40K Tough Love: TROOPS Units Need a Minimum Point Value
We’ve seen enough point tweaks, FAQs, and spammy lists for us to finally see that TROOPS units aren’t like the others…
I’ve noticed a funny little thing this past year. Over and over, GW goes back to the ultra-cheap TROOPS units in the game and slowly but surely bumps them up in value.
Remember the Index books? While they are slowly but surely becoming obsolete, the funny thing is it may be their points values that may finish them off in in the end. If you recall most Index units were overpriced and codex after codex saw the majority of units get steep discounts.
Then the Chapter Approved books come in to adjust the outliers that got missed up or down. But along the way, several uber cheap TROOPS units have been bumped up in price, like Cultists and AM Conscripts.
The Real Value of TROOPS
But alone of all the other types of units TROOPS have an intristic value. They fill out those pesky slots in the large Detachments that cough up all those delicious CPs. If you look at any of the power armies out there – the pattern is the same: TROOPS are commonly seen as necessary evils, grudgingly bought as a means to en end. And a majority of players will ignore any other option but the cheapest. They get their killing elsewhere in their lists.
This of course means that all other TROOPS units get ignored, regardless of their abilities. It doens’t matter that GW may have the pricier TROOPS costed correctly, the budget options mean they never even get a second glance.
Another issue is the very granularity of the point system means that towards the very bottom end, even 1 point differences can lead to unbalanced horde armies that many armies just can’t deal with. Mis-costing a 19-point model to 20-points isn’t too bad, but making a 4-point model 3-points is a big deal.
The Solution
I would argue that there is a “baked in value” of just being a TROOPS unit, and the Design Team should enact a points floor. Think about it this way. If you imagined the crappiest statline in the game, all 1s with no save – what would you pay, so that it would sit on your rear objectives and fill out Detachment slots? Heck, I bet a lot of players would LOVE to have access to such a unit, to save more points for the stuff they really want.
I’m unsure exactly what the floor should be, but 5pts feels about right. This would be enacted by moving any units below the TROOPS floor to the minimum, while leaving higher costed units unchanged.
This will help rebalance the game and reduce the delta between the bargain and the higher costed TROOPS units – making them more appealing.
~What do you think the least a TROOPS model should ever be?
