How would you fix the horde meta?

[kenshin620]

Pull off a 7th edition and bring the concept of "kill the first rank" before they can do anything?

I do think wound remaining x2 for objectives sounds like a good start though, certainly help BCR.

 

Also maybe bring back Fear/Terror? Give to hit penalties, more models fleeing, straight bravery debuffs.

Am I just trying to make WFB 9th?

[Eevika]

1 minute ago, zilberfrid said:

70+ is quite a small amount for 2000 points.

For Free peoples, many 1000 point armies will have over 70*, granted, that is a horde army, but your treshold is quite low. Their batallion has a minimum of 84 models.

* 40 guards, 30 greatswords, 30 crossbows is 880 points and 100 models, then you have a general, and you have a nice great company army. Meeting Engagements break large model counts, but will also come quite close to 70

 

I myself like armies of regular dudes, if everything  becomes larger than life, nothing is epic, you've just shifted the goalposts (see the human tag on 10 ft tall Sigmarines).

Yeah I keep the thresh hold quite low becouse armies I like are like are like 10-25 models. I do have a 60 grot unit every now and then becouse I have to do that to have a chance to be competitive. 

[XReN]

I think that "Horde Meta" means not only a huge number of models on the table, but also taking units at maximum strenght for all the insane benefits of doing so

Every buff just scales to the sky when you take a bigger unit,

I had 30 ghouls removing 2 EotGs and around 20 skinks in 2 combat phases when buffed with +1 attack and +1 damage from Aqshy

I had my 4 summoned units with total of 42 wounds mostly with 5+ save and 6++ death save removed by a single charge of buffed plague monks, that are cheap as dirt. 

Many units also have horde buffs, from something not very impactfull as rerolling save rolls of 1 for chaos warriors and something very impactfull as Skaven allegiance abilities or skeletons' bonus.

I think those horde bonuses need to go, as well as bubbles of battleshock Immunity, on the other hand buffs that affect single units should be wholly within auras, so you will have equal utility from this buff on 1 unit of 40 models and 4 units of 10 models. 

Horde Discount should stay. 

With that we hopefully can get a picture where chaff does chaff's job and elites does elite's job, multiple units of chaff will deal less damage because of unit by unit activations and hordes will be more vulnerable to battleshock because 20 wounds done to 10 man unit will just kill it, but 20 wounds to 40 man unit will make a lot of models flee.

[froo]

I wouldn't say there is a horde meta right now as how many horde armies do you see on top tables? Things are being dominated by FEC and Skaven and that is merely just a temporary issue that we're waiting on FAQ's for.

There is an issue around it being harder to make some armies run. I played in a tournament recently where 2 of my 5 opponents were effectively battleshock immune without having to spend command points and another had command points for days that he had nothing to spend on.

In the same tournament I had a unit of 40 dudes get mostly destroyed (lost 20 guys, 14 more ran) on turn 1 due to a Ripperdactyl dropdown.

I think the new universal Command Abilities will help to alleviate that last issue somewhat and give players more reason to want to spend them on other things.

If it does become a problem in the future, they can do a simple fix to Inspiring Presence by making the unit need to be wholly within X" of a hero and adjust the ranges to suit.

[Eevika]

5 minutes ago, XReN said:

I think that "Horde Meta" means not only a huge number of models on the table, but also taking units at maximum strenght for all the insane benefits of doing so

 Every buff just scales to the sky when you take a bigger unit,

I had 30 ghouls removing 2 EotGs and around 20 skinks in 2 combat phases when buffed with +1 attack and +1 damage from Aqshy

I had my 4 summoned units with total of 42 wounds mostly with 5+ save and 6++ death save removed by a single charge of buffed plague monks, that are cheap as dirt. 

Many units also have horde buffs, from something not very impactfull as rerolling save rolls of 1 for chaos warriors and something very impactfull as Skaven allegiance abilities or skeletons' bonus.

I think those horde bonuses need to go, as well as bubbles of battleshock Immunity, on the other hand buffs that affect single units should be wholly within auras, so you will have equal utility from this buff on 1 unit of 40 models and 4 units of 10 models. 

Horde Discount should stay. 

With that we hopefully can get a picture where chaff does chaff's job and elites does elite's job, multiple units of chaff will deal less damage because of unit by unit activations and hordes will be more vulnerable to battleshock because 20 wounds done to 10 man unit will just kill it, but 20 wounds to 40 man unit will make a lot of models flee.

