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Terrain, the 3rd opponent @ 2021/10/18 00:16:02


Post by: Daedalus81


I'm going to preface this post that it is a very tournament slanted post and if you're not into tournaments you probably won't care for it.

Also, terrain is not a replacement for balance issues. It will not solve DE or Admech or ooLOS spam.

In the latest metawatch GW showed off a GFWR of 49% at NOLA Open. The rounds vary a bit - likely due to the missions.

Spoiler:
They also listed win rates by faction:

Spoiler:
There's a few surprising results there, but that may be due to the bracketing system.

Let's compare NOLA and the London GT.

Here's sample terrain for the London GT:
Spoiler:

And here's NOLA:
Spoiler:

Here's a firing lane comparison between the two:
Spoiler:
Spoiler:


So, I think it's safe to saw that GW's terrain layout is better. And this is where I think some people fall flat in their games.

In all of the games I've played with sufficient terrain movement mattered and casualties were pretty low on turn one. I know many people are frustrated with the urban, symmetrical terrain and I get it, and giant Ls. What if those Ls were dense jungle that infantry could conceivably cross ( breachable ) and blocks LOS until you touch it ( obscuring )? It has the same net effect. Similar to this:

Spoiler:


Here's the LGT top 16:
Spoiler:
Ad Mec
Deathwatch
Death Guard
Sisters
Ad Mec
Drukhari
Drukhari
Ad Mec
Aeldari
Death Guard
Drukhari
Chaos
Drukhari
Ad Mec
Ad Mec
White Scars 5-0


And NOLA:

Spoiler:
Cult Mechanics
Drukhari
Orks
Death Guard
Drukhari
Imperial Knights
Space Wolves
Thousand Sons
Salamanders
Death Guard
Custodes
Blood Angels
Harlequins
Adepta Sororitas
Iron Hands
Grey Knights


Again - no idea what ratio is attributable to brackets, win-path pairing, or terrain, but my hunch is that good terrain is crucial.


Terrain, the 3rd opponent @ 2021/10/18 00:22:21


Post by: the_scotsman


hey just, quick one here, quick question.

....is every battle ever fought fought between two opposing armies that know each other are there but can't see each other at all?

Because it seems kind of like a dumb way to strategically set up a battle to me, just, conceptually, from a narrative standpoint.

Just, every time:

"Yep, men, theyre there, just cant see em through these big L-rocks/Big L-buildings/Big L-walls of trees/big L-walls of ice/giant tetris blocks on Forgeworld Tetriton, curse their over-productive zeal!!"


Terrain, the 3rd opponent @ 2021/10/18 00:38:26


Post by: Daedalus81


 the_scotsman wrote:
hey just, quick one here, quick question.

....is every battle ever fought fought between two opposing armies that know each other are there but can't see each other at all?

Because it seems kind of like a dumb way to strategically set up a battle to me, just, conceptually, from a narrative standpoint.

Just, every time:

"Yep, men, theyre there, just cant see em through these big L-rocks/Big L-buildings/Big L-walls of trees/big L-walls of ice/giant tetris blocks on Forgeworld Tetriton, curse their over-productive zeal!!"


Well, terrain is crucial in Napoleanics. Simple hills allow you to hide units from enemy view. In games without fog of war it's pretty crucial and I don't think any modern army would casually deploy if they knew they were about to contact the enemy.


Terrain, the 3rd opponent @ 2021/10/18 01:22:00


Post by: H.B.M.C.


*looks at the tournament tables*

Disgusting...


Terrain, the 3rd opponent @ 2021/10/18 01:29:25


Post by: Sim-Life


Another "the game is balanced if you try this ONE WEIRD TRICK" post from Daed.


Terrain, the 3rd opponent @ 2021/10/18 01:31:19


Post by: Apple fox


40k tournament tables are the worst most depressing things in the hobby.

I think most 40k tables are really bad an uninteresting, which I don’t think the rules really help with.


Terrain, the 3rd opponent @ 2021/10/18 02:19:54


Post by: Daedalus81


 Sim-Life wrote:
Another "the game is balanced if you try this ONE WEIRD TRICK" post from Daed.


You mean following the guidance of the actual rulebook?


Automatically Appended Next Post:
 H.B.M.C. wrote:
*looks at the tournament tables*

Disgusting...


And what if they visually were not ruins?

What if they were slightly assyemtrical, but still balanced?


Terrain, the 3rd opponent @ 2021/10/18 02:43:08


Post by: H.B.M.C.


 Daedalus81 wrote:
And what if they visually were not ruins?
Wouldn't make a damned bit of difference.

 Daedalus81 wrote:
What if they were slightly assyemtrical, but still balanced?
Then some whiny tournament player would start screeching about it not being balanced.

Symmetrical tables at tournaments didn't used to be a thing. Now they're a fething plague of L-shaped bull gak.



Terrain, the 3rd opponent @ 2021/10/18 02:57:25


Post by: Daedalus81


Well, if it's anything a tournament player will listen to it's data.

The biggest hurdle for tournaments is economics.

Local games don't have to follow the template, but they need to be mindful of terrain keywords and lanes.


Terrain, the 3rd opponent @ 2021/10/18 03:23:32


Post by: Voss


 Daedalus81 wrote:
 Sim-Life wrote:
Another "the game is balanced if you try this ONE WEIRD TRICK" post from Daed.


You mean following the guidance of the actual rulebook?


This?
Unless otherwise noted, when setting up terrain features, use the guidelines detailed on pages 266-269. Terrain features cannot be set up on objectives


Given that pages 266-269 are two very vague paragraphs and 10 pictures (of very open tables with terrain that mostly doesn't block LOS at all), I'm not sure where you're going with this.
The things they really do suggest is using a mix of area terrain and obstacles (which means not just loading the table with walls) and being open enough that tanks and large models don't get trapped.

They do mention obscured terrain near the middle of the table, but don't support that with pictures at all- open columns and windows abound, and the first pic on page 268 is just three crates, a few pipes and then buildings lining the edges! The last picture is a single crate in the middle with a ring of pipes, and three whole buildings on the left edge.


Terrain, the 3rd opponent @ 2021/10/18 06:10:43


Post by: Dysartes


Ignoring the main thrust of the post for a moment, I wonder why Imperial Knights were top of the tree when Chaos Knights were at the bottom - assuming they're referring to "pure" armies there, anyway.


Terrain, the 3rd opponent @ 2021/10/18 07:30:03


Post by: The Black Adder


Terrain has been important in every edition of the game. I would never set it up in a symmetric layout for a game but I understand why they've done this for tournaments.

I think a better layout is one that provides the same obstructed fire lanes, cover bonuses and forces decisions for movement but looks like a real environment. So if you're fighting in a city you should have distinct roads, plazas, city blocks, etc.

I'd like to start going to tournaments next year, just to get some experience paint outside of my small group, but I would get very bored playing games on the same setup over and over. If GW are going to provide TOs with some ideal setup examples/rules they should give some thought to more diverse layouts that offer the same advantages without the bland artificial appearance of the ones used at NOLA.


Terrain, the 3rd opponent @ 2021/10/18 08:06:15


Post by: Da Boss


Thanks for the data Daedalus, I'm interested to look through it even as someone who does not play tournaments so it's nice to have it cross posted here.

The Knights/Chaos Knights win rates also really stood out to me, I'd have assumed they were pretty similar factions?

Also, the Tyranid score is REALLY low, wow. And Necrons too? They recently got updated so that is surprising. Overall a fairly even distribution between Imperial and Xenos factions, with Chaos as a faction actually faring worst. Seems like some effort from the design studio really is needed there.

On the terrain question, I still find it weird that people want to balance and homogenize terrain before balancing and homogenizing lists, if the tournament is supposed to be a test of player skill. If it's so important for it to be balanced that every board has to have the same layout, but then you've got all these wildly differently balanced factions and lists within those factions, it just seems weird to me. Either go all out, wacky cool terrain and very diverse lists for what is essentially a fun day out to play a bunch of games with the competition as the nominal excuse (which I feel was what tournaments mainly were when I still attended them) or actually balance things to make them a proper test of skill rather than a crapshoot in terms of matchup.


Terrain, the 3rd opponent @ 2021/10/18 08:17:34


Post by: Slipspace


There's a problem if the game is only "balanced" if you set up terrain in a very specific way. A good ruleset would require a minimal amount of terrain but function just fine with varying degrees of different types of terrain, ranging from lightly forested all the way up to city fight. At the moment the GW GT terrain "balances" the game by making it nigh-on impossible to shoot anything round 1. That's fine, I guess, but it's missing the real problem, which is the absurd level of lethality that makes this necessary in the first place.

I also find it pretty comical that GW have all these different types of terrain and terrain traits in the rulebook and their own tournament tables boil down to masses of Ruins and a few token Dense pieces.


Terrain, the 3rd opponent @ 2021/10/18 08:18:01


Post by: Dolnikan


I can see multiple reasons for the Chaos Knight scoring. One is that there might very well not have been all that many players, which always is something that can lead to pretty extreme scoring. The other is that there is a lot of overlap with Imperial Knights, perhaps also in terms of player base. Which means that because one of them is better, players will tend more towards that one.

It's the same as win rates for different subfactions. Take the various space marine chapters for instance. It's pretty easy to play as another one while getting some pretty big bonuses for it. So, the most competitive players will generally switch to the most powerful chapter(s) which will further increase their win rate when compared to less powerful ones. After all, only the true diehards will be playing Blood Wolves when they can instead play Ultra Angels.


Terrain, the 3rd opponent @ 2021/10/18 10:57:31


Post by: Dudeface


Slipspace wrote:
There's a problem if the game is only "balanced" if you set up terrain in a very specific way. A good ruleset would require a minimal amount of terrain but function just fine with varying degrees of different types of terrain, ranging from lightly forested all the way up to city fight. At the moment the GW GT terrain "balances" the game by making it nigh-on impossible to shoot anything round 1. That's fine, I guess, but it's missing the real problem, which is the absurd level of lethality that makes this necessary in the first place.

I also find it pretty comical that GW have all these different types of terrain and terrain traits in the rulebook and their own tournament tables boil down to masses of Ruins and a few token Dense pieces.


You mean the rulebook with rules for open and narrative play offer more options than a tightly controlled tournament table? Hardly surprising.


Terrain, the 3rd opponent @ 2021/10/18 12:02:24


Post by: Unit1126PLL


Don't call terrain the 3rd opponent!!

As soon as you suggest it can immobilize unfortunate vehicles (you know, like an opponent could) 40k players go ballistic.


Terrain, the 3rd opponent @ 2021/10/18 12:07:06


Post by: the_scotsman


 Dysartes wrote:
Ignoring the main thrust of the post for a moment, I wonder why Imperial Knights were top of the tree when Chaos Knights were at the bottom - assuming they're referring to "pure" armies there, anyway.


ranged knights work OK on tournament terrain boards, melee knights are useless.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
Dudeface wrote:
Slipspace wrote:
There's a problem if the game is only "balanced" if you set up terrain in a very specific way. A good ruleset would require a minimal amount of terrain but function just fine with varying degrees of different types of terrain, ranging from lightly forested all the way up to city fight. At the moment the GW GT terrain "balances" the game by making it nigh-on impossible to shoot anything round 1. That's fine, I guess, but it's missing the real problem, which is the absurd level of lethality that makes this necessary in the first place.

I also find it pretty comical that GW have all these different types of terrain and terrain traits in the rulebook and their own tournament tables boil down to masses of Ruins and a few token Dense pieces.


You mean the rulebook with rules for open and narrative play offer more options than a tightly controlled tournament table? Hardly surprising.


Yeah, except...have you ever tried to actually PLAY a narrative or open play game with a less than super duper dense table?

It's just kind of a miserable 2-turn experience that feels more like a game of Magic the Gathering than a wargame.


Terrain, the 3rd opponent @ 2021/10/18 12:18:41


Post by: Strg Alt


 the_scotsman wrote:
 Dysartes wrote:
Ignoring the main thrust of the post for a moment, I wonder why Imperial Knights were top of the tree when Chaos Knights were at the bottom - assuming they're referring to "pure" armies there, anyway.


ranged knights work OK on tournament terrain boards, melee knights are useless.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
Dudeface wrote:
Slipspace wrote:
There's a problem if the game is only "balanced" if you set up terrain in a very specific way. A good ruleset would require a minimal amount of terrain but function just fine with varying degrees of different types of terrain, ranging from lightly forested all the way up to city fight. At the moment the GW GT terrain "balances" the game by making it nigh-on impossible to shoot anything round 1. That's fine, I guess, but it's missing the real problem, which is the absurd level of lethality that makes this necessary in the first place.

I also find it pretty comical that GW have all these different types of terrain and terrain traits in the rulebook and their own tournament tables boil down to masses of Ruins and a few token Dense pieces.


You mean the rulebook with rules for open and narrative play offer more options than a tightly controlled tournament table? Hardly surprising.


Yeah, except...have you ever tried to actually PLAY a narrative or open play game with a less than super duper dense table?

It's just kind of a miserable 2-turn experience that feels more like a game of Magic the Gathering than a wargame.






Terrain, the 3rd opponent @ 2021/10/18 12:39:52


Post by: Aziras


It is partly due to the reduction of the table size. Combined with GW's crazy obsession about close combat in a futuristic setting with bigger guns than you can ever imagine.

I played 40k in 2nd and 3rd. You still needed some terrain or the shooty armies won by default, but movement was way more restricted so you could actually outmaneuver opponent's guns. Same with WFB, archers had range that mattered. You could often just march your guys across the table and only worry about some artillery here and there. In both games, but most certainly in WFB distance was a "piece of terrain".

Now... most armies have several units that can cross the board in a single turn. Or shoot indirect anywhere they want. Back in the days a Basilisk could hide in a corner and you had to make a dedicated effort to reach it.

It is also worth noting that in the current meta the dominant armies are not limited by terrain. Flying transports, flyers, indirect spammable artillery, high mobility heavy guns and strong melee. You need to take exceptionally good advantage of terrain to have a chance against those due to to the terrain. Too many guns that get range almost across the board. When melee has threat ranges of 18"+ guns don't feel like guns if they are the same, yet the real problem is the combat threat ranges. Lots of terrain just makes this worse. By offering ways to progress across the board in cover and then unleash the carnage in melee.

What the lack of terrain does though is to make people think there is something wrong with the boards, that 1st turn skews the game, and that certain units are unplayable.

To be honest, there are so many other things wrong with competitive 40k that terrain is the least of the problems.

What I do agree with is how uninspiring most of the terrain is. I strongly prefer to play on decorative boards and would for a competitive game happily accept "bases" and pseudo-terrain rules in order to get some pretty and asymmetric terrain on the table. That dense forest in one side of the board? it just happens to be same rule-based terrain type as the ruins on the other side. Except when you play you can choose to attack through the forest or the ruins, not "left side" or "right side" and none of that "your left or my left?" mess.


Terrain, the 3rd opponent @ 2021/10/18 12:50:21


Post by: PenitentJake


 Sim-Life wrote:
Another "the game is balanced if you try this ONE WEIRD TRICK" post from Daed.


Since I played my first table-top game in '89, adjusting the amount of terrain used in any game from battle to battle until you find the sweet spot for the game feel your group wants has been a thing.

To describe this as a weird trick seems odd to me. Everyone who I personally have played with regularly for the past 32 years would call it either business as usual or common sense.


Terrain, the 3rd opponent @ 2021/10/18 12:57:02


Post by: Daedalus81


Slipspace wrote:
There's a problem if the game is only "balanced" if you set up terrain in a very specific way. A good ruleset would require a minimal amount of terrain but function just fine with varying degrees of different types of terrain, ranging from lightly forested all the way up to city fight. At the moment the GW GT terrain "balances" the game by making it nigh-on impossible to shoot anything round 1. That's fine, I guess, but it's missing the real problem, which is the absurd level of lethality that makes this necessary in the first place.

I also find it pretty comical that GW have all these different types of terrain and terrain traits in the rulebook and their own tournament tables boil down to masses of Ruins and a few token Dense pieces.


That's a fair statement, but I think it is difficult to make a system the uses the quantity of models we have now and get it to play fast without having some measure of lethality. That and I really enjoy the dynamic the terrain allows as far as movement goes.

Visually? It isn't fantastic, but more creative minds can fix that. The system is general enough that you just need to attach keywords to whatever terrain.


Terrain, the 3rd opponent @ 2021/10/18 13:16:52


Post by: Unit1126PLL


 Daedalus81 wrote:
Slipspace wrote:
There's a problem if the game is only "balanced" if you set up terrain in a very specific way. A good ruleset would require a minimal amount of terrain but function just fine with varying degrees of different types of terrain, ranging from lightly forested all the way up to city fight. At the moment the GW GT terrain "balances" the game by making it nigh-on impossible to shoot anything round 1. That's fine, I guess, but it's missing the real problem, which is the absurd level of lethality that makes this necessary in the first place.

I also find it pretty comical that GW have all these different types of terrain and terrain traits in the rulebook and their own tournament tables boil down to masses of Ruins and a few token Dense pieces.


That's a fair statement, but I think it is difficult to make a system the uses the quantity of models we have now and get it to play fast without having some measure of lethality. That and I really enjoy the dynamic the terrain allows as far as movement goes.

