State of the Meta 9/10-9/12

State of the Meta 9/10-9/12

Greetings Fellow Try-Hards,

This will be the first article in a series I would like to call “The State of the Meta''. In this series, I will be using my BCP subscription and my spreadsheet skills, to present to you a snapshot of the current competitive Warhammer 40K Tournament Scene. My goal is to give an unbiased portrayal of what armies are actually being taken to tournaments. We can discuss this information in depth on our Try-Hard discord channel, and there, maybe we can analyze the statistics to better prepare ourselves for our own competitive journeys.

First, I want to discuss what data I am using for this study. I scoured BCP’s global events list to find every 40k event that will be played this weekend. (9/10-9/12) There are several criteria that an event needs to meet in order for me to pull data from it.

1: Event must be in the Best Coast Pairings App. (Only database I have access to.)

2: Must be an “In-Person”, tournament using the 9th Edition GW 2021 GT Mission Pack”

3: Point levels must be at 2,000.

4: Event must have at least 20 submitted and verified lists.

If all four of these criteria are met, I pulled all the faction data to comprise a list of what exactly the “Meta” looks like this weekend. First you will see total data, listing the number of entrants from each army registered for an event this weekend. This “Big Picture View”, will show a global look at faction representation and overall ITC ramifications. I then will list the individual European events, followed by the individual North American tournaments, (Sorry Aussie’s I don’t have access to your tournaments). This will be good to see the subtle differences in the 2 “Meta’s”.

A quick note, I also intend to write a second companion series, starting next week, where I will list the top 3 placing armies from each of these events and give my “Hot-Takes” on how they got there. The hope is, that barring any major releases, we can use the data from these two series to plan any tweaking in our own lists for next week.

I hope you enjoy these articles and I hope it brings some new insight into your own army lists as well as helps prepare you for your next tournament.

40K "State of the Meta" 9/10-9/12 total Faction Representation (248 Armies) Faction: % of Representation:

Drukhari: 23 9% Death Guard: 20 8% Necrons: 17 6.50% Orks: 16 6% Thousand Sons: 14 5.50% Ad Mech: 13 5% Sisters: 12 5% Grey Knights: 12 5% Tyranids: 11 4.50% Space Wolves: 10 4% Custodes: 10 4% Dark Angels: 9 3.50% Tau: 8 3% Iron hands: 6 2.50% Imperial Soup: 5 2% Imperial Guard: 5 2% White Scars: 5 2% Ultramarines:

5 2% Harlequins: 5

2% Chaos Soup: 4 1.50% Craftworlds: 4 1.50% Daemons: 3 1% Aeldari Soup: 3 1% Imperial Knights: 3 1% Templars: 3 1% Iron Warriors: 3 1% Renegade Knights: 2 1% Hive Mind: 2 1% Ultramarines Successor: 2 1% Salamanders: 2 1% World Eaters: 2 1% Blood Angels: 2 1% Deathwatch: 2 1% Raven Guard: 1 0.50% Emperors Children: 1 0.50% Crimson Fists: 1 0.50% Black Legion: 1 0.50% GSC: 1 0.50% We can clearly infer a few things from this data.

1: Ninth Edition Codices are king.

The top 8 represented factions which accounts for 50% of all the armies present are 9th edition codices. When you add in Wolves, Dark Angels, Blood Angels, Deathwatch, almost 60% of the armies present have their 9th edition book and supplement. And then add in the remaining Marine factions and about 70% of the armies being played at least have their 9th edition Codex. When you think about the fact that 38 factions are represented and only 12 of them have all their rules released it means about 31% of the factions represented are accounting for 60% of the armies.

2: We need to prepare for many different profiles.

You need to factor into all of your upcoming lists how to deal with profiles from vastly different armies. You will see a lot of Drukhari, Necrons, Orcs, Death Guard, Sisters, Ad Mech, and Gk/Thousand Sons. Each of these armies present different profiles and styles of play. I think it's actually good to see such variation, because it helps control the perceived “Brokenness” of some books. We also need to be ready for mirror matches if we play these factions.

