So lets assume GW rules writers are competent and they can actually design a game and accomplish the intended aim without any major screw ups like wildly over-powered combos etc (unless you want them). Let's also assume we can't deviate TOO far from what 40k is now so you have to stick to a d6 system, IGOUGO, points, CPs, strats etc, what would be ideal for you without going into too much detail?
A conglomeration of 3rd-6th informed by AoS and LotR. Particularly how AoS handles CPs and 'strats' (if we have to have those) and LotR manages less pointless dice rolling.
Biggest thing would be GW writing a design document first and sticking to it for the entire duration.
Make inquisition detachments viable by bringing back specialist character acolytes, adding transports to the list, and bumping acolyte unit size to ten. Revive the concept of chambers militant.
Create more kits for every range except Space Marines until we are closer to parity; ( at the very least, bring back Asdrubael Vect, Duke Sliscus, Baron Sathonyx and Kheradruahk- and give them models this time; maybe Jacobus and Kyrinov for sisters, gnarloc and greater gnarlocs for Tau, etc).
Start including terrain cards/ rules with terrain, and possibly improve terrain rules (can't shoot through area terrain).
Fix the app.
Restore digital codexes.
Formally announce a living edition and the death of edition churn.
Create more kits for every range except Space Marines until we are closer to parity; ( at the very least, bring back Asdrubael Vect, Duke Sliscus, Baron Sathonyx and Kheradruahk- and give them models this time; maybe Jacobus and Kyrinov for sisters, gnarloc and greater gnarlocs for Tau, etc).
I really object to wasting production slots for smaller armies on special characters.
If you want 'parity,' you need units to choose an army from.
Create more kits for every range except Space Marines until we are closer to parity; ( at the very least, bring back Asdrubael Vect, Duke Sliscus, Baron Sathonyx and Kheradruahk- and give them models this time; maybe Jacobus and Kyrinov for sisters, gnarloc and greater gnarlocs for Tau, etc).
I really object to wasting production slots for smaller armies on special characters.
If you want 'parity,' you need units to choose an army from.
Make generic character kits with a lot of options, then add like a head thats named-character specific or something.
Vect : Archon
Sliscus : new generic Corsair HQ Sathonyx : archon on hoverboard
Kheradruakh : Mandrake HQ
boom, 3 new entries in the anemic force org slot that bring new options
Formally announce a living edition and the death of edition churn.
This basically. Digital codexes and stop endless waves of books. In my ideal 40k core rulebook would last at least 10 years and each codex at least 5-6 before being replaced by a new one. Campaigns, new missions, expansions, etc... would be released for free as downloadable PDF.
Anything else ain't that important for me, as I like current 40k a lot, but reducing the dice rolling would be nice as well.
Built for speed of play and clarity of battlefield
Get rid of most rerolls, modifiers, bucket of dice situations.
Most units use only common abilities and have movement and range limited enough that you can see at a glance what they can and can't reach and how much they threaten
Constrain skew/alpha strike lists though FoC, cost, and/or mission structure
A 'simplehammer' concept certainly isn't going to be to everyones taste, cutting away rules and options for the sake of clarity leads back to old questions like "why are stats 1-10 when the game mostly only uses 3-5", and "why doesn't faction X have a unit that can do Y". But I find clear and concise rules have their own charm with actions having clearly defined stakes and outcomes.
If we wouldn't have to stick to the fundamentals, then I would start from the Apoc ruleset, but since it's against the rules of this exercise, then I would be quite close to what 9th edition, because honestly apart from a few major screw ups on the balance side, the game feels "right" to me. So starting from 9th I would change the following:
New cover system. Less based on obscuring elements, but with many types of cover. Cover in general should matter a lot more, providing bonuses like reduced AP, hit penalties, reduced attacks in melee, damage reductions... in general getting creative with cover. Things out of cover should die fast, things in cover should be harder to take out.
New leadership system. Instead of losing one model, the unit is in disarray. The unit cannot contest objectives and automatically fails actions different from "recover". Cannot receive benefits from stratagems and has a -1 to hit. The unit can recover from disarray with the "recover" action. That action can be started at the start of the movement phase and is completed at the end of the shooting phase. Combat attrition checks stays. Units get a -1 Ld for every other allied unit that was destroyed that turn.
Finally, a unit can be the target of one stratagem or command ability per player per phase.
@Voss- for sure I'd want units added too- I'd like Trueborn, Bloodbrides and Haemoxocytes to be datacards with models rather than upgrades for example. But I do want those characters back- especially Vect.
@VladimirHerzog- agreed the generics are more helpful in the long run, and as a Crusader, more useful to me specifically. However, some of these named characters, particularly Vect (and possibly Kheradruahk) are head and shoulders above what a generic character would be, so they would need a card and a kit.
But the generic Corsair HQ? Yeah, for sure, far and away a better choice- afterall, we already have one named Corsair HQ in Yriel; another wouldn't make Corsairs more viable, even if it would give some of what was taken back to the DE.
Units do what their datasheets say - no endless buffs through layers of stratagems, relics, warlord traits, and auras.
No reroll auras. Ever.
Easier/better secondaries. There is too much to remember in a game of matched play currently, and the various secondaries and actions don't help. Things like RND and banners should just be 'in the shooting phase, instead of shooting'.
More varied primary missions.
No more things that go 'on a 2+, some effect'. Just let those things happen.
A significant reduction in lethality. The game should last 5 rounds, not 2/3.
Make an edition last longer. All books released at the start, with campaign books adding new units as the design team creates new stuff.
-Cut back massively on cognitive burden- use USRs when possible, standardize weapons when possible, re-work stratagems to be abilities tied to characters so that their number scales organically to game size.
-Put design effort into play aids. An army's rules should be able to fit on a double-sided quick reference sheet. A codex should not be needed for play.
-Re-work statlines to more directly represent unit capabilities and increase speed of play. If a unit is supposed to be hard to hit, that shouldn't require a special rule. If a unit is supposed to be good in melee that shouldn't require special rules on top of base stats either. Resolving an attack should not require as many as six rolls plus re-rolls to resolve. Modifiers to rolls are good. Modifiers to stats are better. Re-rolls are bad and should be avoided.
-Implement a reaction system, so that units can perform actions in response to enemy activity (eg firing on units moving into their LOS) at the cost of acting in their next turn.
-Scale back AP modifiers; rework vehicles to feel more like vehicles. Better saves and introducing simple directional (front/back, 180 degrees) armor saves might do it.
-Living, digital rules.
And lastly, perhaps most significantly:
-Re-think the core structure of a battle. Consider escalating engagements where armies arrive piecemeal. Consider sideboard mechanics where you can change your list before game start. Consider requisition mechanics where you pick what units to bring in as the battle unfolds. Consider dynamic deployment zones a la Chain of Command. Consider giving players agency over terrain setups or battlefield conditions. Consider asymmetric objectives, asymmetric army sizes, or asymmetric deployment. Move away from both players showing up with equal-points sight unseen lists, randomly determining an objective for both sides, deploying all their forces on the board a simulated hundred feet from the enemy, and then rolling off for first turn in an immediate bloodbath that rewards pre-game number-crunching and skew lists.
Stratagems would become something specific to the mission being played. A few universal ones like Command Reroll, Insane Bravery, etc. and each mission might have one for the attacker and one for the defender.
Command Points would be used for army construction and unit requisition (e.g. pay CP's for detachments and some units like named characters and some units that would be assigned a rarity keyword).
Eliminate Power Level. This is largely an unneeded and unused feature.
Tone down the quantity of bespoke unit abilities.
Tone down the AP and Damage.
Have some forethought and make a plan with how development of the edition should play out. In other words set some strict guidelines for the edition and its codexes. It seems like GW has a product release schedule, but not a development road map and this is why everything feels reactionary and off-the-cuff.
Move away from both players showing up with equal-points sight unseen lists, randomly determining an objective for both sides, deploying all their forces on the board a simulated hundred feet from the enemy, and then rolling off for first turn in an immediate bloodbath that rewards pre-game number-crunching and skew lists.
That would be a gigantic buff to horde armies and armies who are on the top tiers. It would drasticly hurt armies with less granular point distribution among its points per unit. Just imagine rolling something like 1500pts game, and the opponent has knights that cost 400pts. I guess he is going to have to enjoy a 1200 vs 1500pts game. Same for elite armies where squads cost 200-300pts. Specially if GW didn't give those armies any filler options. And this is before even considering the cost of an army and the collection size, and transport. Tell people that they have to take 3000pts by bus or bike to the store, just in case the game ends up beign 1450pts would make some people quit, and others would just ignore it and play what ever is the avarge game size localy.
Overall 9th edition is solid and I even like how the Codizes implement all these faction and subfaction rules, however :
- Alternation / reaction mechanic is needed to make the game more tactically interesting, the HH Leaks look promising for example
- Strats that represent options - no thanks, just give me Upgrades instead
- Reduce strats overall (I like the mechanic basically, though)
- No models no rules and abominations like the Plague Marine datasheet need to die
- Cover needs to be simplified yet more impactful
- LOS back to main body matters, not Banner tip to toe
- Lethality reduced by core rules, mali for movement and distance and make mali stack again
- More interesting morale system, it's good that nobody outright ignores morale like 70% of the factions did in prior editions, but morale should also matter when you fail via pinning, suppression, limited targeting options, whatever
- Proper narrative mission support, even most Crusade missions look just like the boring matched play stuff, give me asymmetrical missions and rules to play with uncommon armies against each other, a game with Daemons, Tau, Pure Grots and Imperial Knights will never be balanced through Codizes alone, but you could give me missions or Tips how to make these matchups work that are more interesting than: just ignore them gunning you down and wait on that circle for 4 turns
Eliminate Power Level. This is largely an unneeded and unused feature.
Maybe in the games & environments YOU play in.
Some of us, those of us who make use of the Crusade system, use it 2-3 times a week & greatly enjoy not having to waste time fiddling with pts on the more granular level you all love.
Some combo of 3rd through 5th with the best parts from each.
Throw stratagems in the bin, same goes for "no model no rules". Any equipment strats are put back into units as options.
Maybe keep the auras from some characters, but only if the designers can actually use their imagination rather than just handing out re-roll 1s like sweeties.
Lethality reduced majorly. All superheavies and LOW are Apocalypse only (get your bloody Primarchs off my table. I don't care).
All books written simultaneously and/or have a bible for how to write them, that the do not deviate from.
Given the parameters of the exercise, I won't list any specific mechanics, because those would deviate from IGOUGO and D6. But, what I generally want from 40K to be is this:
- most buffs/bonuses/modifiers to base stats should be a result of positioning and other board situations, not Gotcha mechanics like Stratagems or permanent auras that result in predefined blobs of units.
- no card game on top of a miniature game
- lethality reduced by up to 90%
- and most importantly (and this will sound like a heresy to a lot of you) - stop awarding any VPs for killing stuff. The necessity to kill stuff should come from clearing path to achieve mission objectives, not a brainless exercise of direct destruction. Especially in this setting, killing yet another 100 of Orks or Imperial Guardsmen is utterly insignificant. In a real war, going in, blowing up the only bridge within 50km and retreating without firing a single shot is usually more efficient in stopping 50 tanks than trying to blow up those 50 tanks in an open battle.
To sum up - I want 40k to be a proper wargame, not a war themed game with a lot of gamey mechanics.
Well, maybe it would be better, if GW concentrated on making match play, that majority plays, then puting effort in to a crusade/narrative, system which can be created by the players wanting to play that way themselfs.
- Reduce lethality across the board. Weapon AP is fine but the default should be 0 and re-rolling shots/wounds should be rare.
- Eliminate Overwatch, let units fire while in melee on their own turn (except maybe Heavy Weapons). But also units can only attack in melee on their own turn (no double melee every turn of the game). Make fleeing from melee dangerous (bring back overrun mechanics). IOW you get to do your thing on your turn, period.
- Reduce amount of Victory Points earned (low double digits is fine, but that's per game, not per TURN)
- Eliminate Stratagems, Relics and Warlord Traits, there's way too much to memorize at a tournament level.
- Eliminate Auras (replace with things for the HQ/Medic/Banner/Chaplain/Ethereal units to do in the Command Phase)
- Roll Psychic into the Command Phase.
- Make Leadership relevant (for example, require a Leadership check to Charge a unit that is in Cover, or to enter Dangerous Terrain). Including for vehicles!
- Make Transports relevant (i.e. deploy after movement should be universal, charging from a vehicle with a Leadership test)
- Bring back Tank Shock.
- Minimize internal faction differences to unit types and weapon choices - Salamanders should not have three pages of rules that are different from three pages of rules for Raven Guard
- Bring back Universal Standard Rules
- Remove random number of shots. You can give flamers 6 shots and a 'no more than one hit per model' rule or something.
- Reduce the size of the rulebook and codexes. Like 1/3 the size for each and the codex shouldn't even be hardbound, a 48pg staple bound is more than enough. GW can put out premium deluxe versions with all the shiny art if they like, but make the game actually portable.
I have written my ideal version of 40k long ago (around 2015) that does not deviate much from the original by that time but tried to add more player interaction without interrupting the active player and just had more streamlined/clear rules in general
(my ideal version of a SciFi Squad/Platoon level game would look different)
That's the system I learned on and had the most fun playing. I've never played anything older than 6th so I'm just going back to the last time I enjoyed 40K.
One in which rules are designed around giving players a wide variety of very different tools so that they have multiple, creative and satisfying ways of posing and silving problems. Rules that concentrate on player agency, areas of interaction and out-of-the-box problem solving rather than spending time on endless chores the game wants them to passively perform (like rolling a few times too many dice).
Lots of thinking, planning and problem solving, lightning fast resolution.
Think Gloomhaven meets Warmachine meets Divinity Original Sin but in epic scale and grimdark future.
Your chosen restrictions limit the potential of this exercise. You basically said, "You can build a house! Any kind you want! But ... It has to follow this blue print and use these predetermined materials."
So I guess I would have to answer ...
I wouldn't be interested.
Bring back 3.5. the greatest edition ever. The one that lasted almost a decade.
Sim-Life wrote: I figured this would be an interesting exercise.
So lets assume GW rules writers are competent and they can actually design a game and accomplish the intended aim without any major screw ups like wildly over-powered combos etc (unless you want them). Let's also assume we can't deviate TOO far from what 40k is now so you have to stick to a d6 system, IGOUGO, points, CPs, strats etc, what would be ideal for you without going into too much detail?
Hairesy wrote: That's the system I learned on and had the most fun playing. I've never played anything older than 6th so I'm just going back to the last time I enjoyed 40K.
That's fair enough.
You might enjoy giving 5th a try, while it was far from flawless it simplifies a lot from 6th - no warp dice-offs, no challenges, no hull points, no fliers(they were in the game, but as skimmers), no snapshots or overwatch, and less randomness and surplus rolling in general.
Wound allocation is a little messy though, if you do give it a try i'd advise treating all upgraded rank and file models in a squad as a single 'group' for complex wound allocation (it will make sense if you read the rules), and requiring wounds within a group be allocated to any already injured models first. +1 on damage rolls against immobilized vehicles wouldn't go amiss either...
- and most importantly (and this will sound like a heresy to a lot of you) - stop awarding any VPs for killing stuff. The necessity to kill stuff should come from clearing path to achieve mission objectives, not a brainless exercise of direct destruction.
100% agree on you with that and i've been preaching it since the days of ITC. Killing stuff in a wargame is its own reward. Being given points for it means you're doubly rewarded for something you would do anyway
VladimirHerzog wrote: Killing stuff in a wargame is its own reward. Being given points for it means you're doubly rewarded for something you would do anyway
Like what Mezmorki, AnomanderRake and many others have done is the ideal-take all the best bits of what 40K was rules wise (3rd-7th) and put them into the same edition.
Mezmorki goes a bit farther than i would by making his own rules. i just imported the best rules versions into the overall best core rules edition (5th)
Things like grenade throwing, snap fire and overwatch make 5th ed a better game. some rules in 5th were worse than other editions. wound allocation comes to mind and the vehicle assault rules (that were much better in 4th). 22 USRs work just fine in 5th, bloating them to 50+ in 7th was a mistake just like all the strats in 9th.
We have been playing this version of 5.5 at our FLGS for years now and we love it.
As for GW? they will never go back, so that type of game is out the window. in order to "fix" what has happened to the game would require a total reset.
They are totally set on sales and not on proper game development, but assuming they did while still wanting players to build armies with high model counts (for high profit margins) they will have to go away from the IGOUGO system and stratagems. they would also need to tone down the size of the factions on the game. there is no way bring it back under control otherwise. the topic on the stupid number/variant scything talons if a symptom of the problem.
The only hope i could see is if they hired Andy Chambers again as a freelance game designers to come in and use his experience over the last decade of working on his own combined with his 40K experience to find a happy solution.
VladimirHerzog wrote: Killing stuff in a wargame is its own reward. Being given points for it means you're doubly rewarded for something you would do anyway
VladimirHerzog wrote: Killing stuff in a wargame is its own reward. Being given points for it means you're doubly rewarded for something you would do anyway
maybe for current 40k, not wargames in general
In what wargames is killing not important?
not (double) rewarded =/= not important
in those were you have the option to keep them out of the game in other ways, and/or were having an engaged unit is better than removing it instantly
even once made the decision to keep the opponent in melee alive an option as it was an easy way to keep the unit out of play while at the same time kept your own unit save from enemy fire (and he needed to put some afford in to get his unit free again)
or looking he unit/fight in place so the it blocks LOS to a more important unit and so on
there are also games that are won only by objective, if the enemy is ahead of points and you kill the last of his units, he wins (and not like the 40k "this is still a los or draw in a tournament, he wins)
not all wargames are about killing the opponent fast and ignore everything else like current 40k (to is more or less a unique feature of 40k were killing fast instead of trying to get into tactical positions first is rewarded)
do not speak of "wargames" in general if you mean 40k, as I would not call 9th a wargame at all (a miniature game is fine, but for a wargame it misses the strategic and tactical depth)
not (double) rewarded =/= not important
in those were you have the option to keep them out of the game in other ways, and/or were having an engaged unit is better than removing it instantly
even once made the decision to keep the opponent in melee alive an option as it was an easy way to keep the unit out of play while at the same time kept your own unit save from enemy fire (and he needed to put some afford in to get his unit free again)
or looking he unit/fight in place so the it blocks LOS to a more important unit and so on
there are also games that are won only by objective, if the enemy is ahead of points and you kill the last of his units, he wins (and not like the 40k "this is still a los or draw in a tournament, he wins)
not all wargames are about killing the opponent fast and ignore everything else like current 40k (to is more or less a unique feature of 40k were killing fast instead of trying to get into tactical positions first is rewarded)
do not speak of "wargames" in general if you mean 40k, as I would not call 9th a wargame at all (a miniature game is fine, but for a wargame it misses the strategic and tactical depth)
I'm not talking about tabling, i'm talking about weakening my opponent as much as possible so that they lose board presence and let me do the actual missions.
I've played 40k and Infinity (small sample size, i know) and sure, in infinity the game can just end if you kill too much stuff but most tournament games i've played, we would just try to drop the opponent as close as possible to that threshold and max out mission points. Thing is you weren't directly rewarded for killing your opponent, it just gave you more breathing room (and helps break up tiebreakers).