This is weird thing I have seen in the games design lately. Almost all buffs just buff hordes. Like whats the point of taking other stuff in a Gitz army when Snufflers, Loonboss, both types of fanatics, gobba palooza and even the damn shrine only/mostly help basic units of Stabbas. Why would I ever take a Colossal Squig when 40 Grots is cheaper with way more synergy

[zilberfrid]

10 minutes ago, Eevika said:

Yeah I keep the thresh hold quite low becouse armies I like are like are like 10-25 models. I do have a 60 grot unit every now and then becouse I have to do that to have a chance to be competitive. 

I don't think you'll find me on your end of the argument. If you really don't like to construct or paint minis, that's fine, but why should that be inherently better than armies that look like, you know, armies?

Now there may be cases where units receive a buff that is unbalanced, like Gristlegore or Skaven, or changing how objectives are claimed to wounds remaining, but that's a case by case thing instead of a horde "Let's destroy the game by making horde armies useless" like removing point reductions and large unit buffs. I did not hear any way of compensating that from the people saying horde armies are OP.

Edited July 8, 2019 by zilberfrid

[Eevika]

Just now, zilberfrid said:

Now there may be cases where units receive a buff that is unbalanced, like Gristlegore or Skaven, but that's a case by case thing instead of a horde "Let's destroy the game by making horde armies useless" like removing point reductions and large unit buffs. I did not hear any way of compensating that from the people saying horde armies are OP.

 

4 minutes ago, froo said:

I wouldn't say there is a horde meta right now as how many horde armies do you see on top tables? Things are being dominated by FEC and Skaven and that is merely just a temporary issue that we're waiting on FAQ's for.

Both of you seem to be missing the point that every top army relies on massive horde units to win. The one army that does not follow that formula is Gristlegore becouse its just so stupidly designed. I dont want hordes to become useless I want a balanced game where the game can be enjoyed competitively with low model count armies like BCR, and Troggoths. I think it would be a lot more fun seeing tables where massive hordes face great beasts and fight equally instead of massive hordes slaying everything in their path. 

[RuneBrush]

I'm not really sure the horde meta is broken per-sé, however I do feel that one thing we currently have is that the effective bonus of buffs feels exponentially better when applied to a large unit as opposed to a small one.

Change wise, I'd likely drop the horde bonus as the initial point of change.  I don't really think it's necessary now and would certainly change how people write army lists (why wouldn't you add another 10 models if it's only 40 points more) - plus it'd simplify things as well.

One problem is that not all large units are equal when it comes to them being "top of the pack", so any larger changes would simply shake things up for the sake of it.

[XReN]

3 minutes ago, zilberfrid said:

I did not hear any way of compensating that from the people saying horde armies are OP.

Because it doesn't need to be done, the game should be balanced so many small units is as strong as few big units, which is clearly not what's happening atm. 

Hordes are a universal thing now, they scale buffs, they reduce number of drops, they mince everything that is not -2/3 to hit or 2+ save. And If horde is the only way army runs comptetively it's a problem, not a feature. Which I suggest should be solved by buffing underperforming units, giving elites a specialisation in which it excells, instead of just throwing a bucket of dice into your opponent.

And as FEC player I won 4 local tournaments, 2 before new book and 2 after and in every list after new book I had 2 monsters and 80+ ghouls. And I can imagine that Gristlegore, Slaanesh ( I don't know what elite lists they run) Bloodthirster spam requires much more skill to play than ton of dudes and have higher risk/reward ratio. 

[The Jabber Tzeentch]

10 minutes ago, Eevika said:

 

Both of you seem to be missing the point that every top army relies on massive horde units to win. The one army that does not follow that formula is Gristlegore becouse its just so stupidly designed. I dont want hordes to become useless I want a balanced game where the game can be enjoyed competitively with low model count armies like BCR, and Troggoths. I think it would be a lot more fun seeing tables where massive hordes face great beasts and fight equally instead of massive hordes slaying everything in their path. 

The problem with your argument is that you think 70+ models is a horde, which is probably more like the average model count of an army. Having two units of 30 as part of an army is hardly a horde. 

When I go to tournaments or club night, I generally see a mix of armies, some horde, some monsters, all sorts. And they’re all having wins and loses not just the horde armies. 

[zilberfrid]

1 minute ago, XReN said:

Because it doesn't need to be done, the game should be balanced so many small units is as strong as few big units, which is clearly not what's happening atm. 

Hordes are a universal thing now, they scale buffs, they reduce number of drops, they mince everything that is not -2/3 to hit or 2+ save. And If horde is the only way army runs comptetively it's a problem, not a feature. Which I suggest should be solved by buffing underperforming units, giving elites a specialisation in which it excells, instead of just throwing a bucket of dice into your opponent.

