difsta
04-21-2015, 07:21 PM
Hi All,
First time poster, long time reader :P
this is partially in response to the post written by Denzark over at A Commentary on Contemporary Balance in 40K (http://www.lounge.belloflostsouls.net/showthread.php?55087-A-Commentary-on-Contemporary-Balance-in-40K) I was thinking of simply responding there, but decided not to derail his thread, as it is a good read and there were some good discussions.
Re-balancing – Tournaments.
I respect the hell out of TOs, I really do. But in the same way I have demonstrated a level of subjectivity in 40K, TOs are naturally subjective. What you think is an improvement to the problems may not be. Why should we trust your house rules are better than the shambles the design team has come up with? Too much tinkering is counter-productive. What you can do is this: Firstly, place terrain symmetrically so it doesn’t matter which side gets which. Secondly, make sure each side has an equal number of objectives if the game is objective based (if you have an odd number and the players are placing, the gunline player who is lucky to have 3 objectives to place behind his ADL and tank park is already at an advantage. Next, ensure that whatever happens both sides get an equal number of turns (leave time between rounds in case of run over). Lastly, ensure you use a swiss progression system so that the naturally stronger players/armies face off against each other (you may think this point is obvious – but GW use random table selection through all rounds of their in-house GTs). Finally, consider not playing Maelstrom because it is just too random if you are trying to claim balance with your house rule nerfing of ranged D and invisibility.
Historically I would have completely agreed with him. At the tail end of 5th Edition I felt it was as balanced as 40k has ever been, and didn't really require any 'tweaking' to keep it balanced or 'fair'.
Then 6th, and then 7th came along, and with the constant releases of content, it has become harder and harder for the casual tournament goers to keep up. In the southern states of Australia we historically had tournaments that had a 'composition' score, a concept which most people are familiar with (if not, quick google will sort that out). Most tournament goers wanted it, but most tournament goers complained about it :) Later in 5th and pretty much all of 6th we dropped the comp score from a lot of our events. We left it up to GW to keep the table top balanced. Our attendances plumitted. We had events that were 80+ players drop to 20-30 players within 12 months, and then 12 months later not even run. We did a poll of the veteran gamers that had left the hobby, and the biggest gripe they had was lack of balance, and the removal of comp scores meant that if they wanted to be able to keep up with the 'arms race' that was becoming 40k, then they had to invest too much time, money and effort to constantly be changing armies. Now some armies had the benefits you could take different choices and suddenly your army was 'back up to scratch', other codeces were were not competetive, and you either changed codex, allied a codex, or were reserved to the fact you were likely to get your butt handed to you most rounds.
A bunch of gamers in Australia (about 10 of us initially) came up with a system we called Community Comp (www.communitycomp.org (http://www.communitycomp.org/)). This system has grown over the last 2 years, and has over 15 people now on the Community Comp panel. We had a large number of leagues run it to start with, so players could tweak their list every week and see how the system would grow/evolve. We then ran a bunch of free events where people could come along and test out the system (we are talking about 10-20 player events over about 3-4 rounds). The system took off. We now have a large number of events ranging from 15 players up to 100 players now using the system all over Australia (and even in a few other countries now also).
Now the system doesn't change the rules, we aren't nerfing powers like invisibility, we aren't changing how D weapons work. We are simply limitting the strength of the armies that can attend an event. Some events use the Community Comp System 'as it is'. So they allocate a number of comp points to the tournament, and players submit a list and are allocated the appropriate percentage of that based on their list strength. Others have decided that they don't want to have comp scores, all they want to do is stop the absolute BS lists from attending. So they put a credit limit, eg. 'You can't spend more than 14 Community Comp Credits on your list'.
The system is constantly evolving. We have a large number of TO's that have been kind enough to send us the army lists in attendance at their events. This isn't specifically used to change scores, but more to see what level the community are playing at as a whole. This helps us gauge where to set the bar. If a list is doing better than its comp score suggests it should, we don't simply go and now hit that list, but we do take a look at it to make sure we haven't missed some unit or combo. And if that unit or combo is something that deserves an alteration in credits, we then look at updating it.
We have a 3 monthly "full release". Whereby there will be any of the 'large' changes to the system, or previously release codeces. And then we have what we refer to as "minor releases" that we put out roughly 1-2 weeks after a new codex/campaign/data slate/etc. get released. We only update rules for units that are within that release, or have a direct affect on existing units.
I recommend having a read of the document. And before picking any one particular points cost as right or wrong, put your standard list that you love to play the most through the system. See how many points you get. People are expected to spend points, the average list in attendance usually spends between 8-12 credits.
