successful lists

[the jeske]

Apparently only a small percentage only cares about the game such a competitive manner or as I said, GW doesn't and apparently there isn't a large enough percentage in tournament customers to change their minds as the entire customer base is basically Tournament Players, Casual Players, Modellers and Commission-based Army Painters. In a bright ideal world, it would be 30% in each category with 5% being overlap from one category to the other. Realistically, that will never happen. Which means the exact same thing I have said two times already and will say for a third, either the percentage is too small or GW doesn't care. The fact they keep raking in money says that regardless of whichever one it is, people are still shelling out the ying yang for their product and as long as that happens, they don't have to change.

because the turn over of new players is so fast that few go in to the moment when they can actualy make a list of their own ? they either take what is prebuild for them in a codex[3drakes 6-9 oblits etc] or they pick up random stuff. one half of the dudes leaves because they find the game too restrictive [too few options and ways to play, which isnt always true for all dex] and the other group gets wooped hard . What you get after a year out of both this groups is one camp which says that "everything sucks" and another group which calls everyone WAAC [including those that play sob] and would like to write lists for their opponents.

 

GW doesnt care about tournament players because of many things. First of all if they have a good army they wont buy new stuff , they wont do wild impulse buying like new guys do . They also ask questions and no firm likes that . They paint stuff , but not always with GW paints and If they do , they go for table top standard at least . GW on the other hand would like you to pain-destroy your 2-3 units , so that in time you would like to replace them .

 

Again personaly I think this is a wrong asked question , the size of people that actualy go to tournaments doesnt matter[few of the new guys do tournaments for real , so it is easy to imagine that the tournament community is smaller]. What matter is how many people want codex/builds/armies that could be used for tournament play. If someone builds a good army , but never plays in a tournament[his community is 6 dudes he plays over and over again for example] we put him in which group the tournament or non tournament one?

 

 

 

 

 

I think what GW realizes is that there is a competitive group out there

and so while they aren't shifting the entire game into that aspect, they

are trying to somewhat appease them, or at least keep them playing, but

I don't think that their view is that the competitive aspect is their

primary goal, for whatever reason.

And how do they do that ? the tournament community is made out of people who are the opposit of GW wants their main buyer to be . They know what they want to buy , they dont do impulse buying , because they buy the good stuff their armies are viable longer ,which again makes them buy less stuff and if someone is realy in to tournaments then he is probably playing for longer then a year and GW doesnt like vets anywhere near their main buyers .

 

 

 

What I'm saying is that perhaps GW doesn't see the game that way.

 

new guy frustration sells more models , the Game is unimportant , the model sells are important  . If you push him with nice and shiny stuff that doesnt work , create the whole "you can play what you want ,it is B&P, rules dont matter rolling dice is everything" type of enviroment .And the new guy starts to play [and I have yet to find a dude that plays to lose outside of tournament settings] , his stuff doesnt work , but he and his friends are playing , so he goes online or to a shop buys more stuff. If he just started with the good models , the sells of codex post first half years after going legal would be very small [if GW actualy balanced the codex and made all the same way viable as other].

[Brother Amarel]

You said that "they" care on some level enough that you are willing to bet on it. So where have I added words? Your first post did not specify a single group, but rather a very large general group.

 

And a game is a game is it not? Whether it be tabletop, board, rpg, computer or console. So it does apply. If people only play a game to win, then it does not matter what platform the game is on, only that it is a game.

 

Firstly, taking a quote about a group of people and using "they" directly beneath it, clearly denotes that I'm talking about the "they" in the quote. Trying to pretend otherwise is wilful ignorance of the english language.

 

Secondly, no, of course not. A game where you roll dice is utterly different to a game where your physical actions are replicated in a visually visceral manner on the screen. It's chalk and cheese.

 

Anyway, congratulations on devolving another potentially interesting thread into pointless, off-topic, pedantic bickering. 

[Kol Saresk]

Ah, apologies, I forgot that I was the one who specified.