And as FEC player I won 4 local tournaments, 2 before new book and 2 after and in every list after new book I had 2 monsters and 80+ ghouls. And I can imagine that Gristlegore, Slaanesh ( I don't know what elite lists they run) Bloodthirster spam requires much more skill to play than ton of dudes and have higher risk/reward ratio. 

You may think so, but many horde armies are near the bottom of lists, Free People, Disposessed, Wanderers, Slaves to Darkness etc.

Having some armies with a lot of people in it rank high does not mean there is a problem with all of them. I saw a high scoring Deepkin list with 20-odd units, for instance.

 

[Eevika]

1 minute ago, zilberfrid said:

You may think so, but many horde armies are near the bottom of lists, Free People, Disposessed, Wanderers, Slaves to Darkness etc.

Having some armies with a lot of people in it rank high does not mean there is a problem with all of them. I saw a high scoring Deepkin list with 20-odd units, for instance.

 

You are talking about armies that have gotten almost no support from GW. looking at battletome armies the only thing that makes sense

[JPjr]

Also, personally, it's a small point but at least when it comes to objective control I see a difference between something like a Troggoth focused army where you're deliberately picking and choosing from a wide selection to create a low model count army and ignoring the available options for personal/aesthetic reasons and something like BCR where your biggest unit can only be 12 models.

Whilst the easy, obvious fix is, as above, changing how control of objectives is determined if I was in charge of AoS I'd want every proper faction to have access to at least one unit that can be taken, without busting the bank points wise, at up to 20 models. So not necessarily a 'horde', but big enough to contest.

Easy enough to do even for factions focused on bigger models like Ogors. I could easily imagine something like a BCR Packmaster, essentially like a Squig Herd maybe with Frost Sabre pups or some equivalent fanged beasts. You could make it a dual kit and have exactly the same for vanilla Ogors, (though I also like the idea of a normal Ogor gang boss driving a mob of ragged multi-species slaves into battle at the business end of a whip).

Then if the player doesn't want to include them, for reasons, then that's on them but they have the option.

[zilberfrid]

1 minute ago, Eevika said:

You are talking about armies that have gotten almost no support from GW. looking at battletome armies the only thing that makes sense

I vehemently disagree.

High unit count advantage is the only thing keeping quite a few armies afloat. Some armies that happen to have high unit count, perform better than they should. If you break unit count advantage, you break a lot more armies than you fix. It's better to fix the broken armies than to destroy armies GW still sells.

The main problem, is that you think 70+ is a horde. Lower than 70 is a low-model count/elite army, 25- is a monsters&heroes army, the lowest treshold that could defensibly be called a horde army would be 100 at 2000 points.

[Magnus The Blue]

56 minutes ago, EMMachine said:

It wouldn't have to be more mortal wounds but the direction is the right one.

The game does partly lack units that generate more damage against many model units.

Basicl, when we ignore mortal wound flamers for a moment the 4 units that generate more damage against Hordes are the following

1. Grot Scraplauncher (Deadly Rain of Scrap)
2. Decimators (Thunderaxe)
3. Plagueclaw (Barrage of Disease)
4. Field Mortar (High Explosive)

An interesting point for those 3 is, that 3 of 4 are catapults. The game would simply need more units that can create more damage against large model numbers without creating more damage against monsters.

Depending on what you mean by mortal wound flamers (not sure why you would ignore them) you've missed some of the best ones:

1. Guant Summoner (spell)

2. Hell Pit Abomination

3.  Hysterical Frenzy (Slaanesh Spell)

I'm sure there are plenty more, but I definitely think most factors should have at least a soft counter to hordes (currently maybe 1/4 do).

 

[Eevika]

3 minutes ago, zilberfrid said:

I vehemently disagree.

High unit count advantage is the only thing keeping quite a few armies afloat. Some armies that happen to have high unit count, perform better than they should. If you break unit count advantage, you break a lot more armies than you fix. It's better to fix the broken armies than to destroy armies GW still sells.

 The main problem, is that you think 70+ is a horde. Lower than 70 is a low-model count/elite army, 25- is a monsters&heroes army, the lowest treshold that could defensibly be called a horde army would be 100 at 2000 points.

Im talking about fixing the meta. Meta is defined by whats the best armies. I DONT WANT ALL HORDE ARMIES TO BE BAD 

[XReN]

16 minutes ago, zilberfrid said:

You may think so, but many horde armies are near the bottom of lists, Free People, Disposessed, Wanderers, Slaves to Darkness etc.

Having some armies with a lot of people in it rank high does not mean there is a problem with all of them. I saw a high scoring Deepkin list with 20-odd units, for instance.

