Losing Force Organisation

[lantzkev]

2nd edition, every character was better compared to today lol...

Then again some characters could take out 8times their points in models...

[ehlijen]

And then if you want to make a Guard Armoured Company, Marine reserve Company, Eldar Aspect Shrine army, etc. etc., you're srewed.

And is there a reason you shouldn't be?

Part of why 40k is getting so unbalanced (see GK threads...) is that more and more armies don't focus on basic troops. IG parking lots are not an army that works well in a rules environment written primarily for infantry vs infantry fights. Terminators as troops are throwing out the curve of what is needed to make an army all comers.

I liked the concept behind the FOC. But it needs to be applied more strictly, with no mutability. And it needs to be varied by mission so that you can play desperate last stand by heroes or massive meatgrinders with more mooks and fire support. The core of every army should be something that the unspecialised core of every other army actually has a decent chance against, ie about 50-50 +/- respective tactics.

[Grimbad]

2nd edition, every character was better compared to today lol...

Then again some characters could take out 8times their points in models...

Not to have this debate again, but every character's stats were better compared to today, thanks to the hero rank progression scheme. The system, however, was more limiting to characters than later editions, for example only allowing them to strike models in base-to-base, and not obliging the enemy to pile in as many as possible.

Although psykers were psykers.

[Glen_Savet]

Like WarmaHordes?

*SNIP*

Sorry, spotted this and had to laugh. There are quite obviously subpar choices in each faction in Warmahordes. Taking jacks for example, is nearly always worse than taking infantry.

[Charistoph]

The Necron Codex was printed with the FoC inside it. I am not sure, but it doesn't seem that they would replace it, or waist the ink printing it if it were going to be removed.

Look at the Beastmen codex. They have the Fantasy 6th/7th old army building list, even though 8th Edition came out less than 6 months later. Necrons came out considerably earlier to 6th Edition than Beastmen did, so unfortunately, this is a poor reason/example/standard to go buy.

Sorry, spotted this and had to laugh. There are quite obviously subpar choices in each faction in Warmahordes. Taking jacks for example, is nearly always worse than taking infantry.

That was kind of my point, actually. While WarmaHordes has better balance, overall, than 40K, there are suboptimal units in every force. It just seems that everyone uses that system as the example of "perfect" game balance.

Just as a side note, they don't really have an FOC, either. I don't think it would quite work for 40K, though (though it would be fun to try). Most of the armies are just too dang big these days.

[Tarax]

Partly I like the change to percentages as it would allow me to use more units then currently. Commonly these units a low cost in points, so as part of the total army they are very small. Eg. in a 2000 point army currently I can have max 3 Heavy units, but with 25%, ie 500 points, I can have 10 50-points units.

Yet, we'll have to wait and see. And apart from changing to percentages, I think that there will be a different categorization and units will change from categories.

[Deadnight]

Sorry, spotted this and had to laugh. There are quite obviously subpar choices in each faction in Warmahordes. Taking jacks for example, is nearly always worse than taking infantry.

Not necessarily. Most casters can do 2 jacks quite easily. And its not about being "better". jacks have uses, and roles that infantry cant really do. But yeah, a force of all jacks is tricky to do well with.

On topic though.

the FOC is a bad idea, that is a core component of a badly designed, and badly balanced game. remove the FOC, and you havent removed the badly designed, or the badly balanced game issues.

Personally, i'd look into other ideas. take the unit/vehicle cap in Dawn of War. 20pts of infantry. 20pts of vehicles. One thing to take note of is its important to define what you want 40k to be. infantry-centric, with armoured support? that seems reasonable to most people's expectations.



I've always liked the idea (but implementation is something ive never really given much thought to) of having free HQs that unlock a certain "build". builds would be based in the fluff. have a company commander, for example who unlocks a battle company. you get access to reduced price tactical squads, assault squads and devestator squads as a result. Depending on game size, you've got "battle company support assets" like Armour, transports, Dreadnoughts, bikes, veterans and scouts. Have a terminator commander who unlocks a veteran company. you get access to reduced price terminators and dreadnoughts, with correspondingly slightly more expensive "veteran company support assets" like Land Raiders, tactical squads and scots etc.

