Having to go out and buy four more boxes over just one model to make a list work is exactly the problem... the game is expensive enough as it is.
Oh I agree wholeheartedly, its why I have a 3d printer and dont mind proxies at all.
Speaking of opinion, I think they fudged the boarding patrols about as much as they could have.
Btw this is gonna be a rant.
Boarding patrols are a ruleset modification that came out at the tail end of 9th edition in December. It actually features a pretty neat vision and action system (that could still be improved but I wont talk about that here). The premise is that you have a limited list of units you can take there, some modifications to units that would absolutely dominate the limited field (for a good reason too), you have specific strategems only usable for Boarding patrols.
This was all fine, this is how you are supposed to do this. Make rules and balance the game for those rules. Perfect.
And then 10th came out.
Armies are balanced around the complement of rules and unit stats. Some armies have stronger unit rules for weaker army rules and strategems, others have the opposite deal going.
This is still all fine. And Boarding Patrols got their 10th update. Or did they. They got a new unit list that you can take, which is for the most part more open compared to the previous one. But they never got their detachment rules and strategems updated.
The official advice so far is "use 9th boarding patrol detachment rules and strategems and 10th unit stats".
Except this doesnt work.
Some of the old strategems are overpowered in 10th, others are mildly useful (but way less than they were in 9th) and others are straight up unusable.
So currently, this amazing rules system is bogged down by whether or not your particular strategem and detachment list is actually useful for the units you have. You either will have an amazing time or and absolutely horrible one.
Oh and worst of all, they actually limited tyranid lists to the absolute worst units for the format, especially against SM players.
This has been a massive disappointment for me as I really loved the idea of the vision and action rules they brought out, but the fact that a rule set 8 months old is outdated on the border of being unplayable (and one that had 5 rulebook releases meanwhile, mind you) is just so disappointing to me.
There, rant over.