 

Also, you might want to check some of the video games, specifically MMORPG, RTS and TBS as they all have some variation of the "dice rolling factor" when determining if something actually hits the target, how much damage it does and so on so forth. Seriously, go on Dungeons and Dragons Online, its free, make an account, play for thirty minutes or so and watch the little d20 in the corner as it says if an attack actually hits, if its critical and so on so forth. Pretty much every game like that has a program like that on it, DDO just happens to be the only one I've seen that actually shows the die. Or SWTOR as it shows the same thing.

 

 

No offense, but there was "off-topic bickering" since the first page. All I did was ask a question and instead of getting an answer, everyone played ring around the rosies. Everyone could have ignored or answered or even told me to shut up and leave. Even report my posts as being "off-topic" or some other such thing that deserves reporting. As a Moderati, you probably know more about what fits in that category than I do.

[Deus de Mortalis]

I think that having balanced codices would be GOOD FOR EVERYBODY. We could use units we want to use, and still know that we won't automatically lose or feel that we are gimping ourselves. People who are ultra-competitive would be happier as there would be more wiggle room and diversity of competitive lists from each codex. People who want to make fluffy armies would be happier because they know that they wouldn't be shooting themselves in the foot because of it. People who just choose whatever looks cool to include in their lists would have more fun along with their opponents. Excuses like GW is trying to make it less competitive, more of a narrative based game, or that they are a miniatures company and not a gaming company are all a bunch of crap.

 

For me personally there are two problems. Dice rolling is a more deciding factor in the game than it used to be. If I get stuck with a crappy warlord trait while my opponent gets his wish, it annoys me for the rest of the game and can be the deciding factor if I can infiltrate 1 squad or 3. Now I don't know if I will make the charge distance and destroy the enemy squad or if I won't make it and get completely destroyed, while before the law of averages would make it all but assured that my squad would win in close combat. It is all of these little things that bug me about the game now.

 

Secondly the codices are not balanced between them and within themselves. I really hate hate hate the power lists. And I don't mean this for other people who use them, I mean as far as me using them. I want to build a unique army list that is different from everyone else's. I want to have a fluffy army list. And I also don't want to give my opponent an auto-win button. I love the fluff, I love the narrative, and I love playing a fun game where both I and my opponent are evenly matched and trying to determine who is the better player. The narrative and fluff of the game really goes in the toilet for me when I know my army and my opponent's army are unevenly matched. The whole point of point limits and point values is to make opposing armies relatively equal. It is to level the playing field. GW has failed at this a lot, and it seems to be getting worse, not better, and I have been playing since 2001.

 

It seems like GW is unable to write codices that are balanced within themselves and between each other. Maybe they need to try a lot harder with playtesting and having the codices written by a group and not just a single person who comes up with whatever they want. After some rumors about how GW was handling the playtesting of a recent codex, coupled with the fact that the same useless units seem to remain useless after several editions of codices, I have little hope that they care at all to balance them. So instead of changing anything about how they make or playtest codices, they just change the rules to try to reduce the impact of list building and generalship in battle by making the dice a more prominent feature. And also it looks more and more like they just try to make the game all about the shiny new (expensive) toys.

 

GW, if you are reading this, BALANCE THE FREAKING CODICES INSIDE AND OUT.

[the jeske]

the nid codex was balanced in 5th and what did it give people who started or played nids ? Balance is unimportant , what is important is the number of possible builds out of a codex. If lets say codex X has 1 good build and rest is meh , then unless the build is the best in the world [up till now I counted 2 such armies in the history of w40k and 4 in the history of both WFB/W40k] and has no real counters , the codex will suck .On the other hand if a codex gives 3 different builds all playable and all good , then even if they arent on the same lvl the codex is going to be very popular . Not because of a 1 dominant build , but because a tournament player will pick the one to rule them all, someone else will pick a non pre made list[and it will work] and even the dude who buys random stuff will get carried by what the codex can do .