I hope you guys find this information useful. If you have any questions let me know, I'll be glad to answer whatever I can, and look out next week where we will go over the winning lists for each of these tournaments.

Thank you for your time,

-The Butcher-

Sycorax Showdown (Poole, England) 28 Players

Death Guard: 4

Necrons: 3

Ad Mech: 2

Tyranids: 2

Iron Hands: 2

Harlequins: 2

Imperium Soup: 2

Thousand Sons: 2

Sisters: 2

Daemons: I

Grey knights: I

Drukhari: I

Craftworlds: I

Custodes: I

Orks: I

Renegade Knights: I

Astrategas Coliseum II (Alcantarilla, MC, ES) 27 Players

Death Guard: 4

Space Wolves: 3

Drukhari: 3

Ad Mech: 3

Grey Knights: 2

Tau: 2

Death Watch: I

Orks: I

Tyranids: I

UltraMarines Successor: I

Imperial Guard: I

Necrons: I

Salamanders: I

Custodes: I

Sisters: I

Iron Hands: I

COG 2K: (England, GB) 35 Players

Necrons: 4

Drukhari: 3

Tau: 3

Orks: 3

Death Guard: 3

Harlequins: 2

Grey Knights: 2

Dark Angels: 2

Tyranids: I

Iron Warriors: I

Space Wolves: I

Custodes: I

Sisters: I

Ultramarines: I

Thousand Sons: I

Crimson Fists: I

White Scars: I

Black Legion: I

GSC: I

Chaos Soup: I

Craftworlds: I

No Tak X (Burnaby, BC): 31 Players

Thousand Sons: 4

Necrons: 4

Drukhari: 3

Orks: 3

Dark Angels: 2

Aeldari Soup: 2

Hive Mind: I

Blood Angels: I

Tyranids: I

Space Wolves: I

Iron Hands: I

Imperial Knights: I

White Scars: I

Death Guard: I

Craftworlds: I

Renegade Knights: I

Custodes: I

Tau: I

Ad Mech: I

Tables and Towers September RTT: (Maryland, USA) 22 Players

Custodes: 3

Drukhari: 3

Necrons: 2

Dark Angels: 2

White Scars: 2

Death Guard: 2

Imperial Guard: 2

Orks: I

Space Wolves: I

Ad Mech: I

Iron Warriors: I

Sisters: I

Ultramarines: I

Battle Shock: (Colorado, USA) 20 Players

Drukhari: 4

Ad Mech: 2

Imperial Guard: I

World Eaters: I

Grey Knights: I

Harlequins: I

Custodes: I

Tau: I

Hive Mind: I

Tyranids: I

Imperial Knights: I

Ultramarines: I

Sisters: I

Templars: I

Dark Angels: I

Thousand Sons: I

Harbor Heresy: (Washington, USA) 48 Players

Space Wolves: 4

Thousand Sons: 4

Sisters: 4

Drukhari: 4

Orks: 4

Imperial Soup: 3

Ad Mech: 3

Chaos Soup: 3

Death Guard: 2

Tyranids: 2

Daemons: 2

Salamanders: I

Templars: I

Tau: I

Necrons: I

Ultramarines Successor: I

Dark Angels: I

Iron Hands: I

Ultramarines: I

Raven Guard: I

Imperial Guard: I

World Eaters: I

Emperors Children: I

Iron Warriors: I

Odyssey Games September RTT: (California, USA) 37 Players

Grey Knights: 6

Death Guard: 4

Tyranids: 3

Orks: 3

Necrons: 2

Thousand Sons: 2

Custodes: 2

Drukhari: 2

Sisters: 2

Imperial Knights: I

Blood Angels: I

Iron Hands: I

Craftworlds: I

Ad Mech: I

Deathwatch: I

Templars: I

Aeldari Soup: I

Dark Angels: I

White Scars: I

Ultramarines: I