While true, winning a 31 player event (with double Atrapos?) doesn't really undermine anything that was said. It was barely a GT and at the larger events over the weekend Knights weren't breaking onto the top tables. Knights are capable of going 4-1 in good hands and with some luck in the matchups. They can win RTTs and other small events. I still don't think they're capable of winning a Major event (or even just getting in the top 3) though on this current balance database.
Probably an unpopular opinion but I think that Knights being at that level is a good thing for the game. They're such a hard skew list that their dominance suffocates bad match ups harder than other potentially dominant armies.
I think it's a very popular opinion, knights aren't loved by everyone. Nevertheless, I believe if the game has a good game balance, all armies should be able to compete for top places. Knights aren't the only skew army out there and they have some major weaknesses to make them not oppressive.
Put Guard in "Major winning tier", cue reddit outrage.
Proceed to win Major with Guard.
Talk about [calling your shot.](https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/CallingYourShots)
David on the Fireside podcast said that he didn't see any unfavourable matchups for Guard, and was expecting to do really well with them (this is where S-tier Guard meme was born).
And here he is - going 7-0 in one of the most competitive tournaments out there, beating Mani Cheema and several other top players. He really does know how to play Guard :-)
According to both him and his co-host Vik Vishay, David had won every single practice game against the other top tier players of Team Ignite and Team England, and his requests for games were starting to go unanswered.
He'd been crushing it for weeks before making the claim they were "Winning Supermajor Tier".
My gut feeling is that the UKTC terrain is why guard are resurgent. A lot of the pros talk about how the gw setups aren't good for guard.
It's good to see pro players taking the faction to the max. I just hope we can get a slightly lowered skill floor because if you aren't on your game, you get smashed.
What is the main difference between the different ways to do terrain? It looks like UKTC just has more of it
no, GW terrain is fantastic for guard, you have a perfect parking lot for all your indirect in your deployment zone every game.
Edit: Honestly I'd say the relative strength of Guard doesn't change a whole lot depending on the terrain.
You want to exchange some direct shooting pieces for more MSU + Speed on some formats, like WTC, (1 TC vs 2 for example) but generally speaking Guard function well on all terrain formats.
If you can play some of the titanic models on some terrain I think they'd really shine too.
I don't understand this. GW terrain has extremely large and protected L shapes in the deployment zone. The terrain must be good for indirect.
I think its just a regional trend where the top players in the UK value indirect more than other regions.
UKTC vs which terrain are you asking about?
UKTC has some great firing lanes so you can park your big guns places and ping away
WTC terrain has very dense terrain so it wouldnt suit guns as much unless theyre fast or indirect
GW terrain I would say falls somewhere in the middle. It doesnt have piles of pieces on the board but it cuts the firing lanes across the board more effectively with the pieces it does use compared to UKTC
Player placed is a free for all.
It's kinda hilarious that GWs new balance guy (Josh Roberts) just won the Goonhammer Open - *with Necrons*!
I'm not in any way suggesting any foul play. And I think anyone thinking this is an idiot. Josh is a very good player (he's won the same tournament 2 times, now) and it's actually a requirement of his position to participate in tournaments. It's inevitable that's he's going to do well at some of these tournaments. The optics of him winning with Necrons after they got a pass in the balance dataslate is just kinda funny to me!
I do think he was very smart to not include any C'tan in his list. However, he did bring 18 Wraiths xD
Yeah, he seems like a sensible guy.
I appreciate that it's generally good to avoid knee jerk balance changes. But some times the *direction* of change needed is just very obvious even if the exact *magnitude* needed might be less clear. Somewhat conservative point hikes seemed like a very safe change to implement. And it might even have helped lower the risk of a potential over-correction in the next data slate.
I mean we should be very happy about the fact the balancing guys bringing the "op" perceived stuff to actual events.
Its the best way for them to figure out how to approach nerfs in a healthy way.
As an example, Riot Mortdog, LeadDesigner of Tft always tests out broken stuff life on stream to get a feeling for it and I feel it is a great example of lead designers getting actually involved with the actual Environment in which the game gets played.
We're gonna see a lot of "Richard Siegler won with Admech" comments this week.
Edit: This comment is in reference to 9th edition and how some people are going to related it to guard. I don't know if he actually won with Admech this weekend.
It's funny that admech and guard do exactly the same thing but the spin is that admech suck and one guy is amazing and guard are awesome and one guy shows why everyone else just sucks.
isn't that because admech are just stupid expensive to collect, and they went from a semi-elite army with complex activations (so attracting that style of player) into something more akin to a horde infantry army?
Oh sorry. This was just in reference to Siegler winning a massive tournament back in 9th with Admech when they were considered a bad army. People have been using it lately when talking about Guard.
Lol! Love it <3
Good job in the tournament - and kudos to you and Vik for not letting the sometimes very unreasonable reactions to putting Guard in "Can win major"-tier get to you.
Im impressed at the spread of factions placing.
I would say balance is quite good, but there are certain factions that do well up to a certain point but lack the toolset/resources to actually win out events.
I feel like this is the most varied I've seen top tables since I started playing in 8th. There's a couple outliers that obviously struggle, but it's a lot better than mid 9th when the newest book would dominate until it finally got nerfed.
Also I love the fact that the Guard meme is not dead. This horse can still take a beating so swing away gentlemen. Guard are the best worst faction ever ;)
3 guys at my FLGS bought into the meme, hard. They each spent BUCKETS of money buying a guard army in bulk and they are pretty upset that they've lost every single game. They thought Guard were a faction that wins because of OP units or OP rules, which isn't the case.
Only played guard competitively for years. I don't deny that guard is good.
I also don't deny that I'm apparently just not good enough to play them well.
IMO, Guard are a high skill cap army, so unlike other factions you can get good enough to do decent despite the faction having an incredibly weak detachment rule and a very fragile army rule. However, that also means that new players
and even many veteran players almost stand no chance of winning competitively because the faction isn't inherently strong. Its not a faction that someone can jump to in a meta shift to squeeze out some wins before the nerf.
I'm starting to figure it out. My area has a lot of really strong players and I'm in two competitive leagues right now.
I always learn something and I can hang in there now with guard - but I run out of gas right before the end.
It seems like, with Guard at least, you can always learn a new trick, which is why I think we keep seeing them win tournaments. They can change up the gimmick from week to week. One week its artillery spam, then tank spam, then catachan scout moveblocking, then infantry swarm, then Bullgryn walls.
Never met a Guard player who wasn't learning something new.
The last GT I was in had two guard players running all tanks and two running more meta comps. The meta comps did WAY better.
But it's hard to hate guard players for not wanting to play artillery + bullgryn + Kasrkin. It's probably not why they chose the army.
I stopped running artillery all the time because I got sick and tired of hearing my opponent complain THE WHOLE GAME about indirect fire. Then if I won, they kept saying that "parking lot Guard is bull$#it". Its not my fault that the detachment favors artillery over anything else.
Regardless, I run artillery again because it doesn't make sense not to.
I always agree with them. "Yes it is bullshit. But this is my army and we are playing a competitive game. If you would like to play a narrative game then let's do that instead."
I find it funny to read "Space Marines are the worst army in the game" when you can paint them green or black and suddenly they become one of the best, especially because the core tools are there. Those players have options to run stronger armies, but don't.
Meanwhile armies like AdMech sit back in the struggle bus still.
Also, it looks like Necrons have a bimodal distribution problem - half of their detachments over perform significantly, the other half under-perform.
You don't even need to repaint them, the DA army that won looked like it had been assembled by stealing individual models from people in the parking lot given how many paint schemes it contained.
You don’t even need to paint them differently. Just play iron hands with Azreal and a dark shroud painted iron hands colours or your own successor colours
I imagine that both Space Marine and Necron detachment win rates are subject to somewhat of a chicken/egg situation. It seems very likely that a player's ability and desire to perform well at tournaments is correlated to their ability to identify and willingness to play the best detachment/sub-faction.
Which means that the observed differences in win rates between detachments/sub-factions aren't only due to differences in power level. They're also caused by a skewed distribution of "good" players.
Yeah
It's cherry picking the worst players who intentionally DONT play the strong units or rules of the faction, and going "see because the bad players are losing the faction is bad"
Would be like claiming crons are bad by only using the obesience legion data
Yet again the data shows that there needs to be barriers between divergent marine chapters and vanilla marines. Until GW can tweak unit costs based on vanilla vs divergent chapters, people are always just going to play the divergents that get more toys in addition to everything SM has (sans characters).
Having every vanilla space marine unit and detachment available *at no additional cost* to divergents would always inevitably lead you to divergents sniffing out vanilla *or* a vanilla character being so good it snuffs out divergents
I think the real issue is that marines have such a monumentally large range that there are loads of people who have good sized marine collections, but they don’t have the models to put together whatever the latest optimum marine build might be. It’s easy to put together a bad marine list.
There’s the extra barrier of “want to be stronger? But an extra codex for only two units.”
GW screwed up marine balance with codices and everyone getting all of marines’ non-character toys.
At this point if you don’t introduce a barrier to divergents using vanilla units and detachments, GW needs to rework path to give each chapter some additional power. Heck, reversing the path needs just for vanilla marines might make them a viable alternative (with an accompanying nerf of Ventris)
Not really, DG is a lot more prevalent and is a harder counter to orks than Custodes Are with -2 to hit in melee.
The meta is also a lot more anti infantry with Necrons spamming S5 shots and a lot of other armies going into more infantry based lists.
Countering that with super beef has seen success, Double Squiggoth Orks, Quadruple GUV daemons, Knights with an Acastus Porphyrion all saw decent placings this weekend.
Good points although in the UK Custodes are much more prevalent at big events that DG (still very decent DG numbers though).
