Army sizes and points costs

[ZeroWolf]

44 minutes ago, TheArtilleryman said:

Hey, if you’re successfully running a business that sells luxury goods and consistently maintaining a 70% profit margin year in year out then you’ve probably earned it - and don’t have any moral obligation to keep prices down, unlike food stores, for example.

probably right, still a nice thought though!

[jaxom]

Very relevant. I remember 1250 points being a sweet spot for armies having to make meaningful unit choices, but with enough cushion to have a little redundancy. Looking at your list; I think 1500 points may be the modern equivalent.

[SvenIronhand]

I personally like to keep my games at around 1K. Feels like a good sweet spot for the rules as they are.

[Scribe]

On 1/24/2025 at 11:59 AM, jaxom said:

Very relevant. I remember 1250 points being a sweet spot for armies having to make meaningful unit choices, but with enough cushion to have a little redundancy. Looking at your list; I think 1500 points may be the modern equivalent.

 

This tension was also good for the game from a replay perspective. If you cannot afford all the toys in one list, you are going to have a new experience with a different list.

 

"I want it all right now." is just poor.

[Evil Eye]

6 hours ago, Scribe said:

"I want it all right now." is just poor.

This is my stance; lower points values forces the player to choose his force more carefully, and also allows for smaller units to excel that would otherwise be overshadowed by bigger shinier toys. It also increases the importance of each model- the fewer boots on the ground, the more valuable each one is.

[ThePenitentOne]

I've always been a campaign player, so escalation was always my jam. So I'd run the range of game sizes.

 

I also really like roster-based play, some always looking to player fewer points than I have available, which means lower point games tend to happen more often even when larger armies are an option. 

 

I like compound armies, consisting of multiple battlegroups, where each battle group can fight independently in smaller games for side quests etc.

 

Given all of this, my hope for the rule set is always that it facilitates fun, engaging play at all sizes, because I'm ALWAYS gonna run that gauntlet.

[gideon stargreave]

I sort of hazily remember the change from 2nd to 3rd, and the prevailing wisdom was that the rules and points had changed to support bigger armies because people were taking bigger armies in 2nd anyway, and playing at 3k points was a nightmare in that system.  When 3rd came out though, it became normalized to play at 1-1250 points anyway

[ZeroWolf]

12 minutes ago, gideon stargreave said:

I sort of hazily remember the change from 2nd to 3rd, and the prevailing wisdom was that the rules and points had changed to support bigger armies because people were taking bigger armies in 2nd anyway, and playing at 3k points was a nightmare in that system.  When 3rd came out though, it became normalized to play at 1-1250 points anyway

Yeah, i distinctively remember the White Dwarf showing the new edition talking about that. They also spoke about limiting some of the crazier abuses of the 2nd ruleset. The whole article was framed as Andy Chambers getting interrogated by an Inquisitor.

[TheArtilleryman]

I think looking at the points is an interesting way to see changes in the playstyle of the different armies as well.
 

In the first battle report with the orks vs space marines, the ork army today is a lot more points than the marine army. The marines in this force came down by a whopping -47%, whereas the Orks came down by only -27%. I think this reflects the fact that basic Orks in more recent editions are a lot stronger. They have higher strength weapons and more attacks in close combat than they used to, for example. In 2nd I remember them being basically just chaff and weight of numbers was pretty much all they had in their favour. Nowadays even basic boyz are a very nasty threat when they crash into your lines. Even a basic choppa now has -1 AP, and tactical marines have all AP 0 in their basic kit. Therefore the Orks haven’t come down in points as drastically. Model for model, a tactical marine has gone from 30 ppm to just 16 ppm.an ork boy has gone from 12 points to 8.5, so less drop than a marine.

 

The points difference isn’t as stark for the guard in the second battle report. This is because it’s mostly tanks, and tanks take up a massive portion of the points in a guard army in 10th. A basic 10-man infantry squad was 100 points in 2nd without upgrades. The same squad in the 10th ed index was 60 points, with whatever upgrades you want for free.  That’s more than -40% cheaper. Whereas a Leman Russ has only gone down from 205 to 170 points - about -17%. This suggests their tanks have got stronger while their infantry have got weaker.

 

What seems odd is that apart from the AP on the bolters, marines also actually have a better profile than they had all those years ago. Even basic tactical marines have 2 wounds and 2 attacks, but as an army they’ve undergone a relative weakening in game terms. Despite being biggerer and betterer, they’re actually not …

Edited January 26 by TheArtilleryman

[ZeroWolf]

54 minutes ago, TheArtilleryman said:

I think looking at the points is an interesting way to see changes in the playstyle of the different armies as well.
 

