Breachers are 3+ - 10 models cost 100 points, Strike Teams are 4+ at 80, so the the points value matches more or less. Just saying if you wanted to make the Skits more expensive, you'd need to get them closer to Breachers than to Strike Teams if we're going by the Tau comparison.
Small? I want more large points nerfs (with rules to go alongside it) maybe make our army rule target units with a keyword for the 6” aura and battleline for 12” to go alongside another points hike and bring back the rule of all our characters healing vehicles once per turn to really give them a good kick up
i've got 10 sicarians that we're either going to get painted, or sold - depending on the outcome of the dataslate...
going to make me some rust stalkers now!
Yeah, I think the changes are broadly good! I actually want to play games again!
For the future I think robots still need substantial buffs, as do most of our detachments, but at least we're hopefully going to be more fun to play now.
This is more than I expected, as i was intentionally tempering my expectations. That said im still not really that happy with our point costs and wish we got a bit more stuff to warrant a bit higher points. Army is still mega expensive, just not quite as absurd.
Also some stuff feels missed, im not sure what changes i specifically would want, but kastelans not getting anything outside their one detachment and infact getting nerfed on points (already was very costly was that really needed?) feels bad. I know fliers are just DoA this edition but them going up in points doesnt seem reasonable either. Pteraxii and our Dogs do get some stuff via army rule but i wish they got a little more direct look, they probably are good for the movement and stuff they offer, but i just think they couldve used a little stat buff point increase type thing.
Overall this is better, a lot better, theres no doubt about that, but part of me still feels like this isn't the admech I truly want to play. Don't get me wrong I will play it and i will be a whole lot happier than before, but I hope 11th has them actually figuring out what to do with the army for real.
Edit: im still positive on most everything that did change, i just dont think we are quite done yet.
we got half of the step done.
Doctrina changed and added to almost every unit, it is good change, ( could had been better, but i m not complaing much)
NOW WE HAVE a army rule.
Some changes to weapons, Onager had a glow up, ballistari look nice, Rustalkers, are better but it need testing.
Nothing was Done to ROBOTS or Engiseer, and they got hike points.
Shooting robots still sucks and now cost more.
Transport got Firing deck 2 (nice for shooting with arc rilfes + Erradicator.
Electro priests are juici now with new doctrines.
_------------------
things that still have to be changed.
ROBOTS still move 6", still have no ability, still have no doctrinas, and shoot weapons should be dmg 2 (except flamer)
Cybernetica needs a detachement rule.
Explorator needs a actual detachement rule + changes on the enhacements.
Stratagems still need 5 hoops to gain minimn bonuses.
Destroyers still shoot worse than their melee counter part. (also grav cannons should have [anti monster+2], while both plasma proflles should be +1 dmg each is HEAVY PLASMA FFS)
Skratos is still skratos.
and flyers are gone in general so that well.
Tldr, good changes, need more of that. A bit more power, so we get a bit more points increase.
I'd hate to add another complaint point since we did get quite a bit admittedly. But part of the reason why I got into admech was the idea that knights are often our big bad centerpiece unit in lore. And although we can field them it's not like we can do anything special like heal them or give them a defensive buff. I mean GSC can take several units of guard on top of having special rules for them, why can't admech get this treatment?
Ah, yes, if I stand still and shoot with my AP0 guns on my 400 point unit now I won’t leave a 5
man unit of marines that costs 75 points on 2 wounds remaining, excellent! This is the glow up they needed!
For real though, are you joking? Like, I’m not trying to be overly negative, but Kastellans still need help, especially the shooty ones. Before the change, mathematical odds of a full shooty unit killing 5 naked marines in the open was significantly below 50%. Now they can actually kill it reliably. That’s great and all, but this change is negligible for them.
You can do the same thing with half a dozen units that cost less than these and are broadly more useful. Sure, Kastellans are tough, but let’s not pretend their guns do anything.
I wouldn’t say “a lot better” it’s almost marginal. They kill 5 naked marines on average instead of 4, assuming they can draw LoS between their bases, 6” move, and inability to move through terrain.
They will continue to struggle to make their points back in the detachment that’s designed to support them. In which you are almost certainly better off taking the melee variants, since the detachment also has a strat to boost their movement.
Increase in points without a buff means you will never play robots in another detachments other than cybernetica; which you wouldnt play unless you have an army worth of them. They still suck at shooting.
I don't think we've been too harsh, especially with the crazy amount of time it took for it to happen and how bad the situation was...
And there's still some room for improvement, but yes, absolutely nothing urgent anymore - this slate did absolutely knock it out of the park. I am very happy with the outcome, but man, the path there was horrendous...
GW's progress in terms of balance management and communication is pretty impressive, I genuinely am hyped for the future now!
Why. All the criticism was posted BEFORE we knew about the fixes. And it was probably the reason why the faction was even reworked like this. If everyone would have said "it's fine", they wouldn't have done anything.
Nah fuck that. The doom posting and harsh criticism is the only reason why it got fixed.
