The future of compendium warscrolls

[Paul Buckler]

2 hours ago, stuntymike said:

The player in question is ready to quit AoS because he's watching the number of tournies he can take his army too shrink by the day. So it's a big deal for him. 

Again who loses if events continue to let him use his TK?

Not a competative player, but one of several thought I have seen and prob a good one.

Competative event means all players should be able to fight on an equal footing.   If models are not available from the retailer (not eBay) then not everyone will have the same chance of using those models.  So at a 200 player event like SCGT not all 200 players could use TK if they wanted to.  (not that all 200 would and probably only half the field is there to actually win the event).  But the point is still very valid.

Hence my view that at standard matched play events No compendium, at hobby based narrative no problem.  They are all about the story/fluff rather than an equal footing for all entrants.

Its just getting near to the 'cut off' point for the old stuff.  Sad but inevitable, I have no doubt that they will be reborn in an AOS style at some point though.

[MidasKiss]

Well that's the point of the Compendium, it's the last chance saloon for old models.

Like I said earlier though, if there is stuff that is really good they could translate that into new models or new rules for old models if they wanted to. Forge World could easily have its own section so that's just silly, tomb kings could be moved to normal death with greater confusion than having them in the app and having a compendium section, etc.

I will go back to Vampire Counts as an example. They could remove the VC compendium without losing what makes them interesting very easily. I assume this is similar for a lot of the compendium.

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[CoffeeGrunt]

I dunno. As the faction that has less warscrolls than Order has battalions, I'd like to see our options increased, not decreased.

[Ollie Grimwood]

They have brought stuff back out of the compendiums through and someone did say that this would be the case when things got updated model, I think it was in reference to Wardancers. 

[Terry Pike]

I jumped in on the twitter debate about this earlier. May as well summarise my response here for anyone not on twitter.

Compendium should be removed from competitive matched play for the following reasons (my opinion):

• Tomb Kings and I believe most if not all compendium scrolls are no longer available for sale, meaning not everyone has access to them
• The compendium warscrolls house most of the over powered rules interactions and combinations currently available in the game
• Removing "legacy" armies will encourage players to move with the meta keeping the tournament scene in a "modern" place
• Barrier to entry is higher when new players have to go back and learn old armies that are no longer for sale/exist

If you are dead against the removal of compendium, the obvious answer is to write your own pack and run your own event that doesn't use SCGT. If its something people want, you'll get people attending!

[CoffeeGrunt]

2 minutes ago, Terry Pike said:

• The compendium warscrolls house most of the over powered rules interactions and combinations currently available in the game
• Removing "legacy" armies will encourage players to move with the meta keeping the tournament scene in a "modern" place
• Barrier to entry is higher when new players have to go back and learn old armies that are no longer for sale/exist

1) Then release new PDFs with balanced Warscrolls, or update them via Errata,
2) I don't want this game to become Magic the Gathering, with an obsoletion-oriented meta that involves entirely refreshing your collection every six months,
3) Not exactly. Not any more than if GW were to release more Battletomes and factions?

[Arkiham]

Was stuff from the differing editions which was cut allowed to still be played in the newer edition, for instance 7th edition to 8th edition? 

I started late into 8th edition so I'm not too sure, but if not why is there such a fuss about it happening in aos ?

Story lines progress, armies modernise and evolve,  tactics change, as the time line progresses some empires or nations are wiped out 

I'd rather a moving story, model and meta than it being static and beaten to death like 40k currently is.

[CoffeeGrunt]

Well Brets hadn't been updated since, what, 5th? They were still allowed to be played.

Having a moving meta is nice until it's your collection of hundreds of pounds' worth of models that aren't allowed to be played, after being given the glimmer of hope from being included in the GHB. That's the difference between model games and card games. Cards are easily-replaced and require minimal investment in time, you just assemble a deck. An army requires every model to be built, possibly converted and themed, then painted, assembled into an army, tweaked and playtested.

And then binned because some TOs decided you're not allowed to play it.

"Evolving meta" very rapidly becomes, "buy the new shiny or you'll get rekt m9."

[Terry Pike]

13 minutes ago, CoffeeGrunt said:

My opinion

You don't have to agree with my opinion. I'm also done arguing my opinions on this forum, I'm right your wrong, I'm wrong your right, its all your personal preference at the end of the day.

[BobbyB]

I think that perhaps there's some overstatement of the SCGT guys role with gw here that's leading to some conflagration of 'what SCGT have done' with 'what gw are doing'.  The compendium warscroll were always designed to get you by and I don't see how there is any onus on gw to support them beyond that.

