"Points Reverse Engineering in WH 40K" Topic

Has anyone figured a point system from scratch? Lets say someone wanted to make up stats for a Dalek, for example.

That is a major complaint I have against game systems like Warhammer or Flames of War. In these games you are simply given the points cost of units or figures. The really annoying part is where they "adjust the points cost" for "balance". It's totally subjective.
I prefer a system like WRG Ancients, where you are given a chart of First Principle points cost, and you can construct your own.

Yea.
This is a major annoyance.
I hate to say this, but it is all subjective, like John says.
It will cost you "X" points for a SM, but it will cost you "X-2" points on an ork.
Makes no sense.

And it's not just the armor and weapon. The points are also adjusted for training and morale and "special" rules.
It all ends up as "Because I said so". We are not allowed to see Oz behind the curtain.

Rogue Traders point system started with a basic figure (If ah disremember correctly) and all the add ons (ability, weapons and equipment) had their own cumulative cost. It seemed pretty balanced to me ?

Yeah Rogue Trader and Warhammer Fantasy Battles back in the day used to say that you start with a baseline human with a hand weapon (pretty much 3s across the board, 7s for personal stats) was 5 points. Adjust from there.
But back then it was 60+ points per Chaos Warrior. :)

There isn't a balanced point system because none of the game designers have come up with an algorithm for determining how to balance all of the variables in the games to come up with any consistent point cost for a model. The only game that I've used which allowed you to do this was the Silouette Core rule system used by Heavy Gear and similar games. They had an algorithm in which you input the various traits you wanted your vehicle to have and if you did your calculations correctly, it would give you a point cost (Threat Value) as well as an estimated production cost of the vehicle in question so you knew where you stood in relationship to the vehicles which were already in the game. The combat system for the game then allowed you to use all of the abilities (and flaws) of your design against other vehicles. The problem was the rules were a bit slow and you could create the monstrosity that was nearly invulnerable to damage from weapons systems in the game. Your vehicle would have an obscene Threat Value, and the cost would be astronomical, but you could do it.

Warhammer, Dystopian Wars, and all of the other systems are not based on any algorithm where there are known values to come up with a "standard" model in the game, but guestimated point values based upon play-testing of the model versus other models which have established values under the rules as written (or interpreted in GW's case). This makes it nearly impossible to build a new faction/force within the game without essentially taking a model with a current profile and comparing it to another model with a profile and generating a "guesstimate" on what the model you want to field should be for point costs. The GW VDR system has rules for building vehicles for Apocalypse style games, which worked alright, but if you built an actual in-game model with the same rules, it was always cheaper. So, as stated above, it is nothing more than hit and miss with a guesstimate on the point value and modifying it after numerous rounds of playtesting. Good luck.

Warhammer did have a points system, you'll find it in 'Forces of Fantasy'

That's been one of my main gripes against games made by miniature companies… they so often seem to discourage creativity(though of course there are exceptions, like GZG and their Stargrunt/Dirtside/Full Thrust rules that always featured/encouraged DIY). It seems to be, in part, fallout from going down the 'tournament' pathway.
Confrontation 2-3rd was probably the last game I'll get into that doesn't have some sort of design system. Since then I've favored systems like 5150 and GRUNTZ and .45 Adventures… because they facilitate creativity, rather than squelching it.
Not that I expect such DIY rules to give perfectly balanced results… I don't think they can… but the give you a clue to how the designers are thinking and how they've weighted various elements of the rules.
Also, I see it as a 'good will' gesture towards players that the company isn't commanding players only play within 'official' dispensations.
Still, I can go it alone if need be. Just make an educated guess and test it out… just takes longer.

Forget the points and just put all your stuff out there. Odds are your big point sink of a tank is going to get wasted by a lowly guardsman with a melta gun anyway.

Just have fun.

I tested a few of the races, and found that using the formula from Rogue Trader works well, if instead of using the point multiplier in chunks, you break it out by .1 increments. So (off of memory, so this is wrong) if for 5 – 9 points is a x1.5 multiiplier, do 5 = x1.1, 6 = x1.2, 7 = x1.3, 8 = x1.4, 9 = x1.5

That worked out well for most situations. Jump troops were off as I remember, but not too bad otherwise.

Also, many games need to tweak the hard points a little bit based on army availability (unless AVA is a stat, like it is in Infinity).

My short, sarcastic answer for points-engineering in 40k, at least for troops, is 'don't waste your time'. Try 'counts-as' instead. Now, if you can find the old Vehicle Design Rules, those weren't too bad, especially if you knocked about 15% off the end result.

I suspect the example of Dream Pod 9's design system is why they aren't more widespread – among other things, it asked you to compute cube roots at various points in the process.

The old 3rd edition Warhammer / Rogue Trader formulae had the usual flaw of being simply additive. A lascannon cost 15 points regardless of whether you gve it to an untrained conscript or an elite Space Marine hero, which made a mockery of the entire process. It also doesn't take into account any synergistic effects from other units in the force (or even within a stat line; Weapon Skill and Attacks each become more valuable as the other increases, but the formula doesn't take this into account). You can make a jack-of-all-trades unit which is reasonably fast, has a decent gun and OK armour, but three of them probably aren't as good as one slow unit with massive firepower, one defensive unit and one fast assault unit.