Visually? It isn't fantastic, but more creative minds can fix that. The system is general enough that you just need to attach keywords to whatever terrain.


I mean, 4th edition had almost as many models as now and played relatively quickly. My IG army I am building right now I am explicitly building to be playable in both 4th and 9th edition games. My total army list is within appx. 150 points (which is like 1 chimera and a couple HWS more in 9th than in 4th).

The differences are:
1) Reduced lethality. Moving a unit generally reduces its firepower and maximum range (exceptions are certain vehicles and Assault weapons, which are usually short ranged anyways). This reduces the number of units that can fire whilst maneuvering - and therefore the number of dice needed to roll.
2) Reduced lethality. There are very few (no, in my case) rerolls outside of twin-linked weapons. This saves time (and reduces lethality since twin weapons can't do any more damage than their singular counterpart). I disagree with that abstraction and prefer 9th's iteration of twin weapons, but it does reduce lethality and the absence of rerolls saves time.
3) Reduced lethality. No stratagems/auras/orders means units just do what they do - typically between 14 and 20 lasgun shots and/or a heavy weapon and/or special weapon in my case. It takes about 0.02 seconds to resolve a Guard Infantry Squad's shooting in 4th. I suspect that is the same as many factions; differentiation in capability is reflected in statline changes.
4) Reduced lethality. Lack of ability to splitfire means one doesn't get to maximize one's firepower against whatever targets. Want the missile launcher to shoot a tank? Well, you don't need to worry about the lasguns or flamer. Saves time.
5) Lack of a damage stat (Random or otherwise). Units are either Instant Death'd or they take 1 wound (which usually kills a model). Resolving the damage of an attack in 9th is actually sometimes quite a long step, especially random damage and multiwound models.
6) Reduced lethality. Effects that cause "pinning" (for example) rather than outright casualties are a thing. When my Chimeras get asploded, my unit becomes Entangled, which means they can't move or shoot the next turn (are pinned). One entire fewer unit's worth of dice to roll!
7) Reduced lethality. Given that tanks are immune to small arms, there's a reduction in the "roll to see if you roll to see if your opponent gets to roll to see if you get to damage" thing that 40k has going in every edition. In 9th, there is a lot of "tons of dice, small effect" where you're throwing something like 40 attacks to see if you can get a single wound on a target. By making that target immune, it saves tons of times. If this happens lots in every game (e.g. mobs of 30 shoota boys vs Chimeras) the time difference is notable. Resolving a gazillion small arms against a tank so that you can put 2 wounds on it, and then doing so again, and again, and again, takes HUGE amounts of time.

The things that increase time (just for fairness):
1) If you have an opponent who quibbles over template placement in the shooting phase, this can take an age. Fair enough; quibblers gonna quibble.
2) Vehicle damage chart can take a long time if you don't have it memorized.


Terrain, the 3rd opponent @ 2021/10/18 14:35:25


Post by: Sgt. Cortez


 H.B.M.C. wrote:
*looks at the tournament tables*

Disgusting...


It might sound a bit snobbish but as a narrative player I'll have to say, a tournament usually doesn't follow a story, it might feature Custodes fighting Guilliman, it has the most boring kind of repetitive missions... I expect it to have an ugly, economic table because it's about crunching numbers and not really about the hobby.
That being said I've seen beautiful tables in lotr tournaments but these were also sparse while the majority were some grass mats and who can blame the hobby Clubs, as anything else is a logistic nightmare.


Terrain, the 3rd opponent @ 2021/10/18 15:33:15


Post by: the_scotsman


 Daedalus81 wrote:
Slipspace wrote:
There's a problem if the game is only "balanced" if you set up terrain in a very specific way. A good ruleset would require a minimal amount of terrain but function just fine with varying degrees of different types of terrain, ranging from lightly forested all the way up to city fight. At the moment the GW GT terrain "balances" the game by making it nigh-on impossible to shoot anything round 1. That's fine, I guess, but it's missing the real problem, which is the absurd level of lethality that makes this necessary in the first place.

I also find it pretty comical that GW have all these different types of terrain and terrain traits in the rulebook and their own tournament tables boil down to masses of Ruins and a few token Dense pieces.


Visually? It isn't fantastic, but more creative minds can fix that. The system is general enough that you just need to attach keywords to whatever terrain.


Boy, I really really wish this were the case, since I am the guy in charge of tryign to make functional tables out of a whole host of different terrain pieces mostly home-made, but honestly, it's just not.

Mostly due to the height restriction on the two actually impactful terrain traits, dense and obscuring. If those didnt exist I'd slap those traits on almost everything to try and make boards that function.

I'd really, REALLY love to be able to use my new homemade drukhari arena board to have a good game of 40k. but as it stands...man, I've got just zero ideas of how to make it work.


Terrain, the 3rd opponent @ 2021/10/18 15:34:58


Post by: Unit1126PLL


 the_scotsman wrote:
 Daedalus81 wrote:
Slipspace wrote:
There's a problem if the game is only "balanced" if you set up terrain in a very specific way. A good ruleset would require a minimal amount of terrain but function just fine with varying degrees of different types of terrain, ranging from lightly forested all the way up to city fight. At the moment the GW GT terrain "balances" the game by making it nigh-on impossible to shoot anything round 1. That's fine, I guess, but it's missing the real problem, which is the absurd level of lethality that makes this necessary in the first place.

I also find it pretty comical that GW have all these different types of terrain and terrain traits in the rulebook and their own tournament tables boil down to masses of Ruins and a few token Dense pieces.


Visually? It isn't fantastic, but more creative minds can fix that. The system is general enough that you just need to attach keywords to whatever terrain.


Boy, I really really wish this were the case, since I am the guy in charge of tryign to make functional tables out of a whole host of different terrain pieces mostly home-made, but honestly, it's just not.

Mostly due to the height restriction on the two actually impactful terrain traits, dense and obscuring. If those didnt exist I'd slap those traits on almost everything to try and make boards that function.

I'd really, REALLY love to be able to use my new homemade drukhari arena board to have a good game of 40k. but as it stands...man, I've got just zero ideas of how to make it work.


Just make your arena a Ruined City instead, duh (/s)


Terrain, the 3rd opponent @ 2021/10/18 15:44:54


Post by: VladimirHerzog


 the_scotsman wrote:
 Daedalus81 wrote:
Slipspace wrote:
There's a problem if the game is only "balanced" if you set up terrain in a very specific way. A good ruleset would require a minimal amount of terrain but function just fine with varying degrees of different types of terrain, ranging from lightly forested all the way up to city fight. At the moment the GW GT terrain "balances" the game by making it nigh-on impossible to shoot anything round 1. That's fine, I guess, but it's missing the real problem, which is the absurd level of lethality that makes this necessary in the first place.

I also find it pretty comical that GW have all these different types of terrain and terrain traits in the rulebook and their own tournament tables boil down to masses of Ruins and a few token Dense pieces.


Visually? It isn't fantastic, but more creative minds can fix that. The system is general enough that you just need to attach keywords to whatever terrain.


Boy, I really really wish this were the case, since I am the guy in charge of tryign to make functional tables out of a whole host of different terrain pieces mostly home-made, but honestly, it's just not.

Mostly due to the height restriction on the two actually impactful terrain traits, dense and obscuring. If those didnt exist I'd slap those traits on almost everything to try and make boards that function.

I'd really, REALLY love to be able to use my new homemade drukhari arena board to have a good game of 40k. but as it stands...man, I've got just zero ideas of how to make it work.


Just say that your terrain pieces that are "too short" still obscure stuff. Thats how we play it at my store.


Terrain, the 3rd opponent @ 2021/10/18 15:55:33


Post by: Dudeface


 VladimirHerzog wrote:
 the_scotsman wrote:
 Daedalus81 wrote:
Slipspace wrote:
There's a problem if the game is only "balanced" if you set up terrain in a very specific way. A good ruleset would require a minimal amount of terrain but function just fine with varying degrees of different types of terrain, ranging from lightly forested all the way up to city fight. At the moment the GW GT terrain "balances" the game by making it nigh-on impossible to shoot anything round 1. That's fine, I guess, but it's missing the real problem, which is the absurd level of lethality that makes this necessary in the first place.

I also find it pretty comical that GW have all these different types of terrain and terrain traits in the rulebook and their own tournament tables boil down to masses of Ruins and a few token Dense pieces.


Visually? It isn't fantastic, but more creative minds can fix that. The system is general enough that you just need to attach keywords to whatever terrain.


Boy, I really really wish this were the case, since I am the guy in charge of tryign to make functional tables out of a whole host of different terrain pieces mostly home-made, but honestly, it's just not.

Mostly due to the height restriction on the two actually impactful terrain traits, dense and obscuring. If those didnt exist I'd slap those traits on almost everything to try and make boards that function.

I'd really, REALLY love to be able to use my new homemade drukhari arena board to have a good game of 40k. but as it stands...man, I've got just zero ideas of how to make it work.


Just say that your terrain pieces that are "too short" still obscure stuff. Thats how we play it at my store.


Or add a tall lamp post/rebar/tree/stick/statue of Matt Ward/whatever to make the height up on a technicality if people are hard-core RAW.


Terrain, the 3rd opponent @ 2021/10/18 16:54:42


Post by: Daedalus81


 the_scotsman wrote:

Boy, I really really wish this were the case, since I am the guy in charge of tryign to make functional tables out of a whole host of different terrain pieces mostly home-made, but honestly, it's just not.

Mostly due to the height restriction on the two actually impactful terrain traits, dense and obscuring. If those didnt exist I'd slap those traits on almost everything to try and make boards that function.

I'd really, REALLY love to be able to use my new homemade drukhari arena board to have a good game of 40k. but as it stands...man, I've got just zero ideas of how to make it work.


In these situations I think it's fine for you to declare things as obscuring even if they're below 5". But not having seen your terrain I imagine the rules could create a big mismatch to the visuals which could be jarring.


Terrain, the 3rd opponent @ 2021/10/18 17:01:59


Post by: the_scotsman


 Daedalus81 wrote:
 the_scotsman wrote:

Boy, I really really wish this were the case, since I am the guy in charge of tryign to make functional tables out of a whole host of different terrain pieces mostly home-made, but honestly, it's just not.

Mostly due to the height restriction on the two actually impactful terrain traits, dense and obscuring. If those didnt exist I'd slap those traits on almost everything to try and make boards that function.

I'd really, REALLY love to be able to use my new homemade drukhari arena board to have a good game of 40k. but as it stands...man, I've got just zero ideas of how to make it work.


In these situations I think it's fine for you to declare things as obscuring even if they're below 5". But not having seen your terrain I imagine the rules could create a big mismatch to the visuals which could be jarring.


I do that with a couple of the pieces, the main issue is just that in order to create a board that feels like 'this is an arena that I am looking at' you typically would expect a large, mostly open area in the center, with structures more around the outside than the inside. The best I can do is I have a large central 'tent' piece that has a big platform that you can imagine sort of a master of ceremonies standing at and announcing, and then several area terrain pieces representing arena hazards that I declare as generous amounts of Dense Cover, such that basically every sight line across the arena that isnt blocked by the central tent crosses Dense cover.

But unless you move up the stands and have the battle such that the armies can be set up cowering behind the grandstands of the arena, you can't have anything approaching a satisfying game of 9th edition in such a board. Even with practically army-wide -1 to hit, getting the first turn is such a massive hilarious advantage that there's no good game to be had. And the problem with the way Obscuring works is that unless the terrain piece is either in or near my deployment zone, it's ridiculously easy to just ignore it by moving your unit laterally and sighting around the piece. Because it's all or nothing with both Dense and Obscuring - you're either 100% hidden, or you're 100% not hidden if I can sight even the tiniest bit of one model in the unit behind the piece.





Terrain, the 3rd opponent @ 2021/10/18 17:20:08


Post by: ccs


 the_scotsman wrote:
 Daedalus81 wrote:
 the_scotsman wrote:

Boy, I really really wish this were the case, since I am the guy in charge of tryign to make functional tables out of a whole host of different terrain pieces mostly home-made, but honestly, it's just not.

Mostly due to the height restriction on the two actually impactful terrain traits, dense and obscuring. If those didnt exist I'd slap those traits on almost everything to try and make boards that function.

I'd really, REALLY love to be able to use my new homemade drukhari arena board to have a good game of 40k. but as it stands...man, I've got just zero ideas of how to make it work.


In these situations I think it's fine for you to declare things as obscuring even if they're below 5". But not having seen your terrain I imagine the rules could create a big mismatch to the visuals which could be jarring.


I do that with a couple of the pieces, the main issue is just that in order to create a board that feels like 'this is an arena that I am looking at' you typically would expect a large, mostly open area in the center, with structures more around the outside than the inside. The best I can do is I have a large central 'tent' piece that has a big platform that you can imagine sort of a master of ceremonies standing at and announcing, and then several area terrain pieces representing arena hazards that I declare as generous amounts of Dense Cover, such that basically every sight line across the arena that isnt blocked by the central tent crosses Dense cover.

But unless you move up the stands and have the battle such that the armies can be set up cowering behind the grandstands of the arena, you can't have anything approaching a satisfying game of 9th edition in such a board. Even with practically army-wide -1 to hit, getting the first turn is such a massive hilarious advantage that there's no good game to be had. And the problem with the way Obscuring works is that unless the terrain piece is either in or near my deployment zone, it's ridiculously easy to just ignore it by moving your unit laterally and sighting around the piece. Because it's all or nothing with both Dense and Obscuring - you're either 100% hidden, or you're 100% not hidden if I can sight even the tiniest bit of one model in the unit behind the piece.


So what possessed you to make a whole board that's practically useless?


Terrain, the 3rd opponent @ 2021/10/18 17:22:48


Post by: Eldarain


Gladiatorial arena being an iconic Dark Eldar element? Not their fault the terrain rules/ core mechanics limit what's "functional"


Terrain, the 3rd opponent @ 2021/10/18 17:25:20


Post by: the_scotsman


ccs wrote:
 the_scotsman wrote:
 Daedalus81 wrote:
 the_scotsman wrote:

Boy, I really really wish this were the case, since I am the guy in charge of tryign to make functional tables out of a whole host of different terrain pieces mostly home-made, but honestly, it's just not.

Mostly due to the height restriction on the two actually impactful terrain traits, dense and obscuring. If those didnt exist I'd slap those traits on almost everything to try and make boards that function.

I'd really, REALLY love to be able to use my new homemade drukhari arena board to have a good game of 40k. but as it stands...man, I've got just zero ideas of how to make it work.


In these situations I think it's fine for you to declare things as obscuring even if they're below 5". But not having seen your terrain I imagine the rules could create a big mismatch to the visuals which could be jarring.


I do that with a couple of the pieces, the main issue is just that in order to create a board that feels like 'this is an arena that I am looking at' you typically would expect a large, mostly open area in the center, with structures more around the outside than the inside. The best I can do is I have a large central 'tent' piece that has a big platform that you can imagine sort of a master of ceremonies standing at and announcing, and then several area terrain pieces representing arena hazards that I declare as generous amounts of Dense Cover, such that basically every sight line across the arena that isnt blocked by the central tent crosses Dense cover.

But unless you move up the stands and have the battle such that the armies can be set up cowering behind the grandstands of the arena, you can't have anything approaching a satisfying game of 9th edition in such a board. Even with practically army-wide -1 to hit, getting the first turn is such a massive hilarious advantage that there's no good game to be had. And the problem with the way Obscuring works is that unless the terrain piece is either in or near my deployment zone, it's ridiculously easy to just ignore it by moving your unit laterally and sighting around the piece. Because it's all or nothing with both Dense and Obscuring - you're either 100% hidden, or you're 100% not hidden if I can sight even the tiniest bit of one model in the unit behind the piece.


So what possessed you to make a whole board that's practically useless?


Basically, I got a ton of 3d print files for drukhari terrain for free from a patreon, I knew nobody else had a drukhari board and I like making boards that aren't the standard ruined imperial city, and it was early in the edition and I thought large amounts of dense cover could make up for there being a smaller amount of Obscuring on demand.

But apparently its all fine and perfectly balanced, because if you make sure the board is chockablock full of just the one functional terrain keyword out of the dozen or so that exist, then the game isnt decided by the 'who goes first' roll-off! Dang, everything must be really great!

Also, sarcasm aside, come on, editions change. A huge amount of the terrain I built for 7th ed was practically unusable for 8th, and a whole bunch of the sector mech terrain I tried to build with 8th in mind (huge superstructures designed to as close as possible entirely block LOS) are basically unusable in 9th because now theyre just huge areas of the board with the Dense keyword that lacks the all-important Obscuring keyword that makes terrain do anything.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
 Eldarain wrote:
Gladiatorial arena being an iconic Dark Eldar element? Not their fault the terrain rules/ core mechanics limit what's "functional"


yeah, you know what also doesn't work at all?

-A big tunnel complex built from GW's own Zone Mortalis terrain sets. What, is it all one single piece of Obscuring cover? Is it 300 individual pieces, each one being a wall segment?

-a big sprawling Sector Mechanicus setup from GW's own Sector Mechanicus sets. Hope you like completely unbroken sight-lines because its ALLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLL dense baby!