In the first battle report with the orks vs space marines, the ork army today is a lot more points than the marine army. The marines in this force came down by a whopping -47%, whereas the Orks came down by only -27%. I think this reflects the fact that basic Orks in more recent editions are a lot stronger. They have higher strength weapons and more attacks in close combat than they used to, for example. In 2nd I remember them being basically just chaff and weight of numbers was pretty much all they had in their favour. Nowadays even basic boyz are a very nasty threat when they crash into your lines. Even a basic choppa now has -1 AP, and tactical marines have all AP 0 in their basic kit. Therefore the Orks haven’t come down in points as drastically. Model for model, a tactical marine has gone from 30 ppm to just 16 ppm.an ork boy has gone from 12 points to 8.5, so less drop than a marine.

 

The points difference isn’t as stark for the guard in the second battle report. This is because it’s mostly tanks, and tanks take up a massive portion of the points in a guard army in 10th. A basic 10-man infantry squad was 100 points in 2nd without upgrades. The same squad in the 10th ed index was 60 points, with whatever upgrades you want for free.  That’s more than -40% cheaper. Whereas a Leman Russ has only gone down from 205 to 170 points - about -17%. This suggests their tanks have got stronger while their infantry have got weaker.

 

What seems odd is that apart from the AP on the bolters, marines also actually have a better profile than they had all those years ago. Even basic tactical marines have 2 wounds and 2 attacks, but as an army they’ve undergone a relative weakening in game terms. Despite being biggerer and betterer, they’re actually not …

I think the last part is because they're used as the base line everything else is measured against (instead of how it probably should be, a guardsman)

[Deus_Ex_Machina]

On 1/26/2025 at 12:42 PM, TheArtilleryman said:

I think looking at the points is an interesting way to see changes in the playstyle of the different armies as well.
 

In the first battle report with the orks vs space marines, the ork army today is a lot more points than the marine army. The marines in this force came down by a whopping -47%, whereas the Orks came down by only -27%. I think this reflects the fact that basic Orks in more recent editions are a lot stronger. They have higher strength weapons and more attacks in close combat than they used to, for example. In 2nd I remember them being basically just chaff and weight of numbers was pretty much all they had in their favour. Nowadays even basic boyz are a very nasty threat when they crash into your lines. Even a basic choppa now has -1 AP, and tactical marines have all AP 0 in their basic kit. Therefore the Orks haven’t come down in points as drastically. Model for model, a tactical marine has gone from 30 ppm to just 16 ppm.an ork boy has gone from 12 points to 8.5, so less drop than a marine.

 

The points difference isn’t as stark for the guard in the second battle report. This is because it’s mostly tanks, and tanks take up a massive portion of the points in a guard army in 10th. A basic 10-man infantry squad was 100 points in 2nd without upgrades. The same squad in the 10th ed index was 60 points, with whatever upgrades you want for free.  That’s more than -40% cheaper. Whereas a Leman Russ has only gone down from 205 to 170 points - about -17%. This suggests their tanks have got stronger while their infantry have got weaker.

 

What seems odd is that apart from the AP on the bolters, marines also actually have a better profile than they had all those years ago. Even basic tactical marines have 2 wounds and 2 attacks, but as an army they’ve undergone a relative weakening in game terms. Despite being biggerer and betterer, they’re actually not …

The Orks weren´t just such a pushover in 2nd 40K. They still had BS3 and access to Imperial weaponry. In fact modern orkish weapons with the few exceptions of exotic gear like the shokk attack gun didn´t exist. And there were to-hit-modifiers. So Orks equipped with bolt pistols would hit at short range on a 2+. 

[Tawnis]

On 1/26/2025 at 4:42 AM, TheArtilleryman said:

I think looking at the points is an interesting way to see changes in the playstyle of the different armies as well.
 

In the first battle report with the orks vs space marines, the ork army today is a lot more points than the marine army. The marines in this force came down by a whopping -47%, whereas the Orks came down by only -27%. I think this reflects the fact that basic Orks in more recent editions are a lot stronger. They have higher strength weapons and more attacks in close combat than they used to, for example. In 2nd I remember them being basically just chaff and weight of numbers was pretty much all they had in their favour. Nowadays even basic boyz are a very nasty threat when they crash into your lines. Even a basic choppa now has -1 AP, and tactical marines have all AP 0 in their basic kit. Therefore the Orks haven’t come down in points as drastically. Model for model, a tactical marine has gone from 30 ppm to just 16 ppm.an ork boy has gone from 12 points to 8.5, so less drop than a marine.