Which is universally considered the worst edition ever, even by GW which shelved it after just two years, lol.
Worked for me and my old group. Somehow the new "stand in an aura bubble and shoot" just didn't work for me. Then again I used to run Berzerkers in Rhinos, so really I should be used to things not working.
My extremely realistic and idealised version is the current game, but the GW app developers are competent and GW cease and desist lawyers are hyper efficient.
What this results in is the following:
An amazing app that is so good all players use it to play and record all their games of 9th edition 40k. Every single one.
The app has a built in forum for players to discuss the game called nu-dakkadakka.
The C&D lawyers then shut down this forum and all other forums/social media for the game. God, they are so hyper efficient the C&D letter arrives the day before you try to open a new forum!
All conversation is now "by law" forced onto the nu-dakkadakka forum.
Whenever you see a post from anyone on nu-dakkadakka you can inspect their profile which shows their app based gaming history.
This shows games played, win/loss and a host of other information (factions used, units used, per game scores).
By default the filter for nu-dakkadakka doesn't show posts from those who don't play the best game ever (9th edition 40k of couse). You would have to opt in to see their posts but no one ever does.
Wouldn't it be interesting to actually talk to people who play the game? I wonder how empty this thread would be?
And wouldn't it be fascinating when discussing one of your factions in their tactics thread and if a contrarion poster is (using a completely random made up example here) telling you that 10 Scarab Occult is not the way to play TSons, and you can see whether their win rate is better or worse than yours?
Finally it would be interesting if on this competent app you could also look up the profiles of the rules writers and see what they play and their win rates. And you can (and are in fact encouraged) to send them non threatening messages basically consisting of the flawless and perfect app data on Harlequin win rates with pictures of clowns and the words "you?" in comic sans at the bottom.
EightFoldPath wrote: My extremely realistic and idealised version is the current game, but the GW app developers are competent and GW cease and desist lawyers are hyper efficient.
What this results in is the following: An amazing app that is so good all players use it to play and record all their games of 9th edition 40k. Every single one. The app has a built in forum for players to discuss the game called nu-dakkadakka. The C&D lawyers then shut down this forum and all other forums/social media for the game. God, they are so hyper efficient the C&D letter arrives the day before you try to open a new forum! All conversation is now "by law" forced onto the nu-dakkadakka forum. Whenever you see a post from anyone on nu-dakkadakka you can inspect their profile which shows their app based gaming history. This shows games played, win/loss and a host of other information (factions used, units used, per game scores). By default the filter for nu-dakkadakka doesn't show posts from those who don't play the best game ever (9th edition 40k of couse). You would have to opt in to see their posts but no one ever does.
Wouldn't it be interesting to actually talk to people who play the game? I wonder how empty this thread would be?
And wouldn't it be fascinating when discussing one of your factions in their tactics thread and if a contrarion poster is (using a completely random made up example here) telling you that 10 Scarab Occult is not the way to play TSons, and you can see whether their win rate is better or worse than yours?
Finally it would be interesting if on this competent app you could also look up the profiles of the rules writers and see what they play and their win rates. And you can (and are in fact encouraged) to send them non threatening messages basically consisting of the flawless and perfect app data on Harlequin win rates with pictures of clowns and the words "you?" in comic sans at the bottom.
That sounds atrocious.
Like, say I'm a new player. I want to ask around, see what factions might fit me. But, because I don't have the app yet or have no games registered, I can't make a post anyone else sees.
I sincerely hope this post was sarcasm.
Edit: Also, I don't think a C&D would shut this forum down. There's no legal basis for that.
An amazing app that is so good all players use it to play and record all their games of 9th edition 40k. Every single one.
This will never happen as long as I'm alive. I literally HATE doing computer things on my phone. Any screen less than 12" makes me physically uncomfortable, and I hate screen touch keyboards SOOOO much that I wish texting had never been invented.
Don't get me wrong- I still want GW to make an awesome app for those who will use one, and I believe that a digital model is essential to get the living ruleset and persistent edition that I want out of the game.
But don't expect me to use a phone as anything but a phone and possibly an MP3 player unless it is a dire emergency or I'm being paid to do it, because cellphone screens and keyboards are not, never have been, and never could be fun for me. If I can run the app on a windows laptop, we're good.
Go back to 5th edition. Sure it had issues, but if it had the same level of rule support we have today it would have been great.
All it needed was a good core rules FAQ to fix up things like multi-wound models. Then some point changes and FAQ's to tone down factions like GK and SW. In particularly the former.
Skirmish game that has either and interleaved turn structure, or some other turn structure that absolutely isnt UGOIGO, which uses a lot of granularity in how wide and vast the options are for building "army" or "warband" of "team" or whatever. Nothing more than 25ish models. Maybe 30 if youre playing a weenie horde warband. But that would be the exception, not the rule. Regardless, it's focused on low model counts and diversity and creativity of the team build to overcome the obstacles of the scenario.
A largely narrative game that relies on building scenarios to be played that uses mostly infantry type models, but does allow some wiggle room for vehicles and such.
It also introduces aggressive flora and fauna environmental effects, depending on the mission or some other random influence.
Basically, I want 40K Warcry, but with a lot better balanced fighter profiles, and more granularity when it comes to equipment.
It's a tough line to tight balance on, since I am asking for simplicity in gameplay resolution, with a wide variety of options to explore.
But then again, the primary focus is on narrative revelation, so it doesnt have to be a balanced game engine, but some thought in that regard would still be welcome.
And no, not killteam. Especially not with how fireteams are composed. Barf.
My extremely realistic and idealised version is the current game, but the GW app developers are competent and GW cease and desist lawyers are hyper efficient.
What this results in is the following:
An amazing app that is so good all players use it to play and record all their games of 9th edition 40k. Every single one.
The app has a built in forum for players to discuss the game called nu-dakkadakka.
The C&D lawyers then shut down this forum and all other forums/social media for the game. God, they are so hyper efficient the C&D letter arrives the day before you try to open a new forum!
All conversation is now "by law" forced onto the nu-dakkadakka forum.
Whenever you see a post from anyone on nu-dakkadakka you can inspect their profile which shows their app based gaming history.
This shows games played, win/loss and a host of other information (factions used, units used, per game scores).
By default the filter for nu-dakkadakka doesn't show posts from those who don't play the best game ever (9th edition 40k of couse). You would have to opt in to see their posts but no one ever does.
Wouldn't it be interesting to actually talk to people who play the game? I wonder how empty this thread would be?
And wouldn't it be fascinating when discussing one of your factions in their tactics thread and if a contrarion poster is (using a completely random made up example here) telling you that 10 Scarab Occult is not the way to play TSons, and you can see whether their win rate is better or worse than yours?
Finally it would be interesting if on this competent app you could also look up the profiles of the rules writers and see what they play and their win rates. And you can (and are in fact encouraged) to send them non threatening messages basically consisting of the flawless and perfect app data on Harlequin win rates with pictures of clowns and the words "you?" in comic sans at the bottom.
I always wondered how fascism is so alive and well, then I read stuff on the internet and am reminded quite quickly.
EightFoldPath wrote: My extremely realistic and idealised version is the current game, but the GW app developers are competent and GW cease and desist lawyers are hyper efficient.
What this results in is the following:
An amazing app that is so good all players use it to play and record all their games of 9th edition 40k. Every single one.
The app has a built in forum for players to discuss the game called nu-dakkadakka.
The C&D lawyers then shut down this forum and all other forums/social media for the game. God, they are so hyper efficient the C&D letter arrives the day before you try to open a new forum!
All conversation is now "by law" forced onto the nu-dakkadakka forum.
Whenever you see a post from anyone on nu-dakkadakka you can inspect their profile which shows their app based gaming history.
This shows games played, win/loss and a host of other information (factions used, units used, per game scores).
By default the filter for nu-dakkadakka doesn't show posts from those who don't play the best game ever (9th edition 40k of couse). You would have to opt in to see their posts but no one ever does.
Wouldn't it be interesting to actually talk to people who play the game? I wonder how empty this thread would be?
And wouldn't it be fascinating when discussing one of your factions in their tactics thread and if a contrarion poster is (using a completely random made up example here) telling you that 10 Scarab Occult is not the way to play TSons, and you can see whether their win rate is better or worse than yours?
Finally it would be interesting if on this competent app you could also look up the profiles of the rules writers and see what they play and their win rates. And you can (and are in fact encouraged) to send them non threatening messages basically consisting of the flawless and perfect app data on Harlequin win rates with pictures of clowns and the words "you?" in comic sans at the bottom.
Yah, nobodies going to enter any false reports into this.....
40k and infinity aren't wargames? And can you name a game where killing has no benefit? not just "situationally no benefit". I'm legitimately curious.
current 40k is not a wargame, a miniatures game or mass-skirmish, Infinity is a skirmish game
and depending in the version of the original Kriegsspiel (Wargame), and other games were resources are a thing the opponent need to take care of damaged units (reinforcements, "healing" or similar, so you get the decision to kill the unit or let the opponent waste resources on it, also damaged/fleeing units have the chance to lower the moral of other units etc.)
Stargrunt needed you to invest way to much in killing other units that it more or less put you in a disadvantage if you focused in killing instead of pinning and outmaneuver
in Battlegroup, un-pinning a unit gives the same disadvantage as a killed unit, but it is way harder to kill something unless the opponent is doing something stupid, so trying to pin as many units as possible is the better option than trying to kill them.
in old versions of Warhammer you got the choice to let the opponents unit flee out of combat with the chance that it could get back or takes other units on the field with them (so not killing it was better as it could remove other units as well without putting your unit in an exposed position)
in 40k/AoS there is no alternative to killing a unit, or even the need to waste resources in doing it (not even situational)
so yeah, awarding additional points for killing the units is stupid here as there is no real other option anyway (but this is not a "wargame" thing)
Actually, I think that the ideal game will attract a different player base or at least encourage a different mindset amongst hobbyists who play the game a lot, enthusiastically… even so called competitively. In this ideal game, no one uses the word meta for example, or build, or so often talks about lists and win rates instead of collections and scenarios.
That and bring back templates, make the ranges and moves generally shorter, tables larger, forces smaller, make armor act like armor, facings, morale, crossfire, overwatch markers, … las pistols cannot hurt tanks, yada.
Forces, in terms of models, are already small for the standards of the history of 40k.
They're basically the same armies we had in 3rd edition in terms of quantity of models. If not less, since this edition pushes for elite armies and punishes hard any horde force.
It's creep size that is increased, now we see much bigger (and expensive) stuff, that's why people adapted higher formats to fit everything. So basically what is really higher than older edition is just the points format and the size of some models.
8th was an excpetion due to how CPs worked. The edition encouraged to spam cheap troops to get access to CPs. Even elite oriented armies fell into that trap, with tons of scouts or allied guardsmen for imperium forces. My orks were flat out unplayable without 90-150 troop models (which were only 15% to 35% of the points budget on a 2000 points list).
That what one of the biggest reasons why I didn't like 8th edition.
Thankfully that nonsense ended in 9th.
Yeah, points went up for lots of stuff but optimized lists in 9th are very different from optimized lists in 8th, and the latter would certainly have much more models. But in 7th pretty much every faction played with less models than 8th.
I'm talking about doing a model by model comparison.
My nid army from 7th edition would not fit with its current points for example.
Marines incredibly so, just consider how much changed the cost of vehicles, centurions and basic troops.
A 7th demi company would probably be 4000 points now!
Well, for me it would have to be AA instead of IGOUGO.
Other than that, I'd want it to support suppression and impactful morale rules, a turn or two of maneuvering before each side slams into the other, slimmed-down dice rolling and a typical battle size of around 4-5 squads + 1-2 vehicles; something that can easily be finished in an hour or two.
And a ruleset that can last 8-10 years without a major reboot.
Spoletta wrote: I'm talking about doing a model by model comparison.
My nid army from 7th edition would not fit with its current points for example.
Marines incredibly so, just consider how much changed the cost of vehicles, centurions and basic troops.
A 7th demi company would probably be 4000 points now!
Fair, I was talking about optimized lists and common archetypes on average instead, comparing what was common to field in each edition rather than considering the same lists over multiple editions.
I was talking about the number of models factions use or used to get in each edition typically. And compared to older editions the number of models required to field optimized armies isn't higher, in fact I even think in several case it's even much lower, we just field more expensive stuff now. Things that once were much more limited or simply too expensive or ineffective to field in multiples.
Spoletta wrote: A 7th demi company would probably be 4000 points now!
7th is a bad example because of all the free units you got, it was designed that way that people play with 4k points worth of models in a 2k point game
but looking back at 3rd/4th, a 2k point army would fit into a 1,5k point game of 9th
Spoletta wrote: A 7th demi company would probably be 4000 points now!
7th is a bad example because of all the free units you got, it was designed that way that people play with 4k points worth of models in a 2k point game
but looking back at 3rd/4th, a 2k point army would fit into a 1,5k point game of 9th
Yes, I was using an extreme exemple. But just compare the cost of drop pods and tactical marines. This will give you an idea.
Roll all faction rules back to where they were in May-July 2019 (after the Castellan/Ynnari slaying big FAQ and before Marines 2.0 nuked the edition).
Have a half way sensible CA to polish certain rough edges that existed and may be exacerbated by the change.
I guess the alternative if you liked some of the things in Psychic Awakening (and say Codex Necrons) is "roll things back to the first 6 months of 9th but Marines are just banned".
The net result is just 9th edition but with less lethality and rules bloat.
I think it's possible to make a good game somewhat within the constraints of the OP, I'd go about it like...
Reduce the capability of units to reduce lethality. By that I don't just mean reduce strength and AP, I mean everything. Reduce movement speeds across the board, say 5" for standard infantry, 9" for bikes and jump troops.
Reduce the manoeuvrability of weaponary, so returning to 5th edition rules for rapid fire, assault, heavy, etc. Also add a "basic" weapon that just doesn't do anything special.
Remove charge moves, they should just be an extension of normal movement. For the sake of working within the current system, I'd say charges can only be made if you didn't move, and are move+d6" or similar.
Strategems are cut down dramatically. There are perhaps 2 core strategems per phase, and they're all centered on commanders.
If we can't go AA, there should be a reaction system. Reactions that, if used, prevent you doing the action next turn to stop them being "bonus abilities".
Uptonius wrote: Your chosen restrictions limit the potential of this exercise. You basically said, "You can build a house! Any kind you want! But ... It has to follow this blue print and use these predetermined materials."
So I guess I would have to answer ...
I wouldn't be interested.
Bring back 3.5. the greatest edition ever. The one that lasted almost a decade.
Well if you just let people say whatever their ideal 40k was we'd end up with a totally new game in most cases. GW doesn't want to reboot the game again so we're stuck with certain aspects of design (IGOUGO, d6 for sure, CP and strats probably) for another few decades.
Uptonius wrote: Your chosen restrictions limit the potential of this exercise. You basically said, "You can build a house! Any kind you want! But ... It has to follow this blue print and use these predetermined materials."
So I guess I would have to answer ...
I wouldn't be interested.
Bring back 3.5. the greatest edition ever. The one that lasted almost a decade.
Well if you just let people say whatever their ideal 40k was we'd end up with a totally new game in most cases. GW doesn't want to reboot the game again so we're stuck with certain aspects of design (IGOUGO, d6 for sure, CP and strats probably) for another few decades.
Well, since we can't expect deviating from D6 based IGOUGO, and GW clearly thinks that one shotting is a good mechanics (they just released AOS character that can one shot anything with a single die roll), the best thing that could happen to 40K is taking this to the extreme:
- let just everything one shot everything on 4+, then you can buff or debuff this roll via stratagems card game, special rules and on board placement of units. If the roll is failed, then the unit loses some offensive capabilities (like, the next time it shoots it one shots a thing on a 5+) and if the unit is shot a second time, no roll is made, it is removed from the game outright.
This results in exactly the same gameplay as it is today, the entire affair just takes 15 minutes instead of two hours and you roll a single die instead of a 100+ dice per attack. The time density of decision making increases significantly and you can play 4-5 games in an evening, so now best-of-3 or best-of-5 matches are possible, so the inherent Alpha strike problem is less of a deal, the entire rulebook is just two or three pages and codices are 5-10 pages of rules. A nice, portable, fast, "no nonsense" game, that is more useful for tournaments and is 90% focused on list building with symmetrical missions and rigid terrain maps.
And then make a second version for narrative players, with all minutiae of a proper wargame, specifically designed for narrative players with all those templates, vehicle facings, focus on asymmetric missions and all those fluffy stuff tournament players consider bloat. Codices are full of background and non-rules content, special rules introduce mechanics outside of core rules/stats etc.
Basically, separate those two incompatible audiences on the foundation level while feeding them the same basic idea of full scale 40K.
I think 9th is the best edition ever, but it could use a few tweaks.
- Tone the lethality down to where it was with the 9th edition Marine & Necron codex release (maybe DG). I think the lethality is representative of a 41st millennium battlefield. But now where armies are being tabled in 2 turns is just ridiculous (apparently being tabled in 1 turn like SoCal is too much, but 2 turns is fine... o.O)
- GW needs to literally FIRE (terminate job employment) those people responsible for DE, Eldar, Custodes, Tau and Harli codexes, and the managers/salespeople/etc. who promoted this Codex creep. While they're at it, bring those codexes back in line
- I'm fine with Strats, WLTs, etc., just not so many of them on the battlefield at once. A Strat used every turn (or every 3/5 turns) shouldn't be a strat, it should be baked into the weapon profile, or make most of them 1-use only (like Insane Bravery). Let them actually be 'Heroic Moments' and not "Rambo & Commando part MMMCMXCIX"
- I like the Primary and Secondary VP system. Killing (which is so easy in 9th) should not be max reward, it should be capped at 10, as should those secondaries that don't involve leaving your DZ. Easier Secondaries like RND should be capped at 12, while hard Secondaries capped at 15. Now you can play hordes and/or tanks and not be auto-lose, and armies can't sit in their DZ (or just outside it) and have a big advantage.
- Less stuff ignoring cover. Cover is pretty meaningful at it's core, however the amount of stuff ignoring cover, either in shooting or movement is just too much, making cover almost meaningless.
- Drop the AP of all weapons by 1, and the Damage of most weapons by 1, and Character Wounds by 1-2, and drop mechanics like -1D, and drop most INV and FNP saves by 1. 2D weapons should be something REALLY special. This boosts the Marine 2W to mean something, toning down lethality creep, and leaving us where weapons like overcharged Plasma Guns at 2D really mean something.
Move away from both players showing up with equal-points sight unseen lists, randomly determining an objective for both sides, deploying all their forces on the board a simulated hundred feet from the enemy, and then rolling off for first turn in an immediate bloodbath that rewards pre-game number-crunching and skew lists.
That would be a gigantic buff to horde armies and armies who are on the top tiers. It would drasticly hurt armies with less granular point distribution among its points per unit. Just imagine rolling something like 1500pts game, and the opponent has knights that cost 400pts. I guess he is going to have to enjoy a 1200 vs 1500pts game. Same for elite armies where squads cost 200-300pts. Specially if GW didn't give those armies any filler options. And this is before even considering the cost of an army and the collection size, and transport. Tell people that they have to take 3000pts by bus or bike to the store, just in case the game ends up beign 1450pts would make some people quit, and others would just ignore it and play what ever is the avarge game size localy.