-An ork junkyard board with the terrain GW's released for orks - hopefully this one will be useful again soon after i manage to paint up the kill team terrain, but I suspect only 8 big random walls tossed around the board for no reason will only slightly improve the experience. Silly terrain builder, you didnt think the ork junk piles we sold you would DO anything in-game, did you?

-An eldar forest glade with 4 big eldar terrain pieces whoops I mean only 4 functional terrain pieces on the whole board all those trees do practically nothing unless you houserule them to be not forests

I think it should be a sign that an edition of 40k's terrain system has failed, yet again, 9 editions in a row, when it reaches the point of "Everything Is A Ruin".


Terrain, the 3rd opponent @ 2021/10/18 20:23:23


Post by: Unit1126PLL


I am a bit frustrated that the old awesome variety of potential tables have been reduced essentially to ruins.


Terrain, the 3rd opponent @ 2021/10/18 21:26:33


Post by: jeff white


Daed, I so respect your intentions here, love the thread, but do not envy your position. Scotsman is on fire… and there is no way that current terrain rules and table sizes and move stats and damage output and … Unit laid it out… are optimal. Hence, you are in a “make the best of it situation” and that is really a tough place to be, but you do it well and in good humour. Bravo.


Terrain, the 3rd opponent @ 2021/10/18 22:16:47


Post by: Gadzilla666


 Daedalus81 wrote:
In all of the games I've played with sufficient terrain movement mattered and casualties were pretty low on turn one. I know many people are frustrated with the urban, symmetrical terrain and I get it, and giant Ls. What if those Ls were dense jungle that infantry could conceivably cross ( breachable ) and blocks LOS until you touch it ( obscuring )? It has the same net effect. Similar to this:

Spoiler:


I get what you're trying to do here, increasing the variety of terrain visually, but why does it have to be BREACHABLE? Look at the example terrain from NOLA: everything is BREACHABLE. That's all upside for infantry and vehicles with FLY, and downside for vehicles without FLY. There needs to be more terrain that isn't BREACHABLE, to slow down infantry and allow vehicles and bikes/cavalry to benifit from their higher movement, and vehicles with FLY need to pay more for that advantage. Some actual barricades/obstacles with DIFFICULT GROUND would be good as well. The current gw boards are too heavily skewed towards infantry and anything with the FLY keyword.


Terrain, the 3rd opponent @ 2021/10/18 22:19:08


Post by: H.B.M.C.


GW's terrain rules are really just one big L.

Or rather multiple L's, spread around in a symmetrical fashion.


Terrain, the 3rd opponent @ 2021/10/18 23:10:34


Post by: Daedalus81


 Gadzilla666 wrote:
 Daedalus81 wrote:
In all of the games I've played with sufficient terrain movement mattered and casualties were pretty low on turn one. I know many people are frustrated with the urban, symmetrical terrain and I get it, and giant Ls. What if those Ls were dense jungle that infantry could conceivably cross ( breachable ) and blocks LOS until you touch it ( obscuring )? It has the same net effect. Similar to this:

Spoiler:


I get what you're trying to do here, increasing the variety of terrain visually, but why does it have to be BREACHABLE? Look at the example terrain from NOLA: everything is BREACHABLE. That's all upside for infantry and vehicles with FLY, and downside for vehicles without FLY. There needs to be more terrain that isn't BREACHABLE, to slow down infantry and allow vehicles and bikes/cavalry to benifit from their higher movement, and vehicles with FLY need to pay more for that advantage. Some actual barricades/obstacles with DIFFICULT GROUND would be good as well. The current gw boards are too heavily skewed towards infantry and anything with the FLY keyword.


You could, but I think you'd just make FLY more valuable over all - there's only so much of a cost increase than you can do. Bikes can do really well, but too many people treat them like a disposable unit that needs to get into melee asap rather than being a little more ponderous.


Terrain, the 3rd opponent @ 2021/10/18 23:51:35


Post by: Gadzilla666


 Daedalus81 wrote:
You could, but I think you'd just make FLY more valuable over all - there's only so much of a cost increase than you can do. Bikes can do really well, but too many people treat them like a disposable unit that needs to get into melee asap rather than being a little more ponderous.

Yes, but FLY is currently underpriced in most instances. And the overuse of OBSCURING + BREACHABLE terrain in gw's own tournament boards shows that the other terrain traits aren't impactful enough. DENSE + DIFFICULT GROUND, for instance, could be made more impactful by uncoupling "modifiers/conditions" to hit as described by The_Scotsman in the other thread. If we want greater terrain, and unit, variety, then gw needs to look at why certain types are underutilized, including in their own tournaments.


Terrain, the 3rd opponent @ 2021/10/19 00:58:01


Post by: Daedalus81


 Gadzilla666 wrote:
 Daedalus81 wrote:
You could, but I think you'd just make FLY more valuable over all - there's only so much of a cost increase than you can do. Bikes can do really well, but too many people treat them like a disposable unit that needs to get into melee asap rather than being a little more ponderous.

Yes, but FLY is currently underpriced in most instances. And the overuse of OBSCURING + BREACHABLE terrain in gw's own tournament boards shows that the other terrain traits aren't impactful enough. DENSE + DIFFICULT GROUND, for instance, could be made more impactful by uncoupling "modifiers/conditions" to hit as described by The_Scotsman in the other thread. If we want greater terrain, and unit, variety, then gw needs to look at why certain types are underutilized, including in their own tournaments.


Yea, totally agree. Self inflicted penalties should not be limited.


Terrain, the 3rd opponent @ 2021/10/19 08:01:39


Post by: Da Boss


Seems like a simple fix would be to make dense areas obscuring if you're completely on the other side of them, like it used to be in 4e?

It wouldn't get rid of the problem of units evaporating whenever they are in the open, but it would increase the diversity of terrain types with a function.


Terrain, the 3rd opponent @ 2021/10/19 11:59:13


Post by: the_scotsman


 Da Boss wrote:
Seems like a simple fix would be to make dense areas obscuring if you're completely on the other side of them, like it used to be in 4e?

It wouldn't get rid of the problem of units evaporating whenever they are in the open, but it would increase the diversity of terrain types with a function.


As a 'quick fix' it's not too bad, personally I think the keyword system could be greatly greatly reduced and just apply the system of 'do not limit self-imposed penalties (ala advancing and firing assault, firing thru cover, firing at long range)' while keeping the '6s always hit' rule to avoid screwing over low-bs armies too hard.

Imagine a terrain system like this:

ALL TERRAIN:

-can be moved over by any model, paying movement for going up, over, and across the terrain piece
-can be moved thru by infantry, swarms and beasts, paying a flat 2" penalty for each piece they move through
-if a model cannot be placed such that the entire base or hull is not hanging over the edge of a terrain piece, then it cannot end its move on that terrain piece
-Any model within 2" of a terrain piece and that terrain piece is closer to the attacking model than the target model, it adds +1 to save rolls
-Any model more than 50% obscured by terrain or other models not in the attacking or target unit, subtract 1 from hit rolls for that attack
-Any model at the end of the movement phase can be given a 'hiding' chit, hidden units cannot declare shooting attacks or charges, hidden units also cannot be targeted if they are over 50% obscured by terrain or other models and subtract 1 from hit rolls that target hiding units if they are less than 50% obscured.


Terrain, the 3rd opponent @ 2021/10/19 12:25:47


Post by: Stevefamine


Apple fox wrote:
40k tournament tables are the worst most depressing things in the hobby.

I think most 40k tables are really bad an uninteresting, which I don’t think the rules really help with.


You're right on.

Its just that the time, storage space, and money is spent on minis and not on terrain.


Terrain, the 3rd opponent @ 2021/10/19 16:10:42


Post by: catbarf


Dudeface wrote:
Slipspace wrote:
There's a problem if the game is only "balanced" if you set up terrain in a very specific way. A good ruleset would require a minimal amount of terrain but function just fine with varying degrees of different types of terrain, ranging from lightly forested all the way up to city fight. At the moment the GW GT terrain "balances" the game by making it nigh-on impossible to shoot anything round 1. That's fine, I guess, but it's missing the real problem, which is the absurd level of lethality that makes this necessary in the first place.

I also find it pretty comical that GW have all these different types of terrain and terrain traits in the rulebook and their own tournament tables boil down to masses of Ruins and a few token Dense pieces.


You mean the rulebook with rules for open and narrative play offer more options than a tightly controlled tournament table? Hardly surprising.


The problem is when you're trying to set up terrain for an open/narrative game but have to treat it like designing a tournament table, because there's a very specific balance to strike between having wide enough lanes that vehicles can traverse them and having them be too wide and not allow units to stay hidden long enough. Those tournament tables end up being ruins and dense terrain because those are the terrain types that really matter, without occupying so much space that they block movement.

It's easy to build a table that either functionally provides no defense and leads to a quick and lethal game, or one where vehicles and monsters are just useless because they can't participate. It actually takes a lot of effort to put together a good terrain setup.


Terrain, the 3rd opponent @ 2021/10/19 16:34:40


Post by: Unit1126PLL


Plus, and I know I'll probably get attacked for saying this, but armies need to operate in all kinds of terrain.

Having a strict way terrain MUST be to have the battle make any sense at all is a game design failure.

Can you imagine a World War II miniatures game where, if you weren't playing in Stalingrad, you just had absolutely skewed results? Like there was never any combat over open fields (or in the woods, or around a bridge/river, or in a flooded or swampy area, or across hedges/hedgerows, or in small villages with little buildings...)

That game would be laughed out of the room for being unrealistic.

Similarly, in 40k, we're not trying to be realistic (before anyone says so) but there's still a universe to adhere to - a universe in which tanks and infantry still have a place on the battlefield. Any battlefield, not just a ruined city.


Terrain, the 3rd opponent @ 2021/10/19 16:38:17


Post by: Some_Call_Me_Tim


I think that there should be like, a pretty sizable list of different matched play missions that are all based around being a little asymmetrical in layout, like make ‘‘em balanced and have some sample terrain layout for em. I’d love to see how quickly some armies would crumble in an assault on a defensive line type mission.


Terrain, the 3rd opponent @ 2021/10/19 16:48:11


Post by: Daedalus81


 Unit1126PLL wrote:
Plus, and I know I'll probably get attacked for saying this, but armies need to operate in all kinds of terrain.

Having a strict way terrain MUST be to have the battle make any sense at all is a game design failure.

Can you imagine a World War II miniatures game where, if you weren't playing in Stalingrad, you just had absolutely skewed results? Like there was never any combat over open fields (or in the woods, or around a bridge/river, or in a flooded or swampy area, or across hedges/hedgerows, or in small villages with little buildings...)

That game would be laughed out of the room for being unrealistic.

Similarly, in 40k, we're not trying to be realistic (before anyone says so) but there's still a universe to adhere to - a universe in which tanks and infantry still have a place on the battlefield. Any battlefield, not just a ruined city.


You shouldn't get attacked for that. I think those types of terrain and generally viable if you follow the basic guidelines. Like there are hedgerows big enough to hide tanks, so, similarly sized features could work. It's just very expensive to do it well.

Similarly changes in elevation block line of sight really well, but that's no easy accomplishment other than the big hills of yore. A big hill you climb is not much different from a windowed ruins you go into. Just put rubble and such on top so it's clear you still get cover like you were in a ruins.



Terrain, the 3rd opponent @ 2021/10/19 16:51:34


Post by: Nurglitch


Going back to the notion of the terrain as the third players, back in the 5th edition I strongly expected GW to add terrain to people's armies so that it didn't need to be supplied by a third party; if you're taking a defensive army it would be smaller by the terrain and fortifications you'd want, and jungle fighters like the Catachan could be assured of having some jungle to fight in.

I believe they added some fortifications, but the notion didn't really jive with the plastic tables/boards they produced, and so on. It's cool to see Necromunda reproduce the old Zone Mortalis in plastic for us mortals.


Terrain, the 3rd opponent @ 2021/10/19 17:02:19


Post by: Unit1126PLL


 Daedalus81 wrote:
 Unit1126PLL wrote:
Plus, and I know I'll probably get attacked for saying this, but armies need to operate in all kinds of terrain.

Having a strict way terrain MUST be to have the battle make any sense at all is a game design failure.

Can you imagine a World War II miniatures game where, if you weren't playing in Stalingrad, you just had absolutely skewed results? Like there was never any combat over open fields (or in the woods, or around a bridge/river, or in a flooded or swampy area, or across hedges/hedgerows, or in small villages with little buildings...)

That game would be laughed out of the room for being unrealistic.

Similarly, in 40k, we're not trying to be realistic (before anyone says so) but there's still a universe to adhere to - a universe in which tanks and infantry still have a place on the battlefield. Any battlefield, not just a ruined city.


You shouldn't get attacked for that. I think those types of terrain and generally viable if you follow the basic guidelines. Like there are hedgerows big enough to hide tanks, so, similarly sized features could work. It's just very expensive to do it well.

Similarly changes in elevation block line of sight really well, but that's no easy accomplishment other than the big hills of yore. A big hill you climb is not much different from a windowed ruins you go into. Just put rubble and such on top so it's clear you still get cover like you were in a ruins.



yes, but it also looks silly. A hedgerow high enough to hide a tank isn't entirely what I'm talking about, really - not entirely. "Similarly Sized" to 5" tall is like, five times the height of a man in 40k. Those are HUGE, whatever pieces you've built.

And a big hill you climb is absolutely different. Hills would have to be measured to go over (e.g. you measure diagonal/vertical movement) which is considerable when they're 5" tall. Ruins, meanwhile, are breachable, and therefore you can walk right through them (if you're infantry; for some reason, vehicles can't go through them despite being WAY better at actually breaching things than men).


Terrain, the 3rd opponent @ 2021/10/19 17:06:25


Post by: Daedalus81


I think a table with some hills slowing units down doesn't sound too bad.

Hedgerows would indeed need to be smaller, but you could either just give them the keyword or abstract it.


Terrain, the 3rd opponent @ 2021/10/19 17:10:52


Post by: Unit1126PLL


 Daedalus81 wrote:
I think a table with some hills slowing units down doesn't sound too bad.

Hedgerows would indeed need to be smaller, but you could either just give them the keyword or abstract it.


A tank could cross a hill, but cannot cross a ruin. Hills cannot be ruins. What keywords would you give a hill?

Giving them the keyword doesn't do anything if theyre short, because the Keyword references the Rule, and the Rule says "If the terrain piece is 5" high etc etc".

But yes, I could write my own terrain rules to compensate for GW's inability to do so, thank you.


Terrain, the 3rd opponent @ 2021/10/19 17:22:07


Post by: Daedalus81


I'd give it ruins and breachable. Tanks need not apply. Just add tank traps or w/e. You could have normal traversable hills that tanks can go on that are just obscurable and exposed.


Terrain, the 3rd opponent @ 2021/10/19 17:29:12


Post by: Unit1126PLL


 Daedalus81 wrote:
I'd give it ruins and breachable. Tanks need not apply. Just add tank traps or w/e. You could have normal traversable hills that tanks can go on that are just obscurable and exposed.


So you're saying it's just a ruin that behaves like a ruin and looks different. That's not exactly what people mean when they say "the terrain rules are broken."

Again, to go back to the World War 2 game: "Nah, you can play outside Stalingrad, just count the flooded swampland as rubble and the haybales as buildings." ... that's just going to provoke eyerolls.

9th's terrain is better than 8th's but could still be improved. And hills are already in the core rules, and don't do anything.


EDIT:
In fact, the terrain rules have this gem (now that I've checked on hills):
"Hills are considered part of the battlefield rather than a terrain feature."
WHAT? As far as abstractions go, that's the worst yet. Terrain features are the battlefield.


Terrain, the 3rd opponent @ 2021/10/19 17:31:10


Post by: the_scotsman


 Nurglitch wrote:
Going back to the notion of the terrain as the third players, back in the 5th edition I strongly expected GW to add terrain to people's armies so that it didn't need to be supplied by a third party; if you're taking a defensive army it would be smaller by the terrain and fortifications you'd want, and jungle fighters like the Catachan could be assured of having some jungle to fight in.

I believe they added some fortifications, but the notion didn't really jive with the plastic tables/boards they produced, and so on. It's cool to see Necromunda reproduce the old Zone Mortalis in plastic for us mortals.


yeah its too bad GW produces so much 40k terrain that doesnt function in the game.

the whole Zone Mortalis set, the Sector Mechanicus sets, all the fortifications with rules so bad you cant use them (so, all of them..) the recent ork junkyard stuff. Just yesterday I painted up a webway portal because it was in a big pile of donated terrain to match my druhari board and I was just thinking 'welp, too bad this is just a pretty object to look at that does nothing ruleswise on the board.."


Terrain, the 3rd opponent @ 2021/10/20 03:38:16


Post by: ccs


 Unit1126PLL wrote:
 Daedalus81 wrote:
I'd give it ruins and breachable. Tanks need not apply. Just add tank traps or w/e. You could have normal traversable hills that tanks can go on that are just obscurable and exposed.


So you're saying it's just a ruin that behaves like a ruin and looks different. That's not exactly what people mean when they say "the terrain rules are broken."

Again, to go back to the World War 2 game: "Nah, you can play outside Stalingrad, just count the flooded swampland as rubble and the haybales as buildings." ... that's just going to provoke eyerolls.


Assuming we're being polite & not laughing you away from the table/out of the room.

 Unit1126PLL wrote:
9th's terrain is better than 8th's but could still be improved. And hills are already in the core rules, and don't do anything.


