We Should All Be Thankful

[Sleboda]

As part of the GW promotion to give away armies we build in Battle Forge, I have come to appreciate the AoS process of making army lists.

Don't get me wrong, I find making an AoS list to be needlessly complicated and tedious, but trying to make a legal list for 40K is a darned nightmare.

The new app really highlights how crazy-complex it is.  Sheesh! Be thankful, AoS players, that AoS list building is only a 7 out of 10 on complexity. 40K goes to 11.

 

[SunStorm]

From my limited experience I'd agree. I haven't played 40k since 7th, mostly since then it was 30k until I started AoS, but I recently got some Necrons and was looking at how to make them into a legal list and just couldn't work out how to build the list on Battlescribe. 

 

 

[Overread]

I've honestly found most 40K builders to be overly complex or somewhat lacking in a smooth interface. The army building is more complex than AoS, but not horrifically so. 

 

The issue in 8th edition I could see is that GW kept breaking up the information. You had points on one page; unit detials on another; weapons on another; upgrades on another another bit of unit details on another.... Back in the "old days" of 3rd edition and such all unit details were on the units page. Points for the mode, upgrades, upgrade stats etc... it was all there. Sure this meant that for some armies some weapons repeated themselves and some points did where units shared the same upgrade; but it also meant each unit was individual and all the details were neatly arranged. Then came several editions where GW got progressively more and more daft. 

Information was almost ad-hock spread out involving a lot more page flipping. The actual army building wasn't more complex, it was the information that was poorly placed for finding. 9th edition necrons and marines have returned partly toward the old style; with more information on one page rather htan everything spread out like a maniac designed it. The only downside is that the necron one at least lacks the page of unit fluff that I've grown to expect from GW - which is a huge shame to lose. We get a few pages here and there on one or to specific units ,but not the page per unit (or unit type). 

[Neverchosen]

I tried to get the 40k app and subscribe but found there to be so many loopholes for a service that ought to be free and accessible and found that really jarring and off putting. I like that AoS has a smaller cost of entry as Warscrolls are freely available alongside the core rules and our list builder can be accessed on their website. The army books and expansions are a necessity for learning the allegiance abilities, battalion requirements, spell lores etc. but if you are starting out in this already pricey hobby you and a friend can take your start collecting box and get a gaming going in a few hours. I have always felt there was a lot of gatekeeping in 40k now I feel that extends to GW as well as the fans. Which is so strange considering the openness of AOS as a ruleset and community are precisely what drew me back to the hobby.

[sandlemad]

Quite apart from the complexities of list building in AoS vs 40k, it's wild that GW could take something like Azyr in-house and do well, and then only a few years later do such a embarrassingly amateurish job with the 40k equivalent. The technical gulf is huge, goes way beyond things intrinsic to either game system.

[SleeperAgent]

I've said it since day one. Warscroll Builder is amazing and 40k is miles behind. The best option forever was a third party app.

[NinthMusketeer]

I am legitimately surprised anyone would call AoS listbuilding complicated. Pick a sub-faction you like then almost all of it is just picking which units you want in what amount, only a tiny segment of army builds care about restrictions other than battleline. Some units have options if you take them with one weapon or another, but its unit-wide.

Then you go through each hero and pick their bling. Most to all of it is often fixed by sub-faction or is narrowed down to a few best options. This is where it can SEEM overwhelming to newcomers with tons of tables and options everywhere.

If anything I wish it was more complex via the choice of command traits and artifacts being more meaningful than 'fixed by sub-faction' or 'pick from this list of 3 that are clearly better'. Heck half the options in the average battletome could be thrown out because they aren't worth taking.

Some army builds can get tricky though. What armies do you play OP?

Edited December 22, 2020 by NinthMusketeer

[EMMachine]

The funny thing is. 40k listbuilding becomes a nightmare when playing with points. With Powerpoints it should ne quite equal because 40k Powerpoints is basicly the Pointsystem AoS has.

Hopefully 9th Edition will make some points better. I mean, a problem of 8. Edition was for example that Chapter Approved at the beginning only containted changed points. Now you could guess of your codex has the newer points or if parts were from the Codex and parts were from Chapter approved.

In AoS I do at least know, that once a year all points have a reset with the Grand Alliance Book and books that came after have the newest points.

One thing that GW could do better is making an Errata if a new 2 player Campaign Box is released, stating that their is a newer Warscroll (see Shadow & Pain) and print the point changes into the Errata.

Because as we have seen here:

https://www.tga.community/forums/topic/27320-points-in-azyr-vs-ghb-2020/

Warscroll and Point changes that were part of such a box are quite often under the radar if you didn't buy that box.

Edited December 22, 2020 by EMMachine

[Skreech Verminking]

52 minutes ago, NinthMusketeer said:

f anything I wish it was more complex via the choice of command traits and artifacts being more meaningful than 'fixed by sub-faction'

Easily done mate.

just play the skaven.

after-all we don’t have such a kind of stupid thing known as sub-factions.