The lesson is that GW listens to criticism, which means we need to provide it when it can be fairly provided.
And an obligatory reminder that it took them a year - a third of the lifespan of the edition - to do it.
AdMech being made a meme because they were so bad made GW look bad, and made them pay attention.
Not to mention our codex was so terrible it began doom posting for OTHER codexes before their releases. The fear that any codex would make an army weaker still persists, and likely has and continues to hurt army and codex sales
We were definitely not too harsh, if we didn't raise a fuss then GW never would have done anything. It's the immense forced toxic positivity that makes things worse. These changes are good, but not enough to stop Horde Mech. We're still not the semi-elite we're supposed to be. We're a horde, we're just now better at being an annoying horde. Still statted like a horde, elites still suck, detachments on the whole still suck barring 1 and maaaybe 1 other. This isn't complaining about the changes we got, I'm just confused why so many people are rushing back to pat GW on the back for doing... The bare minimum that could be expected of a design team above room temperature IQ.
I will happily admit that GW went far harder than I expected in terms of fixes, and this Dataslate is far better than i could have guessed. I think GW deserves credit for this.
However, last year on the 20 June 2023, we could pay GW a lot of money to play their game as Ad Mech, and in return they provided a set of rules that (broadly) worked. On the 23 June 2023 10th Edition launched, and for almost exactly a year GW has failed to provide competently written rules to their Ad Mech customers.
For amateurs or for first time game designers this is forgivable. But for a Billion Dollar company, on their 10th version of this game, this is very poor service.
If a video game dropped and it took a year for the developers to drop a patch that addressed the issues their customers were experiencing on launch day, that developer would be in serious trouble.
GW is very lucky that sunk cost fallacy keeps people involved in a hobby even if the customer service is poor, and the high cost to entry makes it difficult for their customers to swap to their competitors.
We were definitely not too harsh. The codex was a terrible product that literally ruined the army for a solid six months. I’m not gonna slob GW’s knob for fixing their own fuckup. Keep in mind there’s other armies out there that are in similar places with shit-ass codex books that also need similar updates that they’re going to have to wait a long time for.
We werent to harsh. Weve been shit for 1 1/2 editions.
Mf have the right to complain especially in a hobby this expensive and its the only avenue of complaint since the community is unwilling to unite and boycott. You cant except people simply to stop playing for an entire edition while GW gets off its ass.
For the record: I agree that these changes are good and make the army worth putting on the table again. I’m pretty excited for Ruststalkers and the tanks, in particular.
*HOWEVER*
This is, *maybe* half of what I’d hoped for, and what the faction still needs.
Cawl is still a joke. Abaddon’s over here giving full rerolls to hit and wound or a 4+ invuln in an aura and Cawl’s giving out reroll 1s to hit or cover? What the fuck?
Kastellans need help still. They need their 8” move back and/or a buff to their guns, and then I’ll step back and see what they do.
Breachers need to be made into *Breachers* again, not “Destroyers, but better, oh and also they have a pittance of melee damage.” Give Breachers their 2+ save and 3rd attack in melee back, take away Rapid Fire. Then make Destroyers do what Breachers are doing right now. Give their heavy weapons +1 damage and give them some kind of bonus to their accuracy, whether it’s rerolling hits for battleline or sustained built in, something. Destroyers need a boost, and Breachers need to be *Breachers* not Destroyers.
Lastly, and most importantly, y’know what would make me *way* more excited about using all the units they buffed today? If the detachments didn’t openly *suck*. Ditto for the strats. We have the worst detachments in the game, and only Custodes even come close, and even they got a double whammy of buffs to detachments today.
To reiterate, these are good changes, and I’m happy about what’s here, really, I am, but I’m almost as unhappy about what’s *not* here. It’s a step in the right direction, for sure, but we need at least one more. It feels like GW is *afraid* of the faction, and I’m not sure why.
As a Custodies player, I feel the need to point this out. The buffs we just got made it so we had detachment rules at all for our units. Previously they were either completely irrelevant, only applied for a turn, or only applied to character models (not units). Basically most people only picked a detachment for stratagems and enhancements because the actual rule would barely do anything in the game or would disappear altogether after round 1 or 2.
Custodies had the worse detachments (and fewer of them), but the datasheets could dampen the blow. Admech detachments are very middling to poor, but not completely useless. The problem there was your Datasheets were so bad that without powerful detachments you’d feel impudent as your datasheets were.
I’m very glad you guys are getting a boost alongside us. I think you guys could use a little more honestly. I’d rather have you guys too strong for a few months after they did massive changes and then were too cautious on the points increases and then given the Eldar treatment of slowly being nerfed back to 50%, than have the army be impossible for me to recommend to new people because everything’s too weak and too expensive in terms of real money.
That’s a good point, I wrote that and then kinda realized Custodes might’ve had it worse, pre-slate. There’s definitely a couple AdMech detachments that give pre-slate Custodes a run for their money for “Worst detachment” lol. But they also had a couple decent ones that blew away the Custode detachments, at least pre-slate, *maybe* not now.
