The Name of the Game

So, the final Rules Pack for Open War 14 has been released and it has been confirmed that no Unique Characters will be allowed. Now, from a purely selfish point of view I'm not bothered by this but it's a kick in the teeth to a lot of players. There are some really good armies that are unlocked by some of the newer Characters, such as the ubiquitous Loganwing and the Straken platoon. Plus then there are some really killy options, Ragnar, Lysander, the Swarmlord and Mephiston for example. The reason I don't take any of these guys is because I think that while they are powerful, I feel that they're too pricey in points terms. And there's the rub. For me, creating an army at 1750 points means squeezing every point to be as efficient as possible. I feel that the Characters are balanced and if people want to take them in their army then that should be their choice. In my mind, that just means less Troops. Now, onto my main issue with this ruling. While I'm sure the organisers have their reasons for banning Unique Characters, it is a decision that borders on arrogance. Whoever made this choice thinks that they know better than Games Workshop. Yes, occasionally GW do come up with some crazy rules but in general the rules for 40K are pretty well balanced. The main issues are with the older codices being overpriced and have fewer choices compared to the newer ones (eg Necrons) There certainly aren't any broken Characters and I'd be really annoyed if I'd spent the last year honing a brilliant Logan list only to be told that I couldn't use it but that the organisers would still happily take my entry money. So, the name of the game isn't Warhammer 40,000 but something similar.