EDIT:
In fact, the terrain rules have this gem (now that I've checked on hills):
"Hills are considered part of the battlefield rather than a terrain feature."
WHAT? As far as abstractions go, that's the worst yet. Terrain features are the battlefield.


Yeah, but it's an important distinction. It effects the placement of objectives. And other terrain features.


Terrain, the 3rd opponent @ 2021/10/20 03:42:01


Post by: H.B.M.C.


Otherwise, I believe, hills would not be able to have terrain placed on top, as I don't think you can place terrain on terrain.


Terrain, the 3rd opponent @ 2021/10/20 09:17:40


Post by: Jidmah


Sometimes I wonder whether I'm somehow playing a completely different game than everyone else...

Next to none of the complaints here apply to my games, be it GT missions, open war dadhammer or narrative crusade. I have at least four types of terrain in each game, 25% coverage and at least half of it is not obscuring. I guess I must be doing this "not having fun" thing wrong.
The only thing I can really agree on is that those tournament tables look ugly and boring.


Terrain, the 3rd opponent @ 2021/10/20 13:49:31


Post by: Daedalus81


 Jidmah wrote:
Sometimes I wonder whether I'm somehow playing a completely different game than everyone else...

Next to none of the complaints here apply to my games, be it GT missions, open war dadhammer or narrative crusade. I have at least four types of terrain in each game, 25% coverage and at least half of it is not obscuring. I guess I must be doing this "not having fun" thing wrong.
The only thing I can really agree on is that those tournament tables look ugly and boring.


Playing a different game has been the bane of Warhammer since forever. How many times has "are you playing on planet bowling ball" come up in topics?

8th was particularly bad where you had ITC, Maelstrom, and Eternal War. ITC played wildly differently from the base and it showed. The game is at parity a little more than it used to be, but it will still be nearly impossible to reconcile the difference in experience simply because it is so open ended on terrain.

The game should be accessible to people not taking the extra care on "how to set a table up properly". I just don't know the best way to tackle that. There are some good suggestions that are relatively minor tweaks that seem possible, but we likely won't see major changes from what we have now.


Terrain, the 3rd opponent @ 2021/10/20 13:54:39


Post by: Arbitrator


Apple fox wrote:
40k tournament tables are the worst most depressing things in the hobby.

I think most 40k tables are really bad an uninteresting, which I don’t think the rules really help with.

And to think it wasn't five years ago people laughed at Warmahorde tables. Having every other battlefield consist of sightless L-shapes is pretty depressing.


Terrain, the 3rd opponent @ 2021/10/20 14:27:13


Post by: Las


The title to this thread is pretty instructive to me. This term of "the third opponent" is thrown around a lot these days.

Funnily enough, it's a misremembered term. The term is actually "the third army". As in, the visual presentation and quality of the terrain is as important to wargaming as that of the players' armies.

Prescriptive terrain setups being an important balancing factor to the game may be technically good for gameplay, but it damages the quality of 40k as a wargame in the same way that prescriptive army lists/model selection would be.

It's not that far off from the game telling you what army you need to play.


Terrain, the 3rd opponent @ 2021/10/20 14:48:32


Post by: Eihnlazer


So for all the people complaining about not having terrain diversity, whats stopping you from setting up your table how you want, then saying if your LoS crosses multiple different terrain pieces then you are obscured?

Lets you play on a table that looks however you want and still not get blown off the table turn one.


Terrain, the 3rd opponent @ 2021/10/20 15:33:29


Post by: catbarf


 Eihnlazer wrote:
So for all the people complaining about not having terrain diversity, whats stopping you from setting up your table how you want, then saying if your LoS crosses multiple different terrain pieces then you are obscured?

Lets you play on a table that looks however you want and still not get blown off the table turn one.


For one thing, that's houseruling the terrain rules, which highlights the inadequacy of the stock rules. I'm sure we could do a pass to make the terrain rules easier to remember and less reliant on two or three specific varieties of terrain, but that's not really an endorsement of how they currently stand.

For another, you still have the problems with limitations on what can traverse said terrain; if you use lots of forests instead of ruins you quickly find that maneuvering tanks is a pain. Again, you can fix it with houserules.

And third, that particular solution emphasizes lots of small pieces of terrain over fewer, larger ones. Does it really make sense that you can see through 6" of terrain when it's one piece, but not 2" of terrain when it's two pieces? It's a step in the right direction, but it's a clunky resolution IMO.


Terrain, the 3rd opponent @ 2021/10/20 16:46:07


Post by: Fwlshadowalker


The biggest problem is that people look into a GW book and see it as the beginning and end of all.
And no the tournament scene always used their own rules.


Terrain, the 3rd opponent @ 2021/10/20 17:32:35


Post by: macluvin


That’s how official rules work for a game like 40k. With the sheer size of it we basically have the power to hold up the official rules and say “these are the rules.” Houserules and alternative rules require consent from the opponent because you are asking for something that is beyond the official rules that players are in universal agreement to use. Consent to use alternative and house rules is easier the closer your relationship with the other players, which is why house rules and homebrewed rules are universally normal in DND groups vs 40k for example; in that case the players are not necessarily trying to compete with each other and the players are all fairly well acquainted or at least enough that experimenting with changing mechanics and rules is easier to agree on. 40k involves potentially playing pickup games with strangers, people that are new to the hobby, friends, tournaments, etc. the diversity of relationships makes house rules and playing beyond the rule books increasingly problematic and the core authority lies within the official rules.
Maybe if they designed a game mode that was like crusade except less crazy with the extra ruleon the profiles, designed to make a campaign for a player or even multiple players, and a gamemaster type, we would see a return to further experimentation with the rules and deviance to house rules and the like? At that point the objective shifts from winning and stomping your opponent into the ground and more towards story telling. At that point the game master would be the anchor that holds the authority to change rules to be smoother, more fun for everyone involved, etc.


Terrain, the 3rd opponent @ 2021/10/20 18:15:41


Post by: Unit1126PLL


If I can convince my opponent to play different rules from 40k 9th, I can probably just convince him to play 40k 4th, or chain of command, or anything else.

The number of people willing to accept my house rules who would be unwilling to accept another set of rules entirely is very small.


Terrain, the 3rd opponent @ 2021/10/20 18:32:41


Post by: ccs


 catbarf wrote:
 Eihnlazer wrote:
So for all the people complaining about not having terrain diversity, whats stopping you from setting up your table how you want, then saying if your LoS crosses multiple different terrain pieces then you are obscured?

Lets you play on a table that looks however you want and still not get blown off the table turn one.


For one thing, that's houseruling the terrain rules, which highlights the inadequacy of the stock rules. I'm sure we could do a pass to make the terrain rules easier to remember and less reliant on two or three specific varieties of terrain, but that's not really an endorsement of how they currently stand.

For another, you still have the problems with limitations on what can traverse said terrain; if you use lots of forests instead of ruins you quickly find that maneuvering tanks is a pain. Again, you can fix it with houserules.

And third, that particular solution emphasizes lots of small pieces of terrain over fewer, larger ones. Does it really make sense that you can see through 6" of terrain when it's one piece, but not 2" of terrain when it's two pieces? It's a step in the right direction, but it's a clunky resolution IMO.


Well, taking action & working with those you play with to fix something in the here & now beats the Hell out of the "Just bjtch & moan about it and hope GW changes it next edition" approach.


Terrain, the 3rd opponent @ 2021/10/20 18:53:01


Post by: Sim-Life


ccs wrote:
 catbarf wrote:
 Eihnlazer wrote:
So for all the people complaining about not having terrain diversity, whats stopping you from setting up your table how you want, then saying if your LoS crosses multiple different terrain pieces then you are obscured?

Lets you play on a table that looks however you want and still not get blown off the table turn one.


For one thing, that's houseruling the terrain rules, which highlights the inadequacy of the stock rules. I'm sure we could do a pass to make the terrain rules easier to remember and less reliant on two or three specific varieties of terrain, but that's not really an endorsement of how they currently stand.

For another, you still have the problems with limitations on what can traverse said terrain; if you use lots of forests instead of ruins you quickly find that maneuvering tanks is a pain. Again, you can fix it with houserules.

And third, that particular solution emphasizes lots of small pieces of terrain over fewer, larger ones. Does it really make sense that you can see through 6" of terrain when it's one piece, but not 2" of terrain when it's two pieces? It's a step in the right direction, but it's a clunky resolution IMO.


Well, taking action & working with those you play with to fix something in the here & now beats the Hell out of the "Just bjtch & moan about it and hope GW changes it next edition" approach.


We shouldn't have to discuss ways to fix 40k with our group. GW should be able to write a competent ruleset. Thats kind of the point.


Terrain, the 3rd opponent @ 2021/10/20 19:02:32


Post by: Daedalus81


 Sim-Life wrote:
We shouldn't have to discuss ways to fix 40k with our group. GW should be able to write a competent ruleset. Thats kind of the point.


To me it is competent, but some people understandably don't like it. At some point we'll see if GW leans into the tournament terrain or finds some way to bridge the gap. We're supposedly getting Chapter Approved in December, but I'm betting we won't see any aid to this problem ( if any ) until 10th.


Terrain, the 3rd opponent @ 2021/10/20 19:10:48


Post by: macluvin


It’s hardly competent if there is a serious 3 page discussion about what we need to change to make more than 1 type of terrain relevant.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
Half this discussion wouldn’t exist if they reigned in lethality of the game, oddly enough. So either fix every codex or make terrain relevant... and the terrain fix we are discussing is really just a patch for the underlying issue of an overly lethal IGOUGO system.


Terrain, the 3rd opponent @ 2021/10/20 19:17:01


Post by: Dudeface


macluvin wrote:
It’s hardly competent if there is a serious 3 page discussion about what we need to change to make more than 1 type of terrain relevant.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
Half this discussion wouldn’t exist if they reigned in lethality of the game, oddly enough. So either fix every codex or make terrain relevant... and the terrain fix we are discussing is really just a patch for the underlying issue of an overly lethal IGOUGO system.


People using terrain to balance out lethality is one thing, but reducing lethality doesn't then make the other terrain more impactful by default.

Imo warhammer has never had the best terrain rules and those we have now aren't that far removed from all the other various rules they tried in reality.


Terrain, the 3rd opponent @ 2021/10/20 19:48:46


Post by: Daedalus81


macluvin wrote:
It’s hardly competent if there is a serious 3 page discussion about what we need to change to make more than 1 type of terrain relevant.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
Half this discussion wouldn’t exist if they reigned in lethality of the game, oddly enough. So either fix every codex or make terrain relevant... and the terrain fix we are discussing is really just a patch for the underlying issue of an overly lethal IGOUGO system.


It's 3 pages, because we don't fully agree on that. Lethality is "bad" when you have a single unit stacking buffs. That's a single unit and that's the frame of reference everyone uses. And that single unit generally takes out another single unit. That or something from DE or Admech or some mathhammer in a vaccuum. There's some good suggestions about tackling some of the more obtuse issues, but not all of them are practical.

We had way more lethality in 8th edition and no one was complaining about that in the same fashion back then. Everyone was just talking about which particular unit/list was broken. Now we're in this position where the new books are pretty good and a few light to moderate taps would make things good, but lots of people seem to think it's like the Castellan days and it really doesn't feel like that at all to me.



Terrain, the 3rd opponent @ 2021/10/20 20:09:21


Post by: macluvin


I definitely recall tons of input from a people on dakka that the game is too lethal during 8th. As much as I’ve seen for 9th now. However, whether or not there was more lethality in 8th is irrelevant; that there is still too much for the current system currently in the current edition is. The issue is that the amount of shooting in most competitive lists have will shoot half your army off before you take your first turn. That’s a huge problem in an IGOUGO system. The solution is pretty much exclusively covering the board in incredibly dense LOS blocking terrain. There are ways to buff multiple units to the extent that they will shoot most of their points back in a single round of shooting and that is a problem. Alpha strikes without the aforementioned terrain setups still had approximately a 10% win rate advantage which is huge.


Terrain, the 3rd opponent @ 2021/10/20 22:47:45


Post by: H.B.M.C.


 Daedalus81 wrote:
It's 3 pages, because we don't fully agree on that.
It's 3 pages because people like you act like nothing is wrong.


Terrain, the 3rd opponent @ 2021/10/20 23:26:48


Post by: Daedalus81


 H.B.M.C. wrote:
 Daedalus81 wrote:
It's 3 pages, because we don't fully agree on that.
It's 3 pages because people like you act like nothing is wrong.


I don't think I framed it like that, but I'm sorry you feel that way.


Terrain, the 3rd opponent @ 2021/10/21 00:17:33


Post by: macluvin


As disagreeable as I find daedalus’s opinion he is entitled to his belief that the rules are good enough or any portion of the rules are good enough. He is also very much entitled to make his case for why he thinks we are wrong. Hopefully I didn’t come off as too aggressive. This is technically opinion based on unquantifiable qualities.


Terrain, the 3rd opponent @ 2021/10/21 00:24:43


Post by: H.B.M.C.


macluvin wrote:
This is technically opinion based on unquantifiable qualities.
I want to agree with you, but I don't think that whether the rules are functional is as subjective as, say, film criticism (or as objective as, say, what colour the sky is for that matter).

And as others have pointed out, it's a reoccurring theme with Daed and his engagement with rules problems. The fourth post in this thread called it out quite quickly:
 Sim-Life wrote:
Another "the game is balanced if you try this ONE WEIRD TRICK" post from Daed.




Terrain, the 3rd opponent @ 2021/10/21 00:38:21


Post by: the_scotsman


 Daedalus81 wrote:
macluvin wrote:
It’s hardly competent if there is a serious 3 page discussion about what we need to change to make more than 1 type of terrain relevant.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
Half this discussion wouldn’t exist if they reigned in lethality of the game, oddly enough. So either fix every codex or make terrain relevant... and the terrain fix we are discussing is really just a patch for the underlying issue of an overly lethal IGOUGO system.


It's 3 pages, because we don't fully agree on that. Lethality is "bad" when you have a single unit stacking buffs. That's a single unit and that's the frame of reference everyone uses. And that single unit generally takes out another single unit. That or something from DE or Admech or some mathhammer in a vaccuum. There's some good suggestions about tackling some of the more obtuse issues, but not all of them are practical.

We had way more lethality in 8th edition and no one was complaining about that in the same fashion back then. Everyone was just talking about which particular unit/list was broken. Now we're in this position where the new books are pretty good and a few light to moderate taps would make things good, but lots of people seem to think it's like the Castellan days and it really doesn't feel like that at all to me.



All numbers here assuming T7 3+ target

Including Order of Companions (estimated):

Cawl’s Wrath: 14.6 damage
Volcano: 18.7 damage
Siegebreakers: 4.3 damage

605pts at the time of the castellan meta

.062 damage per point

Of note: this damage relies on AP-4 and AP-5 completely removing the enemy save to be put down. A 5++ reduces the damage of CW+Volc to 22 from 33.


I love that we’ve already poisoned the well against comparing to anything from Admech or Drukhari, that’s cute, wouldn’t be fair to compare the nastiest thing in the past competitive meta to the nastiest thing right now no sir so let’s go with something else, shall we?

Freebootas Wazbom Blastajet


2x tellyport blastas+1x smasha gun, 13.43 damage/190pts = .071 damage per point.

Hmm, that’s weird. How about Eradicators? We’ll give them zero auras, zero doctrines, zero auras and zero superdoctrines, just assume they outflanked onto the board (so theyre -1 to hit) and shot at something with their heavy melta rifles in range.

14.98 damage/150pts for the unit = 0.99 damage per point.

Oh, weird. That’s ALSO more than the old Terror of the Meta, huh?

What about let’s just get silly - sisters of battle. Let’s take a dominion squad, arm them with fething storm bolters, and point them at a tank with the ‘Blessed Bolts’ stratagem - how much can that possibly-
7.21 damage/(17x5pts) = .085 damage per point

Now - let's get the obvious counterpoint that daedelus is going to bring up here out of the way: The thing that made the Castellan meta bad, was actually the fact that the castellan is pretty durable and could at the time get up to a 3++ to protect itself, and it took a LOT to bring that beast down.

But that's not the claim that was made here: the complaint is that the game has, in general, gotten deadlier and that has pushed what was previously usually a 4-5 turn game into a 3-4 turn game with the 3rd and 4th really only happening if someone makes extensive use of reserves or has a big, Obscuring-filled tourney table.

I'm steelmanning here - using the restrictions daed laid out and nothing is from the Admech or Drukhari codex, nothing is relying on a billion...or any, auras, nothing is spending a billion cp, and i'm comparing to a model that has both a relic and an (at the time) 2cp stratagem on. What we're seeing is, when it comes to shoveling gak off the table, a bunch of units that are present in the meta but not particularly known to be top-table-terrors right now blow the old castellan away.


Terrain, the 3rd opponent @ 2021/10/21 01:26:41


Post by: catbarf


ccs wrote:
Well, taking action & working with those you play with to fix something in the here & now beats the Hell out of the "Just bjtch & moan about it and hope GW changes it next edition" approach.


At this point I should just put together a copy-paste form letter along the lines of: 'I can complain about the GW-official rules and simultaneously houserule them to fix the problem as a stopgap, but having to houserule is a suboptimal resolution to poor core rules (particularly for pickup games where most people aren't willing to play by my personal house rules), and therefore I would prefer if GW put out a quality ruleset that doesn't need to be houseruled to work.'