The thing I find most frustrating in these threads is always the people who jump straight to 'that won't work' with no thought given to how else a game might change to accommodate the proposed alterations. Particularly when they invent straw men to critique: who said anything about bringing 3000pts to every game or rolling for battle size?
Maybe you'd bring 2000pts and have a 2000pt game, but only start with 500pts on the board, and bring in some fraction of the remainder with each new turn. Maybe you'd have some ability to recycle units and in effect field more than 2K points over the course of the game. Maybe you'd bring 2000pts with the expectation that you're using 1500pts of it, with 500pts of leftover sideboard. Maybe your roster would be fixed but your units could swap around wargear pre-game, so you're not bringing heavy bolters against Knights. Maybe you could spend leftover points on non-army assets like artillery or air strikes. Maybe you'd have influence on what objectives you get. Maybe you'd have influence on battlefield conditions (Night fighting? Mud? Comms interference? Smoke? Minefields?) that could help or hinder your army. Maybe you'd have control over deployment zones via a pre-game scouting mechanic. Maybe a combination of the above.
The point is that there's no intrinsic reason why the game has to revolve around building a fixed army list before your opponent, goals, or battlefield are known, determining the objective completely at random, then deploying your force in its entirety within the effective range of the enemy. That paradigm is a frequent contributor to balance and gameplay issues and there are a multitude of ways to address it that have been successfully used in other games.
A game doesn't run on maybies. It runs on math, rules and interaction of both of those, influanced by GW policy to sell models and have people play with armies as large as it possible for the avarge player to run. If w40k was or would have been able to be balanced at lower points, within GW own rules structure people would be playing it. I don't think many people dream of having to buy 5 NDKS or 9 voidweavers, if they could play games with 1/5th of those they would. But w40k rule set does not work well when it gets downgraded to smaller points.
And the reasons to build an army and have structure in the game, are the same reason why we have rules in sports. The times of "football" being two villages fighting it out with brass knuckles and clubs etc are gone. A lot of people enjoy the fact that they can go to another store or another town, and know that there they can also play a 2000pts matched play game of w40k. No matter how broken it is. And there are very few people who would want to get informed that at the given store, this month, the game is played with no monsters, cut FA and HVY slots or some other wierd house rules. And the why for it are easy to explain to. When I buy to play a 2000pts army I expect to play with it, at least for an edition. I, and I think many people too, don't want to be in a situation where some social and not company enforced rules make you unable to play, make the game even less fun to play etc.
As side boards go. They only work for armies that have units worth taking over what is an 2000pts list. There is also a problem of different armies being cut, point wise, in different ways. Adding 100-200pts to an horde army is different then adding something to an elite one. And with all games requing duplication for most units to be effective the side board would be, maybe a buff to armies tau or eldar. It would also create huge problems for new players. They already struggle to get 2000pts of a semi optimised list to play, if now they would have to have side boards for multiple factions we are talking about investing more money. Or more feels bad time if they can't afford it or their army doesn't have side board units worth taking.
Maybe you'd bring 2000pts and have a 2000pt game, but only start with 500pts on the board, and bring in some fraction of the remainder with each new turn.
Aha okey. So my units come in 200/400pts cost units. Assuming I run MSU. Characters cost the same or more. 500pts means I can bring one or two units. Meanwhile someone like an eldar player will deploy 5 of his void weavers or similar hyper efficient unit, and blow my units off the table. And then with our forces both arriving in parts, he would each turn get more and more of an adventage. If he went first and we were playing on a normal board, there maybe not even much need to play past turn 1, to check what is going to happen.
catbarf wrote: The point is that there's no intrinsic reason why the game has to revolve around building a fixed army list before your opponent, goals, or battlefield are known, determining the objective completely at random, then deploying your force in its entirety within the effective range of the enemy.
But there are practical reasons - you have to transport your army to and from games, you don't really want to be transporting a dozen armies worth of models so that you have a suitable selection of choices to pick from once you know what your opponent has and what the objective is.
Home field advantage / pay to win aside there is the issue of list tailoring - some factions (historically) are better at certain match-ups, or certain objectives, or certain table setups. All things that need to be considered when considering the benefits of building to a known target against a system that tries to encourage more adaptable all-comers lists.
As for deploying within effective range of the enemy - that is a movement and attack distance issue. Plenty of games in earlier editions of 40k would start out with little or no shooting of note on the first turn.
Karol wrote: A game doesn't run on maybies. It runs on math, rules and interaction of both of those, influanced by GW policy to sell models and have people play with armies as large as it possible for the avarge player to run.
For feths sake, you're in a thread asking people what their ideal version of 40k WOULD be. Its ALL theoretical and obviously means that GW's gak policies wouldnt take place. Have some imagination, just because we say "i'd like to see X in the game" doesn't mean Y-Z wouldn't get changed.
Aha okey. So my units come in 200/400pts cost units. Assuming I run MSU. Characters cost the same or more. 500pts means I can bring one or two units. Meanwhile someone like an eldar player will deploy 5 of his void weavers or similar hyper efficient unit, and blow my units off the table. And then with our forces both arriving in parts, he would each turn get more and more of an adventage. If he went first and we were playing on a normal board, there maybe not even much need to play past turn 1, to check what is going to happen.
again, have some imagination. in an indeal world, voidweavers probably wouldn't be so cheap. Or maybe your dudes wouldn't be as expensive if you didnt only bring terminators. At one point you have to realise that not ever list is equal (and that goes for any wargame, no matter how balanced). If i show up to a game of infinity with 14 fusilier and one TAG, i'm gonna get fethed, even if the game does balance really well.
Stop with your repetitive "woe is me" about the lot you got off ebay.
As for deploying within effective range of the enemy - that is a movement and attack distance issue. Plenty of games in earlier editions of 40k would start out with little or no shooting of note on the first turn.
which is what catbarf seems to be looking for in their ideal version of 40k.
VladimirHerzog wrote: which is what catbarf seems to be looking for in their ideal version of 40k.
I know thats what I would like to see.
I just disagree with tagging it onto the blind army lists, random objectives, and setup.
From personal experience many of the shortest and most one-sided games of 40k have involved list tailoring and building towards known factors. Locally one of the reasons we used to allow heavy proxying was to avoid this very issue of being able to pre-empt a list based on what models you knew an opponent had available.
A game where fire and maneuver along with combined arms tactics are the emphasis.
Give me pinning, flanking, armor facing, and morale mechanics.
Aircraft should return to a form more similar to how they were in 7th edition. NO charging supersonic flyers with dudes on jetpacks only going like 50mph, or flame throwers attacking jets. Get an AA gun or another flyer if you want to do that.
A deployment mechanic similar to chain of command would be cool as well.
The game really should be played on a larger board, not a smaller one. 4x6ft should be the minimum table size for 2k points. Ideally it'd be larger to emphasize maneuver even more.
Deep strike should not be automatic or predictable for either party.
A.T. wrote:But there are practical reasons - you have to transport your army to and from games, you don't really want to be transporting a dozen armies worth of models so that you have a suitable selection of choices to pick from once you know what your opponent has and what the objective is.
Well, I gave different examples of how you could implement sideboard mechanics without needing any more models than you currently field. And altering mission objectives or deployment has nothing to do with how many models you bring. I don't think expecting players to own 3K of models to play a 2K game is reasonable or realistic, which is why I never suggested it to begin with. So I'm not sure why you and Karol are talking about having to bring tons of extra models.
A.T. wrote:Home field advantage / pay to win aside there is the issue of list tailoring - some factions (historically) are better at certain match-ups, or certain objectives, or certain table setups. All things that need to be considered when considering the benefits of building to a known target against a system that tries to encourage more adaptable all-comers lists.
List tailoring is a problem because it isn't accounted for in the rules. The game's balancing mechanisms assume this take-all-comers style where units frequently overperform in specific matchups (eg tailoring), are never taken because their niche is too specialized to be worth including in a TAC list, or have wildly inconsistent utility depending on the context.
Similarly, random objectives create balancing issues. A fast army might be great at asset retrieval but decidedly not great at take and hold. GW's apparent solution to this problem has been to make the objectives as bland, symmetrical, and consistent as possible so that every TAC list is building to functionally the same objectives ahead of time. Then there's terrain- planet bowling ball and wall-to-wall jungle have wildly different impact on the gameplay, so competitive events use bland, symmetrical, consistent terrain, and more interesting setups can easily result in poor gameplay experience.
Assuming some level of list/objective/deployment tailoring in the rules makes for a more robust system. Rather than balancing units in a vacuum (handling skew with brute-force solutions), then having to design missions and terrain setups that can't inconsistently favor some armies over others, you can instead balance units around the assumption that they'll be taken in a suitable environment or against ideal targets- either because players will be swapping out the units that are inappropriate, or because they'll be pushing for objective/deployment conditions that favor them.
The goal is not to encourage all-comers lists per se. It's to make the game more resilient to skew, diverse missions, or non-ITC-standard battlefields by allowing lists to tailor in response to those factors and/or giving players more direct control over those factors. There's already a hint of this concept in the form of secondary objectives, which you choose after reviewing the mission/battlefield/opponent's army, and can (at least in theory- I have criticisms of the implementation) counter skew.
Chain of Command has built-in list tailoring and it works well. You don't take panzerschrecks if the enemy has no tanks, so panzerschrecks can be balanced around the assumption that you'll be using them on tanks, and you never have the situation where you brought anti-tank against all infantry. On the flipside, if you try to load up on tanks, your opponent then has the opportunity to take anti-tank in response and hard-counter your attempted skew. And if you show up to a game and the battlefield is bocage, you haven't lost before it even starts because your list isn't suited to it; you just take flamethrowers instead of field guns.
And Dust Warfare has a system for tailoring battlefield conditions, where both players have points to spend on pre-game conditions along three tracks. You might be able to guarantee that your gunline army gets daylight and clear weather by spending your points on that track, but your opponent will then be free to push for closer deployment. There's a give-and-take that allows counteracting skew and creates for more variety.
Nothing I'm suggesting is particularly novel. I've played games that feature these sorts of mechanics, and I really don't think it would be a huge lift to retrofit any of them onto 40K.
A.T. wrote:As for deploying within effective range of the enemy - that is a movement and attack distance issue. Plenty of games in earlier editions of 40k would start out with little or no shooting of note on the first turn.
I agree. In an ideal world we certainly could scale back movement and attack ranges so that there's a turn or two of closing to contact like we used to have; although that's a much bigger lift than tweaking core rules. I also don't think it necessarily has to be one or the other- I'd be all for a general reduction in engagement range and more interesting deployment.
At the very least, a deployment style like AOS's Meeting Engagement would make for a more drawn out experience that is less likely to be decided via snowballing turn 2.
- GW needs to literally FIRE (terminate job employment) those people responsible for DE, Eldar, Custodes, Tau and Harli codexes, and the managers/salespeople/etc. who promoted this Codex creep. While they're at it, bring those codexes back in line
Agree with a lot of your points, but wanted to mention something here:
DE, Eldar (which includes Harlies BTW) and Tau are three of the top five best Crusade Armies. The Crusade section of these books is some of the best work GW has done in years. The only two from the top five that are missing are GSC and Sisters.
So my proposal, instead of firing these guys, is to allow them to follow and develop their particular genius; I would make them responsible for ALL of the Crusade content. I'd also finance Crusade a bit differently- I'd release a single Crusade book and a single matched play book per season. These books would include rules and missions for the entire campaign. It's fewer resources to sell (Vigilus- 1 book, 2 Mission Packs (so far); Charadon and Octarius- 2 books, 2 MP). This is just two books. But they'd be better value, and done properly, they'd be worth an extra $10-20.
And just because the game has cp and stratagems doesn’t mean that they need to be used. Imho the perfect game would offer layers of optional card gamey bling on top of a substantial rules system which is also layered, allowing for simpler mechanics governing basic games like d&d basic box rules, and advanced rules that can be added in as desired, before there are any more random nonsense noise layered on top but, sure, people might like the basic system plus the CCG gamey elements and this should be possible for them, too…
Roll all faction rules back to where they were in May-July 2019 (after the Castellan/Ynnari slaying big FAQ and before Marines 2.0 nuked the edition).
I'd say to Index stalines. Or better yet, delete all the gak stat inflation from the last three editions or so, no handing out BS/WS 3+ like candy, demons and eldar go back to 4+, 3+ goes back to elite units only. 5+ armour being default again on mooks, 4+ for elite units, 3+ being reserved to power armor/elite necrons. No 2+ to hit on HQs (or especially comically, Eldar mook units), Wraith units need psyker handlers again, no bucket of mortal wounds Tau gun gak, W1 squats, no mass D2 spam without drawbacks such as gets hot, no orkstodes, no S5 guns on chaffiest Tyranids, none of the power creep cheese introduced recently
catbarf wrote: -Cut back massively on cognitive burden- use USRs when possible
I really like people repeat this comical statement when it does the exact opposite of cutting back on cognitive burden. I tried to test new, leak dreads from HH recently and was starkly reminded why I hate that gak - having to pause game to check SIX "USR" on ONE gun in different book then go check what NINE "USR" do for MC (having to flip back and forth between two unit types and USR table) which dreads now are is utterly insane especially seeing most of these could just be a statline modifier included in stats for usability or printed on datasheet. Now multiply it by dozens of weapons, each with its own pile of "USR" and try telling me with a straight face it 'decreases' anything instead of drastically adding to it and making rule mistakes virtually certain even for experienced players (especially for experienced players, seeing "USR" often radically change edition to edition and can go from huge drawback to a massive advantage, see Rage for one)
USR, like armory, and points in badly formatted table in the back instead of datasheets, is garbage from 80s and has no place in any sane ruleset made in 21st century. Period. If you really need a common rule for weapon X, at worst put it in codex, not rulebook, right next to unit entries to minimize flipping, and even then, there should be only 2-3 such rules per army not 80+ like ""USR"" (which were then used by 1-2 units per edition most of the time making any claim to being "universal" laughable). And even then you should do what Magic: The Gathering (to name one competently designed game but these days virtually everyone does it) does and print a reminder text next to "USR" for clarity (but then why you need this other than as a shorthand of "I am incapable of learning any ruleset more modern than the RT/they modernized it and I now hate it/I am still using Dos 3.22, who needs these fancy windows and gak"...)
catbarf wrote: I don't think expecting players to own 3K of models to play a 2K game is reasonable or realistic, which is why I never suggested it to begin with. So I'm not sure why you and Karol are talking about having to bring tons of extra models.
You suggested players bring in excess of 2000pts of army to a 1500pt game (500pt sideboard and an indeterminate number of weapon/wargear swaps).
Not unreasonable to assume by that same math that a 2k game would actually need 3k+ of models between a 500+ sideboard and swaps.
My own comment was more written more in the context of 'move away from both players showing up with equal-points sight unseen lists' which was a little open ended. You mentioned swapping in panzerschrecks for tanks, swapping out field guns in bocage - the idea that units are balanced around the assumption that they'll be taken in a suitable environment or against ideal targets - which means you need those models to hand. And from what little I know of chain of command it isn't exactly 40k in terms of unit count (and cost).
catbarf wrote:-Cut back massively on cognitive burden- use USRs when possible
Irbis wrote: I really like people repeat this comical statement when it does the exact opposite of cutting back on cognitive burden.
Narrator: He would then proceed to illustrate precisely how GW does USRs wrong, and how USRs could instead be written to reduce cognitive burden.
Thanks, I guess. Although I can't honestly tell if you actually support standardized rules or not when your post is all written with the same vacuous vitriol.
Automatically Appended Next Post:
A.T. wrote: You suggested players bring in excess of 2000pts of army to a 1500pt game (500pt sideboard and an indeterminate number of weapon/wargear swaps).
Not unreasonable to assume by that same math that a 2k game would actually need 3k+ of models between a 500+ sideboard and swaps.
If the game is structured around the use of 2000pts 'on paper' but only 1500pts being deployed, then the required model count doesn't change.
I mean, yeah, you're then fielding fewer units, but I didn't see people start playing 2500pt games instead of 2000pts when 9th reset the points costs. People will play whatever the standard is set to. Just look at table sizes.
And again, that was one suggested possibility among many. How about recycling units? Or piecemeal deployment? Or player-driven objectives? Lots of options that don't involve bringing more models than you use.
A.T. wrote: My own comment was more written more in the context of 'move away from both players showing up with equal-points sight unseen lists' which was a little open ended. You mentioned swapping in panzerschrecks for tanks, swapping out field guns in bocage - the idea that units are balanced around the assumption that they'll be taken in a suitable environment or against ideal targets - which means you need those models to hand. And from what little I know of chain of command it isn't exactly 40k in terms of unit count (and cost).
Sure, Chain of Command is a much smaller game with lower barrier to entry, so having a wide variety of support assets that you bring one of each of makes sense for it. I just cited it as an example of how list tailoring isn't necessarily a bad thing if the game is designed around it.
I don't have a problem with the idea of fixed army lists on its own. What I am trying to articulate is that the combination of fixed army lists against unknown opponents, random objectives, and standardized complete deployment makes for a system that is easily broken but a fairly homogenous play experience. It incentivizes netlisting and skew, and has a serious problem with alpha strikes, but can't do much in the way of mission or table variety without the balance going awry. That basic structure is something that can be tweaked without having to re-write the entire game from the ground up.
I mean, even just talking about deployment systems, check out Chain of Command's 'Patrol Phase' system, Conquest: The Last Argument Of Kings's escalation reinforcement mechanic, or AoS's Meeting Engagement gametype. There's no reason deployment has to be lining up all our forces on opposite sides of the board and then ringing a bell to start the fight, it's just a long-standing convention, and there are alternate systems out there.
Roll all faction rules back to where they were in May-July 2019 (after the Castellan/Ynnari slaying big FAQ and before Marines 2.0 nuked the edition).
I'd say to Index stalines. Or better yet, delete all the gak stat inflation from the last three editions or so, no handing out BS/WS 3+ like candy, demons and eldar go back to 4+, 3+ goes back to elite units only. 5+ armour being default again on mooks, 4+ for elite units, 3+ being reserved to power armor/elite necrons. No 2+ to hit on HQs (or especially comically, Eldar mook units), Wraith units need psyker handlers again, no bucket of mortal wounds Tau gun gak, W1 squats, no mass D2 spam without drawbacks such as gets hot, no orkstodes, no S5 guns on chaffiest Tyranids, none of the power creep cheese introduced recently
catbarf wrote: -Cut back massively on cognitive burden- use USRs when possible
I really like people repeat this comical statement when it does the exact opposite of cutting back on cognitive burden. I tried to test new, leak dreads from HH recently and was starkly reminded why I hate that gak - having to pause game to check SIX "USR" on ONE gun in different book then go check what NINE "USR" do for MC (having to flip back and forth between two unit types and USR table) which dreads now are is utterly insane especially seeing most of these could just be a statline modifier included in stats for usability or printed on datasheet. Now multiply it by dozens of weapons, each with its own pile of "USR" and try telling me with a straight face it 'decreases' anything instead of drastically adding to it and making rule mistakes virtually certain even for experienced players (especially for experienced players, seeing "USR" often radically change edition to edition and can go from huge drawback to a massive advantage, see Rage for one)
USR, like armory, and points in badly formatted table in the back instead of datasheets, is garbage from 80s and has no place in any sane ruleset made in 21st century. Period. If you really need a common rule for weapon X, at worst put it in codex, not rulebook, right next to unit entries to minimize flipping, and even then, there should be only 2-3 such rules per army not 80+ like ""USR"" (which were then used by 1-2 units per edition most of the time making any claim to being "universal" laughable). And even then you should do what Magic: The Gathering (to name one competently designed game but these days virtually everyone does it) does and print a reminder text next to "USR" for clarity (but then why you need this other than as a shorthand of "I am incapable of learning any ruleset more modern than the RT/they modernized it and I now hate it/I am still using Dos 3.22, who needs these fancy windows and gak"...)
