Should standard game size be larger than 2k in AoS 2.0

[themortalgod]

So I have been playing with lists from a variety of my armies and list building is feeling pretty tight now thanks to so many things going up in pts cost along with needing to find space for endless spells and bonus CP. I just feel like all my armies are leaving so many more models at home than they have in the past. I'm wondering if it might be worth considering a standard game size of more like 2250 or even 2500 now to provide the feeling of a full size army again. Thoughts?

[MrZakalwe]

Great lord no! When people start playing horde type armies anything over 1500 quickly bogs down into a mess. This system is fundamentally unsuited to big games due to how clumsy and time consuming pile-ins get with too many models. 

If the game gets too big with AoS you quickly start losing the things that make it good. 

[themortalgod]

1 minute ago, MrZakalwe said:

Great lord no! When people start playing horde type armies anything over 1500 quickly bogs down into a mess. This system is fundamentally unsuited to big games due to how clumsy and time consuming pile-ins get with too many models. 

I disagree. I hated 1500 or less. But really, thats closer to what we will not be playing in AoS 1.0 terms now. 

But really, the question isn't about whether we should increase the size of games relative to before. Its whether we should increase the pts allowance to bring the game back UP TO what it was before. 
 

[Skabnoze]

Not every army is smaller than before.  Some are bigger than they used to be, some are smaller, and some are the same size.  There is also more stuff going on with realm abilities, realm spells, endless spells, etc.  

If you want to play bigger games in your area that is great.  But I would say it is too soon to advocate for bigger “standard” games - which pretty much means bigger tournaments.  I would argue that tournaments are big enough as-is and might be better at slightly smaller sizes to speed up rounds.

[Galas]

Fantasy did go that route, with 3k games being common. You dont want that. It will kill the flow of new players. 

[Gecktron]

17 minutes ago, themortalgod said:

I disagree. I hated 1500 or less. But really, thats closer to what we will not be playing in AoS 1.0 terms now. 

But really, the question isn't about whether we should increase the size of games relative to before. Its whether we should increase the pts allowance to bring the game back UP TO what it was before. 
 

Id like to disagree again ( ;D ) I really prefer 1500 or even 1000 point games over bigger 2000 points and up games. On that level each models feels more important as there is less deathly stuff on the field that can wipe out entire units in one turn. 

This also leads to your question: Why do we even play 2000 points? Its big, yes. But you can field almost everything at 1500 or even just 1250 points. Afterwards you just add more of the same. 

I think 2000 points being the tournament standard is more of an residue of other GW games like Fantasy or 40K. 

[themortalgod]

8 minutes ago, Gecktron said:

Id like to disagree again ( ;D ) I really prefer 1500 or even 1000 point games over bigger 2000 points and up games. On that level each models feels more important as there is less deathly stuff on the field that can wipe out entire units in one turn. 

This also leads to your question: Why do we even play 2000 points? Its big, yes. But you can field almost everything at 1500 or even just 1250 points. Afterwards you just add more of the same. 

I think 2000 points being the tournament standard is more of an residue of other GW games like Fantasy or 40K. 

Personally, when an opponent says lets play 1500 I'm pretty disappointed and if its smaller than that like 1k, I don't even want to play. It just doesnt feel epic enough and it doesnt leave room for including most battalions. 

Personally, I don't feel 2k has ever been "big" unless you are spamming horde. I love the dynamic of multiple meaningful things going on around the battlefield. I find with smaller games it just feels too small and ends up being pretty one dimensional.  It also allows for a greater diversity of resources leading to fewer rock/paper/scissors match ups.

I'm feeling the pressure most on my Tzeentch for sure, which went from an 80 model army down to less than 40. But even my undead army feels like it is leaving far more models in the box than it did before. I get that not all armies went up in points but even just the cost of endless spells and CP can easily eat up 10% of a list that wasn't being eaten up before. I know those things are optional but still. 

Idk, if it was up to me every game would be 3500pts+ on an 8x6 table, but I don't have space for that.  