Because this is a really tiring style of apologism that seems to come up in relation to literally every piece of criticism directed at the game. I didn't say it's completely unfixable, I gave practical objections for why Eihnlazer's suggestion is not a satisfactory resolution that solves the objections people in this thread have made. 9th's terrain system is at least a step up from 8th's, but using it to mitigate the current edition's issues quickly highlights its problems.


Terrain, the 3rd opponent @ 2021/10/21 01:57:48


Post by: Daedalus81


Spoiler:
 the_scotsman wrote:
 Daedalus81 wrote:
macluvin wrote:
It’s hardly competent if there is a serious 3 page discussion about what we need to change to make more than 1 type of terrain relevant.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
Half this discussion wouldn’t exist if they reigned in lethality of the game, oddly enough. So either fix every codex or make terrain relevant... and the terrain fix we are discussing is really just a patch for the underlying issue of an overly lethal IGOUGO system.


It's 3 pages, because we don't fully agree on that. Lethality is "bad" when you have a single unit stacking buffs. That's a single unit and that's the frame of reference everyone uses. And that single unit generally takes out another single unit. That or something from DE or Admech or some mathhammer in a vaccuum. There's some good suggestions about tackling some of the more obtuse issues, but not all of them are practical.

We had way more lethality in 8th edition and no one was complaining about that in the same fashion back then. Everyone was just talking about which particular unit/list was broken. Now we're in this position where the new books are pretty good and a few light to moderate taps would make things good, but lots of people seem to think it's like the Castellan days and it really doesn't feel like that at all to me.



All numbers here assuming T7 3+ target

Including Order of Companions (estimated):

Cawl’s Wrath: 14.6 damage
Volcano: 18.7 damage
Siegebreakers: 4.3 damage

605pts at the time of the castellan meta

.062 damage per point

Of note: this damage relies on AP-4 and AP-5 completely removing the enemy save to be put down. A 5++ reduces the damage of CW+Volc to 22 from 33.


I love that we’ve already poisoned the well against comparing to anything from Admech or Drukhari, that’s cute, wouldn’t be fair to compare the nastiest thing in the past competitive meta to the nastiest thing right now no sir so let’s go with something else, shall we?

Freebootas Wazbom Blastajet


2x tellyport blastas+1x smasha gun, 13.43 damage/190pts = .071 damage per point.

Hmm, that’s weird. How about Eradicators? We’ll give them zero auras, zero doctrines, zero auras and zero superdoctrines, just assume they outflanked onto the board (so theyre -1 to hit) and shot at something with their heavy melta rifles in range.

14.98 damage/150pts for the unit = 0.99 damage per point.

Oh, weird. That’s ALSO more than the old Terror of the Meta, huh?

What about let’s just get silly - sisters of battle. Let’s take a dominion squad, arm them with fething storm bolters, and point them at a tank with the ‘Blessed Bolts’ stratagem - how much can that possibly-
7.21 damage/(17x5pts) = .085 damage per point

Now - let's get the obvious counterpoint that daedelus is going to bring up here out of the way: The thing that made the Castellan meta bad, was actually the fact that the castellan is pretty durable and could at the time get up to a 3++ to protect itself, and it took a LOT to bring that beast down.

But that's not the claim that was made here: the complaint is that the game has, in general, gotten deadlier and that has pushed what was previously usually a 4-5 turn game into a 3-4 turn game with the 3rd and 4th really only happening if someone makes extensive use of reserves or has a big, Obscuring-filled tourney table.

I'm steelmanning here - using the restrictions daed laid out and nothing is from the Admech or Drukhari codex, nothing is relying on a billion...or any, auras, nothing is spending a billion cp, and i'm comparing to a model that has both a relic and an (at the time) 2cp stratagem on. What we're seeing is, when it comes to shoveling gak off the table, a bunch of units that are present in the meta but not particularly known to be top-table-terrors right now blow the old castellan away.


This is... not a great analysis. Eradicators are great...and they don't see play, because they die and they're hard to get into position. Time and time again people wax about melta and it just isn't plentiful unless you're playing Argen Shroud Sisters.

Right - 4 artificer SBs per Dom squad. At long range you get 2.7 MW and 0.9 regular wounds. At short you get 5.3 MW and 1.8 regular. So you're saying that when Dominions get within 12" they're as good as a Castellan? God god, man. You putting those in a rhino? Any ablative wounds? Or you know...activating a 5+++ MW shrug?

You really think that models that have the same "damage per point" in a vacuum are comparable when they are T3 3+ W1 or T6 4+ W12 and the Castellan is T8 W28?

It wasn't just the Castellan. It was the BS2 Levi with full rerolls and 20 shots. The Smash Captain with uber charges and rerolls. The over pumped CP. Mortis Dreads. Shining Spears. Trajann the the hover whatevers. Banana Bikes. RG Centurions.




Terrain, the 3rd opponent @ 2021/10/21 02:48:43


Post by: the_scotsman


 Daedalus81 wrote:
Spoiler:
 the_scotsman wrote:
 Daedalus81 wrote:
macluvin wrote:
It’s hardly competent if there is a serious 3 page discussion about what we need to change to make more than 1 type of terrain relevant.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
Half this discussion wouldn’t exist if they reigned in lethality of the game, oddly enough. So either fix every codex or make terrain relevant... and the terrain fix we are discussing is really just a patch for the underlying issue of an overly lethal IGOUGO system.


It's 3 pages, because we don't fully agree on that. Lethality is "bad" when you have a single unit stacking buffs. That's a single unit and that's the frame of reference everyone uses. And that single unit generally takes out another single unit. That or something from DE or Admech or some mathhammer in a vaccuum. There's some good suggestions about tackling some of the more obtuse issues, but not all of them are practical.

We had way more lethality in 8th edition and no one was complaining about that in the same fashion back then. Everyone was just talking about which particular unit/list was broken. Now we're in this position where the new books are pretty good and a few light to moderate taps would make things good, but lots of people seem to think it's like the Castellan days and it really doesn't feel like that at all to me.



All numbers here assuming T7 3+ target

Including Order of Companions (estimated):

Cawl’s Wrath: 14.6 damage
Volcano: 18.7 damage
Siegebreakers: 4.3 damage

605pts at the time of the castellan meta

.062 damage per point

Of note: this damage relies on AP-4 and AP-5 completely removing the enemy save to be put down. A 5++ reduces the damage of CW+Volc to 22 from 33.


I love that we’ve already poisoned the well against comparing to anything from Admech or Drukhari, that’s cute, wouldn’t be fair to compare the nastiest thing in the past competitive meta to the nastiest thing right now no sir so let’s go with something else, shall we?

Freebootas Wazbom Blastajet


2x tellyport blastas+1x smasha gun, 13.43 damage/190pts = .071 damage per point.

Hmm, that’s weird. How about Eradicators? We’ll give them zero auras, zero doctrines, zero auras and zero superdoctrines, just assume they outflanked onto the board (so theyre -1 to hit) and shot at something with their heavy melta rifles in range.

14.98 damage/150pts for the unit = 0.99 damage per point.

Oh, weird. That’s ALSO more than the old Terror of the Meta, huh?

What about let’s just get silly - sisters of battle. Let’s take a dominion squad, arm them with fething storm bolters, and point them at a tank with the ‘Blessed Bolts’ stratagem - how much can that possibly-
7.21 damage/(17x5pts) = .085 damage per point

Now - let's get the obvious counterpoint that daedelus is going to bring up here out of the way: The thing that made the Castellan meta bad, was actually the fact that the castellan is pretty durable and could at the time get up to a 3++ to protect itself, and it took a LOT to bring that beast down.

But that's not the claim that was made here: the complaint is that the game has, in general, gotten deadlier and that has pushed what was previously usually a 4-5 turn game into a 3-4 turn game with the 3rd and 4th really only happening if someone makes extensive use of reserves or has a big, Obscuring-filled tourney table.

I'm steelmanning here - using the restrictions daed laid out and nothing is from the Admech or Drukhari codex, nothing is relying on a billion...or any, auras, nothing is spending a billion cp, and i'm comparing to a model that has both a relic and an (at the time) 2cp stratagem on. What we're seeing is, when it comes to shoveling gak off the table, a bunch of units that are present in the meta but not particularly known to be top-table-terrors right now blow the old castellan away.


This is... not a great analysis. Eradicators are great...and they don't see play, because they die and they're hard to get into position. Time and time again people wax about melta and it just isn't plentiful unless you're playing Argen Shroud Sisters.

Right - 4 artificer SBs per Dom squad. At long range you get 2.7 MW and 0.9 regular wounds. At short you get 5.3 MW and 1.8 regular. So you're saying that when Dominions get within 12" they're as good as a Castellan? God god, man. You putting those in a rhino? Any ablative wounds? Or you know...activating a 5+++ MW shrug?

You really think that models that have the same "damage per point" in a vacuum are comparable when they are T3 3+ W1 or T6 4+ W12 and the Castellan is T8 W28?

It wasn't just the Castellan. It was the BS2 Levi with full rerolls and 20 shots. The Smash Captain with uber charges and rerolls. The over pumped CP. Mortis Dreads. Shining Spears. Trajann the the hover whatevers. Banana Bikes. RG Centurions.




yes - particular units with particular super-combos in the era of 20+CP were able to output massive damage.

Once, usually.

the difference is now, EVERYTHING deals more damage. Why do you think tables need to be denser now? the ability to hide your units is CRITICAL.

Even if a mid-8th smash captain could triple-attack to remove 1 model 2x-3x its points value, paradigm-shifting basically every competitive meta unit from ~0.025-0.035 damage per point to ~0.04-0.06 by layering on the two-rule chapter tactics and the 9th ed doctrine systems while simultaneously upping damage far, far more than you up durability in the new codexes has created this escalation. It's not just everyone else's imagination but you, Daed.

My buggies that used to tickle opponents now knock off 50% of their points value per turn easily. My wyches and hellions evaporate whatever they touch. My thousand sons gak out mortal wounds like it's going out of style, 20+ in a psychic phase if I decide to go on the offense with cult of magic.

A couple critical units in a codex get tougher, but other than that, the biggest difference between 9th and 8th is a removal of the spikey damage combos and a huge increase in the damage you deal consistently, especially with vehicles.

Heldrake more damage Defiler more damage Forgefiend more damage Maulerfiend more damage Rhino more damage, and the Helbrute got tougher (because he already got his more damage with the weapons update, lol).

When GW gives out durability, they give it out with drawbacks. T5 orks...but your 5++ is gone, your morale immunity is gone, your resurrect strat is gone.

But they just casually double the damage on every single buggy and plane, why not, no trade-offs there just make everything an increasingly absurd glass cannon.


Terrain, the 3rd opponent @ 2021/10/21 04:43:12


Post by: Fwlshadowalker


It seems I understand the rules as written on page 260-263 in the big book different from quite a lot. We set up the terrain look at it and decide what it does.
Sometimes we say we just use the examples given and sometimes we define our own because we do not have just the pieces GW shows but our own terrain from the last 20+ years of 40K.
I am quite sure that IS the rules as written.

So what if you assign your Ork scrap yard that you build obscuring? Is there a rule in the BRB for that? I do not see it on Page 264-265.
Yes it is a further step but I think it is well worth in pick up games what the terrain does. In tournaments you are at the mercy of the TO

I agree that GW did something good with the current terrain compared to before but there are gaps that would need filling. Instead of all the rules for armies in campaign books a book with updated Terrain rules would go a long way.


Terrain, the 3rd opponent @ 2021/10/21 07:47:14


Post by: Sim-Life


Honestly I don't think 40k terrain will ever work well unless it ditches true line of sight. Its weird because the writers have abstracted so much of the game at this point but they doggedly stick with TLoS


Terrain, the 3rd opponent @ 2021/10/21 09:57:10


Post by: macluvin


 Sim-Life wrote:
Honestly I don't think 40k terrain will ever work well unless it ditches true line of sight. Its weird because the writers have abstracted so much of the game at this point but they doggedly stick with TLoS


I read an old article that discussed why TLOS was a terrible concept. Basically at 28/32mm scale, rifles should be shooting other tables so range is already terribly inaccurate. Tanks and vehicles are only worse offenders. It would be more accurate to think of models as tokens rather than individual infantry and vehicles.


Terrain, the 3rd opponent @ 2021/10/21 10:08:58


Post by: Da Boss


I definitely agree. I think the problem with LOS rules is they tend to be pretty fiddly for edge cases when in 90% of cases most players just eyeball it and agree with each other, but if you want a competitive game you run into problems with people arguing about it and so on. So if you're writing for a casual audience, it seems like a lot of space and complexity for no good outcome, and if you're writing for a competitive audience it's a lot to process and think about and will still result in some gamey edge cases sometimes.

So TLOS seems like a decent choice because it's straightforward and clear in most cases, or can be clarified with a laser pointer at least. But unfortunately it has negative effects on the game and make it (in my view) less fun than abstracted line of sight with a reasonable opponent.


Terrain, the 3rd opponent @ 2021/10/21 11:06:44


Post by: Sim-Life


 Da Boss wrote:
I definitely agree. I think the problem with LOS rules is they tend to be pretty fiddly for edge cases when in 90% of cases most players just eyeball it and agree with each other, but if you want a competitive game you run into problems with people arguing about it and so on. So if you're writing for a casual audience, it seems like a lot of space and complexity for no good outcome, and if you're writing for a competitive audience it's a lot to process and think about and will still result in some gamey edge cases sometimes.

So TLOS seems like a decent choice because it's straightforward and clear in most cases, or can be clarified with a laser pointer at least. But unfortunately it has negative effects on the game and make it (in my view) less fun than abstracted line of sight with a reasonable opponent.


This is another case where GW could push the "three ways to play" stuff to make each more distinct and keep TLoS for Open and have a set of definite rules for Matched.


Terrain, the 3rd opponent @ 2021/10/21 11:38:29


Post by: Unit1126PLL


If only (4th edition) there was some kind of abstract terrain rules (4th edition) that also incorporated TLOS (4th edition) but had clear and consistent abstractions (4th edition).

The only change I would make is having 5 unit sizes and 5 terrain sizes rather than 3, just because a Baneblade is bigger than a Land Raider is bigger than a Chimera is bigger than an Ogryn is bigger than a Guardsman.


Terrain, the 3rd opponent @ 2021/10/21 12:02:27


Post by: Sim-Life


 Unit1126PLL wrote:
If only (4th edition) there was some kind of abstract terrain rules (4th edition) that also incorporated TLOS (4th edition) but had clear and consistent abstractions (4th edition).

The only change I would make is having 5 unit sizes and 5 terrain sizes rather than 3, just because a Baneblade is bigger than a Land Raider is bigger than a Chimera is bigger than an Ogryn is bigger than a Guardsman.


I was going to mention in one of my posts height rules because they work for Malifaux but I don't think it would work for 40k anymore unless you REALLY abstract it to something like Horde (rippers, scarabs, grots), Infantry (everything from guardsmen to small vehicles like bikers), Vehicle (tanks and walkers), Super-Heavy (knights). But then where does that leave stuff like Ghaz who isn't as big as a tank but not as small as infantry? Or Riptides that are clearly taller than tanks but not as big as a knight?


Terrain, the 3rd opponent @ 2021/10/21 12:06:09


Post by: Unit1126PLL


4th edition had 3 levels because no LOW to no Riptides etc. So is why I suggested going to 5.

Ghaz is about as tall as a Chimera, so size 3. He isn't that small.

Riptides would be Size 4

Knights size 5


Terrain, the 3rd opponent @ 2021/10/21 12:12:27


Post by: Jidmah


Ghaz is about the size of a dread or carnifex.


Terrain, the 3rd opponent @ 2021/10/21 12:53:14


Post by: the_scotsman


 Fwlshadowalker wrote:
It seems I understand the rules as written on page 260-263 in the big book different from quite a lot. We set up the terrain look at it and decide what it does.
Sometimes we say we just use the examples given and sometimes we define our own because we do not have just the pieces GW shows but our own terrain from the last 20+ years of 40K.
I am quite sure that IS the rules as written.

So what if you assign your Ork scrap yard that you build obscuring? Is there a rule in the BRB for that? I do not see it on Page 264-265.
Yes it is a further step but I think it is well worth in pick up games what the terrain does. In tournaments you are at the mercy of the TO

I agree that GW did something good with the current terrain compared to before but there are gaps that would need filling. Instead of all the rules for armies in campaign books a book with updated Terrain rules would go a long way.


the problem is, only a few terrain pieces on the scrapyard board were able to block line of sight. This is incidentally also the problem with the drukhari arena board, the eldar forest board, and the sector mechanicus board - theres a lot of terrain, and not a lot of terrrain that it makes sense giving the Obscuring keyword.

It should be possible to create a board where the armies start out mostly able to see one another that would not result in a massive turn 1 advantage due to the army that goes first being able to evaporate a solid quarter of the opposing force.

I should be able to make up for a lack of Obscuring using the other keywords, but I can not, because they are wholly inadequate. I could rule every barricade as Dense and light and every scrap pile as Light and Heavy and fill the deployment zones with them such that every model in either army was -1 to hit and +1 to sv and you'd still easily be able to scoop a big hunka chunk off the opposing army with very little trouble if you went first.