 

 

All I did was ask a question and instead of getting an answer, everyone played ring around the rosies

GW doesnt care about veterans and doesnt care about tournament players , it only cares about new people buying new stuff [or their parents]. the "support" GW gives in their products has little to nothing to do with what we understand as tournament gaming , if basic rules of an edition have to be errated for almost every tournament[no mystic terrain , pre set up terrain to avoid buildings in front of aegis, no landing pads or bastions etc] , then what GW does with the dex matters little. The real fun will start after codex eldar goes live anyway . 

[zyl-]

Imagine the jeske's disappointment if the eldar codex were actually balanced.

[Kol Saresk]

Imagine the jeske's disappointment if the eldar codex were actually balanced.

Remember, GW is a big evil corporate entity that only cares about lining its pockets so it is even a wonder they actually give us rules. ;)

 

Of course, my bit is this, if GW doesn't care, and we all think they don't care, then why do we keep buying their miniatures and/or rulebooks?

[nurglez]

because it wasn't always like this, and because the setting has been around for 25 years :D

[zyl-]

Perhaps we all hold out hope that someone intelligent will realease a fan version of the rules that are vastly balanced and widely accepted. It's happened before, afterall. I would even be willing to do it myself if I thought it would actually be used by people. It's so very discouraging to spend hours on something and then everyone is like "nah, that's silly." 

[TheDevourer]

Maybe I will too at some point, have done one or two before. But, I put more effort than I care to admit into an exodite fandex + armybuilder datafile. I just don´t have the time to do a dex like that again. And then again it´s not like the chaos dex isn´t good.

[Hellios]

Imagine the jeske's disappointment if the eldar codex were actually balanced.

Remember, GW is a big evil traded corporate entity that only cares about lining its pockets so it is even a wonder they actually give us rules.

Of course, my bit is this, if GW doesn't care, and we all think they don't care, then why do we keep buying their miniatures and/or rulebooks?

It isn't a wonder that they give us rules. The rules are part of their sales campaign. Nerf stuff everyone has, try and make the things you want people to buy good. That is probably why the DE codex was one of the most balanced codices ever... Everything was new.

Because we care, maybe not about GW, or the rules, but about a gaming community we got into in better times. We still like playing with our friends. We may even love the universe. That being said many of us may be buying less now.

[Nehekhare]

if GW doesn't care, and we all think they don't care, then why do we keep buying their miniatures and/or rulebooks?

I don't ;)

 

btw, I counter that "haters gonna hate"-card with "blissful ignorance" ;)

 

and hellios is right: it's not that they don't care, but that their motivation of writing rules is very different from our motivation of playing by these rules. acknowledging that helps understand a lot about 40k.

 

zyl, check ytth (usgta rules).

 

and eldar won't be balanced...kelly writes it and he is UNABLE to produce balanced codices. plus he's an eldar masterrace fanboy fluffhead, doesn't care about good rules. it will have one to none viable builds and be either ridiculously over- or underpowered, like DE/SW/CSM/CD before...

 

if that build is Iyanden, I'll be happy for all my 3rd party Admech minis ;)

[Hellios]

 

if GW doesn't care, and we all think they don't care, then why do we keep buying their miniatures and/or rulebooks?

 

 

and eldar won't be balanced...kelly writes it and he is UNABLE to produce balanced codices. plus he's an eldar masterrace fanboy fluffhead, doesn't care about good rules. it will have one to none viable builds and be either ridiculously over- or underpowered, like DE/SW/CSM/CD before...

 

Whoah, Whoah, Whoah! Is this sarcasm or not? Because C:DE was one of the best codices in recent history... When it comes to being well balanced. Only C:IG was a real problem for it, and it didn't curb stomp all of the other codices that were out at the time. Codices that were released afterwards and changes made due to core rule changes with 6th ed are not a fair way to judge codex DE.

