Forum adverts like this one are shown to any user who is not logged in. Join us by filling out a tiny 3 field form and you will get your own, free, dakka user account which gives a good range of benefits to you: No adverts like this in the forums anymore. Times and dates in your local timezone. Full tracking of what you have read so you can skip to your first unread post, easily see what has changed since you last logged in, and easily see what is new at a glance. Email notifications for threads you want to watch closely. Being a part of the oldest wargaming community on the net. If you are already a member then feel free to login now.

I was all giddy when I got my 6th Ed Codex and subsequent reading session that ensued. The product was shiny, the lore was polished and refreshing to read (despite the fact that 13th Black Crusade has been going on for what, 10+ years now?) and doing a cover to cover reading had me expanding my mind in ways that I could build my armies and unlock the potential for new and exciting combinations with all a new rule set brings.

Then I began to deeply read into each rule that was replaced from the prior edition. I applauded diversifying power weapons, and liked the Overwatch rule followed by making shooting more realistic and giving grenades more teeth. But then I started scratching my head on random charge ranges, nerfing fleet and assault in general, and the random, random dice rolls that now plague the game between the Warlord and Psychic Discipline tables.

Now I am sure people have opposite opinions to me, so I want to know what others think of what GW did better in 6th Ed versus 5th Ed or even before that as I have little knowledge of the rules before 5th Ed and figure GW must of done something better in prior editions than the previous two.

So basically, I want Dakka to list here what they think the pros and cons are of each edition versus prior ones, even if it is simply stating what you think what one edition did better than the other.

You're not likely to find much consensus, I'm afraid.

I don't like the additions of overwatch, snap fire or random charges, principally because I'm of the opinion that the last thing Warhammer 40,000 needs is to be bogged-down with yet more dice rolls. Moreover, different armies benefit (and suffer) from them to different degrees (i.e. hordes with S4 guns such as Orks do well, elite armies with low AV such as Dark Eldar fare poorly), which, since points values have not changed, spoils game balance. The new vehicle rules seem, on balance, to be a slight improvement, however, since vehicles both explode more and fire more.

The missions are still pretty unimpressive, though it's easy enough to design one's own. Warlord traits and random psychic power, I loathe; they're bad for game balance, and reduce the value of planning. Kill points are still a terrible and patronising mechanic.

For myself, I don't on balance much like the changes; I see the rules falling between the objectives of a streamlined system for large battles and a detailed one for skirmishes, and realising neither particularly well.

I like almost everything about 6th.

In my opinion random charges are not really so very terrible a thing. In 5th you had to be 6" or less from your target (with most units) in order to charge. Now you have a chance to charge from further away (which is a plus for assault units) but must face defensive fire (a small minus) and run the small risk of not making it in from between 2" and 6" (a minus for assault units). Overall I think it's introduced an interesting mechanic that is not actually so random that one simply cannot cater for it. Often, i think, what players want is 'control' and so see extra randomness (which always undermines the amount of control one has over units) as a bad thing per se. Which of course it isn't necessarily. Certainly you can have too much randomness and there is an amount of subjectivity with regard to where the line is drawn between 'too random' and 'more weighing of odds in decision making' (which actually adds to the tactical demands on the player). I feel the way random charges work comes squarely in the latter camp. And of course in 5th, charging into terrain (which was commonplace) was always random and nobody was too bothered about that . . .

Random psychic powers, I'm slightly less impressed with as it's quite hard to see a logical justification as to why they should be random from a 'fluff' point of view. It is mitigated by the fact one may always choose codex powers instead, and also that one may always pick the 'default' power if one does not like one's roll. So overall, though i'd rather have had a purchase system, i don't think the randomness here is too bad (though unlike variable charge range, I don't regard this as adding to tactics, rather as 'bad' randomness that is really being random for random's sake).

