Balance Dataslate - June 2025

[Orange Knight]

20 minutes ago, HeadlessCross said:

If there's even a potential for problems, it needs to be addressed. You can argue about how GW's double smash nerfs are usually too much (and they often are), but let's not pretend that YOUR unit shouldn't be hit just because YOU didn't use it a specific way.  

 

But that's not good balancing. It's exactly what the complaint a few posts up was about.

 

Tournament play making casual play worse, not better. There are dozens of examples like this over the years.

 

If Games Workshop can't balance all the detachments, and they definitely can't because there are far too many of them, then they should tone down the numbers and their impacts on army rules across the board.

[Karhedron]

No one likes over/under-powered codices at launch. A lot of people dislike frequent churn because it creates an unstable gaming environment and a feeling of constantlky chasing an elusive meta. What this boils down to most often is people saying:

 

"I just want GW to get it right in the first place so it doesn't need constant tinkering"

 

It sounds as reasonable request on the face of it but I have worked in software for 25 years and I can count on the fingers of one hand the number of releases that have been right first time. And that is for a single product with just one set of requirements. Now imagine 15+ (or however many factions there are now), each needing to be balanced against each other and each with half-a-dozen detachments. There are probably getting on for 100 different detachments in the game. They are never going to get it right first time, especially if people want codex releases faster at the start of the edition.

16 minutes ago, Orange Knight said:

If Games Workshop can't balance all the detachments, and they definitely can't because there are far too many of them, then they should tone down the numbers and their impacts on army rules across the board.

 

Then you get people complaining about dumbing down rules and losing the ability to play distinct sub-factions.

[Blindhamster]

17 hours ago, Karhedron said:

It sounds as reasonable request on the face of it but I have worked in software for 25 years and I can count on the fingers of one hand the number of releases that have been right first time. And that is for a single product with just one set of requirements. 

Not quite so long for me (13 or so now), but this rings so true. 

 

And from the "making stuff" perspective, having spent a year or so working on an elder scrolls ruleset with a whole team and people with a clear vision (UESRPG if interested) it was still a buggy mess that took multiple versions before it got to a better place. Hell I even branched off and did my own version to try and cater to my own TTRPG group, and that still got tweaked and modified a bunch. 

I've also spent multiple years working on my own TTRPG ruleset (called Overture, for anyone interested), with multiple playtesting groups (including some that simply reported back to me, rather than me being directly involved) it's still far from where I'm totally happy with it. 

 

Making balanced games is hard. And "being professionals" doesn't make it any easier. It just means you're paid to make the games that make money. 

Edited June 11 by Blindhamster

[jaxom]

6 hours ago, Ahzek451 said:

2. Detachment disparities. Rules that crank a particular units's power in one detachment but not in others and being punished for it. Why make it a thing? 

This is a personal interest of mine from when I did playtesting for FFG and later Asmodeus (my friend was a designer and they didn’t have to keep it in house until a few months after Asmodeus bought FFG). Consider a card like Shards of Narsil or The Ring. Technically they can equipped to anyone, but they get massive bonuses when equipped to the right character cards. There’s a continuum of selection design: stupid-suboptimal-okay-optimal-broken. Broken is either “we messed up the rules interaction” or “no plays anything but this and that wasn’t our intent.” Optimal being an intended interaction. Okay is “it works if I’m forced to,” and stupid is exactly what it sounds like, but someone might do because no rules stops it. So, how should the equipment cards be priced? We usually went for a little off the top of what they’d be priced assuming optimal. However, a LCG has a lot less use cases.

 

Apothecary Biologis can attach to Heavy Intercessors and Aggressors. They can be in any detachment. They are good to optimal in LAG, Firestorm, Gladius, Angelic Inheritors, and Wrath of the Rock. Stupid in Stormlance, Ironstorm, and Ravenwing Hunt. That’s at least 20 combinations to consider.

