Maxed unit sizes for reduced point cost

[Bojigwe]

As title; for most units, is it "better" to max it out for the discount or to not max it for more units/flexibility? 

I know there will be exceptions and this is a vague question e.g. there's little to no reason not to max out cheap swarm units like clanrats, and some units are too elite and onerous to max out e.g. Blood warriors. I'm talking about the ones in the middle ground.

I'm not sure if this has been asked before, and if it has I apologize but I couldn't find it.

Edit: NOT army specific, just thinking generally

[JPjr]

if you can afford the models and the in game points it's hard to see too many disadvantages.

certainly in my experience with Death & units like skeletons it's hard to say no to a large mob that's not only cheaper, bone for bone, but gets shitloads more attacks, can take a beating without being wiped out and so then be replenished and can dominate objectives.

sure you can lose some flexibility but I think with big and not hugely mobile, relatively cheap, horde units that's what they're there for.

[Skreech Verminking]

Well if we have a look at the skaven side, you’ll notice that the minimum requirement for clanrats is 20.

they aren’t bad for 120p but will die fast, which is why I would consider almost always taking the unit in 40s.

same goes for  the Stormvermins.

they are a great if you’re not interested in fielding tons of them, the problem just is, is that they are useless unless you take them in 40s where their too highly priced points value just barley matches their worth in battle

anything else and your paying 50p too much for each 10models 

 

[stato]

I ran a max unit of 20 Stormcast Sequitors (120pt for 5) and found them powerful but unwieldy and difficult to add buffs due to the amount of space they took up on 40mm bases (the buffs I wanted where 'wholly within' which is a challenge, there are some buffs that are easier for them).  Essentially its down to how you want to use them, Liberators (100 for 5) for example max out at 30 models which is a huge amount of pts and board space.

[Dead Scribe]

The power coefficients basically make it a no brainer to take the maxed out units for the cheap point discount.  They become over optimal at that point and for the most part always a useful component.

[Skabnoze]

It depends on the unit.

Some units have large bases sizes and low reach and so getting more than X models into combat becomes difficult or impossible.  At that point a bigger unit is mainly useful to offset casualties, block off areas of the table, and contest objectives (all of which are useful).  Some armies have lots of "fully within" area buffs and it can be hard to maneuver larger units to get those buffs.

Basically I don't think there is a simple answer to this question.  I think it depends on the individual units and the specific armies.

[RuneBrush]

30 minutes ago, Skabnoze said:

It depends on the unit.

Some units have large bases sizes and low reach and so getting more than X models into combat becomes difficult or impossible.  At that point a bigger unit is mainly useful to offset casualties, block off areas of the table, and contest objectives (all of which are useful).  Some armies have lots of "fully within" area buffs and it can be hard to maneuver larger units to get those buffs.

Basically I don't think there is a simple answer to this question.  I think it depends on the individual units and the specific armies.

100% agree with this!  My general rule of thumb is that 1 wound models is normally pretty efficient to max out (skeletons, grimghast reapers, blood reavers etc).  As soon as you hit 2 wound models (which bumps the cost up), you're sinking quite a lot of points into a single unit which will often have a large footprint and make it pretty unweidly to manage.  But it does depend entirely on the unit and how you want your army to function on the table.

[King Taloren]

To note though the bigger the unit size the more susceptible to bravery tests they become if you take heavy losses.

Though at same time there are a lot of people who will throw everything at the blob and ignore the real threats within your army. Like the wizards or eels.

[svnvaldez]

Personally i'd like to see only 2 unit size options and the corresponding 2 prices. 1 for a max unit size and 1 for a min unit size (no in between size can be taken). I have no idea if its actually a better system. But It would keep things simple and gives GW only 2 point costs to manage. 

[sorokyl]

Putrid Blightkings are a great example of when not to take a unit discount:
1. You will never get all 20 into melee combat (40mm bases, 1" attack range)
2. They have no benefit from many units in a group
3. You will not lose the back ranks before the unit has a chance to attack in combat, (no fodder models needed)
4. This unit is important for doing damage, and by having a lot of  models not in combat, your army is weaker 

Some questions you can ask yourself for other units when considering wether or not to take large groups 

[Skreech Verminking]

13 minutes ago, sorokyl said:

Putrid Blightkings are a great example of when not to take a unit discount:
1. You will never get all 20 into melee combat (40mm bases, 1" attack range)
2. They have no benefit from many units in a group
3. You will not lose the back ranks before the unit has a chance to attack in combat, (no fodder models needed)
4. This unit is important for doing damage, and by having a lot of  models not in combat, your army is weaker 

Some questions you can ask yourself for other units when considering wether or not to take large groups 

I remember the day when 700point worth of skaven Infanterie (40Stormvermins and clanrats) where slaughtered by a unit of 20Putrid blight kings, that -2to the hit role and another -1 to the wound while having to reroll all hit roles of 6s was the doom of my Stormvermins unit while having 5attacks each.

