Rant Post

So first off I know I've been MIA for awhile, school and work don't leave much time to hobby. But I have been going to the monthly RTT up at Huzzah Hobbies. Anyway, this post isn't for that. This post is a rant of sorts, so if you don't want to read a rant from someone who thinks they know what they're talking about don't click read more.




Well you're here now, so prepare yourself. Its going to be a bumpy ride.

So this rant has all come about because of my want to play more competitive events. Unfortunately I'm unable to travel to the major GTs other than the NOVA due to school. Now James Watkins does a great job with his monthly RTT at Huzzah Hobbies. It is by far one of the highlights of my month. Which naturally makes me want to go to more events. With the help of Torrent of Fire's upcoming events and Dakka Dakka's Tournament Discussion forum I've been able to find a few in my area. What sucks is they are all instituting some stupid rules, or the one that I did find that isn't instituting stupid rulings is 4 hours away from me. Now first I want to say thanks to the guys at FTGT hosting this event. Guys you've taken what the major GTs are starting to do and based your events around that. I thank you for that and I just wish I had it in me to drive the 4 hours to attend it. I wish you all the best and I hope the event becomes super popular. But there are a few others that is within my driving tolerance for an event (which is around 2 hours) that I cannot for the life of me go to. The rules that these people have come up with are insane to me.

Lets go with the tournament I found located in Charlottesville. Now I have to have a little backstory to this one first. Their first tournament that I saw from them had the top prize as a Realm of Battle board. Which I thought was a great way to get people to come to an event. It might not be everyone's cup of tea, but hey it is essentially a $300 first prize. I was kind of stoked to go to this event, but then I read their rules. They wanted to stop the 2++ but only nerfed to hell Daemons. Didn't do anything else. They also have a "sportsmanship" rule, meaning if I tabled my opponent I still have to play out the rest of the turns to gain full points. Because they don't think its cool if I design a list that has the intention of tabling people. I like the thought behind it, but the problem that I see is this. What if I play an opponent that really doesn't have that good of a list? What if I actually do the thing that no one does anymore and bring CSM with 2-4 Helldrakes and face a pure SM biker army? So now I have to waste time after I've secured my win to secure the objectives? Please. Stop it. I understand what you're trying to do, but it isn't adding any depth to the game. But to be clear, that rule wasn't the reason I didn't attend their first event. They wanted to stop the 2++ rerollable which I'm 100% cool with. While yes they stopped Screamer Star, they didn't stop the Seer Council. Seer Council only needs one buff on them with the Baron to be nigh unstoppable. Good job guys! You've done nothing. Though I find it really freaking funny that the winner of that event was none other then Rob Tilly with his Daemon Flying Circus list. They set it up for daemons to fail but Rob managed to win it anyway. Good on you Rob. Now onto their current event. Now they've swung to the other side of the spectrum. Saying everything is legal, thats right EVERYTHING. Meaning not just the updated rules from Stronghold Assault but everything from the book is in and Escalation. Then Rob Tilly, being the great guy he is, tells them that might not be the best idea. Their response? We have to let in Escalation because if we were to ban it everyone would be owned by Imperial Knights. Are you kidding me? Have you even played against them? Talked to people that have played with/against them? Are you basing this information on the fact that they have a melee D-Weapon and think nope? I know I did when I first read them. But then I started listening to the people playing with and against them. They're not bad. Hell they are a tool that helps break up the many death stars in this game. I know after I finished reading that thread I was seriously thinking of getting a cheap Revenant off of the internet and taking that to their tournament. I then realized I really didn't want to spend that money just to prove a point. But I hope others that have spent that money do go to their tournament and prove the point. Oh and to top it all off, the only nerf they have is against daemons. The grimor still only affects the daemon invulnerable. Holy shit dude, what daemon player pissed in their cheerios?

The next event is located Glen Burnie Maryland at Dropzone Games. Never been there but they're holding a Warhammer 40k RTT, I was intrigued. But then I read their first rule, no allies, no data slates/formations. Ugh. Come on guys. I know when the Tau formation first came out I thought wow, this is stupid good and almost broken. But then after about a month I realized it wasn't that bad. You're spending 600ish points, without upgrades, on stuff that either will never score or scores 1 out of 6 missions. So its actually kind of balanced. Don't get me wrong its a lot of firepower, but Tau can already dish out so much with their one FOC as is. But I digress. What really annoys me is that with all the complaining Nid Codex gets the formations, skyblight and endless swarm particularly, make Nids super competitive. The ability to put 7 FMCs, and a ton of bodies on top of that make them suddenly top tier. By restricting formations you kick a codex that many people think is super bad even harder in the nuts. And then you ban allies all together. Great, if I wanted to play 5th edition I'd be playing 5th edition. Now I do agree that the sharing of USRs is what is making 40k crazy right now, but there are ways to fix it other than straight out banning something in the base freaking rule book. Like limiting it to two detachments, a primary and one secondary. Meaning if I want to bring my AM and my Inquisition I could, I just wouldn't be allowed to also take a Knight or Space Marines. Such a simple limitation helps stop all this allies shenanigans, and now we're not taking things out of the BRB!