However, this is just for Marines. personally, id envision unique "builds" for every codex. tau for example "hunter cadre build" would have a "core" to their builds comprising the elements of a manta-based hunter cadre (crisis suits, fire warriors, and up to 4 vehicles worth of armour) with supporting elements coming from auxiliary support, broadside, stealth and pathfinder cadres. Imperial Guard could have an "infantry commander" that unlocks an infantry platoon as a "core" with support elements (armour, SW teams, HW teams). A tank commander would be the opposite.

the trick is to base these "core builds with support elements" on the fluff whilst giving players enough leeway to customise and personalise their army. I dont want to be told "this is the exact composition of a battle company. this is how you MUST play it". give rewards for sticking to the theme (like in warmachine theme lists) like slightly cheaper points costs to tactical squads in a battle company build.

It could be an interesting exercise that could open up the game. plus it would be a nice way of having future expansions (through magazines, interwebs etc) listing "new" builds - rather than just battle company, and veteran company marines, how about armoured company marines unlocked by a master of the forge commander. how about drop pod marines. how about last stand marines.

[HereBeDragons]

I am hoping stuff like FOC and "scoring" units go away in 6th. That will go a long way in fixing some of the GK cheese, since the FOC doesn't matter to them anyway.

The FOC is too limiting now and troops are too important. If GW wants to focus on larger point value games, which they always do to sell more models, I can see these things both drastically changing. I could see percentages coming back where you have to spend 25+ on troops and no more than 50% on any single category. Then every army could do its version of purifier spam and GK would be taken down a notch.

Im not sure how everyone doing purifier spam equivalent lists would be a good thing for the game? And if it were possible its pretty safe to say alot of competitive players would do it. The problem here is with the GK codex, not the FOC.

[Vet.Sister]

I've always liked the idea (but implementation is something ive never really given much thought to) of having free HQs that unlock a certain "build". builds would be based in the fluff. have a company commander, for example who unlocks a battle company. you get access to reduced price tactical squads, assault squads and devestator squads as a result. Depending on game size, you've got "battle company support assets" like Armour, transports, Dreadnoughts, bikes, veterans and scouts. Have a terminator commander who unlocks a veteran company. you get access to reduced price terminators and dreadnoughts, with correspondingly slightly more expensive "veteran company support assets" like Land Raiders, tactical squads and scots etc.

However, this is just for Marines. personally, id envision unique "builds" for every codex. tau for example "hunter cadre build" would have a "core" to their builds comprising the elements of a manta-based hunter cadre (crisis suits, fire warriors, and up to 4 vehicles worth of armour) with supporting elements coming from auxiliary support, broadside, stealth and pathfinder cadres. Imperial Guard could have an "infantry commander" that unlocks an infantry platoon as a "core" with support elements (armour, SW teams, HW teams). A tank commander would be the opposite.

the trick is to base these "core builds with support elements" on the fluff whilst giving players enough leeway to customise and personalise their army. I dont want to be told "this is the exact composition of a battle company. this is how you MUST play it". give rewards for sticking to the theme (like in warmachine theme lists) like slightly cheaper points costs to tactical squads in a battle company build.

It could be an interesting exercise that could open up the game. plus it would be a nice way of having future expansions (through magazines, interwebs etc) listing "new" builds - rather than just battle company, and veteran company marines, how about armoured company marines unlocked by a master of the forge commander. how about drop pod marines. how about last stand marines.

I kinda like this idea as well.

[RandomThoughts]

I'd love to loose the FOC. Never liked it much, and I'm already enjoying more and more games without similar restrictions in army selection.

But then again, flexible army selection depends on good balancing, and the best way to ensure the presence of "troops" on the field is by making them worth their points, so players actually desire to play them. The day tournament and net lists are mostly Tactical Marines, Eldar Guardians and Ork Boys with some bit players with more specialized roles thrown in, I'd say we've pretty much reached the point where the FOC has become obsolete.

