Warhammer 40K: Who’s At The Bottom Of The Meta-Barrel?
We all know who’s at the top of the meta-pile for Warhammer 40,000. But which armies are scraping the bottom of the meta-barrel?
If you didn’t know or missed it, the Aeldari are dominating the game. In a close second are the Genestealer Cults. That’s not a matter of opinion either. That’s coming from one of the folks that’s collating tournament data (and yes, you should go check them out). It’s hard to argue with the numbers and even if you try some generous interpretations there’s no denying that these results are far from the win-rates that Games Workshop typically shoots for. Ideally, every army would be at 50%…but even GW know that somewhere between 55%-45% is probably more realistic. It’s also means your game is probably in a healthier spot. That’s just not the case right now with the Indexes.
With that in mind, and using GW’s number ranges, we’re going to look at the bottom of the barrel today. There’s lots of cries for nerfing the top — which is a good start. But let’s not leave the bottom wallowing in their loses and give them some much needed buffs, too.
Bottom Of The 40k Meta-Barrel
Leagues of Votann – 38% Win Rate
Kicking things off from the Sub-40% crowd we’ve got the Leagues of Votann. Hey, remember when these guys were going to be so overpowered that GW had to nerf them before they even got fully released to appease the player outcry? Well that was last edition. In 10th edition it really seems like these fellas are paying for sins they never even got to commit. I feel bad for them now and hope that they get some attention and a rebalance soon.
Sister of Battle – 35% Win Rate
You’d think an army with a similar mechanic to the Aeldari’s Fate Dice would also be at the top. Alas, that’s not the case for the Sisters of Battle. Now, there’s something they are sharing with a few others on this list: lower player count relative to the average. That’s probably a factor in terms of representation and win rates, too. However, there’s something going on with the Sisters of Battle in the meta and I bet it has something to do with the points costs for their units vs relative effectiveness on the tabletop. But that’s just a theory…
Adeptus Mechanicus – 34% Win Rate
What’s going on with Cawl’s boys?! The Adeptus Mechanicus is chugging along at 34% and that’s way below expectations. Again, player count is a contributing factor as players aren’t representing this faction a ton. But there’s probably a good reason for that in ol’ Army design department. Some of their heavy hitters came in a tad high in the points department which is unfortunate for them. Also, their Rad-Cohort special rule is kind of easy to counter: Just leave your deployment zone. Which you were probably going to do anyhow so you could, ya know, score objectives.
Dark Angels – 34% Win Rate
This one is split up between Index and Gladius Task Force builds, but it’s still the same win rate for both. The Lion might be awake but it seems like the Dark Angels are kind of sleeping on the job now. While their Army rule does give them an OC value of 1 regardless of Battle-shocked status, because of the way modifiers work, that’s not really that tough to overcome and take objectives from them. Also, everyone builds around having to deal with Space Marines…but that’s another topic anyhow.
Grey Knights – 33% Win Rate
For the Grey Knights, it’s kind of a shock they are so low on the list. Again, I think it’s a points problem for them. There Teleport Shunt is nice…but I don’t think it’s justifying the points difference between like units compared to Space Marines. Take Terminators as an example. Space Marine Terminators are 205 for 5 while Brotherhood Terminators in Grey Knights are 225 for 5. So you’re paying a premium for the Teleport Shunt rule and access to some specialised wargear and abilities, right? But looking at the Space Marine Terminators and their data sheet…it’s not like they don’t have special rules and wargear, too. Extrapolate that out across the whole army and you end up with a more “elite” army that doesn’t really play that much more elite that Space Marines already.
Death Guard – 31% Win Rate
The Death Guard had a rough start to begin with due to some of the wonky unit numbers. But aside from that I think the biggest issue this army has is pretty simple: Speed. Yeah, I know they are supposed to be the disease slowly spreading their pox across the tabletop. But a basic Plague Marine moves a whopping 5″ base. Most stuff in Terminator armor moves 4″ which is also real slow. Why is this such a big deal in 10th? Take a look at the Only War mission deployment. You might start 24″ apart but you’re playing long ways now. “Just take more transports.” Yeah, pay for a taxi for all your units… I’m sure that will be cheap in the points department. This army has other issues but getting to where they need to be and scoring objectives is one of the big ones. Don’t take my word for it. That 31% win rate speaks for itself.
Drukhari – 31% Win Rate
I’m not entirely sure why the Drukhari are doing so poorly in 10th. They are fast and they do have some pretty deadly firepower. Plus they have a ton of units with a 6++ invulnerable running around. That seems good on paper. But in practice they also seem pretty brittle and once they start losing units the battle seems to snowball in a bad way for them. They only gain pain tokens for destroying units or when the enemies fails battle-shock tests (aside from other specific units that generate them). Maybe it’s just not enough pain tokens to go around. Plus things are supposed to be tougher in 10th, right? Maybe their once deadly lethality didn’t go up enough to compensate and they are still just as glass-cannon as ever.
It’s still pretty early in the life cycle of 10th edition and while we’re glad everyone got Indexes at launch we’re starting to see some armies are just a lot worse off than others. GW did do a quick errata pass on the indexes but we’re looking forward to the first MAJOR update to all these rules. There’s a lot of tweaking and balancing to be done.
If you play one of these armies sound off in the comments and let us know if you think they need help or not.