Now we get to the event that got me to actually post this for all to see. First let me say that I love the guys that do Forge the Narrative. Their love for the game and their love of competition has really motivated me to play in a competitive setting. But I just can't go to the FTW Games RTT. Now I've been very tempted to go down there and play. Just for some reason the 1999+1 level really doesn't interest me right now. NOVA being my only major GT I attend I'm currently trying to play with an 1850 mindset and I really don't feel like playing with an extra 150 points of stuff that I'm going to have to cut out of my list eventually. Which is no one's hang up but my own. If they like the 2k mark, awesome. Honestly I really like 2k mark myself I just have chosen not to drive the 2 hours down there for a game that isn't what I'm trying to concentrate on right now. Another reason I'm hesitant to go down there is their inclusion of Forgeworld Experimental rules. I really don't think experimental rules should be allowed in a tournament. I know I'm probably overreacting to this, but I still dislike it. But now we come to the real reason for this post. Their new allies matrix. I'm 100% cool with making all Battle Brothers turn into Allies of Convenience. I think that will stop a lot of the current Death Star shenanigans going on right now. But then you change Tyranid's allies as well, uh okay. Whats this? They're allies of convenience with Daemons/CSM/Tau/Orks/Necrons? What? I mean, yeah I get why they're like that with Imperial Guard. But the rest? I don't think I've heard of genestealer cults infiltrating any of these other races, especially CSM/Daemons. Now if they have and I haven't read about it apologies. But the real kicker is the next thing, formations are banned. Holy shit guys. You wouldn't have had to mess around with the Nid ally matrix had you allowed formations. You should still change the Battle Brothers thing as I'm interested to see what happens with that. But changing the Nid allies matrix to help them out and then in the next sentence to ban formations? No allies in the world is going to help out nids more then the formations! And to top it off? They're using their FTN special mission rules. Now I'm 100% appreciative of them actually taking time out of their busy lives and creating a rule pack for people to play with. What ticks me off is this, Mike Brandt and Chip Boyd already set something like that up, its called the Independent Mission Catalog. Mike Brandt went around and tried to gather up every Tournament Organizer he could think of and asked them to join this think tank. He then spread the word saying if you're a TO and want to help please let him know and he'd invite you to join in on the discussion. Now I know the FTN guys said on a recent podcast that they got the idea of asymmetric missions from a listener and they were the first people talking about it. That listener and the guys at FTN deserve a big thank you for that, because it got the ball rolling. The problem I have is that instead of trying to collaborate with another established group, they decided to go on their own. Now I could be 100% wrong in that last statement. That they tried and failed to join up with others. I don't know, but from my perspective that's what it looks like. But the whole problem is that this creates another division in the community. People want a single Mission Catalog/FAQ/rules/whatever. And by just doing your own thing you're creating more of a division to an an already heavily divided community. Hell we can't even come together to do a ruling on infiltrating ICs conferring infiltrate to units that don't have it during deployment (they don't btw). How are we going to do anything else? Like I said it doesn't help when you have every major event/person just doing their own thing with, what seems to the outside world, no intent of coming together with other major events/people.

This whole thing really frustrates me. I've found 3 different events within my 2 hour drive limitation, but the only one I go to is James'. Now this isn't to say James' event isn't good enough. Like I said before its the highlight of my month, but his allowing of everything other than Escalation and the AV15/D-Weapons/Fortification Formations from Stronghold Assault has made the event really fun. While you still run into, as Mike Brandt puts it, "Bro Stars" at the event I feel the game is still fun. Hell Joseph Harmon usually places extremely well with his CSM/Daemons army. Thats right CSM main, not a single Daemon Prince is in the list. And he's won the event playing against Beast star round one! My point is, all these restrictions or changes to the games that TOs think will make their event better, makes it so players like me don't even want to put the effort into going. Yes I understand they're trying to make the game better, but less is more. Honestly why these events feel like they need to do more than what events like the NOVA/LVO/BAO does in rules restrictions is beyond me. I like playing NOVA style events because when I get to the table I know that my opponent and I are playing with the same rules. I also really hate the idea of having to memorize different rules for different events. These major events are doing the work for you guys, why do you feel the need to change it even more?

Anyway thats my rant/wall of text. If I got things wrong my apologies and please let me know. It was just really frustrating me and I wanted to get it out. Also, Jesus Astra Militarum. So good. If the fad of changing Battle Brothers to Allies of Convenience takes hold you're going to be seeing a lot of AM armies come out of the woodworks. For me though the semester is almost over which means I'm going to start putting together my NOVA list. I've already got a good inkling of what I'm going to take I just hope the game doesn't change too much in the 4 months left till NOVA!