 

Edited December 22, 2020 by Skreech Verminking

[NinthMusketeer]

I do. Specifically, I play Skryre. I have 2 command traits and 2 artifacts to choose from.* At least my spell options are all good.

*Each chart also has 4 wallpaper options there to fill page space, but you don't actually use them.

[Skreech Verminking]

Just now, NinthMusketeer said:

I do. Specifically, I play Skryre. I have 2 command traits and 2 artifacts to choose from.* At least my spell options are all good.

*Each chart also has 4 wallpaper options there to fill page space, but you don't actually use them.

Yeah but isn’t that then basically a pretty bad example of internal balance?

which most books seem to be having lately.

anyways never mind what I said, And may the warpstone be with you

[Overread]

2 hours ago, EMMachine said:

The funny thing is. 40k listbuilding becomes a nightmare when playing with points. With Powerpoints it should ne quite equal because 40k Powerpoints is basicly the Pointsystem AoS has.

It's not quite the same.

See in Old World and in AoS most units have a single profile. They don't have optional weapons or swap out weapons or lots of upgrades and wargear choices. They just have their basic stats and that is it. So they work well with a single point value because their equipment never ever changes. 

In 40K power-points work on the same principle, except they break because each unit has a range of weapon and upgrade choices. Indeed powerpoints utterly fail in 40K if you've two people with a different intention and mindset building lists because one might build a list without any upgrades, just basic units. The other might throw every upgrade and every single best weapon on each model. The armies would have vastly different levels of "power and performance" because one army is running on minimal and the other is running top end - even if they were the same armies, the same models and that they cost the same in power-points. 

That's why, whilst its a simple and fast system GW has tried to push, it ultimately fails. 

 

 

 

Note Old World and AoS both approach 40K complexity when it comes to leaders; at least in so much has having wargear options, though even then AoS is much more restrictive/simplistic. 

 

 

 

 

As for the whole app situation my guess is that GW just put more resources into the AoS one or a staff member who knew what they were doing; whilst the 40K one got less resources/attention/attentive key staff/whatever. However it is GW clearly wanted pepole to use their subscription service, but their subscription digital service is thus far very bare-bones and riddled with bugs. I've heard more call for digital codex to return for them. 

[AverageBoss]

I honestly dont think list building is bad or hard for either game. AoS is like a 2/10 in difficulty, and 40k with points (because power points are broken and do not work), is like a 5/10.

Of course I use battlescribe for both games. But there are far harder games to build lists out of.

[Clan's Cynic]

13 hours ago, sandlemad said:

Quite apart from the complexities of list building in AoS vs 40k, it's wild that GW could take something like Azyr in-house and do well, and then only a few years later do such a embarrassingly amateurish job with the 40k equivalent. The technical gulf is huge, goes way beyond things intrinsic to either game system.

GW knew if they could get people to pay money for an alpha/beta product so long as it had 40k slapped on it. AoS they'd probably not have the same rabid or sizeable fanbase to risk it.

[NinthMusketeer]

And thank goodness for that!

[ArkanautDadmiral]

I’ve been reading a lot of 40K lore recently and have been wanting to start an army, so I grabbed the app thinking it might hold my hand a bit because I know nothing about 40K listbuilding.

It didn’t take long for me to give up. First thing I noticed was you can’t set your faction and pick from available units within it. You have to search for each unit you want to add, you can’t even search the faction name, a search of ‘Tyranid’ gave me a unit or two that actually had the word tyranid in the name, but that was it.

Then never mind Detachments and the overwhelming amount of options that increase points etc. I didn’t even bother looking into that because what’s the point if the app makes something as fundamental as adding units finicky.

I’ve found entry into 40K really difficult in general. I like some factions based on lore etc but so much of the ranges for anything except SM look really dated. Even new sculpts for some factions are inexplicably poor. I’ve had a hard time even deciding which faction to start with because I don’t want to dump cash into an old range that must surely see an update not far in the future. 

[Kramer]

15 hours ago, SleeperAgent said:

I've said it since day one. Warscroll Builder is amazing and 40k is miles behind. The best option forever was a third party app.

And I just don’t get that from GW. How they handle the app building is insane. 
every single business that has a bigger than local market gets websites, apps, content etc externally sourced. 
it truly baffles me that in November they opened up a job position as app developer. 

how do they see that working? You can’t scale as fast, if someone doesn’t function they are harder to replace, You get not as many specialists on one project and the list goes on. 

its just so horribly outdated. And just to save money I guess? Which seems weird in hindsight because surely they would have earned that difference back if the 40k app just worked these last few months. 

[JackStreicher]

4 hours ago, ArmyOfGrodd said:

app makes something as fundamental as adding units finicky.

Don‘t forget the price tag...

Battle Scribe is plainly better, and free

@Kramer also: One App DEV is at least one too few.