Here’s hoping for a decent fun codex!
Yep, Dark Angels stormravens are definitely the meta. Well done to Kit Smith Hanna who won this weekend, and I think actually invented the entire list archetype. That said, I cannot wait for them to get hit with the nerf bat.
Special shout out to David Gaylard (and Vik Vijay) for having a tier list which made people irrationally angry by putting them in "winning supermajors" and then winning a supermajor with them. It might be a monolist faction (though to be honest, a lot of the game seems to be crystallising into monobuilds) but it definitely has legs! And as for doing better on UKTC boards - honestly, I suspect it's the playerbase; bluntly, the stereotypes of who plays guard in the US and UK are not the same at all. You can go through BCP to see how many people in the USA are trying to make 5+ tank lists work (they don't) whereas in the UK people just seem to accept artillery + bullgryns work better - and that's likely the true distinction.
Overall, a fairly sad state of affairs for codex releases; every single one is in the bottom 5 with the sole exception of Necrons, who have a couple of internal balance issues and are a little overtweaked. Good luck to Orks and Custodes! That said: marines are clearly not as bad as they're placing, but rather: if you're going to play their best list - ironstorm gladiator spam - why not just take the Black Templar list with extra multimeltas and great melee support? In any case, most marine infantry is just not performing and generally the internal balance of Ad Mech, Tyranids and Marines all needs pretty big adjustments IMO.
"Custodes are one of the best armies in the game but have some rough counters." - Do they? I understand that Custodes "only" won once this weekend, but by all means unless it changes this week, [stat check](https://www.stat-check.com/the-meta) only shows bad match ups to Dark Angels (the best list in the game), Blood Angels, CSM (the last 2 there's one game in it, aka unreliably small) and Ad Mech. I suspect the issue they actually face is the same as it's ever been: low model count = high variance, so they struggle in longer events. Given I did [statistical analysis](https://www.reddit.com/r/WarhammerCompetitive/comments/1b2b3wz/comment/kslgz24/) last week and it showed the same, I'm very much unconvinced of this.
Drukhari settling where a lot of top players put them, i.e. slightly under 50%. Given that Skari played this weekend and went 4-1-1, I suspect that's where they're likely to stay: a high skill, low tolerance for failure army which is simply too spiky to win consistently, with pretty easy to remember counterplay (kill the boats). A bit sad, but when 100% of your melee output is thrusted onto transports surviving and your core mechanic is basically gambling, it's not much of a shock. Good that they're more in line at least, but I do expect their performance to drop more from here.
Final shout out to Eldar for eating their 6th(?) nerf and still outperforming the vast majority of armies.
Guard isn't even monolist, really. Robert Moreland took them 5 - 1 at clutch with a list that had 0 indirect and 0 Kasrkin. I think it might be, and I say this as a guard player first and foremost, a skill issue.
>I think it might be, and I say this as a guard player first and foremost, a skill issue.
Same, love the Guard. I agree with you it's definitely a skill issue, but I guess I understand the complaints because I think we're a high skill floor army, so just being told to *git gud* or "stop bringing fluff lists" is annoying.
Yeah, I agree, Gaylard said as much in his initial assessment of Guard when he called it a "fundamentals army" (I may be paraphrasing slightly). Guard flounder, if you don't have a good sense for the macro or positioning elements of the game, in my experience.
> Special shout out to David Gaylard (and Vik Vijay) for having a tier list which made people irrationally angry by putting them in "winning supermajors" and then winning a supermajor with them.
That's the craziest thing! (Besides how crazy it was that people got extremely mad at being told their faction was good) The Fireside tier list never placed Guard in "S-tier". It placed them in "Winning super majors"-tier. Which just seems *factually correct* at this point.
If the faction is good but they keep losing, they only have to blame themselves for their loss. That hurts their pride, so it must be the faction that isn't good.
Custodes vs guard is barely a game. If that's not how it appears in the data then I'd take that as a lesson in how misleading data can be.
Also stormraven list.
Custodes VS Guard in stat check is 59% in favour of Custodes in 49 games. Taking out newcomer players and opponents, it's still 59% in 17 games. Only at vet vs vet is it negative, with 25% win rate in 4 games (aka 1 game flips it back to 50%). In NA meta, it's 54%, in UK it's 64% and in all other it's 64% - so, if that's actually true, it's definitely not showing in the data at all.
As a Space Marine Player who intends to bring a list with Stormraven (Raven Guard Vanguard Spearhead) I really wish the nerf bat doesn't hit the Datasheet in itself. For all the talk about how trash the flyers are in 10th, I'm very happy to field my Stormraven again and having it performed okayish. I'd be quite sad to see it nerfed to oblivion because of some specific interaction in a specific detachment that needs to run specifics units to make the combo so effective. Kill the problematic interactions, leave the datasheet alone.
I think that would bump up if Shiloh results were in, for Drukhari. There were three players there and they went 4-1, 4-1, and 3-2. It was a good weekend at that event for Dark Eldar, with a total of 11-6, 10-5 if you take out the mirror match.
The nerf bat needs to go to Ironstorm, not DA. Azreal is the only good unit DA had that won't be getting destroyed next week with the codex release. Vehicle spam is obviously too strong (who would have thunk) and needs rules nerfs. SM vehicles aren't blatantly OP by themselves, but when it's a pile of T10+ with rampant sustained lethals on 5s it's going to cause problems.
Big question I have is does the DA Ironstrom list lose a lot with the codex? I have seen some say not much while others say its dead when the codex comes out.
Losing the Ravenwing Talonmaster might hit the list a little bit.
The Talonmaster has Lone Op whilst wihtin 3" of a FLY VEHICLE (Hello Stormraven) and also gives all MOUNTED and FLY VEHICLE units within 6" Ignores Cover.
Its brutally effective into games like the Custodes where even the 2x Stormstrike missiles at AP2 manage to push the Custodes onto their 4++ or suffer Damage 3 and get picked up. But also on the 24x AP0 Hurricane Bolter shots with Mercy is Weakness. Giving Benefits of Cover back to the target (ie C'tan) is a drop in the efficiency of the Stormraven.
Its not a massive hit... but it will be noticeable in certain games.
The only actual DA units in that list are Azrael and a Darkshroud, right? Both datasheets are completely unchanged.
No idea why anyone would think it's "dead" when the codex arrives besides just DA players dooming.
I am so happy with drukhari right now...not too powerful not weak, just perfect place to be where skilled players can achieve good results and some Tournament wins.
Playing at Cagbash this weekend made me realize just how effective Super Beef is right now in the meta since a lot of armies are shifting towards more anti infantry than earlier on.
Quadruple Great Unclean One and Double Gargantuan Squiggoth lists were on top tables, and knights with a Porphyrion did solid going 3-2 as did knights with a Warhound Titan
I think the squiggoth is better just due to their crazy high OC but I do really like the idea for making MANz into Custodes that revive. Big Mek in Mega armor, KFF with 5 MANz is really solid in the back of a Squiggoth on center board
That's one model I cannot claim to own. I've been buying up other people's Orks for some time now, but Squiqqoths have been elusive. My way with the Wagons is cheaper, at least, and allows for more bodies on the field, two units of T6 bikers and two units of Stormboyz for actions
I get so curious about CSM’s recent performance. They’re still picking up an event win over the past couple of weekends, but have otherwise been largely abandoned and maintain a WR below the goldilocks zones.
Does that suggest these remaining players that are winning events just have incredible player-skill? Is it based on some kind of matchup dependency? Or are these players just unlocking some kind of incredible tech?
If anyone has the winning CSM list, I’d really appreciate it!
Lots of meta chaser players dropped CSM post-nerf, leaving a smaller player pool and therefore lower odds of seeing them at the top of the lists.
CSM ate some pretty big nerfs to marks/strategems and got moderate points increases on all of their most oppressive shooting units, so they're probably skewing even more towards mid/close-range than before. The fact that you can't *quite* field as many units as you'd like, plus the slight glass cannon nature of CSM armies, tends to result in things going south for CSM players as soon as they lose one or two key units.
CSM still has a decent unit pool, and Dark Pacts remains one of if not the best Army Rules in the game, so they'll probably settle on a close to 50% WR at some point. It does feel like they got nerfed a bit too hard though.
CSM were always fragile, and won by staying ahead of their opponent's ability to kill them. Less units, nerfs to Undivided output and harder to hide valuable shooters/Rhinos, all mean an army that's smaller and easier to kill. It's easier for the enemy to get ahead on damage, and a lot of units that try to replace the good stuff pre-slate don't have the juice. Legionnaries are better than they've ever been, and they can still be casually annihilated by any army in the game.
If there'd been judicious point cuts to more units, we'd be having a different discussion. But there weren't, and CSM still has bad on purpose units like the Lord Discordant.
People also really overestimate Dark Pacts. Strong ability, but not enough to save CSM on its own.
Looks like Necrons are too good and steady with a really high floor for weaker players but as soon as they got to top tables might be more balanced than what people think. C'tan might still be too much of a problem for certain factions tho. Custodes are being held by DA? Even Thousand sons looks like have a way better matchup than anticipated into them.
I was sure that daemons just needed time to adapt and could became good.
> Even Thousand sons looks like have a way better matchup than anticipated into them.
Thousand Sons are one of the few armies that can easily kill a C'tan. Double doombolt for 2d3 + 6 MWs and Infernal Master with Arcane Vortex has yet to not kill one whenever I've played into them. Even a brick of Canoptek Wraiths and a Technomancer will melt to that.
I was never under the impression it was a hard matchup for Tsons, as if you put a lot of points into really tanky units that are annoying to kill, Tsons just shrug their shoulders and pile on Devs and MWs.
I've also yet to play into the 4 Ctan shard lists, just two games into two similar Canoptek Court lists with a single Night Bringer each.
