Heey Dakka Dakka, I hope you're all well!

For my self, I've noticed a really big change in the pace of the game. 7th generally had 1-2 turns of jockeying for position, for cover etc and normally turn 2-4 were where all the action happened, sometimes turn 3-5.

I've found in the new edition, it kicks off turn 1. Just a few examples - Ghostwalk mantle crons unit, Swarmlord in Tyranocyte, Deep strike + warp time ,etc etc. I've found that armies are in the tick of it turn one, and by turn 3 normally definitely turn 4 the game is well decided. The first 2 turns I've found for both players are normally the ones that are hugely involved and almost decide the game.

Have you guys found the same, or not? If so how do you feel about the new pace of the game?

Mostly I like it, but I feel like it does emphasise alpha strike type lists a bit too much - once upon a time going second might mean that you lost a unit or two, if you were unlucky or your opponent had a very good alpha strike, but you were probably ok. Nowadays going second can be lethal.

It really feels like a mixed bag IMO.

In games of 7th/30k, games were nearly always decided in the last turn or two. I have had plenty of games of 30k that swung back and forth and only on the bottom of turn six did either of us know how it was going to go.

The few games of 8th I have played, it was all wrapped up by the end of turn two one way or the other. Between cover not mattering much anymore, turn one deep strikes with brutal alpha strike units, and everything being far more lethal it really seems hard for a game of 8th to last more then a few turns. Which I think is what GW wanted but is overall rather meh.

I've really enjoyed it. Yes, the game really does kick off on turn 1, and usually a ton has happened by the end of turn 2, but I also find that the events of turn 1 and turn 2 involve both players at the right times and give both players something important to act upon. I'd say I miss some of the jockeying for positioning from before, but I find that emotional need is fulfilled by the deployment process. Deployment is now when I "jockey" back and forth, trying to figure out the strategy my opponent is committing to before giving away my own. Then, once battle starts, I get to see if I was right or wrong and get to respond.

I haven't seen a game yet where one person's list wholly defeated the other person. There's been some lopsided games, sure, but those games all had opportunities for one player to do something. I fethed up my first two games SO HARD, and even now there are times I catch myself going "what am I doing!?!" because there's such a clearly superior line of play had I just paid attention to it. I really like this edition because INFANTRY have so many benefits that other units don't have, even if they're no where near the strongest units in a codex. I like this edition because, if I apply myself, I am rewarded for making the correct choice. I like this edition because I'm not punished by the rules of the game for moving a model to the wrong spot, but I am punished by my opponent for doing so.

I'm very happy so far.

EDIT: And at the end of turn 2, though one player may have the advantage, there's still an opportunity to come back over the next 3 turns. I have won one of my games so far, and lost one of my games so far, simply because the game kept going on past turn 5.

 Corrode wrote:
Mostly I like it, but I feel like it does emphasise alpha strike type lists a bit too much - once upon a time going second might mean that you lost a unit or two, if you were unlucky or your opponent had a very good alpha strike, but you were probably ok. Nowadays going second can be lethal.

Huh. I feel like this edition has made going second a lot more tolerable.

Last edition, I ran an army that usually won if I had first turn and usually lost if I didn't, and brought along characters to ensure I did more than my enemy. Now, though, I feel like there are tools to mitigate the effects of going second. I've won going second as much as I've won going first.



I don't actually like the faster pace of the game. It makes them shorter, and I've only had two games out of 30 or so go out to the end, instead of ending in annihilation. Because the game more often than not ends with all of one side eliminated, the objectives are basically a non-factor. I think the problem derives from turn-1 arrival of reserves and from turn-1 melee.

A lot seems to happen in earlier turns.

I'm wondering whether I can mitigate that through proper deployment. Doesn't help that I game mostly at the GW where terrain is scarce. Not that I complain as it's free and easy to get too. Just something to plan around (although every time I play I wish I could hide my big tanks behind a building).

I started liking it a whole lot more when I mixed up my game setup.

I started using the Open War objectives over the basic maelstrom/eternal objectives, and all of those end at minimum turn 5, and many are "sudden death" objectives that can be achieved at any time to instantly win the game. (typically, this is stuff like "hold all the objectives in the game simultaneously") Additionally many of the "Twist" cards reduce the problem of early alpha strikes instantly tabling people by blunting both armies' offensive capabilities early on.

I also changed up the kinds and amounts of terrain I used, and how I used them. In one of the games of the Konor campaign, where I knew I was going second, I was able to hide pretty much my entire army in cover or fully out of LOS turn 1, and my only casualties turn 1 from an entire Guard artillery gunline was 2 wraithguard with 2 wounds on one other guard. I've found myself using a lot more Barricades and Craters, and ruling a lot of the spindlier, oddball pieces of terrain that wouldn't function as ruins to be "Imperial Statuary" minus the LD bonus (Imperial Statuary still provides cover if it obscures 25%). As opposed to 7th, where you could only get a decent cover save by ruling everything a Ruin, you have to have more of the other terrain types in 8th to have cover matter.

That said, I have had pretty frustrating games in 8th too. Particularly the Konor missions, some of which have been very...break-able... with gigantic, super-mobile units coming back from the dead to table my army turn 2, superheavies getting to double-tap their 45 shots by spending 3CP while my army sat in a 12" terrainless wasteland, objectives that were impossible to contest because my army was left without units that could climb to the second story of buildings.

it definitely takes some adjustment, that's for sure. But I think that people often forget how much adjustment had to be made to make a game of 7th fun for both parties as well - we'd just gotten used to it.

Super-meh. It's become too much "alphastrike&bubblewrap" (or exploiting character targeting rules) and the aforementioned jockeying for position doesn't really appear to be as relevant anymore.

I've stopped playing 40k altogether, and have been working on writing my own game system.

8th, in my experience, is a very S-L-O-O-O-W game. I haven't been able to finish a game yet. 7th played a lot faster than it.

 MagicJuggler wrote:
Super-meh. It's become too much "alphastrike&bubblewrap" (or exploiting character targeting rules) and the aforementioned jockeying for position doesn't really appear to be as relevant anymore.

I've stopped playing 40k altogether, and have been working on writing my own game system.

I'm not sure what "jockeying for position" there was in 7th. If there was, I never saw it.


In fact, I'm fairly certain maneuver hasn't mattered in 40k for a long time. I'm not actually sure it mattered at all in the first place, but I wasn't around in the early days, so I can't say for sure, but I'm inclined to guess "no" considering our origins.

The board is just way too small, and weapon ranges too short, and a few other things.

 Inquisitor Lord Katherine wrote:
I'm not sure what "jockeying for position" there was in 7th. If there was, I never saw it.


In fact, I'm fairly certain maneuver hasn't mattered in 40k for a long time. I'm not actually sure it mattered at all in the first place, but I wasn't around in the early days, so I can't say for sure, but I'm inclined to guess "no" considering our origins.

The board is just way too small, and weapon ranges too short, and a few other things.

I had a few (just a few) matches where there was some jockeying, but that's because my friends and I tend to play your average lists. In those games, there were times when making the first real move was severely disadvantageous. This became less frequent as 7th wore on. For my games now, 24 inches has become "I can pretty much hit anything".

I believe "jockeying for position" means fighting for control of objectives and terrain, both of which aren't as big an issue given that cover isn't as powerful this edition and most competitive armies don't really need to play objectives to win.

That is something I've tended to notice, obj secured tends to be more useful hypothetically than in practice, because early tabling is so much more common. Maybe this was always true to a degree, but it feels way more noticeable in 8th and feels far even less engaging as a result.

SilverAlien wrote:
I believe "jockeying for position" means fighting for control of objectives and terrain, both of which aren't as big an issue given that cover isn't as powerful this edition and most competitive armies don't really need to play objectives to win.

Ah, well, that's different from my idea of jockeying for position. For me, jockeying for position means trying to move my units in a way that I gain an advantage over my opponent while also trying to restrict their movements so they are not able to do the same to me. I've had some games entirely come down not on whom had the stronger army, but rather whom was in the better position to fight the engagement that happened. Being able to accurately predict how terrain, relative strength, and position of relative forces will impact the outcome of a conflict and the set-up for the next engagement is very helpful in all strategy games, but shows up now more in 8th (for me) than it did in 7th.

I like it. In 7th edition either nothing died (2++ rerollable invis 2+++ etc.) or I tabled people turn 2 with my Eldar.

While everything can die in 1-2 turns in 8th, using proper los-block terrain and model placement is vital. My games usually end up with all the killy stuff dying within the first three turns, with the remaining ones being smaller units scrambling for objectives,

Yeah, that kind of thing is why deep strike is so strong. It can intimidate an opponent into spreading out to gain board control, and then punish them by allowing you to concentrate your forces on a single part of the army while the rest is out of range.

Lanchester's square law means the concentrated forces will come out of the fight in much better condition than if they had been engaging equal forces separately, allowing them to roll up the board and mop up the units they were ignoring.

However, an abundance of 48"+ weapons combined with a scarcity of LoS blocking terrain on a 4' board can largely render that a moot point.