But... you do realise, that USRdoes not mean, it has to be put somewhere else than the unit entry, right? Just like modern "tailored special rules" are not put somewhere obscure, but are right there on the profile, so USRs can also be put right there. What USRtrully means, is that no two "tailored" rules that have exactly the same effect have different names and wording. So, e.g., there is only oneFNP, not gazilion. But nothing prevents USRs being both universal and repeated wherever they are required. I understand your trauma of being exposed to GW's inability to not only write rules but also do DTP properly. But USRs are, by nature, significantly less of a cognitive burden than remembering dozens of names for the same rule from different codices.
catbarf wrote: What I am trying to articulate is that the combination of fixed army lists against unknown opponents, random objectives, and standardized complete deployment makes for a system that is easily broken but a fairly homogenous play experience.
If you had a known opponent, a known objective, a known deployment... wouldn't you play optimal units for that scenario every time, at least within the limits of what you can change and what is kept hidden?
catbarf wrote: What I am trying to articulate is that the combination of fixed army lists against unknown opponents, random objectives, and standardized complete deployment makes for a system that is easily broken but a fairly homogenous play experience.
If you had a known opponent, a known objective, a known deployment... wouldn't you play optimal units for that scenario every time, at least within the limits of what you can change and what is kept hidden?
I'm curious as to how that works?
I mean, aside from 'known opponent', that's pretty much 40K tournaments as it stands. Known objective and deployment (because they're all the same, because the system can't handle any real variety in mission types), work out the most effective list you can, execute a pre-planned strategy.
If there's some actual variety to missions, deployment, and battlefield conditions- be it random or player-driven- then maybe there does exist a set of optimal units in relation to your opponent's army and the scenario, but in the context of a sideboard mechanic you're going to have to make your choice on the fly with a whole bunch of variables taken into account.
Roll all faction rules back to where they were in May-July 2019 (after the Castellan/Ynnari slaying big FAQ and before Marines 2.0 nuked the edition).
I'd say to Index stalines. Or better yet, delete all the gak stat inflation from the last three editions or so, no handing out BS/WS 3+ like candy, demons and eldar go back to 4+, 3+ goes back to elite units only. 5+ armour being default again on mooks, 4+ for elite units, 3+ being reserved to power armor/elite necrons. No 2+ to hit on HQs (or especially comically, Eldar mook units), Wraith units need psyker handlers again, no bucket of mortal wounds Tau gun gak, W1 squats, no mass D2 spam without drawbacks such as gets hot, no orkstodes, no S5 guns on chaffiest Tyranids, none of the power creep cheese introduced recently
catbarf wrote: -Cut back massively on cognitive burden- use USRs when possible
I really like people repeat this comical statement when it does the exact opposite of cutting back on cognitive burden. I tried to test new, leak dreads from HH recently and was starkly reminded why I hate that gak - having to pause game to check SIX "USR" on ONE gun in different book then go check what NINE "USR" do for MC (having to flip back and forth between two unit types and USR table) which dreads now are is utterly insane especially seeing most of these could just be a statline modifier included in stats for usability or printed on datasheet. Now multiply it by dozens of weapons, each with its own pile of "USR" and try telling me with a straight face it 'decreases' anything instead of drastically adding to it and making rule mistakes virtually certain even for experienced players (especially for experienced players, seeing "USR" often radically change edition to edition and can go from huge drawback to a massive advantage, see Rage for one)
USR, like armory, and points in badly formatted table in the back instead of datasheets, is garbage from 80s and has no place in any sane ruleset made in 21st century. Period. If you really need a common rule for weapon X, at worst put it in codex, not rulebook, right next to unit entries to minimize flipping, and even then, there should be only 2-3 such rules per army not 80+ like ""USR"" (which were then used by 1-2 units per edition most of the time making any claim to being "universal" laughable). And even then you should do what Magic: The Gathering (to name one competently designed game but these days virtually everyone does it) does and print a reminder text next to "USR" for clarity (but then why you need this other than as a shorthand of "I am incapable of learning any ruleset more modern than the RT/they modernized it and I now hate it/I am still using Dos 3.22, who needs these fancy windows and gak"...)
But... you do realise, that USRdoes not mean, it has to be put somewhere else than the unit entry, right? Just like modern "tailored special rules" are not put somewhere obscure, but are right there on the profile, so USRs can also be put right there. What USRtrully means, is that no two "tailored" rules that have exactly the same effect have different names and wording. So, e.g., there is only oneFNP, not gazilion. But nothing prevents USRs being both universal and repeated wherever they are required. I understand your trauma of being exposed to GW's inability to not only write rules but also do DTP properly. But USRs are, by nature, significantly less of a cognitive burden than remembering dozens of names for the same rule from different codices.
The foul taste of USRs comes from 7th when they put in to many redundant ones and bloated the system much like 9th is now.
In 5th ed there were 22 that covered 2 1/2 pages in the main rulebook. after about 3 games of 40K you had them all memorized and it worked just fine. take for example fleet. rather you were fleet of foot, fleet of claw or fleet of hove. the rule was exactly the same game mechanic. simple and easy to remember.
USR, like armory, and points in badly formatted table in the back instead of datasheets, is garbage from 80s and has no place in any sane ruleset made in 21st century. Period.
Is that why most other tabletop wargames use them?
A USR system works fine if you have about 12 (maybe 20 at a push - but I already think that's getting on a bit). And you use those to cover everything that can exist in the game - from your untrained conscript to your super giant tank. As a result other wargames that *successfully* use USRs are almost always much smaller than 40k. Almost all games end up in the same situation as they expand their rosters, and start trying cover more and more slightly niche ideas.
GW has never bound themselves like that - and we all know they never will. They were still making up unique special rules despite near a 100 USRs to use in 7th. This was however the natural evolution - as initially special rules became USRs through the editions.
As an example of the issues:
1. You need a USR for rerolling charges.
2. And rerolling advances.
3. And being able to advance and charge.
4. And roll an extra dice to charge and use the highest two.
5. And being able to fall back and charge.
6. And being able to fallback and shoot.
7. And being able to ignore movement penalties for charging over normally slowing terrain.
8. And being able to move that unit through models.
I'm at 8 of my 12 USRs and I'm probably not yet entirely through "rules in current 40k impacting movement." You can (and a sensible designer possibly would) just say "fine, just we won't have those rules in our game" - but then you are somewhat cutting 40k as we know it apart.
USR, like armory, and points in badly formatted table in the back instead of datasheets, is garbage from 80s and has no place in any sane ruleset made in 21st century. Period.
The majority of board games, card games and miniature games on the market utilize USR's...
The divergence away from them in 8th was an experiment, and it failed. I suspect an 8th/9th edition built upon the core of 3-7th would have been just as successful as the 8/9th we have now if they also got the same marketing and 6month support/supplement schedule and expedient codex rollout.
No one has been able to convince me yet that the success that 8th/9th have achieved has any correlation to their core rules. Any product (good or bad) can be successful if your marketing team and support is strong... look at the video game or movie industry, riddled with subpar products, but that marketing budget really goes a long way to polish the turd.
EDIT: To add clarity to my hyperbolic rant. In 5th-7th I was traveling around the country (US) and in the multiple communities that I would play in, I could always find leagues and game nights dedicated to 40k. Since the end of 8th (around Psychic Awakening time) in those same communities, it's impossible to find a pick up game or league. Everyone has moved onto other games (including some GW games). When I inquire, the sentiment seems to be the same... "9th is not fun" "there's too much book keeping" "the learning curve is too high for new players" etc etc
Tyel wrote: You can (and a sensible designer possibly would) just say "fine, just we won't have those rules in our game" - but then you are somewhat cutting 40k as we know it apart.
Would anyone even notice is their "reroll one dice in a charge" just got condensed into "reroll charges" or "+2 to charges" or whatever?
No, they wouldn't, because it doesn't make any difference.
Stuff like Deepstrike and FNP absolutely need to be USRs. Especially when you have other rules referring to those rules. GW has to write really long and convoluted wording like "any rule that allows a unit to be deployed on the battlefield and then set up a variable distance away from the enemy..." just say "deepstrike" and be done with it.
I regularly get new players wondering "does that rule apply to me, or is Teleport Strike special? What about Manta Strike?". No mate, they're all exactly the fething same.
nou 804308 11336236 wrote:
But... you do realise, that USRdoes not mean, it has to be put somewhere else than the unit entry, right? Just like modern "tailored special rules" are not put somewhere obscure, but are right there on the profile, so USRs can also be put right there. What USRtrully means, is that no two "tailored" rules that have exactly the same effect have different names and wording. So, e.g., there is only oneFNP, not gazilion. But nothing prevents USRs being both universal and repeated wherever they are required. I understand your trauma of being exposed to GW's inability to not only write rules but also do DTP properly. But USRs are, by nature, significantly less of a cognitive burden than remembering dozens of names for the same rule from different codices.
Yeah why can't something FnP be (++X) , while on X being a number different based on army. Deep Strike be (DS X") with X being how close you can deploy to enemy etc. Forward Deployment being (FD X") etc.
Yeah why can't something FnP be (++X) , while on X being a number different based on army. Deep Strike be (DS X") with X being how close you can deploy to enemy etc. Forward Deployment being (FD X") etc.
Because GW rules writers are trying to reinvent the wheel, but they are barley capable of understanding the function the wheel served. Many other systems adopted variable USR's about 20+ years ago. I remember the WotC article on their old portal page when they introduced their first variable mechanics in 2003.
Even other GW games use USRs, lotr even expanded on them with their current edition, so saying "it's something from the 80s" is one of the... strangest things I've read on this board in a while.
Yeah why can't something FnP be (++X) , while on X being a number different based on army. Deep Strike be (DS X") with X being how close you can deploy to enemy etc. Forward Deployment being (FD X") etc.
Because GW rules writers are trying to reinvent the wheel, but they are barley capable of understanding the function the wheel served. Many other systems adopted variable USR's about 20+ years ago. I remember the WotC article on their old portal page when they introduced their first variable mechanics in 2003.
Lol. No, MTG introduced variable mechanics into the game right off the bat 10 years ealier. See Fireball, Life Drain, etc - any spell that reads: (manna cost) (x)
kirotheavenger wrote: Would anyone even notice is their "reroll one dice in a charge" just got condensed into "reroll charges" or "+2 to charges" or whatever?
No, they wouldn't, because it doesn't make any difference.
Stuff like Deepstrike and FNP absolutely need to be USRs. Especially when you have other rules referring to those rules. GW has to write really long and convoluted wording like "any rule that allows a unit to be deployed on the battlefield and then set up a variable distance away from the enemy..." just say "deepstrike" and be done with it.
I regularly get new players wondering "does that rule apply to me, or is Teleport Strike special? What about Manta Strike?". No mate, they're all exactly the fething same.
Well yes. I do think - much like FLY - it would be very easy to include keywords/USRs for deepstrike, infiltrate, pre-game move. The Eldar Codex almost feels like they are inching towards that by defining the latter two before the datasheets.
FNP could probably be defined and covered in the core rules too.
I wouldn't mind if 10th edition did that. I think its when you want to USRify everything else beyond this that things get awkward if you want to avoid a 7th edition.
As an example of the issues:
1. You need a USR for rerolling charges.
2. And rerolling advances.
3. And being able to advance and charge.
4. And roll an extra dice to charge and use the highest two.
5. And being able to fall back and charge.
6. And being able to fallback and shoot.
7. And being able to ignore movement penalties for charging over normally slowing terrain.
8. And being able to move that unit through models.
I'm at 8 of my 12 USRs and I'm probably not yet entirely through "rules in current 40k impacting movement." You can (and a sensible designer possibly would) just say "fine, just we won't have those rules in our game" - but then you are somewhat cutting 40k as we know it apart.
Or you could just have have:
Reroll (X): Models can reroll the specificed rolls. (Also covers rerolling shooting, melee etc)
Fallback (X): Unit can fall back and preform the specified action(s).
Ignore Terrain (X): Units can ignore the specified terrain type(s) when moving.
I feel like when people try to complain about the amount of USRsGW would need they haven't really thought it through.
Tyel wrote: I think its when you want to USRify everything else beyond this that things get awkward if you want to avoid a 7th edition.
You've illustrated that you'd need a whole bunch of USRs to handle all the minute permutations of similar abilities; I'd contend that the fact that all those minute permutations exist is the problem to begin with that USRs could solve. And as others have stated, abilities that need some sliding scale like FNPs can be handled as FNP(X).
So I mean, you could replace all those variations of 'you charge better'- extra die drop lowest, re-roll any, re-roll all, and so on- with Fast Charge (X), where X is either 1 or 2 and that's how many dice you can re-roll when you charge. That provides two levels of improvement and consolidates similar effects into a standardized mechanic. Or, it could be just a straight bonus to your roll; a somewhat different mechanic, but accomplishing the same end goal and providing more room for adjustment.
For abilities that are actually rare, then they don't need to be USRs. But that requires having a plan for game design for an edition, which I suppose GW does not.
Another strike against 7th is the use of nested USRs and unintuitively-named ones. Hammer of Wrath and It Will Not Die are flowery and evocative but a simple Impact Hits or Regeneration are easier to learn. Conveying the flavor of the setting should never get in the way of clear rules. It could be done better.
Also, Kiro is right- the game is chock-full of USRs already. Not just things like Blast, Obsec, FNP, and Deep Strike, but also Pistol, Rapid Fire, Heavy, Assault, Infantry, Vehicle, Monster. I can only imagine what sort of hell we'd be in if GW decided every weapon needed its own bespoke rules handling when you can shoot it; slotting weapons into just a couple of USRs has been fine.
So I mean, you could replace all those variations of 'you charge better'- extra die drop lowest, re-roll any, re-roll all, and so on- with Fast Charge (X), where X is either 1 or 2 and that's how many dice you can re-roll when you charge. That provides two levels of improvement and consolidates similar effects into a standardized mechanic.
And this is where flavour people conflict with balance people.
For balance, anti-bloat, or anti- cognitive burden folks, your solution rocks. I can genuinely see its merits, and I totally understand why you would propose this.
But I love these varieties of charge improvement as methods of distinguishing one faction from another, one subfaction from another or one unit from another. These varieties in particular provide very meaningful differentiations- more so than numeric variations. There's a huge difference between advance + charge and fallback + charge and reroll (x) charge dice. It's a very fluffy, flavourful difference that clearly denotes the character of the unit(s) it applies to:
Advance + Charge: Sprinters with the highest top speed, but lots of variation in performance (raw untrained speed)
Fallback + Charge: Not particularly fast, but really good reflexes and observation skills (good melee training)
Reroll (x) Charge Dice: Less top speed but more reliable performance (speed training)
Reducing ALL of that to Reroll (x) Charge dice just KILLS all of that flavour and differentiation and makes the six limbed aliens so much more similar to both the genetically enhanced and the non-genetically enhanced bipeds, that it reduces the choice to play one or the other from a choice of "skin" vs. a choice of "character class" (to use videogame terms).
Obviously, deepstrike, scout move and FNP abilities have less actual differentiation and flavour, so it would be easier to standardize those- I'm not saying there is no value in consolidation. Some abilities are just ripe for it. But to me, this charge issue very much demonstrates the line that should not be crossed when it comes to simplifying.
And this is where flavour people conflict with balance people.
For balance, anti-bloat, or anti- cognitive burden folks, your solution rocks. I can genuinely see its merits, and I totally understand why you would propose this.
But I love these varieties of charge improvement as methods of distinguishing one faction from another, one subfaction from another or one unit from another. These varieties in particular provide very meaningful differentiations- more so than numeric variations. There's a huge difference between advance + charge and fallback + charge and reroll (x) charge dice. It's a very fluffy, flavourful difference that clearly denotes the character of the unit(s) it applies to:
Advance + Charge: Sprinters with the highest top speed, but lots of variation in performance (raw untrained speed)
Fallback + Charge: Not particularly fast, but really good reflexes and observation skills (good melee training)
Reroll (x) Charge Dice: Less top speed but more reliable performance (speed training)
Reducing ALL of that to Reroll (x) Charge dice just KILLS all of that flavour and differentiation and makes the six limbed aliens so much more similar to both the genetically enhanced and the non-genetically enhanced bipeds, that it reduces the choice to play one or the other from a choice of "skin" vs. a choice of "character class" (to use videogame terms).
Obviously, deepstrike, scout move and FNP abilities have less actual differentiation and flavour, so it would be easier to standardize those- I'm not saying there is no value in consolidation. Some abilities are just ripe for it. But to me, this charge issue very much demonstrates the line that should not be crossed when it comes to simplifying.
yes, because
Reroll one dice
Reroll both dice
Reroll failed
+x" to your charge
all have so much flavorful differences
And were not saying that you couldnt have
Reroll
Advance+ charge
fallback + shoot/charge
as USRs either, i don't know how you got that from what was being discussed
here is a quick list of USR we could put in the game right now :
Scout (x) : pregame move of x"
deepstrike (x) : deepstrike within x"
Reroll (list actions here)
Relentless (x) : unmodified X+'s cause extra hits
Psyker (X) : psyker level (1 cast/deny per level)
FnP (x) : X+++
fast (x) : automatically advance X"
charger : advance + charge
tricky : fallback counts as a normal move
furious (x) : x extra hits when charging
with only these, you could already have a solid base for a game and a good framework to work from.
wanna make tesla in that system? : Relentless (5+)
wanna make harlequin panoply: Charger + tricky
wanna make a strong psyker character ? : Psyker(3) + Reroll(psychic)
want to make marine bikers? : fast(6) + furious(2)
and most importantly : THE DEFINITIONS OF THESE USRs WOULD BE ON THE DATASHEET DIRECTLY (and in the brb/codexes as a reminder)
EDIT: To add clarity to my hyperbolic rant. In 5th-7th I was traveling around the country (US) and in the multiple communities that I would play in, I could always find leagues and game nights dedicated to 40k. Since the end of 8th (around Psychic Awakening time) in those same communities, it's impossible to find a pick up game or league. Everyone has moved onto other games (including some GW games). When I inquire, the sentiment seems to be the same... "9th is not fun" "there's too much book keeping" "the learning curve is too high for new players" etc etc
This rings true to me. 7th, for all its insanity, was still fun. 9th is not as fun. They've over-designed it.
