Are you happy with 40k as it currently is?

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**OrkaMorka**

I haven't been playing for that long. Could you explain what the old torrent of fire rule was?

**MWHistorian**

Can we get back on topic?

**Peregrine**

kaotkbliss wrote:
Certain things should be random though. That's why the word "chance" exists, because there's a "chance" something could happen.
In this case, there's a chance a bullet could pierce the rocket launcher making it unusable, but there's a chance it will be untouched able to be picked up by another.

The "chance" factor is adequately represented by things like rolling to hit. When you have potentially 400+ models on the table dice rolling should be limited to things that really matter, not nitpicking whether or not a particular model of a unit survives. In fact, individual models shouldn't even matter much at this scale, everything should be based around whole units and the models should just define the unit's footprint and number of wounds.

This, of course, is one of the biggest problems of 40k: it's a bloated mess of special rules and exceptions to special rules and exceptions to the exceptions, and rolling dice to see how many dice you roll on a random table where most of the results involve rolling even more dice. You could cut out 90% of the rules involving random dice and you'd probably still have a functioning game. And that's really poor game design.

**insaniak**

kaotkbliss wrote:
insaniak wrote:

But that's the thing - this can be more easily represented using the old torrent of fire rule, without the need for a separate roll at all.

What is the torrent of fire rule? I honestly don't know.

If a unit suffered more wounding hits than it had models, the shooter was allowed to choose one specific model from the unit to make a save against one of those wounding hits.

It basically let the shooter bypass wound allocation for one of their shots, provided the unit was hit with enough firepower.

**Trasvi**

With all the talk about shooting casualties... are there any other games systems that have the same issue as 40k here?

That is, 40k allows:
1. Multiple Hero models in a unit
2. Multiple Character models in a unit
3. Multiple non-character but still special models in a unit
4. Every model in a unit may have different saving throws
5. Every model in a unit may have multiple wounds
6. Some models in a unit may have special rules than confer on to other models in the unit

GW has been through multiple iterations of these rules and still not found a good solution.

Given that unit composition is more complicated than any other wargame I've experienced, what GOOD solutions are there that don't open up another abusive mechanic?
- At the moment, we've got 'take the closest model, except if Look Out Sir'. This leads to micro-managing positioning to either protect characters or use characters as bullet catchers. But it does have the tactical advantage that you can shoot back the first rank of the oncoming enemy to give your army another turn of safety.
- We've tried 'owning player chooses' - this leads to 'hidden powerfists', with no risk of failing Look Out Sir; it means casualties are nearly always taken from the back rank or least important models. It guarantees that when you're getting shot at, EVERYTHING goes exactly the way the target wishes. This is definitely the QUICKEST way to play... but conceptually it sucks that the shooter gets literally the worst possible result.
- We've tried separate wound pools for each differently equipped model... and saw Nob Bikers, Paladins and other multi-wound multi-equipment squads become invincible.

I'm more in favor of the current system, with caveats that you make only ONE roll for Look out Sir (rather than one per hit)

**insaniak**

Trasvi wrote:
GW has been through multiple iterations of these rules and still not found a good solution.

Yes, they have. Then they changed it to 'remove the closest guy first'...

- We've tried 'owning player chooses' - this leads to 'hidden powerfists', with no risk of failing Look Out Sir; it means casualties are nearly always taken from the back rank or least important models. It guarantees that when you're getting shot at, EVERYTHING goes exactly the way the target wishes. This is definitely the QUICKEST way to play... but conceptually it sucks that the shooter gets literally the worst possible result.

This was balanced out by torrent of fire. I never saw the 'hidden powerfist' as a problem. There's nothing worse than paying all those points for upgrades for your units, and then not getting to use them.

This system is quick and easy, and removes the need for extra rolls, or rolling for everything one at a time.

**Peregrine**

Trasvi wrote:
- We've tried 'owning player chooses' - this leads to 'hidden powerfists', with no risk of failing Look Out Sir; it means casualties are nearly always taken from the back rank or least important models. It guarantees that when you're getting shot at, EVERYTHING goes exactly the way the target wishes. This is definitely the QUICKEST way to play... but conceptually it sucks that the shooter gets literally the worst possible result.