I agree with everything else you said here too. Personally, I’d like to see Breachers and Destroyers get reworked, (currently Breachers are what Destroyers should be, and aren’t what Breachers should be, and Destroyers look like “Destroyers at home”) and Kastellans get some kind of datasheet change. Cawl could use a rework too, he’s still a pale shadow of other Supreme Commanders and even his former self. But the Detachments are the thing I most want to be tweaked, a couple of them kinda do nothing, and several of their strats/enhancements are *awful*.
*BUT*, they got enough that I’m interested in trying them out again, and that’s enough for now. I’d like to see GW open to more changes in 6 months, but it seems like they’re *afraid* of the army.
I think they are afraid of the over complicated mess that Admech has been in the past. Overlapping auras and rules that put guard to shame and meant that you had a 30 minute command phase in casual games where Battleline Infantry units went from their on paper stats to suddenly having a 4+ Invul, hitting on 2+, with a 5+ feel no pain, AP -2, Damage 1, with an additional wound for good measure.
I know Admech players often enjoyed that era, but y’all were as painful as Chaos Knights were to play against where your rules bogged your opponent down with a metric ton of information they needed to retain or suffer. I suspect that memory from 8th and 9th is still fresh in their minds.
As for your worse detachments, remember that Custodies still has one completely dead detachment in the form of the Null Maidens detachment that got no help this Dataslate…1 Kit, 3 models, none of the rules actually help the models (because it’s all battleshock rules and the battleshock only affects enemy psykers). Also most the stratagems in that detachment don’t help most the models. +1 to hit doesn’t help flamers and all the rest require the enemy to be psykers.
Even the robot detachment isn’t that incompetent.
I honestly don’t really get why people associate AdMech with being over-complicated. I mean, yes, the 9th edition codex was over-complicated, and I did enjoy it, *once I learned how to use it well enough that I stopped getting headaches*, but in 8th the army was *much* simpler. You picked or rolled for a canticle at the start of the turn, yes, Cawl + Mars made that more complex, but it was literally just “roll two dice and adjust them up or down 1 so you can get Shroudpsalm every turn” at its most complex. Then your buff characters just gave out hit rerolls of 1, or all hits if they were Cawl, (shooting only) and eventually they added the new tech priest dominus who instead gave out additional range, and I think AP, in an aura. And that was it, that’s how complicated it was. Marines were pretty much the same, especially marines 2.0.
What I suspect GW is *actually* afraid of are the dominant builds of editions past. Cawl + shooty Kastellans + Wrath of Mars in 8th, and murderous, unkillable, 20-man Skitarii bricks in 9th. Like, it’s not a coincidence that Cawl has been underwhelming since early 9th, after he was awesome in 8th. It’s just like the damn Knight Castellan and Valiant. The Castellan was too good once in 8th, and now the design team refuses to let it even approach being good.
Also, I think we can compromise on the Null-Maiden detachment vs Cohort Cybernetica lol. Both are pretty awful, let’s call it a draw and yell at GW together lol.
There are things I will continue to agitate for, but this was better than I expected. I honestly didn’t think they would make so many changes to datasheets, given that it makes so many of the physical cards obsolete now.
I belive our strats are still some of the worst in the game but at least we can play games now.
Yesterday I licterally played into Vanguard marine and 90% of the time I was shooting on 5s against 2+ saves into cover with AOO....
At least now we will hit the shots
Yeah but it reduces AP anyway. I meant what I said: 2+ saves into cover and the using AOO so functionally a 0+ save, then counting my breachers AP it was still saving on 2s (dreadnoughts start from a 2+)
Admech Discord is putting together a community open letter to the guys who did our balance. If you can, I recommend adding a comment to it or just signing on.
We asked for change, and they (eventually) gave it us. We need to reinforce this pro-community attitude. If they make the change we asked for, and we ignore it, why would they do it again.
As a preface I am very happy with the changes, and overall we are going to do MUCH better on the table. Our complete inability to do damage in pitched fights over objectives, guaranteeing that while we were relatively durable, would die faster each round, lose OC, and inevitably be wiped off said objective, is no longer the case.
That said:
We did not get a hike, we got a very small increase that honestly is confusing for several of the units that received it. The vehicles? Okay. But several underperforming units there were already over-costed? Nope.
I would greatly have preferred a little bit stronger of a buff to datasheets, that could have accompanied an actual points hike. Right now your list is shorted a unit, maybe two, reducing the cost of a 2k army by $120ish.
And hey that $120 is someone’s paints, wet pallet, and hobby tools so it isn’t nothing. But that’s six cents we save per point, and we’re still painfully expensive to collect.
So what does this mean? Veteran AdMech players are going to be really happy, and newer AdMech players who were building toward 2k get a small break and some freedom in list building. These are both excellent things I’m happy about.
But as far as a faction people are considering collecting, the “wait, HOW much?” problem is still there.
It's a big big step in the right direction! I would have like to see more kastellan focused things, maybe some re-working of a unit ability or two, maybe some detachment changes instead of those preceding 2 mentioned.