All in all the " work something out yourself and playtest it" method works just as well. The VDR rules for 40K still weren't allowed in tournaments, so frankly I don't see what the issue is. if you and your opponents want to introduce new units, the lack of a page of formulae shouldn't stop you.

John the OFM wrote:

That is a major complaint I have against game systems like Warhammer or Flames of War. In these games you are simply given the points cost of units or figures. The really annoying part is where they "adjust the points cost" for "balance". It's totally subjective.

It's not totally subjective at all. There's a good reason why army list designers don't simply use a quick calculation to work out costs – a quick calculation will only work for a unit or single figure, not across an entire army list.
Example from 40K: A standard Space Marine Tactical unit can take an antitank heavy weapon for, say, 10 points. So, a Space Marine Devastator unit should also get them for 10 points, if you were using a standard calculation. But they don't – they have to pay something like twice as much. The army list designers had to adjust the points for game balance. In this case, because the Tactical unit has predominantly short range anti-infantry weapons, and move around a lot – they will rarely get much use from that single anti-tank gun. But the Devastators can take several anti-tank weapons, so the unit as a whole has longer ranged, more powerful weapons. They are going to have a much larger impact on the game than that single heavy weapon in the Tactical unit – so the points cost was adjusted accordingly.

So while a standard points calculation will work for a unit, once you are designing army lists, adjusting costs for balance will have to be done.

There's just so many variables in a given 40k unit and in the way it and it's options relate to the army as a whole, that there's no way to make a good points calculator.

On the plus side, there are so many different units across the many 40k codicies, it shouldn't be hard to find one that either represents what you want outright, or can be slightly tweaked to reflect what you want it to be.

But the Devastators can take several anti-tank weapons, so the unit as a whole has longer ranged, more powerful weapons. They are going to have a much larger impact on the game than that single heavy weapon in the Tactical unit – so the points cost was adjusted accordingly.

There is also the Ballistic Skill difference, so not only is that Devastator Marine more likely to fire every turn, but he is also more likely to hit with any given shot.

Wait, when did Devastators get a better statline than Tac Marines?

I''l probably never play a point costs system. It is so far removed from reality I don't find it worth gaming.

"There is also the Ballistic Skill difference, so not only is that Devastator Marine more likely to fire every turn, but he is also more likely to hit with any given shot."

I just checked the book. They have the same ballistic skill as regular marines.

Space Wolves Long Fangs packs are cheaper than Dev squads due to the lack of a "Sergeant" and can have an extra heavy weapon. 5 Missile launchers do some pretty nasty things to pretty much anything but AV 14. I can just imagine how that'd look in reality. Five frag missiles spreading clouds of razor sharp death… Hah!

But. I totally agree with the fellow above. Now that I've gamed without points systems, I can only rarely, if ever, really go back to them for any reason. Not so much just do to with realism, but because they're such a hassle. I just want to game non-competitively and have fun with it.

On the other hand, I utterly lack the ability to design scenarios, so having a points system helps me to make sure that the forces are some approximation of balanced.

I'm with Lion, I'll play pointless systems ( I do enjoy TW) and I prefer scenario based play. However I don't mind just a bit of competition as a general guide, points systems are an excellent way to aproximate balance or intentional imballance of forces.

Also, when a bunch of folks are showing up to play a game(s) on club night and bringing their own figs, a points system is an incredibly usefull tool for making sure everyone is on roughly the same page.

Related:

Waaaaay early on (around 2002), I stumbled across a gent who "cracked" the points matrix for the game system "VOID 1.1" (of which I was and still am a fanboy) and he converted it into an Excel spreadsheet. I had a copy myself and produced a few extra armies (4 of them in fact) for the system.

After a bit, we experienced a catastrophic PC failure and I lost the matrix (and all the contact info for the gent.)

I had hard copies of the armies, so I know they are "more-or-less" legit points-wise, but no more cheat-sheet to make more…

Void 1.1 points apparently are here:

bofthebb.com/void.php

Rogue Traders point system started with a basic figure (If ah disremember correctly) and all the add ons (ability, weapons and equipment) had their own cumulative cost. It seemed pretty balanced to me ?

Fantasy may still run on that points engine, but not 40k.

In the change from 2e to 3e, the cost of a space marine went from 30 points to 15.

And I don't even want to start in on how warped the Grey Knights got with their previous codex (the one that introduced Draigo as the Chapter Master).

Flames of War is a bit closer to a solid points system, particularly in 2e. Say you wanted to play Fearless Veteran SS instead of Confident Veteran Germans. The change from Fearless to Confident is a 17% shift on the dice for morale purposes, and you could only take ~15% of the points that had been agreed to. However, the points system for tanks seems to shift between editions and eras. An Early War tank will be more expensive than that very same tank in mid-war, and a Mid-War tank will be more expensive than the same tank in Late-War.

Amusingly, the Flames of Vietnam points are apparently identical to late-war, so you could do interesting things like a US Air Cav assault on a WW2 Russian infantry battalion!

Apparently Star Fleet Battles also has a solid points formula as opposed to a "that-looks-about-right" system, but that's a board game and the BPV formula is considered ADB's trade secret (it's pretty sophisticated, as it apparently changes according to which range the ship is at!).