But how much does it really matter? Just finish off the unit and kill the powerfist/melta gun/whatever. Even removing weak models is still bringing a unit closer to death, and you're probably removing those same weak models with any other allocation system anyway. So it's a slight improvement maybe, but is it really worth the cost of having a more complex wound allocation system with 400+ models on the table? Is it so important that you'd sacrifice complexity/depth in some other area to keep the overall complexity of the game under control?

These are the questions you have to ask with a large-scale game like 40k. Part of the price of putting huge armies on the table is accepting that your rules need to have a lot of abstraction to make the game play at a reasonable pace. Unfortunately GW seems to believe that the principles of good game design don't apply to them.

**Talys**

Peregrine wrote:
Trasvi wrote:
- We've tried 'owning player chooses' - this leads to 'hidden powerfists', with no risk of failing Look Out Sir; it means casualties are nearly always taken from the back rank or least important models. It guarantees that when you're getting shot at, EVERYTHING goes exactly the way the target wishes. This is definitely the QUICKEST way to play... but conceptually it sucks that the shooter gets literally the worst possible result.

But how much does it really matter? Just finish off the unit and kill the powerfist/melta gun/whatever. Even removing weak models is still bringing a unit closer to death, and you're probably removing those same weak models with any other allocation system anyway. So it's a slight improvement maybe, but is it really worth the cost of having a more complex wound allocation system with 400+ models on the table? Is it so important that you'd sacrifice complexity/depth in some other area to keep the overall complexity of the game under control?

These are the questions you have to ask with a large-scale game like 40k. Part of the price of putting huge armies on the table is accepting that your rules need to have a lot of abstraction to make the game play at a reasonable pace. Unfortunately GW seems to believe that the principles of good game design don't apply to them.

That's a lotta models

**TheKbob**

Peregrine wrote:
Trasvi wrote:
- We've tried 'owning player chooses' - this leads to 'hidden powerfists', with no risk of failing Look Out Sir; it means casualties are nearly always taken from the back rank or least important models. It guarantees that when you're getting shot at, EVERYTHING goes exactly the way the target wishes. This is definitely the QUICKEST way to play... but conceptually it sucks that the shooter gets literally the worst possible result.

But how much does it really matter? Just finish off the unit and kill the powerfist/melta gun/whatever. Even removing weak models is still bringing a unit closer to death, and you're probably removing those same weak models with any other allocation system anyway. So it's a slight improvement maybe, but is it really worth the cost of having a more complex wound allocation system with 400+ models on the table? Is it so important that you'd sacrifice complexity/depth in some other area to keep the overall complexity of the game under control?

These are the questions you have to ask with a large-scale game like 40k. Part of the price of putting huge armies on the table is accepting that your rules need to have a lot of abstraction to make the game play at a reasonable pace. Unfortunately GW seems to believe that the principles of good game design don't apply to them.

Everybody knows 40k has grown into some horrible abomination of battle and skirmish rules that features none of the benefits of either. Targeting out specific models works well in games designed for it, like Warmachine. And even then, there are specific rules for "take-up" on key pieces like standards and special weapons. The game is basically bad Epic at 28mm scale making it terribly expensive. Add in the ever increasing codex/edition churn, and you'll also see an increase in player churn. The bad part for GW is that us unhappy folks will be sticking around in the real hobby, wargaming, and letting new players know what a train wreck 40k currently is and continues to be.

Just as they rose through positive word of mouth, so too will they suffer to negative word of mouth.

**dracpanzer**

insaniak wrote:
Personally, I'm advocating for a return to the 'owner chooses, coupled with Torrent of Fire' system used previously. So the owner generally chooses, but excessive firepower (and precision shots) would allow the shooter to choose the casualty.

So how many hits do I need to get on a blob of 50 guardsmen loaded up with commissar friends until I get to drop ONE extra shot on the model of my choice?

**insaniak**

Quite a few. As you should, since he has a lot of warm bodies around him.

Fewer next turn, though.

**Blacksails**

dracpanzer wrote:

So how many hits do I need to get on a blob of 50 guardsmen loaded up with commissar friends until I get to drop ONE extra shot on the model of my choice?

A lot.

But hey, you can put all those tactics to use to use over the course of the game to make sure you can do that in the last few turns to stop those last minute objective grabs. You have ~6 turns to put enough wounds down to have that opportunity, so you'll have to plan and prioritize what to shoot and when to shoot it.