[Hendarion]

As an Eldar-player I can nearly be sure that WAAC-players without any force-org-restriction would chose only Fire-Dragons in Serpents and HQ.
Imo the slot-system as currently existing is an epic fail. It works bad on low-point-games because armies are min-maxed. And it works bad on large games, because either you double the slots and end up with min-maxed again or you leave them as-is and end up with armies that are pumped with lots of points of useless junk. Well... ok, that might again be an Eldar-view of the situation, but you get the point I guess.
Imo percent-system is perfectly fine and makes sense at any scale. I don't see either why someone should be able to fill 1500 points of his army with AV14-vehicle-sqadrons while someone else can only fit in 350 in the same force-org-slot. That never made sense to me and with a percent-system both players get treated equally.

[Kevlar]

Im not sure how everyone doing purifier spam equivalent lists would be a good thing for the game? And if it were possible its pretty safe to say alot of competitive players would do it. The problem here is with the GK codex, not the FOC.

The GK codex pretty much thumbs its nose at the FOC. Troop slots mean nothing to them and trying to build a game based around a concept like the current FOC with a codex like GK that can totally ignore it is silly. The game would be better for everyone if the FOC just goes away. I'd like to see GK take on an ork army with six battlewagons full of scoring burna boyz.

[wilsongrahams]

As someone that has Blood Angels, Orks, Tyranids, Eldar, Grey Knights (not gamed with though) and starting Necrons, I can say that the FOC and the percentage system are both imperfect. For example, I can take 1200pts of terminators in a regular FOC chart for Blood Angels, yet I cannot take four types of elites for my Orks totalling just 300pts. There is a wide gulf there. I would expect a system that uses both would be more beneficial however this is far harder to achieve. For example it is very easy to fill a FOC chart with orks unless you take a few point heavy options. Having say 3 slots but also a 25% max limit means that said orks can have their three choices, yet the blood angels cannot be composed almost entirely of terminators. Multiple small units for variety does not make for a more powerful army in MOST cases (I'm sure it does in some min maxing cases though) and so the FOC can be restricting at times. For example 6 boyz units in trukks would max out your foc chart and yet not provide 25% minimum in a 4k game (larger than average but not unheard of). One or the other, whichever is the lower/greater depending upon the slot would be more useful at times.

I would dearly love to be able to use Burnas, Lootas, Tankbustas and Nobs in an army and yet I have to use one of the 'breaks foc' options (a warboss) to do so, and this kinda defeats the purpose of the chart to begin with. For my necron force, I would love to have a triarch stalker and 5 of each lychguard and praetorians with each weapon option, yet this would need 5 foc slots, but only be 21 models, yet I can take 21 models in 3 slots just by now having variety and having larger units. This is an example of where percentages would be useful, and yet other armies could heavily abuse a percentage system.

I guess the idea that I see as being the best so far without having limits as both the foc and percentages have depending upon the army (I know orks to terminators are extremes but it is a good point) is that of allowing one Elite, Fast or Heavy for each troops choice.

Another option is one that my group and I are thinking of adding to fantasy to prevent death stars, and than no unit can exceed 20% of the armies total size, meaning in a 3k game you cannot realistically take hordes of elite units, and it means that there is more variety too. Whilst the exact percentage would need looking at for 40k this would prevent taking the minimum core and maximum elite (5 tacticals per slot and 10 terminators in each elite for example) and a different option to allow variety of choice for say the orks would be that the army could not have more than 10% (for example) of any unit type from elite, fast or heavy (probably different for each), so you could have as many different elite units as you wanted but would have to keep them small to fit them all into the total points, and not max out on any one type.

I realise I have thrown a few different things in here and not all could be put into one system, I just wanted to highlight the issue with having just one system or the other whilst trying to cover different armies and points values.

[lantzkev]

The GK codex pretty much thumbs its nose at the FOC. Troop slots mean nothing to them and trying to build a game based around a concept like the current FOC with a codex like GK that can totally ignore it is silly. The game would be better for everyone if the FOC just goes away. I'd like to see GK take on an ork army with six battlewagons full of scoring burna boyz.

No offense, but the GK codex just makes some troops that aren't normally that is all. It is no different than the other codexes abilities to make certain units troops, the only thing is does is allow selections from the elite choice become troops, which guess what?