[Nehekhare]

sarcasm: yes, irony: no ;)

 

C:DE has beautiful minis and nice fluff, but its viable/crap unit ratio is like 12 to 1 (kheradruakh anyone?). Listwise it was venom-/razorspam all over until 6th hit and then nothing. nowadays you see the odd allied detachment for eldar (much older and yet still much better dex) or nicely painted miniature collections.

[the jeske]

Imagine the jeske's disappointment if the eldar codex were actually balanced.

imagine the eldar codex how it realy is.

 

 

 

Remember, GW is a big evil corporate entity that only cares about lining

its pockets so it is even a wonder they actually give us rules.

[points out at JJ WD article which tells us that rules are unimportant and everything can be cleared up with rolling] <_< .GW makes rules because of 3 things . A because back way back in history when citadel was making models , they suddenly noticed that there are third parties trying to make rules for the models they make . B codex change is needed to clear the secondary market , enlarge the standard game size or explains why we need to buy huge hard to transport dual kit models . C law of inertion .

I didnt say that GW was evil , just that they dont care about veterans , nor about people already with large collections . GW always was a model selling company first and this through the years ment that they concentrate the most on new players just starting the game. If you can prove me wrong am waiting for arguments.

 

 

 

 

Of course, my bit is this, if GW doesn't care, and we all think they

don't care, then why do we keep buying their miniatures and/or

rulebooks?

first of all people that already have armies spend less , then new guys . On why people buy stuff , that is easy again . If you spend 20 years doing something an invest crap ton of cash[be it in form of actual money or time] , leaving is mostly a hypothetical option. It is easier for a new guy to leave the hobby after a year or so , then someone who already plays for a few editions .

 

 

 

 

because it wasn't always like this, and because the setting has been around for 25 years

 

only you do remember that in both citadel and GW case they sold models first and then stared doing the rules later . Can you explain an abomination like the gav or jj chaos dex or jj DA dex , if selling models[or the belief that selling models] wasnt seen by GW as the most important thing and stuff like rules only a secondary thing?

[Sception]

I agree the game isn't in a great state right now, and GW doesn't seem to run things terribly well, but I don't buy into the conspiracy theories of new stuff always being made great and old stuff being made terrible.

 

Again, remember 4e?  Remember how the fancy new models were possessed?  Yeah, they were awful.  What was fantastic?  Plague Marines.  No new models.  And in 6e?  Yeah, the fancy new helldrake is the bees knees, but the fancy new fiends and smith and maulers are decidedly meh to sub-meh, and the fancy new warp talons and apostle and are just garbage.  Meanwhile, what's the best troop choice?  Again, Plagues, and still with no new models.

 

 

So yeah.  Maybe they try to make the new stuff strong and the old stuff weak, but if they do then their design & development process is too incompetent and inconsistent to pull it off.

 

 

 

the nid codex was balanced in 5th and what did it give people who started or played nids ? Balance is unimportant , what is important is the number of possible builds out of a codex. If lets say codex X has 1 good build and rest is meh , then unless the build is the best in the world [up till now I counted 2 such armies in the history of w40k and 4 in the history of both WFB/W40k] and has no real counters , the codex will suck .On the other hand if a codex gives 3 different builds all playable and all good , then even if they arent on the same lvl the codex is going to be very popular . Not because of a 1 dominant build , but because a tournament player will pick the one to rule them all, someone else will pick a non pre made list[and it will work] and even the dude who buys random stuff will get carried by what the codex can do .

 

I guess you're talking about external balance for the 5e nids?.  I don't know, the nids in 5th struck me as slightly underpar even there, but it was the internal balance that made them terrible - so many awful choices, so many poorly considered & poorly written rules.  But I guess that's what you're talking about with the limited builds bit.

 

In general I agree with this assessment of what makes a codex good/fun.  As always, I like to trot out Vamp counts.  Their 7th ed book was one of those 'one unstoppable uberbuild' kind of situations Jeske's describing above.  The list built itself, there were almost no decision points involved, and until daemons rolled out to just annihilate everything, the single solitary vamp count build was utterly dominating.  And yeah, a lot of tournament players played Vamp Counts.  But as a casual player I stopped playing them, because the one list was boring and any time I tried to run anything else I felt like the book was punishing me for not playing the game the way it wanted me to.

