I haven't played L&D for a very long time, but I pulled out my old lists. Most of mine consisted of covens with a handful of IG vehicles attached (Hydras for AA, Hellhounds for FF), with daemon engine formations as support choices. Even my "traitor" themed Tzeentch lists were mainly Cultists (as degenerate IG/PDF) with just a few attached vehicles.

In fairness, that may be due to the minis I happen to own. With Silver Towers for on-ground fire support and lots of Doomwings for Intercepting and hitting infantry in cover, that reduces the need for more conventional IG armor, AA and artillery.

5k and one hydra in each coven.

_________________
My EPIC and BFG Blog: https://epicaddiction.wordpress.com/

ahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh.

that explains why you are so worried about the list being restricted - at 5K you really can take a bit of everything, whereas an army doc that's perfect at 3k would be a bit repetitive at 5k.
definetly something I'll bear in mind for future design work.

_________________
My shifting projects

Bingo!

Lists are supposed to be balanced and interesting from 2k to 5k points.

_________________
My EPIC and BFG Blog: https://epicaddiction.wordpress.com/

I would more work on the 2.7k to 5k bracket myself. But this is why I put out these feelers and see how people react.

_________________

Already been explained repeatedly - as the list is bloated, tries to represent to many things, has redundant options and goes against the design ethos of EA. IMO those outweigh 'No, it will make me change my list'

_________________
www.epic-uk.co.uk
NetEA NetERC Human Lists Chair
NetEA Chaos + Black Legion Champion

And yet, it seems to work and play in a more balanced way than many other lists.

_________________
My EPIC and BFG Blog: https://epicaddiction.wordpress.com/

_________________

Balanced?

I think the issue is internal balance. Some units seem to be a 'must take' and others are a bit of a waste of points.

Hence Tim experimenting with the current list, trying to use it without the traitor guard elements. As he gets more practice, his use of the seemingly sub-par elements are improving.
That's what he means (I think) when he says demonstrate it.
Talk about some games you've played, what units you took and why and how they performed.

The original accusation for bloated came, i think, from the way you couldn't fit all of the units into a 2 page reference sheet. Something as simple as that.
Nealhunt also has a dislike for the silver towers and possibly the knights devine being in the general list. Both are faction specific, but also highly specific to one place and time which, for the silver towers at least, wasn't in a Latd force.

There's also no plans to retire the old list, simply to see if there's a better way of doing things. What he was talking about earlier on in the thread was trying a new list with a different structure: two core formations - one for traitor guard and one for cultist rabble.

_________________
My shifting projects

Don't worry, I'm keeping abreast of this discussion. Whilst I do feel that the list is bloated, where else do we have 'see another army list for half the units that you can choose' printed, I am also of the opinion that there might be room for some new dedicated LatD units. However, I am still playing with lists and will not start to open this up until I'm happy with what I want to proceed with.

This is definitely true, but I don't see it changing any time soon. Both the knights and the towers have a dual "generic daemon engine" role in practice and that has its own momentum which will compete with the background fiction for a long time to come.

If I had a magic wand, on the other hand...

_________________

I find it very unhelpful continually saying No the changes will affect my list. I'm in no way wanting to force changes through, and neither is Tim, the purpose of this thread is to judge whether the problems with the LATD -that it goes against the design ethos of specialised armylists to be a more generalist representing the full range of traitor IG to cultists+daemon engines andthat it is bloated and has unecessary/competing options are sufficient that they require the lists too be split, another option as Tim has outlined or just minor changes.
Therefore what would be helpful is players TESTING if the list works as cultist army or traitor iG etc and what over options could be added to seperate lists to make them viable, or suggesting what changes could be made to the list as it is or what or other options could be pursued. Not just popping up every page to say 'No change, No change it would make me change my list, leave it alone' and repeating ad nauseam.

_________________
www.epic-uk.co.uk
NetEA NetERC Human Lists Chair
NetEA Chaos + Black Legion Champion

I think that characterisation is a little unfair. Most people against the changes not because it would force them to change their list - but because we haven't been shown a driving need for the changes. The list works well as it is, and is pretty well externally balanced against other 'standard'-style lists. OK, internal balance if fairly bad (the auto-include of hydras for example) but it is no worse than say codex marines and thier warhound problems. Surely this means that all that is really needed is a tweaking of stats rather than wholesale change?

I play traitor IG most commonly, relying on daemons to make up for its shortcomings when compared with regular IG.

_________________
My EPIC and BFG Blog: https://epicaddiction.wordpress.com/