Stormsurge discussion

[phandaal]

This is all getting silly now. Being able to delete people's hard earned models in a single turn so easily in a thoughtless exercise of just throwing dice doesn't equal fun.

 

I genuinely fear for the long term customer retention of this hobby.

 

(Pretty hard to not chicken little this, but after the supposed "fixes" to the Dark Eldar, I have little hope this will be balanced)

GW has trouble balancing the fun factor on both sides of the table.

 

And yes, if the other guy feels like his models are just there to get removed he will eventually skip the middle man and not show up at all.

[Captain Coolpants]

Great googly moogly!!!

 

12 damage!?!? And its heavy 2!? That's potentially 24 damn damage!!!

 

Or 6 shots at 4 damage a piece at greater range... That's 24 damage.

 

These tau guns are funny haha

Edited January 13, 2022 by Captain Coolpants

[Scribe]

So is it possible to build a pure suit/mecha list?

 

Asking for a friend...

[AenarIT]

Great googly moogly!!!

 

12 damage!?!? And its heavy 2!? That's potentially 24 damn damage!!!

 

Or 6 shots at 4 damage a piece at greater range... That's 24 damage.

 

These tau guns are funny haha

4 SM Devastators with Lascannons can do 24 potential damage as well, and they don't cost 350-400 points

It's a big gun that deals a lot of damage in one hit, so it feels like a big one. But it still needs to hit, to wound and to not be saved to be effective. As for its efficiency, only knowing the point cost we can judge it.

Edited January 13, 2022 by AenarIT

[Biscuittzz]

Am I the only one thinking this is actually.....balanced? The mega shot is only 24" so anything that could be a target will just stay out of range and if it moves to get in range it loses the ability to use the anchors right so no re-roll? Seems a reasonable payoff.

 

Also, that feeling when your last void shield point on an Astraeus eats the full 12 damage.

[Captain Idaho]

It's certainly not balanced. Rerolls to hit, marker light bonuses, all stacking to ensure you're getting your shots through each turn.

 

Comparing this gun to a Devastator Squad with Lascannons? Nah, not even close! This weapon system is the most broken thing since last week! ;)

[phandaal]

 

Great googly moogly!!!

 

12 damage!?!? And its heavy 2!? That's potentially 24 damn damage!!!

 

Or 6 shots at 4 damage a piece at greater range... That's 24 damage.

 

These tau guns are funny haha

4 SM Devastators with Lascannons can do 24 potential damage as well, and they don't cost 350-400 points

It's a big gun that deals a lot of damage in one hit, so it feels like a big one. But it still needs to hit, to wound and to not be saved to be effective. As for its efficiency, only knowing the point cost we can judge it.

 

 

24 damage would require 4 hits, 4 wounds, and 4 max damage rolls.

 

4 Lascannons can also do 1 damage, or any other number between 1 and 24, and they are on less durable models, etc etc.

[Commander Dawnstar]

Not making any arguments about whether these numbers are appropriate or not, but genuine question to those of you who think this is too much:

 

What sort of damage should the single standout weapon on a 350-400 point Lord of War be putting out to make it feel worth fielding without being oppressive?

Edited January 13, 2022 by Commander Dawnstar

[Biscuittzz]

It's certainly not balanced. Rerolls to hit, marker light bonuses, all stacking to ensure you're getting your shots through each turn.

 

Comparing this gun to a Devastator Squad with Lascannons? Nah, not even close! This weapon system is the most broken thing since last week!

 

I'm not as up to date with Tau as most so don't know what marker lights effect etc. so I'll take your word for it.

 

The most broken thing so far this week. 

[Captain Idaho]

Another thing is, we're seeing that Custodes not allowed Damage 3 weapons in melee whilst Genestealer Cult get power tools which are superior, now this plus the Eldar leaks...

 

Yuk.

 

Not making any arguments about whether these numbers are appropriate or not, but genuine question to those of you who think this is too much:

 

What sort of damage should the single standout weapon on a 350-400 point Lord of War be putting out to make it feel worth fielding without being oppressive?

Ask Necron players ;)

 

Thing is, damage should be reduced across the board. But because Dark Eldar Raiders started off sub 100pts (or whatever) you got this absurd situation where a larger more powerful model needs to delete everything.

 

7th edition with Strength D weapons was awful and GW have found a way make it even more widespread in 9th...

Edited January 13, 2022 by Captain Idaho

[Plaguecaster]

I like this Gw making full boast that you can easily one shot knights and titan. Good luck trying to sell any new knight models now

I say that but now GW will probably give knights so many rules to ignore most damage being even harder to kill when they get their codex

Edited January 13, 2022 by Plaguecaster

[Metzombie]

 

Rerolls to hit, marker light bonuses, all stacking to ensure you're getting your shots through each turn.

