Warhammer 40K: Let’s Talk About The Latest ‘Metawatch’ Faction Breakdown
Games Work just put out a new Metawatch article with a detailed faction breakdown from LVO 2022. So what’s the state of competitive 40k?
In case you missed the it for some reason, the Las Vegas Open 2022 has come and gone. It was a massive event and at the end of the day the winner was crowned. There were some pretty interesting lists from the event that the community has been dissecting. But today, we’re taking a step back from the lists themselves and looking specifically at the overall meta at the event. Games Workshop has a great breakdown of the armies that were at the event.
Breaking Down The Meta
Looking at the numbers, just about half the field was some flavor of Imperium with 30% being some type of Imperial army (AdMech/AM/Custodes/Sisters/Knights/etc.) and then 19% being some flavor of Space Marine. While I would have liked to see more specific faction breakdowns for what those actual numbers were, this is still pretty telling.
The next largest ‘faction’ was Chaos at 15%. That’s a combo of all the different chaos lists from Daemons to Chaos Marines to Knights to everything in between. Considering that CSM haven’t gotten a new codex for 9th but the “sub” factions have gotten books and they still managed 15% of the field is worth noting. Perhaps with a new CSM book that number could be even larger.
Following that up, the next largest faction is actually the Tyranid sub-factions. At 11%, the Hivemind consisting of Tyranids and Genestealer Cults made a pretty strong showing. And two of those lists ended up in the top 8.
“Oh, what about the 14% Xenos lists? That greater than 11%.” Yes. You’re 100% correct that 14 is greater than 11. However, that Xenos is a combination of T’au, Necrons, and Orks. None of which were separately larger than the “Hivemind” or even the Aeldari (which is Craftworlds and Drukhari). The Aeldari clocked in at 10% of the field and I have a sneaking suspicion that most of that was Drukhari over the Craftworlds (or even Ynnari).
The Top Of The Charts
When you cut to the top 8, you’ve got 2 Hivemind lists, 2 Drukhari lists, and 4 Imperial lists. Grey Knights could be considered a flavor of Space Marine but we don’t know exactly how GW counted them. There were no members from the ‘Xenos’ faction or the ‘Chaos’ faction in the top 8. Again, we’re not going to get into each list. If you want more insight into those, you can check GW’s article out for that.
One thing I think we do need to state is that all of the players that made it to the top 8 had great showings overall. GW said it best: “It just goes to show that faction mastery and balanced list design can still prevail even when the meta shifts under your faction. Adaptability wins games, but consistency wins tournaments.” None of those players would have been in the top 8 without the ability to adapt to the game and the consistency of high skill play. Or as another player once told me, “your dice can only carry you so far.”
Overall Meta Trends
So what do these numbers tell us about the overall meta? On the grand scheme of things, be ready to play vs the Imperials! When roughly half the field is coming up Imperium (when combined with Space Marines) you’re probably going to face some flavor of the Emperor’s forces. Those do vary widely but prepping for Space Marines (of all flavors) as well as Custodes and AdMech/AM is going to be important.
If you’re playing in one of the other factions, I think your odds of mirror match at the start of a competitive tournament is probably low. That might shift as the games go on but that’s the nature of tournaments.
I think another big takeaway is that you should never underestimate a faction you might not have seen for a while. All it takes is someone who’s been playing that faction for a while and they can surprise you. Oh, and I suppose getting a new batch of rules (like a codex or Army of Renown) probably helps, too.
Again, I do wish we had a bit more granularity in which factions were being chose besides the overall ‘sub-faction’s but it’s a pretty high level spread of what you can expect at an event. Your local meta will probably vary but if you’re traveling to a larger event I would expect to see the overall numbers reflect something similar to the LVO (on a smaller scale). The 40k meta is changing all the time. But the top-tier armies are displayed rather prominently in the top 8. There are 2 Custodes armies and 2 Drukhari armies. Those codexes are doing quite well these days. But that could all change after the next book or Balance Dataslate comes out. Time will tell.
What do you make of the overall meta of 40k based on the LVO numbers?