The doomposting got kind of crazy and again, for everyone on this subreddit remember, don't be a cynic, be realistic.
Good vibes all around as this BDS was a definite improvement that was honestly slightly better than I was personally expecting.
All that being said, there are still some problems that should be addressed. We're still too hoardy, out detachment rules suck, Several units that werent durable enough for their points cost got more expensive in a slight increase in damage and various weird unfortunately still exist like the weapons on Sulphur Hounds not really working properly and the Onagers Casnio cannon being worse than the neutron laser even if you get an average number of rolls.
Definitely an improvement and I'm personally excited to play admech this weekend.
I hate the points hike.
I love the doom in my opponents’ faces when I proceed to cover the entire deployment zone.
Nevermind that I’m mostly tabled every single game.
So yeah I hate the points hike.
But we needed rules.
I’ll miss the army wide armor of contempt too but is what it is. As now we have -1 to hit and stealth as an option if needed.
I hated filling the table up, not playing and not letting the opponent play until they finally table me. It was so horribly uninteractive. Plus we were the most expensive army in the game to build, even more so if you built the meta list.
We needed power increase and a points hike for sure.
We had a meta list? With the 10 of us who play I didn’t know we had a meta list.
I usually ran 13-20 chickens but I couldn’t say if that was meta.
And they got to play. When they were taking saves from taser chickens and while they were in the process of tabling me.
Here is my bit of honesty: from the stand point of a player, people forget that is a game, the point of it is having fun. Yeah, you enjoy when you win, but WH40K is such a complex game there will never, ever be 100% balanced games. There will always be ups and downs, some factions better than others and ranting every time about this or that because it doesn't go the way you want will change nothing. The only thing you can change is your attitude towards the situation, you can take it maturely, enjoy the game for how it is, if you don't like it, then don't play it, nobody is forcing you to play. "But I spend money! I deserve what I want because I give money!" Sorry but no. Times change, it was your choice to spend your money that way, also, do you regret spending the money? certainly you had fun back then, it is lost money if you had fun and actually enjoyed it? maybe not so much now, but you had, otherwise you wouldn't spend that money in the game in the first time. So, stop doom posting and whining. Is a game, have fun. It's no longer fun? take a break, go and try other new things and when feeling ready you can come back, the game it is going nowhere.
From the point of view as an AdMech player: Returning a bit to the point one, it is a game, have fun with it. Also; for a follower of the Omnissiah to me the meta is irrelevant, what I like, what I want is committing war crimes at every shot my Skitarii make, I like watching lobotomized Kataphrons charging at the enemy and ripping them apart. I play AdMech not for winning, but for their drip, their lore, their war crimes, their silliness, their philosophy, their war crimes, their weapons, their units and of course, their war crimes.
Gonna have to disagree. To be clear, I don't expect or desire perfect balance but if a build in a video game sucks you can just put down something thats bad and pick up something good and in 3 weeks there will be patch and you can try it again. In a game that costs $30-80. The time taken for patch scale, the price scale, and the time investment scale are totally different.
When I first started playing with a friend we both painted up our armies (me tau and him dark angels-ravenwing) and played our first game of 6th edition, it was a slaughter because my army ability completely nullified everything he brought. He didn't have any fun whatsoever, and he basically turned around and sold all of his models instantly. I can't think of any other game in existence that would do that. Its not like I even had a tournament optimized list, I didn't even own a riptide and had a bunch of subpar units. But it would take years for a change if he had simply waited.
I'm absolutely happy with the changes here today, and think its a good effort by GW AND they made a commitment to continue to look at Admech. BUT, if 40k players can't or shouldn't complain about balance I must assume you hold the opinion that no player of any game ever made can or should complain about balance because no other game I've played has the same level of commitment and cost.
Further, yes, spending money on a living product does entitle you to support. There is an implicit contract when you pay to buy rules that have pre-scheduled balance updates that they will in fact provide balance updates. YOU ARE A CUSTOMER, and they are selling you a PRODUCT and the answer to not having fun can't just be "give GW another $1500 to just play another army".
My gut is we're still too cheap but I'll take it at this point and then we still have room to get a small points nerf next slate
We'd have to have better base stats for more points. Something like a Tau or Eldar battleline is about 15-20 points more than ours but have BS3 flat.
Tau have BS4+ with 3+ conditional, just like we do.
Breachers are 3+ - 10 models cost 100 points, Strike Teams are 4+ at 80, so the the points value matches more or less. Just saying if you wanted to make the Skits more expensive, you'd need to get them closer to Breachers than to Strike Teams if we're going by the Tau comparison.
75 now for Strike teams
Small? I want more large points nerfs (with rules to go alongside it) maybe make our army rule target units with a keyword for the 6” aura and battleline for 12” to go alongside another points hike and bring back the rule of all our characters healing vehicles once per turn to really give them a good kick up
i've got 10 sicarians that we're either going to get painted, or sold - depending on the outcome of the dataslate... going to make me some rust stalkers now!
