Top 5 List Building Mistakes (Warhammer 40k)
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- เผยแพร่เมื่อ 24 ม.ค. 2025
- *Patreon Link* / danielbrewster
*Interested in Wh40k coaching? I recommend Art of War:*
theartofwar40k...
• WH40k Secondaries (How...
• Design Better Warhamme...
00:48 -- Fighting Ghosts in the Meta
05:24 -- Focusing Only on "Killing"
07:16 -- Overestimating Buff/Synergy consistency
10:00 -- Changing Lists Every Game
12:13 -- List Building in a Vacuum
Sound quality is scuffed but good content as always
Yep! Really hard for me to record these days and the wind/microphone totally crappd out on me. Didn't realize till I got home. It'll be improved for next time, and sorry you had to deal with the rough audio
@@danielbrewster8642 no problem, as the content was great :)
I found myself in the scenario of bringing a new list to a big tournament. Was a desaster, indeed, but it was the only list I could paint in time 😂
Love your content, keep on the good work!
@@danielbrewster8642
Hey Dan, sound engineer here. The issue you have often comes from having two sources of audio, like the camera mic and the mic in front of you. Because of the time difference between the sounds due to the difference in distance from you it creates that metallic filtering sound. If this is the case then simply muting one or the other would solve the problem.
Thanks for the great content!
Still my favourite WH40K Tactical Channel! Thank you once more Dan!
Love that you're back
thanks!~
As a new player your channel is helping me out a lot, too many other channels seem to focus on what models you should be fielding and what upgrades they should have, but don't talk about how to actually use those models in game.
Glad you didn't let the quality stop you from putting out an informative video. Thank you!
i have recorded then deleted about 15 videos in the past few months haha. Didn't want to lose this one since my recording time is way less these days
I'm not a competitive player but I love these videos because I enjoy getting a deeper understanding of the game and there's always practical advice that even a casual player can find helpful for improving.
I'm personally really prone to the third mistake. In my last game I was really banking on using a miraculous ability and thus was screwed when she was killed before I could.
So glad you like my content
You make some great points. Thanks. I'm currently scouring TH-cam for advice, having returned to the tabletop 40k. for a the first time since 4th edition. So, I've got a lot of catching up to do, and these videos of yours and others', really help. All the best, from northern England.
Your first point is on point. I was considering taking a Death Guard double patrol without a plague caster to my first tournament due to fear of TSons, but I realized that I really can't survive w/o the buffs he provides my units. If I run into them, I'll just have to deal with it.
hopefully it works out for you!
YES!!! Absolutely love how this channel takes the competitive side seriously.
Glad you like it!
Great video, loved the fall foliage in the background!
Thanks. It was very cold -- had to power through it for my wonderful viewers
When I played Thousand Sons in 8th edition I used to say if you have to cast spells on a unit to make it good, it's not a good unit. I learned this when I had a heldrake and cast Diabolical strength, glamor of tzeentch, boon of change, and then promptly failed to cast warp time time on him.
you get it, david!
@@danielbrewster8642 I'm going to have to screenshot that since no one will ever say that to me again! lol
I started watching your videos since a short while ago, but two things you said in previous videos (and again in this one) that REALLY caught my attention where:
1) Don't change lists every game
2) Plan your secondaries
Yeah, it seems like such obvious things to consider, once you actually sit down to think about them, but I had not thought about them at all since the 8th edition was released.
I sadly had to miss a tournament in my local area a little while ago, but on the running up to the tournament I did manage to get a lot of practice matches to see if my list was up to par with what the tournament would be. Both pieces of advice I mentioned were central to my list design and the way I played it.
It gave me REALLY good results.
Thank you for the content. It's actually quite useful. Specially for people like me, who always have been much more into the narrative or casual styles of play, and are just now starting to try their hand at more competitive stuff.
Thanks for your comment. Judging by my polls and other research, you are exactly my "base". Casual players who want to learn the intricacies of the game.
I'm not Art of War or Table Top Titans level good at all, but I try to make my own type of content.
@@danielbrewster8642 yeah, we are clearly the base for these videos. Like I said, your content was REALLY useful to me.
I play a lot of matched play games, but never with a competitive mindset. Only as a way to balance army sizes.
I run local match-play and narrative play campaigns, both with and without the Crusade system. I also write Open-Play scenarios and run the occasional Narrative "Tournament".
I had only twice tried my hand at competitive, and even then had a win rate of... I dunno, about 1 every 3 games? Not much.
