Lessons Learned at the LVO - A Call for Common Sense Within Our Community

[DrBored]

So you're sad that people bought beautiful models and enjoyed playing with them? How sad that someone else's pleasure makes you cry inside.

I could be really sassy, but I'm just going to leave with this.

It makes me sad that the state of the game is in such a point of bandwagoning that so many people are using the same units, such that armies almost look identical if it weren't for different paint jobs.

The competitive scene seems to slowly be crawling back towards Knights versus Knights, and that's rather appalling, when there's so much depth to the 40k verse.

But then, that's why I'm not a competitive player. The more something is hyped and overused, the less I like it.

I'll just be over here having a blast with my Land Raider Redeemers, Lightning Claw Terminators, and other things that people would supposedly never ever in a million years use in a list because they're 'garbage'.

I think, ShadowcatX, that you're being a bit venomous and negative. Sorry if that's taken as an insult, but your tone just seems really sharp and borderline offensive, like you're really eager to find something that'll set someone off.

[gory_v]

It's unfortunately an issue on forums where an honest and respectful discussion can devolve into assumptions about other poster's opinions and name calling. There's no reason whatsoever that we can't be civil and talk about our differences with the coming ground in mind that we all love 40k. We may never agree about how we think the game should be played, but we can at least try to see each other's points of view when discussing the issues that are resulting in the shrinking of our beloved hobby.

[ShadowcatX]

It makes me sad that the state of the game is in such a point of bandwagoning that so many people are using the same units, such that armies almost look identical if it weren't for different paint jobs.

The competitive scene seems to slowly be crawling back towards Knights versus Knights, and that's rather appalling, when there's so much depth to the 40k verse.

Have you actually seen the results of the LVO, only one person playing knights cracked the top 8. No knight on knight action in the top seats. In fact, the top 8 was incredibly diverse with 11 different armies making it to the top 8 (between primaries and allies). Competitive play, when examined, does not show the results you are insisting it does.

[Popsical]

Dr bored, you can fight my chaos marine chosen and helbrute with your non competitive guys if you like.
In tournaments people play to win the whole gig so stacking the list in their favour is normal.
I try not to look at army lists online anymore because even if they are fluffy and asking for tactical advice, the replies tend to be "replace unit a with unit cheese". Oh and as monty python said "spam, spam, spam".

[gory_v]

Have you actually seen the results of the LVO, only one person playing knights cracked the top 8. No knight on knight action in the top seats. In fact, the top 8 was incredibly diverse with 11 different armies making it to the top 8 (between primaries and allies). Competitive play, when examined, does not show the results you are insisting it does.

While the top 8 and top finishers in general are what inspired me to write this, he's not completely wrong about the rest of the players who were in the middle of the pack. There was a lot of diversity within the entire field, but in the early going there were a lot of tau formations, Knights, serpents, super heavies, and super fortifications in play at the end of day 1 before the cream rose to the top and those players were knocked out of contention.

[DrBored]

Dr bored, you can fight my chaos marine chosen and helbrute with your non competitive guys if you like.
In tournaments people play to win the whole gig so stacking the list in their favour is normal.
I try not to look at army lists online anymore because even if they are fluffy and asking for tactical advice, the replies tend to be "replace unit a with unit cheese". Oh and as monty python said "spam, spam, spam".

Man, I'd totally take you up on that battle.

And yeah, online advice just turns every potential list into a net-list. What bites is that the guys that post their lists have already, in most cases, bought the models for that list, so to have some internet guy tell them they need to go junk half their army and buy 200 dollars of more stuff to make it 'good'... it's just a shame.

40k is one hobby that perhaps suffers from the existence of the Internet... at least in some regards.

[gory_v]

I could be really sassy, but I'm just going to leave with this.

It makes me sad that the state of the game is in such a point of bandwagoning that so many people are using the same units, such that armies almost look identical if it weren't for different paint jobs.

The competitive scene seems to slowly be crawling back towards Knights versus Knights, and that's rather appalling, when there's so much depth to the 40k verse.

But then, that's why I'm not a competitive player. The more something is hyped and overused, the less I like it.

I'll just be over here having a blast with my Land Raider Redeemers, Lightning Claw Terminators, and other things that people would supposedly never ever in a million years use in a list because they're 'garbage'.