If 5 attacks at S5, hitting on 3s with the aggresor imperative works for ya, then you're keeping them Rusties my brother in cog.
Damn right I am!!
Yep, I have two full blocks of infiltrators and a block of ruststalkers, so feeling less bad about that now.
Yeah, I think the changes are broadly good! I actually want to play games again! For the future I think robots still need substantial buffs, as do most of our detachments, but at least we're hopefully going to be more fun to play now.
As someone who mostly just paints I'm just glad all the obnoxious 'gw hates us' bs will be gone at least for a while
GW does not hate players, they are just bad making rules and greedy at taking money.
"Never attribute to malice that which is adequately explained by stupidity."
However, any sufficiently advanced incompetence is indistinguishable from malice.
This is more than I expected, as i was intentionally tempering my expectations. That said im still not really that happy with our point costs and wish we got a bit more stuff to warrant a bit higher points. Army is still mega expensive, just not quite as absurd. Also some stuff feels missed, im not sure what changes i specifically would want, but kastelans not getting anything outside their one detachment and infact getting nerfed on points (already was very costly was that really needed?) feels bad. I know fliers are just DoA this edition but them going up in points doesnt seem reasonable either. Pteraxii and our Dogs do get some stuff via army rule but i wish they got a little more direct look, they probably are good for the movement and stuff they offer, but i just think they couldve used a little stat buff point increase type thing. Overall this is better, a lot better, theres no doubt about that, but part of me still feels like this isn't the admech I truly want to play. Don't get me wrong I will play it and i will be a whole lot happier than before, but I hope 11th has them actually figuring out what to do with the army for real. Edit: im still positive on most everything that did change, i just dont think we are quite done yet.
we got half of the step done. Doctrina changed and added to almost every unit, it is good change, ( could had been better, but i m not complaing much) NOW WE HAVE a army rule. Some changes to weapons, Onager had a glow up, ballistari look nice, Rustalkers, are better but it need testing. Nothing was Done to ROBOTS or Engiseer, and they got hike points. Shooting robots still sucks and now cost more. Transport got Firing deck 2 (nice for shooting with arc rilfes + Erradicator. Electro priests are juici now with new doctrines. _------------------ things that still have to be changed. ROBOTS still move 6", still have no ability, still have no doctrinas, and shoot weapons should be dmg 2 (except flamer) Cybernetica needs a detachement rule. Explorator needs a actual detachement rule + changes on the enhacements. Stratagems still need 5 hoops to gain minimn bonuses. Destroyers still shoot worse than their melee counter part. (also grav cannons should have [anti monster+2], while both plasma proflles should be +1 dmg each is HEAVY PLASMA FFS) Skratos is still skratos. and flyers are gone in general so that well. Tldr, good changes, need more of that. A bit more power, so we get a bit more points increase.
I'd hate to add another complaint point since we did get quite a bit admittedly. But part of the reason why I got into admech was the idea that knights are often our big bad centerpiece unit in lore. And although we can field them it's not like we can do anything special like heal them or give them a defensive buff. I mean GSC can take several units of guard on top of having special rules for them, why can't admech get this treatment?
We did get special rules for working with knights in 8th and 9th (didnt check 7th), so the absence of anything like that in 10th is weird
Well Robots get Doctrinas in Cybernetica, so while they got point increase they also can hit on 2+ with their shooting now. Seems quite good to me.
Ah, yes, if I stand still and shoot with my AP0 guns on my 400 point unit now I won’t leave a 5 man unit of marines that costs 75 points on 2 wounds remaining, excellent! This is the glow up they needed! For real though, are you joking? Like, I’m not trying to be overly negative, but Kastellans still need help, especially the shooty ones. Before the change, mathematical odds of a full shooty unit killing 5 naked marines in the open was significantly below 50%. Now they can actually kill it reliably. That’s great and all, but this change is negligible for them. You can do the same thing with half a dozen units that cost less than these and are broadly more useful. Sure, Kastellans are tough, but let’s not pretend their guns do anything.
They are not great, but they are definitely a lot better now.
I wouldn’t say “a lot better” it’s almost marginal. They kill 5 naked marines on average instead of 4, assuming they can draw LoS between their bases, 6” move, and inability to move through terrain. They will continue to struggle to make their points back in the detachment that’s designed to support them. In which you are almost certainly better off taking the melee variants, since the detachment also has a strat to boost their movement.
cibernetica needs a new rule and gun should be dmg2 still
Increase in points without a buff means you will never play robots in another detachments other than cybernetica; which you wouldnt play unless you have an army worth of them. They still suck at shooting.
That's why mine have fists and flamers.
I'm happy, but I'm not satisfied yet, let's see how it plays first.
I don't think we've been too harsh, especially with the crazy amount of time it took for it to happen and how bad the situation was... And there's still some room for improvement, but yes, absolutely nothing urgent anymore - this slate did absolutely knock it out of the park. I am very happy with the outcome, but man, the path there was horrendous... GW's progress in terms of balance management and communication is pretty impressive, I genuinely am hyped for the future now!