Ditto but slightly moreso, Warlord Powers. Here a lucky roll may mean your Warlord is (say) scoring, or gains FNP for him and his squad when claiming an objective, whereas a bad roll may mean you get something pretty worthless for the mission. Again, i'd rather have had these points based and perhaps only available to 'ordinary' HQs (ie not special characters). However, though 'bad' randomness in that one player may gain an advantage and the other none, I don't think many of these will decide a game.

Just about everything else -- flyers, look out, sir!, terrain picking, deployment types (especially the long board), missions, snap firing, hull points (initially I thought an average 3 was probably too few, but after my first game I saw 3 was actually a very good level to set them at), and all the small but significant changes to eg going to ground, AP, skimmers, vehicle movement, etc, seem to work well.

So overall a huge improvement on 5th for me.

EDIT: and one thing has struck me, I think fielding a 'balanced' army is much harder now as it's very hard to squeeze in counters to the large number of threats an enemy might possibly field. Again, I think this is actually a good thing overall, though if it is the case, it will make tournaments with small numbers of games played even more random in terms of who wins overall (but could make longer-term league play more interesting).

Overwatch: Good idea
Every other nerf to assault: bad idea.

Overwatch added to 5th ed makes sense and gives certain armies a chance against assault elements that they normally don't have, apart from just backing away from the assault and shooting the unit after it's done murdering its comrades. However, since the armies that have this problem number roughly 2 (IG and Tau) and one of them has units to spare in the pursuit of fighting attrition wars (IG) I would have been fine with this simply being a rule added to Tau.

However, when you add overwatch to the other assault nerfs, only the most rediculously overpowered and well protected units will survive to get into combat, let alone the rapid firing that happens next turn (those Necron ricochet shields make alot more sense now, don't they?

It's a classic example of GW "fixing" something with 3 solutions when one would have sufficed.

The evolution of vehicles is a fine example.

In 3e, there were two charts for vehicles, glancing and penetrating. If you shot through cover, the vehicle was "hull down" and thus could only be glanced. You could be destroyed on the glancing chart. All vehicles, not just open topped ones could move 12", disembark troops, and let them charge. If you got 2 Immob results on a vehicle, nothing happened. No stunned, no shaken, no destroyed weapon: it just became a hole in the chart. You could camp a rhino full of marines in woods on an objective and laugh as your opponants blew off the storm bolter, blew off the tracks, then repeatedly got results 1-5 on the glancing chart that had absolutely no repercussions whatsoever.

In 4e, there were three charts for vehicle damage (iirc): glancing, penetrating, and Ordinance. The charts were more deadly, as any penetrating result of Weapon Destroyed or better caused the troops inside to disembark and make a pinning check. If the vehicle was destroyed, everyone was pinned automatically, regardless of Fearless. If the vehicle was destroyed on a 5 on the Ord chart, everyone took a S hit equal to the S of the weapon used, on a 6 everyone died outright with no saves of any kind (A little fuzzy on that. My book is at home, but I do no for certain a penning 6 by Ordinance killed all of the passengers.) AP1 weapons had a use for the first time, and that use was to make any Glancing hit a Penetrating hit instead. This meant that 50% of the time, Railguns penetrated Landraiders, and unless you hid from LOS, AP weapons WERE going to smoke you. Also, Forest terrain blocked LOS, making hiding vehicles completely much easier. A Penetrating hit destroyed the vehicle on a 4-6, with a 4 being a wreck, a 5 being roll scatter and d6, move the vehicle to that location and disembark passengers (ALWAYS fun to do a slow motion flip of your vehicles, mimicking the panicked screams of those inside as the hunk of metal flew through the air) and a 6 was remove the vehicle entirely. No wreckage, no crater, just pinned passengers in the open. And pinned didn't give cover saves then. This was also the first time Multiple Immobilized/WD results did something. Sure you could only kill a vehicle on a glancing 6, but if it was immobilized, your next immobilized took a weapon, and vice versa. No more weapons, no more mobility? Dead vehicle, even if you only hit those results again. Dreads could take glancing hits based on the CR they lost by. Killed models but still outnumbered? Take a glance. Granted, Dreads counted as 10 models in CC, but still: there was the option... Skimmers always counted as Hull Down if they moved more than 6", and even if they didn't move could only be hit on a 6 in CC. Trying to kill Wave Serpents in 4th was... an exercise. Thus, the only transports worth taking were Skimmer transports (DE, Eldar, Tau,) Open topped transports (because you could still jump out of them to assault, DE and Orks) and Land Raider Crusaders, as you could move and fire all of your weapons on the way in, got assault grenades for termies hitting units in cover, and could assault out. The last item was quite a gamble though. One good shot from a melta and you might have that whole 400pt squad (with characters) pinned in the open. Or worse, killed dead. 600pt investment, meet 25pt melta gunner. Have a nice day.