Terrain, the 3rd opponent @ 2021/10/21 13:32:54


Post by: Daedalus81


 Sim-Life wrote:
This is another case where GW could push the "three ways to play" stuff to make each more distinct and keep TLoS for Open and have a set of definite rules for Matched.


That approach doesn't seem to work for most people since everyone tends to take on the matched play rules though?


Terrain, the 3rd opponent @ 2021/10/21 13:54:56


Post by: Sim-Life


 Daedalus81 wrote:
 Sim-Life wrote:
This is another case where GW could push the "three ways to play" stuff to make each more distinct and keep TLoS for Open and have a set of definite rules for Matched.


That approach doesn't seem to work for most people since everyone tends to take on the matched play rules though?


Because Matched play is in this dumb place where things are standardised but not quite. You're also doing that thing where you assume this change is done in a vacuum and nothing else changes.

What if Matched gets renamed to Advanced? Or Tournament? Does that make it easier to accept?


Terrain, the 3rd opponent @ 2021/10/21 14:03:13


Post by: Daedalus81


 the_scotsman wrote:
yes - particular units with particular super-combos in the era of 20+CP were able to output massive damage.

Once, usually.

the difference is now, EVERYTHING deals more damage. Why do you think tables need to be denser now? the ability to hide your units is CRITICAL.

Even if a mid-8th smash captain could triple-attack to remove 1 model 2x-3x its points value, paradigm-shifting basically every competitive meta unit from ~0.025-0.035 damage per point to ~0.04-0.06 by layering on the two-rule chapter tactics and the 9th ed doctrine systems while simultaneously upping damage far, far more than you up durability in the new codexes has created this escalation. It's not just everyone else's imagination but you, Daed.

My buggies that used to tickle opponents now knock off 50% of their points value per turn easily. My wyches and hellions evaporate whatever they touch. My thousand sons gak out mortal wounds like it's going out of style, 20+ in a psychic phase if I decide to go on the offense with cult of magic.

A couple critical units in a codex get tougher, but other than that, the biggest difference between 9th and 8th is a removal of the spikey damage combos and a huge increase in the damage you deal consistently, especially with vehicles.

Heldrake more damage Defiler more damage Forgefiend more damage Maulerfiend more damage Rhino more damage, and the Helbrute got tougher (because he already got his more damage with the weapons update, lol).

When GW gives out durability, they give it out with drawbacks. T5 orks...but your 5++ is gone, your morale immunity is gone, your resurrect strat is gone.

But they just casually double the damage on every single buggy and plane, why not, no trade-offs there just make everything an increasingly absurd glass cannon.


Thousand Sons have to gak out mortal wounds. The entire army is very short ranged and terrible at melee and good placement screens out the more deadly spells.

Heldrake hardly changed unless it melees an aircraft and it went from 140 to 165.

The Forgefiend? It sucked unless you popped Daemonforge, which is now gone. What's the math on that you ask?

7.2 damage then 6.4 damage now. A singular FF went down in damage. AND it used to be 150 points and is now 175! Helbrute used to be 102 and is now 120.

People complained and complained about strats making bad units good. So the made the bad unit good, removed the strat....and it's still a problem!


Automatically Appended Next Post:
 Sim-Life wrote:
What if Matched gets renamed to Advanced? Or Tournament? Does that make it easier to accept?


I dunno. I think most people have that psychological desire to "play it straight" and they'll want do what they think is the most rigorous rule set.


Terrain, the 3rd opponent @ 2021/10/21 14:15:21


Post by: Sim-Life


 Daedalus81 wrote:

 Sim-Life wrote:
What if Matched gets renamed to Advanced? Or Tournament? Does that make it easier to accept?


I dunno. I think most people have that psychological desire to "play it straight" and they'll want do what they think is the most rigorous rule set.


So then whats the problem? If people want to do that they have to learn new LoS rules. Just like how when 8th came along we all had to learn the new systems for army building, CP, morale etc.


Terrain, the 3rd opponent @ 2021/10/21 14:15:45


Post by: the_scotsman


...except they never make the bad unit good by making them tougher. They always make the bad unit good by making them deal 2x-3x the damage, and MAYBE they might bump the sv up by 1 pip or bump a unit up to 2w while also reducing the unit's defenses in some other area.

If you set up a board where there aren't significant blockers of line of sight but there is plenty of other forms of cover, the game will be functionally over in 2.5 battle rounds. That's a structural problem both in terms of 'the players get to make very few decisions with their units, so basically it just becomes a glorified lets just check our lists against one another' system, and also because who gets that critical third turn because they rolled off and got to go first gets a massive advantage. the maximum defensive boost you can get from the board state beyond 'cant target me at all' is 33%, and that's INCREDIBLY tricky to achieve, because you generally have to get every single model in a unit within 1" of a terrain piece and also behind a Dense terrain piece. And it's just straight-up impossible for vehicles bikers etc because they cant even claim light cover at all, it may as well not exist.

That's EXACTLY why without huge Obscuring cover the player who gets the first turn has like a 60% winrate. For most units theres almost no barrier between the beginning of the game and their ability to start chunking 1/3 of their opponent's army every single turn.

its like if you designed a fighting video game where a character dies in 2 punches or 1 kick, and then wondered 'hmm, i wonder why nobody seems to be picking the slow characters? I keep adding in mechanics for throwing, and new combos, and new special moves, why does it still seem like there's such a problem here?"

play any game with an older faction like Guard, Eldar, GSC or Nids without FW against a 9th ed book, the amount theyve escalated the damage consistency 9th ed units put out becomes immediately and glaringly obvious.


Terrain, the 3rd opponent @ 2021/10/21 16:03:44


Post by: PenitentJake


I will not deny any of the problems mentioned in this thread- I think they are legit, and they do exist. I even believe that some of the discussion that we've seen in this thread and others like it has been helpful, and has posed some viable solutions. And yes, in an ideal world, I admit that the base rules should be strong enough that we don't have to propose solution. But I admit, we may not be in that ideal world.

So, as a proposed solution that could work, and could increase the fun factor, without house-ruling terrain, is Theatres of War.

I'm not sure if it was in this thread or another, but Scotsman went into detail about a game set on Fenris, and quite rightfully, he and his opponent didn't think that dense urban terrain was very fluffy. I suggested a "Snow Storm" Theatre of War. These rules have some problems, I'll admit.

1/ They don't solve any problems in Tournament Play; this is not to say they can't work with the Matched Play rules- they CAN. But putting them in an actual organized tournament could be problematic for various reasons.

2/ They DO genuinely lend themselves to narrative play.

3/ They aren't in the BRB or the dexes; I don't even think they appear in current Campaign books or Mission Packs, though it's been a while since I've looked. They are all over White Dwarf Flashpoint articles and PA books; they also appear in the three vs. boxes I've purchased (Blood of the Phoenix, Piety and Pain, Hexfire).

4/ Being story-based, they only work if you want the story flavour imparted by the rules. Snow Storm was appropriate for Scotsman's battle, cuz Fenris. But if you were trying to get the benefit of snow storm rules so you can minimize lethality, but your game is set on a hard-vacuum mining asteroid, that's not a very "feel-good" solution.

Anyway, just something that might help those who are looking for solutions. I'm not saying "you have to do this"; I'm not saying "you're playing wrong if you don't do this or don't want to do this" etc, etc. Just saying it might work for you if you want to play the game and tackle an identified issue using published source material.



Terrain, the 3rd opponent @ 2021/10/21 16:32:46


Post by: Jidmah


At least the book of rust had some pretty fancy theatres of war, the mission packs don't. Not sure about the other two campaign books.


Terrain, the 3rd opponent @ 2021/10/21 17:19:16


Post by: Las


Here's my proposal after playing my first few games of 9th.

A model must be visible to be targeted. A model is visible if 25% of it can be seen by the model doing the targeting.

You cannot kill what you can't see, with the exception of blast, flame weapons, certain psychic spells etc

Terrain/cover comes in two types:

Soft cover and hard cover. A model must be in or behind the terrain piece to receive the benefits of cover.

Soft cover (trees, bushes, ramshackle fences, anything that will obscure but not offer protection): -1 to hit.

Hard cover (ruins, barricades, bunkers, anything that would offer physical protection to the target etc): -1 to hit and +1 to save.


Terrain, the 3rd opponent @ 2021/10/21 17:22:54


Post by: Racerguy180


So basically cover vs concealment.


Terrain, the 3rd opponent @ 2021/10/21 17:25:48


Post by: dewd11


I couldn't imagine playing without TLOS. Using "% visible" is too fiddly and just leads to contention. I always play on tables with lots of terrain at my LGS. Haven't seen a person lose turn 1 since 8th ed, unless they deploy bad with nothing hidden.


Terrain, the 3rd opponent @ 2021/10/21 17:29:23


Post by: Las


Racerguy180 wrote:
So basically cover vs concealment.


Exactly. Easy to parse out and identify terrain piece to terrain piece. With additive bonuses that can be easily remembered.

dewd11 wrote:
I couldn't imagine playing without TLOS. Using "% visible" is too fiddly and just leads to contention. I always play on tables with lots of terrain at my LGS. Haven't seen a person lose turn 1 since 8th ed, unless they deploy bad with nothing hidden.


% rule could be changed. Honestly I'd be fine with TLOS just without spikes, gun barrels, horns etc. That specific part of the game is absolutely absurd.


Terrain, the 3rd opponent @ 2021/10/21 17:30:42


Post by: the_scotsman


 Las wrote:
Here's my proposal after playing my first few games of 9th.

A model must be visible to be targeted. A model is visible if 25% of it can be seen by the model doing the targeting.

You cannot kill what you can't see, with the exception of blast, flame weapons, certain psychic spells etc

Terrain/cover comes in two types:

Soft cover and hard cover. A model must be in or behind the terrain piece to receive the benefits of cover.

Soft cover (trees, bushes, ramshackle fences, anything that will obscure but not offer protection): -1 to hit.

Hard cover (ruins, barricades, bunkers, anything that would offer physical protection to the target etc): -1 to hit and +1 to save.


Great starting point for "Core Rules' type stuff, the only thing I'd add is "when determining if a target model is obscured, ignore additional models in either the target or attacking model's unit, and ignore terrain features within 1" of the attacking model if making a shooting attack." But its definitely an improvement.

Almost anything would be an improvement to the two terrain systems gw has right now - the completely abstracted and basically nothing system presented in the free Core Rules is both unimpactful (only +1 to save which is rarely that noticeable) and entirely relies on players being reasonable and playing by intent because it defines nothing at all, and then the full matched play terrain rules which are a hilarious wall of text defining a dozen-odd traits that almost never come up at all.

I can respect the intention behind it, but the actual effects of Difficult, Defensible, Heavy, Light and Dense cover are so wimpy and ephemeral that you could apply them almost universally across the board and the sheer mass of layered offensive rules everyone gets now would just effortlessly blow past them.

You could probably set up the game on an empty board and declare that every model would permanently benefit from defensible, heavy, light, and dense cover and still have 1 side tabled by BR3.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
dewd11 wrote:
I couldn't imagine playing without TLOS. Using "% visible" is too fiddly and just leads to contention. I always play on tables with lots of terrain at my LGS. Haven't seen a person lose turn 1 since 8th ed, unless they deploy bad with nothing hidden.


%visible IS true line of sight. its how most old-school wargames operate.

more abstracted line of sight is closer to what Kill Team does - draw a straight line between the closest point on the two models and see what terrain pieces that line crosses, and what rules they convey. Do not stoop down to try and 'see what your model can see' just go off the rules conveyed by the terrain and the relation between the models.





Terrain, the 3rd opponent @ 2021/10/21 17:46:09


Post by: Racerguy180


I'd like if it was you need to see torso/hull/whatever to be able to hit them. Then it would only be on the specific model that is visible, not the entire unit(unless artillery/mortar/grenade).



Terrain, the 3rd opponent @ 2021/10/21 17:46:55


Post by: Las


I also wouldn't mind adding "gone to ground" rules for certain infantry units into the game. ie: if its lore-friendly, have a unit that doesn't move in the movement phase automatically gain the benefits of -1 to hit. Hell, make it cumulative with soft/hard cover.

Guardsmen would hit the dirt if they're out in the open, while Khorne Berserkers, cultists, most marines wouldn't etc.


Terrain, the 3rd opponent @ 2021/10/21 17:49:25


Post by: macluvin


I’m about to start copying Scotsman’s thread comments and sending them to that faq feedback email...


Terrain, the 3rd opponent @ 2021/10/21 17:49:39


Post by: Racerguy180


It would evoke the lore. A human needs to hit the deck, your walking tank doesn't...


Terrain, the 3rd opponent @ 2021/10/21 17:53:23


Post by: Las


Racerguy180 wrote:
It would evoke the lore. A human needs to hit the deck, your walking tank doesn't...


Exactly, put it on the datacard or whatever:

Goes to Ground: If no model in this unit moved during your movement phase, models targeting this unit suffer -1 to hit in addition to any other bonuses offered by terrain features.


Terrain, the 3rd opponent @ 2021/10/21 17:58:30


Post by: the_scotsman


Racerguy180 wrote:
I'd like if it was you need to see torso/hull/whatever to be able to hit them. Then it would only be on the specific model that is visible, not the entire unit(unless artillery/mortar/grenade).



I think generally, youre going to need to have a split between 'open/narrative play Terrain' which can have a lot of 'talk it over with your opponent and play by intent! Remember that the models posed heroically as your miniatures cant perfectly represent how the soldiers would actulaly be on the field of battle' etc and Matched Play Terrain, which can be rigidly defined closer to its current state.

Personally, if you put me in charge of Open Play/Narrative Play, I'd put in a few rules:

1) "units can only draw line of sight from a reasonable point on the model. For most models with traditional bodies, this should be the model's head. For vehicles, by default you should use a point roughly at the front and towards the top of the model, though you should talk to your opponent and you may make certain allowances for vehicles with turret weapons for that weapon to be able to target units assuming a 360 degree rotation."

2) "when drawing line of sight to a target, banners, antennae, weapons, bases or other scenic features not a part of the model's main body or hull should not be considered a valid point to target. In general however, it should not be possible to achieve a situation where a model cannot be targeted, but can still draw line of sight to a target unless it is firing a weapon that can explicitly ignore line of sight rules. "

And for matched play where everything is hyper-defined, I'd have the designers put out a CAD file for any given model, stuck somewhere on the datasheet with the 'sighting point' marked as a blue dot and 'untargetable bits' marked out as red. Heroscape had this gak figured out perfectly in like 2008.




Terrain, the 3rd opponent @ 2021/10/21 17:59:31


Post by: JohnnyHell


Terrain is the “3rd army”. Who’s playing two opponents for it to be the third???


Terrain, the 3rd opponent @ 2021/10/21 18:15:01


Post by: Sim-Life


When you start talking about measuring to specific parts of models it results in stuff like crouching wraithlords and provokes "modelling for advantage" discussions. I always preferred the base-to-base/column style of LoS as it keeps things simple.


Terrain, the 3rd opponent @ 2021/10/21 18:16:20


Post by: the_scotsman


 Sim-Life wrote:
When you start talking about measuring to specific parts of models it results in stuff like crouching wraithlords and provokes "modelling for advantage" discussions. I always preferred the base-to-base/column style of LoS as it keeps things simple.


...which would, theoretically, allow you to target NO part of the model, right?

Like if I had a model that was smaller than its base, and my opponent could target part of my 'imaginary cylinder' with part of their 'imaginary cylinder' wouldnt that result in MORE not LESS of the confusing negative player epxeriences mentioned here?


Terrain, the 3rd opponent @ 2021/10/21 18:22:16


Post by: macluvin


 the_scotsman wrote:
 Sim-Life wrote:
When you start talking about measuring to specific parts of models it results in stuff like crouching wraithlords and provokes "modelling for advantage" discussions. I always preferred the base-to-base/column style of LoS as it keeps things simple.


...which would, theoretically, allow you to target NO part of the model, right?

Like if I had a model that was smaller than its base, and my opponent could target part of my 'imaginary cylinder' with part of their 'imaginary cylinder' wouldnt that result in MORE not LESS of the confusing negative player epxeriences mentioned here?


Actually... that’s not a terrible suggestion. Add a keyword for grots for example to be size small, marines and guard to be medium, and terminators to be bulky, etc... then write for how the terrain interacts with the sizes. Grots may be out of line of sight when terrain that provides cover bonuses to marines is in the way, for example. Basically define the cylinder height by key word and define height by terrain type.

Now, I admit that this may be clunky inefficient and overly complicated. It may warrant thinking outside of how we currently understand war games rules though.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
Or simply use the infantry/bike etc. keywords to define how the models interact with the terrain and just lump grots to terminators in the same size category, etc....


Terrain, the 3rd opponent @ 2021/10/21 20:42:01


Post by: Unit1126PLL


*people ITT deriving 4th edition terrain rules, with units in size categories and terrain in size categories...*


Terrain, the 3rd opponent @ 2021/10/21 22:24:19


Post by: H.B.M.C.


 Las wrote:
Goes to Ground: If no model in this unit moved during your movement phase, models targeting this unit suffer -1 to hit in addition to any other bonuses offered by terrain features.
The issue with this is that it would encourage even more static play.