 Verviedi wrote:
8th, in my experience, is a very S-L-O-O-O-W game. I haven't been able to finish a game yet. 7th played a lot faster than it.

Really? That is the first time I have heard anyone with that experience. I have found that Turn 1 and 2 typically have very high kill rates.

Out of interest, what sort of armies are you playing? At my local gaming club, I am confident that we can fit a 2000 point game into an evening now that we have all gotten our heads round the new ruleset. Previously, anything above 1750 was chancy.

 Yarium wrote:

SilverAlien wrote:
I believe "jockeying for position" means fighting for control of objectives and terrain, both of which aren't as big an issue given that cover isn't as powerful this edition and most competitive armies don't really need to play objectives to win.

Ah, well, that's different from my idea of jockeying for position. For me, jockeying for position means trying to move my units in a way that I gain an advantage over my opponent while also trying to restrict their movements so they are not able to do the same to me. I've had some games entirely come down not on whom had the stronger army, but rather whom was in the better position to fight the engagement that happened. Being able to accurately predict how terrain, relative strength, and position of relative forces will impact the outcome of a conflict and the set-up for the next engagement is very helpful in all strategy games, but shows up now more in 8th (for me) than it did in 7th.

+1, exactly.

A good tactics game should be more than what your army list is and what your deployment strategy is. Unfortunately this seems, based on reading lots of comments here and elsewhere, what the game has fallen even more towards (having already leaned heavily this way).

In wargames this jockeying is talked about as position & maneuver - which relates heavily to use of terrain to leverage a tactical advantage. More lenient line of sight rules, less/no LoS blocking terrain, weaker cover saves (easily negated by many AP weapons) has greatly reduced the need for position & maneuver.

When people say the game feels decided after the first two turns - when in prior editions it felt like it came right down the wire - I think there is a problem. And if objectives are largely irrelevant because one army is likely to be functionally destroyed well before the end of the game, then there is a problem. Building an army list should be about how t be flexible enough to respond to different victory conditions - not to optimize its ability to annihilate the enemy and make objectives irrelevant.

GW tried to make the faster paced (an admirable goal) but did so, it seems, by making things a lot deadlier, so that as each turn goes by there are less and less models/units for players to move. There is also, as a direct consequence of that, fewer and fewer options and decisions that players can make, which means the game is going to play out more and more on auto-pilot after the first couple of turns have set the trajectory. The game should get MORE interesting as it proceeds as the options for position and manuever increase. But it seems as if it simply gets LESS interesting.

I'm slowly working on a set of advanced rules, based mostly on 8th edition (since I do appreciate the major simplification of the game mechanics overall), but pulling in bits and pieces from prior editions where it re-injects more tactical decision making.

 Inquisitor Lord Katherine wrote:

 MagicJuggler wrote:
Super-meh. It's become too much "alphastrike&bubblewrap" (or exploiting character targeting rules) and the aforementioned jockeying for position doesn't really appear to be as relevant anymore.

I've stopped playing 40k altogether, and have been working on writing my own game system.

I'm not sure what "jockeying for position" there was in 7th. If there was, I never saw it.


In fact, I'm fairly certain maneuver hasn't mattered in 40k for a long time. I'm not actually sure it mattered at all in the first place, but I wasn't around in the early days, so I can't say for sure, but I'm inclined to guess "no" considering our origins.

The board is just way too small, and weapon ranges too short, and a few other things.

MSU Multiassaults, force kiting, flanking/better firing angles, tank shock & AOEs, and 7e shooting casualty resolution, and Reserves being a core part of the game rather than a "unit-specific" (or a "single stratagem." They all ultimately did promote more long-term thought beyond "Can my blobs outlast your vectors while I out-dice you to death?". Granted, units like Wraithknights and the Riptides existed outside of that system, but the "maneuver" aspect was independent of that. And it's granted that certain combos didn't scale well (Khan giving all Tacsquads Scout + a Gladius led to the infamous "Blue Scars" army), but equally messy is "I can only ninja-sneak one unit forward for a turn 1 melee. Do I sneak Tacmarines or Assault Terminators?"

I know I've had my share of wins while running armies which have been outgunned and outclassed, simply by focusing on the objective and choosing my fights.

I still find the most notable issue with 40k is the massive downtime between players, where one player gets to do everything while the other player waits for their turn.

SilverAlien wrote:I believe "jockeying for position" means fighting for control of objectives and terrain, both of which aren't as big an issue given that cover isn't as powerful this edition and most competitive armies don't really need to play objectives to win.

Well, yes, sort of. There is much less playing to objectives, but it's long been my opinion that Maelstrom of War is the primary culprit for this. They make strategic maneuver fairly pointless. Well, more accurately they disincentivise proactive strategy in exchange for reactive strategy, and they make the player react to the game instead of to the enemy, which is what's bad. Predicting, pre-empting, and reacting to enemy maneuvers is good strategic depth, reacting to a random card draw that doesn't actually involve the other player in any way [especially considering objectives are generally accomplished on the turn they're drawn if you want to win the game] is not.

Yarium wrote:

 Inquisitor Lord Katherine wrote:
I'm not sure what "jockeying for position" there was in 7th. If there was, I never saw it.


In fact, I'm fairly certain maneuver hasn't mattered in 40k for a long time. I'm not actually sure it mattered at all in the first place, but I wasn't around in the early days, so I can't say for sure, but I'm inclined to guess "no" considering our origins.

The board is just way too small, and weapon ranges too short, and a few other things.

I had a few (just a few) matches where there was some jockeying, but that's because my friends and I tend to play your average lists. In those games, there were times when making the first real move was severely disadvantageous. This became less frequent as 7th wore on. For my games now, 24 inches has become "I can pretty much hit anything".

What's "your average list"? In 7th, GW wrote the lists we played with, but otherwise, what I tended to see as an "average" list was mech infantry. The average list I see still is.

With most of what I see, there aren't really any circumstances where the information gained from going second is more valuable than just killing a pile of enemy units.


I also noticed that you've conflated range with decreased relevance of maneuvering, and I've generally held the opposition position. Short ranged units and CQC units I think are "bad" for encouraging interaction with objectives, terrain, and overall strategic and tactical maneuver.


Generally, it doesn't matter what and where the terrain is if neither of you can shoot each other anyway.

So far its ok.

Kinda heavy on the first 3 turns with any proceeding turns being clean up and desperation moves.

about 8/10 of my games have been fairly close and could of swung ether way with a lucky this or that.

iv had a few stomps though.

otherwise besides a few abuse cases on the internet lists the game seems fine.

 Inquisitor Lord Katherine wrote:
What's "your average list"?

Yeah, I, perhaps, should have clarified that. Our "average" lists tend to be largely infantry-based, with squads of basic guns mixed with special weapons and sergeants. Not a lot of min-maxing, and absolutely no spam (the most spam I think we ever achieved was my 9 Scat-bikes when playing Harlequin/Eldar in 7th). Having transports is good, but often we have more infantry squads than what can be transported. I especially like to be close combat and swarmy (every single army I play has a strong close combat element to it, even the Eldar by having lots of clowns), so I don't leave my gaming group with a lot of options for "sit back and shoot". With all of us having lots of troops, there's not a lot of sit back and shoot anyways, so positioning is very important, even in 8th. Finally, we play with a LOT of terrain! I personally enjoy a good City Fight terrain ensemble, and have ruins poking out EVERYWHERE, which gives a lot more Cover bonuses than you might get elsewhere, and restricts movement of ground-based vehicles significantly as well.

 Yarium wrote:

 Inquisitor Lord Katherine wrote:
What's "your average list"?

Yeah, I, perhaps, should have clarified that. Our "average" lists tend to be largely infantry-based, with squads of basic guns mixed with special weapons and sergeants. Not a lot of min-maxing, and absolutely no spam (the most spam I think we ever achieved was my 9 Scat-bikes when playing Harlequin/Eldar in 7th). Having transports is good, but often we have more infantry squads than what can be transported. I especially like to be close combat and swarmy (every single army I play has a strong close combat element to it, even the Eldar by having lots of clowns), so I don't leave my gaming group with a lot of options for "sit back and shoot". With all of us having lots of troops, there's not a lot of sit back and shoot anyways, so positioning is very important, even in 8th. Finally, we play with a LOT of terrain! I personally enjoy a good City Fight terrain ensemble, and have ruins poking out EVERYWHERE, which gives a lot more Cover bonuses than you might get elsewhere, and restricts movement of ground-based vehicles significantly as well.

No offense, that sounds super boring.

I always find games against CQC armies very point-and-clicky and un-engaging. I like terrain too, but you can't have too much, otherwise tanks have no room to maneuver. If tanks can't drive down the streets, your streets are way too narrow.


Most of the "strategic maneuvering" that I see with CQC and short ranged armies is playing cat and mouse with gun/charge range. I don't consider that a desirable state of play.