**Plumbumbarum**

I'm all for 5th wound allocation system but only if you can't allocate to models not visible to the firer, it was the most off putting thing for me in 5th ,,tolerance for abstraction has limits too. Some system for universal precision shots would be welcomed ie you pick up as many dice as you want (or faction/ unit limited) from succesful to hit rolls pool and test BS on them, succes is a precision shot and failure is a miss. Top of my head ofc.

**Blacksails**

The drawback to the idea of not being able to hit models you can't see is the potential for the shooting player to use their own units to block line of sight to all but a handful of units they want dead. That to me feels gamey and more of an immersion/abstraction issue than the alternative.

**KaptinBadrukk**

No opinion here. But then, I play 5th.

**vipoid**

Out of interest, does anyone miss abstract LoS?

**docdoom77**

vipoid wrote:
Out of interest, does anyone miss abstract LoS?

YES! A million times yes! 4th had LoS and terrain down perfect! No arguments, no lasers, no confusion.

**Grimtuff**

InB4 Insaniak explains (again) that EVERY edition of 40k has had TLOS. It was only 4th that added in the area terrain thing, which confused people who treated every terrain piece as area terrain.

**kaotkbliss**

If area terrain is what I think it is, then that's been there since 2nd (a dense forest could be represented on the battlefield by a few trees in a group. Models could not see more than 2" into the terrain measured from the terrain's base inwards)

**insaniak**

Plumbumbarum wrote:
I'm all for 5th wound allocation system but only if you can't allocate to models not visible to the firer, it was the most off putting thing for me in 5th ,,tolerance for abstraction has limits too. Some system for universal precision shots would be welcomed ie you pick up as many dice as you want (or faction/ unit limited) from succesful to hit rolls pool and test BS on them, succes is a precision shot and failure is a miss. Top of my head ofc.

The point of being allocate to models out of LOS was that you drew LOS to and wounded the unit. It was part of the whole 'moving to a unit based game' thing that I mentioned earlier, getting rid of the importance of individual models.

It also helped remove LOS sniping, where careful model placement would allow you to single out specific models in enemy units.

docdoom77 wrote:
vipoid wrote:
Out of interest, does anyone miss abstract LoS?

YES! A million times yes! 4th had LoS and terrain down perfect! No arguments, no lasers, no confusion.

Having been around on the forums during 4th edition, I can confidently say that 4th edition LOS was the most argued over of any edition so far... because so many people misunderstood how it was supposed to work.

As Grimtuff said (

) ... 4th used TLOS like every other edition. It just had more abstract rules to deal with area terrain and close combats. But so many people thought that those rules were supposed to apply game-wide (ignoring the parts of the rules that specifically said otherwise) and GW never bothered to clarify it, and so for the entire life of 4th edition people were constantly arguing about how it worked.

**docdoom77**

insaniak wrote:
Plumbumbarum wrote:
I'm all for 5th wound allocation system but only if you can't allocate to models not visible to the firer, it was the most off putting thing for me in 5th ,,tolerance for abstraction has limits too. Some system for universal precision shots would be welcomed ie you pick up as many dice as you want (or faction/ unit limited) from succesful to hit rolls pool and test BS on them, succes is a precision shot and failure is a miss. Top of my head ofc.

The point of being allocate to models out of LOS was that you drew LOS to and wounded the unit. It was part of the whole 'moving to a unit based game' thing that I mentioned earlier, getting rid of the importance of individual models.

It also helped remove LOS sniping, where careful model placement would allow you to single out specific models in enemy units.

docdoom77 wrote:
vipoid wrote:
Out of interest, does anyone miss abstract LoS?

YES! A million times yes! 4th had LoS and terrain down perfect! No arguments, no lasers, no confusion.

Having been around on the forums during 4th edition, I can confidently say that 4th edition LOS was the most argued over of any edition so far... because so many people misunderstood how it was supposed to work.

As Grimtuff said ( ) ... 4th used TLOS like every other edition. It just had more abstract rules to deal with area terrain and close combats. But so many people thought that those rules were supposed to apply game-wide (ignoring the parts of the rules that specifically said otherwise) and GW never bothered to clarify it, and so for the entire life of 4th edition people were constantly arguing about how it worked.

I don't know how anyone could be confused by 4th edition area terrain rules. Simple and laid out clearly in the rule book. They had a size and blocked things of the same or smaller size. You couldn't see all the way through area terrain (blocked LoS up to it's height, regardless of whether or not you could draw a line through it) and it had a depth of vision (was it 4"? It's been a long time).

