have great offensive potential combined with speed, you're usually a glass cannon ala Drukhari. If you have great offensive power and great durability, you're usually quite slow ala Imperial Guard. This is what is balanced across every codex. Ideally, allies can be brought in to shore up some of the weaknesses but you should also imo lose some of your strengths by doing this.

 

AM isn't exactly slow though. They have deep striking infantry, transports and even flyers with transport capacity. Only thing they're missing are actual Jump Pack units and Bikes (though they do have Rough Riders with the Index rules). It's just that they don't need that speed to win games because. Same with T'au who have really mobile units but win games with a super boring castle list.

[chapter master 454]

If you want to keep allies in competetive 40k (and you shouldn't, but if you do) then CPs need to stop being generated on a unit basis and switch to a points basis, and allies shouldn't grant access to strats, relics, or warlord traits, those should be your warlords faction only.

 

It makes no sense that 1000 pts of marine troops and hqs produces fewer CP's than 1000 pts of guard, or whatever.

Points are how the system is supposedly balanced, so why is a key resource tied to raw unit count?

 

Ah...might wanna rain check your sentence. Here let me re-phrase the issue: "so why is key resource tied to DETACHMENT count".

 

After all, the objective of the loyal 32 and even the rusty 17 is to MINIMISE body count for that detachment and even for smash captain lists it isn't about unit count, but detachment count. If we did it based on unit count then AM and Tyranids would be drowning in CP while knights would be rubbing 2 CP together.

 

Just remember, I will state it is an issue of detachments. It is a good system, like formations, however it does require a good bit of work to iron out as it does help us have some options in how to build lists outside of "ok so how do i minimise the cost of these albatross units of HQ and 2 troops" of prior years. Yea, Battalion is the mainstay detachment but I would argue that is intentional, it is MEANT to be the most common. However would be nice to see armies use the other ones other than for abuse cases.

[Biscuittzz]

 

My opinion of the problem is that GW have a balancing philosophy for Codexes that is different to their philosophy for balancing the game as it currently stands.

 

From what I can see all codexes are based around offence/defence/speed. If you have great offensive potential combined with speed, you're usually a glass cannon ala Drukhari. If you have great offensive power and great durability, you're usually quite slow ala Imperial Guard. This is what is balanced across every codex. Ideally, allies can be brought in to shore up some of the weaknesses but you should also imo lose some of your strengths by doing this.

 

AM isn't exactly slow though. They have deep striking infantry, transports and even flyers with transport capacity. Only thing they're missing are actual Jump Pack units and Bikes (though they do have Rough Riders with the Index rules). It's just that they don't need that speed to win games because. Same with T'au who have really mobile units but win games with a super boring castle list.

 

 

Ok yea, I think you're taking my example too literally using guard. I was just using them as the quickest example I could think. I want the emphasis to be on the point that bringing in allies hides weaknesses without any sort of trade-off.

[CaptainMarsh]

Boost monodex. Knights have their Lances which grant additional CP by filling out SH detachments in a specific manner. Do that for all codexes, then apply an additional non-CP benefit if the entire army is monodex. Which codexes fill out which detachments and get additional CP benefits and what benefits would armies get for being monodex would quite obviously need a lot of work, but it would help monodex, won't be a kneejerk 'screw off' to Allies, and can help flavor up armies. I dunno. I'd rather boost mono than cut soup, myself.

[Zodd1888]

Tie CP to points and be done with godawful diatribe. At least for Matched Play.

 

How can you balance Stratagems if you don't know how many CP a list will have? You can't.

 

Once that's done we can start looking at individual issues as a variable is made static.

[G8Keeper]

Maybe there's merit to the GSC style of allied guard detachments?  Half the CP you gain (rounding up) for non-main army allies?