Not that it's bad, but I'd rather focus on where on the battlefield my forces are committed and what objectives and buildings I'm fighting for than precisely how many eighth's of an inch I am from that enemy Genestealer squad. Fussing with minuate, while it isn't not tactical maneuvering, is pretty boring compared to larger scale decsisions.

 Inquisitor Lord Katherine wrote:
No offense, that sounds super boring.

I always find games against CQC armies very point-and-clicky and un-engaging. I like terrain too, but you can't have too much, otherwise tanks have no room to maneuver. If tanks can't drive down the streets, your streets are way too narrow.


Most of the "strategic maneuvering" that I see with CQC and short ranged armies is playing cat and mouse with gun/charge range. I don't consider that a desirable state of play.

Not that it's bad, but I'd rather focus on where on the battlefield my forces are committed and what objectives and buildings I'm fighting for than precisely how many eighth's of an inch I am from that enemy Genestealer squad. Fussing with minuate, while it isn't not tactical maneuvering, is pretty boring compared to larger scale decsisions.

To that, I can only say you'd have to see us play! I think you're making a LOT of assumptions that simply aren't the case.

The other important adjustment I think is that Terrain should now really be "bigger is better." We've had a major shift from our terrain strategy in 7th - where we mostly created smaller, modular terrain pieces which could be rearranged in a number of different ways to form differently shaped ruins - to our new setup, where every terrain piece we put on the table needs to be able to easily hold a minimum of 10 models OR fully block a basic vehicle from LOS.

To that end we've added about 10 large painted and based styrofoam rocks for LOS blockers, and a bunch of MDF cut bunkers and more "Platform" style buildings, with the idea being that each of them should be both fully enterable by a good sized squad, and that the building itself should reasonably block fire lanes from at least ground combat units.

The quality and speed of the game is night and day when compared to using only the porous, GW and GW-style "open ruins" - cover is much easier to gain, and maneuvering to get good fire lanes is much more important.

 Mezmorki wrote:
In wargames this jockeying is talked about as position & maneuver - which relates heavily to use of terrain to leverage a tactical advantage. More lenient line of sight rules, less/no LoS blocking terrain, weaker cover saves (easily negated by many AP weapons) has greatly reduced the need for position & maneuver.

I don't think this is entirely the fault of the game.

I see so many pictures of people's games where there's 2-4 pieces of LoS blocking terrain and they're all placed in the corners so that the two armies can be deployed 24" apart in the middle of their deployment zones with immediate LoS on each other.

True. But - I have a fairly dense terrain setup and with true line of sight, intervening terrain providing no cover bonuses or hit modifiers, and with all modes in a unit needing to be in area terrain to get benefit of cover -even if you have a bunch of terrain it isn't nearly as impactful as it was. Maybe since it's so useless people figure you might as well just not bother with it.

Terrain needs to be less binary in how it effects the mechanics - because that creates nuance for different tactical choices to emerge and be possible.

Terrain definitely makes or breaks this game. While the rules simplification and the reigning in of the Codex power creep (please GW do not bring this back) is refreshing in my opinion the game can feel like a shooting gallery if a table is not set up properly.

Generally I include one large LOS blocking piece of terrain in the middle of the board with some smaller LOS blocking terrain pieces somewhere outside of the deployment zones. I rarely have LOS blocking terrain inside a deployment zone because I feel it encourages games to devolve into two gunlines shooting back and forth.

 Mezmorki wrote:
True. But - I have a fairly dense terrain setup and with true line of sight, intervening terrain providing no cover bonuses or hit modifiers, and with all modes in a unit needing to be in area terrain to get benefit of cover -even if you have a bunch of terrain it isn't nearly as impactful as it was. Maybe since it's so useless people figure you might as well just not bother with it.

Terrain needs to be less binary in how it effects the mechanics - because that creates nuance for different tactical choices to emerge and be possible.

If those terrain pieces are what would have been area terrain in previous editions then you're right, that is pretty close to not having them now. Multiple chunky pieces of LoS blocking terrain is essential. It was in previous editions but it's even more important now.

 Inquisitor Lord Katherine wrote:

 Yarium wrote:

 Inquisitor Lord Katherine wrote:
What's "your average list"?

Yeah, I, perhaps, should have clarified that. Our "average" lists tend to be largely infantry-based, with squads of basic guns mixed with special weapons and sergeants. Not a lot of min-maxing, and absolutely no spam (the most spam I think we ever achieved was my 9 Scat-bikes when playing Harlequin/Eldar in 7th). Having transports is good, but often we have more infantry squads than what can be transported. I especially like to be close combat and swarmy (every single army I play has a strong close combat element to it, even the Eldar by having lots of clowns), so I don't leave my gaming group with a lot of options for "sit back and shoot". With all of us having lots of troops, there's not a lot of sit back and shoot anyways, so positioning is very important, even in 8th. Finally, we play with a LOT of terrain! I personally enjoy a good City Fight terrain ensemble, and have ruins poking out EVERYWHERE, which gives a lot more Cover bonuses than you might get elsewhere, and restricts movement of ground-based vehicles significantly as well.

No offense, that sounds super boring.

I always find games against CQC armies very point-and-clicky and un-engaging. I like terrain too, but you can't have too much, otherwise tanks have no room to maneuver. If tanks can't drive down the streets, your streets are way too narrow.


Most of the "strategic maneuvering" that I see with CQC and short ranged armies is playing cat and mouse with gun/charge range. I don't consider that a desirable state of play.

Not that it's bad, but I'd rather focus on where on the battlefield my forces are committed and what objectives and buildings I'm fighting for than precisely how many eighth's of an inch I am from that enemy Genestealer squad. Fussing with minuate, while it isn't not tactical maneuvering, is pretty boring compared to larger scale decsisions.

I do agree that melee lists are very one-dimensional, though I think there is a sweet spot for range where it's large enough to threaten a good chunk of the board, but short enough that some degree of defeat-in-detail can be achieved. Usually roughly between 18" and 48", though the high end of that range pushes things when the short edge of the table is also 48".

Of course it's relative to table size, larger play areas can make use of longer ranges. And a handful of table-covering artillery units can spice things up by making sure defeat-in-detail isn't quite the instant-win button that it would be without them.

 greenterror88 wrote:
Terrain definitely makes or breaks this game. While the rules simplification and the reigning in of the Codex power creep (please GW do not bring this back) is refreshing in my opinion the game can feel like a shooting gallery if a table is not set up properly.

Generally I include one large LOS blocking piece of terrain in the middle of the board with some smaller LOS blocking terrain pieces somewhere outside of the deployment zones. I rarely have LOS blocking terrain inside a deployment zone because I feel it encourages games to devolve into two gunlines shooting back and forth.

As if "devolve into two gunlines shooting back and forth" is better than devolution into a ball of melee.

I make sure there's some at the edges for gun teams and tanks, and then some in the middle to break up the board into discrete areas.

I like the fact the pace of the game has sped up. No more looking up every special rule. It is my belief that all the special rules of 7th edition dramatically increased the time it took to play a turn.

Loving it, i also highly enjoyed 7th as well. but 8th is more fun.

Jockeying for position in my eyes in things like - Using scatbikes to stay out of range, then deciding to get in charge range to commit to a objective, while making the charge distance for a opponent 9" to keep it relatively safe.

There is just SO much speed in the game now. Genestealers go on Average 29" across the table with a swarmlord. Teminators with warptime almost guarantee a charge etc.

There is less time before the engagement, essentially.

I really like the pace of the game, but I hate it when people surrender at the end of turn 2 because they "think" it's over.

And I think FIRST TURN should be decided not by a dice roll (or drops), but by BIDDING. Each player secretely bids some Command points. Then both reveal how many Command points they were bidding. The highest takes First turn and loses the Command points. The other one goes second.

 Nym wrote:
I really like the pace of the game, but I hate it when people surrender at the end of turn 2 because they "think" it's over.

And I think FIRST TURN should be decided not by a dice roll (or drops), but by BIDDING. Each player secretely bids some Command points. Then both reveal how many Command points they were bidding. The highest takes First turn and loses the Command points. The other one goes second.

Agreed that players shouldn't give up. Lots of games I'm seeing have a real turning point where it's anyone's game on turn 3. Not 100% sure why, but I've seen a lot fewer "steamrolled" games in 8th than in 7th. Basement Collective just put up a Battle Report, and the same thing nearly happened, with a close game out of what looked heavily lopsided after turn 1: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ussgonwm1TE

As for going first, what if both players bid the same amount of command points? I actually really like the dice roll (with the +1 bonus mechanic, as opposed to just auto-going first) because it makes it more interesting for choosing larger or smaller squads, and finding ways to speed up your deployment to get down sooner, though you "show your hand" so to speak sooner too. I love the current deployment method. Probably because deployment was one of my favourite things of 3rd edition.

