Its that time again. Time to start looking at the data from tournaments and see exactly how the scales of power are balanced. After the most minor of tweaks early on to Aeldari, GW has had a fairly slow hand when it comes to releasing FAQs, Errata, and Dataslate balances, sticking to their normal schedule rather than trying to get out ahead of current issues in the game.
You can listen to the ever-handsome Stu and his counterpart Nick speak on the meta here, as well as see their article. (I met Stu briefly not long ago. I’m sure he doesn’t remember me, but he seems like a pretty good dude)
Let’s look at the breakdown
I wish I could say I was surprised. Craftworld, GSC, Imp Knights, and Custodes are effectively deep-dicking everyone. Met-hoppers the world over are really over-inflating their sense of skill by simply buying into the new hotness, all so they can say “I’m so god-damn good”.
The middle armies have effectively stayed right where they are at, with some jockeying around, but ultimately the middle tier armies haven’t really moved. Honestly, this is where the game is actually fun. The lower-to-middle tier armies are pretty solid, and some of the best games I’ve had of Warhammer have come in those games
Even armies that are below a 45% win rate look decent, each one just has some issues that make it tough for them. I’ve only played a single game against guard, but from what I’ve seen there is some play in there. I am going to borrow my buddies guard army this week to see what I can come up with, but I think there are some hidden gems in there.
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Sisters are better than they look on paper. The issue I see there is the lack of any anti-vehicle/monster shooting. with 2 datasheets that have s10 or higher, and both of them are -1 AP, they will struggle. Multimeltas being 18″ and s9 really hurts them, considering they have no special rules for their bread and butter weapon. To me, fixing sisters is as easy as giving their Multimeltas AV/AM 4+
Drukhari are a weird animal. This is one of the two armies I play regularly, the other being Orks. I’ve done exceptionally well with them, but my list is extremely surgical, I just won my round 3 against Custodes, and here is a look at my list and a preview into round 3 of my 22 player comp-league list. Like and Subscribe if you’re a cool kid.
I don’t know the indexes inside and out, but I’ve played against Tau, and read a lot of Ad Mech, and from what I can see they just struggle with scoring. Tau can still throw enough dice to delete everything on the table, but they cannot hold objectives well, and their small footprint/unit size makes it tough to play tactical objectives. Switching to Fixed may help them a bit. Admech, I think suffer the same fate, though I could be wrong there, as I’ve not gotten to see them on the table, only theorycraft. Balancing these armies to score will be tough, because I know at least 1 of them still throws an ass-ton of shooting dice in an edition that rewards shooting, which can make that knife’s edge tough to maneuver on.
Marines are going to perpetually underperform, and really SHOULD sit right around the bottom of the pack. Why? Because they are the most over-represented faction, and have the highest percentage of new players. Every starter box has marines. Even I own a handful, despite not playing them or really liking them. (All My Homies Love Xenos)
Again, I’ve only played against Votann one game, so I don’t know much about them. They don’t seem terrible on paper, but not having played against them, its hard to form a real opinion. The game was interesting, with both of us effectively tabling each other, but the mobility of my drukhari just held him in check and kept him from scoring.
September is the first major milestone for 10th edition. In September we should see 2 things:
- The first of the Codexis (Marines/Nids)
- The first real dataslate
The first of the Codexis will let us all know what direction the game is heading. So far 10th is a mixed bag, with the good being… Pretty good… but the bad is just atrocious.
The dataslate will let us know just how much GW is interested in creating a balanced game for matched play. Remember that we are a minority (Comp players). Though we also provide the most visibility for the game (as far as players go). It will be interesting to see what direction GW takes with the game, and I honestly believe it will make or break 10th. An edition that has so much potential could become either the best, or the worst.
Chris