Editing Cheese (section)

== In Competitive Play ==
Most often, Cheese strategies rely on your opponent not having a proper counter to it and falls apart or is at worst 'balanced' if he happens to have that counter. As such, it often involves "metagame" speculations, by bringing something that cannot be countered by a majority of currently popular lists/decks/units. Then the "meta" shifts and suddenly everyone absolutely ''has'' to have that counter, lest they suffer at the hands of the cheesemongers. To Illustrate this imagine a Local Gaming Store that played a lot of Cities of Death (or some other kind of vehicle-unfriendly format) and so over time nobody bothered to bring any tanks or heavy vehicles to their games and there was little to no dedicated anti armor. If suddenly a player with an Imperial guard armor company joined the group his tanks would be perceived as cheese since nobody would have the weapons to fight him and so he would, at first dominate. Some games constantly seem plagued by this effect, where the game seems to revolve around just one tactic and counter tactic for a long time, at least until the next shift. In good games these shifts happens quickly meaning that the games 'meta' changes rapidly as one strategy becomes predominate, people adopt tactics and tools to counter it, and people adapt to counter the new now dominant counter and so on. This way you can use the imbalances, the Cheese, to create interesting gameplay as people play around with them and what does counter them. Cheese is, from a design perspective, a way to make games more interesting then a system that was perfectly balanced would be. This is known as [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e31OSVZF77w Perfect Imbalance]

That's if the game is actually well balanced, which is, to be fair really hard to do. If it's not, the Cheese every faction needs to stay flavorful becomes unstoppable powercreep, breaking the game until the developers fix it. A good example of these would be flyer-heavy lists in a 6E [[Warhammer 40,000]], when very few armies had reliable and cost effective anti-air. [[Cronssant]]s and [[Helldrake]]s reigned supreme for more than a year, until new codices gave everyone some cheap and powerful anti-air weapons. There was literally no way for the meta to adapt to these tools, which hadn't been granted to the other factions to adapt to the new flyers, and in a few cases still haven't. With No counters there was no reason to not use the new flyers, meaning the thing these flyers counter became under powered in the face of a meta where there counter would be everywhere. When a game is dominated by broken cheese, either you become the cheese yourself, you find the counter to the cheese and play only that, or you realize that the only winning move is not to play. At least until the problem is fixed. 

Occasionally the players themselves can break or at least heavily change game balance on their own. Often times this happens with the use of combinations of game elements the designer did not anticipate. TCG's are very vulnerable to this especially as they get older and the total number of cards and combinations goes up. When you make a new card for a TCG, it's almost impossible to keep in mind every single card that has come before and think of how your new card will interact with the existing sets. This is the reason [[Magic: The Gathering]] uses formats to try and control the number of cards players have access too. [[Pun-Pun]] is another, albeit extreme, example since you're combining elements from four splatbooks to become god at level one. In 40k this sometimes happens when you have a codex written for last edition's rules in current edition, as the interaction can be unexpected by the designers. Sometimes however meta shifts alone can wreck game balance on their own. A good example of that would be the change from 6th to 7th edition WH40k, where Monstrous Creature spam became the big cheese. This led to a reactionary rise in plasma weapon use, that in turn nerfed (the already mediocre and quite plasma vulnerable) TEQs into the ground since their hard counter was now more abundant, generally however these meta shift balance problems solve themselves as people just stop using the countered element, meaning the counter is now mediocre without a target, the counter goes away a bit and you can start using the once countered option.

Worst of all, [[Games Workshop|shortsighted developers]] often deliberately create broken unstoppable cheese to boost their sales and attract new players with a simple strategies that allow them to beat experienced players just by throwing their money in. And to make sure no one remain unharmed, these cheese armies/decks/lists would get nerfed in a year or two, either by actually nerfing them or by introducing even more powerful tools that power creep over the existing ones, forcing these new players to either actually learn how to play smart or (preferably for developers) buy new overpowered shit.

The phrase "Cheesy" is derived from the British English "Beardy". This refers to the older veterans of the game, [[Dorf|often decked out with massive beards]]. Because of their time with the game they have developed the best tactics, army lists and know how to defeat anything. Because their mastery of the game comes from experience the new players often have trouble dealing with their "beardy" tactics and armies.

=== Warhammer 40,000 examples ===
See this nice page here: [[List_of_40K_Cheese|List of 40K Cheese]]

