The dissolution of the Force Organisation Chart?

[salamut2202]

okay, I found a pic of a very old game back from 4th edition in the game. It was a pretty basic game, some buildings on a bit of wood painted green. It was space marines vs tyranids on the table and I could see how very standard this game was (it was in progress but I could clearly see) a:

-Space marine captain in a command squad;
-A group of teminators;
-A dreadnought;
-2 tactical squads;
-2 scout squads;
-Some bikes;
-Some assault marines;
-A devastator squad;
-A predator;
-A razorback;

Verses

-A tyranid hive tyrant;
-A brood of warriors
-Some lictors scattered about
-A very large termigant brood
-A larger hormagaunt brood
-Some genestealers
-A couple of ripper bases
-Some raveners
-A few garoyles
-S few zoanthropes scattered around
-A carnifex

Now, it looked really standard, a couple of cool, painted forces with a bit of everything and you could see what was elite, what was fast and how cool that looked on an army.

Let's say, disregarding points, what we can have now?
So we'll say we're playing spacemarines over 2,000 so we have potentially 2 armies worth of those as my primary detatchment,
An Eldar or Sisters or something allied detatchment,
An inquisitorial detatchment,
A fortification detatchment,
A formation like the Firebase Support Cadre,
A lord of war detatchment.

I'm all for options but is the force organisation chart near done away with? I mean the end result might end up nothing like a space marine army. the only thing the FOC in concerned about is there's these things called troops and they're scoring and heavy and fast can also score sometimes. There's also a dude and he roles on a table to get a trait. It's less and less a consideration about anything anymore. I'm all for fun and casual play but I never thought that this structure of the game would be laxed to such a  degree.

So does the Force Org matter anymore and should it?

[Arguleon-veq]

I think its utterly, utterly insane what they have done in the past month or so to the basic core of the game. Why have they done it? to sell downloadable rules and bigger 'combo' box sets.

It is getting to the point at the minute where I actually cant keep up and im a very competitive player who has ALWAYS made sure I have every rulebook/codex/faq out. But there is no way I am buying these 30 quid supplements even the one that you get an actual book for, I will never in a million years pay top price for some downloaded rules, they a few years ago they would have put on the GW website for free!! with the rate of 'dataslates' coming out now I cant see how anybody can justify keeping up with it.

The fact that you can have a 'legal' army in it now that is;

Inquisitor
3 Marine Flyers
Tau Broadsides and a Riptide
Wraithknight, Wraithlords, Wraithguard
Superheavy

In one legal army. It doesnt even have a troop choice!

I am really, really hoping that the tournament scene doesnt buy into this utter nonsense and just gives a blanket ban on everything that isnt standard rulebook and codex.

I doubt I could ever quit the game because I have invested so much time and money into it but what they have done the past month or so has just totally blown me away with how daft it is. I will continue to buy main codex and have whatever main rulebook  is out but beyond that I am not buying into it all and if that means I will only really be able to play games with my mates at home then so be it, I will have to drop out of going to tournaments and clubs.

[Narric]

I personally don't think GW cares anymore. re just trying to push more overpriced downloads and Big kits out, just to fill their own pockets and pay share-holders.

The first version of Apocalypse was probably the first hint we got, as imo, its all gone downhill from their in terms of keeping the FOC a core part of your army.

I think if I got back into 40k, I'd probably refuse to play anyone with anything more than a single Allied detachment and possibly a single Rulebook fortification. Anything more then that in my opponents army, and I know I'm not going to have a fun game.

[Pilum]

If I was being charitable and to play devils advocate, it could be that GW want to encourage more narrative thinking, rather than the 1500-pts-pitched-battle-go! stereotype. I don't think this is a conscious decision, mind, but it may be better to look at the releases as a toolbox rather than a must-use. Disclaimer: while I play hard, I am not a competition gamer in the least.

I'd link it to two things: "Big Cats in Normandy" and trying to Random Battle the Falklands in something like Steel Panthers 2 (for those who go back that far!!!). They're both similar problems with gaming but in slightly different directions.

Big Cats: anyone who's done WW2 games knows what's coming here. EVERY German player almost invariably loads up on Tigers and Panthers where available. Pz4's and the like are simply point sinks for more armour when they can't afford a Cat, even though they were far more common.

Steel Panthers 2 was a post-WW2 TBS, very grog, very numbers based. It would generate random battles for you based on actual org charts. So set it to May 1982, GB v Argentina (Might have been "generic western-equipped army"), auto-select forces, go. And be amazed that the battle of Goose Green was apparently a massive clash of tanks.

The thought occurs that this could tie into the off-cited problem of casters in D&D being able to break the game with the right spells; a GM saying "uh, no, time/dimension magic doesn't work that way/at all in this world" is apparently anathema.

Just because the options are there doesn't mean they HAVE to be used. Just another choice in the toolbox. Perhaps this game of X-Wing is at Battle of Yavin, so no B-Wings. You're playing LotR, so no more than 9 "Wraith Lords" in the ruleset of your choice (and yes a friend of mine did once see someone try to use 12 Nazgûl...). Yes this is stating the obvious, I know.

Edit: this is not to say that I necessarily agree with everything that's coming out if it leads to No Fun and relentless spamming, but this is perhaps the price we pay for having a comparatively free and easy "rule of cool" driven environment. Having the Riptides Of Doom supporting the Last March of Iyanden while the Eagle Khan of the White Scars flies air cover would be a pretty impressive end of campaign battle (and the last scene of the anime! ) but to see it week in week out gets old.

Edit 2: I suppose as a further analogy: Codex US Army would be written to let you field any post-2000 US battlegroup. You would use the same army list for Afghanistan, Iraq or even a what-if based on the Korean sabre-rattling of a few months ago, but no-one would say that the same list would be "realistic" for each one (cheap "Afghan Army" allies holding the line outside Seoul springs to mind) - yet this is what every codex/army book has to cover, including occasional oddball options based on one or two actions (say, allowing a squads dedicated marksman to carry a Barret .50 rather than his standard weapon due to the presence of PFC Jones at the village of Qum'quat, next thing you know EVERYONE takes that upgrade). This is a strictly in-universe view. I'm not denying that the lists are primarily written to sell pretty toys! Hope this is making sense...

[Chicop76]

Actually I stopped playing at stores due to the Inquisition codex and the haphazard effort with sisters. Frankly it's too much and I am clueless what to build or use.

Thanks to inquisition it shuts down marines like a few months later.  Who wants to play if the next codex or two comes out and counters your army. Marines with eldar and tau for example.

I think allies has gotten ridiculous.  Also the data sheets are pretty bad. I mean really the new prince is not broken at all when you think about now you have to deal with re rollable 2 plus cover saves and invulnerable saves.

[CoffeeGrunt]

At my local we don't really use Inquisition, Fliers or Forts, and no-one's rolled up with Superheavies yet. There's one player who runs Inq/Forts along with his Sisters, but that's a pretty fluffy Witch Hunters list rather than an engineered block of cheddar.

This is really going to come down to the players involved. I can see why Tournament players are worried, because most Tournament players work to squeeze every drop of uncertainty from a game in order to maximise success and minimise fun. (I really don't like Tournaments.) Letting one guy take a Revenant against your usual All Comers list just boils down to who fires first, and can you get Melta in range before the D guns slap you off the board?

We've got some scenarios planned against a Stompa, though, using that scenario where you take a shedload of models against it and see how quickly you can bring it down. That'll be fun, I'm planning a full mech and suits force of Railheads and Fusion teams. Very rare I get to play something like that.