[Trayanee]

I hope thats never gonna happen. 2000 is a little too much too, but its bearable. More would make the games by far too long. 

[syph0n]

What engaged me with AoS was the ability to build an army and it not be a giant horde of spears like WHFB felt. You knew it was bad when everyone had unit fillers because it cost a fortune to build and took an age to paint! 

I just fancied looking at a Scourge Privateers army because I've got, what I thought, loads of Corsairs. But when it scales to 2k, I'd probably want 100 of them! That frightens me frankly, and if the standard was another 500, I'd be reaching for the noose (or at least another 2 Kharibdyss!) 

I've only played around the 1k mark since starting back, so maybe experiencing 2k might make the difference. I feel like 1250 might be my personal sweet spot to allow variety, spells etc. 

[stratigo]

3 hours ago, themortalgod said:

So I have been playing with lists from a variety of my armies and list building is feeling pretty tight now thanks to so many things going up in pts cost along with needing to find space for endless spells and bonus CP. I just feel like all my armies are leaving so many more models at home than they have in the past. I'm wondering if it might be worth considering a standard game size of more like 2250 or even 2500 now to provide the feeling of a full size army again. Thoughts?

 

Higher points do lessen the impact of most types of summoning (nurgle, undead, seraphon, and sylvaneth specifically), so that's a point in favor of it. But hordes can already play quite slow, and GW keeps pushing out putting more and more and more models on the table for it's competitive meta.

[chord]

Smaller is better to get new players in, which is something we should all want

[Ahriman]

Depends what you mean by 'standard'.

I think the way they've done it at the moment gives new playes a natural progression (1k leading to 2k ect) and no one should feel pressured by the community to go higher than they want.

Having said that I think 2.5k is the sweet spot for AoS games, once you're completely comfortable with your rules, army and battleplans. Especially if you're a narrative gamer!

I've written so many 2k lists that don't have any room for cool, fun, quirky stuff after my battleline and other 'mandatory' things have taken up all the points, 2.5 lets me have more fun.

But its all personal.

[Carnelian]

It's so hard to build a 2k list that has everything I want to get in it! Tough decisions must be made. For me, that's great and means that at 2k there are always sacrifices and compromises - as it should be!

[Wraith01]

I've always found AoS scales perfectly from small games to big games. I've enjoyed playing with only the original Starter set, Start Collecting vs Start Collecting, Skirmish, Path to Glory, proper 1000 - 2000 point games and crazy Open play scenarios. At my local games shop we play it all and always have fun. 

If you want to play 2500 point games and can find people willing to play at that size; knock yourself out and have a ball!

 

[Hecatone]

Nobody has time for that.

[SaJeel]

1000 points is all around better imo esp for tournaments

 

 

[Kirjava13]

7 hours ago, Wraith01 said:

If you want to play 2500 point games and can find people willing to play at that size; knock yourself out and have a ball!

The only real answer. Thread done!

[BobbyB]

For the last year 2000pts has definitely felt too big for tournament games.  People routinely taking 90+ of the same model and flooding the table and making everything a grind leads to not only overlong games that run over, but also significantly less fun games.  It really felt like games should have been 200-500pts lower.  I'm hopeful that the changes to coherency, the addition of command points, and the proliferation of 'wholly within' will make this work out a little better in AoS 2, but I guess that will depend on how summoning affects the game. I certainly wouldn't entertain the idea of increasing game sizes

[CDM]

I thought 2k was actually too big in AoS 1.0  for 'standard games'. Watching 2k games take 3 hours on occasion can be a chore.

2k in 2.0 is better I think because you get a good looking force competing all over the place for objectives. Pick up games should be 1500 or less and tornament games 1750.

[AaronWilson]

I think this question will receive different answers depending on the armies people play as some armies just don't function at 1k points and other armies will excel. A excellent example is LoN, they're extremely good at 1k points due to there recursion and access to cheap but very good battle line. Tzeentch suck at 1k points as the heroes are very expensive so it's very hard to create a list that isn't tiny, on top not really being able to interact with the FP system. 