[Wraith01]

I struggle with maxing out units because I don't like to buy multiple kits of the same thing. I prefer variety in my armies, just because it looks cooler. I'm also more of a painter/collector. I don't really participate in tournaments so it doesn't hurt my play style. All that said I do have a unit of 30 Bloodletters that is pretty lethal. But I've been summoning them in with bloodtithe points since AoS 2.0 so haven't been using the full set too much.

[sorokyl]

2 minutes ago, Skreech Verminking said:

I remember the day when 700point worth of skaven Infanterie (40Stormvermins and clanrats) where slaughtered by a unit of 20Putrid blight kings, that -2to the hit role and another -1 to the wound while having to reroll all hit roles of 6s was the doom of my Stormvermins unit while having 5attacks each.

20PBK in a line where they can all attack is 40 inches long. If you see a 40 inch long line of elite infantry, you should probably  run away=) 

580 points in 40 inches is bad. As a comparison, 500 pts of Stormvermin can attack in a spread of only 13 inches  (40 1 inch bases in 3 ranks)

Unless he has the movement/charge to wrap around you, a pile in of 3 inches means that he can only get like 8 PBK's on you in 1 turn (8 x 2 inch base = 16 inches)
 

[Forrix]

20 minutes ago, sorokyl said:

Putrid Blightkings are a great example of when not to take a unit discount:
1. You will never get all 20 into melee combat (40mm bases, 1" attack range)
2. They have no benefit from many units in a group
3. You will not lose the back ranks before the unit has a chance to attack in combat, (no fodder models needed)
4. This unit is important for doing damage, and by having a lot of  models not in combat, your army is weaker 

Some questions you can ask yourself for other units when considering wether or not to take large groups 

I was going to post about Blightkings but you beat me to it lol. I'll add that bigger groups also make them more susceptible to the dreaded -1hit debuff. Bigger groups do have the advantage of being easier to keep within 7 inches of a Harbinger of Decay though for his buff. Basically I keep my Blightkings in 5 man units unless I'm taking a harbinger then I'll take one 10 man unit and have the Harbinger follow it around.

[Skreech Verminking]

10 minutes ago, sorokyl said:

20PBK in a line where they can all attack is 40 inches long. If you see a 40 inch long line of elite infantry, you should probably  run away=) 

580 points in 40 inches is bad. As a comparison, 500 pts of Stormvermin can attack in a spread of only 13 inches  (40 1 inch bases in 3 ranks)

Unless he has the movement/charge to wrap around you, a pile in of 3 inches means that he can only get like 8 PBK's on you in 1 turn (8 x 2 inch base = 16 inches)
 

I think you’re misunderstanding me.

I was  referring to the buffs they can get and the magic that can literly make a bloodfrenzy unit to slaves.

when I charged my friends Blightkings there where around 10-11 of them in reach of attacking, and that wasn’t the problem thanks to his buffs my Stormvermins were hitting him on 5s rerolling successful hits of 6s (we might have done that one wrong though)

so literally  meaning from my 200attacks I got about 20in killing just barley 2blightkings.

his blightkings who where than in range slaughtered halve of my unit.

Im not preferring to their damage they could and can do in 20s (definitely not, better of taking 5s then) but more in the survivability this unit can get when taken in a unit of 20.

all those buffs they can be fit from in this size is massive making this unit almost unkillable.

Not all that exist in aos must be able to kill a unit in the first turn.

But I get where your coming from.

just throwing in my own oppinion on those guys😅

[The Cranky Dwarf]

Also large units are vulnerable to spells like the foot of gork or the great maw. That lesson was hard learned. Nothing like losing an entire elite unit to one luck spell.

[Skabnoze]

2 hours ago, sorokyl said:

20PBK in a line where they can all attack is 40 inches long. If you see a 40 inch long line of elite infantry, you should probably  run away=) 

Or use some form of sniper attack to kill a model in the middle and watch half the unit disappear.

[Overread]

It really depends.

 

Not just on the unit itself, but what function it plays within the faction and within your army. Even though the discount for a full unit is good and more models is generally good for any unit in isolation; sometimes you don't need nor want it.

First up it can be a huge point sink in a single unit, that might make them very powerful, but at the same time its power in one single spot on the board. That limits its versatility and leaves you open to your opponent locking that unit in combat with a cheaper unit of their own whilst the rest of their army goes about killing the rest of yours or securing objectives. 

Of course some units are designed around the idea of working best in full; skaven have quite a few units that not only get a price decrease but ability improvements when in larger and full units. At which point you do have an expensive and powerful unit working well so you're taking the first risk; but sometimes its what makes that unit shine and work on the battlefield so in a larger game its not as much a downside even though its still only one unit. 