 

What seems odd is that apart from the AP on the bolters, marines also actually have a better profile than they had all those years ago. Even basic tactical marines have 2 wounds and 2 attacks, but as an army they’ve undergone a relative weakening in game terms. Despite being biggerer and betterer, they’re actually not …

While I do agree with a lot of what you've said in this thread overall, you'll want to consider exactly WHEN a lot of these changes happened when making your comparisons. 

 

For instance, Tactical Marines went down to 15 PPM in 3rd edition and were generally just kinda okay as they (along with Scouts) we're the army's "Troop Tax". Since then, edition to edition, they've stayed around the 15 PPM mark as a kind of baseline. They were 14 PPM by 7th Edition and while bouncing around a little in recent years, they have again settled at 14 PPM. 

[ChapterMasterGodfrey]

Man this thread wants me to bring up my points / toughness rework thread.

 

I play almost exclusively at 1000 points. I only get time to play at that size. It's not ideal but 2000 points isn't either. 

 

The root of all these changes though has already been touched on, they want to sell more models (by lowering points costs) to more people (by making the game simpler).

 

I would honestly love a community movement to crowd source evergreen, ever-adapting and importantly, ever-free rules for 40k. I am quite certain we would do a better job at rules than GW.

[ZeroWolf]

1 minute ago, ChapterMasterGodfrey said:

Man this thread wants me to bring up my points / toughness rework thread.

 

I play almost exclusively at 1000 points. I only get time to play at that size. It's not ideal but 2000 points isn't either. 

 

The root of all these changes though has already been touched on, they want to sell more models (by lowering points costs) to more people (by making the game simpler).

 

I would honestly love a community movement to crowd source evergreen, ever-adapting and importantly, ever-free rules for 40k. I am quite certain we would do a better job at rules than GW.

Isnt that what one page rules is? Plus there's sci-fi agnostic games aplenty 

[ChapterMasterGodfrey]

26 minutes ago, ZeroWolf said:

Isnt that what one page rules is? Plus there's sci-fi agnostic games aplenty 

I tried to read one page rules and I wasn’t particularly enamoured by it. I still want to play in 40K sandbox.

[jaxom]

1 hour ago, ZeroWolf said:

Isnt that what one page rules is? Plus there's sci-fi agnostic games aplenty 

 

39 minutes ago, ChapterMasterGodfrey said:

I tried to read one page rules and I wasn’t particularly enamoured by it. I still want to play in 40K sandbox.

 

OPR double-downed because they not only altered points costs to reduce army sizes, but they also made a system simpler than 10th ed core rules. If one is looking for a game with a level of complexity on par with 3e 40k and its descendants then OPR is not a good option.

[*42*]

On 1/24/2025 at 10:06 AM, Deus_Ex_Machina said:

2nd 40K was a proper Sci-Fi game which can still be enjoyed today by downloading the Battle Bible from the interwebz. Modern 40K by comparison has devolved into a fast food game geared towards quick tournament play where you score points by standing on circles. 

 

And now more depth to it:

In 2nd 40K the Space Marine was clad in power armour which made him immune to the threats of gas weapons and viruses, gave him protection versus blinding attacks and provided him last but not least with a saving throw of 3+. The Tactical marine was armed with Bolt pistol, Bolter, Combat Knife, Frag & Krak grenades and he could CHOOSE which ranged weapon (including grenades) for use in the shooting phase.

And to compare it again to modern 40K: Power armour provides a 3+ save and the marine can choose to fire either a Bolter or Bolt pistol. Depending on edition the grenades either became gimmicks which could only be used in certain situations or were restricted in application (e.g. only one model of a squad is permitted to toss a grenade).

 

This is obviously only the tip of the iceberg although it makes it clear that we have here two completely different games. One plunges you into a rich Sci-fi setting where a lot of stuff happens on the tabletop whereas in the other case you have a dumbed down version for tournament players fighting in L-shaped ruins.

While here is quite some polemics, this hits an additional point. 
Back in the yonder days games with comparable fewer models took forever, translated to todays amount of models a 2k game would take two days. 