And this is where flavour people conflict with balance people.
For balance, anti-bloat, or anti- cognitive burden folks, your solution rocks. I can genuinely see its merits, and I totally understand why you would propose this.
But I love these varieties of charge improvement as methods of distinguishing one faction from another, one subfaction from another or one unit from another. These varieties in particular provide very meaningful differentiations- more so than numeric variations. There's a huge difference between advance + charge and fallback + charge and reroll (x) charge dice. It's a very fluffy, flavourful difference that clearly denotes the character of the unit(s) it applies to:
Advance + Charge: Sprinters with the highest top speed, but lots of variation in performance (raw untrained speed)
Fallback + Charge: Not particularly fast, but really good reflexes and observation skills (good melee training)
Reroll (x) Charge Dice: Less top speed but more reliable performance (speed training)
Reducing ALL of that to Reroll (x) Charge dice just KILLS all of that flavour and differentiation and makes the six limbed aliens so much more similar to both the genetically enhanced and the non-genetically enhanced bipeds, that it reduces the choice to play one or the other from a choice of "skin" vs. a choice of "character class" (to use videogame terms).
Obviously, deepstrike, scout move and FNP abilities have less actual differentiation and flavour, so it would be easier to standardize those- I'm not saying there is no value in consolidation. Some abilities are just ripe for it. But to me, this charge issue very much demonstrates the line that should not be crossed when it comes to simplifying.
yes, because
Reroll one dice
Reroll both dice
Reroll failed
+x" to your charge
all have so much flavorful differences
And were not saying that you couldnt have
Reroll
Advance+ charge
fallback + shoot/charge
as USRs either, i don't know how you got that from what was being discussed
here is a quick list of USR we could put in the game right now :
Scout (x) : pregame move of x"
deepstrike (x) : deepstrike within x"
Reroll (list actions here)
Relentless (x) : unmodified X+'s cause extra hits
Psyker (X) : psyker level (1 cast/deny per level)
FnP (x) : X+++
fast (x) : automatically advance X"
charger : advance + charge
tricky : fallback counts as a normal move
furious (x) : x extra hits when charging
with only these, you could already have a solid base for a game and a good framework to work from.
wanna make tesla in that system? : Relentless (5+)
wanna make harlequin panoply: Charger + tricky
wanna make a strong psyker character ? : Psyker(3) + Reroll(psychic)
want to make marine bikers? : fast(6) + furious(2)
and most importantly : THE DEFINITIONS OF THESE USRs WOULD BE ON THE DATASHEET DIRECTLY (and in the brb/codexes as a reminder)
Just to add on top of that, FNP shouldn’t really be a USR, it should be a normal resolution sequence step: hit, wound, save, distribute damage, apply any FNP, remove models; and be directly included in the statline. Just like everyone thinks about it anyway.
EDIT: To add clarity to my hyperbolic rant. In 5th-7th I was traveling around the country (US) and in the multiple communities that I would play in, I could always find leagues and game nights dedicated to 40k. Since the end of 8th (around Psychic Awakening time) in those same communities, it's impossible to find a pick up game or league. Everyone has moved onto other games (including some GW games). When I inquire, the sentiment seems to be the same... "9th is not fun" "there's too much book keeping" "the learning curve is too high for new players" etc etc
This rings true to me. 7th, for all its insanity, was still fun. 9th is not as fun. They've over-designed it.
As to „9th is not fun anymore”, a huge part of it for me is the pseudo-law language it is written in - reading it became a chore. That is because English language is horrible when it comes to being precise and easily readable at the same time, as it doesn’t allow null-subject sentences. So you have to have either an insane number of repetitions or long constructions to point out exactly which part of the previous sentence/paragraph you are referring to. This limitation of English when compared to e.g. Polish is also a reason why I was often amazed how some people rule-lawyered about rules that were very precise and straightforward when translated to Polish, because they gained the null-subject in the translation process. And it is real pain in the arse when trying to write my own rules in English. In Polish those same rules could sometimes be 3-4 times shorter without loosing precision, just as this very paragraph
The thing that makes 9th unfun to me is the cognitive load.
I'm spending so much brain power trying to sieve through all the strategems, secondary objectives, relics, etc, I don't have enough brainpower left to have fun.
I play many different games, 40k is the only game where I feel the need to create an A4 cheatsheet of abilities that I keep in front of my in games and constantly refer back to.
kirotheavenger wrote: The thing that makes 9th unfun to me is the cognitive load.
I'm spending so much brain power trying to sieve through all the strategems, secondary objectives, relics, etc, I don't have enough brainpower left to have fun.
I play many different games, 40k is the only game where I feel the need to create an A4 cheatsheet of abilities that I keep in front of my in games and constantly refer back to.
Warmachine/Hordes got to that point to me. There were so many little rules to keep track of and so many absurd clarifications of 'how rules really work' and exploits that you could chain together to get 20+" of movement on the charge,
especially if your opponent didn't know them. There was a really weird one with the troll colossus (the mountain king) where if you charged past someone and they took the free strike from leaving melee range, you got extra movement for the charge you were currently taking, could spawn whelps, eat one and heal while mid charge.
To this day, I still don't get the rules interactions that supposedly allowed it, but everyone agreed that it did, and the guy who took up the pressganger position for the area (to poach players for another store, sadly enough) was actively teaching people that was how the game was 'supposed' to be played and pretty much destroyed what had been the casual game nights at the store that was close enough for me to go to on a regular basis (~40 minutes away rather than 60 or so- it made enough of a difference on work nights)
Just to add on top of that, FNP shouldn’t really be a USR, it should be a normal resolution sequence step: hit, wound, save, distribute damage, apply any FNP, remove models; and be directly included in the statline. Just like everyone thinks about it anyway.
it's not common enough to warrant being in the statline (unless you wanna do FNP(7+) on everything)
EDIT: To add clarity to my hyperbolic rant. In 5th-7th I was traveling around the country (US) and in the multiple communities that I would play in, I could always find leagues and game nights dedicated to 40k. Since the end of 8th (around Psychic Awakening time) in those same communities, it's impossible to find a pick up game or league. Everyone has moved onto other games (including some GW games). When I inquire, the sentiment seems to be the same... "9th is not fun" "there's too much book keeping" "the learning curve is too high for new players" etc etc
This rings true to me. 7th, for all its insanity, was still fun. 9th is not as fun. They've over-designed it.
As to „9th is not fun anymore”, a huge part of it for me is the pseudo-law language it is written in - reading it became a chore. That is because English language is horrible when it comes to being precise and easily readable at the same time, as it doesn’t allow null-subject sentences. So you have to have either an insane number of repetitions or long constructions to point out exactly which part of the previous sentence/paragraph you are referring to. This limitation of English when compared to e.g. Polish is also a reason why I was often amazed how some people rule-lawyered about rules that were very precise and straightforward when translated to Polish, because they gained the null-subject in the translation process. And it is real pain in the arse when trying to write my own rules in English. In Polish those same rules could sometimes be 3-4 times shorter without loosing precision, just as this very paragraph
I agree about the legalese. I can't speak too much about the differences between languages though, hah. That's fascinating.
But from just the english-legalese standpoint, as has been pointed out before a lot of the legalese seems to be purely in the service of removing options from models, too. All the extra words just being used to specify that you can only build units the way they come in the kits, which is also removing the fun from building an army/models/converting imo. It's no good.
I'm not the biggest fan of 8th, but they at least initially got one major thing right, which was improved accessibility. A free, simple rule set and cheap army lists in the form of the Indexes brought a lot of people back. It was very uncomplicated, which is really REALLY important.
EDIT: To add clarity to my hyperbolic rant. In 5th-7th I was traveling around the country (US) and in the multiple communities that I would play in, I could always find leagues and game nights dedicated to 40k. Since the end of 8th (around Psychic Awakening time) in those same communities, it's impossible to find a pick up game or league. Everyone has moved onto other games (including some GW games). When I inquire, the sentiment seems to be the same... "9th is not fun" "there's too much book keeping" "the learning curve is too high for new players" etc etc
This rings true to me. 7th, for all its insanity, was still fun. 9th is not as fun. They've over-designed it.
As to „9th is not fun anymore”, a huge part of it for me is the pseudo-law language it is written in - reading it became a chore. That is because English language is horrible when it comes to being precise and easily readable at the same time, as it doesn’t allow null-subject sentences. So you have to have either an insane number of repetitions or long constructions to point out exactly which part of the previous sentence/paragraph you are referring to. This limitation of English when compared to e.g. Polish is also a reason why I was often amazed how some people rule-lawyered about rules that were very precise and straightforward when translated to Polish, because they gained the null-subject in the translation process. And it is real pain in the arse when trying to write my own rules in English. In Polish those same rules could sometimes be 3-4 times shorter without loosing precision, just as this very paragraph
I agree about the legalese. I can't speak too much about the differences between languages though, hah. That's fascinating.
But from just the english-legalese standpoint, as has been pointed out before a lot of the legalese seems to be purely in the service of removing options from models, too. All the extra words just being used to specify that you can only build units the way they come in the kits, which is also removing the fun from building an army/models/converting imo. It's no good.
I'm not the biggest fan of 8th, but they at least initially got one major thing right, which was improved accessibility. A free, simple rule set and cheap army lists in the form of the Indexes brought a lot of people back. It was very uncomplicated, which is really REALLY important.
Blightlords (and soon the new csm termis) losing the option to all have the same combi weapons pisses me off soooo damn much. From a modeling point of view, it renders old squads not legal anymore, makes playing not wysiwyg a pain in the ass and makes resolving a shooting phase soooo tedious, especially considering they all have different ranges and ideal targets
I love battletech for a major reason (other than the tournament crowd avoids it which means there is no meta and no universal way to have to be forced to play like there is in 40k):
There are different ways to play the game.
I know we say "but Auticus there are multiple ways to play the game now. There's matched play, narrative play, and open play."
To that I respond: yeah but no. There are those modes, but I can count on one hand the number of people that I have ever known that will deviate from matched play.
When I say multiple ways to play:
Battletech has a crunch advanced Classic system.
Battletech has a simplified 40k style version called Alpha Strike.
Battletech has eras that you can play in that means some things don't exist.
Battletech has a whole book on advanced rules you can choose to use or not to use.
Battletech has a very deep campaign system that lets the simulation enthusiasts enjoy the game.
Battletech has a simplified campaign system that lets most 40k style players enjoy campaigning without needing to worry about a ton of details.
Battletech has different scopes of play. Ground war, an aerospace layer, an solar system scale layer, and then an entire interstellar galaxy spanning scale.
You have in Battletech a ton of ways to enjoy the game and it really caters to everybody.
Unlike 40k, which is matched play using its wonky framework meta every game.
Thats probably not a realistic ask though. But if they could give us an advanced ruleset that played more like a wargame and let the normal 40k rules be its simplified "alpha strike" version, I'd consider buying in again.
Man I haven't played Battletech in over 25 years. Might be cool to see if there's any local groups. I found my old "Command Star" of Clan Assaults (some custom) in a box a few weeks ago, lol.
kirotheavenger wrote:The thing that makes 9th unfun to me is the cognitive load.
I'm spending so much brain power trying to sieve through all the strategems, secondary objectives, relics, etc, I don't have enough brainpower left to have fun.
I play many different games, 40k is the only game where I feel the need to create an A4 cheatsheet of abilities that I keep in front of my in games and constantly refer back to.
Yes because 40K went from -epic battles in 3rd-7th to sterilized tournament play by 9th. the posted who mentioned that they think 9th is the best the game has ever been, is in the minority from my experience. many of our "hardcore" 9th ed players have moved to other games not made by GW. one of them bought his first classic battletech lance and had his first game thanks to catalysts new plastic sets.
Voss wrote:
kirotheavenger wrote: The thing that makes 9th unfun to me is the cognitive load.
I'm spending so much brain power trying to sieve through all the strategems, secondary objectives, relics, etc, I don't have enough brainpower left to have fun.
I play many different games, 40k is the only game where I feel the need to create an A4 cheatsheet of abilities that I keep in front of my in games and constantly refer back to.
Warmachine/Hordes got to that point to me. There were so many little rules to keep track of and so many absurd clarifications of 'how rules really work' and exploits that you could chain together to get 20+" of movement on the charge,
especially if your opponent didn't know them. There was a really weird one with the troll colossus (the mountain king) where if you charged past someone and they took the free strike from leaving melee range, you got extra movement for the charge you were currently taking, could spawn whelps, eat one and heal while mid charge.
To this day, I still don't get the rules interactions that supposedly allowed it, but everyone agreed that it did, and the guy who took up the pressganger position for the area (to poach players for another store, sadly enough) was actively teaching people that was how the game was 'supposed' to be played and pretty much destroyed what had been the casual game nights at the store that was close enough for me to go to on a regular basis (~40 minutes away rather than 60 or so- it made enough of a difference on work nights)
The reason why WM/H works is because it was designed to be a skirmish system with a smaller model count where more complex rules can work. however the guy teaching people to play the "right way" is part of the problem. those people are toxic and destroy the community. there are some silly combos that our regular group know about that we specifically do not use because it would make the game less fun to play. we also play at a lower points value and we never do steamroller rules.
Insectum7 wrote:Man I haven't played Battletech in over 25 years. Might be cool to see if there's any local groups. I found my old "Command Star" of Clan Assaults (some custom) in a box a few weeks ago, lol.
I never stopped playing it since 1987. you would be surprised how many small hardcore player groups exist out there. it tends to be a very niche thing based on location. some areas have no players, others like my area have several large groups of dedicated players.
auticus is correct. because there are many ways to officially play Battletech and not one "current" correct way it leaves a lot of options for the player base. especially since the core game mechanics have only had slight optional tweaks over the last 30+ years leaving the core rules effectively unchanged.
our group for example prefers to use the optional rules for
.3d terrain
.ECM ghost imaging
.alternate ammo
.fire as you bear (no declare fire phase as it slows the game down in our opinion)
.forced withdrawal (also to speed up game play)
.compounding pilot checks for every 20 points of damage taken.
.maxtech vehicle damage tables (to make vehicle more viable and encourage their use)
.aerospace on ground maps (aerotech II)
.no customs jobs
.ammo explosion rules (max tech)
We also like playing era 3050+ so we can use any thing we like and also pit clans VS inner sphere (not to say we do not go back and do 3025 from time to time for exploding fun)
Unless we are playing a scenario we also do not use BV or tonnage (because the crit system exists) we do point for point-1 lance can have 4 mechs or 3 mechs and a tank or 3 tanks and a helicopter etc (clan conversion is 1.3 to 1 so 2 lances face off against a clan star). the main goal for us is to build your forces around the theme of the faction or unit you play (yes the lore is that deep).
We do all these things both for speed of play as noted above and also the fun of play.
auticus wrote: I love battletech for a major reason (other than the tournament crowd avoids it which means there is no meta and no universal way to have to be forced to play like there is in 40k):
There are different ways to play the game.
I know we say "but Auticus there are multiple ways to play the game now. There's matched play, narrative play, and open play."
To that I respond: yeah but no. There are those modes, but I can count on one hand the number of people that I have ever known that will deviate from matched play.
When I say multiple ways to play:
Battletech has a crunch advanced Classic system.
Battletech has a simplified 40k style version called Alpha Strike.
Battletech has eras that you can play in that means some things don't exist.
Battletech has a whole book on advanced rules you can choose to use or not to use.
Battletech has a very deep campaign system that lets the simulation enthusiasts enjoy the game.
Battletech has a simplified campaign system that lets most 40k style players enjoy campaigning without needing to worry about a ton of details.
Battletech has different scopes of play. Ground war, an aerospace layer, an solar system scale layer, and then an entire interstellar galaxy spanning scale.
You have in Battletech a ton of ways to enjoy the game and it really caters to everybody.
Unlike 40k, which is matched play using its wonky framework meta every game.
Thats probably not a realistic ask though. But if they could give us an advanced ruleset that played more like a wargame and let the normal 40k rules be its simplified "alpha strike" version, I'd consider buying in again.
Quoted for truth. BT is very high on my list for all these reasons. With one single book, and the interwebs for getting all those Mech stats, I can play classic lance vs lance, I could play just infantry and tanks, I can even play just aircraft. Or if I want to make a day of it, combined arms on the 6x4 table, with or without hexes. $100 will actually buy a playable list.
Insectum7 wrote: Man I haven't played Battletech in over 25 years. Might be cool to see if there's any local groups. I found my old "Command Star" of Clan Assaults (some custom) in a box a few weeks ago, lol.
The new plastics that were released have caused an explosion of interest. They are great.
PenitentJake wrote:But I love these varieties of charge improvement as methods of distinguishing one faction from another, one subfaction from another or one unit from another. These varieties in particular provide very meaningful differentiations- more so than numeric variations. There's a huge difference between advance + charge and fallback + charge and reroll (x) charge dice. It's a very fluffy, flavourful difference that clearly denotes the character of the unit(s) it applies to:
You're conflating two separate things.
Re-roll charges, advance and charge, and fall back and charge are all distinct abilities. Those could be three different USRs.
Re-roll charges, re-roll one die on charges, re-roll any or all dice on charges, add # to charges, and roll 3D6 and drop the lowest on charges are all mechanically different methods of accomplishing the same result: you charge better. Those could all be consolidated to one USR.
Mechanical differences that meaningfully change how units play is good for flavor. Mechanical differences that amount to trivia, and may have statistically different outcomes but largely identical purpose, offer no additional flavor but do increase the complexity and cognitive burden of the system.
auticus wrote:Battletech has a crunch advanced Classic system.
Battletech has a simplified 40k style version called Alpha Strike.
Honestly if BT had a ruleset in between the very 80s demolition-derby-in-slow-motion CBT and the extremely streamlined, IMO a bit overly simplified Alpha Strike (I like having discrete weapons, I just wish they were faster to resolve), I'd be playing it every week.
But yes agreed; BT is a good example of a 'framework' where you can pick and choose what elements you want to play with and highly customize your experience.
Honestly? ProHammer is pretty close to my ideal because not only does it address many of the problem's my group has had with 40k, but we actually play it. The "ideal" is all well and good but what can actually get to the table it what matters at the end of the day.
Why ProHammer? It's a hybrid of 4th/5th rules designed for compatibility with all 3rd-7th edition codexes. It works with 7th edition, and isn't horrendously imbalanced, because because it cuts out a lot of the shennanigans from 7th edition codxes (formations, super-detachments, and all their special rules).
Classic 40k keeps the focus on the miniatures and their positioning + maneuvering. Not managing a CP resource pool and tracking myriad combinations of layered rules. What you see is what you get for the most part. It's less mental overhead but more nuanced core rules makes for better play.
ProHammer adds some further twists, like rules for suppression, cross-fire, screening, reactive fire, overwatch, etc. and those have all been working really well. Games are dynamic, morale leads to fun dynamics, the mission set has been good, and we keep adding onto the system (playing a map-based campaign right now).
The best is that the codexes are all available, no more waiting for GW release cycle to play out. Since we're using a custom ruleset, we have no qualms about adjusting things on the fly to make a more balanced experience.