GW fixed this in 5th by letting vehicles take cover saves AND softening the vehicle chart (only destroyed on a 5-6, no more auto pinning, forced disembarkation, auto kills, etc) AND keeping vehicles from being destroyed on a glance except under extrodinary circumstances AND leaving wreckage behind for cover for passengers AND dropping the cost of vehicles. Any one or 2 of those things would have been wonderful, but changing them all shifted the Meta as subtly as the Earth shifting on its axis. Hell, even 4e with 5e vehicle costs would have been worth something.

Clearly, middle ground could have been found in there, even by just mashing those two rules sets and it could have been QUITE balanced. Instead we got 6e, which is another whole kettle of fish entirely, with its "all or nothing" approach to vehicle destruction. Time will tell.

The random assault range is crap, it may not seem bad to many but if you play an army that relies heavily on assaulting it can easily lose games for you. Getting lightly armored CC units in close is already tough enough, then toss on overwatch and wound allocation from the front, then hope you don't fail a 5" charge . . . ridiculous. How is it that my units can move reliably up until they get close to combat, then who knows how far they can go! Fail your charge and you get overwatched, then rapid fired on their turned, then possibly assaulted or another round of overwatch.

And people are saying, "well, now you can charge up to 12" ". Except the odds are very low and you're most likely to get stranded in the open and decimated. Especially when you don't have SM armor.

6e = Anti-Assault, Pro-Shooty

TBH I'm ok with the random psyker and warlord stuff just because if it wasn't, it'd be inevitable that we'd always see the same exact ones being used and getting boring. Now the terrain effects, those are over the top imo.

The random assault range is crap, it may not seem bad to many but if you play an army that relies heavily on assaulting

Strange, because I do and it doesn't. You just have to consider more carefully how and where to assault.

for my money shooting and assault are now better balanced than in 5th but shooting is not really superior to assaulting overall. What has happened is some (most?) units must be used differently now.

Blood and Slaughter wrote:

The random assault range is crap, it may not seem bad to many but if you play an army that relies heavily on assaulting

Strange, because I do and it doesn't. You just have to consider more carefully how and where to assault.

for my money shooting and assault are now better balanced than in 5th but shooting is not really superior to assaulting overall. What has happened is some (most?) units must be used differently now.

Convenient how you skipped over the part where I said, "especially if you Don't have SM armor". I'm sure getting stranded in the open isn't that bad when you have 2+ and 3+ saves.

Also, how are Assaulting and Shooting equal when Assaulting got nerfs and Shooting got buffs. That is a gap widening.

60mm wrote:

Blood and Slaughter wrote:

The random assault range is crap, it may not seem bad to many but if you play an army that relies heavily on assaulting

Strange, because I do and it doesn't. You just have to consider more carefully how and where to assault.

for my money shooting and assault are now better balanced than in 5th but shooting is not really superior to assaulting overall. What has happened is some (most?) units must be used differently now.

Convenient how you skipped over the part where I said, "especially if you Don't have SM armor". I'm sure getting stranded in the open isn't that bad when you have 2+ and 3+ saves.

Also, how are Assaulting and Shooting equal when Assaulting got nerfs and Shooting got buffs. That is a gap widening.

