So how does everyone plan to play?

[Adeptus]

It seems like Matched Play rules are intended to be the most balanced, but they're also fairly bland and (for Grey Knights) fairly punitive.

 

The Narrative Play seems like much more fun, allowing null deployment  for us and actually allowing us to USE all those psychic powers we have at our disposal. But I worry that the game will become more imbalanced, leading to less people wanting to play that way.

 

The other factor is that in games that have multiple ways to play, almost without exception the tournament standard (in this case, the Matched Play rules) become the default for all games, no matter if they're casual, friendly, league, tournament or whatever. People like to feel like they're 'tournament ready' and they like to feel they're getting the most fair gaming experience without one side gaining an advantage over the other.

 

So... how do YOU intend to play? Do you plan on pushing Narrative or Free play over Matched play? Or do you plan on only playing Matched Play games?

[Gentlemanloser]

No one i know will touch narrative. Power levels and free upgrades?

 

Narrative is going to be saved for beer and pizza days when everyone's just got new boxes for xmas and we throw down for our yearly 'apocalypse'.

 

Matched is going to be the only way played.

[Adeptus]

40K is a purely beer and pretzels game anyway, IMO, so I think I'll be pushing locally for Narrative Play games. At least it has a rough framework with included scenarios and rough power levels.

[Waking Dreamer]

Whichever seems most fun to be honest.

 

Possibly matched play for the points system/army building but with some tweaked house rules borrowed from Narrative play if the former is too restrictive for the armies involved. 

[Valerian]

It seems like Matched Play rules are intended to be the most balanced, but they're also fairly bland and (for Grey Knights) fairly punitive.

 

The Narrative Play seems like much more fun, allowing null deployment  for us and actually allowing us to USE all those psychic powers we have at our disposal. But I worry that the game will become more imbalanced, leading to less people wanting to play that way.

 

 

With unlimited access to the Sanctic table (especially Purge Soul power, I think it's called), and ability to Teleport pretty much the entire army with precision turn 1, I'd be afraid that we'd curb-stomp pretty much every other army out there.  I'm a little disappointed on those Matched Play restrictions, but at the same time, I certainly see why they did it.

[Adeptus]

It's a concern, but I think a lot of other forces will also increase in power at the same time. One of my friends played a Space Wolf army that was entirely in drop pods, and matched play games hurt his army as much as mine. Not to mention Daemon or Eldar armies losing the ability to cast multiple powers a turn (and it's not even manifest, it's attempt to manifest) is nearly as painful for them as it is for us.

[Gentlemanloser]

Totally true. But imagine this for a narrative game.

 

GK msu. As many 5 man squads as power levels allow. All with daemonhammers as they're free.

 

Null deploy entire army for 3 turns, then drop in and every unit casts purge soul for many Mortal wounds.

 

I don't think that would be fun to face.

[Adeptus]

Sure, but the counterpoint is your opponent keeping all his drop pods in reserve until turn 4, then landing them and grav-gunning your Strike squads to death.

 

And besides, our tamed down version of Smite isn't very exciting. One wound, per manifest. Woo.

 

And I haven't actually read the Narrative play missions yet, but I wouldn't be surprised to see standard game parameters like holding objectives for a certain period of time to win. Keeping your army in reserve till turn three might not always be the best option, especially with that 9" charge to try and make on the turn you arrive.

 

And all THAT aside, it still sounds like a more fun game than simply putting models on the table, then taking models off the table because I'm getting shot to pieces by some triptide bull:cuss shooty list that ISN'T hamstrung by the new Matched Play rules.

[Gentlemanloser]

IIRC you can't do that. You have to come in by T3 or you die.

 

And it's not smite you spam, but Purge Soul.

 

Which yo can't do in Matched Play.

 

Purge Soul is both roll 2d6 + Ld.  If we win, the enemy takes a number of Mortal wounds in difference to the two rolls.