The game needs to have choices, and things that are mutually exclusive. 9th introduced the concept of Actions that units could take (raise banners, psychic actions, etc.). I think this type of thing, moved to the underutilised Command Phase, would be a great way to add more choice to the game.

So, 'Go to Ground', would be something you choose for units not engaged in melee during the Command Phase. A unit that has Gone to Ground cannot move, advance or declare charges, but has +1Ld and maybe this acts as a 'Defensive Stance', that allows a unit to choose between Overwatch or being -1 To Hit in melee (rather than tying that to confusing and bloated terrain rules).



Terrain, the 3rd opponent @ 2021/10/21 23:00:37


Post by: Racerguy180


The command phase is where stuff like this SHOULD happen. The Sgt. ordered them to get down(insert James Brown emphasis), Lieutenant said be more effective with your shots/attacks, etc...

Currently it's basically just another motion to go thru that other than regaining a CP could be forgotten.


Terrain, the 3rd opponent @ 2021/10/21 23:41:33


Post by: Las


 H.B.M.C. wrote:
 Las wrote:
Goes to Ground: If no model in this unit moved during your movement phase, models targeting this unit suffer -1 to hit in addition to any other bonuses offered by terrain features.
The issue with this is that it would encourage even more static play.

The game needs to have choices, and things that are mutually exclusive. 9th introduced the concept of Actions that units could take (raise banners, psychic actions, etc.). I think this type of thing, moved to the underutilised Command Phase, would be a great way to add more choice to the game.

So, 'Go to Ground', would be something you choose for units not engaged in melee during the Command Phase. A unit that has Gone to Ground cannot move, advance or declare charges, but has +1Ld and maybe this acts as a 'Defensive Stance', that allows a unit to choose between Overwatch or being -1 To Hit in melee (rather than tying that to confusing and bloated terrain rules).



I see your point and I agree in principle when it comes to choice and the underutilization of the command phase. However, in this example what would functionally separate this choosing to go to ground from a stratagem? If the answer is “it doesn’t cost cp”, would we then have effectively two tiers of stratagem?

To me, it feels like it’s far easier to clean the terrain rules and put something like this in there rather than to do so to stratagems.


Terrain, the 3rd opponent @ 2021/10/21 23:51:21


Post by: Rihgu


 Las wrote:
 H.B.M.C. wrote:
 Las wrote:
Goes to Ground: If no model in this unit moved during your movement phase, models targeting this unit suffer -1 to hit in addition to any other bonuses offered by terrain features.
The issue with this is that it would encourage even more static play.

The game needs to have choices, and things that are mutually exclusive. 9th introduced the concept of Actions that units could take (raise banners, psychic actions, etc.). I think this type of thing, moved to the underutilised Command Phase, would be a great way to add more choice to the game.

So, 'Go to Ground', would be something you choose for units not engaged in melee during the Command Phase. A unit that has Gone to Ground cannot move, advance or declare charges, but has +1Ld and maybe this acts as a 'Defensive Stance', that allows a unit to choose between Overwatch or being -1 To Hit in melee (rather than tying that to confusing and bloated terrain rules).



I see your point and I agree in principle when it comes to choice and the underutilization of the command phase. However, in this example what would functionally separate this choosing to go to ground from a stratagem? If the answer is “it doesn’t cost cp”, would we then have effectively two tiers of stratagem?

To me, it feels like it’s far easier to clean the terrain rules and put something like this in there rather than to do so to stratagems.


It would be a core rule, presumably, and no more a stratagem than declaring a unit to Advance, or even Shoot.


Terrain, the 3rd opponent @ 2021/10/22 00:00:59


Post by: H.B.M.C.


That's it. And it would be universal.

The game would/should have a list of basic Actions that can be performed during the Command Phase, everything from 'Raise the Banners' to 'Go to Ground' to 'Covering Fire' to 'Sprint*' to 'Rend the Veil**' and so on.

I'm just throwing everything at the wall at the moment - I have a spreadsheet of random 40k ideas I've been adding to every day after my walk covering everything that is at around 350 lines by now - so not everything has coalesced yet, but I think that the core problem of all GW's rules - great idea/terrible execution - is something that can be fixed easily enough.

*Give up shooting to roll an extra D6 for Advance.

**Give up casting psychic powers to make it easier for friendly psykers to cast.


Terrain, the 3rd opponent @ 2021/10/22 02:14:28


Post by: ccs


 Sim-Life wrote:
ccs wrote:
 catbarf wrote:
 Eihnlazer wrote:
So for all the people complaining about not having terrain diversity, whats stopping you from setting up your table how you want, then saying if your LoS crosses multiple different terrain pieces then you are obscured?

Lets you play on a table that looks however you want and still not get blown off the table turn one.


For one thing, that's houseruling the terrain rules, which highlights the inadequacy of the stock rules. I'm sure we could do a pass to make the terrain rules easier to remember and less reliant on two or three specific varieties of terrain, but that's not really an endorsement of how they currently stand.

For another, you still have the problems with limitations on what can traverse said terrain; if you use lots of forests instead of ruins you quickly find that maneuvering tanks is a pain. Again, you can fix it with houserules.

And third, that particular solution emphasizes lots of small pieces of terrain over fewer, larger ones. Does it really make sense that you can see through 6" of terrain when it's one piece, but not 2" of terrain when it's two pieces? It's a step in the right direction, but it's a clunky resolution IMO.


Well, taking action & working with those you play with to fix something in the here & now beats the Hell out of the "Just bjtch & moan about it and hope GW changes it next edition" approach.


We shouldn't have to discuss ways to fix 40k with our group. GW should be able to write a competent ruleset. Thats kind of the point.


Ok, take the bitch/moan/hope approach. Let's take a bet on how that'll work out for you come 10e. And 11e. And 12th+....
Meanwhile, in the here & now that matters (assuming you actually play the game), you've got a problem. And GW isn't going to solve it for you. What are you going to do about it?


Terrain, the 3rd opponent @ 2021/10/22 02:47:06


Post by: catbarf


ccs wrote:
What are you going to do about it?


Houserule it when playing with friends, have poor pick-up games and organized events where houserules are not permitted, complain on the Internet because it's still a problem.

Maybe complain a little extra when folks trot out this particular flavor of apologism masquerading as pragmatism.


Terrain, the 3rd opponent @ 2021/10/22 03:16:59


Post by: Unit1126PLL


Complaining on the internet isn't mutually exclusive with anything else.


Terrain, the 3rd opponent @ 2021/10/22 05:54:40


Post by: morganfreeman


Fixes for targeting would be crazy easy.

Make it so that bases are upward 'cylinders', you can target to (or from) any vertical area in that cylinder above the base. This allows for cool poses / overhangs without having the enemy unload into a dude's out stretched hand and wipe out his units.

There are size categories by which you know how 'tall' those targeting cylinders are. I.E. size 1 is one inch tall, size 2 is two inches, size 3 is three, so on and so forth. Admittedly you wouldn't want to use it quite like that (as a Space marine should be larger than a guardsmen). Worst case scenario is you create a 'size' stat and then turn it into a marketing opportunity by introducing a custom 'size measure' which has the specific heights marked for each potential point. Similar to how Kill Team has a custom tape measure.


Vehicles and other models without a base require a certain percentage / size value of the hull (again, you can use the custom tool for this if you want to be kind of dickish but also iron-clad in removing debate) to be visible both to be targeted AND to fire at targets. This does lead to edge-cases where your land raider can fire all of its guns through a suitably sized window, but it makes cover useful for vehicles and also removes the silliness of shooting all of your guns from a tiny wing-flap / antenna, or taking critical At fire on that same point.

From that point, with TLOS removed and targeting actually functional, terrain could be similarly abstracted (basically bring back 4th edition) so that more than just one type of terrain is useful, and everything doesn't have to be a solid L-shaped block.

Also, as has been noted, lethality should be scaled back immensely. Or GW should take advantage of un-capping stats and start making some units suitably tough in ways beyond invulnerable saves.


Terrain, the 3rd opponent @ 2021/10/22 07:12:24


Post by: Jidmah


You don't even need to invent new sizes when everything is already categorized into swarm, infantry, beast, bikes, vehicles, monster, titanic and aircraft. You could just use those to define a default height for interacting with terrain.


Terrain, the 3rd opponent @ 2021/10/22 09:06:07


Post by: Dysartes


 Jidmah wrote:
You don't even need to invent new sizes when everything is already categorized into swarm, infantry, beast, bikes, vehicles, monster, titanic and aircraft. You could just use those to define a default height for interacting with terrain.

Given INFANTRY covers everything from a Grot up to at least a Custodes - and possibly larger things I can't recall - I can see why people might want something a little more granular.

*grabs Necron and SM 'dexes to look for large INFANTRY*

Hmm... Lokhurst Heavy Destroyers are pretty chunky, and both Skorpekh and Ophidian Destroyers seem quite big, too. I think Centurions are probably the chonkiest INFANTRY in the SM book.

Equally, quickly looking at MONSTER in the Necron book, the Reanimator and Doomstalker present very different heights to many Tyranid MONSTER units.


Terrain, the 3rd opponent @ 2021/10/22 09:34:41


Post by: H.B.M.C.


 Dysartes wrote:
Given INFANTRY covers everything from a Grot up to at least a Custodes - and possibly larger things I can't recall - I can see why people might want something a little more granular.
Nah I'm with Jid on this one. I think the current amount of unit types would be enough for the cover system he's describing. It's plenty granular as it is.

There are weird edge cases and other infantry-based outliers (Oblits, Centurions, Ogryn), so you could introduce the concept of 'heavy infantry' or 'bulky infantry', but otherwise yeah, what Jid says rings true.


Terrain, the 3rd opponent @ 2021/10/22 09:36:17


Post by: Da Boss


I think large infantry as a category would iron out most of the problems.


Terrain, the 3rd opponent @ 2021/10/22 09:42:20


Post by: Jidmah


Terrain is already a super abstract, I believe that there is no need to introduce additional layers of complexity to add a false impression realism to it. It does have to be intuitive, but not realistic.

About infantry, both custodes/centurions and gretchin/rattlings are within an inch in size of your average marine or ork.
I really see no reason to differentiate between models at that level unless you want to have height stats accurate to a tenth of an inch for every model. Which essentially is just a more complicated way of doing TLOS.

For vehicles and monsters, I guess you could introduce an additional divider for smaller and larger models, but I also don't think such a differentiation would really add a lot to the game - there will always be an outlier or two where a cool looking model collides with an abstract rule.

In the end, you have to ask whether it's important to the game that a carnifex receives a different benefit from a 5" tall ruin than a doomstalker, and whether that difference is worth making the game more complex for it. Also keep in mind the implications this has for upgrades like adding wings to a hive tyrant.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/KISS_principle


Terrain, the 3rd opponent @ 2021/10/22 10:01:29


Post by: H.B.M.C.


It's not really adding complexity though, as there are rules in place for transports and how they interact with particularly big models (Centurions, Ogryn, etc.).

Really it would be codifying what that type of infantry is, and applying that rule consistently across the game.


Terrain, the 3rd opponent @ 2021/10/22 10:20:00


Post by: Jidmah


Transport rules, eh?

This model has a transport capacity of 12 FLASH GITZ, SPECIALIST MOB INFANTRY or <CLAN> INFANTRY models. Each MEGA ARMOUR or JUMP PACK model takes up the space of 2 models.


This model has a transport capacity of 20 FLASH GITZ or <CLAN> INFANTRY models. If this model is equipped with a killkannon, it has a transport capacity of 12 FLASH GITZ or <CLAN> INFANTRY models instead. Each MEGA ARMOUR or JUMP PACK model takes up the space of 2 models. If this model has the GOFF keyword and is not equipped with an ’ard case or a kannon, killkannon or zzap gun, it can transport 1 GHAZGHKULL THRAKA. GHAZGHKULL THRAKA takes up the space of 18 models.


Terrain, the 3rd opponent @ 2021/10/22 11:09:41


Post by: Unit1126PLL


I would say those are about as simple as the 39 death guard stratagems divided into 7 categories.


Terrain, the 3rd opponent @ 2021/10/22 11:29:49


Post by: Jidmah


.


Terrain, the 3rd opponent @ 2021/10/22 11:46:32


Post by: Sim-Life




He's referring to when you argued that learning 37 stratagem was a simple afair and anyone who couldn't is stupid, because its ironic that you're now arguing that extra size categories would complicate the game.


Terrain, the 3rd opponent @ 2021/10/22 11:53:50


Post by: Jidmah




Terrain, the 3rd opponent @ 2021/10/22 13:20:28


Post by: Las


 H.B.M.C. wrote:
That's it. And it would be universal.

The game would/should have a list of basic Actions that can be performed during the Command Phase, everything from 'Raise the Banners' to 'Go to Ground' to 'Covering Fire' to 'Sprint*' to 'Rend the Veil**' and so on.

*Give up shooting to roll an extra D6 for Advance.

**Give up casting psychic powers to make it easier for friendly psykers to cast.


Once again I totally agree with you in principle, but I'm not sure these actions make sense in the command phase without some kind of relation to the in-game resource meant to (clumsily) represent command and control (cp).

As you describe these actions, they more resemble the immediate orders of squad leaders that are situationally reacting to the enemy in order to achieve their objectives. To me, these are better represented in the individual phases of the game that relate to the action that is being forgone, which also makes them easier to remember than declaring them all in one phase.

Conversely, I believe that the command phase could better represent the difficulties of battlefield command and control with a few small changes (guard players will recognize this):

1. Represent the chain of command by making stratagems issued by HQ models on the table rather than an omniscient player.

2. Give HQ units a command range beyond which they cannot issue stratagems to units. For army wide stratagems, I'm not sure quite how to represent this but I believe an answer exists. Warlord gets a bonus to this range.

3. For a stratagem to "go off" make the unit receiving the order succeed a leadership test to represent that unit's officer's ability to lead the unit to execute the order.

I do think something like this could work really well and be augmented with simple army-wide rules to represent the particularities of different armies. For example, a couple spit balls:

Synapse - a unit in Synapse rolls 1d6 when making a leadership check to perform a stratagem.

Mob Rule - As long as there are more orks in the unit than the highest leadership value of any model in the unit, this unit automatically passes leadership tests when executing stratagems. If there are less orks than the highest value, roll 3d6.

 H.B.M.C. wrote:
I'm just throwing everything at the wall at the moment - I have a spreadsheet of random 40k ideas I've been adding to every day after my walk covering everything that is at around 350 lines by now - so not everything has coalesced yet, but I think that the core problem of all GW's rules - great idea/terrible execution - is something that can be fixed easily enough.


I'd be very interested in seeing something like this.


Terrain, the 3rd opponent @ 2021/10/22 13:57:41


Post by: Crispy78


 Las wrote:

I'd be very interested in seeing something like this.




Terrain, the 3rd opponent @ 2021/10/22 14:16:21


Post by: Las


Crispy78 wrote:
 Las wrote:

I'd be very interested in seeing something like this.




Whats the deal?


Terrain, the 3rd opponent @ 2021/10/22 15:52:40


Post by: Crispy78


Lame joke that probably loses its limited humour on explanation.

That's what it looks like after HBMC has thrown everything at the wall, sort of thing...


Terrain, the 3rd opponent @ 2021/10/22 15:57:41


Post by: Sim-Life


 Las wrote:
Crispy78 wrote:
 Las wrote:

I'd be very interested in seeing something like this.




Whats the deal?


If only there was some words in the gif you could stick into google to get an explanation.


Terrain, the 3rd opponent @ 2021/10/22 15:59:16


Post by: macluvin


Honestly this abstracted line of sight idea would make the game much more fluid and we already have most of the existing framework for it. The only downside is that tlos offers better immersion but I do think that article I read on why tlos sucks had the right idea; we really need to move away from the idea that an individual model represents an individual piece on the battlefield and start thinking of them more as tokens, and we should think of terrain more as tokens or representation of the battlefield. The cylinder idea might be one of the fundamental keys to making the game more fluid and terrain more effective.


Terrain, the 3rd opponent @ 2021/10/22 16:18:08


Post by: Las


 Sim-Life wrote:
 Las wrote:
Crispy78 wrote:
 Las wrote:

I'd be very interested in seeing something like this.




Whats the deal?


If only there was some words in the gif you could stick into google to get an explanation.


Why are you being sarcastic?

I understand the meme and have seen the always sunny episode. I didn't get what he was referring to exactly. Whats your deal?


Terrain, the 3rd opponent @ 2021/10/22 16:40:35


Post by: macluvin


I think he meant the board of ideas is what he was referencing. What HBMC said that you quoted.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
 Las wrote:
 H.B.M.C. wrote:


 H.B.M.C. wrote:
I'm just throwing everything at the wall at the moment - I have a spreadsheet of random 40k ideas I've been adding to every day after my walk covering everything that is at around 350 lines by now - so not everything has coalesced yet, but I think that the core problem of all GW's rules - great idea/terrible execution - is something that can be fixed easily enough.


I'd be very interested in seeing something like this.


This


Terrain, the 3rd opponent @ 2021/10/22 17:39:58


Post by: Dysartes


 Jidmah wrote:
Terrain is already a super abstract, I believe that there is no need to introduce additional layers of complexity to add a false impression realism to it. It does have to be intuitive, but not realistic.

