Goatboy’s Warhammer 40K: Unit Nerfs, Bans & Updates
Goatboy here with some quick thoughts on what GW needs to do to patch up 40K.
It feels like a lot of players are not that excited about the upcoming season as nightmares of T’au frag bullets, mind bullets, and Custodes golden lads coming to take their candy and girlfriends. So what do you think they end up doing to fix any of this? Is GW going to do something about it?
The answer is most likely yes. GW have done a lot better job of being on top of issues than they have in the past. I expect to see something before long just to answer a few things and try to even up damage armies can do. The better question is are we going to see major hits to an army like we saw with Orks or the slow cuts we saw with Dark Eldar. Let’s discuss some of the things they could do and wax poetically about what could happen.
EXTRA new and improved!
Updating Datasheets?
The first thing they could do is bit changes to Dataslates to try and resolve an issue. This is the more nuclear button aspect to fixing things and while it can be needed at times I feel it should be more of a last resort. The game isn’t designed as a full digital experience so invalidating rules that are just printed makes people question why to even buy something new and shiny. Now of course we could see this done in slight cuts to a set of rules like removing a single word or a quick “bulk” rule tweak but will see.
Here are some examples of what they might do to resolve this in some of the “mean” armies out there. Removing options for the Tau Crisis suits as they don’t even come in their boxed set. A complete reworking of the Custodes Shield host rules to remove some of the rougher aspects of that host’s rules. Or say a full removal of keywords to try and get ahead of a future issue.
Core Rule Updates?
The next thing is more of a bulk change to the overall core rules in order to eliminate some of the broken aspects armies have now and future armies. You saw this with the hit towards flyers in the last balance update. You could also see this in how they could rework things like Squadron in order to circumvent breaking the rule of 3. I think these updates can be pretty drastic but they feel a lot less “rough” for specific armies as it is GW looking at ways to clean up their game as a whole and not just attack one army.
I think this is probably the best way to hit the no LOS shooting issue with things like no LOS shooting do not get a reroll or positive modifiers if they are shooting at a unit not visible to them. It would be a broad change but something that would go after any future issues. I know a lot of the older books had no LOS shooting but since they were not saddled with the CORE keyword they couldn’t get rerolls. Unfortunately GW gave some of these options to armies that got CORE when they probably shouldn’t have or had their options looked at more.
I also wonder if this would have been a more elegant solution to the Ork buggy issue by just saying that a squadron of models still has to follow the rule of 3. So yes you could take 3 in a Squadron but then you couldn’t take any more units as you already had 3 of the same model type. This would hit at the upcoming Eldar issue with no LOS shooting platforms and any future “squadron” issues we might see. It would hit some other Ork options but it would allow an Ork player to take 3 single units of buggies instead of a big unit that can be a pain to move around.
Changing Points?
Finally we have very simple updates like just changing points. This is easiest way to balance things as the game is designed to have points updated easily. Between the App and the overall selling point of point updates we can quickly see a change without too much “complaining”. It is interesting to see how basically removing a unit or two from an army can quickly take it from top tier to mid range very quickly.
Imagine not having all the HQ choices for Custodes or enough points to cover your banner planting choices? What if they had to take more Sisters of Silence to allow them to work secondaries? Look at how Dark Eldar had a massive change with just some simple point drops to key units. Or how if they tweak a few small things we quickly removing an army because they don’t have jabbronies able to lay mines, gather data, or just cover an objective.
Something is Coming – But What?
We know something is coming and will just have to wait and see if this will be a slow burn of an army dominating or we all of a sudden see a new contender for the top of the table. I know we have Nids coming soon and their leaked weapon profiles look like we are in for some rough shooting coming down the pipe. Of course this all could be moot if they don’t nearly have the board control on the table top due too heavily increased point costs. I am hoping Crusher Stampede takes a bit of a hit as it is a very rough “gatekeeper” army but will just have to wait and see in a few weeks.
Or hey, maybe GW might just move to the MTG model and ban or limit certain units per quarter. I just hope Chaos Space Marines doesn’t suck too bad and we get new Berserker models finally.
Please give us good rules!
Until next time – Death to the False Emperah!!!