Also saying 'just comp it' is all well and good but comping anything will take a lot more time and work than just making up a points value and assigning it to a couple of units. If you comp compendium stuff, especially by changing points values, you really have to look at everything else too. People who run tournaments put in an inordinate amount of work, and asking them to do even more because you don't like how they've chosen to do things comes off as a little entitled.

I'm not intending to stick my oar in either way as this argument is just going to go backwards and forwards, but it just seemed like these were a couple of salient points. Hopefully there will be events of both kinds. I believe that both events that have said no compendium since SCGT did are effectively SCGT warm up events so pointing a finger at them and saying everyone will copy SCGT is not really helpful

[Thornshield]

Well Brets hadn't been updated since, what, 5th? They were still allowed to be played.
Having a moving meta is nice until it's your collection of hundreds of pounds' worth of models that aren't allowed to be played, after being given the glimmer of hope from being included in the GHB. That's the difference between model games and card games. Cards are easily-replaced and require minimal investment in time, you just assemble a deck. An army requires every model to be built, possibly converted and themed, then painted, assembled into an army, tweaked and playtested.
And then binned because some TOs decided you're not allowed to play it.
"Evolving meta" very rapidly becomes, "buy the new shiny or you'll get rekt m9."

One of the problems of WFB was that once you had an army, you don't need to purchase new ones. GW is a company after all and needs sales of their models. AoS revitalised it with new models, new factions, new setting.

Now, there is a sad truth that players could have invalidated collections, at the risk of alienating them, but GW have always targeted the collector, those who keep buying and buying and buying.

Compendium and discontinued models don't make GW money as the sales are on eBay. Which is probably one reason as to why they've brought out Made to Order.

So from a company's point of view, moving closer to MtG's block sets for Matched Play makes more financial sense if they can get the balance/timing right.

Looping back to tournaments, people will host the events they want, with or without compendium. It's clear there's a divide, which we can use to diversify the options of events out there. Just don't let it become personal and hate driven.

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[Dave Fraser]

1 hour ago, Paul Buckler said:

Not a competative player, but one of several thought I have seen and prob a good one.

Competative event means all players should be able to fight on an equal footing.   If models are not available from the retailer (not eBay) then not everyone will have the same chance of using those models.  So at a 200 player event like SCGT not all 200 players could use TK if they wanted to.  (not that all 200 would and probably only half the field is there to actually win the event).  But the point is still very valid.

Hence my view that at standard matched play events No compendium, at hobby based narrative no problem.  They are all about the story/fluff rather than an equal footing for all entrants.

Its just getting near to the 'cut off' point for the old stuff.  Sad but inevitable, I have no doubt that they will be reborn in an AOS style at some point though.

I can buy virtually every model in the TK range from GW or other model makers. Sure they're not labelled as TK but necron wraiths as necroserpents. Chaos forgefiends as sphinxes etc etc. 

 

Plus not everything is available to everyone by game design, I've yet to find a way to fit stormfiends in my order list. 

[CoffeeGrunt]

15 minutes ago, Terry Pike said:

You don't have to agree with my opinion. I'm also done arguing my opinions on this forum, I'm right your wrong, I'm wrong your right, its all your personal preference at the end of the day.

I don't have to agree, and nor do you, which is why we have this discussion thread so that we can discuss different views on the matter, and assess strengths and weaknesses of the various approaches. This isn't about "winning" and making the other person agree, it's about open discourse on a subject that might really affect the game we both play.

7 minutes ago, Thornshield said:

-snip-

 

It's a fair point, and as someone noted above we probably have an overinflated view of how much the SCGT influences GW. That said, GW did have the ear of TOs when writing the GHB, apparently, so how much influence it has remains to be seen.

I understand GW are a business, and that they had to draw a line under WHFB and move on. Fair enough. I was just hoping that we'd pulled the band-aid off sharply and could get on with things. Is this going to be how the game progresses though? What is the lifetime we can expect of an army? If you buy a collection but others don't in enough armies, does your army get put up for the chopping block next?

My main problem is that it doesn't make sense to bin ranges of plastics in particular. The moulds don't deteriorate like silicone moulds. Tomb Kings aren't selling partly because of stagnation, and partly because GW has now stopped selling them. Even if the will to buy was there, the product isn't. I'd at least like to see their units rolled into Death, or reimagined. As it stands it really cuts our options down to the bone. 

[Paul Buckler]

6 minutes ago, Dave Fraser said:

I can buy virtually every model in the TK range from GW or other model makers. Sure they're not labelled as TK but necron wraiths as necroserpents. Chaos forgefiends as sphinxes etc etc.