So you already know how Markerlights work in the new codex? Did I miss a leak somewhere? And if the target has a 4+ invul save only half its attacks get through. 

[Captain Idaho]

It's ok, my new bought Telemon has damage -1. We got this. :)

 

 

Rerolls to hit, marker light bonuses, all stacking to ensure you're getting your shots through each turn.

 

So you already know how Markerlights work in the new codex? Did I miss a leak somewhere? And if the target has a 4+ invul save only half its attacks get through.

You don't need to know the rules to know they'll give bonuses, come on!

[Metzombie]

It's ok, my new bought Telemon has damage -1. We got this.

 

 

Rerolls to hit, marker light bonuses, all stacking to ensure you're getting your shots through each turn.

So you already know how Markerlights work in the new codex? Did I miss a leak somewhere? And if the target has a 4+ invul save only half its attacks get through.

You don't need to know the rules to know they'll give bonuses, come on!

 

And I know from the last few codices that a lot of buffs do not apply to things like vehicles and monsters. So it ist not unlikely that the stormsurge would get no bonus from markerlights.

[SkimaskMohawk]

This is all getting silly now. Being able to delete people's hard earned models in a single turn so easily in a thoughtless exercise of just throwing dice doesn't equal fun.

 

I genuinely fear for the long term customer retention of this hobby.

 

(Pretty hard to not chicken little this, but after the supposed "fixes" to the Dark Eldar, I have little hope this will be balanced)

 

I don't know what game you've been playing, but you've bene able to one shot models...forever.

 

Vehicles could get exploded from one shot (like the infamous missile killing a landraider off a glance in 4th, 5th and 6th), everything else was mostly vulnerable to instant death.

 

And that was before 8th, the king of kill everything in one turn of shooting. Remember ynnari reapers? Or ynnari shinning spears? Or smash captains? Or Knight Castellans? Or Imperial Fist Centurions? Or relic shokk attack guns? Or Raven Guard Centurions? Or whatever else we want to pull from 8ths greatest hits.

Edited January 13, 2022 by SkimaskMohawk

[Commander Dawnstar]

 

Not making any arguments about whether these numbers are appropriate or not, but genuine question to those of you who think this is too much:

 

What sort of damage should the single standout weapon on a 350-400 point Lord of War be putting out to make it feel worth fielding without being oppressive?

Ask Necron players

 

Can't I ask you since you're here?

 

You're saying this thing isn't balanced, so regardless of your feelings towards the state of this edition ... how would you go about balancing it if you didn't have permission to change the game at large?

 

---

 

(Just for the record I completely agree with you on issues of power creep and how some of GW's recent design choices are harkening back to my least favourite parts of 7th, and I've been raising the T'au one-big-gun-per-platform design as a problem long before we got here. This sort of thing feels like something of the logical conclusion of lumping all of a big unit's threat into a single point of expression.)

 

I like this Gw making full boast that you can easily one shot knights and titan. Good luck trying to sell any new knight models now

I say that but now GW will probably give knights so many rules to ignore most damage being even harder to kill when they get their codex

 

I mean ... if we assume this thing has access to a rerollable 3+ to hit then it's still only averaging 0.74 damaging hits against a Knight with Rotate Ion Shields per volley, and it needs to be within 24" of the Knight without having moved that turn to even do that if it's deployed anchors. I wouldn't call that easily one-shotting the thing.

 

 

[Legionary Pallas]

I honestly don't think we've seen enough to make a verdict on it. It's easy to see a profile with a bunch of big numbers and start seeing the potential, but AP-2 on Dispersed Shot means armour is still plenty viable to reduce its effects, despite its high strength and damage. The big shots are only 24" and you wanna be standing still to get the rerolls so you can actually hit with the damn thing, so it's threat range is something that can be somewhat mitigated until it dies. Add all that to the fact it will almost certainly get a price increase and I think you'll be paying too much for one big model that will attract every single high damage source on the table and not end up making its points back before it inevitably dies.

 

All we've seen is some big numbers designed to make people's eyes bulge and sell models preemptively, it worked for the Hammerhead after all, there's still points cost and defensive profile to see, as well as a whole other main gun.

[Oxydo]

Have all the people claiming that the sky is falling forgotten about Volcano Lances being Heavy D6 S14 AP-5 3d3 dmg Blast with native hit rerolls vs Titantic and range 80? Or the Harpoon being S16 AP-6 10 dmg + d3 MW with a native hit reroll vs vehicles/monsters? Or invul ignoring AP-4 Shieldbreaker missiles that can ignore Look Out Sir with a strat? All on far more mobile platforms.
 