[phandaal]

19 hours ago, jaxom said:

Apothecary Biologis can attach to Heavy Intercessors and Aggressors. They can be in any detachment. They are good to optimal in LAG, Firestorm, Gladius, Angelic Inheritors, and Wrath of the Rock. Stupid in Stormlance, Ironstorm, and Ravenwing Hunt. That’s at least 20 combinations to consider.

 

If balance is the goal, what they would need is for the average power of the apothecary's buffs to be baked in to his unit cost. Detachments as well (this would be more complicated because this is basically an army-wide buff and would have to take into account everything else in the army).

 

That is probably not possible under the way points are currently done though, because the current points are based on subjective/semi-objective buffs/nerfs compared to tournament performance. They would need a baseline single-model points cost that all subsequent unit costs are layered on top of, which does not seem to exist.

 

Technically I think it is possible to create a mathematically balanced system out of the current layers of rules, but I also think it would be a huge undertaking and probably not something GW would find value in doing right now.

Edited June 11 by phandaal

[HeadlessCross]

19 hours ago, jaxom said:

That’s at least 20 combinations to consider.

But the question is whether all those combinations SHOULD be considered vs just the strongest interaction. 

 

Like, Aggressors and Eradiactors are ALWAYS going to be better for the Biologis buffs simply because they cost more and get more benefit. Likewise, why should the price of a Lieutenant consider someone using them in a Tactical Squad vs something more expensive and getting more utility like Sternguard or Assault Intercessors? 

 

If a casual player is not concerned about the balance and just wants to throw around dice as some people proclaim, then why complain about the character cost anyway?

[RagnarökNRoll]

9 minutes ago, HeadlessCross said:

casual player is not concerned about the balance and just wants to throw around dice as some people proclaim, then why complain about the character cost anyway?

Exactly this. 

 

I used to chase the tournament meta — literally chase it — I traveled across continents to play during the competitive season for years. Since shifting to a narrative focus in my playtime, I can tell you that casual players are often caring about the wrong things. Not to throw shade at folks, but if you're not putting in the reps with an army list tailored to win, I can almost guarantee you that improving your positioning and decision making with what you are playing with will have a significantly higher impact on your win ratio than losing out on points due to competitive balance releases. 

 

Lean into telling a story in your casual matches, not complaining about a handful of points nerfs affecting your already inefficient lists. "I would have won, if not for my unled Aggressors getting a points tax for the sins of Gladius!" is not a good look. 

 

At the end of the day, I believe balance updates are a good thing for everybody. 

[Brother Captain Vakarian]

2 hours ago, RagnarökNRoll said:

Exactly this. 

 

I used to chase the tournament meta — literally chase it — I traveled across continents to play during the competitive season for years. Since shifting to a narrative focus in my playtime, I can tell you that casual players are often caring about the wrong things. Not to throw shade at folks, but if you're not putting in the reps with an army list tailored to win, I can almost guarantee you that improving your positioning and decision making with what you are playing with will have a significantly higher impact on your win ratio than losing out on points due to competitive balance releases. 

 

Lean into telling a story in your casual matches, not complaining about a handful of points nerfs affecting your already inefficient lists. "I would have won, if not for my unled Aggressors getting a points tax for the sins of Gladius!" is not a good look. 

 

At the end of the day, I believe balance updates are a good thing for everybody. 

As a purely casual, narrative (crusade) player these days, I have to 100% agree here. I mainly play Space Marines, with a very non-meta, diverse list. Learning how to play the game well has benefitted me immensely more than changing to chase meta-dominant units would have done. It helps that the main opponent I play with is likeminded and we have a good discussion about the stage of things in the game, but at the end of the day the minor alterations balance updates force to my lists have never made major negative impacts, and have at times made a few positive ones. Overall, my lists have been only really affected at the edges. Playing well, and to the mission, has been much more important than adjustments to units’ value. 
 