Because previously assault was many times more powerful then shooting

60mm wrote:

Blood and Slaughter wrote:

The random assault range is crap, it may not seem bad to many but if you play an army that relies heavily on assaulting

Strange, because I do and it doesn't. You just have to consider more carefully how and where to assault.

for my money shooting and assault are now better balanced than in 5th but shooting is not really superior to assaulting overall. What has happened is some (most?) units must be used differently now.

Convenient how you skipped over the part where I said, "especially if you Don't have SM armor". I'm sure getting stranded in the open isn't that bad when you have 2+ and 3+ saves.

Also, how are Assaulting and Shooting equal when Assaulting got nerfs and Shooting got buffs. That is a gap widening.

As an Ork and CD player, I can testify that this doesn't really affect me to much.

But then again as a fantasy player I've already learned how to properly consider ranges and figure out just what I need to do in order to get into combat. Namely a bit of intelligence and proper planning.

Convenient how you skipped over the part where I said, "especially if you Don't have SM armor". I'm sure getting stranded in the open isn't that bad when you have 2+ and 3+ saves.

You've assumed I play only space marines, which is incorrect, I also have evil space faeries and tyranids.

Also, how are Assaulting and Shooting equal when Assaulting got nerfs and Shooting got buffs. That is a gap widening.

In 5th, assault was (overall) better than shooting. So now it's more even as shooting is a bit better and assault takes more planning.

Glancing vehicles, premeasuring, new rules for reserves, no assault after outflank or infiltrate - all great despite me running genestealer outflanking list.

Allies, fortifications - undecided, rather like it, prone to abuse probably though

Mysterious objectives, terrain - not sure but rather dislike

2d6 charges, random warrior abilities - stupid, the former almost game breaking for me, hate random affairs

Look Out Sir! - ridiculous, the rule itself is ok but the explanation...

2d6 charges, random warrior abilities - stupid, the former almost game breaking for me

I'm interested to know why you feel that way about random charges. Honestly, not trying to pick a fight here, just curious because in my experience of 5th, charges were almost always into terrain and so almost always random (albeit in a different way). 2d6 random charge seems to me to actually give assault units a boost (in that they might be able to assault more than 6") in return for a penalty in that the may have to take defensive fire and then not make it in (but you mitigate that by charging with a unit that's close first and of course you might not have made it in in most cases in 5th too).

I agree, it's harder to judge whether an assault will hit home now, and it's actually quite tricky (for me anyway) to calculate the odds of successfully charging into cover (whereas in 5th, that was easy). But surely it just means you can't rely on assaults as readily as in 5th rather than nearly breaking the game.

Blood and Slaughter wrote:

2d6 charges, random warrior abilities - stupid, the former almost game breaking for me

I'm interested to know why you feel that way about random charges. Honestly, not trying to pick a fight here, just curious because in my experience of 5th, charges were almost always into terrain and so almost always random (albeit in a different way). 2d6 random charge seems to me to actually give assault units a boost (in that they might be able to assault more than 6") in return for a penalty in that the may have to take defensive fire and then not make it in (but you mitigate that by charging with a unit that's close first and of course you might not have made it in in most cases in 5th too).

I agree, it's harder to judge whether an assault will hit home now, and it's actually quite tricky (for me anyway) to calculate the odds of successfully charging into cover (whereas in 5th, that was easy). But surely it just means you can't rely on assaults as readily as in 5th rather than nearly breaking the game.

I'd rather KNOW I can get into assault, than risk the game on needing to roll a 6 on 2d6 and getting a 5. Before, I *KNEW* what my units could do, and could plan accordingly. One failed charge can easily lose a game.

Nagashek wrote:However, when you add overwatch to the other assault nerfs, only the most rediculously overpowered and well protected units will survive to get into combat, let alone the rapid firing that happens next turn (those Necron ricochet shields make alot more sense now, don't they?

Are you assaulting a tactical squad with a unit of 3 grots?

Using tactical marines as a basis, as they seem to have the 'best' overwatch reaction with a full squad firing approximately 20 S4, AP5 shots not considering heavy weapons or special weapons.