Edited December 23, 2020 by JackStreicher

[Beliman]

40k list-building is a bit unintuitive.

I played a bit of other war-games and I believe that 40k is the one that I have the most problems with.
Btw, talking about list-building, Othmark has an awesome and refreshing list-building mechanic. Check it out if you can!

[jaWn]

Mostly related to this, it seems like you can make an AoS army and submit it for the Battleforge promo contest. I would love to win a new AoS army for a 40k contest. 

[Kramer]

6 hours ago, JackStreicher said:

Don‘t forget the price tag...

Battle Scribe is plainly better, and free

@Kramer also: One App DEV is at least one too few.

Just to be clear. I didn’t say there is one app developer. They opened a job opening for one. (In addition to the clearly horribly understaffed team)

[AverageBoss]

18 hours ago, ArmyOfGrodd said:

I’ve been reading a lot of 40K lore recently and have been wanting to start an army, so I grabbed the app thinking it might hold my hand a bit because I know nothing about 40K listbuilding.

It didn’t take long for me to give up. First thing I noticed was you can’t set your faction and pick from available units within it. You have to search for each unit you want to add, you can’t even search the faction name, a search of ‘Tyranid’ gave me a unit or two that actually had the word tyranid in the name, but that was it.

Then never mind Detachments and the overwhelming amount of options that increase points etc. I didn’t even bother looking into that because what’s the point if the app makes something as fundamental as adding units finicky.

I’ve found entry into 40K really difficult in general. I like some factions based on lore etc but so much of the ranges for anything except SM look really dated. Even new sculpts for some factions are inexplicably poor. I’ve had a hard time even deciding which faction to start with because I don’t want to dump cash into an old range that must surely see an update not far in the future. 

Use battlescribe for 40k list building.
Use 1D4chan tactics pages and battlescribe to get info on how various armies play.
Space Marines, Necrons, Deathguard, Sisters of Battle, and Thousand Sons have the most up to date model ranges. But 40k suffers from a HUGE release and support imbalance. As bad as Stormcast used to be, and ORDER is currently, they have nothing on SMs and the Imperium.

Detachments let you pick what sort of skeleton you want for your army. Want something with lots of well rounded options? Battalion is your go to. Want to make a tank company with a wall of steel? Go with vanguard for those 4 heavy support slots.

And yes, 40k does charge you more points to make your guys better. A gun that can kill one dude vs a gun that can kill four and also threaten light vehicles should see a points difference.

Edited December 24, 2020 by AverageBoss

[RuneBrush]

Just been catching up with this thread am and curious about something.  Do people think that we're making our own lives difficult because we're using a digital tool to create our lists rather than going old school and using a pen and paper?  A huge amount of the issues I've had in the past with writing 40k lists has actually been the tool rather than the process of writing the list.

On 12/22/2020 at 5:24 PM, Overread said:

In 40K power-points work on the same principle, except they break because each unit has a range of weapon and upgrade choices. Indeed powerpoints utterly fail in 40K if you've two people with a different intention and mindset building lists because one might build a list without any upgrades, just basic units. The other might throw every upgrade and every single best weapon on each model. The armies would have vastly different levels of "power and performance" because one army is running on minimal and the other is running top end - even if they were the same armies, the same models and that they cost the same in power-points. 

That's why, whilst its a simple and fast system GW has tried to push, it ultimately fails. 

I've only played 40k using power level and it's been fantastic.  At a few open days in the past, I've also spoken to many of the designers and the crux of power level is that it's reliant upon you and your opponent having similar mindsets.  If one of you goes in with the approach that you want to crush your opponent and the other is looking for a chilled game, one (or both) of you is going to be disappointed.  Ultimately power level is all about throwing a quick army together without over thinking it and having a good game, it's deliberately loose so that players are free to do things that may not be allowed under the stricter matched play points system.

It actually comes back to the most important thing about gaming - communicating with your opponent.  Make sure you both know what you're after from a game.  It's something my local group does pretty well and why we all make sure we've an idea what each other are bringing to begin with (for example, I make sure to let my group know if I'm bringing a full unit of 30 grimghast reapers).

[JackStreicher]

I enjoyed Power Level games (Crusade), yet the points seem random as hell (Cultists cost the same amount of power points compared to way better units in other armies and so on).

The games were still pretty fun though, yet the Power Points really need some common sense.

[Fairbanks]

17 hours ago, RuneBrush said:

Just been catching up with this thread am and curious about something.  Do people think that we're making our own lives difficult because we're using a digital tool to create our lists rather than going old school and using a pen and paper?  A huge amount of the issues I've had in the past with writing 40k lists has actually been the tool rather than the process of writing the list.

I agree. It’s these crazy whippersnappers with their number-adding machines and mechanical pencils. Back in my day, you used your fingers and toes to count, and if you needed to, your friend’s fingers and toes.