Blood angels Dante -sang guards are troops
Blood angels astroth - removes limit on death guard
Tryannids - Termagants = Tervigons as troops
Dark Eldar - haemonculous make Wracks troops
Dark Eldar - Baron makes Hellions troops
Dark Eldar - Urien makes Wracks Troops
Tau - Farsight = xv8s as troops
Space Wolves - Logan = wolf guard as troops
Space Wolves - Canis = Fenrisian wolves as troops


I'm sure there are a few more examples, the tau one I'd have to double check, but as you can see it's HARDLY unique to grey knights.

[AlphariusOmegon20]

Really doesn't work.

I don't see why not.

1.) From GW's perspective, this means we need more variety of models, but less of them. And less transports, because those cost points too. 25% of 2000 is only 500; that means one Elite in a Land Raider, maybe. GW isn't going to want that solution. Neither are all the people who bought armies that get totally shut down by this logic. It would make more sense if the books were filled with non-optimal choices with kits available but they generally aren't; GW's obvious marketing strategy is to release in waves, have us buy the less powerful but cool looking stuff to start a new army, and then later deploy the irresistably awesome stuff. Doing force org percents would totally mess up that very successful model of deployment.

! don't believe that, 500 pts for your elites is fine. The point of such a system is limit Elites, so that they do truly represent their rare nature. I also don't think anyone would argue with less transports, considering all the complaints about parking lot armies and Razorspam.

2.) It invalidates tons of army builds. Many builds nowadays revolve around elites or heavy support being maxed out. While it could level things out, it could also really dull up the game and make it so that higher point levels become the standard as a counter to that. This is probably more along a line that would benefit GW, but it would piss off the player base royally.

Which goes against the whole purpose of why a unit is placed in eites in the first place, it's not supposed to be a common unit, unlike the lists you described which tend to view Troops as an elite unit due to being taken as more of an afterthought.

I also do not hear any WFB players complaining about higher point games either.

3.) In fantasy the units and what they do are all much more centralized. Much of the unit functions are described in the main rulebook. In 40k it's obviously not like that, and limited armies to take things by points is going to really hurt lots of forces.

Again I don't see how it would affect it, even with your post. WoC players are consistently outnumbered by opponent armies, yet are quite powerful because of their stats. There is a balance there. I see no reason why it can't work for 40K, as it did for WFB.

this sort of rigid percentage structure isn't going to work well in 40k. In fantasy you have common troops,followed by elite troops, followed by elite-er troops.

Fast Attacks aren't more elite than Troops, and Elites more elite than Fast Attacks? How is that not the case?

Units are organised by their rarity rather then their role.

Agreed.

In comparison 40K organises troops by function more so then rarity.

I dispute that. The fact that Tacticals are fairly common compared to Assaults is striking ( 6 vs 2 per company), and the fact that Termies are even more rare than Assaults is also true. The same goes for Empire Swordsmen, when compared to Greatswords and Steam Tanks. So again, how is it based on function instead of rarity?

This is a huge change to how armies are built which would have a huge (and most likely highly negative) effect on all existing armies.

Compared to the highly negative restrictions we now deal with thanks to the FOC chart.

if an army or a build happens to heavily favour one FOC slot over the other, using percentage systems would just make such armies virtually impossible to work with.

I dispute that. I think it would make it easier to build such armies.

A percentage system would require 40k units to be completely reorganised based on how often they should be fielded rather then their battlefield role.

I dispute that also. I don't think any change is required cosmetically. It only requires looking at what the organizations means, which is a philosophical change only.

Even if this were better then the FOC it'd require a huge change to all existing codexs and likely make 40k a bit of a mess for the first half of an edition as armies are reworked and reorganised to get the most from the new system.

Again I dispute that, and could be handled with simple FAQs, much like the High Elves were handled.

I don't see GW bothering with the fallout from players with hugely invalidated armies

Armies get invalidated every edition change, that's nothing new. It's not like it hasn't happened before. Just talk to an Iron Warriors Chaos player about the changes brought by the switch from 3.5 to 4th ed codexes.

nor the huge task or rebuilding unit organization when the FOC system isn't all that bad anyway.

No it isn't that bad, it's a downright horrible mechanic that has served well past it's time, and desperately needs to be changed.

[althathir]

I don't understand why everyone is trying to reinvent the wheel here...

