Whats your opinion: Allies?

[Rune_Priest_Rhapsody]

I would be fine with allies if so many people around me were not abusing the allies rules. I like the concept, especially with my chaos having some demons on the loose every once in while. Where issues start are the downright stupid combos people are running for "normal" games in my area. If people were not so bent on that maybe my opinion would be different but currently i think allies/extra force org, formations should not be alowed untill 2500+.

I completely agree with you, Thunderhawk3015, and imma let you finish...

 

The thing is that games mean different things to different people. And breaking rules open by assembling uber stupid ally combos is just as fun to someone and riding on a teeter-todder is to another.

My guess, and not derail the thread, is that GW had this glorious living brain fart that controlled the ebbs and flow of the sales department. Then one day it got greedy, so they encased it in a giant golden throne to sit inside their bank account on Terra, for eternity.

 

End of Line

[Fytharin]

 

I would be fine with allies if so many people around me were not abusing the allies rules. I like the concept, especially with my chaos having some demons on the loose every once in while. Where issues start are the downright stupid combos people are running for "normal" games in my area. If people were not so bent on that maybe my opinion would be different but currently i think allies/extra force org, formations should not be alowed untill 2500+.

I completely agree with you, Thunderhawk3015, and imma let you finish...

 

The thing is that games mean different things to different people. And breaking rules open by assembling uber stupid ally combos is just as fun to someone and riding on a teeter-todder is to another.

My guess, and not derail the thread, is that GW had this glorious living brain fart that controlled the ebbs and flow of the sales department. Then one day it got greedy, so they encased it in a giant golden throne to sit inside their bank account on Terra, for eternity.

 

End of Line

 

Not sure how much this may have been true or changed much considering most of us had poor impulse buy control even before we had the option to ally in a second army....

[Squark]

Personal thoughts; The allies system is a very good idea, but its not implemented well.

 

It helps with edition shifts (covering holes that a previous edition's codex was not designed to do). Codexes without anti-air could get it, as could codexes that got crappy anti-air (i.e Flakk missiles. It'd be nice for consistency, but they wouldn't help with fliers much. Flakk missiles, to work, need to be in four or five places on the field at one point to work, so a flier can't just blow most of the flakk squad away in a single shooting phase).

 

It provides fluff support for things that are cast off. Thinks like wulfen packs, or genestealer cults (admittedly, that isn't there. why GW didn't provide rules for 'nids to have genestealer cults made of guardsmen or tau is beyond me)

 

And of course, it provides genuine alliances. Unless its the heresy or Badab War, the Space Marines pretty much always have had support from the PDF or guard in campaigns. Chaos space marine get demons. etc.

 

Of course, the execution was... problematic. Things I feel need to be fixed:

 

-No mixing of the chain of command: Independant characters cannot join the allied detachment's unit or vice versa (special exception for Inquisitors. Because they are in fact, genuinely special like that). Stops wolf Priests from giving 3 special rules to guard blobs, or buff tau commanders joining Eldar squads.

 

-Refine the matrix: Tau have no battle brothers (if you really must, add more units like gue'sva and other xenos allies). Space Marines, while they can develop some degree of respect for the Tau, will not tie their operations with them. And eldar should not be treating any other species as equal to theirs. Eldar/Dark Eldar alliances are fixed (We have a corsair army from forgeworld for actually making corsairs). Also, provide 'nids with genestealer cults to make up for not getting other forms of allies.

 

-Limit battle brothers affects to BRB effects. Its reasonably doable to balance battle brothers if all that's usable on the allies are a few, strict effects in the BRB. Fortuning things that were never meant to be fortuned is not.