Aesthetics of Sampler Box armies vs. Spam armies

[sketchesofpayne]

Now I'll be the first to admit that from a balance, fun, gameplay aspect "spamming" units (which seems to be defined as 'more than two') is a negative thing. However, from an aesthetic point of view I dislike the chocolate 'sampler box' style army lists. The ones where no two units are alike.

To me these lists are like an army consisting of 1 blackhawk, 1 apache, 1 abrahms tank, 1 infanty squad in a hummer, 1 infantry squad on foot, 1 infantry squad in an APC, 1 howitzer, 1 mortar team. You'd never see a force like this in the field. Units tend to use the same equipment and vehicles for repair and resupply purposes if nothing else.

Now I field armies some would call 'spam-tatstic' but for me they have an aesthetically (http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/aesthetic) balanced feel. A kind of feng-shui (http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/feng shui) that may be unique only to me. For example:

3 tactical squads in rhinos
3 dreadnoughts in drop pods
3 landspeeder typhoons
1 terminator squad with terminator librarian

or

3 tactical squads in rhinos
2 land raider redeemers
2 assault terminator squads with terminator chaplain

or

Pedro Kantor and Librarian
3 sternguard squads (two 9-man and one 10-man) in drop pods
2 sniper scout squads
2 devastator squads in drop pods

or

1 commisar lord
4 veteran guard squads
3 armored sentinels with plasma cannons
3 scout sentinels with autocannons
2 standard leman russ tanks
1 leman russ executioner

Even if you don't agree with me, can you see what I'm saying?

[Tuatara]

I can see what you're saying. "Spamming" units is a bit of a odd thing to call it really. You put forward the most suited force to win your battle. Equally, going for an army that looks great aesthetically, but is not effective is also a little odd.

An army that looks aesthetically pleasing is always nice, but it is secondary to effectiveness.

[Commissar Lewis]

I can see what you are saying, man. A "spam list" does look more cohesive.

But then again, a rag-tag, sampler-box army has that underdog vibe going for it. In that army, you just put on Eye of the Tiger and face impossible odds, Rocky-style.

[lobster-overlord]

I personally think that "spamming" is more of when you ahve the same army of cheese over and over and over again. A tweaked out IG with lots of melta, and then the next table has it as well.... I would consider one army of over used units as cheese, and two armies or more of the same in teh same tourney would then be spam.

[Lerra]

I think it depends a bit on the army. With some armies, it makes sense to have a hodge-podge of units ("These are the only survivors of the planetary defense force").

[Sharp]

For certain types of units duplicating is too overpowered to be fun to play against for some people.

It's fairly simple.

[Warptiger]

Nothing wrong with spam, it makes more tactical sense.

It increases your odds of achieving whatever plan you have for the battle. One off units are fun, but it sucks when you roll badly and miss/fail/etc and have nothing else left to achieve your goals. It'd be like fielding an army where you have a single lascannon in the whole army, and if you miss, whoops, that's that. Try blowing up that tank next turn. Multiple copies of the same unit give you extra chances.


But nothing says you have to make every unit look identical. You could model two units with identical codex descriptions to look completely different, even though they'd play exactly the same. I play chaos mostly, so I'm absolutely spoiled: I can customize and convert them however I feel. But, you can do the same thing in other armies as well. Imperial guard armies could have squads drawn from totally different worlds, who have totally different gear (kind of like 2nd and 3rd edition guard armies you saw in white dwarf, where you'd see tallarn raider and mordian guard in the same army). Orks used to have multiple clans, and you'd frequently see 3-4 clans in the same army... each clan fulfilling different roles.

If you plan it out, you can have a spam army where every unit looks unique... even though on paper those unique looking squads are identical.

[Melissia]

Why should I try and make every single infantry squad unique?

Or, for that matter, every single one of my 120 Boyz?

Hell, for that matter four different Sisters squads use the exact same models anyway, with only Seraphim and Repentia using unique models-- and the latter are both ugly AND useless tactically.

[mysterex]

The problem I have with a lot of ork lists is that they are supposed to be "mobs" but the list often contains identically sized units like it's some sort of regular army.

It would take very little to make them more fluffy simply by randomising the unit sizes.

[Melissia]

The problem I have with THAT is that it messes up one's army list by making it obnoxious to deal with points ...

Also, I LIKE 30-Ork units... and if you're going mech, 12 is the largest you can get anyway...

[BlacknightIII]

Why is spam more than two of the same anything? Maybe it would be better called redundancy. Certain armies need copies of units to get the job done. One of my friends has a huge collection of IG and he usually takes three of everything and still sometimes the units wont accomplish their assigned tasks. Same thing with Ork and Nid troops, you need massive amounts of the same option especially if you running on foot. The only army I think can't get away with spaming is Space Marines and thats because you usually only need one of something to get the job done, maybe two.

[BlackKnight15624]

I honestly see the difference between unit redundancy and spamming as being an argument of power levels. For instance, melta weapons are extremely rare and precious, so you wouldn't normally see almost a company of veteran guardsmen in the same vicinity kitted to the teeth with them. Obviously, this is based on my perceptions of the fluff, so if you disagree, feel free.