I also run Ad Mech—as the Ad Mech book was at release it was nearly unplayable. I suppose I could have struggled along and made something work, but it would not have been a fun army to play. The balance updates have eventually gotten to a place where I can at least put Ad Mech on the board and enjoy them. 
 

On balance, I will take the updates as they are over the old days of 4th-ish when I used to play (Blood Angels and Grey Knights, so I knew both ends of the spectrum). Back then, if you got a raw deal on army books (and yes it did happen) you were stuck that way for one edition at a minimum, maybe more. 

Edited June 11 by Brother Captain Vakarian
Clarity

[kabaakaba]

But, does that points adjust really break combo? I mean doesn't we still take same combos but fix our lists in other way like took cheaper action monkeys for example? I mean it's looks pointless, cause aggressors + biologist still work?

[Karhedron]

51 minutes ago, kabaakaba said:

 I mean it's looks pointless, cause aggressors + biologist still work?

 

I think in that specific case they actually nerfed the Enhancement to make it less powerful. 

[Northern Walker]

3 hours ago, RagnarökNRoll said:

Lean into telling a story in your casual matches, not complaining about a handful of points nerfs affecting your already inefficient lists. "I would have won, if not for my unled Aggressors getting a points tax for the sins of Gladius!" is not a good look. 

Points cost increases for units that are not being used in a particular combination based entirely on rules still feel bad though. Getting to play with less of your toys for the sins of competetive players can often leave a sour taste.

I wholeheartedly agree about leaning into telling a story, but not everyone is as fortunate as those of us who have likeminded playgroups/friends.

Honestly a wholescale divorce of the tournament rules and the normal rules would be something I'd be very keen on.

[HeadlessCross]

2 minutes ago, Northern Walker said:

Points cost increases for units that are not being used in a particular combination based entirely on rules still feel bad though. Getting to play with less of your toys for the sins of competetive players can often leave a sour taste.

But is there a cohesive argument to why Fire Discipline should be costed as if you were running a character in a Tactical or Infiltrator squad?

 

After all, Chaplains weren't priced like that during ye olde 40k.

[Brother Captain Vakarian]

Things should be costed based on their optimal use, and players should be capable of understanding and accepting that they may overpay for specific combinations of characters, units, and enhancements if they are choosing to use a suboptimal combination. This is normal and inherent to casual and narrative play. 
 

In a casual setting, there are plenty of good reasons to choose the suboptimal combinations with the understanding that they are suboptimal. You aren’t playing in a tournament, so your choices don’t need to all be about maximizing potential output per point spent. 
 

For example, my big melee threat unit in my Marines list is a Captain, Bladeguard Ancient, and 6x Bladeguard. The Captain has artificer armor (Gladius detachment). I am aware of the less-than-optimal nature of this setup. It’s still very fun to play, fits the narrative I want for my force, and has managed to win me several games. I would not run this setup in a tournament list. But I don’t play tournaments, so I don’t care. And it doesn’t hurt me in the long run that this setup gets balanced based on what does or doesn’t perform particularly well in tournaments. Because it’s the part of my list that matters most to me, I adjust other things on the margins based on balance changes. 

[Northern Walker]

54 minutes ago, Brother Captain Vakarian said:

In a casual setting, there are plenty of good reasons to choose the suboptimal combinations with the understanding that they are suboptimal. You aren’t playing in a tournament, so your choices don’t need to all be about maximizing potential output per point spent. 

I'm on board with that, infact I'd go further and say that thinking about whether it is or isn't optimal shouldn't be entertained at all in a casual setting. My point about points changes are for casual players whose lists are suddenly over-costed and needing all sorts of shuffling, which can be much more frustrating when there's an overarching theme they're trying to adhere to.

[Brother Captain Vakarian]

6 minutes ago, Northern Walker said:

I'm on board with that, infact I'd go further and say that thinking about whether it is or isn't optimal shouldn't be entertained at all in a casual setting. My point about points changes are for casual players whose lists are suddenly over-costed and needing all sorts of shuffling, which can be much more frustrating when there's an overarching theme they're trying to adhere to.