Overwatch is fired as snap fire, which means BS1. Which means that tactical marines will hit with an average of 4 hits, and would T3 with 2 of those. While I understand that in practice, it could do much more damage, it could also do no damage. Overwatch simply doesn't do the damage people fear it will. A unit with low AV is generally going to be a horde, where the few shots that hit won't kill many, or a unit with a high av will save most if not all of the wounds.

The worst overwatch will do, on average, is occasionally pull a squad out of assault range. The actual casualties are minimal. Of all the things to complain about, Overwatch is the stupidest, because it really doesn't have that huge of an effect.

I'll join this gripe and groan fest

1: Not caring for random Assault ranges, if you have bad movement rolls (e.g. this guy) youll roll low, I have seen enough far more 2-5 than I have 6-12 inch rolls.
2 Overwatch: Overwatch has the potential to be brutal depending on luck again. We all know tfg that always rolls awesomely, and that other poor sod who cant roll worth crap.
3 Mysterious objectives: Honestly for mysterious objectives I wish there were more options in the BRB.
4 Glancing Vehicles, hate/love relationship, hate how it effects me, love how it effects my enemy
5 Allies and fortifications: It's alright, definitely a marketing gimick

Obviously much of 6th edition is to change the current meta and force people to buy new miniatures (lets face it change the meta every few years and you'll see a good boom in sales). I would imagine stocks in GW have gone up quite a bit due to increase in sales.

I'd rather KNOW I can get into assault

Sure. But in most cases you couldn't KNOW in 5th because you'd be assaulting into terrain. So you had to play the percentages game anyway.

I think the maths below is correct, though calculating assaults into cover in 6th is quite hard (so any proper mathematician's input/correction here would be appreciated).


Charge 1" into the open: 5th - 100%, 6th - 100%; into cover: 5th - 100%, 6th - 100%

Charge 2" into the open: 5th - 100%, 6th - 100%; into cover: 5th - 97%, 6th - 100%

Charge 3" into the open: 5th - 100%, 6th - 97%; into cover: 5th - 89%, 6th - 89%

Charge 4" into the open: 5th - 100%, 6th - 92%; into cover: 5th - 75%, 6th - 76%

Charge 5" into the open: 5th - 100%, 6th - 83%; into cover: 5th - 56%, 6th - 63%

Charge 6" into the open: 5th - 100%, 6th - 72%; into cover: 5th - 32%, 6th - 48%

Charge 7" into the open: 5th - 0%, 6th - 58%; into cover: 5th - 0%, 6th - 34%

Charge 8" into the open: 5th - 0%, 6th - 42%; into cover: 5th - 0%, 6th - 21%

Charge 9" into the open: 5th - 0%, 6th - 28%; into cover: 5th - 0%, 6th - 12%

Charge 10" into the open: 5th - 0%, 6th - 17%; into cover: 5th - 0%, 6th - 6%

Charge 11" into the open: 5th - 0%, 6th - 8%; into cover: 5th - 0%, 6th - 2%

Charge 12" into the open: 5th - 0%, 6th - 3%; into cover: 5th - 0%, 6th - <1%

I'm fairly confident that any error I've made regarding 6th charges into cover won't be too gross.

6th gives a better chance of charging into cover and charging into the open is more reliable in 6th than charging into cover was in 5th. Also you have the chance to charge from much further away, which allows you more tactical options (suppose I have two units who could charge one of yours. If I declare a charge with one that's 7" away before declaring one with the unit that's 5" away, do you overwatch against the first unit or chance it not getting in so you can overwatch against the closer. Also, if I do make it in with the 7" charge, I can declare a charge against another of your units with my second unit if I like. More options, more tactical decisions, richer game, so good randomness, I think.

Blood and Slaughter wrote:Honestly, not trying to pick a fight here

Sorry but you've just questioned my opinion on Warhammer rules, this is serious. My friends in GB will find you.