 

4e CSMs felt the same way, even if their one list wasn't so dominating.  6e CSMs feel the same way too, at least when I'm playing them without allies.  And when I play with allies, the lack of interaction or synergy with our only battle brother is frustrating in and of itself.

 

 

I know I'm always harping on and on about how great the 8th ed vamp book is, and yes I am marrying it and no none of you are invited to the service, but it's a great example of what Jeske was describing in a good book.  Several viable builds, none of which stand out as 'the best', make the book versatile and customizable and fun, even if none of those builds are the most powerful in the game as a whole.

 

Worth noting, Ghouls are still good, Zombies are still good, Grave Guard are still good, none of which were new for the 8e book.  Yes, the previous dominating build was dramatically downgraded, but several of its component pieces are still quite functional.  Yes, a lot of the new stuff was very good, too, but that's the point.  Almost everything was good.  It's a shame subsequent books didn't quite live up to that standard, and it's a shame the book has to exist within the relatively unbalanced framework established by the 8e core rules, particularly the magic rules & core lores.

[Hellios]

sarcasm: yes, irony: no

C:DE has beautiful minis and nice fluff, but its viable/crap unit ratio is like 12 to 1 (kheradruakh anyone?). Listwise it was venom-/razorspam all over until 6th hit and then nothing. nowadays you see the odd allied detachment for eldar (much older and yet still much better dex) or nicely painted miniature collections.

I disagree. The Dark Eldar by there very nature are pretty much forced to take transports. I've seen Raiders as well as Venoms. It is part of the armies character. It is disappointing that Web Way Portal lists are not really viable. The Dark Eldar don't have many really strong units but they have very few really bad units (when it comes to internal balance... Mandrakes and Krapduak being two that stand out.

I see Wych and warrior lists... mounted in transports... like 90% of DE armies always have been. I now see homunculus based list... Normally mounted but not always... and I see these units mixed together. The problem has always been keeping these units alive, If you can do that they can perform well.

I was sad that the Mandrakes went from having a very interesting deployment method to being really bad.

[Nehekhare]

I see Wych and warrior lists... mounted in transports... like 90% of DE armies always have been. I now see homunculus based list... Normally mounted but not always... and I see these units mixed together. The problem has always been keeping these units alive, If you can do that they can perform well.

that's basically one and the same list, isn't it? haven't seen them performing well. 1 E/DE special char deathstar made top 16 at adepticon.

 

I don't buy into the conspiracy theories of new stuff always being made great and old stuff being made terrible.

yeah they don't even care that much.

[Brother Amarel]

Ah, apologies, I forgot that I was the one who specified.

 

Also, you might want to check some of the video games, specifically MMORPG, RTS and TBS as they all have some variation of the "dice rolling factor" when determining if something actually hits the target, how much damage it does and so on so forth. Seriously, go on Dungeons and Dragons Online, its free, make an account, play for thirty minutes or so and watch the little d20 in the corner as it says if an attack actually hits, if its critical and so on so forth. Pretty much every game like that has a program like that on it, DDO just happens to be the only one I've seen that actually shows the die. Or SWTOR as it shows the same thing.

 

 

No offense, but there was "off-topic bickering" since the first page. All I did was ask a question and instead of getting an answer, everyone played ring around the rosies. Everyone could have ignored or answered or even told me to shut up and leave. Even report my posts as being "off-topic" or some other such thing that deserves reporting. As a Moderati, you probably know more about what fits in that category than I do.

 

Thank you for the patronising explanation of a random number generator, I do know how they work. All computer games use such algorithms in some form or another at various levels of importance. Finding an example of one that renders a die to replicate this does not change the fact that dice games and computer games are different.

 

Also, I'm a Moderati Cedo, I have no more impact on the day-to-day decision-making and running of the board than a Frater Domus. 