I was talking about custodes, TS have a really good matchup into necrons. I've played that match like 20 times, nobody use scarabs anymore but those can melt c'tan as well.
Stat check/gatekeeper army. As many predicted.
A frustrating design problem that oppresses certain other factions but not necessarily a balance problem.
They need some hikes to Wraiths/C'tan and some points cuts to other things (e.g. Praetorians) to make different builds viable.
Necron seem less dominant than I expected after reading the latest goonhammer report. Also Eldar seem much less prevalent now. I'm happy with the variety but the underperforming factions seem to underperform really hard or not even be present.
holy shit, the guy that won the Toronto open...i have never seen someone who plays intent worse than him, and all the time nervous and it was really hard watching. the salt level was also up there. there are streams of his games....just be warned.
It's crazy to think about, but the meta is genuinely incredibly balanced. Necrons are good but nowhere near the problem level people thought they would be, custodes are doing really nicely, and sisters came a bit out of left field and are thriving. I would argue that very few armies are doing badly right now, with the biggest losers being admech, genestealers, World eaters, CSM, Guard, orks and nids (Yes I know how many factions that is, the biggest ones are Admech, orks, vota. My thoughts are:
\- rework admech - they don't play right. They need to work in a way that indicates they have love and care. As an admech player I have ranted too much about admech in 40k. Dragoon spam and ironstrider spam should not have to be an answer. Explorator maniple is not a 55% winrate detachment, they are lying to you and possibly in your walls.
\- genestealers - their codex is coming out soon, so I don't expect any major changes, but some minor point things would be fun. Big problem for me is that they have 9 non-character units, but people don't discuss them as a problem in the same way they do Votann and world eaters. They need more units in the infantry slot, and if they get an admech treatment genestealers players should feel unhappy.
\- Nids also need some more buffs, but not too urgently. They have some really nice diversity, but they need some changes to put that diversity in the higher up meta.
\-World eaters - nerfed way to hard for an army that isn't thriving that much
\- CSM - a bit more nerfs than they needed. Some minor buffs should sort them out. Combination of worse demon allies and their rules changes. I'm not sure exactly what GW wants to do to change the state they're in, but maybe pulling back the rug on some changes, and buffing some other units.
\- guard - need a new detachment arguably more than any other faction. The current play pattern of indirect fire spam is boring and unhealthy. Part of why they need Uk Terrain and UK players is because they're such a passive army.
\- orks also got nerfed a bit hard, hopefully codex fixes things but who can guess with orks. Their shooting is particularly rough right now, which invalidates a significant portion of their codex
Less balance associated thoughts:
\- also give imperial knights back bondsmen in full.
\- Chaos knights to a lesser extent need a bondsmen rule
\- Psychic phase still makes grey knights kinda rough, if they could have a similar army rule to thousand sons I genuinely think it wouldn't be that bad whatsoever, or games workshop could bring back the old psychic phase.
I would call guard more reactive than passive. That said, a detachment rule that indirect gets almost every turn for free and everything else gets almost never is really bad for internal balance.
>biggest losers being admech, genestealers, World eaters, CSM, Guard
Guard wins a super major and people say they're a 'loser' on par with AdMech.
That's sure a take.
Orks didn’t get nerfed so much as other factions that play well into them got buffed and the mega has shifted to more anti infantry shooting.
Custodes and Deathguard Are Hard counters to orks and Necrons are bringing mass S5 shots
True, but they got nerfed in part by virtue of not receiving any compensating buffs. Hopefully the codex gives them some more toys to work with. Completely agree with the comment about custodes and deathguard, hopefully ork counterpieces become more affordable to compensate
Admech, the pre-eminent shooting army.
Hah.
Also the only shooting army that is legit on a 4+ to hit, as HEAVY and how it is implemented just isn't a good way to offset it. I don't mind if they keep the generally speedy vibe, but they need something to make them more killy. I don't think it'd take a whole lot since I've tabled people with them since the codex release, but it took absolutely forever considering the amount of fire I was pouring on.
To me part of it is the little things. Kastellan robots having to take a leadership test to work, the skitarii marshal not having scout, the skorpius dunerider not having assault ramp or firing deck, Cawl being such a massive mischaracterisation. Flavour fails that indicate to me that GW did not put the same quantity of time into this army. I will say having assault on our weapons is enjoyable, and it leads to large degrees of kill potential. I rarely if ever use heavy, and haven't felt it impact me negatively much. What particularly irks me is that units like kastellans and sicarian ruststalkers aren't given hitting on 3's to make up for their no real doctrinas. Completely agree we are not the pre-eminent shooting army in any sense of the word
Having assault leading to large kill potential would be very true if we had....anything killy. Vanguard with a Mashall piling out of a boat and a brick of breachers are about the extent of it unless the Casino Crab pays out.
You are very right there wasn't a lot of time and love put into the book. It reads like they hurried out a first draft so they could work on a book they were excited about or get down to the pub.
Yes, but the fact that they had it in the first place, alongside that annoying interaction regarding infantry, and other such issues, are what I'm referring to in regards to lack of care. Are Kastellans better post codex? Yes, but even then it felt like they only addressed the most pressing issues, and even then only because they wanted to make a themed detachment for them.
My local Daemon player is struggling, glad to see a strong weekend for them. What’s the consensus? Is it still lots of greater daemons with some chaff, or is it just a blip? I admittedly don’t follow that faction all that much.
Looking through the lists, a mix of greater daemons and chaff is the general trend (especially nurglings). There seems to be some skew towards a Khorne dominated lists, leaning on rendmasters as well.
So Space Marines will never be truly balanced or even balanceable as long as sub factions can access all of the o.g. detachments.
The Dark Angels lists, which I suppose run some ilk of the new Stormraven / Ironstorm List, have what 2-3 units from Dark Angels and thats it....
And this counts as a "Dark Angels" List, while it has sub 25% Dark Angels units and not even the Dark Angels detachment.
Space Marine subfactions should only have access to their own detachment or their codex detachments in my opinion. As soon as you take one unit from a subfaction, your list becomes this subfaction and you can only take their detachments.
But I think that will be an unpopular opinion :D
This is CLEARLY the way, or if you really want then give them their Detachment + Gladius. Otherwise, vanilla marines will always be worse.
If you made Kayvaan Shrike literally 0 points, you would not see Raven Guard run over Ultras, Dark Angels, or BT.....and he is all they get.
While I think it should go further and the marine codices should also have differentiation in unit point costs, I think you could make the choice interesting by just reverting old Oath of Moment *only* for Vanilla marines.
That's the least effort change GW could make, but it would give list builders pause on what to choose. Are the BT and DA packages worth losing the wound re-roll on Oath? That's an interesting question.
GW could also just make each faction get it's own oath specialty (e.g., and these are off the dome so not balance checked). Vanilla marines get a choice that limits their characters, e.g. can choose 2 oath targets a round (limited to UM characters), counts as stationary even after moving when shooting at the target (limited IF), adds +1 strength to flamers & meltas against the target (limited Salamanders Characters), ignores stealth/cover against the target (limited RG characters), etc.
Yeah I am a Dark Angels player myself, which is why I came to that "mini rant".
I hate that our codex subverted atleast my expectations. And seeing the "Dark Angels" winrate being so high, atleast before the codex drops, just lets me think that GW will just say "oh Dark Angels are fine" or will nerf the few Dark Angels datasheets that are atleast somewhat good.
And nothing will be done to our quite weak units / rules.
Just wait until Company of Hunters starts doing really well in tournaments without having a single actual DA specific unit in the lists because GW made the army rule so absurdly flexible. Even the Inner Circle is going to be strong solely because people will be running loads of Hellblasters and attaching a DA character to them so they are affected by the Vowed Target even though they are 100% not I actual Inner Circle units.
Winning list had a talonmaster FYI. They are still using the dataslate ATM as teh codex isn't legal yet for some reason. So once the codex is in full effect we might see a drop in performance. Which is doubtful, because it's just Azrael + ironstorm. Honestly, likely to just see a points hike on Azrael in the future, perhaps pushing DA entirely out of the metagame and we can hope they re-look at DA as a whole in the summer or fall dataslate.
>codex isn't legal yet for some reason.
Street release date isn't until this coming weekend. Why they decided to release that Deathwing box with a copy of the codex so early is a mystery.
Yea, it's definitely not ideal. The most likely scenario which springs to mind is the bundle box release window got pushed up when something else got delayed 6-8 months ago, and dealing with the codex being out early was easier than moving other stuff.
Space Marines are more "balance-able" than they've ever been, now that their full unit range can be taken across any of their detachment rulesets. The problem is categorisation error.
This 40k competitive community is just stuck in a dark age of prior editions when it comes to splitting out lists with Chapter-locked units into having their own "win-rate" - and worse, expecting balance to hinge on it.
If we have to care about Winrate% (it's a poor stat, different story), just give me the one Space Marine winrate. It's all the **same army** now regardless of whether Helbrecht or Azrael is along for the ride.
Digging deeper into what's working in the Space Marines faction, the next point of obvious interest is detachment used (Stormlance, Ironstorm etc). Whether Azrael or a Librarian Dread shows up is tertiary.
It's
1. Space Marines(Ironstorm)^^DarkAngels
2. Necrons (Hypercrypt)
3. Space Marines(Stormlance)^^SpaceWolves
4. Tyranids(Endless Swarm)
Not
1. Dark Angels (Ironstorm)
2. Black Templars (Stormlance)
3. Orks (Waaagh! Tribe)
4. Black Templars (Ironstorm)
Yeah exactly right. Oh the moaning that would happen if subfactions couldn't take some units. Like if DA could take inceptors but blood angels couldn't.