I never enjoyed 40k more and it was due largely to those rules. Want to hide something? Find area trerrain of the same height and place it behind it. Not fuss, no muss. No worrying about seeing a chestplate through 3 intervening windows, because my laser said so. I hate TLoS for stuff like this. The models are supposed to represent dynamic figures, not static ones. The chances of drawing line of sight in those instances should be nil.

We were always clear on the difference between area and non-area terrain. Of course we chose to focus mostly on area terrain because it was simpler and looked great: Ruins, Trees, Rocky outcroppings, etc.

**insaniak**

The confusion came from people not understanding that those rules didn't apply to non-area terrain or other models.

**Plumbumbarum**

Blacksails wrote:
The drawback to the idea of not being able to hit models you can't see is the potential for the shooting player to use their own units to block line of sight to all but a handful of units they want dead. That to me feels gamey and more of an immersion/abstraction issue than the alternative.

You could limit vehicle sniping by making units that moved in the same turn (yours ofc not enemy's) not count for LoS or sth. I prefer vehicle sniping to shooting throug hills and buildings anyway tbh, I'm not really a cinematic narrative person but this rubbed me wrong for some reason.

@insaniak that is imo going too far into unit based direction game especialy that on your average 2 ruins 5 trees table you couldn't hide anything ever, try playing nids like that. Not a reason I hated it btw, it really broke my immersion when a 18 termagants behind a bunker were shot to pieces because the firer saw two. Model positionioning for a sake of LoS doesn't really strike me as pointless micromanagment tbh.

**Lanrak**

I find it very telling that GW have gone through 7 editions of the game , and they still have not sorted out issues with the core game mechanics and resolution methods.

Most games get ' what you can shoot at' and 'how casualties are removed ' sorted in the beta rules.

40k 'game development' looks more like changing stuff up for the sake of obvious shifts in meta to drive sales.

Rather than refining the rules to deliver improved game play, and improve sales through genuine joy from using the rules.

GW seem to be trapped into invalidating things that have gone before, to try to force people to by new stuff.
This means having to spend a lot of time and money making new stuff to replace the old product.

Where as getting the game play right , allows the game to be expanded in new ways adding more to it.
But NOT having to invalidate anything.So things can be updated and new models replace old one at a more measured and considered pace.

(This makes customers feel more valued and less like walking wallets.)

Removing special models last , or removing casualties from the front are both equally valid ways of dealing with casualty removal.
They just need the rules to support which ever method is chosen chosen.(Designer notes help players understand the reasoning behind such decisions.)

**H.B.M.C.**

My views were summed up a while ago:

What I mean by "done" is that I've reached the point where I don't want to be burnt any more. I know I've said this at least twice already during the course of this long and winding thread, but I hated 4th and 5th to the point where I didn't buy anything for them, but with 6th I saw things that were (in my mind) improvements over the previous two editions. So many of my personal "deal-breakers" (especially the ones from the 5th Ed vehicle rules) were removed, and while I still dislike Hull Points and the idiotic method of casualty removal in 6th it was a level of bull gak that I was willing to accept for what was otherwise a better rule set than the previous to. And I bought into it. I got the rulebook, the starter box, Apoc, all the Warzones (other than Damocles, as I didn't know it was limited edition), all the psychic cards even for the armies I didn't play, the Apoc Cards, templates, Escalation, Strongpoint Assault. Everything. I was fully invested and it felt good to be 'back in the game', so to speak.

But now? My cards are invalidated, my rulebook is worthless, my supplement books (Strongpoint and Escalation) aren't worth the paper they're printed on and once again Apoc is a set of rules written for a different edition. And all of this took place within two years of the previous edition. Two years! That's ludicrous. I could almost live with it if 7th Ed was GW making a new edition to fix the problems of 6th - like a 'break glass in case of stupidity' situation where they've seen what 40K has become (allies shenanigans, dataslates, and other nonsense) and they decided the best way to fix it was to tear the Band-Aid off quickly and reset everything with a new edition. But they're not doing that. They're adding more extraneous nonsense. More charts. More things to roll on. More cards (which I refuse to buy now). More dataslates (which are just DLC... and I have real problems with DLC that extend way beyond GW's method of selling them). More blatant disregard for the fluff (now Eldar can summon Slaaneshi Daemons every turn, Inquisitors and Dark Angels are BFFs, Dark Eldar would totally ally with a Slaaneshi Daemon army... but Guard will never ally with Chaos because Traitor Guard and reasons reasons reasons). The game has become "buy all our playsets and toys", where simply buying GW minis is the HHHobby rather than using them. And now we don't even have the certainty that what we have will stick around for any length of time. This edition is to fill a checkbox and make a full year report look better (because the half-year looked bad). It's cynical, and as I said a couple of pages back I am certain that Jervis' team holds an utterly different view of what 40K is and how it operates, and as tired as it is to make fun of the narrative forging and all that you can see how they see it as the most important thing, and that's a shame because they act as is having a balanced game with a tight and consistent set of rules (as opposed to a set of rules one might call unbound - geddit?) is mutually exclusive to forging another bloody narrative.