Scarier or equally scary weapons than the Blast Cannon have existed for a long time so I have a hard time seeing how another faction's Knight sized Lord of War getting a Knight level weapon somehow is the end of all things. As long as they are priced properly, it's not really a problem.

[phandaal]

 

 

You're saying this thing isn't balanced, so regardless of your feelings towards the state of this edition ... how would you go about balancing it if you didn't have permission to change the game at large?

 

 

 

That is a problem inherent with any Big Awesome Model. In order to justify its expense both in-game and in real life, it has to be a spectacular. Problem is that your opponent usually will not enjoy playing against it in that case. But if the model is no good, you feel like it is a waste.

 

Not really something that is up to all of us here to solve... GW chooses to include those models in the game, so it is up to them to make it work.

[Commander Dawnstar]

 

That is a problem inherent with any Big Awesome Model. In order to justify its expense both in-game and in real life, it has to be a spectacular. Problem is that your opponent usually will not enjoy playing against it in that case. But if the model is no good, you feel like it is a waste.

 

Not really something that is up to all of us here to solve... GW chooses to include those models in the game, so it is up to them to make it work.

 

Totally. I was a champion of team "Imperial Knights were a mistake" back in 7th when they ignored the majority of the vehicle damage table and threw out Strength D attacks and Stomps.

 

The main reason I'm labouring this point is because we're talking about a 24" range firing mode on a largely immobile unit that doesn't do anything fancy like ignore invulnerable saves or throw out bonus mortal wounds (as far as we know). The Stormsurge isn't going to be making 12" moves like an Imperial Knight or throwing out 6+ Strength 16 attacks in melee that hit on a 2+ for 8 damage, so its shooting needs to be reasonably impressive if it's going to have any kind of appeal to it. This isn't some god weapon which can threaten the whole battlefield or something like the Railgun that damages just about anything with minimal counterplay or chance to defend, it's just a gun with a high Strength and damage value.

 

So approaching it completely in a vacuum, is the Damage the only thing that's potentially a problem here? Would anyone be up in arms if it did 6-8 Damage? How about ten?

Edited January 13, 2022 by Commander Dawnstar

[BLACK BLΠFLY]

There’s no way you can validly compare this to a devastator squad. Oh well geedub strike yet again.

[Bonzi]

It's not the damage totals of the Railgun and this cannon now that's the problem, it's the flat guarantee of the damage if it isn't saved. This is part of the creep that's accelerated ever since Drukkari. Why do melta guns, dark lances, and cognis lascannons outclass all other anti-tank weaponry? It's reliability in damage. In half range melta is d6+2, guaranteeing minimum 3, maximum 8 damage. Cognis and Dark Lances both guarantee minimum 4, maximum 6 damage. Meaning if you hit, wound, and your opponent fails their save you have a reliable minimum damage you know you will do. These Tau weapons remove that last level of chance entirely with their fixed damage. If you hit and wound and your opponent fails a save you are picking up a dreadnought, an Impulsor, a Rhino ect.

 

40K is a game of odds and gambling. Everyone gambles to hit, and to wound with guns...then, when all other armies have to gamble that their opponent won't make a save the Tau railgun ignores that and says you're taking this amount no matter with no chance to save...and it's between 10 and 13. That's extreme reliability. The Storm surge gun appears to allow saves, but again where everyone else is rolling one more time to see what their damage is the Storm surge doesn't. No gamble needed. The more times you have to string together successful d6 rolls in a row the worse your odds are of an optimal outcome.

 

Necron Doomsday Barge:

 

d6 # of shots, d6 to hit with each shot, d6 to wound with each shot, d6 possible invuln save against the damage, then d6 for amount of damage.

 

Vs

 

Railgun: d6 to hit, d6 to wound then 9 damage+d3. No saves (other than FnP and those work against other damage too so they can be ignored for comparison).

 

The difference is obvious: five gambles vs two. Rerolls, bonuses, blah blah blah...it doesn't matter. The less dice you have to roll to achieve the outcome you want, the more reliable your outcome is. Doomsday Cannon is the extreme of one end vs the other, but it illustrates the point well. Tau are being given guns that have one to two fewer gambles in destroying a unit. It's not the total damage (a ton of units have the ability to do more than 24 wounds...but none have the certainty) it's the certainty of it.

 

Now for the sad part. These super guns mean almost nothing in our throwaway infantry dominated meta. Go ahead and splatter two obsec infantry with your super gun, it won't get you the point and it won't beat the meta. What these guns do do, is take the poor state vehicles and most monsters in 9th are in and push them all the way to irrelevant. Bringing lord's of war or heavy tanks or Dreds? Why bother? All their defense is based on the idea of Toughness 8 (laughable vs St 9+), lots of wounds and damage reduction (laughable vs flat damage 10+), armor and invuln saves (Railguns don't even allow that). These Tau guns are curbstomping units that are already bad. They won't win the Tau any games but they guarantee feel bad moments for anyone dumb enough to bring armor against them.