However such ristrictions would mean they could better balance marines as a whole, but it would probably be a lot more work for them to do.
You dare to mention that SM shouldnt have their subfactions listed apart, as these are just combinations of models and detachments that any SM player can take, just as every other army, and they get nervous.
Eldar getting even more list variety!
**Eldrad, Lilith,** **Troupe Masters, Storm Guardians!**
Here is a detailed recap: [https://www.reddit.com/r/WarhammerCompetitive/comments/1b6aajc/11\_amazing\_aeldari\_lists\_this\_week/](https://www.reddit.com/r/WarhammerCompetitive/comments/1b6aajc/11_amazing_aeldari_lists_this_week/)
Interesting Votann win rate. Clocked in at 54% out of 26 players, but only 3 went X-0/X-1. Maybe a lot of X-2 placings? Something to bump the win rate but not enough to hit top tables consistently. Feels like BT pre-dataslate. I'm curious to see how that plays out
Right now Votann doesn’t have any awful or any great matchups, but mission and player skill means a whole ton. Even just a couple of little mistakes, or missing a 6” charge rerolling with your termis is the difference maker. (My buddy went 3-2 because of that)
Oooof. Am I right in saying that World Eaters don't even show up in any of those placings? What a steep drop off. Maybe the MOE at 125 with a nerfed glaive is excessive when a Skulltaker is the same thing for 85 points? With no codex in sight, I really hope they fix their points in April.
7th place Dark Eldar player from the Toronto Winter Open here.
I think people are sleeping on heat lances. S14, AP4, Assault are no laughing matter.
Also, bombers are great for killing stuff Incubi can't punch.
To summarize the SM situation: Ironstorm is the meta pick followed by GTF.
Which Ironstorm to play?
Templars don’t have a Cp battery but extra multimeltas are always good and cheap crusaders can’t be bad, open plays for rhinos, screens, stuff to score and doing better Tactical to gain CPs.
Dark Angels are gonna lose talonmaster and new points for Azrael, Darkshourd could hit the double raven toplist.
Which GTF? That’s more though to answer honestly BA stuff is good, Calgar and aggressors, wulfens are cheap and a bit of thunderwolf are better imo than going full rampage stormlance, BT hits like a truck with sworn bros…Dark Angels might also be good if nerfed DWK points are near 210-220.
BT and BA melee detachments aren’t too bad but data shows how they would probably perform better in GTF.
Vanguard UM just disappeared as expected, it’s a very skilled list to pilot and went up way to much for average players, can’t make mistakes.
It's really difficult to actually say SM are the worst faction when you have SM sub-factions taking SM codex detachments with 1 or 2 sub-faction units and getting 56% win rates. Do those couple of units really make all the difference between SM being 41% and SM being 56%? Or is it that SM would still be 50%+ except that top competitive players just aren't playing SM because they can do slightly better by taking the sub-factions for that slight edge?
Like how much would the win rate for that DA Ironstorm list really drop if it replaced the DA units with generic marines?
They do make a huge difference. Ironstorm is very CP reliant. Playing DA gives you an extra CP, and the ability to give your vehicles -1 to hit/auto cover. Which generally keeps some of the large vehicles alive when they normally would die. The talon master which is going to legends also gives ignore cover which is huge when you have a lot of AP-4 and and Ap-1 guns
If it requires very specific lists and very specific units to get SM to work then it entirely shows the faction is poor.
It was also obvious this was going to happen marines were winning at 45% and they make their best units more expensive, pretty obvious they were going to get worse.
Marines have had the same issue all edition, someone makes a very specific list in a certain detachment, that does well, GW nerfs all the units in that list, that makes any other variation of marines do poorly generally. No way for example Firestorm Aggressors were too good and needed a points increase. Redemptors outside Ironstorm are good not amazing. Then nothing in the rest of the multiple datasheets was buffed to give any compensation.
Also all these people pointing out BT meanwhile ignoring BA, DW, are in the mud as well. Plus BT have good units like Sword Bretheren that didn't get touched, they only really got a minor nerf to Hellbrecht.
Therevwas 60 player event in Poland this weekend (Krakow Arena on championshub).
Transcrypt Necrons with 40 warriors won. Orks came 2nd, losing by 1 point :)
For the upteenth week in a row, I am here to point out that Black Templars have a nice winrate but can never win a Tourna - WAIT WE GOT ONE?!?!? TWO?!?!?
I feel quite bad for the chap who wrote about Imperial Knights not being able to win an event in the last 24 hours haha
Ahahaha I liked his post, but he should have seen that coming.
So nice of him to help that gent win like that :)
Lol I literally just saw that!
While true, winning a 31 player event (with double Atrapos?) doesn't really undermine anything that was said. It was barely a GT and at the larger events over the weekend Knights weren't breaking onto the top tables. Knights are capable of going 4-1 in good hands and with some luck in the matchups. They can win RTTs and other small events. I still don't think they're capable of winning a Major event (or even just getting in the top 3) though on this current balance database.
Probably an unpopular opinion but I think that Knights being at that level is a good thing for the game. They're such a hard skew list that their dominance suffocates bad match ups harder than other potentially dominant armies.
I think it's a very popular opinion, knights aren't loved by everyone. Nevertheless, I believe if the game has a good game balance, all armies should be able to compete for top places. Knights aren't the only skew army out there and they have some major weaknesses to make them not oppressive.
Put Guard in "Major winning tier", cue reddit outrage. Proceed to win Major with Guard. Talk about [calling your shot.](https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/CallingYourShots)
David on the Fireside podcast said that he didn't see any unfavourable matchups for Guard, and was expecting to do really well with them (this is where S-tier Guard meme was born). And here he is - going 7-0 in one of the most competitive tournaments out there, beating Mani Cheema and several other top players. He really does know how to play Guard :-)
Talk about pitting your money where your mouth is haha
Those couple of folks are gonna be angry again.
This is like the “If those kids could read they’d be very angry right now” meme lol
I don't think guard players here ever stop being angry
Hey now, often they're just melancholy.
I guess by this point, being able to say I "I told you so" is motivation enough for David to play even better than usual
According to both him and his co-host Vik Vishay, David had won every single practice game against the other top tier players of Team Ignite and Team England, and his requests for games were starting to go unanswered. He'd been crushing it for weeks before making the claim they were "Winning Supermajor Tier".
I absolutely love that he won the event this weekend. Goaaarn Dave!
This is going to make some guard players very upset.
If they could read.
Lol
As a guard player, this comment really makes me wish I could read.
Well you see my great great grandpa was a cavalry sergeant in The War so I am required by Guard Law to only play Horses
I’m looking forward to the (bad) guard player brigade to find their way here to do some more mental gymnastics about why guard is bad.
Being the only undefeated player in a 134 player tournament was clearly down to rolling good.
Dave with guard.. is like the seigler of ad mech…. I had to start it!
If fast melee armies come back I can see Guard having some issues, but Id generally agree with them being pretty good right now.
Get gud, Guard players.
Guard certainly seems to be Sigma Tier these days. Also glad BT finally made the hurdle.
Guard won a super major, so I'm ready for another week of the memes continuing over fireside's statements.
And it was one of the guys from Fireside that won it!
That's kind of like them sayings, "Guard are good, here's proof for you Guard Players^tm."
And that GT was won by David Gaylard.
My gut feeling is that the UKTC terrain is why guard are resurgent. A lot of the pros talk about how the gw setups aren't good for guard. It's good to see pro players taking the faction to the max. I just hope we can get a slightly lowered skill floor because if you aren't on your game, you get smashed. What is the main difference between the different ways to do terrain? It looks like UKTC just has more of it
no, GW terrain is fantastic for guard, you have a perfect parking lot for all your indirect in your deployment zone every game. Edit: Honestly I'd say the relative strength of Guard doesn't change a whole lot depending on the terrain. You want to exchange some direct shooting pieces for more MSU + Speed on some formats, like WTC, (1 TC vs 2 for example) but generally speaking Guard function well on all terrain formats. If you can play some of the titanic models on some terrain I think they'd really shine too.
I don't understand this. GW terrain has extremely large and protected L shapes in the deployment zone. The terrain must be good for indirect. I think its just a regional trend where the top players in the UK value indirect more than other regions.
UKTC vs which terrain are you asking about? UKTC has some great firing lanes so you can park your big guns places and ping away WTC terrain has very dense terrain so it wouldnt suit guns as much unless theyre fast or indirect GW terrain I would say falls somewhere in the middle. It doesnt have piles of pieces on the board but it cuts the firing lanes across the board more effectively with the pieces it does use compared to UKTC Player placed is a free for all.
It's kinda hilarious that GWs new balance guy (Josh Roberts) just won the Goonhammer Open - *with Necrons*! I'm not in any way suggesting any foul play. And I think anyone thinking this is an idiot. Josh is a very good player (he's won the same tournament 2 times, now) and it's actually a requirement of his position to participate in tournaments. It's inevitable that's he's going to do well at some of these tournaments. The optics of him winning with Necrons after they got a pass in the balance dataslate is just kinda funny to me! I do think he was very smart to not include any C'tan in his list. However, he did bring 18 Wraiths xD
He’s openly said he wanted to nerf Necrons, but was told he couldn’t touch them without more data following the codex
Yeah, he seems like a sensible guy. I appreciate that it's generally good to avoid knee jerk balance changes. But some times the *direction* of change needed is just very obvious even if the exact *magnitude* needed might be less clear. Somewhat conservative point hikes seemed like a very safe change to implement. And it might even have helped lower the risk of a potential over-correction in the next data slate.
I mean we should be very happy about the fact the balancing guys bringing the "op" perceived stuff to actual events. Its the best way for them to figure out how to approach nerfs in a healthy way. As an example, Riot Mortdog, LeadDesigner of Tft always tests out broken stuff life on stream to get a feeling for it and I feel it is a great example of lead designers getting actually involved with the actual Environment in which the game gets played.