I justify (to myself, anyway) that I don't spam because I take 3 tactical squads all kitted out with what I consider "standard issue," i.e. flamers and missile launchers. I see this as unit redundancy, as the frequency of specialist kit is proportional to how much an average unit of a given type would have access to.

[Melissia]

Err, you're thinking of plasma. Melta isn't THAT rare.

[BuFFo]

An army that looks aesthetically pleasing is always nice, but it is secondary to effectiveness.

In my opinion, I see an army as opposite from what you said.

For me, the aesthetics of an army is more important than an army's ability to WAAC.

I understand that some people play to win, and some play to have fun by not caring if they win. I, for instance, put my models on the table with the goal of having exciting turns, awesome die rolls, and great turn of events. I don't care if I win at all, I just want to enjoy the experience rather than the ending.

I would rather have two armies looking unique, awesomely converted with various unit choices slugging it out than two Chaos Marine lists with double Lash and4x Plague Marines units trying to over power the other play to win.

As for the army boxes, I don't care for them personally, so I have no opinion about them. If they are made for starter players, then they should be more balanced, but if they are made to compliment an army already in use, then they should have a variety of units.

[Gotthammer]

It'd be like fielding an army where you have a single lascannon in the whole army, and if you miss, whoops, that's that. Try blowing up that tank next turn. Multiple copies of the same unit give you extra chances.

I only take a single lascannon in my 1500 Marine army - he's never killed a vehicle, not even the Vyper he hit six times... I also only take one meltagun (I'm thinking of splashing out on a second).

I like it in that should something fail, I have something different to use. So rather than rolling for 4 lascannons I'm rolling for a Lascannon from long range, a multi-melta from the close up attack bike, krak missiles to the rear from the Land Speeder and Melta Bombs from the charging scouts etc. Variety being the spice of life and all that.

[Melissia]

Be glad your army list actually HAS variety then.

[the jeske]

I wonder how people play necron or nids without spaming .

[Melissia]

'Nids have multiple troops choices at least. Genestealers, Warriors, gaunts, gants, tervigons...

[Gotthammer]

True that Marines have more variety, but I mostly run big blocks of Tac marines with a couple of support units, only varying wargear.

If I were to run Sisters they'd probably not be the most effective as I'd take things like Dominions, Inquisitors (also good for taking my SoB Land Raider) and Arbites to have a more 'first line of defence' feel to them - ie an =I= shows up just before heresy strikes and gets together with the SoB and Arbites to arrange the smackdown.
I'd probably also induct so I can use my SoB Dreadnought (though that is cheating a bit).

I really liked the Witch Hunters codex when it came out, but the limited all-metal line for the SoBs put me off a full scale force (I hate having two models posed the same - they don't look like different people then!).

[Melissia]

If I were to run Sisters [...] I'd take [...] Inquisitors [...] and Arbites

Then you're not taking a Sisters army.

[Gotthammer]

Melissia, that's kind of what I meant - that I would do those things to get the variety so I was agreeing with you, though poorly worded.



I find spamming to be as much about boringness as repetitiveness. What I mean is that with Necrons (and to an extent other older codexes like DH/WH) and swarm codexes like 'nids and Orks is that there isn't much choice for the core of the army, or the extreme builds.

With Eldar, IG, and Marines there is a lot more variety of units to fill certain slots or roles - for troops Space Marines can have in various guises: Tactical Marines (several varieties), Scouts, Blood Claws, Assault Marines, Bikers, Terminators (Deathwing, Wolf Guard), Wolf Guard, Dreadnoughts, Death Company, Fenrisian Wolves and maybe one or two different. Add in Chaos and you get the whole gamut of Cult troopers.

Some are obviously better in a points to killy ratio sense, but the majority of lists I see play a variety of each. Deathwing is rarely called "Terminator Spam", at least not in a derogatory sense, but I have heard of Scout Spam / Sniper Spam. What's the difference? Maybe it's that Deathwing is rare, and famously hard to win regularly with as well as being true to the background, while Sniper Scouts are fairly common and predicatable (they'll sit still and shoot you - yay).

Take this to the IG and the now ubiquitous Melta-vet Spam. People who rail against it see it as dull, cheap, boring, a 'lame auto-win button' etc. I don't think that a list with six Penal Legion squads backed up by Storm Troopers as Arbites would be called 'Penal Legion spam' in the same way as the Melta-Vets.
The problem in my eyes is that the IG have this list with a huge variety in it, and someone's only taking a single tiny piece of that over and over.
Also, the reverse of what I said with Deathwing, that it's not what is generally considered to be the image of the IG: hordes of crappy dudes being fed to the meatgrinder backed up by tanks. This of course is a very narrow view of the background, but where marines having six identical Tactical Squads is in their codex (both real and imaginary), the image of a guard unit with 18 meltaguns in it is out to the extreme - much like sixty scouts showing up to a battle with sniper rifles. Did the enemy decide to attack the Chapter's target range or something?