Although I missed the last tournament here, due to personal engagements, in what practice games I did manage to play, prior to the tournament date, I managed a 4-0 win streak. This was using Firstborn Dark Angels, versus one Farsight Enclaves army, two Death Guard armies, and one Black Templar army.
Scores for the first game, sadly, I did not keep. But for the others I managed scores of 68/43, then 88/67, then 95/73. All with the same list, which was tailored to specific secondaries.
Keeping track of how secondaries performed was a good excercise, as well. Seeing how to play them better over time.
Again, one cannot argue against the results of applying your advice. Thank you for your content.
As someone with a 3D printer and a community that doesn't care about proxies, the constant list changing has lost me *a ton* of games. Keeping my list the same over the last 5 games has vastly improved my skill.
I need to try this.
Certainly fun to swap new stuff every game, but consistency makes you a lot better
@@Circuz36GamingChannel I gave myself a 110 point limit, which allowed me to flex in an assassin or an inquisitor, or change out one Tempestus Scion suicide unit for a group of 10 guardsmen, but keeping myself from removing 3 Leman Russ or leaving 300 points of Bullgryn at home has forced me to really understand what units are supposed to be doing, what their weaknesses actually are, and has let me try them in multiple roles (coming in from reserves, staying as a counter punch, targeting dreadnoughts instead of intersessors). I very highly recommend it, especially if you record how many points you get from game to game. I have been seeing a slow but constant increase in VPs every game.
@@RandalxFlagg oo
Win percentage isn't the stat you should care about into "ghosts". Grey Knights podium almost every weekend now, so if you want to actually *win* an event, your odds of facing them are much higher than just the 10% representation they present among participating players. Yes, don't take away psykers if they are anchors for your win condition, but also make sure your win condition against those factions (esp. Grey Knights) doesn't lean on a casting secondary, because they WILL shut you down with extreme prejudice.
It's good to "plan for the best and forget the rest," but Grey Knights are among the best, and if you want first place, the odds are high you WILL have to beat them.
Exactly. Well said!
I imagine they will break top 5 in win percent and meta after all the nerfs/buffs. Certainly willing to remove the psyker if i see that happen and it probably will!
one thing to consider is if you are using 40K stats centre for what is in the meta, the top 4's are currently over 5 weeks out of date if the win rate and % of meta is equally out of date then the number of tsons and GK players might be much higher. I know of the 2 GT's I've been to in the last month TSONS and GK players have made up about 20% of the opponents in a 5 game tournament.
Totally. I think the argument is a good one, and everyone has a different tipping point. I'm close, and willing to be convinced with a little more data. If it was 20% of psyker hosing armies I would certainly make the switch
Say it with me - You slightly increase your chance at winning against TS and GK, in exchange for losing every single game against Admech one-shotting your dreadnoughts - in addition to making the Space Marine mirrors worse.
It's not a good deal. Stop advocating for people to make their lists worse.
@@brothertobias I didn't advocate one way or another, I said to consider if the global stats are out of date and that consider your local meta
Loving the outdoor recording. Glitchy but fun.
And great content!
Thanks for the visit
Nice to see you getting some fresh air :P
Great content as always! Thank you!
My pleasure!
Just played my first game. My Salamanders won against Orcs
Josh! Congrats. Those orks are reaaally strong these days. Hope you can get out to a tournament
@@danielbrewster8642 calm down there brotha! Unless you want to coach me thru it. No Tournaments just yet
Vulkan Lives.
Honestly, you've got some of my favorite 40k content out there! Such good information and well communicated!
Thanks, Major League Nerd. I'm hoping to really expand my ability to do content over time
I just stomped a Raven Guard army that had a bunch of Elites but the bare minimum Troops. The mission had the 4 objectives in no man's land and he had to move his entire army into my threat range to try to contest the objectives
Yep. Mission and terrain are huge. Which really helps increase the replayability of the game
@@danielbrewster8642 I recommended your channel to him to help him as he builds his collection more. I was playing the custom Necron Dynasty with pregame move and all obsec. He had several pregame moves as well but didn't respond to me getting first turn. I had quite an alpha strike and it was all downhill from there.
Love your tactical advice sir. Thank you.
the way that officer explained his napkin math the other video, is there a guide on how to use the stat variables to pick targets?
no real guide, just use break points. Str 5 or 8 are break points against a T4 guy. -3 AP when someone has only a 5+invul is wasted. Still, target priority is most important
First video of yours, and I like your style of "no bullshit, all analysis."