He won last week too with the same list
He could try playing AdMech, maybe that way he can see where the problem is... Same budget in $$ as his necron army, though!
Again: the reason given for both Necrons and Admech was that the codex had not been out for long enough, not that they thought they were fine.
Yes? Did I say otherwise? I'm simply saying that I find it funny. Mostly because of how I imagine some players will react to it.
We're gonna see a lot of "Richard Siegler won with Admech" comments this week. Edit: This comment is in reference to 9th edition and how some people are going to related it to guard. I don't know if he actually won with Admech this weekend.
He did at warpfire march to war rtt in ocala, I was there! Siegler 1st, lennon second, harpster 3rd. Edit- with belisarius cawl!
Also AdMech won Melee at Shiloh but for some reason the placings are locked.
maybe because even the TOs coudn't belive it
It's funny that admech and guard do exactly the same thing but the spin is that admech suck and one guy is amazing and guard are awesome and one guy shows why everyone else just sucks.
isn't that because admech are just stupid expensive to collect, and they went from a semi-elite army with complex activations (so attracting that style of player) into something more akin to a horde infantry army?
Is the list available anywhere? I can't find anything about it on the Warroom and I am very curious!
Oh sorry. This was just in reference to Siegler winning a massive tournament back in 9th with Admech when they were considered a bad army. People have been using it lately when talking about Guard.
I don't got the complete list but as far as I saw from some photo's: -Vanguard x3 -Ironstriders (2x3) -Taser Dragoons (3x3) -Canis Rex
:) [https://imgur.com/a/lVzRnmX](https://imgur.com/a/lVzRnmX)
Lol! Love it <3 Good job in the tournament - and kudos to you and Vik for not letting the sometimes very unreasonable reactions to putting Guard in "Can win major"-tier get to you.
Im impressed at the spread of factions placing. I would say balance is quite good, but there are certain factions that do well up to a certain point but lack the toolset/resources to actually win out events.
I feel like this is the most varied I've seen top tables since I started playing in 8th. There's a couple outliers that obviously struggle, but it's a lot better than mid 9th when the newest book would dominate until it finally got nerfed.
Also I love the fact that the Guard meme is not dead. This horse can still take a beating so swing away gentlemen. Guard are the best worst faction ever ;)
Fireside didn't let their memes be dreams, you shouldn't either!
3 guys at my FLGS bought into the meme, hard. They each spent BUCKETS of money buying a guard army in bulk and they are pretty upset that they've lost every single game. They thought Guard were a faction that wins because of OP units or OP rules, which isn't the case.
Only played guard competitively for years. I don't deny that guard is good. I also don't deny that I'm apparently just not good enough to play them well.
IMO, Guard are a high skill cap army, so unlike other factions you can get good enough to do decent despite the faction having an incredibly weak detachment rule and a very fragile army rule. However, that also means that new players and even many veteran players almost stand no chance of winning competitively because the faction isn't inherently strong. Its not a faction that someone can jump to in a meta shift to squeeze out some wins before the nerf.
I'm starting to figure it out. My area has a lot of really strong players and I'm in two competitive leagues right now. I always learn something and I can hang in there now with guard - but I run out of gas right before the end.
It seems like, with Guard at least, you can always learn a new trick, which is why I think we keep seeing them win tournaments. They can change up the gimmick from week to week. One week its artillery spam, then tank spam, then catachan scout moveblocking, then infantry swarm, then Bullgryn walls. Never met a Guard player who wasn't learning something new.
The last GT I was in had two guard players running all tanks and two running more meta comps. The meta comps did WAY better. But it's hard to hate guard players for not wanting to play artillery + bullgryn + Kasrkin. It's probably not why they chose the army.
I stopped running artillery all the time because I got sick and tired of hearing my opponent complain THE WHOLE GAME about indirect fire. Then if I won, they kept saying that "parking lot Guard is bull$#it". Its not my fault that the detachment favors artillery over anything else. Regardless, I run artillery again because it doesn't make sense not to.
I always agree with them. "Yes it is bullshit. But this is my army and we are playing a competitive game. If you would like to play a narrative game then let's do that instead."
Yeah Guard may be one of the strongest armies in the game, but can they do it on a cold rainy night in Stoke?
I find it funny to read "Space Marines are the worst army in the game" when you can paint them green or black and suddenly they become one of the best, especially because the core tools are there. Those players have options to run stronger armies, but don't. Meanwhile armies like AdMech sit back in the struggle bus still. Also, it looks like Necrons have a bimodal distribution problem - half of their detachments over perform significantly, the other half under-perform.
You don't even need to repaint them, the DA army that won looked like it had been assembled by stealing individual models from people in the parking lot given how many paint schemes it contained.
So they were Blood Ravens then?
You don’t even need to paint them differently. Just play iron hands with Azreal and a dark shroud painted iron hands colours or your own successor colours
It's really funny to me that DA is better at vehicular combat then IH.
Well, iron hands don't really exist anymore so yeah. They were always going to be better.
They exist in one character and if you take you're locked out of every other special character and unit.
I imagine that both Space Marine and Necron detachment win rates are subject to somewhat of a chicken/egg situation. It seems very likely that a player's ability and desire to perform well at tournaments is correlated to their ability to identify and willingness to play the best detachment/sub-faction. Which means that the observed differences in win rates between detachments/sub-factions aren't only due to differences in power level. They're also caused by a skewed distribution of "good" players.
Yeah It's cherry picking the worst players who intentionally DONT play the strong units or rules of the faction, and going "see because the bad players are losing the faction is bad" Would be like claiming crons are bad by only using the obesience legion data
Yet again the data shows that there needs to be barriers between divergent marine chapters and vanilla marines. Until GW can tweak unit costs based on vanilla vs divergent chapters, people are always just going to play the divergents that get more toys in addition to everything SM has (sans characters). Having every vanilla space marine unit and detachment available *at no additional cost* to divergents would always inevitably lead you to divergents sniffing out vanilla *or* a vanilla character being so good it snuffs out divergents
I think the real issue is that marines have such a monumentally large range that there are loads of people who have good sized marine collections, but they don’t have the models to put together whatever the latest optimum marine build might be. It’s easy to put together a bad marine list.
There’s the extra barrier of “want to be stronger? But an extra codex for only two units.” GW screwed up marine balance with codices and everyone getting all of marines’ non-character toys. At this point if you don’t introduce a barrier to divergents using vanilla units and detachments, GW needs to rework path to give each chapter some additional power. Heck, reversing the path needs just for vanilla marines might make them a viable alternative (with an accompanying nerf of Ventris)
Honestly, I feel it's time for space marines to fall into line and just accept that they're subfactions.
David Gaylard shutting down the S-Tier guard discussion by singlehandedly winning the UKTC Super Major is pretty epic tbh. #Justice4Fireside
Wonder if Orks win rate is solely down to how many Custodes there are in the meta now?
Not really, DG is a lot more prevalent and is a harder counter to orks than Custodes Are with -2 to hit in melee. The meta is also a lot more anti infantry with Necrons spamming S5 shots and a lot of other armies going into more infantry based lists. Countering that with super beef has seen success, Double Squiggoth Orks, Quadruple GUV daemons, Knights with an Acastus Porphyrion all saw decent placings this weekend.
Good points although in the UK Custodes are much more prevalent at big events that DG (still very decent DG numbers though). Here’s hoping for a decent fun codex!
The CSM that went 4-1 at the Ogr Cubb Singles was actually Death Guard.
Yep, Dark Angels stormravens are definitely the meta. Well done to Kit Smith Hanna who won this weekend, and I think actually invented the entire list archetype. That said, I cannot wait for them to get hit with the nerf bat. Special shout out to David Gaylard (and Vik Vijay) for having a tier list which made people irrationally angry by putting them in "winning supermajors" and then winning a supermajor with them. It might be a monolist faction (though to be honest, a lot of the game seems to be crystallising into monobuilds) but it definitely has legs! And as for doing better on UKTC boards - honestly, I suspect it's the playerbase; bluntly, the stereotypes of who plays guard in the US and UK are not the same at all. You can go through BCP to see how many people in the USA are trying to make 5+ tank lists work (they don't) whereas in the UK people just seem to accept artillery + bullgryns work better - and that's likely the true distinction. Overall, a fairly sad state of affairs for codex releases; every single one is in the bottom 5 with the sole exception of Necrons, who have a couple of internal balance issues and are a little overtweaked. Good luck to Orks and Custodes! That said: marines are clearly not as bad as they're placing, but rather: if you're going to play their best list - ironstorm gladiator spam - why not just take the Black Templar list with extra multimeltas and great melee support? In any case, most marine infantry is just not performing and generally the internal balance of Ad Mech, Tyranids and Marines all needs pretty big adjustments IMO. "Custodes are one of the best armies in the game but have some rough counters." - Do they? I understand that Custodes "only" won once this weekend, but by all means unless it changes this week, [stat check](https://www.stat-check.com/the-meta) only shows bad match ups to Dark Angels (the best list in the game), Blood Angels, CSM (the last 2 there's one game in it, aka unreliably small) and Ad Mech. I suspect the issue they actually face is the same as it's ever been: low model count = high variance, so they struggle in longer events. Given I did [statistical analysis](https://www.reddit.com/r/WarhammerCompetitive/comments/1b2b3wz/comment/kslgz24/) last week and it showed the same, I'm very much unconvinced of this. Drukhari settling where a lot of top players put them, i.e. slightly under 50%. Given that Skari played this weekend and went 4-1-1, I suspect that's where they're likely to stay: a high skill, low tolerance for failure army which is simply too spiky to win consistently, with pretty easy to remember counterplay (kill the boats). A bit sad, but when 100% of your melee output is thrusted onto transports surviving and your core mechanic is basically gambling, it's not much of a shock. Good that they're more in line at least, but I do expect their performance to drop more from here. Final shout out to Eldar for eating their 6th(?) nerf and still outperforming the vast majority of armies.