Think you answered your own point just there

[Terry Pike]

3 minutes ago, Dave Fraser said:

Plus not everything is available to everyone by game design, I've yet to find a way to fit stormfiends in my order list.

This is a terrible point to try and make, it has no relevance to compendium being allowed/removed.

4 minutes ago, Dave Fraser said:

I can buy virtually every model in the TK range from GW or other model makers. Sure they're not labelled as TK but necron wraiths as necroserpents. Chaos forgefiends as sphinxes etc etc. 

This is also not a good point to make, seeing as GW events don't allow you to use weird proxies and unofficial special characters. You want to use Setra, then it has to be the GW model, which is no longer in production.

[Dave Fraser]

Where are we talking about a GW event?

 

and my point with SF in order was talking about everything available to everyone which is never true. 

[Arkiham]

its not a gw event, but being the biggest event in the world ( apparently ) for warhammer, it is most definitely going to affect games-workshop,

 

it's highly likely to be covered by games-workshop on twitch, which means they've given whatever the event is doing their seal of approval, and by association with the event organisers in such a manner they are representing the event and its rules. (  at least this is my view ) 

[Terry Pike]

Where are we talking about a GW event?
 
and my point with SF in order was talking about everything available to everyone which is never true. 

Stormfiends are available to you, in a chaos allegiance army, which is available in the rules and available to buy.

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[Ratamaplata]

This happens in all sports... rules and regulations change season to season. Rugby has numerous changes nearly every season which mean players and teams have to change style/tactics. F1 teams have to build new cars to new specs every season, hence why it's so expensive to be involved in.

I'm a competitive athlete (albeit in an old man division) in a sport which has changes regularly which can mean something I had trained to do for 10 years becomes illegal (this has happened to me). This is the nature of competition with rules. If you want to compete you do it under the rules that are implemented.

[Dave Fraser]

19 minutes ago, Arkiham said:

its not a gw event, but being the biggest event in the world ( apparently ) for warhammer, it is most definitely going to affect games-workshop,

 

it's highly likely to be covered by games-workshop on twitch, which means they've given whatever the event is doing their seal of approval, and by association with the event organisers in such a manner they are representing the event and its rules. (  at least this is my view ) 

Fair enough it's just that people were at pains to point out this was just a couple of independent events earlier and n no way impacted the wider scene. I guess it isn't quite as standalone as they made out. 

[CoffeeGrunt]

28 minutes ago, Ratamaplata said:

This happens in all sports... rules and regulations change season to season. Rugby has numerous changes nearly every season which mean players and teams have to change style/tactics. F1 teams have to build new cars to new specs every season, hence why it's so expensive to be involved in.

I'm a competitive athlete (albeit in an old man division) in a sport which has changes regularly which can mean something I had trained to do for 10 years becomes illegal (this has happened to me). This is the nature of competition with rules. If you want to compete you do it under the rules that are implemented.

So long as it doesn't filter down to casual play, that's fine. I think that's the main thing discussed here; whether the SCGT decision will feed back to GW and the game at large, and alter it down to the grassroots.

[Jimbo]

2 hours ago, Paul Buckler said:

Not a competative player,

Says Mr Ranked 24th in the UK rankings  

(If you haven't played @Paul Buckler then you should because he's an awesome chap!)

 

I've made the point on Twitter but there will be events out there which will have different comp, some of which will allow Compendium Warscrolls so there should be options for everyone.    

I suspect that given the new found enthusiasm that GW has for community engagement, there will be a lot more regular updates/alterations to AoS so it's probably something we need to get used to.  

And as Jervis Johnson said in his interview with Dan and Wayne, there is no 'right' way to play the game.  It's up to us to make what we want of each game we play.

Jimbo

[Carnelian]

I haven't read the whole thread but would weigh in that I see no benefits at all to GW dropping compendium points from the generals handbook. The rules are out there for everyone to read, they are fun and they involve only a very little amount of upkeep.

I'd SCGT want to do it then fine that's up to them. I would hope that the gamers they lose out on as a result of the decision would be picked up by alternative tournaments running different rules for their tournaments.  

[The Stronghold]

This is definitely up to the individual tournament organisers, and hopefully there will continue to be options for both sides of the debate well into the future.

I would however also hope to see GW endeavour to keep as much of the older stuff included in the game as possible, and continue to grow the number of warscrolls rather than retiring warscrolls just because they don't currently sell the minis. Keeping the warscrolls around could even be made profitable via the Made to Order program.

[Terry Pike]

Just out of interest is there anyone here who will not be attending SCGT2017 because they cannot take Compendium Warscrolls?