 

If every single one of our MSU 5 man squads, Dreads and Characters is casing all those, every Psychic Phase, armies without an equal number of Psychers to Deny is going to lose. Hard.

 

That might fit the Narrative, but I don't think many will find that fun.

 

As for Triptide, if that's an issue, it's not from Matched Play itself, but by GW actually *not* playstesting and balancing and the Rip Tides still being too cheap.

 

I've looked through a little bit of the Eldar stuff for a mate and had to laugh.

 

Pathfinders dealing extra Mortal Wounds on wound rolls of 6+.  D Scythes being S10, AP4, D3 hits auto hitting.  Scorpions Mandiblsters causing a mortal wound for each scorp on a roll of 6 on a d6 every fight phase.

 

Yeah....

 

That's nothing Matched *or* Narrative play is going to balance.

[Adeptus]

IIRC you can't do that. You have to come in by T3 or you die.

 

And it's not smite you spam, but Purge Soul.

 

Which yo can't do in Matched Play.

 

Purge Soul is both roll 2d6 + Ld.  If we win, the enemy takes a number of Mortal wounds in difference to the two rolls.

Turn three, turn four, my point is that we aren't the only force that can null deploy and not having any feet on the ground for three turns might be harmful depending on the mission parameters. If nothing else, an 18" bubble is pretty big. A large enough enemy force could conceivable block the entire table off, or at least all the good parts, just leaving a nice little kill-box to deploy in. And Purge Soul isn't that scary when it's just a straight up LD compare: If we assume average dice rolls, we'll cause NO wounds on LD 8 armies and only one per manifest on LD 7 armies. That's hardly terrifying.

[Gentlemanloser]

Sure, on Average.

 

But we lose nothing when we lose.

 

Ad when your opponent rolls snake eyes and you roll average and delete a squad with them having nothig they can do to stop it.

 

And every single unit we field has the potential to do that.

 

It only requires a few bad rolls to see the game swing massively.

 

I just shudder at the unbalanced naure of it, and don't think I'll enjoy Vehicles that are expensive in points and their weapons all cost, while you can freely upgrade to the most expensive weapons all over at no increase in 'power' I Narrative play.

 

If people enjoy the more freeform nature, more power to them.  But I'm having enough trouble with the 'balance' of Matched atm, let alone throwing an semblance of balance out the window with open or narrative.

[Adeptus]

Sure, on Average.

 

But we lose nothing when we lose.

 

Ad when your opponent rolls snake eyes and you roll average and delete a squad with them having nothig they can do to stop it.

 

And every single unit we field has the potential to do that.

 

It only requires a few bad rolls to see the game swing massively.

 

I just shudder at the unbalanced naure of it, and don't think I'll enjoy Vehicles that are expensive in points and their weapons all cost, while you can freely upgrade to the most expensive weapons all over at no increase in 'power' I Narrative play.

 

If people enjoy the more freeform nature, more power to them.  But I'm having enough trouble with the 'balance' of Matched atm, let alone throwing an semblance of balance out the window with open or narrative.

I guess we're just after different things. 40K isn't now, never has been, and never will be balanced. Anyone approaching it with the intent of playing a tight, competitive game is on a fools errand, so I'm really just looking for a framework that allows the game to be played between friends without wasting our time.

[Gentlemanloser]

Yeah, but that's what GW promised with 8th.

 

Playtesting and Balance.

 

I fell for it. ;)

[Valerian]

Yeah, but that's what GW promised with 8th.

 

Playtesting and Balance.

 

 

 

Seems to me that you've made a pretty good argument in their favor in this thread.  All of those things you pointed out above as being OP aren't allowed in Matched play - full null deploy and spamming everything but the nerfed version of Smite is out, so well done GW.

[Gentlemanloser]

I don't disagree with that!

I support the half army reserves in Matched.

But Matched isn't anywhere near 'balanced'. At least not to the level GW claimed it was.

Not until Strikes are a wanted choice again, will Matched be close to where it was promised to be!