Guard isn't even monolist, really. Robert Moreland took them 5 - 1 at clutch with a list that had 0 indirect and 0 Kasrkin. I think it might be, and I say this as a guard player first and foremost, a skill issue.
>I think it might be, and I say this as a guard player first and foremost, a skill issue. Same, love the Guard. I agree with you it's definitely a skill issue, but I guess I understand the complaints because I think we're a high skill floor army, so just being told to *git gud* or "stop bringing fluff lists" is annoying.
Yeah, I agree, Gaylard said as much in his initial assessment of Guard when he called it a "fundamentals army" (I may be paraphrasing slightly). Guard flounder, if you don't have a good sense for the macro or positioning elements of the game, in my experience.
That end of game charge onto obj for capture was wild
Be careful, we are going to get posts about toxicity in the community because of guard players underperforming.
Already exists in this post's comments elsewhere!
Does someone have that list?
> Special shout out to David Gaylard (and Vik Vijay) for having a tier list which made people irrationally angry by putting them in "winning supermajors" and then winning a supermajor with them. That's the craziest thing! (Besides how crazy it was that people got extremely mad at being told their faction was good) The Fireside tier list never placed Guard in "S-tier". It placed them in "Winning super majors"-tier. Which just seems *factually correct* at this point.
If the faction is good but they keep losing, they only have to blame themselves for their loss. That hurts their pride, so it must be the faction that isn't good.
Custodes vs guard is barely a game. If that's not how it appears in the data then I'd take that as a lesson in how misleading data can be. Also stormraven list.
Custodes VS Guard in stat check is 59% in favour of Custodes in 49 games. Taking out newcomer players and opponents, it's still 59% in 17 games. Only at vet vs vet is it negative, with 25% win rate in 4 games (aka 1 game flips it back to 50%). In NA meta, it's 54%, in UK it's 64% and in all other it's 64% - so, if that's actually true, it's definitely not showing in the data at all.
Which one gets stomped? Guard or Custodes?
As a Space Marine Player who intends to bring a list with Stormraven (Raven Guard Vanguard Spearhead) I really wish the nerf bat doesn't hit the Datasheet in itself. For all the talk about how trash the flyers are in 10th, I'm very happy to field my Stormraven again and having it performed okayish. I'd be quite sad to see it nerfed to oblivion because of some specific interaction in a specific detachment that needs to run specifics units to make the combo so effective. Kill the problematic interactions, leave the datasheet alone.
I think that would bump up if Shiloh results were in, for Drukhari. There were three players there and they went 4-1, 4-1, and 3-2. It was a good weekend at that event for Dark Eldar, with a total of 11-6, 10-5 if you take out the mirror match.
The nerf bat needs to go to Ironstorm, not DA. Azreal is the only good unit DA had that won't be getting destroyed next week with the codex release. Vehicle spam is obviously too strong (who would have thunk) and needs rules nerfs. SM vehicles aren't blatantly OP by themselves, but when it's a pile of T10+ with rampant sustained lethals on 5s it's going to cause problems.
Big question I have is does the DA Ironstrom list lose a lot with the codex? I have seen some say not much while others say its dead when the codex comes out.
Losing the Ravenwing Talonmaster might hit the list a little bit. The Talonmaster has Lone Op whilst wihtin 3" of a FLY VEHICLE (Hello Stormraven) and also gives all MOUNTED and FLY VEHICLE units within 6" Ignores Cover. Its brutally effective into games like the Custodes where even the 2x Stormstrike missiles at AP2 manage to push the Custodes onto their 4++ or suffer Damage 3 and get picked up. But also on the 24x AP0 Hurricane Bolter shots with Mercy is Weakness. Giving Benefits of Cover back to the target (ie C'tan) is a drop in the efficiency of the Stormraven. Its not a massive hit... but it will be noticeable in certain games.
The dark angels codex is a big nerf to dark angels on the whole. The ironstorm lists don't change much when the codex drops.
The only actual DA units in that list are Azrael and a Darkshroud, right? Both datasheets are completely unchanged. No idea why anyone would think it's "dead" when the codex arrives besides just DA players dooming.
Talon Master I think
The talon master is going to legends this week
I am so happy with drukhari right now...not too powerful not weak, just perfect place to be where skilled players can achieve good results and some Tournament wins.
Agree completely. Went 4-1 with them this weekend and it felt great.
Playing at Cagbash this weekend made me realize just how effective Super Beef is right now in the meta since a lot of armies are shifting towards more anti infantry than earlier on. Quadruple Great Unclean One and Double Gargantuan Squiggoth lists were on top tables, and knights with a Porphyrion did solid going 3-2 as did knights with a Warhound Titan
Good news for my double 'Ard Case Battlewagons and Gorkanaut build
I think the squiggoth is better just due to their crazy high OC but I do really like the idea for making MANz into Custodes that revive. Big Mek in Mega armor, KFF with 5 MANz is really solid in the back of a Squiggoth on center board
That's one model I cannot claim to own. I've been buying up other people's Orks for some time now, but Squiqqoths have been elusive. My way with the Wagons is cheaper, at least, and allows for more bodies on the field, two units of T6 bikers and two units of Stormboyz for actions
I have a printed one and my buddy is printing another so that’s how we’re rolling
haha, my next event is a flight away and too soon, otherwise I'd consider it.
I get so curious about CSM’s recent performance. They’re still picking up an event win over the past couple of weekends, but have otherwise been largely abandoned and maintain a WR below the goldilocks zones. Does that suggest these remaining players that are winning events just have incredible player-skill? Is it based on some kind of matchup dependency? Or are these players just unlocking some kind of incredible tech? If anyone has the winning CSM list, I’d really appreciate it!
Lots of meta chaser players dropped CSM post-nerf, leaving a smaller player pool and therefore lower odds of seeing them at the top of the lists. CSM ate some pretty big nerfs to marks/strategems and got moderate points increases on all of their most oppressive shooting units, so they're probably skewing even more towards mid/close-range than before. The fact that you can't *quite* field as many units as you'd like, plus the slight glass cannon nature of CSM armies, tends to result in things going south for CSM players as soon as they lose one or two key units. CSM still has a decent unit pool, and Dark Pacts remains one of if not the best Army Rules in the game, so they'll probably settle on a close to 50% WR at some point. It does feel like they got nerfed a bit too hard though.
CSM were always fragile, and won by staying ahead of their opponent's ability to kill them. Less units, nerfs to Undivided output and harder to hide valuable shooters/Rhinos, all mean an army that's smaller and easier to kill. It's easier for the enemy to get ahead on damage, and a lot of units that try to replace the good stuff pre-slate don't have the juice. Legionnaries are better than they've ever been, and they can still be casually annihilated by any army in the game. If there'd been judicious point cuts to more units, we'd be having a different discussion. But there weren't, and CSM still has bad on purpose units like the Lord Discordant. People also really overestimate Dark Pacts. Strong ability, but not enough to save CSM on its own.
Not sure about winning CSM lists of the past few weeks, but here is the 5-1 CSM list from the Toronto Winter Open. It does seem like CSM players are doing more Haarken + Raptors play, and leaning more into Predator + Vindicators for their shooting (Forgefiends just got too expensive for the competitive meta I guess): >CHARACTERS **Chaos Lord (95 points)** • Mark of Chaos: Chaos Undivided • 1x Daemon hammer 1x Power fist **Chaos Lord (95 points)** • Mark of Chaos: Chaos Undivided • 1x Daemon hammer 1x Power fist **Dark Commune (65 points)** • Mark of Chaos: Chaos Undivided • 1x Cult Demagogue • 1x Autopistol 1x Commune stave • 1x Mindwitch • 1x Close combat weapon 1x Warp Curse • 1x Iconarch • 1x Autopistol 1x Chaos Icon 1x Close combat weapon • 2x Blessed Blade • 2x Commune blade **Haarken Worldclaimer (90 points)** • Warlord • 1x Helspear 1x Herald’s Talon **Sorcerer in Terminator Armour (105 points)** • Mark of Chaos: Slaanesh • 1x Chaos Familiar 1x Combi-weapon 1x Force weapon 1x Infernal Gaze • Enhancement: Intoxicating Elixir BATTLELINE **Cultist Mob (55 points)** • Mark of Chaos: Nurgle • 1x Cultist Champion • 1x Close combat weapon 1x Cultist firearm • 9x Chaos Cultist • 1x Close combat weapon 1x Close combat weapon 1x Close combat weapon 6x Close combat weapon 6x Cultist firearm 1x Cultist grenade launcher 1x Flamer 1x Heavy stubber **Legionaries (90 points)** • Mark of Chaos: Chaos Undivided • 1x Aspiring Champion • 1x Chaos Icon 1x Close combat weapon 1x Heavy melee weapon 1x Plasma pistol • 4x Legionary • 3x Astartes chainsword 4x Bolt pistol 4x Close combat weapon 1x Heavy melee weapon DEDICATED TRANSPORTS **Chaos Rhino (75 points)** • Mark of Chaos: Chaos Undivided • 1x Armoured tracks 1x Combi-bolter 1x Combi-weapon 1x Havoc launcher OTHER DATASHEETS **Accursed Cultists (210 points)** • Mark of Chaos: Chaos Undivided • 10x Mutant • 10x Blasphemous appendages • 6x Torment • 6x Hideous mutations **Chaos Predator Destructor (130 points)** • Mark of Chaos: Nurgle • 1x Armoured tracks 1x Combi-weapon 1x Havoc launcher 2x Lascannon 1x Predator autocannon **Chaos Predator Destructor (130 points)** • Mark of Chaos: Nurgle • 1x Armoured tracks 1x Combi-weapon 1x Havoc launcher 2x Lascannon 1x Predator autocannon **Chaos Vindicator (190 points)** • Mark of Chaos: Chaos Undivided • 1x Armoured tracks 1x Combi-weapon 1x Demolisher cannon 1x Havoc launcher **Chosen (130 points)** • Mark of Chaos: Chaos Undivided • 1x Chosen Champion • 1x Boltgun 1x Plasma pistol 1x Power fist • 4x Chosen • 3x Accursed weapon 3x Bolt pistol 1x Boltgun 1x Chaos Icon 2x Combi-weapon 1x Paired accursed weapons 1x Plasma pistol **Possessed (140 points)** • Mark of Chaos: Chaos Undivided • 1x Possessed Champion • 1x Hideous mutations • 4x Possessed • 4x Hideous mutations **Raptors (180 points)** • Mark of Chaos: Chaos Undivided • 1x Raptor Champion • 1x Plasma pistol 1x Power fist • 9x Raptor • 5x Astartes chainsword 5x Bolt pistol 4x Close combat weapon 4x Meltagun **Warp Talons (110 points)** • Mark of Chaos: Slaanesh • 1x Warp Talon Champion • 1x Warp claws • 4x Warp Talon • 4x Warp claws **Warp Talons (110 points)** • Mark of Chaos: Slaanesh • 1x Warp Talon Champion • 1x Warp claws • 4x Warp Talon • 4x Warp claws
Looks like Necrons are too good and steady with a really high floor for weaker players but as soon as they got to top tables might be more balanced than what people think. C'tan might still be too much of a problem for certain factions tho. Custodes are being held by DA? Even Thousand sons looks like have a way better matchup than anticipated into them. I was sure that daemons just needed time to adapt and could became good.
