Razorwing flock spam - its amazing

Jimsolo wrote:

I've literally never seen a time in 40k when spam wasn't a thing.  There will always be units where a little is good and a lot is better, or crappy choices that are so cheap that quantity becomes quality.

It seems like an unavoidable part of the game.

Spam is easy to fix.
Simply place a cap on units, like, the example previously mentioned, in Magic the Gathering.

The only reason it appears unavoidable in 40k is because capping unit quantities would cripple GW's sales, as also previously mentioned in this thread. And of course, GW would never do that unless they were absolutely forced to.

But that hurts some armies tho like Harlequins and SOB (they only have 1 troop units) and it has other problems as well.

There honestly is no simple fix, 3rd-5th had limited slots, but it still didnt stop the spam.

Obviously there would be unique caps for each army so smaller armies wouldn't get ruined.
And if there was spam despite the caps back in 3rd and 5th, then the caps weren't correctly implemented.

But hay ho, none of this matters anyway.

The point is, for some armies, 'spam' isn't just unavoidable, it is intended, and it should be. Tyranids, orks, Imperial Guard: all these armies should be able to spam crap tons of guys to drown their opponents in corpses. It's a time honored tactic both in fantasy and reality, and its an integral part of the lore for several factions.

Jimsolo wrote:

The point is, for some armies, 'spam' isn't just unavoidable, it is intended, and it should be.  Tyranids, orks, Imperial Guard: all these armies should be able to spam crap tons of guys to drown their opponents in corpses.  It's a time honored tactic both in fantasy and reality, and its an integral part of the lore for several factions.

This, and also caps never worked before.

I had an IG friend when i first started playing show mehis 3? or 4? IG list.

His HQ and troops were 3 Tanks, and then spam everything else lol.

Easy tourney rule fix: 2000 pts. 1 battalion detachment. That's it. Everyone gets 6 command pts. Spam is limited. Sure, it limits options quite a bit, though this is basically how most tourneys worked prior to 6th edition. As some of you may recall, there was a LOT of pushback to the idea of taking multiple detachments when 6th edition first hit, until it eventually became the norm.

Alternatively, you could enforce a 1 battalion detachment limit, plus a set number of allowable auxiliary detachments. That would open up options somewhat, but not favor spam.

The amount of birds we can take in a battalion is absurd, since every elite slot taken as a beastmaster is another unit of 12 birds. So you can cram 9 units of birds into one battalion (even tho the beastmasters cost quite a bit).

No one could run Knights that way.

TeenageAngst wrote:

No one could run Knights that way.

Well, they couldn't run *strictly* knights. They would have to take them in superheavy auxiliary slots, assuming you were using the alternative option that I mentioned.

That wouldn't allow players to use their Knight houses though.

Seems a little harsh to make an entire faction unplayable for the sake of spam reduction that may or may not be effective.

krayd wrote:

Easy tourney rule fix: 2000 pts. 1 battalion detachment. That's it. Everyone gets 6 command pts. Spam is limited. Sure, it limits options quite a bit, though this is basically how most tourneys worked prior to 6th edition. As some of you may recall, there was a LOT of pushback to the idea of taking multiple detachments when 6th edition first hit, until it eventually became the norm.

Alternatively, you could enforce a 1 battalion detachment limit, plus a set number of allowable auxiliary detachments. That would open up options somewhat, but not favor spam.

Doesnt stop spam... and just hurts many armies... not a good fix.

Its not a simple fix at all, there are many little things not just 1 big thing.

Maybe if they kept in rules that fixed this problem it wouldnt be a problem. Rampage, instant death, blasts, but no, we're too stupid to use universal rules or scatter dice.

Just give each unit a specific max number
Or maybe even nicer, increase point cost of units the more you take them. I love it but considering how many people cannot calculate how much a normal unit is by adding up the base cost and the weapon/equipment cost this might be to much math for them.
crap of work, but only option if you want to use a limit since the normal force organization chart is not balanced across armies.
Those rules just replace which units work better, not that as soon as something is better (which some things will be) people start spamming it. Just having 1 unit inherently is better versus TAC list since he has only a few weapons to deal with that, and either half of his weapons can barely hurt it or half his weapons are way to expensive to deal with it efficiently.

Just let people run what they want. This is obviously how they intended the game to be since this is the most balanced version of 40k ever made. We are merely too shortsighted to see their vision.

I generally find that spam is it's own downfall making your army less flexible and not giving you tools for every scenario.

Razorwing flock spam sounds nice until you run into an army that has a highly effective way of killing characters, without those beastmasters your army will crumble.

So how many flocks / beastmasters do you need to be effective with and will that leave you with enough points to fill out the holes in your army?

I am mystified at the removal of USRs. USRs were created in the first place *because* the problem that we are having now was rampant in 3rd edition, which had rules written in a similar manner as 8th (similar rules across codices had to be interpreted separately, etc).

Granted, there are quite a few things that I like about 8th edition - however, for an allegedly heavily playtested 18 month rules creation cycle, it seems like they overlooked a lot of things.

Tell you what 40k needs. Some sort of template weapon, maybe like a Flamer template? They could even add some sort of blast marker, that scattered using a special dice and a couple of D6. That might get rid of blobs of cheap crap.

*ironic*

Hellstrom wrote:

Tell you what 40k needs.  Some sort of template weapon, maybe like a Flamer template?  They could even add some sort of blast marker, that scattered using a special dice and a couple of D6.  That might get rid of blobs of cheap crap.

*ironic*

Double hits on swarms (at least, from random-hit weapons, like blasts, flamers, etc) would probably suffice. The problem with swarms is that they're no longer particularly vulnerable to certain weapon types, as they were before.

In the recent FAQ, flocks finally got their points increased to 14 points/base

Still very strong in lists,instead of 120, take 60 lol.

Honestly depending on the meta changes (fliers cant be the only thing on the table or you lose), we might see a real meta now and 30-40 might be enough.

I have 30 and in semi-comp lists 30 is well over enough.

Well, they shouldn't be nerfed into uselessness. What point value would you suggest for them?

I still think that bringing back extra vulnerability to 'blast' type weapons would be a preferable counter to swarms.

No,,, b.c at this point they are the same cost per wounds as Gants and Cultist (But those 2 things are stronger, birds have more attacks and faster at the cost of S/T lessen)

Making them more costly on purpose to make them crappy is stupid, the point of the game is to have units equal out for balance

If i think "Oh a Flyer is good at 160pts, but 160pts of Birds is just as good" then you have balance.

Yea. I think something along those lines is OK. I'd rather say that the two units should have equal overall power, but different roles (e.g. they will be added in different styled lists). Universal units are bad.

Still feel that beastmasters and similar units like conscripts should be limited in number of units allowed. For example in AM armies I can imagine that the rules for being Battleforged should be much harsher than in, say, Dark Eldar pirates.