I absolutely hate how trerrain is basically irrelevant for most things and armies that use to rely on terrain for saves are often just stuck with nothing to protect them. Use to be that having terrain could bog down infantry advances giving an advantage for units holding a piece of terrain so positioning so your not standing out in the open mattered as well as making outflanking useful to get shooting angles without terrain being in the way. Now terrain just is there to pretty up the board and give small units parked in a ruins a better armor save. All those sand bags, barriers, long + narrow terrain pieces, and small Los blocking terrain are basically useless as the terrain requirements makes it so you need to be in area terrain with the entire unit inside and 50% concealed (good luck getting that unless your a small unit of infantry) while anything sitting behind terrain better hope to be 100% blocked from vision or that terrain does basically nothing.

Lack of cover saves really hurts weak armor units while it also offers no layered defense against weapons that murder armor so something like a IG heavy weapons team or loota in cover still gets no save against plasma weapons as that -AP eats both the armor and cover bonus. Also giving high armor units a bigger benefit from cover that low armor units feels terrible as a terminator in cover is still sitting pretty with a 2+ armor save even against AP-1 but a loota in ruins gets guardsmen armor from that cover which given the abundance of -AP weapons means they are rarely getting a save.

I agree that the current adjustment to save just doesn't work. It's more valuable for high save models which are exactly the ones it ought to have the least effect for.

 Nym wrote:
I really like the pace of the game, but I hate it when people surrender at the end of turn 2 because they "think" it's over.

And I think FIRST TURN should be decided not by a dice roll (or drops), but by BIDDING. Each player secretely bids some Command points. Then both reveal how many Command points they were bidding. The highest takes First turn and loses the Command points. The other one goes second.

I like this as a way to balance games between armies with alpha-strike strategies, as it gives the defender a significant advantage and adds a strategic element to the first turn as players decide how many command points they need. However there are armies that can afford to basically go "all-in" because they don't make a whole lot of use out of CPs and others that can't muster enough points to bid. Also it probably won't work well in low-point games.

 Nym wrote:
I really like the pace of the game, but I hate it when people surrender at the end of turn 2 because they "think" it's over.

And I think FIRST TURN should be decided not by a dice roll (or drops), but by BIDDING. Each player secretely bids some Command points. Then both reveal how many Command points they were bidding. The highest takes First turn and loses the Command points. The other one goes second.

Bidding would be cool. so would command level bonus from your warlord.

I enjoy the speed of play, but only getting one turn of shooting before a cc focused opponent runs into your face is taking some getting used to.

It really makes me wonder why I bother playing.

The new 40K seems to... I dont know... It lacks something In particular any semblance of tactics or... I dont know, it just seems so dull and shallow, even when compared to the previous edition.
The lack of tactical depth really does not do it for me, and everything seems to come down to 'push models to the centre/place X and shoot' with the only thing stopping everything from becoming a game of pushing toy soldiers about making pewpew noises being the objectives which force you to move towards them. And even that is... Not interesting.

If all of your games have entire forces shot off the field turn 1, consider raising the points level. Lethality has gone way up, and unit upgrade costs have gone way down. Terrain saves are less important than LOS blockers. If you feel like melee forces are on you too soon, use screening units and chaff to protect your forces.

 greenterror88 wrote:
Terrain definitely makes or breaks this game. While the rules simplification and the reigning in of the Codex power creep (please GW do not bring this back) is refreshing in my opinion the game can feel like a shooting gallery if a table is not set up properly.

Generally I include one large LOS blocking piece of terrain in the middle of the board with some smaller LOS blocking terrain pieces somewhere outside of the deployment zones. I rarely have LOS blocking terrain inside a deployment zone because I feel it encourages games to devolve into two gunlines shooting back and forth.

Played a big 6000pt game yesterday and we agreed before hand that ALL ruins blocked LOS through them - this worked really well.

Codex Power Creep is already here.

 master of ordinance wrote:
The new 40K seems to... I dont know... It lacks something In particular any semblance of tactics or... I dont know, it just seems so dull and shallow, even when compared to the previous edition.
The lack of tactical depth really does not do it for me, and everything seems to come down to 'push models to the centre/place X and shoot' with the only thing stopping everything from becoming a game of pushing toy soldiers about making pewpew noises being the objectives which force you to move towards them. And even that is... Not interesting.

Only played a couple of games but been finidng it the opposite - I like the options of Fall Back and the Deep Strike without error, the table seems to be very fluid - but as i say only a couple of games under my belt !

 Mr Morden wrote:

Codex Power Creep is already here.

So C:GK is more powerful than C:SM/C:CSM?

 Scott-S6 wrote:

 Mr Morden wrote:

Codex Power Creep is already here.

So C:GK is more powerful than C:SM/C:CSM?

Well Codex armies get Free Chapter Tacitics, relics, cut price Power Fists etc - Index armies don't.

It's amusing to me that people mentioned bidding since the very first game of 8th edition I played, we decided to do just that thing (secretly bidding CP to add to our roll-off for going first). I've played maybe 8-10 games of 8th edition and almost none of them have been without house-rules, custom scenarios or altered terrain rules.

8th edition is a good "start" to a rule set, but if you play the god-damn-awful boring usual scenarios...it's a huge bore.

 Mr Morden wrote:

 Scott-S6 wrote:

 Mr Morden wrote:

Codex Power Creep is already here.

So C:GK is more powerful than C:SM/C:CSM?

Well Codex armies get Free Chapter Tacitics, relics, cut price Power Fists etc - Index armies don't.

So where's the creep? The codexes that have come out have all been fairly balanced against each other.

 Scott-S6 wrote:

 Mr Morden wrote:

 Scott-S6 wrote:

 Mr Morden wrote:

Codex Power Creep is already here.

So C:GK is more powerful than C:SM/C:CSM?

Well Codex armies get Free Chapter Tacitics, relics, cut price Power Fists etc - Index armies don't.

So Codex armies are more powerful than Index armies? Hardly a surprise. Also, there's no creep in that - as long as the codexes are relatively balanced against each other and they come out fairly promptly then no problem.

As you say They are more powerful so its power creep. How can it not be?

Some won't get them till next yeat - so its all great if you have an army with a shiny new Codex and Feth you if you have an Index army?

On a positive note they are moving more quickly than before - well especially if you are Marines - just the four dexes out, however its the inherent problem with the Codex system - you get the haves and the have nots and apparently the have nots should not complain becuase they are lucky they even get an Index and well they should just buy Marines.

The game does seem to play much more smoothly and quickly - just a shame we have to put up with the Codex imbalance system.

 Mr Morden wrote:

As you say They are more powerful so its power creep. How can it not be?

Some won't get them till next yeat - so its all great if you have an army with a shiny new Codex and Feth you if you have an Index army?

On a positive note they are moving more quickly than before - well especially if you are Marines - just the four dexes out, however its the inherent problem with the Codex system - you get the haves and the have nots and apparently the have nots should not complain becuase they are lucky they even get an Index and well they should just buy Marines.

The game does seem to play much more smoothly and quickly - just a shame we have to put up with the Codex imbalance system.

Creep is progressive. If all the codexes are roughly equal in power then there's no creep.

"Codex creep" is where each successive codex is more powerful than the codexes that came before. No codex creep so far but it's still pretty early.

Don't bother Scott-S6. People still believes GW is good enough at rule writting to do Power-creep.

Power-creep is a deliverate attempt to do the new hotness more powerfull, but that has been proven false edition after edition for GW games. Sometimes the new hotness is utterly crap, unusable and bottom tier, other times is balanced, other times is OP.

Yes - the whole "new models/codexes always get amazing rules" is hilarious. They get the complete opposite half of the time. If anything it demonstrated that they didn't understand the rules well enough to do that if they wanted to. (and FW certainly can't - see things like anti-aircraft missiles that are worse against aircraft than regular missiles)

On another note, anyone try homebrewed cover rules? I was thinking of trying to encorperate flanking rules for vehicles and units in cover for house rules. Do vehicles explode easily enough without vehicle facings?


Automatically Appended Next Post:
Also i think walkers should have rules to shoot stuff and move with no penalty to bs.

I feel like vehicles have become way more survivable. Others feel that way? You need so much anti-armor in concentration to knock out a vehicle.

 Mezmorki wrote:
I feel like vehicles have become way more survivable. Others feel that way? You need so much anti-armor in concentration to knock out a vehicle.

I do. I rarely see a vehicle killed in one turn unless there is a huge amount of fire-power poured into it and even then they require some lucky rolls. It makes me laugh when I see people complaining about "everything can hurt everything" like lasguns killing landraider because they never do. I mean you might get lucky with a last ditch effort to take the last wound off a land raider by rolling like 40 dice at it, but in fluff terms at the point the land raider is barely operational and it's hull is torn open and it's fuel reserves are leaking all over the place. A stray lasgun killing a land raider is like igniting the fiel after it's been torn open by lascannons or hitting the ammo storage because the doors have fallen off.

I can't remember if I posted in this thread but I will anyway, I like the new pace. I've always played balanced armies so I'm not having a lot of trouble adapting to the new style of play.

I guess the question I was passively asking was this: are vehicles too survivable?

With changes to the morale system, I feel like model counts in squads tend to decline more quickly as a result of casualties - which means an immediate reduction in firepower as well.

