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Hey-o, Caleidah and I are working on a way to make the size of forces in a battle random, as opposed to battles with set point values. This would add an element of realism where one side could outnumber the other, and while clearly not tourny-viable, it'd be great for mixing up things between you and a regular friend/opponent.

Right now, this is the system we have set up so far, we're going to try and test it out this weekend. The idea is to have a random number of units as per force organization charts, each with a random number of points. Leftover points for one unit can not be spent on another unit.

HQ
-D3 HQ choices
-Each choice can have points randomized between the minimum-point HQ and the maximum-point HQ.

Elites, Fast Attack, and Heavy Support
-2d3-1 choices (between 1 and 5)
-Each choice can have points randomized between the minimum-point troop choice and half the maximum points. This is because some armies can have ridiculous number of upgrades (such as Chaos units that can cost almost 700 points).

Troops
-D6+2 choices (between 3 and 8 )
-Each choice can have points randomized between the minimum-point troop choice and half the maximum points.
-The different number of units is so that it remains balanced to have more weight on troops than on the specialists.

Comments?

And an Eldar troop choice could range between 60 and 191, between a min-sized Dire Avenger squad and half the cost of one with all the wargear, Exarch powers, and a maxed-out Wave Serpent.

We talked a bit about how ridiculously large some HQ units can get, for example Marneus Calgar and 3 Honor Guard squads being nearly 2500 points. So, we decided to change it up a little bit where HQ are concerned.

-Retinues count as an additional HQ slot.
-There's a cap on HQs of 400 points per choice.

Chaos Space Marines

HQ: 90-400
Elites: 90-295
Troops: 75-300
Fast Attack: 99-230
Heavy Support: 75-273

Yup. Chaos could be beasty-huge.

not really getting the concept... help?

You might be able to solve the point problems by simply having the players make one or two large army lists of the same points values (( If it's more than 2500pts you need more than one Force Org)).

So each player makes let's say lists of 4,000pts worth of stuff. Then they roll off and pick things from those lists according to how many spots they get.

Another way to use this and prevent retardation would be to simply give each unit a number and have them roll randomly for the units as well, re-rolling doubles.

Ex.:
Rolls 2d3 = 3. I get three units!
Rolls 3d6 = I got my plasma marine squad, my close combat marine squad, annnnd another plasma marine squad.

This would help to minimize cheese. to keep players from simply making one point-sink HQ and always getting it, we could require them to always fill out the force Org completely if possible, as well as having the points each player is allotted split evenly between each force org chart.

Now at this point people could still be a d**k about what they pick, but if they're trying this hard you probably don't want to play with them.

While there is nothing wrong with assigning limits on points values for each army on spending limitations, it'll take much longer to create and have to be re-evaluated when new updates and armies come out.