How to prepare for team tournaments

Greetings, my nickname is Typhus. Recently, the 40k Teams format has been growing in popularity among Warhammer 40000 players, as many consider it to be the best way to play this game. The purpose of this article is to guide you through entering the world of 40k Teams and provide you with an actionable plan for preparing your team before an event.

To begin, let's briefly explain the concept of team tournaments. As the name implies, instead of a single player, a team of players is involved. However, rather than me describing all the details of 40k Teams, I recommend reading this informative introductory article from Goonhammer, if you are not familiar with the topic: https://www.goonhammer.com/start-competing-40k-team-tournaments/

Assuming you have already read the article and have an understanding of army choices, terrain packs, and differential scorings, let's delve into how to properly prepare for the event. Preparation process is similar regardless of the team size. First, you need to gather a group of players, decide on each person's army, prepare army lists, adjust for the terrain pack, identify what is effective in the current meta, and have a rough idea of how you want to approach pairings. We will use a 5-man team tournament as an example to explain this process.

Phase I - Army Choice:

You have five players participating in the upcoming event as a team. Each player has one or more armies available to play, but how do you decide which player should play which army? Let's take an example based on how we prepared to win the Alpine Cup in 2023:

Player 1 - Anthony: armies available - World Eaters
Player 2 - Innes: armies available - Genestealer Cults, Iron Hands, Tyranids
Player 3 - Pumba: armies available - Thousand Sons, all kinds of Space Marines
Player 4 - Brian: armies available - Orks, Craftworld Eldar, Harlequins
Player 5 - Typhus: armies available - Dark Eldar, Harlequins, Sisters of Battle

Once you have all the armies listed, the next step is to decide which player should play which army. To do this, start by assessing how each army fares in the current meta that will be present at the tournament. Depending on your team's experience, you may need external help to assess this. Create an Excel spreadsheet with rows for your team's armies and columns for potential meta picks. Estimate how each army performs against the popular armies in the current state of the game.

Here's an example of a table we used to estimate the meta for an 8v8 tournament in the Netherlands. The color coding provides an estimate of each army's performance:

Dark Green - big win, essentially 16+ in Differential scoring
Light Green - small win, 12-15 in Differential scoring
Yellow - drawish, 8-12 in Differential Scoring
Orange - small loss, 5-7 in Differential Scoring
Red - big loss, 4- in Differential Scoring
Grey - flippy matchup, score heavily depends on roll to go first (say gunline mirror)
??? - player doesn’t know how to estimate it

If you're a newer player, it might be easier to operate with three color codes:

Green - those games that you comfortably win in WDL format.
Yellow - those games you remember as being super tight in WDL, those that were on the knife's edge, and a few rolls decided who had those 3-5 points more at the end of the game
Orange - those games you felt like you had no chance when approaching the table.

Feel free to use the more detailed color coding if you're comfortable with it. I find it provides the best granularity without overloading you with information.

Meta Estimation:

Now that you have an idea of color coding your estimation of the meta, let’s dive right in. How to identify what’s at the top of the meta? You can do this by listening to weekly shows, checking Goonhammer tournament recap posts, or by using an awesome dashboard like https://www.stat-check.com/the-meta. You can even look directly at army matchup data in the matchup matrix tab!

Having identified those top armies in the game, you can now ask all of your players to estimate how their armies fare into the given armies. At this point it’s worth it for every player to have a specific list in mind, you can always side your army to be better into certain matchups, but it’s counterproductive when you want to assess the meta state! Now you might ask - how should I assess the matchup? When assessing the matchup, it's important to consider the impact of different terrain and missions, and to choose the most non-polarizing ones for your initial estimation. If the matchup changes drastically due to terrain or mission, be sure to make a note of it in the spreadsheet (for example playing into quick melee armies on closer deployments - like quarters). If you’re unsure of the matchup I suggest you mark it accordingly and discuss it with your teammates. This allows all of you to share your experiences, and show other points of view. Ultimately if you don’t have any idea you can look at the matchup matrix tab on the dashboard, but there always should be an asterisk to any data you get from the internet - it might not be representative of your terrain pack, skill level etc. Have that in mind, and don’t trust others blindly. What works for someone might not work for you. It might be worth it to play matchups you’re not sure of with someone else. At the age of Tabletop Simulator it’s easier than ever to grab another experienced player to give you a good test match.