[Hellios]

 

I see Wych and warrior lists... mounted in transports... like 90% of DE armies always have been. I now see homunculus based list... Normally mounted but not always... and I see these units mixed together. The problem has always been keeping these units alive, If you can do that they can perform well.

that's basically one and the same list, isn't it? haven't seen them performing well. 1 E/DE special char deathstar made top 16 at adepticon.

 

I don't argue that the DE codex is one of the most powerful codices. I argue that it could hold its own when it was released, and that almost all of the units are usable without crippling your list when compared to an optimum DE list. Is it one list? Are Most space marines one and the same list? They pretty much consist of units in power armor.

 

I would also argue that DE are not one of the most popular lists and that they have a steep learning curve... It is possible that this learning curve is part of the reason that DE are not that popular. Even if the DE were the most powerful list an unpopular list is unlikely to have as many in the top 16. DE lists punish you if you make mistakes, not ideal for tournaments. They are just too fragile.

[Nehekhare]

I can agree with those assertions but that makes them not balanced but sub par in my book. kelly wrote lots of flavourful rules and fluff-inspired special chars, but nothing of that really worked out on the table. 6th killed what was left.

[Kol Saresk]

 

 

Ah, apologies, I forgot that I was the one who specified.

 

Also, you might want to check some of the video games, specifically MMORPG, RTS and TBS as they all have some variation of the "dice rolling factor" when determining if something actually hits the target, how much damage it does and so on so forth. Seriously, go on Dungeons and Dragons Online, its free, make an account, play for thirty minutes or so and watch the little d20 in the corner as it says if an attack actually hits, if its critical and so on so forth. Pretty much every game like that has a program like that on it, DDO just happens to be the only one I've seen that actually shows the die. Or SWTOR as it shows the same thing.

 

 

No offense, but there was "off-topic bickering" since the first page. All I did was ask a question and instead of getting an answer, everyone played ring around the rosies. Everyone could have ignored or answered or even told me to shut up and leave. Even report my posts as being "off-topic" or some other such thing that deserves reporting. As a Moderati, you probably know more about what fits in that category than I do.

Thank you for the patronising explanation of a random number generator, I do know how they work. All computer games use such algorithms in some form or another at various levels of importance. Finding an example of one that renders a die to replicate this does not change the fact that dice games and computer games are different.

lol, so what difference am I missing exactly?

[the jeske]

They are just too fragile.

the army costs too much too. it costs like necron or IG [or even more if someone started in 5th] , but is less efficient.

 

 

 

So yeah.  Maybe they try to make the new stuff strong and

the old stuff weak, but if they do then their design & development

process is too incompetent and inconsistent to pull it off.

 

It is rather that they realy think that people buy models based on looks mostly. Then their design makes sense . Apostol or Techy dude , the talons , the metal possessed . just to take the chaos stuff . On the inconsistent part your totaly right, I dont think that all of the DT they have is incompetent.

 

 

 

 

I guess you're talking about external balance for the 5e nids?.  I don't

know, the nids in 5th struck me as slightly underpar even there, but it

was the internal balance that made them terrible - so many awful

choices, so many poorly considered & poorly written rules.  But I

guess that's what you're talking about with the limited builds bit.

 

It is not just that . Remember when the nid codex was being done the DT already knew they wanted to add flyers and ally to the game . Nids got the revers of the chaos slot options . chaos had no fast , no elite[well technicly there was termicid and chosen , but by the time PMs/oblits/DPs were maxed out we were looking at a 2k+army] , 1hvy support 1 HQ 1 good troop and 2 ok ones.

nids have everything good put in to the elite slot . It is not even a choice thing , because unlike other armies nids dont have ally or anti tank/long range support in other slots . So we have to play those stupid choir lists that get shot down by a single rune seer. 

 

 

 

 

It's a shame subsequent books didn't quite live up to that standard,

and it's a shame the book has to exist within the relatively unbalanced

framework established by the 8e core rules, particularly the magic

rules & core lores.