Vehicles, in comparison, seem much stronger. It's simply not possible to 1-shot a tank anymore, and most tanks require many, many shots to bring down. While it's true that vehicles lose accuracy as they take more damage, compared to the old crew stunned/shaken results that would severely gimp shooting on every glancing hit, vehicle damage output remains much higher throughout their longer lifespan. Make no mention of twin-linked weapons now simply doubling the number of shots.

The costs for many vehicles has gone up, but for others it hasn't really changed that much - despite vehicles being considerably more powerful.

I was tabled in 3 turns in 3 games at NOVA and my list had 3 baneblades (technically stormhammers) and 2 lesser vehicles. That means a baneblade plust 2/3rds of a lesser tank per turn of shooting.

I think tanks aren't too durable for the price they pay. They are very very expensive.

 argonak wrote:
I enjoy the speed of play, but only getting one turn of shooting before a cc focused opponent runs into your face is taking some getting used to.

It really makes me wonder why I bother playing.

Depends on how you play the game out. One of my very first games was a Dark Eldar wych cult list against an all khorne bezerkers/Kytans army and found that while the tactical makeup of slowing down an opponent had changed in that terrain mattered less, model placement mattered more. The biggest key is: Vehicles no longer have the ability to move through units as standard (no Tank Shock), and all pile-in moves (which includes Consolidate moves) are limited to moving towards the closest enemy unit. This is a lot of why flyers are such incredibly great utility units - it's very easy to completely halt the advance of a charging unit by moving a unit of fast chaff directly in front of them (blocking them during the movement phase and limiting them to charging just that unit) and then placing a flyer, which they physically can't assault, directly behind them such that it will be the closest enemy unit once they wipe out the chaff, effectively preventing that consolidation move entirely.

To use a video game analogy, keeping out of close combat has become somewhat less about kiting, and much more about including and using your crowd control abilities properly.

 Mezmorki wrote:
I feel like vehicles have become way more survivable. Others feel that way? You need so much anti-armor in concentration to knock out a vehicle.

I feel the opposite. I think elite infantry has probably taken the biggest hit this edition, but given the plentiful amount of multiple damage weapons vehicles (though better than in 6th and 7th) are not very survivable in comparison to hordes of infantry.

Pile-in / consolidate being towards the closest unit - this does mean that you can newly engage a unit in CC that wasn't previously engaged, correct?

E.G., in a way the sweeping advance from 3rd/4th edition is back? Of course, the difference now being that units engaged in CC can freely fall back on their movement phase (although they can't shoot/assault then).

Breng77 wrote:

 Mezmorki wrote:
I feel like vehicles have become way more survivable. Others feel that way? You need so much anti-armor in concentration to knock out a vehicle.

I feel the opposite. I think elite infantry has probably taken the biggest hit this edition, but given the plentiful amount of multiple damage weapons vehicles (though better than in 6th and 7th) are not very survivable in comparison to hordes of infantry.

This increased emphasis on hordes and artillerypieces in favor of most other options in the game is almost exactly what happened to WHFB during 8th edition. As GW continued to overcompensate with that game and add more powers designed to eliminate "big blocks," the game gradually slowly died off as it ultimately became about magic alphastrikes and throwing giant blocks of wound counters towards each other.

Why bother taking big monsters when they get attritioned down, or can be AT'd dead fast?

 Mezmorki wrote:
Pile-in / consolidate being towards the closest unit - this does mean that you can newly engage a unit in CC that wasn't previously engaged, correct?

E.G., in a way the sweeping advance from 3rd/4th edition is back? Of course, the difference now being that units engaged in CC can freely fall back on their movement phase (although they can't shoot/assault then).

yes it does, with some key notes.

If you charged you can only attack things on which you declared a charge. If you consolidate into a unit it will get to attack you during that fight phase.

Then also as you not, units can fall back on their turn

 MagicJuggler wrote:

Breng77 wrote:

 Mezmorki wrote:
I feel like vehicles have become way more survivable. Others feel that way? You need so much anti-armor in concentration to knock out a vehicle.

I feel the opposite. I think elite infantry has probably taken the biggest hit this edition, but given the plentiful amount of multiple damage weapons vehicles (though better than in 6th and 7th) are not very survivable in comparison to hordes of infantry.

This increased emphasis on hordes and artillerypieces in favor of most other options in the game is almost exactly what happened to WHFB during 8th edition. As GW continued to overcompensate with that game and add more powers designed to eliminate "big blocks," the game gradually slowly died off as it ultimately became about magic alphastrikes and throwing giant blocks of wound counters towards each other.

Why bother taking big monsters when they get attritioned down, or can be AT'd dead fast?

Interesting.

I've been trying to understand how morale changes might be affecting the balance of the game - and I wonder if it has a more pronounced effect than we might realize?

In older editions, assuming you were playing for mission objectives, failing a morale check caused units to fallback, which can mean moving off of objectives. But at the same time, the falling back unit could still shoot. Since no extra models were removed for failing a morale test, the firepower of the unit was preserved better.

In 8th edition, you no longer fall back, but failing a test results in additions models being removed from the board. This disproportionately affects smaller units (particularly those with low leadership), lowering their firepower and making them easier to eliminate on a subsequent turn (less models, etc.). It's a positive feedback loop that results in units being whipped from the board more quickly. This was done, presumably - to speed up games? Less models, less movement, less LoS checking, less die rolling, etc.

Thus, horde armies / large model count units are able to whether these morale failures while still holding position.

This stuff is all obviously intertwined, making it hard to parse the relative balance of things in a vacuum.

Breng77 wrote:

 Mezmorki wrote:
Pile-in / consolidate being towards the closest unit - this does mean that you can newly engage a unit in CC that wasn't previously engaged, correct?

E.G., in a way the sweeping advance from 3rd/4th edition is back? Of course, the difference now being that units engaged in CC can freely fall back on their movement phase (although they can't shoot/assault then).

yes it does, with some key notes.

If you charged you can only attack things on which you declared a charge. If you consolidate into a unit it will get to attack you during that fight phase.

Then also as you not, units can fall back on their turn

Mind you, the actual fighting in CQC isn't where it derives its power.

The strength of CQC lies in turning off shooting and decreasing movement opportunities, and just getting there is enough.

 Inquisitor Lord Katherine wrote:

Breng77 wrote:

 Mezmorki wrote:
Pile-in / consolidate being towards the closest unit - this does mean that you can newly engage a unit in CC that wasn't previously engaged, correct?

E.G., in a way the sweeping advance from 3rd/4th edition is back? Of course, the difference now being that units engaged in CC can freely fall back on their movement phase (although they can't shoot/assault then).

yes it does, with some key notes.

If you charged you can only attack things on which you declared a charge. If you consolidate into a unit it will get to attack you during that fight phase.

Then also as you not, units can fall back on their turn

Mind you, the actual fighting in CQC isn't where it derives its power.

The strength of CQC lies in turning off shooting and decreasing movement opportunities, and just getting there is enough.

It depends, it depends on the screening units etc. But yes limiting your opponents options is where I've had the most success with assault units.

 Mezmorki wrote:
Pile-in / consolidate being towards the closest unit - this does mean that you can newly engage a unit in CC that wasn't previously engaged, correct?

E.G., in a way the sweeping advance from 3rd/4th edition is back? Of course, the difference now being that units engaged in CC can freely fall back on their movement phase (although they can't shoot/assault then).

Yes, you can re-engage. However, the big drawback is that you don't get to fight a second time, and they do. This is fine if it's something like a vehicle that's unlikely to hurt you, but even a squad of tactical marines can cause a couple of extra wounds you wouldn't otherwise have taken if you consolidate into them.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Mezmorki wrote:

 MagicJuggler wrote:

Breng77 wrote:

 Mezmorki wrote:
I feel like vehicles have become way more survivable. Others feel that way? You need so much anti-armor in concentration to knock out a vehicle.

I feel the opposite. I think elite infantry has probably taken the biggest hit this edition, but given the plentiful amount of multiple damage weapons vehicles (though better than in 6th and 7th) are not very survivable in comparison to hordes of infantry.

This increased emphasis on hordes and artillerypieces in favor of most other options in the game is almost exactly what happened to WHFB during 8th edition. As GW continued to overcompensate with that game and add more powers designed to eliminate "big blocks," the game gradually slowly died off as it ultimately became about magic alphastrikes and throwing giant blocks of wound counters towards each other.

Why bother taking big monsters when they get attritioned down, or can be AT'd dead fast?

Interesting.

I've been trying to understand how morale changes might be affecting the balance of the game - and I wonder if it has a more pronounced effect than we might realize?

In older editions, assuming you were playing for mission objectives, failing a morale check caused units to fallback, which can mean moving off of objectives. But at the same time, the falling back unit could still shoot. Since no extra models were removed for failing a morale test, the firepower of the unit was preserved better.