Blood and Slaughter wrote: I'm interested to know why you feel that way about random charges. Honestly, not trying to pick a fight here, just curious because in my experience of 5th, charges were almost always into terrain and so almost always random (albeit in a different way). 2d6 random charge seems to me to actually give assault units a boost (in that they might be able to assault more than 6") in return for a penalty in that the may have to take defensive fire and then not make it in (but you mitigate that by charging with a unit that's close first and of course you might not have made it in in most cases in 5th too).

I agree, it's harder to judge whether an assault will hit home now, and it's actually quite tricky (for me anyway) to calculate the odds of successfully charging into cover (whereas in 5th, that was easy). But surely it just means you can't rely on assaults as readily as in 5th rather than nearly breaking the game.

I didn't like the randomness of terrain charges or running distance in 5th as well. If GW knows better and there really is some randomness in movement needed (still trying to grasp the concept behind it), I could accept something along the lines of 4 + d3 or sth, 1d6 is already bad imo and 2d6 is just wild. It doesn't hurt me that much as I have lots of fleet in my army but I just generaly want this game to take a tactical heavy route instead of slowly becoming an adventure game type luckfest.

Will hapily be proven wrong so that random movement is more tactical than fixed one. I love the style of the book they even managed to make dioramas and especialy models not looking like straight from some cartoon, would like to just play and drop the whole houserouling/ own system/ back to 5th dillemas.

Well fair enough, if you didn't like random charges into cover in 5th, then that;'s consistent. But random charges in this edition don't seem to me to be worse than in 5th overall (even given you can no longer be assured of charging 3" in the open, you've generally better odds charging into cover and potentially longer charges to boot).

I do think random charging actually adds to the tactical decision making and options available (and you can still be sure of charging, just manoeuvre to have a model 2" or less away) but it's common and a reasonable viewpoint to want more control.

But I do also think that 6th has introduced some 'bad' randomness that can give one side or the other an advantage that can't really be compensated for by planning -- eg the warlord traits where one side can gain a small advantage over the other for a specific mission type.

youbedead wrote:

60mm wrote:

Blood and Slaughter wrote:

The random assault range is crap, it may not seem bad to many but if you play an army that relies heavily on assaulting

Strange, because I do and it doesn't. You just have to consider more carefully how and where to assault.

for my money shooting and assault are now better balanced than in 5th but shooting is not really superior to assaulting overall. What has happened is some (most?) units must be used differently now.

Convenient how you skipped over the part where I said, "especially if you Don't have SM armor". I'm sure getting stranded in the open isn't that bad when you have 2+ and 3+ saves.

Also, how are Assaulting and Shooting equal when Assaulting got nerfs and Shooting got buffs. That is a gap widening.

Because previously assault was many times more powerful then shooting

Previously... you mean before 5th? Then you are correct. See my post above. In 5e if someone assaulted you, they were either trying to break open your transport, or their shooting had broken open the transport, allowing them to charge the unit inside. Without sweeping advance, you were restricted to one combat at a time. If your opponant planned poorly (or you managed to herd them together) one could get in multi assaults, which, if you were REALLY good at assault, you could handle. If you think that the fact that Tau Firewarriors had a chance to defeat Grey Knight Paladins in CC by killing one, watching them fail LD, then actually catching them when they failed meant then CC was more powerful than shooting, then I guess I don't have much to say. But generally most units would charge, kill one unit in CC, then get whittled down by rapidfire. Maybe they would get to charge again with the few models left, but I know my Wyches never got more than one good charge off. And that's even if I waited and let my shooters thin out their army a bit first, and if I'm waiting THAT long to get into CC, my assault assets haven't been worth much anyway and I should get shooters instead. The only time my CC elements did major, game winning things was when I got lucky. Last turn objective assaults never had any relevance in any game I played in 5th.

-Loki- wrote:

Nagashek wrote:However, when you add overwatch to the other assault nerfs, only the most rediculously overpowered and well protected units will survive to get into combat, let alone the rapid firing that happens next turn (those Necron ricochet shields make alot more sense now, don't they?

Are you assaulting a tactical squad with a unit of 3 grots?