Narrowing Down the Armies:

Let’s get back to the armies we had available for Alpine:

Player 1: Anthony, armies available: World Eaters
Player 2: Innes, armies available: Genestealer Cults, Iron Hands, Tyranids
Player 3: Pumba, armies available: Thousand Sons, all kinds of Space Marines
Player 4: Brian, armies available: Orks, Craftworld Eldar, Harlequins
Player 5: Typhus, armies available: Dark Eldar, Harlequins, Sisters of Battle

At this point it’s worth having an answer into the top armies present in the game at the given meta. It’s not always possible, but you can do it. Having all these armies above written down in our estimation spreadsheet, we have identified that most of the armies we have don’t really play well in the meta. They have been nerfed too hard, or just don’t work into the most popular armies. As a result, we needed to drop these armies from consideration, which left us with a smaller pool of viable options:

Player 1: Anthony, armies available: World Eaters
Player 2: Innes, armies available: Genestealer Cults, Iron Hands
Player 3: Pumba, armies available: all kinds of Space Marines
Player 4: Brian, armies available: Orks, Craftworld Eldar
Player 5: Typhus, armies available: None

Here we can observe some trends starting to emerge. As we had the benefit of having four players with armies on the current top meta armies, we were able to allocate armies for three of us at this stage:

Player 1: Anthony, playing: World Eaters
Player 2: Innes, playing: Genestealer Cults
Player 3: Pumba, playing: Iron Hands/ Dark Angels
Player 4: Brian, armies available: Orks, Craftworld Eldar
Player 5: Typhus, armies available: None

Based on our earlier analysis, it was clear that some of the armies available to us were not suitable for the current meta. As a result, we had to make a decision about which armies to choose for myself and Brian. Since I didn't have any armies, it was up to me to try something new. However, my recommendation is that unless you have highly skilled players who can easily switch between armies, it's better to keep them on an army they feel most comfortable with. In my case, this would have probably meant creating a Dark Eldar list, as I have experience with them.

Having 2 armies set in stone, and one player thinking about how to optimize his build (as you could say about Iron Hands and Dark Angels at this point of the game), it was time to identify potential problematic armies we could face with the current team. What does this mean - look for armies that none of the armies you already have can play against. In our case it was Astra Militarum, Genestealer Cults, World Eaters. We had some answers into GSC and WE already in the form of Marines and GSC respectively, but needed a second army that could cover those matchups (if you are not familiar with the idea of attackers and defenders, please go and read Goonhammer article linked earlier).

As most pairing processes involve the defender army being attacked by two attackers, it's crucial to have two armies that can effectively counter a specific opponent. However, it's not always feasible to have access to armies that can fill in the gaps, or there may not be an army that can counter a specific opponent. In such cases, I suggest finding an army that excels in scoring points even when losing. Sometimes, in the meta, there may be a dominant army that is difficult to defeat, and in such cases, it's best to bring armies that can passively play and steal points from the strongest army in the game. You can then attack with the counter, while the other army plays a sacrificial role.

Astra Militarum being a problem, made us lean heavier into Iron Hands out of the marine choices. This moment helped us iron out the choice for 3rd player. Now for the remaining two we needed something that could play into GSC/WE/AM reliably - this led us to Necrons. There was a build of Necrons that could play into all 3 of those armies, and most importantly it could play into AM on their choice of table. Even though Necrons weren’t present in any top charts of the meta, they had their use in what we needed them to do, and were the only army in the game that could play all 3 armies for a drawish score reliably no matter the terrain and mission. This meant I had to learn a new army quickly, but I had the privilege of another great Necron player teaching me all the ins and outs.

This left us with a choice for the 5th army. We were debating Orks and Guard. Guard seemed oppressive, but we identified a potential problem. Terrain pack meant that Guard wouldn’t get good firing lanes, and would compete for boards with Iron Hands, which was counterproductive as a team composition. This, combined with Brian telling us Orks win against WE/GSC/CWE reliably, made us decide to go with the experience, and let Brian play Orks.

We ended up with:

Anthony: World Eaters
Innes: Genestealer Cults
Pumba: Iron Hands
Brian: Orks
Typhus: Necrons

Now to reiterate the process:

Write down all the estimations of your armies into projected meta
If unsure about certain matchups, talk it through, look up our dashboard, ask others and finally if possible play the matchup yourself.
Choose first 2, 3 armies that are the best in the meta, or those your players have available if they are faction specialists.
Look for weak points in the combination of those armies. What armies you don’t have covered? Check if any of the armies you have available, can fill in the blanks. Maybe some army you don’t have available as a team will fit your needs? Then you can consider borrowing it, but I suggest you do it if you are confident in the amount of time and preparation you have to learn a new army on a short notice.
Go through points 3 and 4 a few times if possible. Maybe there’s a better solution you haven’t yet looked at?

Phase II - Estimations after lists have been released:

Now that the lists have been revealed, it is important to revisit the estimation table. It is possible that other teams have brought armies that were not previously considered, so it is better to be prepared and avoid any surprises during pairings. It is recommended to go through the estimation process again for each team separately rather than for the entire tournament as a whole. Below is an example of how we estimated the matchups against two teams:

Separating the estimations for each individual team is recommended. This allows for easy adjustment of the generic estimations later on, based on the mission being played. There is often limited time between receiving the lists and the start of the event, usually around a week or so. It's advisable to make estimations on the day lists are officially published. This way, you can identify patterns and popular armies that you may be unsure of how to play against. If there's an opportunity to get a test game against such armies within this short timeframe, it's highly recommended. One bad estimation can have a significant impact in the next step - which is pairings.