* [[Tyranid|Tyranids]] throughout the entirety of 2nd Edition, <s>and never again since</s> they're back in 9th Edition
* [http://images.dakkadakka.com/gallery/2009/7/21/43731_md-Motivational%20Poster%2C%20Necrons%2C%20Warhammer%2040%2C000.jpg Pre-5th edition Necrons] (Note: Oldcrons are back in business, routinely fucking over anything with hull points using basic warriors.)
* [[Dawn of Eldar]]
* [[Cyrus]]
* [[Plasma Syphon]]: An item to utterly disable plasma weapons, in an army that can practically only be hurt by plasma weapons. Even worse, at first it also affected Tau pulse weapons, Tyranid Bio-plasma, Eldar Starcannons, and more giving those armies them almost ''nothing'' to fight with that can crack the Grey Knight's heavy armor. 
* [[Kaldor Draigo]]
* [[Warbikers|Biker Nobs]]: In 5th edition, Nobz had enough options to give each one a different loadout, allowing their commander to play musical wounds. You'd have to deal a wound to every member of the 10 strong squad before any of them would die. 
* Chaos Lord with Mark of Nurgle riding Bike
* [[Warhammer_40,000/6th_Edition_Tactics/Eldar#Tactics|Jetbiking Seer Council]]
* [[The Ultimate Grey Knight Cheese List]]: This 6th edition list allowed you to kill anything while being nearly untouchable.
* [[Heldrake]]s: Seventh edition gave them a slight nerf, followed by a direct de-cheesing in an FAQ. Still quite effective, but not as gamebreaking as they were in 6th.
* Massed Vendetta spam: Despite 7th edition giving everybody and their mothers anti-air options, enough Vendettas are still dangerously cheesy
* [[Chapter Master Smashfucker]]
* 7E [[Eldar]] in general, honestly.
* 7E [[Wraithknight]] Spam
* 7E [[Ynnari]], period.
* [[Riptide]] Spam
* [[Hive Tyrant|Flyrant]] Spam
* [https://1d4chan.org/wiki/Warhammer_40,000/Tactics/Space_Marine_Legion_List_(30k)#XV_Legion:_Thousand_Sons| Sekhmet Terminator Cabal]
* [[Skitarii]] and [[Cult Mechanicus]]
* Super-formations, ie [[Necron]] Decurion and [[Adeptus Mechanicus]] War Convocation.
* <u>'''ALL'''</u> of the [[Adeptus Custodes|Custodes.]] Most basic troops are as tough as a [[Warboss]] and can hit like a train. Have so many OP units and vehicles it makes the [[Grey Knights]] look like a [[Grot]] in comparison.
* 30k [[Magnus the Red|Magnus the Red]] with Invisibility. Cannot be hit AT ALL unless you cover the table with blasts until something accidentally touches him. Applies to his unit too. Enjoy your rape.
* The SUPER LIMITED MAKE Imperial Space Marine model, a disgusting marine that could be added to most units that had a bolted combi gun that didn’t have only one shot and hit like a melta, cheese mostly because like 1 person you know will have one, if even, bonus if added to a very tank squad like dark angel veterans with shields 
* The [[Warlord_Battle_Titan#Warlord-Sinister_Pattern_Battle_Psi-Titan|Warlord Sinister Psi-Titan]], which takes an already cheesy monster and adds yet another layer of cheese upon it.
* Early on in 8th Edition, [[Warhammer_40,000/Tactics/Imperial_Guard(8E)| the entirety of the Imperial Guard]]. Tapered off with the gradual power creep of newer codexes and Psychic Awakening supplements.
* 8th edition Eldar with -4 to hit modifier spam. This tactic came to a hard end when 9th edition launched.
* Late 8th edition Space Marines, particularly Iron Hands.
* Space Marine [[Eradicator|Eradicators]]
* [[ The Horus Heresy: Legions]]: Knights, a particulary annoying Thaddeus deck, [[Fulgrim|'''FUCKING FULGRIM''']], all [[Emperor's Children]] warlords except for maybe [[Saul Tarvitz|Saul]]. Oh and [[Kharn|FUCKING KHARN]]
* 9th Edition [[Deathwing]] Terminators. Bloody hell... Obsec and permanent Transhuman Physiology from Inner Circle, and access to Armor of Contempt as well as Storm Shields, on top of the usual Terminator perks, like 2+ saves and deep striking. That's also on top of being horrendously undercosted, costing even less per-model than non-Deathwing Terminators.

=== Magic: The Gathering examples ===
* Each and every single card singled out by name on the Legacy Banned list. 
* Special shout-out to Tolarian Academy, which was the centerpiece of a deck type so powerful that entire tournaments were decided by the coin tosses used to determine which player played first, and literally every single goddamn card in this deck that wasn't a basic land got banned.
* Every legacy deck.
* Every vintage deck.
* Control decks.
* Blue decks in general.
* [[Awesome|Mill decks]].
* Infect decks.
* Certain insane commander decks.
* [[Eldrazi]] ramp, get a bunch of mana, drop an [[Rape|eldrazi Titan]] and get swinging.
* [[Slivers|Sliver]] decks (''Coming from a dedicted [[Slivers|sliver]] player, this deck is ridiculous. every single sliver is a lord, so you simply pump out more and more of them and then start beating down with a hord of [[Awesome|10/10 flying lifelinking indestructible double-striking shroud haste trampling poisonous slivers that make a sliver token when they hit]] [[Rape|and because they double strike, you can swing in with everything and triple your sliver count]].'' )
* [[Dredge]].
* Birthing Pod. an entire strategy was built around this card, and get whatever creature you need from your deck.

=== Warhammer Fantasy Battles examples ===
* The [[Doomstacks]] of [[Total War: Warhammer]] and its sequels.
** [[Sisters of Avelorn]] for High Elves, and their shiny [[DAKKA]] that would make an Ork weep tears of glee.
* Crossbows, Bolt Throwers, and Grudge Throwers buffed by [[Thorek Ironbrow]].
* Waywatchers for the Wood Elves.
* Black Orcs for the Greenskins, very good in melee.


Behold the power of cheese, indeed.