About infantry, both custodes/centurions and gretchin/rattlings are within an inch in size of your average marine or ork.
I really see no reason to differentiate between models at that level unless you want to have height stats accurate to a tenth of an inch for every model. Which essentially is just a more complicated way of doing TLOS.

For vehicles and monsters, I guess you could introduce an additional divider for smaller and larger models, but I also don't think such a differentiation would really add a lot to the game - there will always be an outlier or two where a cool looking model collides with an abstract rule.

In the end, you have to ask whether it's important to the game that a carnifex receives a different benefit from a 5" tall ruin than a doomstalker, and whether that difference is worth making the game more complex for it. Also keep in mind the implications this has for upgrades like adding wings to a hive tyrant.


The model of a grot or Ratling might be within an inch of a guardsman, and so might a Custodes/Centurion/etc, but within the setting we're talking 3-4 feet of height, let alone the associated bulk - a grot or Ratling is probably between one quarter and one eighth the bulk of a Space Marine, let alone a Custodes or Centurion.

It probably comes down to needing a BULKY keyword (and whatever the opposite would be - SCRAWNY, perhaps?) that means you treat them as one size category larger or smaller for targeting, or something like that. As noted, larger models are already restricted on transport usage, so why not keep the verisimilitude when it comes to how much easier (or harder) it would be to see things within the same "type" bracket.

If you keep the keywords away from being infantry-specific, you can use them for monsters, vehicles, etc, as well, as appropriate.

How important this sort of thing would be will vary by person of course, and whether it is a significant breakpoint in your verisimilitude is up to you. Not doing this would, for me, be as silly as saying that you have a fixed to-hit value in melee, regardless of how competent your opponent is...


Terrain, the 3rd opponent @ 2021/10/22 17:47:47


Post by: catbarf


 Las wrote:
As you describe these actions, they more resemble the immediate orders of squad leaders that are situationally reacting to the enemy in order to achieve their objectives. To me, these are better represented in the individual phases of the game that relate to the action that is being forgone, which also makes them easier to remember than declaring them all in one phase.

Conversely, I believe that the command phase could better represent the difficulties of battlefield command and control with a few small changes (guard players will recognize this):


I've generally felt that if you want to preserve the command point mechanic as a 'booster' resource rather than trying to model C&C, it would be straightforward to draw a line between actions that impose trade-offs and abilities that provide buffs.

So maybe going to ground- improving save at the cost of limiting movement/shooting next turn- is an ability that any unit can do, but an ability that just improves your cover save with no detriment should cost CP and require an officer nearby.

In general I agree that things that squads or units 'just do' shouldn't be tied to command points. My squads shouldn't lose the ability to take cover or pop smoke because the commander is focusing on the wombo-combo on the other side of the battlefield.

macluvin wrote:Honestly this abstracted line of sight idea would make the game much more fluid and we already have most of the existing framework for it. The only downside is that tlos offers better immersion but I do think that article I read on why tlos sucks had the right idea; we really need to move away from the idea that an individual model represents an individual piece on the battlefield and start thinking of them more as tokens, and we should think of terrain more as tokens or representation of the battlefield. The cylinder idea might be one of the fundamental keys to making the game more fluid and terrain more effective.


I'm glad to see more people becoming aware of the unintuitive scale implications of TLOS. Unfortunately, just thinking of models as tokens doesn't necessarily solve it- the 'footprint' of models and terrain still impose odd characteristics. For example, if we hold that the ground scale is 1mm = 1ft (making a human at game scale 'actually' 6mm tall) and we are simply using 28mm models for convenience, then either we need to be using 6mm terrain to match the ground scale, or a cozy little 28mm cottage model will have a board footprint that implies that it is actually a sprawling mansion. There inevitably comes a point where having parts of the game not-to-scale breaks down, and you just kinda have to roll with what feels right and doesn't cause too much heartburn.

My issue with TLOS is more that it ties a very fundamental characteristic of targeting to the static pose of the minis. In a lot of games that use TLOS, you're allowed to sub in a comparable model posed differently to check in those edge cases where poses are relevant. In 40K, your prone sniper by RAW can't stand up to shoot over sandbags, and the sergeant with a sword held in the air to rally the troops is incapable of bringing it down to stay out of sight, helplessly hoisting it over his cover as the bullets ricochet off of it to kill the entire squad huddled with him. That's the kind of crap that makes me strongly dislike 40K's TLOS implementation.


Terrain, the 3rd opponent @ 2021/10/22 20:58:23


Post by: Platuan4th


 Dysartes wrote:
 Jidmah wrote:
Terrain is already a super abstract, I believe that there is no need to introduce additional layers of complexity to add a false impression realism to it. It does have to be intuitive, but not realistic.

About infantry, both custodes/centurions and gretchin/rattlings are within an inch in size of your average marine or ork.
I really see no reason to differentiate between models at that level unless you want to have height stats accurate to a tenth of an inch for every model. Which essentially is just a more complicated way of doing TLOS.

For vehicles and monsters, I guess you could introduce an additional divider for smaller and larger models, but I also don't think such a differentiation would really add a lot to the game - there will always be an outlier or two where a cool looking model collides with an abstract rule.

In the end, you have to ask whether it's important to the game that a carnifex receives a different benefit from a 5" tall ruin than a doomstalker, and whether that difference is worth making the game more complex for it. Also keep in mind the implications this has for upgrades like adding wings to a hive tyrant.


The model of a grot or Ratling might be within an inch of a guardsman, and so might a Custodes/Centurion/etc, but within the setting we're talking 3-4 feet of height, let alone the associated bulk - a grot or Ratling is probably between one quarter and one eighth the bulk of a Space Marine, let alone a Custodes or Centurion.

It probably comes down to needing a BULKY keyword (and whatever the opposite would be - SCRAWNY, perhaps?) that means you treat them as one size category larger or smaller for targeting, or something like that. As noted, larger models are already restricted on transport usage, so why not keep the verisimilitude when it comes to how much easier (or harder) it would be to see things within the same "type" bracket.

If you keep the keywords away from being infantry-specific, you can use them for monsters, vehicles, etc, as well, as appropriate.

How important this sort of thing would be will vary by person of course, and whether it is a significant breakpoint in your verisimilitude is up to you. Not doing this would, for me, be as silly as saying that you have a fixed to-hit value in melee, regardless of how competent your opponent is...


Just copy the Size categories and silhouettes from Infinity. Have a LOS question? Place the silhouette relegated to that size and check.


Terrain, the 3rd opponent @ 2021/10/22 21:52:43


Post by: jeff white


More abstraction e.g. cylinders is not a solution for me.I would prefer a base size plus a standard unit status like gone to ground or pinned or taking cover or hiding etc…


Terrain, the 3rd opponent @ 2021/10/22 22:22:49


Post by: H.B.M.C.


 catbarf wrote:
My issue with TLOS is more that it ties a very fundamental characteristic of targeting to the static pose of the minis. In a lot of games that use TLOS, you're allowed to sub in a comparable model posed differently to check in those edge cases where poses are relevant. In 40K, your prone sniper by RAW can't stand up to shoot over sandbags, and the sergeant with a sword held in the air to rally the troops is incapable of bringing it down to stay out of sight, helplessly hoisting it over his cover as the bullets ricochet off of it to kill the entire squad huddled with him. That's the kind of crap that makes me strongly dislike 40K's TLOS implementation.
The weird part is that it didn't used to be this way. GW explicitly stated that things like antennae, banner poles, gun barrels and other "dramatic posing" was't enough to constitute a valid target.

Why they switched that - I guess to make the game 'easier'? - is just baffling as it's not improved anything.


Terrain, the 3rd opponent @ 2021/10/22 23:52:52


Post by: Insectum7


 H.B.M.C. wrote:
 catbarf wrote:
My issue with TLOS is more that it ties a very fundamental characteristic of targeting to the static pose of the minis. In a lot of games that use TLOS, you're allowed to sub in a comparable model posed differently to check in those edge cases where poses are relevant. In 40K, your prone sniper by RAW can't stand up to shoot over sandbags, and the sergeant with a sword held in the air to rally the troops is incapable of bringing it down to stay out of sight, helplessly hoisting it over his cover as the bullets ricochet off of it to kill the entire squad huddled with him. That's the kind of crap that makes me strongly dislike 40K's TLOS implementation.
The weird part is that it didn't used to be this way. GW explicitly stated that things like antennae, banner poles, gun barrels and other "dramatic posing" was't enough to constitute a valid target.

Why they switched that - I guess to make the game 'easier'? - is just baffling as it's not improved anything.
It is wierd, yeah. They also used to have language about how models didn't 'act' as they were posed. It was also explicitly assumed that they were hugging cover and staying low when necessary.


Terrain, the 3rd opponent @ 2021/10/23 00:50:55


Post by: H.B.M.C.


They went from abstraction to a bizarre form of total literalism, strange for a game where everyone is jumping off rocks.


Terrain, the 3rd opponent @ 2021/10/23 04:22:25


Post by: Spoletta


Honestly that's not where the problem lies right now.

LoS and obscuring are fine, leave them like that. The game just isn't fun when no one can see anyone and anything being seen gets toasted.

What needs work (and actually not much) is the cover system.
I'm ok with a unit fully in the open being an easy target. That's fine and normal. In any game featuring a modern or modern-like warfare, anything that is left out in the open is toasted.
What is not fine, is that cover isn't properly protecting your units.
IMHO, cover (all types) should provide a +1 save bonus. Then the type of cover provides an additional effect over that. Dense cover is a -1 to hit, light cover lets you ignore AP 1 and 2 from shooting, heavy cover is a cramped space, so non-vehicle//monsters get half the attacks (both attacker and defender).

Do this, and the game becomes instantly less lethal. You also provide a limitation for AP 1 and AP2 which are the most impacting AP steps right now.


Terrain, the 3rd opponent @ 2021/10/23 05:41:41


Post by: Racerguy180


 H.B.M.C. wrote:
They went from abstraction to a bizarre form of total literalism, strange for a game where everyone is jumping off rocks.

They're jumping off of those rock so they CAN get LOS on a target....it's just they are also a target.


But it's stupid nonetheless.


Terrain, the 3rd opponent @ 2021/10/23 07:01:52


Post by: H.B.M.C.


As to the discussion of cylinders and whatnot, I prefer defined size categories that everything fits within rather than anything that must be measured.

Whilst largely impossible to remove completly, I feel that imaginary invisible cylinders lead to "modelling for advantage" for more.


Terrain, the 3rd opponent @ 2021/10/23 08:27:57


Post by: Sim-Life


 H.B.M.C. wrote:
As to the discussion of cylinders and whatnot, I prefer defined size categories that everything fits within rather than anything that must be measured.

Whilst largely impossible to remove completly, I feel that imaginary invisible cylinders lead to "modelling for advantage" for more.


Firstly, how do you model for advantage if your models volume is defined by it's base? Secondly, why can't it be both? I'm pretty sure thats how Infinity works. Your models volume is as wide as its base and has high as its category, hence why it has little templates for measuring LoS you can put down.
Spoiler:


Terrain, the 3rd opponent @ 2021/10/23 08:30:15


Post by: Platuan4th


 Sim-Life wrote:
 H.B.M.C. wrote:
As to the discussion of cylinders and whatnot, I prefer defined size categories that everything fits within rather than anything that must be measured.

Whilst largely impossible to remove completly, I feel that imaginary invisible cylinders lead to "modelling for advantage" for more.


Firstly, how do you model for advantage if your models volume is defined by it's base?


Exactly what I was going to say. The defined silhouettes means that you're modeling for modeling since it means squat for the actual LoS of the game.


Terrain, the 3rd opponent @ 2021/10/23 10:45:26


Post by: Unit1126PLL


Some "cylinder" games just have it so the top of the cylinder is the highest point on the model.


Terrain, the 3rd opponent @ 2021/10/23 11:43:16


Post by: endlesswaltz123


Part of the reason why the game is unbalanced at times is because of the pure amount of information players know going into a tournament.

Such information is terrain, and tournaments should have varied boards/tables. Some very heavy density, some around middle, some quite a minimal amount of density.

When you are drawn your opponent, you are also drawn a board at random also. It is then just as much pot luck what board you get as to what opponent you get. You will be guaranteed at least one game on each board type (would need an algorithm of sorts to sort players and tables, it would take a bit of work but it would be possible). Some may get 3 or 4 games on the same type of board, some may get a more varied type of game.

Plan for that then, at which point the best players will still rise to the top but won't be able to guarantee wins necessarily just because their army is incredibly skewed to a take huge advantage of terrain format.

But hey, I'd really mix things up if I ran a tournament anyway, needing to bring an army that can compose a 1000, 1500 and 2000 point list the would be based upon the round, custom games/objectives that also can't be planned for necessarily.... The best players will adapt, everyone else will be challenged and have a good time. Yeah it would be a fair bit of planning/effort on the organisers part, but that's part of the problem I perceive, people just want to run a tournament in a copy and paste format to try and earn some fairly easy money (and as an event organiser myself in sports, people aren't running tournaments for the sake of the game, they want to get some money out of it in the end).


Terrain, the 3rd opponent @ 2021/10/23 15:52:06


Post by: macluvin


Dude the OP blatantly demonstrated that the game doesn’t work unless the board is saturated with line of sight blocking terrain. The discussion is the fact that any other sort of terrain is a mild inconvenience at best when it comes to the first turn advantage, and most alpha strikes shoot/charge right through it. At worst the terrain has one or more of the 75% of terrain rules that are irrelevant.
With the current terrain rules and lethality of the edition, the game is fundamentallly unbalanced and gives a 10% advantage to the first turn.
Unless lethality is scaled back or terrain rules actually significantly reduce shooting effectiveness significantly more so than it does now that first turn advantage is going to dominate who goes first.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
Maybe we need to bring back the 4+ Cover save...


Terrain, the 3rd opponent @ 2021/10/23 16:59:28


Post by: Las


I am definitely pro 4+ blanket cover save over how the game functions right now.



Terrain, the 3rd opponent @ 2021/10/23 19:55:38


Post by: Sarigar


 endlesswaltz123 wrote:
Part of the reason why the game is unbalanced at times is because of the pure amount of information players know going into a tournament.

Such information is terrain, and tournaments should have varied boards/tables. Some very heavy density, some around middle, some quite a minimal amount of density.

When you are drawn your opponent, you are also drawn a board at random also. It is then just as much pot luck what board you get as to what opponent you get. You will be guaranteed at least one game on each board type (would need an algorithm of sorts to sort players and tables, it would take a bit of work but it would be possible). Some may get 3 or 4 games on the same type of board, some may get a more varied type of game.

Plan for that then, at which point the best players will still rise to the top but won't be able to guarantee wins necessarily just because their army is incredibly skewed to a take huge advantage of terrain format.

But hey, I'd really mix things up if I ran a tournament anyway, needing to bring an army that can compose a 1000, 1500 and 2000 point list the would be based upon the round, custom games/objectives that also can't be planned for necessarily.... The best players will adapt, everyone else will be challenged and have a good time. Yeah it would be a fair bit of planning/effort on the organisers part, but that's part of the problem I perceive, people just want to run a tournament in a copy and paste format to try and earn some fairly easy money (and as an event organiser myself in sports, people aren't running tournaments for the sake of the game, they want to get some money out of it in the end).


Tables with varying terrain (not symmetrical) is what many 40K tourneys were years/decades back. It didn't really impact who'd ultimately win the tourneys; better players with the tuned lists won, whether RTT, Ard Boyz, or GTs. Those same players also learned about, at a minimum, what types of terrain and density would be used for an event which impacted their list design. Symmetrical terrain was a response to uneven terrain layouts which held the potential to sway the outcome of the game based on a single dice roll. Tourney players vocalized their concerns and organizers responded to those paying for the events. My first experience with the symmetrical terrain at a large event was Circa NOVA 2012 (5th edition). Some people don't care for it, but looking at the number of large events today which utilize the concept is an indicator the players so pay and attend these events want it or, at least, are accepting of it.

To the OP. I am enjoying the GW layout. I made my own and one can place whatever terrain that suits their aesthetic as it is based on keywords. GW rules explicitly state players can do this. As far as the layout, I found it very challenging in a good way. In most previous games (tourney and pick-up), this particular layout opened up the usage of Defensible, which I rarely had the opportunity to use. There were sufficient LOS blockers as well as usable lanes of fire. Additionally, there is very little issues where one encountered wobbly models; playable terrain. Terrain layout still did not seem to aid flyers or titanic models, but I think that is more a 9th edition issue than terrain layouts.

The only thing I did not care for was how models/terrain pieces could be bumped and slide on the plexiglass. To remedy that, I purchased a set of GW sized tourney bases from 3D6 Wargaming that replicates the plexiglass bases but uses the same material game mats and objectives are made from.

I'm sure more improvements will be made once the GW Tourney circuit ends. I'm confident Mike Brandt will go through and assess what worked and what needed improvement for the next series of tourneys. He has always been open to constructive criticism and adjusts accordingly.





Terrain, the 3rd opponent @ 2021/10/27 20:59:55


Post by: The Servant


If you want to play an actual 3 player game check out Kill Team Dominator 600 (KTD600).

https://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/list/801635.page

Pretty slick and balanced style, but yes terrain is a major factor in it as well.