Phase III - Pairings:

This topic is way more complex than you could expect. If you’ve already done some pre-work during the army choice phase, it will be significantly easier. You need to identify what army is your defender - I suggest doing it by a process of elimination. Write down two armies that would attack each of the opposing team's armies. Usually you can identify there’s one army that’s less useful than others. To give a quick example from the pairings tables above:

Let’s first identify armies that are the most problematic, and prioritize answering those first. In this case it’s GSC and DA. Let’s write down our answers into them:

GSC: Orks, GSC
DA: Orks, IH

Having identified counters into those two, we can see that remaining armies are going to be at worst a draw if we just don’t get our Orks into Daemons. We can also see that our only answer into DA is IH, so we don’t want to attack anything else with them, and keep them available as long as possible.

After identifying the defending army through a process of elimination, it becomes clear that Necrons have the least number of favorable matchups and don't provide any significant counter to opponents that haven't already been covered for at least a draw by the team. Therefore, it makes sense to use them as the defending army.

However, deciding on pairings after the first defender is much more complex, and couldn’t be possibly dissected in an article like this. If you want to learn about different philosophies and strategies for this, I recommend watching the videos I have made in collaboration with other experienced 40k team players. The links to these videos can be found at the end of the article.

Consider doing some mock pairings against other top teams if possible. You can ask one of your teammates to do the pairings from their point of view, or ask someone from outside the team. This can help you identify potential approaches to pairings that aren’t obvious at first, and can give you upper hand during the pairings. It's always better to be prepared and anticipate potential scenarios beforehand.

During the event:

Once you have your opponents for the round, review your previous estimations for their armies. If you haven't done estimations for their specific armies, try to quickly prepare them. It's important to adjust your estimations for the mission and any specific tables that may be used. Make sure to discuss this with all your team members as you only have a limited amount of time, typically 10 to 15 minutes. If you have already done estimations for similar armies in other teams, use that as a reference. The more time you save on estimations, the more time you'll have to plan your pairings strategy.

It is also important to adjust your estimations after each game. You may have misjudged how a certain matchup would unfold and need to make changes to your estimations. Make sure to do this after each round so that you don't repeat the same mistake twice.

Summary:

Teams 40k is more complex than the regular singles events. There’s the added layer of complexity of army choices, but I hope this article helped to break the entry barrier! To sum up all the steps:

Identify what armies your players can play, and what they feel comfortable with
Prepare estimations for the general meta:

Write down all the estimations of your armies into projected meta.
If unsure about certain matchups, talk them through, look up our dashboard, ask others and finally if possible play the matchup yourself.
Choose first 2, 3 armies that are the best in the meta, or those your players have available if they are faction specialists.
Look for weak points in the combination of those armies. What armies you don’t have covered? Check if any of the armies you have available, can fill in the blanks. Maybe some army you don’t have available as a team will fit your needs? In this situation you can consider borrowing it, but I suggest you do it if you are confident in the amount of time and preparation you have to invest to learn a new army on a short notice.
Go through points 3 and 4 a few times if possible. Maybe there’s a better solution you haven’t yet looked at?

After list submission, write down estimations against opposing teams

If not possible for every team, identify at least the top teams, or those you’re most likely to face against. Then do the estimations against them.
If unsure about the matchup - play it, or discuss it in-depth with your team.
If you have time - do some mock pairings against top teams, or teams you know you will face round 1. Use your teammates or someone from outside your team to do the pairings as opponents.

During the event remember to adjust the estimations round by round. If at any point you’ve realized that specific matchup doesn’t work like you expected, make sure to update it in your estimations!

Feel free to ask any additional questions about the 40k Teams format. I would be happy to address them in future episodes of Enter The Matrix or upcoming articles.

For more 40k Teams content, you may want to explore the Enter The Matrix series from the Stat Check network. I have included some recommended videos on pairings and team preparations below. Even though the meta might change and estimations might become outdated due to edition changes, the principles behind pairings remain the same.

Looking specifically for 5 man teams pairings, check this one out:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O3wsliV8iYw&ab_channel=StatCheck

Looking for 8 man teams pairings, check those out:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tj72YByLHVI&ab_channel=StatCheck

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NJDiBOXd7JM&t=3256s&ab_channel=StatCheck

Want to hear how other teams prepared for the 5 man teams event? Check this one out:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xy9Zws4h04k&t=3s&ab_channel=StatCheck

Thanks for reading,

Piotr “Typhus” Zawiła-Niedźwiecki

P.S. Thanks to Tweak from Contact Lost for proofreading!