Thumbs up, I'm crafting a Salamanders army myself, thanks for the theorycrafting
one of the nicer comments I've ever received.
@@danielbrewster8642 Ha, well I do appreciate how you aren't dumbing it down for the algorithm or making that one face or anything.
I'd be interested to see how you rate my in-progress Salamanders list that i'm about 3/4 done collecting. Just got a rhino because "focused only on killing stuff" was definitely an issue
I think a lot of the more “casual” players (and please I don’t mean this disparagingly - I consider myself one) don’t really understand the mathematics of the probabilities behind how their armies work / could work. Humans are by nature less risk averse and too many people build around powerful but improbable combos - often because they just don’t know how to do the math.
It’s the same in magic. I keep preaching the gospel of hypergeometric probability calculators to people but they ignore my advice, slot in that one card the only remember the one time it won them the game - forgetting all the others they drew it and it was useless.
Thanks for the comment! And yeah the vast majority of players are actually quite casual
Love your point about taking ownership of mistakes, and not having results oriented thinking. Just played only my second.game after returning to the hobby after 20 years and got thoroughly stomped in a 1k game by an experienced Tyranid player running new Leviathan Nids. I got tabled in turn three, having only managed to kill three genestealers 😂
At first I was dismissing the game, as my opponent rolled an obnoxious amount of 4+ invuls on his hive tyrant, rolled two super-smites back to back, and made a 9' charge with 16 genestealers coming out of reserves. But having a good objective look back and focusing on what was in my control, I can see several key mistakes that could have given me far more play. The biggest mistake was in not naming the hive tyrant as the target of my seal of oath (I wasn't aware of the new Nid relic for -1 to wound, which makes a hive tyrant REALLY tanky, especially when near a maleceptor). Then I needed to deploy my hellblasters in strategic reserve, given I needed their damage output and it is very hard to screen out a monster with a 16' move that can move twice thanks to swarmlord. Lastly, I removed casualties incorrectly, in a way that opened a hole in my screen and made it even easier for the hive tyrant to get where he needed. I got crushed, bit I feel like I learnt a lot just from that one game. It helps that my opponent was really nice as well.
loved the story. sounds like you have the right attitude
@@danielbrewster8642 It was the most fun I have ever had being brutally dismembered . . .
Dan have you done a video about damage Roll over or if it can’t roll over when attacking wounded models in a unit.
I have not, but only Mortal Wounds and special abilities overflow over
"taking accountability for their loss" this is huge! I was dying laughing cuz it is so true. "My opponent is stupid, the meta, models they bought, bad the board was" hahahahhhhha you are so right!
worst one I ever heard was "i only lost because my opponent made a terrible list and played terribly"
Crazy what turning off a Gellar Field does to Mic quality sometimes
TBH a windy area near cars and planes probably didn't help
The problem with not taking psykers because of TSons and GK being strong is that they're not the only faction with strong psykers. Nids for example have strong, non-character psykers and Shadow in the Warp means they do well in a mental shootout.
good point! Those deny's can be strong!
It looks awesome where you are. I always come away from your videos with something new to think about.
Glad to hear it!
Love it! Thanks
You are so welcome!
@9.28 He pulls a Santa inspired move:
Making a list and checking it twice!
Audio from the warp! Was this Dan talking or was it a Lord of Change giving us warhammer tips?!
Truly our tzeentch lord spoke through me on that day
I didn't realize you were from New England as well. What tournaments in the area have you been hitting up? Were you thinking about attending the GT in Rhode Island in Feb?
Spent the majority of my life and college years in the area. I'm actually just passing through and won't be going to any tournaments
There's a GT in RI? Must look into this
No worries! I was surprised to see and wondered if I was going to get a crack at those blood angels.
And yeah it's called CaptainCon (had to look it up). I've never been before but sounds promising.
Thank you for summarizing the entire video in the first 30 seconds. Saved me 15 minutes 45 seconds!
I play Necrons. I've won the last three games (mildly competitive scene) and had few models on the table at the end. Didn't matter as I blocked my opponent from scoring points in different ways each turns.
I also play Nihilakh Dynasty which most opponents dismiss.
Thats the necron way!
I'm having this fight on the subreddit every week. 🤦♂
Yeah, nice work Space Marine-guy. You really showed that single Thousand Sons player what was what when you removed the 5+ Invulnerable save from your army. And all it took was losing to three or four consecutive Speedwaaaghs and Mars Stratoraptors in a row.