I think, ShadowcatX, that you're being a bit venomous and negative. Sorry if that's taken as an insult, but your tone just seems really sharp and borderline offensive, like you're really eager to find something that'll set someone off.

I think the definition of 'competitive' in this hobby is inherently flawed. If you're learning a little bit more from your mistakes each game and becoming a better player for it, then don't sell yourself short. Competitive players aren't the ones who win all the time whatsoever and those who think winning is everything will generally get burned out when it doesn't always go the way they were expecting when they approach the game so linearly. Not a swipe at anyone here, but you have to challenge yourself if you want to be good or even proficient at anything in life. FACT.

[ShadowcatX]

While the top 8 and top finishers in general are what inspired me to write this, he's not completely wrong about the rest of the players who were in the middle of the pack. There was a lot of diversity within the entire field, but in the early going there were a lot of tau formations, Knights, serpents, super heavies, and super fortifications in play at the end of day 1 before the cream rose to the top and those players were knocked out of contention.

Of course there were, but 1) there were far more people than armies so there had to be over lap and 2) people playing what they perceived to be powerful within what they had access to. That happens in every tournament for every game from Magic the Gathering to Infinity to 40K. Very few people pay to enter tournamemts with the intention of not trying to do well.

But the reality is at the upper levels of competition multiple armies are doing quite well. It is not Eldar and Tau roflstomping poor little space marines and knight on knight violence, it is a plethora of options in the hands of highly skilled players. That is a healthy environment, regardless of what the naysayers might proclaim. This is a good time to be playing 40k.

[gory_v]

Of course there were, but 1) there were far more people than armies so there had to be over lap and 2) people playing what they perceived to be powerful within what they had access to. That happens in every tournament for every game from Magic the Gathering to Infinity to 40K. Very few people pay to enter tournamemts with the intention of not trying to do well.

But the reality is at the upper levels of competition multiple armies are doing quite well. It is not Eldar and Tau roflstomping poor little space marines and knight on knight violence, it is a plethora of options in the hands of highly skilled players. That is a healthy environment, regardless of what the naysayers might proclaim. This is a good time to be playing 40k.

Which is why you should be considerate of what DrBored identifies as competitive. I'm assuming a lot here, but odds are that locally, he may not have the type of players at his LGS or in his local community that fit the same mold as those who made it to the top. His perception of competitive is what he sees locally which may be a lot of min/maxing and player taking advantage of the currently perceived most broke combinations, units, and army lists out there. While the lack of variety may not hold water at the highest echelons, the matter of fact is that your local meta will generally consist of those you saw in the middle of the pack at LVO. This isn't an assumption or swipe at anyone who occupied those places, (hell, I was there myself), but rather connection of the dots from our earlier back and forth.

[shiwan8]

I love how of the top armies you list, none of them won the LVO, and at least 2 didn't break the top 8, and Eldar only had one list in top 8. LVO, along with the other tournaments have proven that eldar and tau are not busted the way bad players keep saying they are. Good, yes, but not a level above everything else.

We seem to see this thing from very different angles. I personally look at a codex as a whole and I think your angle is is one that defines the power level of a codex solely by looking at it's tournament standing even if that standing was achieved by spamming just one unit. In my mind, if a codex has 1 good unit and 1 unit that is the best of the bad units that you just have to suffer to actually get a game going, the codex is bad no matter what the tournament standings are. The different levels are clear when the game is casual. Actually you just need to compare units from each codex to another codex unit that has the same role.

For example: Tank buster in nid dex is the carnifex, eldar equivalent is WK. Sure, carnifex is 90p cheaper. It also hurts tanks only in cc, moves 6+d6 per turn vs. 12 that WK moves, has less wounds, lower toughnes, no antitank weaponry and hits on charge as much as WK hits when charged, has low init and WS.
Another example would be raveners vs. wraiths. Wraiths are in every single way at least equal to raveners + they do not need a babysitter. The cost for 5 is about equal.

After these comparisons you see if each codex has something that compensates it's handicaps through advantage on some other field. It's really easy to see that nids get their butts handed to them in every area when you look at the overal power level of the 3 codices.

Really, the actual standings in tournaments mean nothing when you are not comparing individual lists.The overal balance of the game is so far from what the bare minimum is that it's not even funny.