Then sometimes a unit might be needed only to fill a battleline slot, the unit isn't the focus of your army so there's no desire to max it out to its full loadout because you've got the backbone of your army invested in other areas of the force. Having an idea what your overall tactics might be and how each unit plays into it is important and will really help you make these choices on what to and what not to take .

 

Terrain can also come into play; if your tables are often very choked with terrain and features then having more smaller units might be a benefit. Sure they might cost more; but on the flipside they can move around more readily on the tighter map; whilst a bigger unit could easily get bogged down or end up strung out and at risk of snipers knocking out middle units and breaking unit cohesion (resulting in mass losses). However if the terrain is often wide and open then that will easily favour bigger units for maximum power. 

Utility - some units are there for a specific utility/feature/ability/function. As a result you don't need a big number of them, just enough to get the job done without overkill. This leaves you points to invest into other segments of the army. So whilst the unit isn't getting the discount on price; it is smaller and cheaper and giving you points to spend elsewhere in the army. 

[Kramer]

For me depends on the gameplan. Do I need a cheap as possible screen (10 giant rats) or board control (40 clanrats). That, depends on the rest of the roles of everything else. 

What does the damage, what claims the objectives etc. To be honest if we;re talking clanrats. They are great because you can make it pretty offensive with the right buffs. So that makes it doubly worth it. Different thing for 9 to 12 Ogors. 12 Ogors doesn't help me much in the board control in comparison with 9 Ogors. (which I think is the sweet spot). But the extra points is worth the redundancy. Blood warriors... never played them but if they are my sacrificial screen, I'd rather have 4 units of 5 than 2 of 10 I think. Better utility as a screen. You can split them or double them up. If you want hem as a sturdy defend the objective block I could see the discount being good. But really 520 points to secure an objective seems to much. 30 warriors would deff defend one tho 😂

[King Taloren]

8 hours ago, Skreech Verminking said:

and that wasn’t the problem thanks to his buffs my Stormvermins were hitting him on 5s rerolling successful hits of 6s (we might have done that one wrong though)

I don’t remember Nurgle having anything that caused rerolling hit rolls of six. I know the cycle of corruption has one turn that makes you reroll all your sixes to wound rolls.

[Skreech Verminking]

12 hours ago, King Taloren said:

I don’t remember Nurgle having anything that caused rerolling hit rolls of six. I know the cycle of corruption has one turn that makes you reroll all your sixes to wound rolls.

😳, This Rat!

they are literally everywhere to find.

Never thought that the day would come when the skaven take over.

 

[Inquisitorsz]

It's been mentioned already but base size is important.  
Having 32 or 40mm size bases with only a 1" melee range means the majority of your unit is not going to be able to fight most of the time.  
So you get a slight discount but at the cost of nearly zero effectiveness out of those extra bodies (other than soaking wounds).  

Same goes for units that get cheaper but don't get any additional bonus for being bigger. Clan rats and skeletons among others greatly benefit from being bigger units. But some units don't. They get cheaper but get nothing else so that's less worth it. 

I think roughly, in general, 1 wound 25mm models it's good to max them out. They usually sit on objectives so the extra wounds help and you can get more of them into base contact/melee range.   
The more elite units are often better off as smaller units.  

Finally, being a bigger unit means your one buff spell gets a bit more efficient.... but a lot of the new ones require "wholly within" so be careful of that. I found that quite difficult with Nighthaunt short buff range, especially on 32mm base units. 
That also goes both ways, enemy debuff spells will hit a larger portion of your army, especially ones that slow down movement, they can bog down a huge chunk of your force. 

So TLDR; very much depends on your list, the mission, the opponent and what unit it is. 

[Cambot1231]

What was the verdict taking chaos warriors for discount? Too big of base for those two attacks?  In my experience I've never had anyone chew through all 20 in a unit with sheilds so I feel that 30 is just overkill and a potential waste.

[XReN]

39 minutes ago, Cambot1231 said:

What was the verdict taking chaos warriors for discount? Too big of base for those two attacks?  In my experience I've never had anyone chew through all 20 in a unit with sheilds so I feel that 30 is just overkill and a potential waste.

Our chaos players (not StD cuz they suck) usually go with units of 30 and 5, because it's not that big of a deal here to slaughter 30 of them somewhere mid game and 5s are just cheap

[peasant]

On 3/16/2019 at 6:39 AM, King Taloren said:

I don’t remember Nurgle having anything that caused rerolling hit rolls of six. I know the cycle of corruption has one turn that makes you reroll all your sixes to wound rolls.

There is The witherstave, and artifact that make enemy units at 12" to rr 6s yo hit.