 
I can sympathize with the concerns about sticking to a theme when points change heavily. That said, I’ve found that approaching it as solving the “challenge” of staying in theme while looking at the updates keeps things interesting and engaging. 
 

I’ll push back about not thinking about things being optimal at all in a casual setting: I try to keep somewhat up to speed on what’s considered to be optimal precisely because I want to take some suboptimal choices in casual lists. I do this deliberately to make the games more meaningful for opponents who are building for theme more than optimization. If I know what’s optimal and what isn’t, I can build my lists to be both thematic and also respectful of the general level of optimization that my opponents and I expect. This requires an engaged and thoughtful group, I’ll grant you. 
 

Ultimately, having to tinker with points and making your themes work in casual lists is the price we have to pay for regular balance updates, which I prefer over none at all. And because of how people are and work, nothing that GW does will be “perfect,” regardless of our desire that it be so. On balance, I’ll take the more regular attempts at updates and more effort to get balance right, because if all we get is the first attempt and no corrections like the old days, we’re stuck being haves or have-nots for a whole edition cycle at a minimum. 

[sairence]

17 hours ago, Northern Walker said:

Honestly a wholescale divorce of the tournament rules and the normal rules would be something I'd be very keen on.

 

This exists. All you need to do is to ignore the dataslate and Munitorum Manual, which are specifically meant for competitive tournament play. Heck, you can ignore the seasonal mission packs if you don't like them. If you consider the competitive updates to be unsuitable, you simply need to convince at least part of your local scene of the merits of that. GW can't do that for you, they can only offer options.

 

Like...we had a fixed Casual, Matched and Tournament play distinctions before in previous editions. People ended up mainly using the tournament play rules, as I recall.

 

 

[chapter master 454]

I don't think the people asking for casual understand what casual means and I think that lies at the heart of the issue here.

In fact there may even be several groups using that label for various reasons. The first are the honest ones, they genuinely want the game to be casual and not have such a focus on tournament play. This group however can easily do this by just not using the tournament updated stuff as others have pointed out. Just use the codices raw, no updates or anything and by any amount there likely are people who do this already and we don't hear from them because they are content and content people don't complain (much). If you do belong to this group but are an outlier in your gaming scene then...well I can't help. I can't say anything that won't sound like I disregard your plight but in some form you also show disregard for others and how they want to play the game.

 

Another group are more nefarious. They use the Casual tag to hide their discontent that their top tier army got slapped, clapped in irons and made to pay the price. These people want to revert the changes because they want to go back to curb-stomping with Wraith-knight overwatch. These individuals are near impossible to spot in this setting as this is one of those "bad faith" things but we can't deny it could be happening.

And one other possible group is the one that just don't like that they got caught in the blast zone. This one, I feel for. These are the victims of it the worst but as with any balance updates, there will be winners, losers and victims. And even if you were to stop all updates, you still get winners, losers and victims when we see how poor one codex is vs. how broken another is.

 

So then, why do we focus on tournament scene for balance? Well because it gives data, feedback and contrary to popular belief the top players actually want to enjoy the game too. You think they enjoy playing top tier meta armies when that is the 240 infantry spam? You think they enjoy playing an army that doesn't play the game and is more akin to solitaire? The majority of them don't. Only a select few poisonous individuals do and those are "those guys" we know from gaming clubs and areas and those are the people who develop "that reputation".

My gaming club is a regular spot for the scottish tournament players. GTs, Teams. These guys KNOW their stuff and many others attend tournaments regularly too and are strong players. However, even the strongest of them still don't enjoy when armies are way too strong. None of them were rejoicing over Moar Dakka and were actually commenting on how dumb it was...some I think even skipped a tournament because of it. They want to have fun and have good games. Don't think tournament players want the game to be nothing but misery...they want to enjoy the game, hobby and social aspect of it fully. They don't like it when one army rolls another, they want to see both armies have a good time. Can we have games where there are hilarious mismatches? Yes, it happens but they often try to keep it fun though sometimes...the dice just don't want to play along.