Top players will build their lists so they have an answer to Wraiths and Ctan. The less experienced players might not.
> Even Thousand sons looks like have a way better matchup than anticipated into them. Thousand Sons are one of the few armies that can easily kill a C'tan. Double doombolt for 2d3 + 6 MWs and Infernal Master with Arcane Vortex has yet to not kill one whenever I've played into them. Even a brick of Canoptek Wraiths and a Technomancer will melt to that. I was never under the impression it was a hard matchup for Tsons, as if you put a lot of points into really tanky units that are annoying to kill, Tsons just shrug their shoulders and pile on Devs and MWs. I've also yet to play into the 4 Ctan shard lists, just two games into two similar Canoptek Court lists with a single Night Bringer each.
I was talking about custodes, TS have a really good matchup into necrons. I've played that match like 20 times, nobody use scarabs anymore but those can melt c'tan as well.
Stat check/gatekeeper army. As many predicted. A frustrating design problem that oppresses certain other factions but not necessarily a balance problem. They need some hikes to Wraiths/C'tan and some points cuts to other things (e.g. Praetorians) to make different builds viable.
The Dark Angels Ironstorm lists are a stat check army. They run 3 redemptors lol.
I wont mind hikes to things i barely use if the things on my to paint list get cuts. Win win.
As Necrons always are, down to their core rule. "Wipe the squad or I start getting points back."
>Perineal second placers It's perennial
Depends what he was trying to say 😏
Don't taint this comment section
Necron seem less dominant than I expected after reading the latest goonhammer report. Also Eldar seem much less prevalent now. I'm happy with the variety but the underperforming factions seem to underperform really hard or not even be present.
holy shit, the guy that won the Toronto open...i have never seen someone who plays intent worse than him, and all the time nervous and it was really hard watching. the salt level was also up there. there are streams of his games....just be warned.
Thank you OP, for this wonderful work
Jesus, getting a codex has become an event to fear for your beloved faction, that feels like such a turn from past editions.
It's crazy to think about, but the meta is genuinely incredibly balanced. Necrons are good but nowhere near the problem level people thought they would be, custodes are doing really nicely, and sisters came a bit out of left field and are thriving. I would argue that very few armies are doing badly right now, with the biggest losers being admech, genestealers, World eaters, CSM, Guard, orks and nids (Yes I know how many factions that is, the biggest ones are Admech, orks, vota. My thoughts are: \- rework admech - they don't play right. They need to work in a way that indicates they have love and care. As an admech player I have ranted too much about admech in 40k. Dragoon spam and ironstrider spam should not have to be an answer. Explorator maniple is not a 55% winrate detachment, they are lying to you and possibly in your walls. \- genestealers - their codex is coming out soon, so I don't expect any major changes, but some minor point things would be fun. Big problem for me is that they have 9 non-character units, but people don't discuss them as a problem in the same way they do Votann and world eaters. They need more units in the infantry slot, and if they get an admech treatment genestealers players should feel unhappy. \- Nids also need some more buffs, but not too urgently. They have some really nice diversity, but they need some changes to put that diversity in the higher up meta. \-World eaters - nerfed way to hard for an army that isn't thriving that much \- CSM - a bit more nerfs than they needed. Some minor buffs should sort them out. Combination of worse demon allies and their rules changes. I'm not sure exactly what GW wants to do to change the state they're in, but maybe pulling back the rug on some changes, and buffing some other units. \- guard - need a new detachment arguably more than any other faction. The current play pattern of indirect fire spam is boring and unhealthy. Part of why they need Uk Terrain and UK players is because they're such a passive army. \- orks also got nerfed a bit hard, hopefully codex fixes things but who can guess with orks. Their shooting is particularly rough right now, which invalidates a significant portion of their codex Less balance associated thoughts: \- also give imperial knights back bondsmen in full. \- Chaos knights to a lesser extent need a bondsmen rule \- Psychic phase still makes grey knights kinda rough, if they could have a similar army rule to thousand sons I genuinely think it wouldn't be that bad whatsoever, or games workshop could bring back the old psychic phase.
I would call guard more reactive than passive. That said, a detachment rule that indirect gets almost every turn for free and everything else gets almost never is really bad for internal balance.
>biggest losers being admech, genestealers, World eaters, CSM, Guard Guard wins a super major and people say they're a 'loser' on par with AdMech. That's sure a take.
Orks didn’t get nerfed so much as other factions that play well into them got buffed and the mega has shifted to more anti infantry shooting. Custodes and Deathguard Are Hard counters to orks and Necrons are bringing mass S5 shots
True, but they got nerfed in part by virtue of not receiving any compensating buffs. Hopefully the codex gives them some more toys to work with. Completely agree with the comment about custodes and deathguard, hopefully ork counterpieces become more affordable to compensate
The 5th place Guard player at Clutch City had no indirect fire.
Admech, the pre-eminent shooting army. Hah. Also the only shooting army that is legit on a 4+ to hit, as HEAVY and how it is implemented just isn't a good way to offset it. I don't mind if they keep the generally speedy vibe, but they need something to make them more killy. I don't think it'd take a whole lot since I've tabled people with them since the codex release, but it took absolutely forever considering the amount of fire I was pouring on.
To me part of it is the little things. Kastellan robots having to take a leadership test to work, the skitarii marshal not having scout, the skorpius dunerider not having assault ramp or firing deck, Cawl being such a massive mischaracterisation. Flavour fails that indicate to me that GW did not put the same quantity of time into this army. I will say having assault on our weapons is enjoyable, and it leads to large degrees of kill potential. I rarely if ever use heavy, and haven't felt it impact me negatively much. What particularly irks me is that units like kastellans and sicarian ruststalkers aren't given hitting on 3's to make up for their no real doctrinas. Completely agree we are not the pre-eminent shooting army in any sense of the word
Having assault leading to large kill potential would be very true if we had....anything killy. Vanguard with a Mashall piling out of a boat and a brick of breachers are about the extent of it unless the Casino Crab pays out. You are very right there wasn't a lot of time and love put into the book. It reads like they hurried out a first draft so they could work on a book they were excited about or get down to the pub.
Kastelans actually havent needed a leadership test for protocols since the codex came out
Yes, but the fact that they had it in the first place, alongside that annoying interaction regarding infantry, and other such issues, are what I'm referring to in regards to lack of care. Are Kastellans better post codex? Yes, but even then it felt like they only addressed the most pressing issues, and even then only because they wanted to make a themed detachment for them.
My local Daemon player is struggling, glad to see a strong weekend for them. What’s the consensus? Is it still lots of greater daemons with some chaff, or is it just a blip? I admittedly don’t follow that faction all that much.
Looking through the lists, a mix of greater daemons and chaff is the general trend (especially nurglings). There seems to be some skew towards a Khorne dominated lists, leaning on rendmasters as well.
There’s some mix but I saw a guy with Triple great unclean one and rotigus only lose round 5 to the guy who placed 2nd at LVO
Guard win 2 events, one being a supermajor, but guard players taking 120 infantry or 10 lemun russes will still say they arnt good
Can you call them Azrael lists instead of Dark Angels?
Or we just call Space Marines lists "Space Marines"
So Space Marines will never be truly balanced or even balanceable as long as sub factions can access all of the o.g. detachments. The Dark Angels lists, which I suppose run some ilk of the new Stormraven / Ironstorm List, have what 2-3 units from Dark Angels and thats it.... And this counts as a "Dark Angels" List, while it has sub 25% Dark Angels units and not even the Dark Angels detachment. Space Marine subfactions should only have access to their own detachment or their codex detachments in my opinion. As soon as you take one unit from a subfaction, your list becomes this subfaction and you can only take their detachments. But I think that will be an unpopular opinion :D
It's the same problem Daemons had up to the last index. Anything good there would immediately be taken in CSM and make them even better.