Now you're down in the lowers brackets, with all the other Marine Players. Marine players who actually did bring Librarians. And I'm sure their multimeltas ripping straight through your Redemptors will not matter at all, because you did prevent that Thousand Son from scoring 15 VP that one time. If we disregard that they instead scored 12 VP, because you had nothing in your list to deny the psychic secondaries.
Go, Space Marine-guy. What a pro-gamer.
lol. Yeah you get it. I'm not trying to convince people the psyker is "worth it" vs Tsons, I'm saying its worth it because 90% of the meta isn't TSONS or Gray Knights
Having a plan is so important. It's not enough to come to the table with the mindset of only reacting to what happens. Damage control is a constant downward spiral. Just walking up the board with out regard or respect for the enemy's lethality is also foolish.
Be proactive, and make sure to try and get value in those 5 limited turns. Part of getting better at the game is not about winning every match, its looking at shortcomings and working to improve.
great comment!
Your content is so excellent. Are you doing this stuff anymore?
I'm most guilty of changing my list after every game and not getting practice with the same list. It's so tempting to change things because a game or two didn't play out the way I thought it would.
It's also fun!
@@danielbrewster8642 so true, I like to try out every single option in the codex even if I know a lot of them aren't so good.
Why the change, besides fun? One of my favorite things is asking my opponent what I did wrong, even if I won. I often find it is bad play. It is also a great way to learn more about other codices you aren't familiar with.
@@kamaeq it's mostly just lacking confidence in the list and giving up on it after the first bad loss.
Perfect! I was just making some (mistakes)
Glad I could help!
Another great video even with a robot voice occasionally. I'm in my list testing phase before a Major GT. I'm playing my Tau even though I feel that my harlequins could fair better but I know T'au more inside and out. So maybe another suggestion for list builder is experience with that army
Wish I knew more about Tau to help you! Lets hope you get a new codex soon
The other thing to consider with ghosts in the meta. Is that the meta in every players circle is defineably different. If all your friends religiously play Tsons or Greyknights.. then rather than loosing 1.5% average points you loose considerably more due to higher exposure.
Which in turn gets reflected into the internet hivemind. Because players consistently beaten by these lists, then tell other people who have never played those lists, who in turn take it as gospel because... 'well they play against them all the time, i should listen to them because i have no experience with it'.
So minor issues on the grand scale get escalated because of their niche application. The lack of contact people have with the armies ends up making them look like meta defining issues, despite the opposite being true.
True, data is an aggregate. But if you're going to a large event where people travel far, I would go with the averages. Here's the big takeaway, it's a personal decision based on your situation and army. I just want people to make an educated decision, rather than just saying no psykers because internet man said so
@@danielbrewster8642 Absolutely. Important to be incontrol of the decisions you have and make the right ones for the setting.
i think you‘re not allowed to temporal surge a daemon prince, or did i misread the spell?
I think I meant using it with a demon prince. Not using it ON a demon prince.
@@danielbrewster8642 TY or the reply! sad, i was hoping i could do it. would be awesome if it still worked. i play TS and since i learned u do too i would love any TS specific videos from you!
"specing for toughness 3"
finally, time for assault hellblasters to shine
All hail the assault hellblasters
Grey Knights are pretty much top of the Meta atm though, so dunno if this video holds up now that Admech and Orkz and DE got nerfed. If you're in a tournament (and want to win it) even if only 10% are playing GKs, chances are you're gonna have to play them and beat them! Their GK Secondary is an easy 15 if you have just 1 Psyker and in return you also can't take the best Secondary against them
Yeah I think GK will rise in popularity and meta %. We'll have to see how the numbers shake out, but Its likely that NOW it is no longer worth putting in a slightly helpful psyker if you're trying to win a GT. Their TWIP was like 5% compared to DE's 30% but those numbers might flip as the data shakes out. I'll pin a comment with my new views as hard tournament data comes out
"No one should take psykers"
*Cries in Eldar*
I thibk you should take psykers :)
@@danielbrewster8642 yep I know
I'm just laughing at how people think you shouldn't
You took 3 factions of SM into account for the argument on your first point, but what about Tyranids?
Depends. I don't play tyranids. Do you think your zoanthropes are better than your other options? Do they score you 2+ points more than the other options? I can't make the decision every faction and every unit. That's for you to decide based in your experience
Tyranids have excellent psychic powers, I definitely don't think they should voluntarily give them up.