 

Yes. I agree it can be tedious to keep up with updates. That's the same in real life too however. Things change. And I'd rather 40k change and evolve and get frustrated at keeping pace than get frustrated at it stagnating.

[HeadlessCross]

19 hours ago, Brother Captain Vakarian said:

 

For example, my big melee threat unit in my Marines list is a Captain, Bladeguard Ancient, and 6x Bladeguard. The Captain has artificer armor (Gladius detachment). I am aware of the less-than-optimal nature of this setup. It’s still very fun to play, fits the narrative I want for my force, and has managed to win me several games. I would not run this setup in a tournament list. But I don’t play tournaments, so I don’t care. 

1. Just because you using Artificer Armor in this situation isn't optimal doesn't mean it should be priced lower.

2. If you really don't care about suboptimal units or point values, then updated points should hardly be an issue to better reflect a unit's value. 

3. "But my theme" isn't an excuse for fixes not being implemented. 

Edited June 12 by HeadlessCross

[LSM]

On 6/10/2025 at 10:01 AM, Ahzek451 said:

No one that is in good faith is expecting Emperor's children level of perfection...

 

Actually, "Emperor's Children level perfection" might be a good comparison.

 

(In that any sane person who gazes upon what the Emperor's Children consider to be perfection recoils in abject horror.)

[Ahzek451]

10 minutes ago, LSM said:

 

Actually, "Emperor's Children level perfection" might be a good comparison.

 

(In that any sane person who gazes upon what the Emperor's Children consider to be perfection recoils in abject horror.)

Haha, maybe I should have specified pre-heresy era then. 

[Brother Captain Vakarian]

25 minutes ago, HeadlessCross said:

1. Just because you using Artificer Armor in this situation isn't optimal doesn't mean it should be priced lower.

2. If you really don't care about suboptimal units or point values, then updated points should hardly be an issue to better reflect a unit's value. 

3. "But my theme" isn't an excuse for fixes not being implemented. 

I think we’re in exact agreement here. Nonetheless, it seems like you’re presenting these positions as rebuttals to my points (my apologies if I misunderstand). I have been arguing these three points consistently in my posts, just not in such a starkly presented manner. 

[Maritn]

[duplicate]

Edited June 13 by Maritn

[Maritn]

On 6/5/2025 at 9:32 PM, Evil Eye said:

I hate to say "I told you so" re: the problems of trying to make a "living system" with seasonal patches, but, well, I told you so.

 

In my opinion the problem is the little care GW puts into developing these codices, not the fact that they try to fix their biggest mistakes on a regular basis. 

 

On 6/6/2025 at 6:10 AM, HeadlessCross said:

All you're really proving is the point that an electronic living ruleset is the best way to move forward. 

 

This would just be another band aid to cover up the underlying issue. 

 

The root cause is this: as long as we keep buying half baked codices, they will keep selling us half baked codices. 
 

I haven’t bought the 10th edition Space Marines Codex and I‘m glad I didn’t. But sorry, I’m getting too far off topic I guess…

[Karhedron]

42 minutes ago, Maritn said:

The root cause is this: as long as we keep buying half baked codices, they will keep selling us half baked codices.

 

GW have always been pretty open that the rules are just a vehicle to sell the models. Release now and patch later means that they can use the tournament crowd to do their beta testing. 

[Antarius]

I'm no fan of the current model of patching either, but I think it's mostly that it's actually hard (if not impossible) to balance a game with that amount of possible interactions. Especially since you have a huge percentage of the player base working together on how to most effectively break the game in its latest "balance updated" iteration as soon as it is out.

My immediate thought was that it's a sisyphean task, but well, Sisyphus didn't have a choice, so I guess it's more of a fool's errand.