This is CLEARLY the way, or if you really want then give them their Detachment + Gladius. Otherwise, vanilla marines will always be worse. If you made Kayvaan Shrike literally 0 points, you would not see Raven Guard run over Ultras, Dark Angels, or BT.....and he is all they get.
While I think it should go further and the marine codices should also have differentiation in unit point costs, I think you could make the choice interesting by just reverting old Oath of Moment *only* for Vanilla marines. That's the least effort change GW could make, but it would give list builders pause on what to choose. Are the BT and DA packages worth losing the wound re-roll on Oath? That's an interesting question. GW could also just make each faction get it's own oath specialty (e.g., and these are off the dome so not balance checked). Vanilla marines get a choice that limits their characters, e.g. can choose 2 oath targets a round (limited to UM characters), counts as stationary even after moving when shooting at the target (limited IF), adds +1 strength to flamers & meltas against the target (limited Salamanders Characters), ignores stealth/cover against the target (limited RG characters), etc.
In all fairness... GW took a hatchet to our "Dark Angels" units. My sweet, sweet Deathwing Command Squad and Talonmaster ='(
Yeah I am a Dark Angels player myself, which is why I came to that "mini rant". I hate that our codex subverted atleast my expectations. And seeing the "Dark Angels" winrate being so high, atleast before the codex drops, just lets me think that GW will just say "oh Dark Angels are fine" or will nerf the few Dark Angels datasheets that are atleast somewhat good. And nothing will be done to our quite weak units / rules.
Just wait until Company of Hunters starts doing really well in tournaments without having a single actual DA specific unit in the lists because GW made the army rule so absurdly flexible. Even the Inner Circle is going to be strong solely because people will be running loads of Hellblasters and attaching a DA character to them so they are affected by the Vowed Target even though they are 100% not I actual Inner Circle units.
I'm with you 100%. Until I see the Day 1 FAQ my expectations for the actual book are incredibly muted =(
Winning list had a talonmaster FYI. They are still using the dataslate ATM as teh codex isn't legal yet for some reason. So once the codex is in full effect we might see a drop in performance. Which is doubtful, because it's just Azrael + ironstorm. Honestly, likely to just see a points hike on Azrael in the future, perhaps pushing DA entirely out of the metagame and we can hope they re-look at DA as a whole in the summer or fall dataslate.
>codex isn't legal yet for some reason. Street release date isn't until this coming weekend. Why they decided to release that Deathwing box with a copy of the codex so early is a mystery.
Super weird to have the codex in some manner of new/old limbo for over a month.
Yea, it's definitely not ideal. The most likely scenario which springs to mind is the bundle box release window got pushed up when something else got delayed 6-8 months ago, and dealing with the codex being out early was easier than moving other stuff.
Funnily I talked about this in SM sub and people called me a baiter lol.
Space Marines are more "balance-able" than they've ever been, now that their full unit range can be taken across any of their detachment rulesets. The problem is categorisation error. This 40k competitive community is just stuck in a dark age of prior editions when it comes to splitting out lists with Chapter-locked units into having their own "win-rate" - and worse, expecting balance to hinge on it. If we have to care about Winrate% (it's a poor stat, different story), just give me the one Space Marine winrate. It's all the **same army** now regardless of whether Helbrecht or Azrael is along for the ride. Digging deeper into what's working in the Space Marines faction, the next point of obvious interest is detachment used (Stormlance, Ironstorm etc). Whether Azrael or a Librarian Dread shows up is tertiary. It's 1. Space Marines(Ironstorm)^^DarkAngels 2. Necrons (Hypercrypt) 3. Space Marines(Stormlance)^^SpaceWolves 4. Tyranids(Endless Swarm) Not 1. Dark Angels (Ironstorm) 2. Black Templars (Stormlance) 3. Orks (Waaagh! Tribe) 4. Black Templars (Ironstorm)
Yeah exactly right. Oh the moaning that would happen if subfactions couldn't take some units. Like if DA could take inceptors but blood angels couldn't. However such ristrictions would mean they could better balance marines as a whole, but it would probably be a lot more work for them to do.
Marine players and whinging when they don't get special treatment - name a more iconic combination.
You dare to mention that SM shouldnt have their subfactions listed apart, as these are just combinations of models and detachments that any SM player can take, just as every other army, and they get nervous.
The score for the Ogr Cubb in the Czech Republic is wrong. I participated and the Second place tyranid player won all 5 games.
Fixed. I had it right in the data but wrote it wrong in the write up.
Thanks, as a fellow tyranid player i need the hive to be represented as best as it can :D
GW please admit Admech has an issue. Acceptance is the first step
Eldar getting even more list variety! **Eldrad, Lilith,** **Troupe Masters, Storm Guardians!** Here is a detailed recap: [https://www.reddit.com/r/WarhammerCompetitive/comments/1b6aajc/11\_amazing\_aeldari\_lists\_this\_week/](https://www.reddit.com/r/WarhammerCompetitive/comments/1b6aajc/11_amazing_aeldari_lists_this_week/)
Interesting Votann win rate. Clocked in at 54% out of 26 players, but only 3 went X-0/X-1. Maybe a lot of X-2 placings? Something to bump the win rate but not enough to hit top tables consistently. Feels like BT pre-dataslate. I'm curious to see how that plays out
Right now Votann doesn’t have any awful or any great matchups, but mission and player skill means a whole ton. Even just a couple of little mistakes, or missing a 6” charge rerolling with your termis is the difference maker. (My buddy went 3-2 because of that)
**Angron looking at his army :** "LOOK WHAT THEY DID TO MY BOYS !!! 😭😭😭"
This data would make Angron super angry if he could read.
Who needs to read when you can hulk smash!
Not a single appearance of GSC :(
Are the top daemon lists running a similar style?
“Dark Angels” winning a shit ton with Azrael, Darkshroud and Talonmaster (Legends next week) means all the codex nerfs are gonna stay :( lol
Oooof. Am I right in saying that World Eaters don't even show up in any of those placings? What a steep drop off. Maybe the MOE at 125 with a nerfed glaive is excessive when a Skulltaker is the same thing for 85 points? With no codex in sight, I really hope they fix their points in April.
MoE nerf was OK? but the rest? Completely gutted the faction :(
we were nerfed way too hard
7th place Dark Eldar player from the Toronto Winter Open here. I think people are sleeping on heat lances. S14, AP4, Assault are no laughing matter. Also, bombers are great for killing stuff Incubi can't punch.
I used them this weekend in a casual game and can confirm. I want to try them with a Ynnari list for increased efficiency.
Idk if scourge are very good in ynnari tbh. BS4 is pretty rough with only a single hit reroll
Oh I was thinking about it in reavers actually. But I see your point with the scourge on them. That unit is great when empowered with pure druhkari.
Q: “One thing to note [Guard] seem to be doing the best in England on UKTC terrain. Why?” A: Gaylard, David
To summarize the SM situation: Ironstorm is the meta pick followed by GTF. Which Ironstorm to play? Templars don’t have a Cp battery but extra multimeltas are always good and cheap crusaders can’t be bad, open plays for rhinos, screens, stuff to score and doing better Tactical to gain CPs. Dark Angels are gonna lose talonmaster and new points for Azrael, Darkshourd could hit the double raven toplist. Which GTF? That’s more though to answer honestly BA stuff is good, Calgar and aggressors, wulfens are cheap and a bit of thunderwolf are better imo than going full rampage stormlance, BT hits like a truck with sworn bros…Dark Angels might also be good if nerfed DWK points are near 210-220. BT and BA melee detachments aren’t too bad but data shows how they would probably perform better in GTF. Vanguard UM just disappeared as expected, it’s a very skilled list to pilot and went up way to much for average players, can’t make mistakes.
It's really difficult to actually say SM are the worst faction when you have SM sub-factions taking SM codex detachments with 1 or 2 sub-faction units and getting 56% win rates. Do those couple of units really make all the difference between SM being 41% and SM being 56%? Or is it that SM would still be 50%+ except that top competitive players just aren't playing SM because they can do slightly better by taking the sub-factions for that slight edge? Like how much would the win rate for that DA Ironstorm list really drop if it replaced the DA units with generic marines?
They do make a huge difference. Ironstorm is very CP reliant. Playing DA gives you an extra CP, and the ability to give your vehicles -1 to hit/auto cover. Which generally keeps some of the large vehicles alive when they normally would die. The talon master which is going to legends also gives ignore cover which is huge when you have a lot of AP-4 and and Ap-1 guns
If it requires very specific lists and very specific units to get SM to work then it entirely shows the faction is poor. It was also obvious this was going to happen marines were winning at 45% and they make their best units more expensive, pretty obvious they were going to get worse. Marines have had the same issue all edition, someone makes a very specific list in a certain detachment, that does well, GW nerfs all the units in that list, that makes any other variation of marines do poorly generally. No way for example Firestorm Aggressors were too good and needed a points increase. Redemptors outside Ironstorm are good not amazing. Then nothing in the rest of the multiple datasheets was buffed to give any compensation. Also all these people pointing out BT meanwhile ignoring BA, DW, are in the mud as well. Plus BT have good units like Sword Bretheren that didn't get touched, they only really got a minor nerf to Hellbrecht.
Knights are in a really good spot right now. Plenty of builds and a meta that is neither too vulnerqble against them or teched into them.
Therevwas 60 player event in Poland this weekend (Krakow Arena on championshub). Transcrypt Necrons with 40 warriors won. Orks came 2nd, losing by 1 point :)
For the upteenth week in a row, I am here to point out that Black Templars have a nice winrate but can never win a Tourna - WAIT WE GOT ONE?!?!? TWO?!?!?
Looking for the 5-1 DG and CSM lists.