[Inquisitor_Lensoven]

On 1/22/2025 at 4:03 PM, TheArtilleryman said:

This is a really good point that I hadn’t considered. Now you mention it, it makes a lot of sense. I played a large game the other day with Raven Guard vs T’au and we both had quite a few infiltrating units. It was extremely difficult for both of us to deploy all our units in a good position that some of them even ended up in our deployment zone because we couldn’t find every unit a covered position more than 9” away from an enemy.

 

I completely agree with this and still play on 6’x4’ mostly. However because the points and size you mentioned are GW’s suggested size they are also now the tournament standard, so it makes sense that people are using them.

 

 

Yep. I tend to play 1k points because I don’t have time to play bigger games. It’s funny, because having done those calculations in the OP, I’ve realised that 1k in 10th is roughly equivalent to 1.5k in 2nd, so I guess that’s why it feels right.

 

@DemonGSidesand @tychobi I can understand where you’re both coming from. Knights are a good example but are better with the addition of armigers and some infantry allies.
 

I think they can all work but what you do need to do at 1k points is be much more selective with what you take. In a 2k game you can have a bit of everything, but in a 1k game you can really feel the absence of your big guns if your opponent brings a chonky model, or if you are without much close combat ability. A good example for me was playing a small Phobos heavy Raven Guard army against Death Guard. My S4 AP 0 bolters just weren’t cutting it and if they got close I was screwed. I realised I couldn’t win on muscle so after a few attempts I got better at tactical positioning and was able to use my better mobility and special rules to outmanoeuvre my opponent and win a game or two.

I don’t think knights work well at 1k from a balance point of view.

At 2k you can have a castellan, and like 3 armigers. That’s like 30 T10 wounds and 24 T13 wounds.

 

if you don’t warn your opponent they will do almost no meaningful damage. Even if you warn them, they still will likely struggle to deal with the mass unless they 100% skew full AT, and even then it might be a hard fight against them.

 

[phandaal]

On 2/3/2025 at 12:04 PM, jaxom said:

 

 

OPR double-downed because they not only altered points costs to reduce army sizes, but they also made a system simpler than 10th ed core rules. If one is looking for a game with a level of complexity on par with 3e 40k and its descendants then OPR is not a good option.

 

For the core, free rules this is true. That is the "one page" of rules for running a wargame.

 

For $5, people can buy advanced rules that let you layer more and more systems on. Vehicle armor and damage charts for titans, strategems and secondary objectives, and basically everything in between. How many extra systems you add is up to you and your friends. At that point it is as complex as you want to make it.

 

That $5 also gets you access to an evergreen version of the advanced rules, because whenever they make changes to the ruleset they will update the file that you already purchased. So it is not 100% free, but it is pretty close.

 

Edit: from their page on DriveThruRPG - here is what comes in the advanced rulebook. The first bullet is that free core part. The rest is what comes along with the $5 purchase.

Spoiler

• Core Rules
• Advanced Rules
  • Terrain Placement
  • Deployment Styles
  • Extra Missions
  • Side-Missions
  • Extra Actions
  • Solid Buildings
  • Random Events
  • Battlefield Conditions
  • Terrain & Objective Effects
• Total Conversions
  • Fog of War
  • Brutal Damage
  • Command Points
  • Suppression
  • Multiplayer Games
  • Apocalyptic Games
  • Kitchen Table Games
  • Small-Scales & Multi-Basing
• Additional Content
  • Tournament Guidelines
  • Solo & Co-Op Rules
  • Campaign Rules
  • Mission Cards

 

Note that all of the army books are available for free on our website, and are not part of this rulebook. If any updates are made to the rules, then this version of the rulebook will also be updated (we'll send you a message to let you know).

 

Edited February 5 by phandaal

[jaxom]

@phandaal, I was thinking of the unit stats; the way they folded a bunch into Quality.

[phandaal]

54 minutes ago, jaxom said:

@phandaal, I was thinking of the unit stats; the way they folded a bunch into Quality.

 

Yeah, Quality is basically 40k's Weapon Skill/Ballistic Skill and Leadership rolled into one. They do have modifiers for units to allow them to differentiate between their shooting and fighting if it makes sense.

 

For example, Orks have "Bad Shot" that makes them shoot at a lower Quality so they can have better hand-to-hand (and Grots have the opposite for better shooting).

 

The whole system is surprisingly versatile for the way they market it... but it definitely is more streamlined at the core.

Edited February 5 by phandaal
accidentally a word