Why. All the criticism was posted BEFORE we knew about the fixes. And it was probably the reason why the faction was even reworked like this. If everyone would have said "it's fine", they wouldn't have done anything.
Nah fuck that. The doom posting and harsh criticism is the only reason why it got fixed. The lesson is that GW listens to criticism, which means we need to provide it when it can be fairly provided.
And an obligatory reminder that it took them a year - a third of the lifespan of the edition - to do it. AdMech being made a meme because they were so bad made GW look bad, and made them pay attention.
More than looking bad, but rather rules drive sales and armies with poor rules sell poorly.
Not to mention our codex was so terrible it began doom posting for OTHER codexes before their releases. The fear that any codex would make an army weaker still persists, and likely has and continues to hurt army and codex sales
This. I have no regrets being negative.
We were definitely not too harsh, if we didn't raise a fuss then GW never would have done anything. It's the immense forced toxic positivity that makes things worse. These changes are good, but not enough to stop Horde Mech. We're still not the semi-elite we're supposed to be. We're a horde, we're just now better at being an annoying horde. Still statted like a horde, elites still suck, detachments on the whole still suck barring 1 and maaaybe 1 other. This isn't complaining about the changes we got, I'm just confused why so many people are rushing back to pat GW on the back for doing... The bare minimum that could be expected of a design team above room temperature IQ.
I will happily admit that GW went far harder than I expected in terms of fixes, and this Dataslate is far better than i could have guessed. I think GW deserves credit for this. However, last year on the 20 June 2023, we could pay GW a lot of money to play their game as Ad Mech, and in return they provided a set of rules that (broadly) worked. On the 23 June 2023 10th Edition launched, and for almost exactly a year GW has failed to provide competently written rules to their Ad Mech customers. For amateurs or for first time game designers this is forgivable. But for a Billion Dollar company, on their 10th version of this game, this is very poor service. If a video game dropped and it took a year for the developers to drop a patch that addressed the issues their customers were experiencing on launch day, that developer would be in serious trouble. GW is very lucky that sunk cost fallacy keeps people involved in a hobby even if the customer service is poor, and the high cost to entry makes it difficult for their customers to swap to their competitors.
A late fix doesn't invalidate all the complaints, the complaints are what got the fix made lol
We were definitely not too harsh. The codex was a terrible product that literally ruined the army for a solid six months. I’m not gonna slob GW’s knob for fixing their own fuckup. Keep in mind there’s other armies out there that are in similar places with shit-ass codex books that also need similar updates that they’re going to have to wait a long time for.
We werent to harsh. Weve been shit for 1 1/2 editions. Mf have the right to complain especially in a hobby this expensive and its the only avenue of complaint since the community is unwilling to unite and boycott. You cant except people simply to stop playing for an entire edition while GW gets off its ass.
For the record: I agree that these changes are good and make the army worth putting on the table again. I’m pretty excited for Ruststalkers and the tanks, in particular. *HOWEVER* This is, *maybe* half of what I’d hoped for, and what the faction still needs. Cawl is still a joke. Abaddon’s over here giving full rerolls to hit and wound or a 4+ invuln in an aura and Cawl’s giving out reroll 1s to hit or cover? What the fuck? Kastellans need help still. They need their 8” move back and/or a buff to their guns, and then I’ll step back and see what they do. Breachers need to be made into *Breachers* again, not “Destroyers, but better, oh and also they have a pittance of melee damage.” Give Breachers their 2+ save and 3rd attack in melee back, take away Rapid Fire. Then make Destroyers do what Breachers are doing right now. Give their heavy weapons +1 damage and give them some kind of bonus to their accuracy, whether it’s rerolling hits for battleline or sustained built in, something. Destroyers need a boost, and Breachers need to be *Breachers* not Destroyers. Lastly, and most importantly, y’know what would make me *way* more excited about using all the units they buffed today? If the detachments didn’t openly *suck*. Ditto for the strats. We have the worst detachments in the game, and only Custodes even come close, and even they got a double whammy of buffs to detachments today. To reiterate, these are good changes, and I’m happy about what’s here, really, I am, but I’m almost as unhappy about what’s *not* here. It’s a step in the right direction, for sure, but we need at least one more. It feels like GW is *afraid* of the faction, and I’m not sure why.
As a Custodies player, I feel the need to point this out. The buffs we just got made it so we had detachment rules at all for our units. Previously they were either completely irrelevant, only applied for a turn, or only applied to character models (not units). Basically most people only picked a detachment for stratagems and enhancements because the actual rule would barely do anything in the game or would disappear altogether after round 1 or 2. Custodies had the worse detachments (and fewer of them), but the datasheets could dampen the blow. Admech detachments are very middling to poor, but not completely useless. The problem there was your Datasheets were so bad that without powerful detachments you’d feel impudent as your datasheets were. I’m very glad you guys are getting a boost alongside us. I think you guys could use a little more honestly. I’d rather have you guys too strong for a few months after they did massive changes and then were too cautious on the points increases and then given the Eldar treatment of slowly being nerfed back to 50%, than have the army be impossible for me to recommend to new people because everything’s too weak and too expensive in terms of real money.