The ideal 40k is when you can make it your own. It's unfortunately that the prevailing mode of play is "matched play or the highway" (unless you can find people up for crusade).
I like basically nothing about 9th edition - so going retro is really where it's at for us.
Reroll one dice
Reroll both dice
Reroll failed
+x" to your charge
all have so much flavorful differences
I agree. Did you actually read my post? Did you read the piece by Catbarf? Did you read the post his post was based on?
Someone listed ALL the charge abilities including the cool ones I mentioned in my post, and the generic reroll abilities. Then CB seems to have suggested taking ALL of those abilities and converting them to the USR Charge(x) where X represents the dice rerolled. And that is the thing I said would kill the flavour.
as USRs either, i don't know how you got that from what was being discussed
It's entirely possible I misinterpreted CB's post (the piece that I quoted), but it really did seem like he was suggesting reducing ALL of the "I charge better than you" abilities to the Charge(x) USR.
here is a quick list of USR we could put in the game right now :
Scout (x) : pregame move of x"
deepstrike (x) : deepstrike within x"
Reroll (list actions here)
Relentless (x) : unmodified X+'s cause extra hits
Psyker (X) : psyker level (1 cast/deny per level)
FnP (x) : X+++
fast (x) : automatically advance X"
charger : advance + charge
tricky : fallback counts as a normal move
furious (x) : x extra hits when charging
Decent list- it's more than the ones I listed in my own post, but it does include all of the ones I listed. Again, I don't disagree with USRs for some rules- I was responding to a post that seemed like it was suggesting turning interesting charge variations into generic ones- and again, maybe I was misinterpreting- Cartbarf ain't no slouch, and usually makes decent suggestions.
Reducing ALL of that to Reroll (x) Charge dice just KILLS all of that flavour and differentiation and makes the six limbed aliens so much more similar to both the genetically enhanced and the non-genetically enhanced bipeds, that it reduces the choice to play one or the other from a choice of "skin" vs. a choice of "character class" (to use videogame terms).
There's a lot of talk on reroll charges, and I'd like to mention that I'm a huge fan of set charge distance, and not random charges. That's one thing that would make me want to play again. I've become a warhammer fantasy fan, but I probably won't play 9th edition, as it will most likely have random charges. If 40k ever adds set charge distance again, I'll be a bit happier.
agreed on set charge distance at movement x2 after an order to charge thereby no shooting, or shooting witha penalty only light weapons, yada... and wth moves reduced to old standards, 3, 4 maybe 5 " and cut way back on modifiers and stuff like fleet of foot and so on.
TheBestBucketHead wrote: There's a lot of talk on reroll charges, and I'd like to mention that I'm a huge fan of set charge distance, and not random charges. That's one thing that would make me want to play again. I've become a warhammer fantasy fan, but I probably won't play 9th edition, as it will most likely have random charges. If 40k ever adds set charge distance again, I'll be a bit happier.
I hate set charge distances unless you also get rid of pre-measuring. It just results in a bunch of measuring to make sure you're outside an opponents threat range.
TheBestBucketHead wrote: There's a lot of talk on reroll charges, and I'd like to mention that I'm a huge fan of set charge distance, and not random charges. That's one thing that would make me want to play again. I've become a warhammer fantasy fan, but I probably won't play 9th edition, as it will most likely have random charges. If 40k ever adds set charge distance again, I'll be a bit happier.
I hate set charge distances unless you also get rid of pre-measuring. It just results in a bunch of measuring to make sure you're outside an opponents threat range.
Is it any different to shooting though?
I hate random charges because an abnormally low charge is nothing but a "feth you, you don't get to play today".
I could see a more limited charge, like 3+2d3 or something.
TheBestBucketHead wrote: There's a lot of talk on reroll charges, and I'd like to mention that I'm a huge fan of set charge distance, and not random charges. That's one thing that would make me want to play again. I've become a warhammer fantasy fan, but I probably won't play 9th edition, as it will most likely have random charges. If 40k ever adds set charge distance again, I'll be a bit happier.
I hate set charge distances unless you also get rid of pre-measuring. It just results in a bunch of measuring to make sure you're outside an opponents threat range.
its the same as premeasuring with shooting.
OnePageRules has such a simple yet efficient way to charge
in your activation you can do these actions :
Hold + Shoot
Move + Shoot
Move + Move
Move + Move (in base contact) + Melee
TheBestBucketHead wrote: There's a lot of talk on reroll charges, and I'd like to mention that I'm a huge fan of set charge distance, and not random charges. That's one thing that would make me want to play again. I've become a warhammer fantasy fan, but I probably won't play 9th edition, as it will most likely have random charges. If 40k ever adds set charge distance again, I'll be a bit happier.
I hate set charge distances unless you also get rid of pre-measuring. It just results in a bunch of measuring to make sure you're outside an opponents threat range.
...Sort of. When I've seen it in other games it's never been that much of a problem; even in Warmachine (otherwise notorious for its finickiness and fiddly positioning) I've never seen it result in dramatic game slowdown, just because the game's scenarios are largely king-of-the-hill-based and there's no such thing as a leafblower list that can kill a significant amount of stuff with ranged attacks, so by staying all the way out of charge range you're probably setting yourself up to lose on scenario.
TheBestBucketHead wrote: There's a lot of talk on reroll charges, and I'd like to mention that I'm a huge fan of set charge distance, and not random charges. That's one thing that would make me want to play again. I've become a warhammer fantasy fan, but I probably won't play 9th edition, as it will most likely have random charges. If 40k ever adds set charge distance again, I'll be a bit happier.
I hate set charge distances unless you also get rid of pre-measuring. It just results in a bunch of measuring to make sure you're outside an opponents threat range.
its the same as premeasuring with shooting.
OnePageRules has such a simple yet efficient way to charge
in your activation you can do these actions :
Hold + Shoot
Move + Shoot
Move + Move
Move + Move (in base contact) + Melee
I much prefer this "two action" system, and it's the standard for games - Killteam, Necromunda, Starwars Legion, OPRs, Epic, and more all use essentially a two action system. It might be addressed "here's a list, pick any two" or "pick one that does two things", OPR uses the second..
It limits the amount of firepower a unit can put down as they can't use both guns and combat at the same time. Normally you have rules for using pistols in melee, either directly (shoot them as a CCW attack) or indirectly (they grant you better melee).
Specifically to charging, I also like how charges aren't crazy distances. In 40k your average charge is 13", whereas your average "just sprint across the battlefield" is 9.5". Then you get units that combine sprinting at full tilt and charging (and shooting on the way for good measure) so you're looking at a 16.5" charge! You're outpacing even fast recon elements now! And that's just average not including rerolls and such, rolling well you can outpace aircraft!
It's silly, the sudden "burst of speed" you get for charging is out of all proportion to reality.
I prefer a move + d6 charge. It doesn't have to be full on random 2d6 but I'm a hard no on set charge distances never deviating.
Set charges I've got way too much experience watching "the dance" that it doesn't seem like a wargame anymore, it seems like two forces dancing around each other waiting for the other to mess up then charge.
That goes against anything in my head where I would expect forces to run at each other, not laterally dancing around each other.
"What about gun ranges? Those are fixed and no one has a problem with that?"
Yeah. You also have to roll to hit. You don't just auto hit in range. The d6 + movement is kind of like that. You still have to roll to get in there instead of just getting to do it 100%.
VladimirHerzog wrote:OnePageRules has such a simple yet efficient way to charge
in your activation you can do these actions :
Hold + Shoot
Move + Shoot
Move + Move
Move + Move (in base contact) + Melee
Also how it works in the Apocalypse ruleset.
auticus wrote:"What about gun ranges? Those are fixed and no one has a problem with that?"
Yeah. You also have to roll to hit. You don't just auto hit in range. The d6 + movement is kind of like that. You still have to roll to get in there instead of just getting to do it 100%.
You have to roll to hit in melee too, though.
Random charge distances, where you have to roll to see if you get the opportunity to roll to hit, is more like the shooting system in Fireball Forward, where you throw range dice along with your actual rolls to hit, and if the range dice + base range don't equal or exceed the range to the target, the whole attack is a failure. At least there you do have a base range, as opposed to the omnipresent risk of snake eyes on a charge in 40K.
I find it more than a little strange that a game where you have exact movement distances, exact shooting distances, exact deep strike, exact pile-in/consolidation, and overall a very heavy focus on exact positioning and measurement then implements getting into melee as a bell curve. I mean, if you don't like the 'I'll put myself 12.1" away so I am immune to melee' concept, that already rears its head every time you position yourself .1" beyond the movement+range of a unit, or set up your 9" no-deep-strike bubble to render a protected character immune to being shot or charged out of deep strike.
I'm okay with both more random (though I think we both know how 40K players would react to random movement distances) and more deterministic approaches, it's just the mix of the two that's odd.
Problem with this is jump packs (or even worse bikes) get truly mind boggling threat ranges and means foot sloggers get totally and utterly left in the dust.
Although if you removed charges as an additional move entirely and instead made them a variant of moves (in the same way as advance or fallback is), I'd be all for this one.
S
"What about gun ranges? Those are fixed and no one has a problem with that?"
Yeah. You also have to roll to hit.
I don't entirely agree with the comparison. A charge roll is far, far, more swingy than rolling to hit is for ranged weapons. Namely it's one single roll to determine every single "shot".
Not to mention, of course, melee weapons have to roll to hit as well!
It is, however, a valid point that melee tends to be substantially more deadly for a given unit cost. Then again, melee also gives the enemy a free attack back plus potential overwatch, so it's also substantially more hazardous than shooting.
Overall I think it's a bit of a wash and it comes down to preference. Personally I think if ranged weapons have set threat ranges I don't see why melee shouldn't too. Plus extreme random charges just leads to feels-bad situations when you roll snakeeyes on a 4" charge or double 6s on an 11" charge, it's waaay too swingy a roll to leave to two dice.
Most of the games I play are move + d6 so I dont have a problem with jump packs or bikes or whatever.
I know for me - I don't want anything to do with deterministic 100% charges. It is a horrible experience for what I want out of a game ("the dance" I mean).
auticus wrote: I prefer a move + d6 charge. It doesn't have to be full on random 2d6 but I'm a hard no on set charge distances never deviating.
Set charges I've got way too much experience watching "the dance" that it doesn't seem like a wargame anymore, it seems like two forces dancing around each other waiting for the other to mess up then charge.
That goes against anything in my head where I would expect forces to run at each other, not laterally dancing around each other.
easy fix : make the mission force players to have a midfield presence (like 9th does, thats pretty much the only good part of 9th's missions IMO)
"What about gun ranges? Those are fixed and no one has a problem with that?"
Yeah. You also have to roll to hit. You don't just auto hit in range. The d6 + movement is kind of like that. You still have to roll to get in there instead of just getting to do it 100%.
you still have to hit with melee.....
if you want to make both equal, then you would add a roll to see if your unit is allowed to shoot before they can actually shoot
Automatically Appended Next Post:
auticus wrote: Most of the games I play are move + d6 so I dont have a problem with jump packs or bikes or whatever.
I know for me - I don't want anything to do with deterministic 100% charges. It is a horrible experience for what I want out of a game ("the dance" I mean).
you still do "the dance" even with non fixed charges tho... most games i play i have to check what the threat range of a big melee threat is and position myself outside of it (sometimes i'll be greedy and be within a charge of 10-12 but the only difference is that with fixed charges, you're losing 2-3")
Mezmorki wrote: Honestly? ProHammer is pretty close to my ideal because not only does it address many of the problem's my group has had with 40k, but we actually play it. The "ideal" is all well and good but what can actually get to the table it what matters at the end of the day.
Man, when people asked you balance questions about ProHammer before and you got mad at them, and now you're advertising it again? Wack.
Mezmorki wrote: Honestly? ProHammer is pretty close to my ideal because not only does it address many of the problem's my group has had with 40k, but we actually play it. The "ideal" is all well and good but what can actually get to the table it what matters at the end of the day.
Man, when people asked you balance questions about ProHammer before and you got mad at them, and now you're advertising it again? Wack.
A system he put a ton of work in and works well, and he’s keen on SHARING it?
It boggles the mind! The audacity! /s
you still do "the dance" even with non fixed charges tho... most games i play i have to check what the threat range of a big melee threat is and position myself outside of it (sometimes i'll be greedy and be within a charge of 10-12 but the only difference is that with fixed charges, you're losing 2-3")
Not going to split hairs but i've spent 15 years with fixed charge distance and about 10-12 years without it and the feeling is night and day to me on the level of "the dance".
So while there may be one with random charges, its not anything near as annoying as it is with 100% deterministic charge distances for me.
Mezmorki wrote: Honestly? ProHammer is pretty close to my ideal because not only does it address many of the problem's my group has had with 40k, but we actually play it. The "ideal" is all well and good but what can actually get to the table it what matters at the end of the day.
Man, when people asked you balance questions about ProHammer before and you got mad at them, and now you're advertising it again? Wack.
A system he put a ton of work in and works well, and he’s keen on SHARING it?
It boggles the mind! The audacity! /s
Depends on the criticism. As a game dev myself I know the level of criticism we take.
But some of the criticism tossed transcends criticism and becomes personal attacks and just overblown exaggeration. But thats why we aren't usually allowed to engage on social media with the players.
Mezmorki wrote: Honestly? ProHammer is pretty close to my ideal because not only does it address many of the problem's my group has had with 40k, but we actually play it. The "ideal" is all well and good but what can actually get to the table it what matters at the end of the day.
Man, when people asked you balance questions about ProHammer before and you got mad at them, and now you're advertising it again? Wack.
A system he put a ton of work in and works well, and he’s keen on SHARING it?
It boggles the mind! The audacity! /s
Well we know he doesn't take criticism well.
Maybe the author of said criticism doesn't take rejection well.
TheBestBucketHead wrote: There's a lot of talk on reroll charges, and I'd like to mention that I'm a huge fan of set charge distance, and not random charges. That's one thing that would make me want to play again. I've become a warhammer fantasy fan, but I probably won't play 9th edition, as it will most likely have random charges. If 40k ever adds set charge distance again, I'll be a bit happier.
I hate set charge distances unless you also get rid of pre-measuring. It just results in a bunch of measuring to make sure you're outside an opponents threat range.
its the same as premeasuring with shooting.
OnePageRules has such a simple yet efficient way to charge
in your activation you can do these actions :
Hold + Shoot
Move + Shoot
Move + Move
Move + Move (in base contact) + Melee
I much prefer this "two action" system, and it's the standard for games - Killteam, Necromunda, Starwars Legion, OPRs, Epic, and more all use essentially a two action system. It might be addressed "here's a list, pick any two" or "pick one that does two things", OPR uses the second..
It limits the amount of firepower a unit can put down as they can't use both guns and combat at the same time. Normally you have rules for using pistols in melee, either directly (shoot them as a CCW attack) or indirectly (they grant you better melee).
Specifically to charging, I also like how charges aren't crazy distances. In 40k your average charge is 13", whereas your average "just sprint across the battlefield" is 9.5". Then you get units that combine sprinting at full tilt and charging (and shooting on the way for good measure) so you're looking at a 16.5" charge! You're outpacing even fast recon elements now! And that's just average not including rerolls and such, rolling well you can outpace aircraft!
It's silly, the sudden "burst of speed" you get for charging is out of all proportion to reality.
This is one of the reasons i love DUST 1947 so much, not only does it use AA, each time a unit activates it can combine any 2 actions in any order(there is also no roll to wound, hitting is wounding). Where it concerns melee it is very simple-B2B contact attacks are made simultaneously unless you are a melee specialist with the charge or first strike USR. (first strike is pretty obvious, charge allows a third action for CC if you double move into base contact)
Mezmorki wrote: Honestly? ProHammer is pretty close to my ideal because not only does it address many of the problem's my group has had with 40k, but we actually play it. The "ideal" is all well and good but what can actually get to the table it what matters at the end of the day.
Man, when people asked you balance questions about ProHammer before and you got mad at them, and now you're advertising it again? Wack.
A system he put a ton of work in and works well, and he’s keen on SHARING it?
It boggles the mind! The audacity! /s
Well we know he doesn't take criticism well.
Maybe the author of said criticism doesn't take rejection well.
Or said author positioned the legitimate questions in an arrogant and condescending manner not worthy or a reply.
I have talked at length with Mezmorki about his prohammer project. i agree with his intent but i do not care for some of his solutions as i see them as not needed from our own groups experience, compared to how we do our hybrid 5th ed based combined edition games very similar to prohammer in intent.
This is one of the reasons i love DUST 1947 so much, not only does it use AA, each time a unit activates it can combine any 2 actions in any order(there is also no roll to wound, hitting is wounding). Where it concerns melee it is very simple-B2B contact attacks are made simultaneously unless you are a melee specialist with the charge or first strike USR. (first strike is pretty obvious, charge allows a third action for CC if you double move into base contact)
DUST1947 honestly looks like it has some really good rules. I really like the way it handles attack values with the small table and armour values.
Alas, the company didn't survive Covid and I'll never get to play it
My experience with set charge distance is with Infinity and WHFB 6th, and 6th let you respond to a charge by fleeing. If you got caught, your unit died (my play group changed this to auto hits in the melee phase.) This wouldn't work in 40k. I think a Move+d6 would be fine, or adding more responses to being charged. I'd like to add responses to most actions. Move+d6 is probably the best compromise for how powerful getting a charge is, locking the player out of shooting, and providing protection unless the unit engaged leaves melee.
Mezmorki wrote: Honestly? ProHammer is pretty close to my ideal because not only does it address many of the problem's my group has had with 40k, but we actually play it. The "ideal" is all well and good but what can actually get to the table it what matters at the end of the day.
Man, when people asked you balance questions about ProHammer before and you got mad at them, and now you're advertising it again? Wack.
A system he put a ton of work in and works well, and he’s keen on SHARING it?
It boggles the mind! The audacity! /s
Well we know he doesn't take criticism well.
Maybe the author of said criticism doesn't take rejection well.
Given their post came off like an unabashed shilling of the ruleset with nowhere a disclaimer that they themselves worked on it, there's already deception and cynical management of expectations going on.
Hecaton wrote: Given their post came off like an unabashed shilling of the ruleset with nowhere a disclaimer that they themselves worked on it, there's already deception and cynical management of expectations going on.
Awww, gak! You caught me. I'm totally shilling my project hard. I'm driving so many clicks to my ProHammer thread here on Dakka (the only exclusive place you can access ProHammer!!!) and I'm getting mad ad revenue from the admins. It's crazy. Heck, I only work like 5 hours a week and I made like $2346.37 last week shilling ProHammer. You should sign up for this too!
TheBestBucketHead wrote: There's a lot of talk on reroll charges, and I'd like to mention that I'm a huge fan of set charge distance, and not random charges. That's one thing that would make me want to play again. I've become a warhammer fantasy fan, but I probably won't play 9th edition, as it will most likely have random charges. If 40k ever adds set charge distance again, I'll be a bit happier.
I hate set charge distances unless you also get rid of pre-measuring. It just results in a bunch of measuring to make sure you're outside an opponents threat range.
Is it any different to shooting though?
Not really since shooting is for the most part too powerful in 40k.