 

GW even knows it. Look at Custodes and the Tau strat previewed today. Trajan and the

Tau strat both have the ability to reduce to 1 or flat out ignore the damage of a single attack. This is what's necessary now to keep something alive because toughness, wounds, armor, invulns, and FnP saves along with minuses to hit or wound are no longer adequate protection to keep a model alive because GW has written weapons and armies with rules that ignore or over ride not just some of those mechanics, but nearly all of them. Guess any all of the 9th Ed dexes written before Black Templars can just suck eggs because they won't get those strats or abilities until 10th.

 

I'm happy Tau players will get to once again enjoy an army that's been in the dumpster for too long. I'm upset GW is doing this at the cost of the health of an already ailing edition.

 

Thanks for attending my TED talk.

Edited January 13, 2022 by Bonzi

[Iron Father Ferrum]

There’s no way you can validly compare this to a devastator squad. Oh well geedub strike yet again.

You'd have to compare it to 400 points of Devastators if you really want anything approaching a valid comparison.

 

Between this and the Hammerhead, I really feel like GW just doesn't want to see many tanks on the table. Wave Serpents apparently get Transhuman so that'll help them a little, I suppose.

[Emurian]

Find it weird you people try to compare an infantry squad (Devestators) vs a Vehicle / Walker pointswise to get your point across. Comparing oranges to apples sorta speak. The difference between an infantry unit and a tank is to big to put them next to eachother and start drawing straight conclusions from said comparison. Infantry squads provide bodies to the heavy weapon thats hidden there, ergo coming with your DX weapon is going to kill a model or 2 but thats about it, gj you got 20-40 points of marines out of it whereas a Tank will actually degrade after taking X damage resulting in a net loss in its output with all guns. Those 2-4 missing bolter shots are not missed as much as your to hit chances dropping by 17% with all your vehichle guns imo.

People here seem to raise questions how to balance out the game. Can we at least agree on some things?

#1 Powercreep with every new codex is real
#2 New units tend to be pushed to the limit
#3 Said powercreeped units sell well for GW and they do this on purpose.
#4 GW Is not interested in balancing out the units to start with
#5 We will never have a balanced game at the end of an edition. There will always be a real distinct power feel between the first released codex and the last one of the edition.

So if you truly are interested in balancing the rules then the only real way to do this is wait for the edition to be done with, line up all the codexes and tweak at that point. I have done the same with my Warhammer Epic collection (Necrons versus Eldar) which I use to play 4th edition with. I played that edition the most by far, with hundreds of battles under my belt with a variety of armies. I sat down from time to time and tried to reflect on certain battles I played a lot (Dark Eldar vs my mate his Necrons) and then started making small tweaks.

Example: 4th edition Necrons had this 25% phase out rule. Which in general was fine if you where spamming infantry. Monoliths on itself where decent models, but taking Monoliths did cut heavily into your Phase Out threshold. Result: As a Dark Eldar played I ignored the Monoliths 100% and just blasted away warrior squads with 3x disintegrator  (aka plasmacannons) ravagers to force my mate his army to Phase Out. Now, if I play Epic 4th, I implement a rule that every monolith cuts down the Phase Out threshhold by 5% up to 10% max as long as the model is still present on the field. This small tweak has changed the way I approach that matchup as the Monoliths are not that easily to be ignored anymore, likewise removing a Monolith from the table feels impactfull overall rather then just killing a single unit.

This hindsight is whats needed to truly balance out an edition IMO. There is no reason to debate balance if the root problem (GW) has no interest in truly balancing the game. It feels like were trying to reinvent the wheel over and over again while we know the road we use is muddy and full with potholes. 

I agree with some people here stating: Its just a sheet with some high numbers on it, wait untill you know the cost of said model. I have had this debate with my irl friends too. There is no reason to debate solely on a statline without knowing the point cost behind it. We all know a 2 pts Fire Warrior would be broken whereas a 20 pts one is overpriced. Seeing a datesheet means nothing on itself. Its part of the hype they try to create and overall people seem to fall for it =/. 

I can not cry about these previews as a mainly UM player. I am happy that my Tau friend, which is playing the army for around 18 years, now has this feeling his army will become playable again. Everyone gets to ride the carousel from time to time. TBH I had a harder time accepting  that SoB and Admech got their codexes ''so fast'' considering they did pretty ok before their new dex dropped meta wise whereas it was clear that Tau/CWE/IG could use the love more.




 

[ThePenitentOne]

That's just a weird angle on the Sun Shark. You can get something reasonably similar from the 360 image on the webstore.

 Thanks- I can see it now.