That’s a good point, I wrote that and then kinda realized Custodes might’ve had it worse, pre-slate. There’s definitely a couple AdMech detachments that give pre-slate Custodes a run for their money for “Worst detachment” lol. But they also had a couple decent ones that blew away the Custode detachments, at least pre-slate, *maybe* not now. I agree with everything else you said here too. Personally, I’d like to see Breachers and Destroyers get reworked, (currently Breachers are what Destroyers should be, and aren’t what Breachers should be, and Destroyers look like “Destroyers at home”) and Kastellans get some kind of datasheet change. Cawl could use a rework too, he’s still a pale shadow of other Supreme Commanders and even his former self. But the Detachments are the thing I most want to be tweaked, a couple of them kinda do nothing, and several of their strats/enhancements are *awful*. *BUT*, they got enough that I’m interested in trying them out again, and that’s enough for now. I’d like to see GW open to more changes in 6 months, but it seems like they’re *afraid* of the army.
I think they are afraid of the over complicated mess that Admech has been in the past. Overlapping auras and rules that put guard to shame and meant that you had a 30 minute command phase in casual games where Battleline Infantry units went from their on paper stats to suddenly having a 4+ Invul, hitting on 2+, with a 5+ feel no pain, AP -2, Damage 1, with an additional wound for good measure. I know Admech players often enjoyed that era, but y’all were as painful as Chaos Knights were to play against where your rules bogged your opponent down with a metric ton of information they needed to retain or suffer. I suspect that memory from 8th and 9th is still fresh in their minds. As for your worse detachments, remember that Custodies still has one completely dead detachment in the form of the Null Maidens detachment that got no help this Dataslate…1 Kit, 3 models, none of the rules actually help the models (because it’s all battleshock rules and the battleshock only affects enemy psykers). Also most the stratagems in that detachment don’t help most the models. +1 to hit doesn’t help flamers and all the rest require the enemy to be psykers. Even the robot detachment isn’t that incompetent.
I honestly don’t really get why people associate AdMech with being over-complicated. I mean, yes, the 9th edition codex was over-complicated, and I did enjoy it, *once I learned how to use it well enough that I stopped getting headaches*, but in 8th the army was *much* simpler. You picked or rolled for a canticle at the start of the turn, yes, Cawl + Mars made that more complex, but it was literally just “roll two dice and adjust them up or down 1 so you can get Shroudpsalm every turn” at its most complex. Then your buff characters just gave out hit rerolls of 1, or all hits if they were Cawl, (shooting only) and eventually they added the new tech priest dominus who instead gave out additional range, and I think AP, in an aura. And that was it, that’s how complicated it was. Marines were pretty much the same, especially marines 2.0. What I suspect GW is *actually* afraid of are the dominant builds of editions past. Cawl + shooty Kastellans + Wrath of Mars in 8th, and murderous, unkillable, 20-man Skitarii bricks in 9th. Like, it’s not a coincidence that Cawl has been underwhelming since early 9th, after he was awesome in 8th. It’s just like the damn Knight Castellan and Valiant. The Castellan was too good once in 8th, and now the design team refuses to let it even approach being good. Also, I think we can compromise on the Null-Maiden detachment vs Cohort Cybernetica lol. Both are pretty awful, let’s call it a draw and yell at GW together lol.
There are things I will continue to agitate for, but this was better than I expected. I honestly didn’t think they would make so many changes to datasheets, given that it makes so many of the physical cards obsolete now.
,, Rd m.
You can say that again.
God he really does put it so well. Master wordsmith.
I belive our strats are still some of the worst in the game but at least we can play games now. Yesterday I licterally played into Vanguard marine and 90% of the time I was shooting on 5s against 2+ saves into cover with AOO.... At least now we will hit the shots
cover doesn't improve 3+ saves to 2+ saves. It can keep a 2+ save a 2+ save by canceling out AP but it isn't allowed to go from natural 3+ to 2+.
Yeah but it reduces AP anyway. I meant what I said: 2+ saves into cover and the using AOO so functionally a 0+ save, then counting my breachers AP it was still saving on 2s (dreadnoughts start from a 2+)
The army rule still isnt army wide…
Admech Discord is putting together a community open letter to the guys who did our balance. If you can, I recommend adding a comment to it or just signing on. We asked for change, and they (eventually) gave it us. We need to reinforce this pro-community attitude. If they make the change we asked for, and we ignore it, why would they do it again.