Dont worry about your baseball reference, nobody else knows either.
send help
yup, i'm guilty of all 5!
Great content but not a fan of the outside shoot just because of audio
Yeah I could have picked a better location for sure
Ironically enough Grey Knights are now number 1 or 2 (depending how you rate Thicc City) and Bring it Down is better against them for the most part.
Yeah this was before all those updates. Definitely moved to #2 spot for GK in my mind
0:51 gg ez as necron.
big brain plays
Now the Grey Knights might be top of the meta lol
Oh how the tables have turned!
*cries in thousand sons* but that's the point of the video, critically think and determine when the tipping point has been reached. And I think we got there
Infinity has a saying... It's not your list, it's you.
of all the variables that exist in a game, a huge amount of them you can control!
Ill allways take the rhino. Best car in the 40th millenium
vroom vroom
Fortunately, I don't play witches, but that is a personal choice. I'm an original (pre-retcon from "atheist" to whiny Empie worshipper) BT player. I've swapped to Custodes, but they are weak vs 1000 Sons right now. Have to see how GW balances Custodes with the buffed Marines and anti-psyker weakness.
tough, custodes dont match up well into mass Mortal wounds
@@danielbrewster8642 And they are an old codex that happened to be balanced against 1W Marines. Now against 2W Marines, they have been weakened badly. They no longer are super warriors a cut above, but are merely slightly better than Terminators.
I'm expecting GW to buff their wounds and turn the 6+ FNP into a 5+, as well as make all their master crafted weapons into master crafted stat lines. Will the cost be too much? We will see.
If not, Dread Host looks better and better despite the CP cost.
I like this, but I don't agree with the point on results based thinking . Proof of History > Proof of Maths : and here's why.
If I flip a coin, what's the chance that you can guess it (assuming it can never land on it's side)
If you said 50%, well what if I've practiced flipping coins all my life and I can get whatever flip I want 99% of the time? Or to use your poker analogy, what if I'm extremely good at reading reactions. And with as much practice as anyone can reasonably commit to it you can't hide it from me. Would a sensible person go all in here?
Proof of Maths does has a reliance on knowing absolutely all the variables, unfortunately this is not always possible. Proof of history (and this does support you point about not changing armies about) will contain allowances for what we don't know.
fair point
I'm not sure if I understand your "proof of history" concept here, but with what I get, I think you are talking about first hand experience. If so, I fully disagree with you. That's a type of fallacy, anecdotal evidence. What you experienced, is true, but isn't truth. If I went to Nevada twice, and both times it rained, if I say that in my opinion, Nevada is rainy, that is true, but it isn't the truth.
@@gustavotriqui Proof of history is what sounds like. If something has occurred 75% of the time then the chance of it occurring is 75% even if that's not what maths would represent.
To use your Nevada experience. 100% of the times you've been to Nevada it's rained. So when you go historically it has a 100% chance of raining. Does this mean that there's no chance it won't rain - absolutely not.
The more often you were to return to Nevada and it would continue to rain, then I would be more confident that if you were to go it would rain. This does not necessarily mean you going there causes it to rain directly. It may be something external, such as *when* you chose to go.
Proof of Maths is only superior if you know all the variables, which when you take into account how wide *all* truly is, this will never be possible.
Proof of history has an inbuilt mechanism for coping for unknown variables that corrupt the result. If I were to flip a coin 100 times and it came up 100 heads, it's reasonable to assume that it's not a fair flip and the actual chance of heads is close to or near 100%. You just have accept that, even if you don't understand why.
The one weakness if you've not spotted it already is sample size. To bring it back on to subject, if you deep struck in a squad of Terminators who proceeded to make a 9" charge, that does not mean it will happen everytime. However if you played say 20 games and they made it 15 times. I'd take them confidently they would make the charge and adjust my expectations accordingly based on the sample size getting larger.
If nothing else playing like this (which i do) somewhat causes your minatures to develop sort of personalities. You do need to be aware of the possibility of confirmation bias. Keep a notepad or something,
This channel has good contents, too bad nothing new
Abhor the Witch is not very good vs Tsons and Wrath of Magnus is not very good for the Tsons player.
Why do you think abhor isn't good vs tsons?
@@danielbrewster8642 because it means you need to table Tsons to get most of it and Tsons are tough and dangerous. Going aggro into them is a bad idea.
A very good player who won a TTS competition named Max Gwiss said that every time someone took Abhor against him he got less than he would for ROD. this has been my experience too.