And I can't do it anymore!

I'm not a kid any more, playing 40K with his friends during school holidays or on weekends while at Uni. There are far better representations of 40K out there (the RPGs, which I adored before my personal bias of writing the RPG's became a factor), and they don't require wrestling with GW's inability to write a coherent and consistent set of rules. And that's before we even get into the questionable ethics of their bullying business practices, embargos, pricing structure, secrecy and all that other nonsense that sits beneath the surface.

And then this is exacerbated by the White Knights and their clueless "everything is fine, nothing is broken" attitute towards everything...

But I've gone on long enough...

Yeah...

**Gwaihirsbrother**

Haven't played since 5th. Really want to but game isn't what I want. It probably could be but I would have to go through the hassle of haggling over how to tweak the game so I could like it. Bleh. My kids are getting older. Maybe I can start to play 4th edition with them soon.

--

Loved area terrain rules of 4th. My store never had debates and what not over them, though people didn't really understand the rules; everything was area terrain all the time. Tried a few times to play the right way but mostly got confused looks. Still thought it was way better than 5th's terrain rules.

**master of ordinance**

I still play but in all honesty I torrent my stuff. In fact, at my local club I am building a name as the go to person when GW releases yet another Codex update at ludicrous prices. Take the new SM codex for instance, I may not play but two of my friends do so I just torrented it for them and stuck it on their pendrives. I did the same for another friends DA codex.
But enough of my potentially illegal activities.
The main reason as to why I still play 40K is because it is the easiest system to find a game for in my area. But I dont like it and I have been backing out ever since the ridiculous price hikes and the terrible rules started.
Hull Points on vehicles essentially negating there existence and making a tank essentially an MC without any of the benefits.
Casualty allocation which forces me to keep my important stuff right at the back of the unit, forcing me to spend an age organising my infantry sections each turn to ensure that the important models are sufficiently bubble wrapped.
TLOS that really pisses me off. "I can see a 1MM square of that tanks hull through three buildings and a stack of rusty girders, so I can blitz it with my Devestators" or "I can see that mans foot/arm/leg/head/etc, I can shoot that squad".
Codex updates that are so fething biased it is un-bloody-believable. I mean, compare the IG codex to the SM codex. Everything the Space Turd forces have is underpriced and hideously powerful where as there are about 5 viable choices in the entire Imperial Guard codex.
Formations. Bloody damnable formations. "I have this this and this, free models/special rules for me".
Shoddy rule writing - in a game I had yesterday my friend brought that triple Vindicator squadron. Despite one of them being stunned and thus snapfiring and thus unable to fire its main gun the RAW still allowed him to fire that S10 board cleanser. Because all three where still alive and rolling.
The price. ARGH, CRITICAL HIT TO MY WALLET!!!! And that was just one 10 man Guard section.
Random Hammer. Do. Not. Get. Me. Started.
Blatantly overpowered crap like Invisibility which essentially makes units under its effect all but immune to everything.
A completely broken psychic phase. Sure if no one has more than 1 to 2 focus points per thousand points it can be quite relaxed. But then you get the minmax WAAC powergamers whom bring 20+ to a 1.5K game and the psychic phase basically becomes This for the player without butt feth tons of psykers
And many other problems I can not be bothered to list here.

Long story short, I am trying to get the Warmachine/Bolt Action scene restartedand when I do it will be GG 40K.

**TyranidPainter**

Warhammer 40k died with the introduction of the 6th edition rules in my opinion. They began to revive it with 7th but it pales in comparison to 5th.
It was complicated with 5th edition but not overly so. I can't say that for 7th edition.

**jreilly89**

Yep, its a blast. There are some wonky things, but its more fun than any other mini game I've tried.