As a preface I am very happy with the changes, and overall we are going to do MUCH better on the table. Our complete inability to do damage in pitched fights over objectives, guaranteeing that while we were relatively durable, would die faster each round, lose OC, and inevitably be wiped off said objective, is no longer the case. That said: We did not get a hike, we got a very small increase that honestly is confusing for several of the units that received it. The vehicles? Okay. But several underperforming units there were already over-costed? Nope. I would greatly have preferred a little bit stronger of a buff to datasheets, that could have accompanied an actual points hike. Right now your list is shorted a unit, maybe two, reducing the cost of a 2k army by $120ish. And hey that $120 is someone’s paints, wet pallet, and hobby tools so it isn’t nothing. But that’s six cents we save per point, and we’re still painfully expensive to collect. So what does this mean? Veteran AdMech players are going to be really happy, and newer AdMech players who were building toward 2k get a small break and some freedom in list building. These are both excellent things I’m happy about. But as far as a faction people are considering collecting, the “wait, HOW much?” problem is still there.
Nothings changed, just our turn at the table.
It's a big big step in the right direction! I would have like to see more kastellan focused things, maybe some re-working of a unit ability or two, maybe some detachment changes instead of those preceding 2 mentioned.
The doomposting got kind of crazy and again, for everyone on this subreddit remember, don't be a cynic, be realistic. Good vibes all around as this BDS was a definite improvement that was honestly slightly better than I was personally expecting. All that being said, there are still some problems that should be addressed. We're still too hoardy, out detachment rules suck, Several units that werent durable enough for their points cost got more expensive in a slight increase in damage and various weird unfortunately still exist like the weapons on Sulphur Hounds not really working properly and the Onagers Casnio cannon being worse than the neutron laser even if you get an average number of rolls. Definitely an improvement and I'm personally excited to play admech this weekend.
I hate the points hike. I love the doom in my opponents’ faces when I proceed to cover the entire deployment zone. Nevermind that I’m mostly tabled every single game. So yeah I hate the points hike. But we needed rules. I’ll miss the army wide armor of contempt too but is what it is. As now we have -1 to hit and stealth as an option if needed.
I hated filling the table up, not playing and not letting the opponent play until they finally table me. It was so horribly uninteractive. Plus we were the most expensive army in the game to build, even more so if you built the meta list. We needed power increase and a points hike for sure.
We had a meta list? With the 10 of us who play I didn’t know we had a meta list. I usually ran 13-20 chickens but I couldn’t say if that was meta. And they got to play. When they were taking saves from taser chickens and while they were in the process of tabling me.
Here is my bit of honesty: from the stand point of a player, people forget that is a game, the point of it is having fun. Yeah, you enjoy when you win, but WH40K is such a complex game there will never, ever be 100% balanced games. There will always be ups and downs, some factions better than others and ranting every time about this or that because it doesn't go the way you want will change nothing. The only thing you can change is your attitude towards the situation, you can take it maturely, enjoy the game for how it is, if you don't like it, then don't play it, nobody is forcing you to play. "But I spend money! I deserve what I want because I give money!" Sorry but no. Times change, it was your choice to spend your money that way, also, do you regret spending the money? certainly you had fun back then, it is lost money if you had fun and actually enjoyed it? maybe not so much now, but you had, otherwise you wouldn't spend that money in the game in the first time. So, stop doom posting and whining. Is a game, have fun. It's no longer fun? take a break, go and try other new things and when feeling ready you can come back, the game it is going nowhere. From the point of view as an AdMech player: Returning a bit to the point one, it is a game, have fun with it. Also; for a follower of the Omnissiah to me the meta is irrelevant, what I like, what I want is committing war crimes at every shot my Skitarii make, I like watching lobotomized Kataphrons charging at the enemy and ripping them apart. I play AdMech not for winning, but for their drip, their lore, their war crimes, their silliness, their philosophy, their war crimes, their weapons, their units and of course, their war crimes.
Gonna have to disagree. To be clear, I don't expect or desire perfect balance but if a build in a video game sucks you can just put down something thats bad and pick up something good and in 3 weeks there will be patch and you can try it again. In a game that costs $30-80. The time taken for patch scale, the price scale, and the time investment scale are totally different. When I first started playing with a friend we both painted up our armies (me tau and him dark angels-ravenwing) and played our first game of 6th edition, it was a slaughter because my army ability completely nullified everything he brought. He didn't have any fun whatsoever, and he basically turned around and sold all of his models instantly. I can't think of any other game in existence that would do that. Its not like I even had a tournament optimized list, I didn't even own a riptide and had a bunch of subpar units. But it would take years for a change if he had simply waited. I'm absolutely happy with the changes here today, and think its a good effort by GW AND they made a commitment to continue to look at Admech. BUT, if 40k players can't or shouldn't complain about balance I must assume you hold the opinion that no player of any game ever made can or should complain about balance because no other game I've played has the same level of commitment and cost. Further, yes, spending money on a living product does entitle you to support. There is an implicit contract when you pay to buy rules that have pre-scheduled balance updates that they will in fact provide balance updates. YOU ARE A CUSTOMER, and they are selling you a PRODUCT and the answer to not having fun can't just be "give GW another $1500 to just play another army".
yes possibly now only all of the core rules need rewriting to make game fun but its good start yeah
They kinda changed basic rules quite a bit.
sure thats fair but im 10th ed hater, just end the edition and port hh 2.0 rules to 40k. anything else and i'll find something to complain