I feel 2k has that balance that no army is really disadvantaged because you're playing the point level, playing anything above I imagine can get messy fast with just SO many rules to remember. 

[RuneBrush]

Personally I don't think there is a standard point size for a game other than at tournaments.

All point levels have their own inherent pro's and cons.  Smaller sized games mean you can't fit everything in and in cases some armies really struggle to perform.  Larger sized can result in the same unit being spammed and games becoming unwieldy.  2k is sort of the "middle of the road" for most armies.

Everybody also has their own inherent opinion on what makes a game enjoyable for them.  Some people love an epic 8 hour battle, whilst for other a game that takes a couple of hours is fine.

I love seeing endless hordes of models on a tabletop - it's really atmospheric and looks amazing.  However the concept of playing a game like that leaves me dead inside (or deader than I normally am).  It's bad enough moving one unit of 40 skeletons, let alone half a dozen of them and knowing that I'd have nowhere near enough heroes to provide buffs just wouldn't make an enjoyable game

[Overread]

I can see the game perhaps pushing up to 2500 in light of the rise in battalion points. Basically raising the limit without making a vast difference to the number of units that factions can take from 1.0 to 2.0.

 

That said I agree it also depends on the different armies. For example with Daughters of Khaine you need at least a 3500 game to field their Morathi focused Battalion alone. And that's assuming no hags/queens on cauldrons or any unit beyond its minimum count. But then Daughters are closer to an "elite" army so their points are higher and their model count lower. Which means players of that army might often want bigger games to field more unit variety and vary composition choices. Whilst hoard armies might not feel that pressure and instead want more modest limits so that they can swarm, but not feel like its a chore each time its their movement phase. 

 

 

At the local scene the time limits, terrain, tables and how fun others are to play with will all come into effect in what makes people want bigger or smaller games. 

[Jamopower]

1 hour ago, AaronWIlson said:

I think this question will receive different answers depending on the armies people play as some armies just don't function at 1k points and other armies will excel. A excellent example is LoN, they're extremely good at 1k points due to there recursion and access to cheap but very good battle line. Tzeentch suck at 1k points as the heroes are very expensive so it's very hard to create a list that isn't tiny, on top not really being able to interact with the FP system. 

I feel 2k has that balance that no army is really disadvantaged because you're playing the point level, playing anything above I imagine can get messy fast with just SO many rules to remember. 

The allegiance abilities seem to be written for 2000 points, which is not a very good design in my opinion. Would be much better if the gravesites would be one per 500 points for example. Also of course the value of summoning is directly  proportional to a game size. Getting an extra 100 point unit in 1000 point match is twice as good as in 2000 points.  

It has always also puzzled me why the matched play point sizes are 1000, 2000 and 2500. 1500 points seem to be pretty normal game for many, while the increases from 2000 to 2500 are quite big. Not a big deal, but strange. 

[Overread]

One element is that by keeping points simple and fixed the game introduces features that work better at certain level. For example Battalions clearly work better at higher point counts, whilst at lower ones they eat up a significant chunk. Putting 100-150 points into "nothing" on the table itself at 1000 points is a significant chunk of the potential points. It's a whole other unit of variety gone. 

Scaled point values for some things depending on the point value for the game might be a nice feature, but sliding scales can make things "complicated" and can also stifled casual chatter or cause confusion. That said it might be one way to scale the points of some upgrades and features to better represent the game scale. 

[Karol]

It could end up being played at more then 2000pts. But from what I have been told this is also the slippery slope WFB went down. There are already armies that cost too much too start for an avarge player. So if the norm became 2500pts, we could get the meta is shaped not only by how powerful something is, but mostly how much is cost. A new player that hears he needs to buy 10-15 of the same box, on top of 1-2 start collecting and heros, will just start a different army or a different game. And this could be really bad, if most of the popular armies get hard countered by a high cost army and worse one that has a hard counter in the form of a list that costs even more, you soon start getting people feed up with playing mirror matchs or games they know they will lose, because opponents army is just a tier better.