In 8th edition, you no longer fall back, but failing a test results in additions models being removed from the board. This disproportionately affects smaller units (particularly those with low leadership), lowering their firepower and making them easier to eliminate on a subsequent turn (less models, etc.). It's a positive feedback loop that results in units being whipped from the board more quickly. This was done, presumably - to speed up games? Less models, less movement, less LoS checking, less die rolling, etc.

Thus, horde armies / large model count units are able to whether these morale failures while still holding position.

This stuff is all obviously intertwined, making it hard to parse the relative balance of things in a vacuum.

If anything, the biggest flaw of the new morale system is that GW wasn't quite willing enough to follow through on making it universal.

Every problematic horde unit around today (Ork Boyz, Conscripts, Poxwalks if we start seeing them with the new codex, Genestealers with the GSC patriarch) is partially a problem because you can't stack up that critical-mass morale check to wipe them out.

If taking out 30 conscripts meant that the remaining 20 would up and run then they'd be a much easier threat to deal with than they are now.

Basically, old morale+sweeping advance was a rule that *in theory* was a big deal but *in practice* rarely ever applied, but was somewhat clunky and hard to keep track of, and new morale is a rule that *in theory* is a big deal but *in practice* rarely ever applies, but at least when it does it's pretty easy to keep track of...so...improvement, but I feel like if GW had followed through on some of their blustery "Morale is going to be IN THE GAME and only VERY RARELY is anyone going to fully ignore its effects!" from the early previews, we'd be in better shape.

Yarium wrote:

 Nym wrote:
I really like the pace of the game, but I hate it when people surrender at the end of turn 2 because they "think" it's over.

And I think FIRST TURN should be decided not by a dice roll (or drops), but by BIDDING. Each player secretely bids some Command points. Then both reveal how many Command points they were bidding. The highest takes First turn and loses the Command points. The other one goes second.

Agreed that players shouldn't give up. Lots of games I'm seeing have a real turning point where it's anyone's game on turn 3. Not 100% sure why, but I've seen a lot fewer "steamrolled" games in 8th than in 7th. Basement Collective just put up a Battle Report, and the same thing nearly happened, with a close game out of what looked heavily lopsided after turn 1: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ussgonwm1TE

As for going first, what if both players bid the same amount of command points? I actually really like the dice roll (with the +1 bonus mechanic, as opposed to just auto-going first) because it makes it more interesting for choosing larger or smaller squads, and finding ways to speed up your deployment to get down sooner, though you "show your hand" so to speak sooner too. I love the current deployment method. Probably because deployment was one of my favourite things of 3rd edition.

You could split the difference, number of CP committed is added as a bonus to roll-off. So if equal commitment, becomes a straight roll-off (or still keep the +1 for the person who finished deploying first.

argonak wrote:I enjoy the speed of play, but only getting one turn of shooting before a cc focused opponent runs into your face is taking some getting used to.

It really makes me wonder why I bother playing.

Use Transports to engage units and keep them from engaging your shooters; one of the many things that makes transports so much more viable is their value as screening units. With Transports being so much more survivable, your opponent will have to concentrate a lot of dakka or cc on the transport to get to the center of the tootsie pop.

Mezmorki wrote:I feel like vehicles have become way more survivable. Others feel that way? You need so much anti-armor in concentration to knock out a vehicle.

Yes. Especially when the dice gods are on your side and it take 3 units 2 turns to destroy a Ravager that only had 1 wound left when at the start of said 2 turns

master of ordinance wrote:The new 40K seems to... I dont know... It lacks something In particular any semblance of tactics or... I dont know, it just seems so dull and shallow, even when compared to the previous edition.
The lack of tactical depth really does not do it for me, and everything seems to come down to 'push models to the centre/place X and shoot' with the only thing stopping everything from becoming a game of pushing toy soldiers about making pewpew noises being the objectives which force you to move towards them. And even that is... Not interesting.

Really? I feel like the game has more or less exactly the same tactical weight of the last edition, maybe a little better. And if you really want something tactical, try some of the narrative missions, they're actually super fun. Although we did discover they need a bit of tweaking, and don't necessarily lend themselves well to perfectly points balanced lists. Like, I played a game with a friend using one of the fortified defender/exposed attack scenarios at 1250 pts, with sustained assault, and still ended up both feeling that with the value of sustained assault, the game might have played more fairly if he, as the defender had had an extra 250 or so points.

AnFéasógMór wrote:

master of ordinance wrote:The new 40K seems to... I dont know... It lacks something In particular any semblance of tactics or... I dont know, it just seems so dull and shallow, even when compared to the previous edition.
The lack of tactical depth really does not do it for me, and everything seems to come down to 'push models to the centre/place X and shoot' with the only thing stopping everything from becoming a game of pushing toy soldiers about making pewpew noises being the objectives which force you to move towards them. And even that is... Not interesting.

Really? I feel like the game has more or less exactly the same tactical weight of the last edition, maybe a little better. And if you really want something tactical, try some of the narrative missions, they're actually super fun. Although we did discover they need a bit of tweaking, and don't necessarily lend themselves well to perfectly points balanced lists. Like, I played a game with a friend using one of the fortified defender/exposed attack scenarios at 1250 pts, with sustained assault, and still ended up both feeling that with the value of sustained assault, the game might have played more fairly if he, as the defender had had an extra 250 or so points.

From what i'm seeing many are mixing up "cirect counter" for "tactics" before we had many units that would be flat out immune to some weaponry, others completely able to destroy something.

Over all the game is the game, its still Kill your opponent using the best Rock, Paper, Scissor unit you can, and if you can, then mass number of attacks will do, while trying to get objectives.

But for some players having a direct Rock/paper/scissor unit to counter someone else idea of tactics is kinda gone (but not really) a T13 Walker can no longer charge an IG blog and ignore the damage they do while holding them down for a turn, now that same Dreadnought will take some damage from the IG.. but again nothing actually changed, the IG blob still wont kill in melee and will just fall back like before.

This also goes for the Psychic phase, many feel is less but its not any less just different.

I just see players "perceiving" less tactics when IMO there are MUCH more tactics.

1) Deployment YGIG is a new tactic/strategy to the game
2) Psychic you pick your powers and they can still change the game into your favour, Smite on everything now gives more tactics for you and your opponent (they can try counter it with a trash unit via good placement)
3) Characters matter now and there are way to deal with them
4) Mortal wounds, you no longer can have a 2++/5+++ and dont care about taking damage. (something that doesnt take damage isnt tactics its lack of tactics)
5) DSing.. OH MAN this is a big change, always place where you want is very nice (outside of 9 that is) this added a solid tactic now that it isnt random
6) Consolidate into melee
7) The 1" = melee and pile ins shenanigans
8 ) Command Points... this along added a large amount to the game


Out of everything i'd say Psychic is the one phase that took a small hit in tactics, but its in a good way IMO.

I love 8th speed of the game, but just like any 40k it really depends on the 2 players. Ive had 7th gmaes that last 8hrs and other that lasted 1hr, both times going to turn 6. Some players just are slower, rules lawyer, play heavy summoning, dont know the rules etc.. Then you have players that been playing for years, knows all the rules dont need to argue with each other, just come in roll some dice and have fun.

The Speed of 8th is a bit faster for sure compare to 6th and 7th, i'd so tho its about the same as an 1850pts 5th game and we are playing 2k.

1) Alternating deployments were back in 3rd and 4th, where players deployed based on FOC, with HS deploying first and DA deploying last. 5th added "deploy first go first, unless seized", which actually made for meaningful tradeoffs. In fact, the combo of getting an advantageous deployment as well as getting to cap objectives on the end turn, combined with generally reduced firepower meant there were many times when it was preferable to go second, while such an option is hardly as attractive in 8th.
2) You have far less Psychic Powers, period, and the internal balance is still not there. If you pick Infernal Gaze over Warptime, or Eadbang over Da Jump, then you could write rules for GW. 5th had the same issue too, as there was a dramatic difference between picking Smite or Avenger versus picking Null Zone. You also have Psychic Focus, eliminating the ability to scale Psychic Powers, and also reducing most Psychic builds to Smitespam, with Forgeworld Malefic Lord Smitespam being the current most point-efficient option.
3) Characters have mattered in most every edition. This is the first edition where a character can fail to reach melee that nearby units made it to. Somehow I doubt that's how Kharn the Betrayer earned his title.
4) This was a notable problem. Introducing a D analogue was not the solution. Reducing the prevalence of 2++s is. Unless you're Draigo in which case, congrats if you take him.
5) Conscriptwalls can create giant deadzones of overlapping no-DS. Scatter was a calculated risk. Plus there were scatter-mitigator effects anyway. Inversely, you cannot reserve units unless they explicitly have that ability. Players not thinking to put stuff in Reserve is one of the circumstances that made Leafblower so infamous in 5th, only they outright removed that option. Is there a wonder that Guard players love their Basilisks in 8th?
6 & 7) 3rd and 4th, removed in 5th. Arguably removed because it made it way too easy to roll up gunlines.
8) I've mostly seen CP used as a reroll or dpt buff, with the non-regenerating nature of it combined with no spending caps resulting in it being just another way to frontload damage in a turn. Adding more alphastrike statbuffs doesn't exactly strike me as particularly strategic.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Mezmorki wrote:

 MagicJuggler wrote:

Breng77 wrote:

 Mezmorki wrote:
I feel like vehicles have become way more survivable. Others feel that way? You need so much anti-armor in concentration to knock out a vehicle.