 

yes I fully agree. For me the two best codex in the entire history of w40k[gamewise] were then 4th ed sm and chaos dex. Back then If you asked them what they played and they said chaos it told you 0 about what they play. Same with sm , gunlines , drop lists , all AS sm lists , double dev lists , infiltration builds , armies with apothecaries , sure some where better then other .it is impossible to make a codex where picking any X units will always get the same level of army or to be more precise it is possible Gav made a DE army book which was so bad that it didnt matter what units you took and how you tried to play it was always bad. GW had to errate the whole codex in a WD soon after it hit the shops.

[Deus de Mortalis]

yes I fully agree. For me the two best codex in the entire history of w40k[gamewise] were then 4th ed sm and chaos dex. Back then If you asked them what they played and they said chaos it told you 0 about what they play. Same with sm , gunlines , drop lists , all AS sm lists , double dev lists , infiltration builds , armies with apothecaries , sure some where better then other .it is impossible to make a codex where picking any X units will always get the same level of army or to be more precise it is possible Gav made a DE army book which was so bad that it didnt matter what units you took and how you tried to play it was always bad. GW had to errate the whole codex in a WD soon after it hit the shops.

 

For me too! I never had more fun making armies and playing 40k than I did during the time periods that those two codexes were legal. My brother played Khorne and I played both Chaos Undivided and Space Marines. The best part about those two codexes were that you could build any type of army you wanted to, and they all worked, and it never felt like you were paying taxes for anything or that the codex was trying to fight you. Now the codexes all want you to take certain units, leave others at home, take certain special characters you don't want to unlock things you do, and take a lot of shiny new toys that maybe not everyone wants in their army.

[Sception]

Jeske, you mean the 3.5 Chaos dex, right?  Chaos got two codeces in 3rd edition, one in 4th edition, and none in 5th edition.  The 4e chaos dex was the Gav dex, the terrible one right before the current just-bad one.

 

I also loved the 3.5 book, but there were certainly issues with it.  You had to look in several different places to find the rules for each individual unit (unit entry, list entry, the page that says what marks are allowed and what it does to the force org, the page with the effects of the mark, the armory entries for what some options do, the mark specific armory page for what other options do), and altogether it was too confusing for a lot of players, particularly non-chaos players trying to understand their opponents armies.  The sub lists were either broken or didn't provide enough differentiation to be worth the bother of their inclusion (pretty much all of the themes were perfectly functional out of the main dex anyway, apart from the lack of cultists which everyone should have had access to to begin with).  The rules for how much wargear characters were allowed to have, and what of it counted towards what overlapping sublimits (some equipment counted as wargear, some count as gifts, some as gifts and wargear, some as neither, with none of it clearly explained in the book and was instead written out in the FAQ later), etc.

 

So I certainly don't consider the 3.5 book to be perfect.  But it was the funnest and coolest chaos codex we've seen, particularly when expanded with the Lost and the Damned rules from the EoT campaign (now there's a sub list worth the effort to implement)

 

I think my ideal chaos codex would look A LOT like the 3.5 book, just without the sub lists, with re-balanced mark/cult rules (and perhaps some distinction between marks and cults).  And since there's no going back on the daemon codex, I'd replace the daemonic elements with mortal rabble from LatD (mutants, traitors, spawn, etc), while maybe playing up the dark mechanicus angle a bit in terms of new daemonic weapons and wargear throughout the list (not just daemon engine vehicles, but unique-to-chaos daemonic ranged and melee weapons carried by squads, & techno-daemonic character wargear).  I also might keep the prince and lord as separate entries, I'm not a big fan of trying to fit completely different units under the same unit entry via 'upgrades' (again, my problem with how 3.5 handled the cult units/marks).

 

 

But if I had my way, I'd definitely bring back vet skills and the like.  Make chaos marines more varried and customizeable.  CSMs have a lot of options right now, but they don't really add up to much practical variety.