Mezmorki wrote: Honestly? ProHammer is pretty close to my ideal because not only does it address many of the problem's my group has had with 40k, but we actually play it. The "ideal" is all well and good but what can actually get to the table it what matters at the end of the day.
Man, when people asked you balance questions about ProHammer before and you got mad at them, and now you're advertising it again? Wack.
A system he put a ton of work in and works well, and he’s keen on SHARING it?
It boggles the mind! The audacity! /s
Well we know he doesn't take criticism well.
Maybe the author of said criticism doesn't take rejection well.
Given their post came off like an unabashed shilling of the ruleset with nowhere a disclaimer that they themselves worked on it, there's already deception and cynical management of expectations going on.
Imagine being this mad over a free rule set no one is forcing anyone to play.
Also in response to...someone using pre-measuring and fixed charges in WMH, WMH basically forces you into moving forward in order to win the game. You can't dance around outside of engagement range too much because if the opponent gets into the scoring area first you go down on points and letting your opponent get well into the zone makes it hard to get them out and come back on points. Eventually you're going to meet in the middle of the board for a punch up and you generally want to be the one getting there first. 40k is a much broader game, with multiple points of engagement and more ranged, so it's easier to kill things without committing too hard.
TheBestBucketHead wrote: There's a lot of talk on reroll charges, and I'd like to mention that I'm a huge fan of set charge distance, and not random charges. That's one thing that would make me want to play again. I've become a warhammer fantasy fan, but I probably won't play 9th edition, as it will most likely have random charges. If 40k ever adds set charge distance again, I'll be a bit happier.
I hate set charge distances unless you also get rid of pre-measuring. It just results in a bunch of measuring to make sure you're outside an opponents threat range.
you still do "the dance" even with non fixed charges tho... most games i play i have to check what the threat range of a big melee threat is and position myself outside of it (sometimes i'll be greedy and be within a charge of 10-12 but the only difference is that with fixed charges, you're losing 2-3")
Not going to split hairs but i've spent 15 years with fixed charge distance and about 10-12 years without it and the feeling is night and day to me on the level of "the dance".
So while there may be one with random charges, its not anything near as annoying as it is with 100% deterministic charge distances for me.
Respect.
Anything wrong with a system providing two possibilities, and allowing players to choose which to employ?
So, “let’s use fixed charge today, kool?” Or “let’s use random charge today, kool?” With perhaps some backstory, say “the battlefield is flooded with torrential rains and footing is uneven under foot, sinking under the weight of walkers and tracks getting mucked up, wheels spinning in drenched sludge, so charges are random, kool?”
Not sure why a game system like 40k that has used different rules in different editions doesn’t simply compile the possibilities and let people choose what they like best. TOS can do the same, establishing which rules will be used and advertising accordingly… would be interesting imho.
This is one of the reasons i love DUST 1947 so much, not only does it use AA, each time a unit activates it can combine any 2 actions in any order(there is also no roll to wound, hitting is wounding). Where it concerns melee it is very simple-B2B contact attacks are made simultaneously unless you are a melee specialist with the charge or first strike USR. (first strike is pretty obvious, charge allows a third action for CC if you double move into base contact)
DUST1947 honestly looks like it has some really good rules. I really like the way it handles attack values with the small table and armour values.
Alas, the company didn't survive Covid and I'll never get to play it
They also really keep the bloat down by keeping unique weapons down to 1 type per faction. i like to think of it as a cross over between index 8th ed 40K and infinity. not quite as complex as the latter but with enough complexity to make it deeper than the former.
I am seeing some 3d print STLs show up for it now, especially for the "dustified" WWII vehicles. hopefully that will expand or the game will come back in a new incarnation. fortunately i have 5 full armies for it, so i am not at a shortage for game opportunities.
jeff white wrote: Not sure why a game system like 40k that has used different rules in different editions doesn’t simply compile the possibilities and let people choose what they like best.
Because 40k primarily runs on pickup games, discussing exactly which possible permutation of a dozen different "options" you want to use before a game is wildly impractical.
At the end of the day, I might not 100% like random charge distances, but I still think it's best for GW to pick something to be a unified ruleset people can rally around.
jeff white wrote: Not sure why a game system like 40k that has used different rules in different editions doesn’t simply compile the possibilities and let people choose what they like best.
Because 40k primarily runs on pickup games, discussing exactly which possible permutation of a dozen different "options" you want to use before a game is wildly impractical.
At the end of the day, I might not 100% like random charge distances, but I still think it's best for GW to pick something to be a unified ruleset people can rally around.
Could you define "Pickup games"?
Ive seen this phrase used in context that is different than how Ive used it or seen it used before.
Every game club across the US that Ive been apart of (at least 13 in 5 states) would use the term pickup game in reference to a game vs a new or non regular player. If I show up to a lgs and ask a regular who i have a pre-exsisting relationship with to play a game, this wouldn't classify as "pickup."
The reason I bring this up is that I do not believe that 40k primarily runs on pickup games or games against an unknown opponent in a non-tournament scene where the only common denominator is that we both play the same game.
If you have an exsisiting relationship with your opponents then it shouldn't be out of the ordinary to discuss before the game what rules you want to follow...
EDIT: On the random charges vs fixed charges discussion, the game designers who decided 6" move 6" charge actually took other rules into account with these numbers. At the time rapid fire primarily was 24" and required you to be within 12" so you can double tap but at the risk of being charged. Now with the increased RF ranges and variable move speeds its much harder to find a medium without favoring one aspect or the other
Every game club across the US that Ive been apart of (at least 13 in 5 states) would use the term pickup game in reference to a game vs a new or non regular player. If I show up to a lgs and ask a regular who i have a pre-exsisting relationship with to play a game, this wouldn't classify as "pickup."
Never seen it used that way myself. Generally when people say 'pickup game,' they mean just that- you play against whoever else turned up that night at the store. No scheduling through facebook, building specific counter lists, pre-choosing scenarios or whatever people do these days.
You might have a general list in mind or make up one on the spot, but if you, Stevedave, Bob and Kevin are the folks that show up, you play one, the others play each other, and if there's time you'll swap opponents and fit another game in.
Even if they're regulars, you don't know if you're playing Stevedave's Eldar, Kevin's Orks or Bob's Space Marines.
Because maybe Bob didn't show up, but Marcy brought her Nids.
The reason I bring this up is that I do not believe that 40k primarily runs on pickup games or games against an unknown opponent in a non-tournament scene where the only common denominator is that we both play the same game.
Me too, I still believe in garagehammer. I think most of the games are played at people's homes or even in stores but mostly between players that already know each other, know each other armies and have probably organized the game in advance.
Even in real random pick up games, typically players know the pool of players and what specific armies (or even specific collections of models) they can realistically face. Most of the metas don't have more than 20-30 players.
It's not like every club or shop is something close to a GT with 150+ partecipants from different areas.
Yeah, you know the guy. He has 2000pts and you have 2000pts. His 2000pts loses to your army 5 out of 6 times. Now you can adapt. I specially like the idea of talking for hours what is okey and what isn't, when most stores have 2-3 tables, so talking means someone else will take the table and now you can wait for them to finish.
I use "pickup game" to refer to either of two things.
- You post on my group's facebook/discord/Whatsapp/whatever "anyone want a game thursday?" and whoever picks up you're good to go.
Depending on size of group I might not know them at all, or I might be already be acquainted. But we're not exactly close enough to have swapped numbers.
- You turn up at your group on the prescribed day and throw down with whoever else is milling about.
Either way I don't have any desire to be discussing which permutation of rules we want to use.
In my games, we briefly discuss which mission pack we want to use then we get to playing. Anything more would take too long and introduce too much debate.
Yeah, it totally depends on what someone wants from the gaming experience. I for example have stopped playing against unknown opponents long ago, I organize a game through a chat, or get contacted by another player who wants to play, and once we actually meet we already had all the pre-game talk we needed to have. I mean, I know the pool of players and approximately what they have so I can realistically expect what I might face even if I don't know which one of them would be my random opponent.
Occasionally there's a new player around and then yeah, blind game might happen but after a couple of matches also that opponent becomes known in terms of skills and what I can reasonably expect to face at the table. And most of the times it's someone new to the hobby, who can't possibly field the flavour of the month or play it properly, so even that scenario is not something I should worry about either.
Metas with 40+ dedicated players that all show up regularly might be different than my experience I guess.
All that aside, if someone said great, let’s do 1250 pts on a 6x4 table using this scenario using these movement and charge rules, as in the main rule book under optional rules, or simply as a house rule for this game use fixed charge distances, would not be a problem for me… best would be imho if gw simply had a main book with options from different past editions and a fellow hobbyist could say let’s use weapon profiles and movement and targeting mechanics from third, vehicle rules from fourth, army composition rules from second, and this scenario from fourth, no flyers, no superheavies, and no named characters, and i could say great… let’s do it, but the first game, let’s run 500pts so I can get used to those vehicle rules again, kool? Not sure why this would be trouble… for a pickup game
I have been playing two versions of 40K for the last 15 years or so:
1. Custom 2nd.
2. Custom 3rd-6th
Both contain AA, templates and proper terrain rules. TLOS is also not a thing. Version 1 allows ridiculous Hollywood explosions to occur and grunts throwing frag grenades like crazy while Version 2 allows me to field massive mobs of plague zombies to be annihilated by Imperial Knights.
jeff white wrote: All that aside, if someone said great, let’s do 1250 pts on a 6x4 table using this scenario using these movement and charge rules, as in the main rule book under optional rules, or simply as a house rule for this game use fixed charge distances, would not be a problem for me… best would be imho if gw simply had a main book with options from different past editions and a fellow hobbyist could say let’s use weapon profiles and movement and targeting mechanics from third, vehicle rules from fourth, army composition rules from second, and this scenario from fourth, no flyers, no superheavies, and no named characters, and i could say great… let’s do it, but the first game, let’s run 500pts so I can get used to those vehicle rules again, kool? Not sure why this would be trouble… for a pickup game
Another wrinkle is a lot of people use pickup games as tournament practice games.
So they don't want to entertain or debate using non tournament standard scenarios or rules since that is a waste of their time to them.
"A game that allows you to reenact heroic thematic and dramatic battles of the 41st millennia"
Basically take the new HH2.0 rules, bring in other factions, and ill be happy thats all i want, minor balancing to objectivly broken/insane combos, and or GW having the backgone to outright call out broken things and specifically shoot them down.
Example, say one unit is able to very clearly abuse a rule that all other armies are fully capable of using to not observe levels, GW having the gaull to just come out and say, hey this army/unit can do this any more because it was insane everyone else can keep playing with it.
jeff white wrote: All that aside, if someone said great, let’s do 1250 pts on a 6x4 table using this scenario using these movement and charge rules, as in the main rule book under optional rules, or simply as a house rule for this game use fixed charge distances, would not be a problem for me… best would be imho if gw simply had a main book with options from different past editions and a fellow hobbyist could say let’s use weapon profiles and movement and targeting mechanics from third, vehicle rules from fourth, army composition rules from second, and this scenario from fourth, no flyers, no superheavies, and no named characters, and i could say great… let’s do it, but the first game, let’s run 500pts so I can get used to those vehicle rules again, kool? Not sure why this would be trouble… for a pickup game
Another wrinkle is a lot of people use pickup games as tournament practice games.
So they don't want to entertain or debate using non tournament standard scenarios or rules since that is a waste of their time to them.
Yep. And different tourney circuits could run their own mix of rules, or the newest of the new edition rules re GW supporting their newly reinvented squats or Uber weapon toting jump pack restartes or whatever… nothing stopping that and I would suppose an even better measure of player skill, to adapt to different rules environments rather than exploiting one set of loopholes with one commission painted “build” after another…
auticus wrote: Most of the games I play are move + d6 so I dont have a problem with jump packs or bikes or whatever.
Personally I’d prefer a guaranteed charge range and a random charge range. Guaranteed charge range would be half move (rounded up), IE:
- Necron Warriors with their 5 inch move would have a guaranteed charge range of 3 inches. Anything higher would require a charge roll.
- Kroot Carnivores with their 7 inch move would have a guaranteed charge range of 4 inches. Anything more requires a roll.
- Assault Marines with their jump packs would have a guaranteed charge range of 6 inches. Larger would require a roll.
- Vertus Praetors with their 14 inch move would have a guaranteed charge range of 7 inches. Larger would still require a roll.
I think this is far more balanced and prevents situations where you roll low and completely miss out.
If you're talking about the current 2d6 charge, I guess you have a point, but you're quoting an approach to charges that already has minimum distances built in.
Voss wrote: ??
Move characteristic+1d6 inherently does that.
If you're talking about the current 2d6 charge, I guess you have a point, but you're quoting an approach to charges that already has minimum distances built in.
Move +D6 is a higher average than 2D6, and then some models can go crazy. Land Speeders charging 20+ inches could be pretty disruptive. I'd be slamming Rhinos into things all the time too. Feels wierd.
Voss wrote: ??
Move characteristic+1d6 inherently does that.
If you're talking about the current 2d6 charge, I guess you have a point, but you're quoting an approach to charges that already has minimum distances built in.
Move +D6 is a higher average than 2D6, and then some models can go crazy. Land Speeders charging 20+ inches could be pretty disruptive. I'd be slamming Rhinos into things all the time too. Feels wierd.
on the contrary, charging your empty rhinos into troops to cause disruption feels dope as feth.
Voss wrote: ??
Move characteristic+1d6 inherently does that.
If you're talking about the current 2d6 charge, I guess you have a point, but you're quoting an approach to charges that already has minimum distances built in.
Move +D6 is a higher average than 2D6, and then some models can go crazy. Land Speeders charging 20+ inches could be pretty disruptive. I'd be slamming Rhinos into things all the time too. Feels wierd.
on the contrary, charging your empty rhinos into troops to cause disruption feels dope as feth.
Sure, but we can already do it with a move of 12" plus a 2D6 charge. 12 move, plus 12+D6 is even farther. This is across the table from the start of the game. I think it's a breaking point when a bunch of units are easily assaulting beyond 24".
Imo the issue with assault range right now is the total possibility of wiffing 2-4 inch charges. Being limited to a 12" charge range is definitely not an issue.
Voss wrote: ??
Move characteristic+1d6 inherently does that.
If you're talking about the current 2d6 charge, I guess you have a point, but you're quoting an approach to charges that already has minimum distances built in.
Move +D6 is a higher average than 2D6, and then some models can go crazy. Land Speeders charging 20+ inches could be pretty disruptive. I'd be slamming Rhinos into things all the time too. Feels wierd.
on the contrary, charging your empty rhinos into troops to cause disruption feels dope as feth.
Sure, but we can already do it with a move of 12" plus a 2D6 charge. 12 move, plus 12+D6 is even farther. This is across the table from the start of the game. I think it's a breaking point when a bunch of units are easily assaulting beyond 24".
Imo the issue with assault range right now is the total possibility of wiffing 2-4 inch charges. Being limited to a 12" charge range is definitely not an issue.
oh, i was assuming charges would be part of the movement like it is in onepagerules. yeah, if its move + move + roll it would be a little dumb.
When I brought up static charges, my examples were Infinity and WHFB, and the person who said Move+d6, if I remember correctly, also played old WHFB. Charging was done in the movement phase. I'm not a fan of charging being its own phase. Move+d6 is a nerf from Move+2d6, especially with it being done in the movement phase. But I'd prefer double move, unless they have fly, and vehicles would have to be different, too. In WHFB, flying models had charge equal their fly move, not double. Hopefully this clears this up a bit.
Voss wrote: ??
Move characteristic+1d6 inherently does that.
If you're talking about the current 2d6 charge, I guess you have a point, but you're quoting an approach to charges that already has minimum distances built in.
Move +D6 is a higher average than 2D6, and then some models can go crazy. Land Speeders charging 20+ inches could be pretty disruptive. I'd be slamming Rhinos into things all the time too. Feels wierd.
on the contrary, charging your empty rhinos into troops to cause disruption feels dope as feth.
Sure, but we can already do it with a move of 12" plus a 2D6 charge. 12 move, plus 12+D6 is even farther. This is across the table from the start of the game. I think it's a breaking point when a bunch of units are easily assaulting beyond 24".
Imo the issue with assault range right now is the total possibility of wiffing 2-4 inch charges. Being limited to a 12" charge range is definitely not an issue.
oh, i was assuming charges would be part of the movement like it is in onepagerules. yeah, if its move + move + roll it would be a little dumb.
^Ahh, gotcha. I might have missed that detail in the conversation.
Automatically Appended Next Post:
TheBestBucketHead wrote: When I brought up static charges, my examples were Infinity and WHFB, and the person who said Move+d6, if I remember correctly, also played old WHFB. Charging was done in the movement phase. I'm not a fan of charging being its own phase. Move+d6 is a nerf from Move+2d6, especially with it being done in the movement phase. But I'd prefer double move, unless they have fly, and vehicles would have to be different, too. In WHFB, flying models had charge equal their fly move, not double. Hopefully this clears this up a bit.
Yeah 40k 2nd edition workrd with charging being in the movement phase too.
Personally I like charges being done in it's own phase because it can be leveraged to further diversify troops, which is what the 3rd ed paradigm introduced. Models who fired pistols or Assault weapons were able to charge, while models who fired Rapid Fire or Heavy Weapons could not. It was a neat distinction that could require tough choices by the player.
I am quite happy to just stay with the 5th ed model when it comes to charging-
fixed charge distances over open ground, modified by movement/interaction through terrain-if you want more charge range bring a unit that is cavalry leaping or beasts. it gives the different unit types a reason to stand out.
With various rules regarding terrain, scout/outflank, rage/frenzy and fleet (and a very few special units/characters that can assault from deepstrike). my experience over the last decade+ is that while most units cannot assault turn 1, they really have no trouble living long enough to make it into assault with a table that has reasonable amounts of terrain on it.
Unless you are doing a complete game redesign there is no logical reason for random charge ranges to exist over open ground when so much else in the game has fixed ranges for ease of game play.
auticus wrote: Most of the games I play are move + d6 so I dont have a problem with jump packs or bikes or whatever.
Personally I’d prefer a guaranteed charge range and a random charge range. Guaranteed charge range would be half move (rounded up), IE:
- Necron Warriors with their 5 inch move would have a guaranteed charge range of 3 inches. Anything higher would require a charge roll.
- Kroot Carnivores with their 7 inch move would have a guaranteed charge range of 4 inches. Anything more requires a roll.
- Assault Marines with their jump packs would have a guaranteed charge range of 6 inches. Larger would require a roll.
- Vertus Praetors with their 14 inch move would have a guaranteed charge range of 7 inches. Larger would still require a roll.
I think this is far more balanced and prevents situations where you roll low and completely miss out.
Pretty kewl idea! So, to try to get more than the guaranteed charge would imply risking not getting the guaranteed amount? Interesting…
Voss wrote: ??
Move characteristic+1d6 inherently does that.
If you're talking about the current 2d6 charge, I guess you have a point, but you're quoting an approach to charges that already has minimum distances built in.
The difference is you've just increased charge range. You've gone from average 7 inch charges for everyone, to 6 inch movement models having an average 9.5 inch charge, with even faster units with say for example a 14 inch move to have an average 17.5 inch charge.