I feel the opposite. I think elite infantry has probably taken the biggest hit this edition, but given the plentiful amount of multiple damage weapons vehicles (though better than in 6th and 7th) are not very survivable in comparison to hordes of infantry.

This increased emphasis on hordes and artillerypieces in favor of most other options in the game is almost exactly what happened to WHFB during 8th edition. As GW continued to overcompensate with that game and add more powers designed to eliminate "big blocks," the game gradually slowly died off as it ultimately became about magic alphastrikes and throwing giant blocks of wound counters towards each other.

Why bother taking big monsters when they get attritioned down, or can be AT'd dead fast?

Interesting.

I've been trying to understand how morale changes might be affecting the balance of the game - and I wonder if it has a more pronounced effect than we might realize?

In older editions, assuming you were playing for mission objectives, failing a morale check caused units to fallback, which can mean moving off of objectives. But at the same time, the falling back unit could still shoot. Since no extra models were removed for failing a morale test, the firepower of the unit was preserved better.

In 8th edition, you no longer fall back, but failing a test results in additions models being removed from the board. This disproportionately affects smaller units (particularly those with low leadership), lowering their firepower and making them easier to eliminate on a subsequent turn (less models, etc.). It's a positive feedback loop that results in units being whipped from the board more quickly. This was done, presumably - to speed up games? Less models, less movement, less LoS checking, less die rolling, etc.

Thus, horde armies / large model count units are able to whether these morale failures while still holding position.

This stuff is all obviously intertwined, making it hard to parse the relative balance of things in a vacuum.

More interesting, is that since the defender allocates *all* casualties, from shooting, battleshock, etc, you can have a unit plop on an objective and stay until its wiped out. This, combined with removal of any "move the enemy effects" (be it Tank Shock or Forgeworld shenanigans), and melee pile-in being optional on a model basis, all serves to make the game far more "attrition" rather than "maneuver."

@MagicJugglerMade

Totally hypothetical question for you ... but do you think it would be possible to use 8th Edition as a base but give it a massive house-rule overhaul that brings some things back to more 5th-like gameplay?

Long story short, I have a big giant google sheet I'm working on that compares specific game mechanics across editions (mostly 4th, 5th, 6th, and 8th - since I have the rulebooks for those). I'm interested, purely for my own enjoyment and play, in making a "Hybrid Hammer" that's a mash-up of various rulesets.

So for example, using 8th edition as a base, but then:
- Make area terrain block LoS (ala 4th edition)
- Switch back to fixed cover saves, but apply on a model by model basis
- Shooting through intervening models provides a cover save (or hit modifier, TBD)
- Use blast markers to determine number of hits (instead of D3/D6) and then role to hit per 8th edition
- Remove pre-measuring ranges (optional)
- Reintroduce go-to-ground
- Melee charges less variable...somehow
- +1 attack on melee charge, but defending units in cover strike simultaneous with charging units
- Restore vehicle weapon firing arcs
- Toughness penalty for shooting vehicles in the rear arc
- Possibly re-do morale system to old-school fallback style instead of removing models.
- Maybe do something different with how vehicles take damage.
- Rework reserves and deployment rules.

Obviously this will need a lot of careful thought. I feel like somewhere between all these editions is a solid game system, but the balance always just swings around too much to settle in a nice position.

I really do like the simplification of 8th E in many ways (and the index's are pretty excellent). It feels like a good very clean base to build on. Many of my above tweaks would add to the complexity and game length, but if it adds to tactical depth, in particular making terrain and maneuver more important with less potential for alpha strikes, I think that's a fine price to pay.

I think it would work. There were things about 5th that I still don't remember as fondly (Independent Characters count as their own unit in CC, but sergeants don't, 50% cover for large units, torrent of fire aka "what do you mean those Kroot in the open get a 3+ cover save?" etc) but overall 5th did do a lot right, being a good middle ground in its own way. Generally, I tend to prefer when a game favors "midfield pushes" and maneuvering taking a few turns to plan out, rather than "static gunlines", or "bubblewrap+piece trading."

I've been mostly working on scratch-building my own system, that's Alt Activation but uses Tactical Points (aka Command Points) to alter turn order rather than for Stratagem statboosts. Since TP are on a 'per turn' basis, it's easier to balance them to be less alphastrike-ish, and the fact they're also the resource you spend to bring in Reserves means that by nature, alphastrike/null armies are going to be more chaotic/less coordinated than just simply starting on the table. But the biggest thing I'm doing is adding a Magic-like 'stack' mechanic for Interrupts, to minimize downtime between players getting to do stuff.

- Make area terrain block LoS (ala 4th edition)
We do that - works fine

- Switch back to fixed cover saves, but apply on a model by model basis
Prefer current system

- Shooting through intervening models provides a cover save (or hit modifier, TBD)
Seems fine

- Use blast markers to determine number of hits (instead of D3/D6) and then role to hit per 8th edition
Not a fan as balst markers are a bit of pain and slow the game down

- Remove pre-measuring ranges (optional)
Urgh no - Pre -measuring is IMO essential.

- Reintroduce go-to-ground
not bothered either way

- Melee charges less variable...somehow
Just go with Move +d6, no more than 12" if you prefer.

- +1 attack on melee charge, but defending units in cover strike simultaneous with charging units
Not bothered - happy with it as is

- Restore vehicle weapon firing arcs
Prefer not to

- Toughness penalty for shooting vehicles in the rear arc
Not needed I donlt think and assume it would not apply to all vehicles?

- Possibly re-do morale system to old-school fallback style instead of removing models.
Happy with as is

- Maybe do something different with how vehicles take damage.
Why?

- Rework reserves and deployment rules.
Why?

In what ways do people think units not being able to move through other friendly models (or vehicles charging through e.g. Tank shock) affects the game balance and tactical dynamics?

 Mezmorki wrote:
I guess the question I was passively asking was this: are vehicles too survivable?

With changes to the morale system, I feel like model counts in squads tend to decline more quickly as a result of casualties - which means an immediate reduction in firepower as well.

Vehicles, in comparison, seem much stronger. It's simply not possible to 1-shot a tank anymore, and most tanks require many, many shots to bring down. While it's true that vehicles lose accuracy as they take more damage, compared to the old crew stunned/shaken results that would severely gimp shooting on every glancing hit, vehicle damage output remains much higher throughout their longer lifespan. Make no mention of twin-linked weapons now simply doubling the number of shots.

aside from weapons that really abused the HP mechanics (like 7E multilaser spam vs AV10-12 units), actually most vehicles should have lower lifespans and require fewer shots on average to kill than they did before. They cant be one shotted, but their wounds can be chewed through with much greater efficiency.

Some of that comes from weapons, others come from some vehicles being translated very poorly into the new paradigm. Lascannons for instance required about 14 BS4 shots to HP out a Russ from the front, with any single shot having a 1/54 chance to kill it in 7E, but in 8E you need fewer shots, 9 or 10 on average, because despite having far more "wounds" and a save, it's wounded twice as often and each successful wound can strip up to 6 wounds, not to mention being vulnerable to small arms now.

The thing is though, in prior editions - especially going back to 4th - a hit that didn't destroy the vehicle still impacted its performance a lot. Getting crew stunned on a glancing was enough to prevent it from firing some or all of its main weapons a single penetrating hit had more than 50% chance to knock out a major gun, immobilize it, or destroy it outright. In close combat, multiple attacks with a power first or equivalent would seriously hinder a vehicle.

Granted, vehicles may have been too weak back then outside of their transport role - and transports were a lot cheaper then too because it was assumed that it was going to explode pretty quickly.

Just did the math for 8th edition. Requires 12.3 lascannon shots to kill a Leman Russ on average. Not a huge decline, and on average is going to take as fair number of shots being the wounds stack up enough for it to start loosing speed and BS.

I hated 5th....... I like modifiers more, i hated vehicle rules (especially skimmers), i hated No pre-measure, i hate templates too.

I love the melee in 8th also, its sooo good to me.

8th is for sure my fav.

PS: Your talking about lets say a 200pts tank, should a 30pt weapon kill a 200pt tank? No... should 200pts of that weapon kill it? it more likely it should be able to.

So when we talk about killing vehicles, i hate the idea that a couple Las cannons should kill a tank, honestly it shouldnt.

Edit: I think you did your math wrong on that 12.5 shots, b.c you only need 4 wounds to go through and on average for 4D6 is enough to kill it, that means you need like 9 shots. if is 3+ to hit and 3+ to wound, with command points you can get a much more average number on the damage.

I used a 4+ to hit.

What do you like so much about melee in 8th?

 Mezmorki wrote:
I used a 4+ to hit.

