Warhammer 40K: Orks ‘More Dakka’ Nerf Is a Lesson To Us All
The 40K Ork Detachment ‘More Dakka’ get hit with the nerf bat . GW gave every player a valuable lesson, if we choose to listen.
This last week saw the Ork Detachment More Dakka get hit with the nerf bat to bring it back down amongst the normal armies. If you hadn’t played against it well let me tell you it was a brutal list to face against. While I don’t think it’s completely dead detachment I do think Orks will just move onwards.
‘More Dakka’ – We Hardly Even Knew You
The Nerf hit More Dakka in three places. The Sustained 2 rule got removed and moved to just Sustained 1 during the Waaagh. They left the Assault rule to all their shooting weapons for Infantry and Walkers which is a pretty powerful rule a lot of other armies use pretty well. They also nerfed the Waaagh rule to not affect the Gretchin units which is helpful as well. They also changed the Waaagh Strat to cost 2 CP, and the ignore cover Strat is now just a unit that can ignore cover instead of the whole army versus an enemy unit.
All of these hits take the detachment down and this leaves the army looking at one of the other options they have. I know it is a pretty rough hit but most of the armies I saw at Adepticon were either Ork players who have a ton of stuff or cobbled together from borrow hammer to ride the meta wave, which is always something to think about when you try to build out a new army.
Beware of Bandwagon “Auto-Win” Armies
If the detachment is too good is it worth it to really invest time into it? Do you try to get all the models, get them built, quickly painted, and watch as they get nerfed a week later? Do you just take what is consistent and good instead of trying to ride the wave? Or do you just hope something you got a pile of and is painted somewhat ok will become hot once again?
I am happy that GW is hitting detachments, units, and armies that are deemed too good. It is nice to see that the balance is mostly followed, even though some of the releases can feel a bit too much left out. It is still nice to see something tried, deemed to strong, and brought back in line pretty quickly.
I know it seems very sudden to get a good thing and then have it taken away in a bit of Grimdark rules-whiplash. It does lead me to say to anyone if a rule is too good in 40K 10th Edition don’t expect it to stay around. The game needs an army to try and work together, and it takes player skill to be good, so if it is too easy, it won’t stay. GW seems to be pushing people to really just play what they like and want to consistently instead of just riding the meta wave like a pizza-eating sewer ninja.
A lot of this also has me rethinking some of the reviews I have done in the past and what might be a good detachment if you played with it. I’ll talk about it later this week during my Hot Mess article when I relook at Detachments and how it is a heck of a lot better than I gave it credit for.
The 40K Meta Moves Ever Onward
Soon, we are going to get a pile of new army stuff with the true release of Emperor’s Children and the three other Cult Codexes in the coming months. Well, see what ends up floating to the top as a good army and what floats underneath as a strong contender that doesn’t jump out at you instantly. I am excited as a player, as it is a ton of new stuff to dig into.
To wrap up this little chat if you are playing something new and it feels way too good. Don’t invest a ton of time into it model/paint-wise. It is going to get a lot harder to stretch your hobby and time dollar, so just be prepared to move off of a project if it gets hit with that Nerf bat. You should play an army you connect with and find enjoyable instead of the flavor of the month/week/weekend.
Forewarned is fore-armed.