If you have any questions about the system, you can post them here, or on our Facebook Page (https://www.facebook.com/CommunityComp)
- Josh
First time poster, long time reader :P
this is partially in response to the post written by Denzark over at A Commentary on Contemporary Balance in 40K (http://www.lounge.belloflostsouls.net/showthread.php?55087-A-Commentary-on-Contemporary-Balance-in-40K) I was thinking of simply responding there, but decided not to derail his thread, as it is a good read and there were some good discussions.
Re-balancing – Tournaments.
I respect the hell out of TOs, I really do. But in the same way I have demonstrated a level of subjectivity in 40K, TOs are naturally subjective. What you think is an improvement to the problems may not be. Why should we trust your house rules are better than the shambles the design team has come up with? Too much tinkering is counter-productive. What you can do is this: Firstly, place terrain symmetrically so it doesn’t matter which side gets which. Secondly, make sure each side has an equal number of objectives if the game is objective based (if you have an odd number and the players are placing, the gunline player who is lucky to have 3 objectives to place behind his ADL and tank park is already at an advantage. Next, ensure that whatever happens both sides get an equal number of turns (leave time between rounds in case of run over). Lastly, ensure you use a swiss progression system so that the naturally stronger players/armies face off against each other (you may think this point is obvious – but GW use random table selection through all rounds of their in-house GTs). Finally, consider not playing Maelstrom because it is just too random if you are trying to claim balance with your house rule nerfing of ranged D and invisibility.
Historically I would have completely agreed with him. At the tail end of 5th Edition I felt it was as balanced as 40k has ever been, and didn't really require any 'tweaking' to keep it balanced or 'fair'.
Then 6th, and then 7th came along, and with the constant releases of content, it has become harder and harder for the casual tournament goers to keep up. In the southern states of Australia we historically had tournaments that had a 'composition' score, a concept which most people are familiar with (if not, quick google will sort that out). Most tournament goers wanted it, but most tournament goers complained about it :) Later in 5th and pretty much all of 6th we dropped the comp score from a lot of our events. We left it up to GW to keep the table top balanced. Our attendances plumitted. We had events that were 80+ players drop to 20-30 players within 12 months, and then 12 months later not even run. We did a poll of the veteran gamers that had left the hobby, and the biggest gripe they had was lack of balance, and the removal of comp scores meant that if they wanted to be able to keep up with the 'arms race' that was becoming 40k, then they had to invest too much time, money and effort to constantly be changing armies. Now some armies had the benefits you could take different choices and suddenly your army was 'back up to scratch', other codeces were were not competetive, and you either changed codex, allied a codex, or were reserved to the fact you were likely to get your butt handed to you most rounds.
A bunch of gamers in Australia (about 10 of us initially) came up with a system we called Community Comp (www.communitycomp.org (http://www.communitycomp.org/)). This system has grown over the last 2 years, and has over 15 people now on the Community Comp panel. We had a large number of leagues run it to start with, so players could tweak their list every week and see how the system would grow/evolve. We then ran a bunch of free events where people could come along and test out the system (we are talking about 10-20 player events over about 3-4 rounds). The system took off. We now have a large number of events ranging from 15 players up to 100 players now using the system all over Australia (and even in a few other countries now also).
Now the system doesn't change the rules, we aren't nerfing powers like invisibility, we aren't changing how D weapons work. We are simply limitting the strength of the armies that can attend an event. Some events use the Community Comp System 'as it is'. So they allocate a number of comp points to the tournament, and players submit a list and are allocated the appropriate percentage of that based on their list strength. Others have decided that they don't want to have comp scores, all they want to do is stop the absolute BS lists from attending. So they put a credit limit, eg. 'You can't spend more than 14 Community Comp Credits on your list'.
The system is constantly evolving. We have a large number of TO's that have been kind enough to send us the army lists in attendance at their events. This isn't specifically used to change scores, but more to see what level the community are playing at as a whole. This helps us gauge where to set the bar. If a list is doing better than its comp score suggests it should, we don't simply go and now hit that list, but we do take a look at it to make sure we haven't missed some unit or combo. And if that unit or combo is something that deserves an alteration in credits, we then look at updating it.
We have a 3 monthly "full release". Whereby there will be any of the 'large' changes to the system, or previously release codeces. And then we have what we refer to as "minor releases" that we put out roughly 1-2 weeks after a new codex/campaign/data slate/etc. get released. We only update rules for units that are within that release, or have a direct affect on existing units.
I recommend having a read of the document. And before picking any one particular points cost as right or wrong, put your standard list that you love to play the most through the system. See how many points you get. People are expected to spend points, the average list in attendance usually spends between 8-12 credits.
If you have any questions about the system, you can post them here, or on our Facebook Page (https://www.facebook.com/CommunityComp)
- Josh