HQ 25% max
Elite 25% max
Troops 25% min
Fast attack 25% max
Heavy Support 25% max

Based off of 8th ed WFB numbers, which do work.

I think the percentages wouldn't line up quite like that, more like
HQ 35% max
Elite 50% max
Troops 25% min
Fast Attack 25 max
Heavy Support 25% max

Hq's would have more points, because there is only one category (fantasy has 25% for each lords & heroes). 35% allows for a lot more of iconic hq choices in a 2000 point game (captain & retinue, seer council, tryant & guard), and crons appear designed to be hq heavy. Elites would be similiar to the special slot, fast attack and heavy support would be more limited (I expect most fliers to be FA - just speculation). I think there would also have to be some sort of spamming rule, otherwise units like long fangs, psydreads, etc. would be spammed even more than they are now.

Those percentages would also allow for transports to fit in better, because there is a bit of a catch 22 where they are concerned cause some armies rely on them more than others.

That said I really don't mind the FoC, I think its a solid system but fifth started to give each armies ways of modifying it, and now the differences between the haves & the have nots is sizable. So if they stick with it, giving players options to modify it a bit (by trading for slots for example) would be nice or just sticking with this design paradigm throughout 6th (though they would have to fix fire points and wound allocation)

[Tarax]

I've always liked the idea (but implementation is something ive never really given much thought to) of having free HQs that unlock a certain "build". builds would be based in the fluff. have a company commander, for example who unlocks a battle company. you get access to reduced price tactical squads, assault squads and devestator squads as a result.

If you do this, ie have reduced costs for certain unit types, you will still get some spam-lists, as some units will always be better and thus are more likely to be taken en masse.
Balance in points can only be achieved if you always rate a model by itself. Its place in the FOC (or whatever we will get) has to make no difference.
I don't mind if some units get unlocked to get a certain build, but there are other ways to restrict units. Making certian units 0-1 is an option, or the current limitation of max 3 Elites.
HQ unlocking units, like Aspect Autarchs unlock their Aspect Warriors or SM biker captain unlocks Biker units, are easily implemented. Or an upgrade, ie point cost, can unlock certain units or abilities, like Salamander Captain with the chapter traits of Vulcan He'Stan.

[Gondrak]

they would need to change every codex to get a good percentage system.
like chapters unwritten said in his 3.), the units work differently.
the system would need a complete overhaul to look like the 2nd Edition one that Captain Gallas posted.

[Bloodknight]

The system, however, was more limiting to characters than later editions, for example only allowing them to strike models in base-to-base, and not obliging the enemy to pile in as many as possible.

Yup, 10 guardsmen could keep Abaddon occupied for a whole game. Expensive characters that were not psykers were a massive waste back then.

[ehlijen]

I think the percentages wouldn't line up quite like that, more like
HQ 35% max
Elite 50% max
Troops 25% min
Fast Attack 25 max
Heavy Support 25% max

Hq's would have more points, because there is only one category (fantasy has 25% for each lords & heroes). 35% allows for a lot more of iconic hq choices in a 2000 point game (captain & retinue, seer council, tryant & guard), and crons appear designed to be hq heavy. Elites would be similiar to the special slot, fast attack and heavy support would be more limited (I expect most fliers to be FA - just speculation). I think there would also have to be some sort of spamming rule, otherwise units like long fangs, psydreads, etc. would be spammed even more than they are now.

Those percentages would also allow for transports to fit in better, because there is a bit of a catch 22 where they are concerned cause some armies rely on them more than others.

That said I really don't mind the FoC, I think its a solid system but fifth started to give each armies ways of modifying it, and now the differences between the haves & the have nots is sizable. So if they stick with it, giving players options to modify it a bit (by trading for slots for example) would be nice or just sticking with this design paradigm throughout 6th (though they would have to fix fire points and wound allocation)

The whole point of such a system would be to restrict such units. 500 points buys a lot in HQ at 2k. That's 1 basic marine characters + command squad + rhino +140 points of upgrades for the lot.

Likewise 6 assault termies + crusader fits into the 500 point bracket. Or you could just take a non dedicated landraider.

The idea of any such system is that the iconic units are the ones found in the core/common/squads/troops section.