Now that 14 inch move unit can effectively go 31.5 inches to make their charge 1st turn. That's terrible.
My suggest just makes charges more reliable. So a 14 inch move unit can 100% charge something 7 inches away from it, or they roll if they want to risk going up to 12. I've just made the current system more reliable.
Voss wrote: ??
Move characteristic+1d6 inherently does that.
If you're talking about the current 2d6 charge, I guess you have a point, but you're quoting an approach to charges that already has minimum distances built in.
The difference is you've just increased charge range. You've gone from average 7 inch charges for everyone, to 6 inch movement models having an average 9.5 inch charge, with even faster units with say for example a 14 inch move to have an average 17.5 inch charge.
Now that 14 inch move unit can effectively go 31.5 inches to make their charge 1st turn. That's terrible.
My suggest just makes charges more reliable. So a 14 inch move unit can 100% charge something 7 inches away from it, or they roll if they want to risk going up to 12. I've just made the current system more reliable.
You're working under the assumption that in this scenario charging units get to move AND charge though. Why not just make declaring charges the first part of the movement phase like Fantasy used to do.
I think current 40k is the best it's been, the missions are balanced and fun.
The issue holding it back is faction balance.
This could be easily fixed by removing points from the paper codexes and storing them on an online document which can be tuned and tweaked easily.
There is no point in printing points in the codexes anyway as they are invalidated before you get the shrink wrap off.
Units that are clearly problematic like Voidweavers can get an instant increase. And units not seeing any play can get a decrease.
This would need to be supplemented by regular FAQ's and balancing dataslates.
Even with this balance is never going to be 100% assured as there are simply too many moving parts.
But I reckon they could get most of the factions performing in and around that sweet spot of 50% win rate.
Slight problem with charging before shooting is that you can't soften up a target first, which is a much more important aspect of 40k than it was Fantasy.
You could solve this by still charging in the charge phase, but only if you didn't move beforehand.
Or, better yet, go to Alternating Activation so one unit can shoot before the other charges
I mean, I get your point, but unless you're charging top of T1, you do get to soften up your target first. By shooting it in the previous Shooting phase.
Pickled_egg wrote: I think current 40k is the best it's been, the missions are balanced and fun.
hard disagree, current matched play missions are all the same but with slight variations
Was about to say the same thing lol.
Current 40kimo is the worst its ever been because its the most boring thing to play right now. Every single game is the same damn thing, playing on the same board, using the same ITC standard terrain set up.
Every game feels like its being played in a clean room, its serialized, standardized, its soulless.
Well they are better then what was going on in 8th. But with how much time it takes GW to update stuff and make it good, by the time a missions system could be made fun, GW tends to change the design paradigma and everyone is back to hoping their army is going to do very well under a new core rules system.
Karol wrote: Well they are better then what was going on in 8th. But with how much time it takes GW to update stuff and make it good, by the time a missions system could be made fun, GW tends to change the design paradigma and everyone is back to hoping their army is going to do very well under a new core rules system.
uhhh hard disagree, missions in 8th at least played better because the game itself was not as asinine as it became now.
And that also does not make any sense, the missions can be fine, in fact look at 7th when it came to open war, that was a blast in terms of missions. They can do it, they just choose not to now because they would rather market toward the tounrament crowd, which is why the missions are so bland. Then you look over at AoS, and see the missions they have, and the dynamics it introduces.
I love threads like this because it just shows the wide variety of what people want the game to be. Suggestions here range from no random charges, go back to 3-7 rules, and everything in between. My personal preference (note preference not saying my opinion is move valid) is that I would hate to go back to the 3-7 rules.
I personally think 9th is the best edition based on the core rules. And as for codex creep and balance, that has ALWAYS been a problem in 40k and will ALWAYS be a problem. There are over 20 factions, some with wildly different play styles, and so it is inevitable that some armies play styles will be better than others just in how the core rules interact with those armies. And this game is no less balanced than previous editions for the competitive scene with spamy BS lists dominating. At least GW tries to fix that now instead of dealing with the broken meta for years. However, when you compare the 9th edition books, with maybe the Necrons as an outlier, if both players are not bringing WAAC lists, then this game is much more balanced than previous editions by a good margin. Part of that is just the fact that factions actually get updates without having to wait a decade. I have played very few games in a semi-competitive way that have been total blowouts i.e over on turn 2. That cannot be said for 3-7 when blow outs were the default basically.
As for what I would do now to make the game better, in my opinion, is make it so no unit can be subject to multiple stratagems at a time. This is something that can be done without FAQs across multiple codex, with one simple statement in a main FAQ. This would eliminate some of the more egregious combinations.
I, personally, would also prefer if all stratagems were once use only. So you need to pick the right time to transhuman, or lighting fast reflexes, instead of it being an ever turn go to. Again this would take very little effort to implement. Also you might see some more of the under or non-used stratagems.
Both of these fixes are aimed at what is probably the most dysfunctional part of 9th, stratagem abuse and stacking of rules.
I also think the ap modifiers have gotten a little to much in the offense direction and probably need to be toned down, but that would require a bunch of FAQs across multiple codex which makes it more difficult to implement.
I dont think anyone is saying that there has never not been codex creep, i think most people are syaing that the current codex creep is the worst its ever been.
My experience from mid 6th to now is that in my opinion its definitely is the worst its ever been, if not the most blatantly obvious that its just for marketing purposes, with the release vastly over tuned, and then nerfed 3 months later.
The other issues is this edtion is the worst in terms of things i need in order to play the game. Even at the tail end of 7th i never had to bring this much crap to a game, with rules spread out across multiple books and FAQs to fix those books
I agree on ap though, and ill say what i know people dont like to hear. All or nothing AP system was the best, and the way HH 2.0 is doing AP is so far the best looking AP system i have seen in the game.
For those that dont know the AP system of HH 2.0 is all or nothing, but AP3 and AP2 are very rare, but a lot of weapons have rending or breach Which is rending on a 4+
Voss wrote: ??
Move characteristic+1d6 inherently does that.
If you're talking about the current 2d6 charge, I guess you have a point, but you're quoting an approach to charges that already has minimum distances built in.
The difference is you've just increased charge range. You've gone from average 7 inch charges for everyone, to 6 inch movement models having an average 9.5 inch charge, with even faster units with say for example a 14 inch move to have an average 17.5 inch charge.
Now that 14 inch move unit can effectively go 31.5 inches to make their charge 1st turn. That's terrible.
My suggest just makes charges more reliable. So a 14 inch move unit can 100% charge something 7 inches away from it, or they roll if they want to risk going up to 12. I've just made the current system more reliable.
You're working under the assumption that in this scenario charging units get to move AND charge though. Why not just make declaring charges the first part of the movement phase like Fantasy used to do.
Sim, no chance you are planning on moving to South Korea anytime sooner or later?
I ask cuz exactly, this is how things should be done. Charging is an all out for the turn. I wish for the return of epic style order tokens too… overwatch, hidden, broken, yada… charge would be one of those placed at the beginning of the turn as orders are given.
kirotheavenger wrote: I think double move is too far, SM bikes charging 28", let's not!
I think the issue is that all the activity a unit does in 40K is additive. If you move, you go a set distance. If you move and then charge, you can easily be doubling your actual distance covered in a turn. Whether you shoot or not makes no difference, unless you Advance, which gives you only a measly 1D6" extra in exchange for no shooting or charging.
So you have one unit that moves 6" and Advances to move another 1D6" and doesn't shoot, while another unit moves 6", shoots, and then charges an extra 2D6". The unit that gave up its shooting and charging to move faster doesn't go as far as a unit that moved and shot and then charged anyways. Any mechanic where charging is still bonus movement on top of all your other activity has the same sorts of edge cases and issue of potentially enabling excessive movement.
A lot of games nowadays instead use an action system, typically two actions per unit, so you can move + charge or shoot + charge but not move + shoot + charge. Apocalypse does something similar, where the Assault order allows a formation to move twice and fight in melee, but not shoot.
Would bikes with a 28" charge range but no ability to shoot when charging be more oppressive than bikes with a 21" average charge range (more with rerolls), 26" threat range, and the ability to shoot before they charge? Could be, but I don't see it as a sure thing- and if your opponent had some ability to react, rather than all standing around while you zoom in to beat them up, that would help too.
Pickled_egg wrote: I think current 40k is the best it's been, the missions are balanced and fun.
hard disagree, current matched play missions are all the same but with slight variations
Was about to say the same thing lol.
Current 40kimo is the worst its ever been because its the most boring thing to play right now. Every single game is the same damn thing, playing on the same board, using the same ITC standard terrain set up.
Every game feels like its being played in a clean room, its serialized, standardized, its soulless.
I can't really argue with how you subjectively feel about the game. It's your opinion, you are fully entitled to it and its no better or worse than my own.
I would add that I'm approaching the game from a competitive/tournament perspective. I get that games can feel very samey because that's kind of the intent with competitive play to ensure balance at tournaments, everyone plays the same mission pack. And I do feel they are making an effort to freshen it up with the notion of "GT seasons" (though I strongly object to the price point on those books)
But I also play narrative games, big apocalypse games, doubles games, I'm not just confined to competitive play. And you do have other options like the new Maelstrom deck. But tbh in my group we don't even use GW rules to govern those type of games, we come up with our own scenario's, objectives etc, and we discuss our armies in advance we establishment if we go are going fluffy or hard with our lists.
but my rather long winded point is, its hard to argue with you as I don't know what angle you are approaching the game with.
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You don't need to benefit financially to make it obnoxious.
Pickled_egg wrote: I think current 40k is the best it's been, the missions are balanced and fun.
hard disagree, current matched play missions are all the same but with slight variations
Was about to say the same thing lol.
Current 40kimo is the worst its ever been because its the most boring thing to play right now. Every single game is the same damn thing, playing on the same board, using the same ITC standard terrain set up.
Every game feels like its being played in a clean room, its serialized, standardized, its soulless.
If 2k Matched tourney practice games were all I played, I wouldn't like the game either.
If those are the only games you can get, you have my genuine sympathy.
If they are the only games you choose to play, I would question why. Obviously, the game should be strong enough that you can play your chosen format and have fun- I'm not saying otherwise.
But my games rarely feel the same. I don't think I've played the same size of game more than 3 times in a row, and because I use Agendas to drive my narratives, I tend to switch those up every game- though I usually prioritize the bespoke agendas because they tend to tie-in with long-term faction based goals. Another thing that provides me with a lot of variety is that I tend to run many small Crusades that ally to fight larger battles. I use theatre of war rules, but sparingly. I bought the Charadon and Octarius campaign books but I only have the mission packs for Charadon. I haven't actually played that battle yet- if I play in those settings, I want to play through the whole thing and I'm already involved in my own campaign setting, so it'll be a while.
Like I said though, I get that some people don't have the option to explore alternative formats, and I can even understand the POV of people who choose 2k matched out of a desire to belong to a scene or whatever.
Backspacehacker wrote: I dont think anyone is saying that there has never not been codex creep, i think most people are syaing that the current codex creep is the worst its ever been.
My experience from mid 6th to now is that in my opinion its definitely is the worst its ever been, if not the most blatantly obvious that its just for marketing purposes, with the release vastly over tuned, and then nerfed 3 months later.
The other issues is this edtion is the worst in terms of things i need in order to play the game. Even at the tail end of 7th i never had to bring this much crap to a game, with rules spread out across multiple books and FAQs to fix those books
I agree on ap though, and ill say what i know people dont like to hear. All or nothing AP system was the best, and the way HH 2.0 is doing AP is so far the best looking AP system i have seen in the game.
For those that dont know the AP system of HH 2.0 is all or nothing, but AP3 and AP2 are very rare, but a lot of weapons have rending or breach Which is rending on a 4+
I actually disagree. I think codex creep is much less worse now. I remember the 5th/6th edition necrons and GK. 7th edition elder. Yikes. This power creep is nothing compared to those. But that is just my experience yours may vary. But I believe my second point is still valid which is the easiest and best way to “fix” 9th would be limits on strats
I have played very few games in a semi-competitive way that have been total blowouts i.e over on turn 2. That cannot be said for 3-7 when blow outs were the default basically.
first i think we need to clarify the difference between competitive and tournament-all wargames by their very nature are competitive, however that changes to another level when it comes to tournament style play.
As somebody who started in 3rd and went back to playing 5th when 8th edition dropped i have to give you a hard disagree there. the fact that scoring isn't done until the end and the game can go to a random turn 6 or 7 totally changes the outcome of the game. especially where objectives are involved, it keeps both players actively playing. most games in my experience are very close run things not blow outs and to me that is a good thing.
I actually disagree. I think codex creep is much less worse now. I remember the 5th/6th edition necrons and GK. 7th edition elder. Yikes. This power creep is nothing compared to those. But that is just my experience yours may vary. But I believe my second point is still valid which is the easiest and best way to “fix” 9th would be limits on strats
While i agree that 6th was a terrible edition (even GW agrees) and 7th had it's own version of bloat via formations. in 5th aside from GKs no longer being GKs as part of the military orders of the inquisition as the 3rd ed book properly played them(they were never supposed to be their own equivalent stand alone marine chapter). most codexes were quite good and not power creep in the same level we are seeing now where they need an immediate nerf(like the game devs didn't even play thier own game to understand the mistakes). in fact many were worse. that is why many 4th or 3rd ed codexes are used in our 5th ed games as they better represent the factions in the lore. GKs come to mind as do orks, eldar and tau.
I actually disagree. I think codex creep is much less worse now. I remember the 5th/6th edition necrons and GK. 7th edition elder. Yikes. This power creep is nothing compared to those.
I agree, people do seem to have short memory. And don't forget that now GW fixes the issues, sometimes really really soon. So most of the stuff that is OP on paper and crushed one or two main events in real life never happens for a very large portion of players. Like the 9 squigbuggies and 5 flyers that outraged the world, how many of the posters here have actually played against such infamous list, let alone played against it multiple times? In 7th the most OP armies stayed OP for very long without touching anything. Even drukhari in 9th, which have been top tiers for a while, had to rework their lists pretty heavily after a couple of fixes by GW.
Codex creep on paper isn't really an issue if such creep only last a few months.
Every-turn scoring requires a sudden death end game trigger. Warmachine does it well - you score points every turn but if at any point a player has a specified lead (5 Control Points in case of WM) the game ends instantly with his win.
One of the golden rules of game design is that a game should last only up to the point when outcome is obvious and not a moment longer. It's one of the things WH40K does badly.
how many of the posters here have actually played against such infamous list, let alone played against it multiple times?
As somebody who has been playing 40K for 20 years and still plays miniature games regularly every week (including 40K), lets go through them shall we
.nid zilla-check
.chaos double lash prince-check
.iron warriors 3rd ed version-check
.riptide spam-check
.eldar corsairs FW army list-check
.DKOKFW army list-check
.elysians FW army list-check
.5th ed GKs-check
.chaos demon summoning spam-check
etc...
I have fought these types of lists multiple times over hundreds if not thousands of games, even against the toughest of lists i have had good games as long as the players involved had the right mind set.
I have also faced rather mediocre lists that were terrible games because of the people i was playing against. codex creep is a thing that GW uses for marketing, even more now than they did before. they may attempt to fix it faster now, however the fact it gets released in the state it has been without proper play testing or even a cursory understanding of the game is more of an issue for me. but then GW left the sphere of a Napoleonic style wargame in favor of a war themed game a long time ago.
My point is that currently there might even no need of the right mind now set since infamous lists are doomed to be axed in a short period of time, unlike in previous editions.
A lot of games nowadays instead use an action system, typically two actions per unit, so you can move + charge or shoot + charge but not move + shoot + charge. Apocalypse does something similar, where the Assault order allows a formation to move twice and fight in melee, but not shoot.
I agree with the problem of "added action" in 40k, and the example of move+shoot+charge vs move+advance does show the problem perfectly.
I would love a two action system.
However, I think the problem if a simple doube move charge would still be there.
Bikes charging 28" (like 32" on Eldar bikes!) is ridiculous when rifles have a maximum range of 24" and an effective range of 12". Eldar bikes would literally be able to charge you from further away than you could ever hope to move+shoot them.
Meanwhile my Terminator Assault Squad is charging just 10"...
Many games use a move+X system instead, so we might have a M+6 or M+2d3 or similar. This lowers the excesses of high speed, and means there's not such a huge gulf between fast and slow.
That said, assault unitd varying from 5" move all the way up to 16" would still be a huge difference, I'd like to reduce movement speed across the board.
This would also (and more importantly) make the board feel a little bit larger.
Say 5" standard for infantry, 7-9"ish for bikes and jumppacks.
Whilst we're at it reduce weapon ranges as well. Small arms should *cap* at 24", 18" being fairly common.
It's just dumb when my army's standard rifle can reach most of the way across the board.
Cyel wrote: Every-turn scoring requires a sudden death end game trigger. Warmachine does it well - you score points every turn but if at any point a player has a specified lead (5 Control Points in case of WM) the game ends instantly with his win.
One of the golden rules of game design is that a game should last only up to the point when outcome is obvious and not a moment longer. It's one of the things WH40K does badly.
Certainly true in matched, where the win is all that matters.
But in Crusade, I might not be playing to win the mission- I might be trying to succeed at an Agenda or a trial of sorts, which is worth experience points, but no VP. This is probably the biggest functional difference between Crusade and Matched.
I think there were also some tournament formats where your VP total counted for something regardless of strict wins vs losses, so ending a game prematurely due to an inability to win could screw those players over too. As a guy who doesn't play tournaments, or even matched play, I have no idea if this is still common at tournaments or whether they've devised a work-around.
A lot of games nowadays instead use an action system, typically two actions per unit, so you can move + charge or shoot + charge but not move + shoot + charge. Apocalypse does something similar, where the Assault order allows a formation to move twice and fight in melee, but not shoot.
I agree with the problem of "added action" in 40k, and the example of move+shoot+charge vs move+advance does show the problem perfectly.
I would love a two action system.
However, I think the problem if a simple doube move charge would still be there.
Bikes charging 28" (like 32" on Eldar bikes!) is ridiculous when rifles have a maximum range of 24" and an effective range of 12". Eldar bikes would literally be able to charge you from further away than you could ever hope to move+shoot them.
Meanwhile my Terminator Assault Squad is charging just 10"...
Many games use a move+X system instead, so we might have a M+6 or M+2d3 or similar. This lowers the excesses of high speed, and means there's not such a huge gulf between fast and slow.
That said, assault unitd varying from 5" move all the way up to 16" would still be a huge difference, I'd like to reduce movement speed across the board.
This would also (and more importantly) make the board feel a little bit larger.
Say 5" standard for infantry, 7-9"ish for bikes and jumppacks.
Whilst we're at it reduce weapon ranges as well. Small arms should *cap* at 24", 18" being fairly common.
It's just dumb when my army's standard rifle can reach most of the way across the board.
Infinity, which does double action, has two move characteristics, where you move the first one your first move, and the second your second move. So a 6-2 move,, you'd move 8 inches total. Also, bikes could be changed pretty drastically to work within even just making it so charges are double move at the beginning of movement. All you have to do is have certain vehicle types have set charges, like how Fly did in WHFB.