What do you like so much about melee in 8th?

B.c we dont need to be base to base, and we can pile in "around" much easier now, we can use that to help block other models and units.

I like that pistols can be used in melee (been asking for this since 5th ed)

I like we can consolidate into other units

I think MWG did a bit about all the different things you can do in melee (I havent watch it yet but i'm told its really good).

It just has so much more strategies than in any other edition.

Edit: Spelling

AnFéasógMór wrote:

argonak wrote:I enjoy the speed of play, but only getting one turn of shooting before a cc focused opponent runs into your face is taking some getting used to.

It really makes me wonder why I bother playing.

Use Transports to engage units and keep them from engaging your shooters; one of the many things that makes transports so much more viable is their value as screening units. With Transports being so much more survivable, your opponent will have to concentrate a lot of dakka or cc on the transport to get to the center of the tootsie pop.

Yeah I need to get better at that. My guard force doesn't have a problem, because mentally its easy to guardsmen as chaff, and then fall back and shoot the crap out of the opponent. I have a tougher time doing that with my marines, not the least of which because I have far fewer units on the field.

I like most of the rules in 8th. Not a huge fan of mortal wounds, but I can see a need for a little bit of it in the game, just not as much as some factions seem to be getting.

The terrain rules need some work, which is easy enough to accomplish without over-complicating things.

Not a huge fan of the rule of 1 on psychic powers, but don't know if that's needed for balance.

Other than those two things, I think the basic rules are pretty good. Some units need some work and the Stratagems are mostly boring copy and paste so far.

Melee combat is interesting and it takes a bit of decision making to use it well. Vehicles are good for the first time since 2nd edition (a couple too good as always). Morale is, well morale I guess. I was always a fan of units breaking and being destroyed if they got caught, but this is a decent compromise when it actually matters. I also love them getting rid of template weapons, though certain armies need some adjustments since their templates made up for horrible BS (Orkz).

I'd like them to introduce an ally limit of one army and 20% of points like they did for AoS which certain armies only able to ally with certain others.

Overall, I think this edition has the potential to be the best I've played since 2nd (though 2nd had some really clunky and unfun rules too).

 Scott-S6 wrote:

 Mr Morden wrote:

 Scott-S6 wrote:

 Mr Morden wrote:

Codex Power Creep is already here.

So C:GK is more powerful than C:SM/C:CSM?

Well Codex armies get Free Chapter Tacitics, relics, cut price Power Fists etc - Index armies don't.

So where's the creep? The codexes that have come out have all been fairly balanced against each other.

I don't think Mr Morden actually understands what power creep is.

If the house rules enhance the game then definately try to get the community involved and maybe give feedback to GW. The whole point of 8th supposedly is to be a living ruleset. I love some of the ideas you have, and figured that some of those changes should make it back into the new edition. A general guideline I found when making house rules is that if a rule takes more than 1 clause or trigger to trigger, then it is generally a poorly designed rule and that you should avoid that pitfall. Rules triggering in 7th requiring complex triggers to go off to apply complex results was part of why 7th was such a mess.

Anyways, why couldnt they just have kept rules with the same effect with the same name? Why does "hatred" have at least 2 different names?

 Mezmorki wrote:
@MagicJugglerMade

Totally hypothetical question for you ... but do you think it would be possible to use 8th Edition as a base but give it a massive house-rule overhaul that brings some things back to more 5th-like gameplay?

Long story short, I have a big giant google sheet I'm working on that compares specific game mechanics across editions (mostly 4th, 5th, 6th, and 8th - since I have the rulebooks for those). I'm interested, purely for my own enjoyment and play, in making a "Hybrid Hammer" that's a mash-up of various rulesets.

So for example, using 8th edition as a base, but then:
- Make area terrain block LoS (ala 4th edition)
- Switch back to fixed cover saves, but apply on a model by model basis
- Shooting through intervening models provides a cover save (or hit modifier, TBD)
- Use blast markers to determine number of hits (instead of D3/D6) and then role to hit per 8th edition
- Remove pre-measuring ranges (optional)
- Reintroduce go-to-ground
- Melee charges less variable...somehow
- +1 attack on melee charge, but defending units in cover strike simultaneous with charging units
- Restore vehicle weapon firing arcs
- Toughness penalty for shooting vehicles in the rear arc
- Possibly re-do morale system to old-school fallback style instead of removing models.
- Maybe do something different with how vehicles take damage.
- Rework reserves and deployment rules.

Obviously this will need a lot of careful thought. I feel like somewhere between all these editions is a solid game system, but the balance always just swings around too much to settle in a nice position.

I really do like the simplification of 8th E in many ways (and the index's are pretty excellent). It feels like a good very clean base to build on. Many of my above tweaks would add to the complexity and game length, but if it adds to tactical depth, in particular making terrain and maneuver more important with less potential for alpha strikes, I think that's a fine price to pay.

Overall I like it.

Taking wounds from the direction of fire was a neat idea, but it was tedious and it completely crippled armies like orks. I never had a single ork unit get to melee with me under those rules.

I like the changes to cover, though it does make LOS blocking terrain even more important. It didn't make sense that cover would replace your armor and not be affected by guns.

I could see having cover provide you with a secondary save like it did in previous editions, but let AP apply to it. ex: Guardsman with his 5+ is sitting in some heavy wall cover that gives a 3+ save. He gets shot with a heavy bolter and gets to make a 4+ cover save. That would be more realistic and also benefit low armor units.

macluvin wrote:
If the house rules enhance the game then definately try to get the community involved and maybe give feedback to GW. The whole point of 8th supposedly is to be a living ruleset. I love some of the ideas you have, and figured that some of those changes should make it back into the new edition. A general guideline I found when making house rules is that if a rule takes more than 1 clause or trigger to trigger, then it is generally a poorly designed rule and that you should avoid that pitfall. Rules triggering in 7th requiring complex triggers to go off to apply complex results was part of why 7th was such a mess.

Yeup, agree. I am a published boardgame designer (as in an actual publisher, not self-published) - so I have some confidence in being able to craft clear rules that strike a balance between adding depth vs. adding unnecessary overhead. We'll see where it goes.

cmspano wrote:
Overall I like it.

Taking wounds from the direction of fire was a neat idea, but it was tedious and it completely crippled armies like orks. I never had a single ork unit get to melee with me under those rules.

I like the changes to cover, though it does make LOS blocking terrain even more important. It didn't make sense that cover would replace your armor and not be affected by guns.

I could see having cover provide you with a secondary save like it did in previous editions, but let AP apply to it. ex: Guardsman with his 5+ is sitting in some heavy wall cover that gives a 3+ save. He gets shot with a heavy bolter and gets to make a 4+ cover save. That would be more realistic and also benefit low armor units.

I was contemplating the "direction of fire" aspect and was pondering about a compromise for the rules. The defender allocates wounds, within range and line of sight, and you cannot allocate casualties to models if there are any interposing models from the same unit in the way. Or something along those lines. A "middle ground" that would allow for some flanking or limited objective-clearing, but wouldn't lead to oddities like Scatbikes in a line perpendicular to the Gravcannon they wished to snipe out, or so.

I at the beginning of 8th loved the pace, now I find myself burnt out. I've found in our games 1st turn wins 99% of the time and everybody just brings an alpha strike army. it's become extremely bland and boring. and with lack of diversity in rules and gameplay We've since moved to Inq28mm campaign in the hopes that necromunda's re-release will bring some excitement back to the universe.

8th edition is not balanced. The lack of balance is wearing me a bit thin. I also find certain rules, like character targeting, get in the way, more than they make an interesting game.

In a non-competitive environment, the game is balanced just fine, but so was 7th. Except the psychic phase. Even in casual games, the 7th psychic phase was borked.

Played a game this weekend that was like 80% infantry, without horde cheese. It was fun and went to turn 5, and actually had tactical depth.

Id have to say 8th is far more balanced as an edition than any edition they have made so far. Also MSU is kinda against horde so I have no idea what your trying to say there.

8th has some pretty bad internal balances in the various armies, but the game overall has a damn fine balance.

You're right, I had half of a thought in that sentence and messed it up while cleaning it up. I was referencing two things I find OP, but I don't want to call out the names. Anyway, i've corrected the post.

All 3 games I've played have been pretty close and no clear victor until round 3 or 4. I really do like the pace.

Alpha strike to victory is not much fun. There should be an advantage to going first. Just not so much with 3 ravens breathing down your neck and deep strikers in your backfield.

The reality is you're either alpha striking or building a list to deal with alpha striking.

 3orangewhips wrote:
Alpha strike to victory is not much fun. There should be an advantage to going first. Just not so much with 3 ravens breathing down your neck and deep strikers in your backfield.

The reality is you're either alpha striking or building a list to deal with alpha striking.

Or building a fluffy list and getting wrecked.

You should be able to keep deepstrikers out of your backfield from smart deployment. Maybe my first two games had that issue, but seriously, they have to be 9" away from your models and you can normally dictate where they are allowed to go.