 

Those armies also fall into cathegory of not ever having a battletome, or any support except crappy allegiance in GHB. And that is a problem for another discussion.

Every Death army is about running Hordes (Except Gristlegore), DoK are hordes, many Chaos armies are hordes (plague monk spam, plague bearer spam, demonette spam, as i heard better BoC lists are also horde-oriented), any competetive destruction list is horde. Have you played or ever heard of Kunning Rukk stacking CA to generate more shoots on 6+ to hit? It tabled my FEC on turn 2 with mostly 1 unit doing all the work. 

Edited July 8, 2019 by XReN

[zilberfrid]

1 minute ago, Eevika said:

Im talking about fixing the meta. Meta is defined by whats the best armies. I DONT WANT ALL HORDE ARMIES TO BE BAD 

But you are talking about a general nerf to high model count units. Not a specific nerf to the specific units that currently overperform.

Why are you disagreeing that there are specific units in specific armies that need fixing, and instead come up with blanket nerfs to high model count units?

[Eevika]

Just now, zilberfrid said:

But you are talking about a general nerf to high model count units. Not a specific nerf to the specific units that currently overperform.

Why are you disagreeing that there are specific units in specific armies that need fixing, and instead come up with blanket nerfs to high model count units?

When have I said all high model count armies need to be nerfed. This post is mostly about breaking the horde meta and making low model count armies viable at a competitive level. 

[zilberfrid]

8 minutes ago, XReN said:

Those armies also fall into cathegory of not ever having a battletome, or any support except crappy allegiance in GHB. And that is a problem for another discussion.

Every Death army is about running Hordes (Except Gristlegore), DoK are hordes, many Chaos armies are hordes (plague monk spam, plague bearer spam, demonette spam, as i heard better BoC lists are also horde-oriented), any competetive destruction list is horde. Have you played or ever heard of Kunning Rukk stacking CA to generate more shoots on 6+ to hit? It tabled my FEC on turn 2 with mostly 1 unit doing all the work. 

And still, destroying the weakest armies because some units in some armies overperform is not the answer, that GW did not give them enough love is no reason to dig their ditch even deeper. Just go for specifics, not generics.

There are units with a very low model cost that have an ability to deal massive damage? Fix that unit, perhaps by removing discounts, or even making the unit more expensive when stacking, or higher base cost, or a changed warscroll, but general rules are not the solution.

Edited July 8, 2019 by zilberfrid

[Eevika]

1 minute ago, zilberfrid said:

There are units with a very low model cost that have an ability to deal massive damage? Fix that unit, perhaps by removing discounts, or even making the unit more expensive when stacking, or higher base cost, or a changed warscroll, but general rules are not the solution.

Do you think 3 grots holding an objective when 3 dragons are standing on it makes sense?

[XReN]

Just now, zilberfrid said:

And still, destroying the weakest armies because some units in some armies overperform is not the answer. Just go for specifics, not generics.

There are units with a very low model cost that have an ability to deal massive damage? Fix that unit, perhaps by removing discounts, or even making the unit more expensive when stacking, or higher base cost, or a changed warscroll, but general rules are not the solution.

Can you go back please and re-read everything I said about weaker armies? Hordes doesn't fix the problems with those armies, battletome does. 

[zilberfrid]

3 minutes ago, Eevika said:

Do you think 3 grots holding an objective when 3 dragons are standing on it makes sense?

Ah, there you have me, I did not re-state that I do think remaining wounds is better than model count, and that is a general rule.

[EMMachine]

6 minutes ago, Magnus The Blue said:

Depending on what you mean by mortal wound flamers (not sure why you would ignore them) you've missed some of the best ones:

1. Guant Summoner (spell)

2. Hell Pit Abomination

3.  Hysterical Frenzy (Slaanesh Spell)

I'm sure there are plenty more, but I definitely think most factors should have at least a soft counter to hordes (currently maybe 1/4 do).

 

Partly because mortal wounds is normally an anti armor thing (because it bypasses the save), and is bad practice as well (it works basicly against 5 models as good as against 10 models as against 20 models etc.)

The 3 catapults are interesting in that case because because they use the normal attack resolve mechanics but are stronger against high model units without being stronger against high armour elite units.

[zilberfrid]

2 minutes ago, XReN said:

Can you go back please and re-read everything I said about weaker armies? Hordes doesn't fix the problems with those armies, battletome does. 

You have stated that that is a problem for another discussion.

One that may never come. Battletomes would help, but it's not here, so we cannot take it into consideration.

If there are no other fixes, breaking them further as a byproduct of fixing a few high performing armies is not an option. So come up with specific fixes for the specific overperforming armies.