Using tactical marines as a basis, as they seem to have the 'best' overwatch reaction with a full squad firing approximately 20 S4, AP5 shots not considering heavy weapons or special weapons.

Overwatch is fired as snap fire, which means BS1. Which means that tactical marines will hit with an average of 4 hits, and would T3 with 2 of those. While I understand that in practice, it could do much more damage, it could also do no damage. Overwatch simply doesn't do the damage people fear it will. A unit with low AV is generally going to be a horde, where the few shots that hit won't kill many, or a unit with a high av will save most if not all of the wounds.

The worst overwatch will do, on average, is occasionally pull a squad out of assault range. The actual casualties are minimal. Of all the things to complain about, Overwatch is the stupidest, because it really doesn't have that huge of an effect.

Unless you remember that charging that unit of marines with, say Wyches, will not only increase the odds that I will be out of range to charge (leading to my murder) but also have a fair chance to be forced to make a panic check (especially after, once depleated, I only have 5 or less models left and the next charge I make will be pointless,) or reduce my unit to combat ineffective levels. Losing those 1-2 models before the combat starts might be managable for Marines, whose cost and design intent is to make them survivable even when they strike simultaneously against most armies. This is devastating for units whose cost and equipment is balanced around getting the first strike. Wyches have I6 so they can make the most of S3 and A3 on the charge before their T3 gets them raked over. Once I lose those 1-2 models, I am far less likely to survive combat on successive turns, meaning that MEq's will win the attrition battle (more so when one considers the FNP nerf) I could charge with multiple units, sure. But that means I have just invested nearly 500pts into taking out a 200-250 pt squad of marines. Orks could do this, but I just don't have the numbers.

Overwatch does far more damage than just one or two lost models in small count assault units. Before you ask, Wyches can come at most 15 in a unit. At that point they are footslogging across the board or coming out of WWP they can't assault from. They'd never make it.

Blood and Slaughter wrote:

2d6 charges, random warrior abilities - stupid, the former almost game breaking for me

I'm interested to know why you feel that way about random charges. Honestly, not trying to pick a fight here, just curious because in my experience of 5th, charges were almost always into terrain and so almost always random (albeit in a different way). 2d6 random charge seems to me to actually give assault units a boost (in that they might be able to assault more than 6") in return for a penalty in that the may have to take defensive fire and then not make it in (but you mitigate that by charging with a unit that's close first and of course you might not have made it in in most cases in 5th too).

I agree, it's harder to judge whether an assault will hit home now, and it's actually quite tricky (for me anyway) to calculate the odds of successfully charging into cover (whereas in 5th, that was easy). But surely it just means you can't rely on assaults as readily as in 5th rather than nearly breaking the game.

The 2d6 problem comes from another group of rules. One, the change to vehicular dismounting. For those in open topped vehicles, they could count on a 12" move, a 2" disembark (that you could strech to 3) and a 6" charge. Orks on their WAAAGH! or Wyches could fleet, adding another d6. If they hit cover, this meant their assault range was a minimum of 17". The fleet ignored cover, so that would help you get far enough in to connect on the DT roll usually. On average you hit about a 22" threat range going into cover. Average now for those same units is 19". So not only is your charge range in the open lowered, but so is your charge range into cover, even while ignoring the movement penalty on that charge. There already existed multiple ways to ameliorate that disadvantage for cover, usually by deploying close. Units that deploy from other vehicles, rhinos for instance, used to be able to move up 12" and sit in their boxes. Next turn they leave the vehicle, gaining 3", move 6" and assault 6" (or best of 2d6 into cover). That's a total of 27" (or 22" if that assault move is into cover and you get unlucky on your roll) over two turns. In 6th ed, they can only move 6" and get out (behind the vehicle if they don't want to get shredded) losing them 3". The next turn they move 6" and assault at MOST 12", giving them a total of 21" over two turns, but in reality an average much closer to 16" over two turns, a range that could then be shortened further by Snapfire. Now which do you think is easier to overcome? Making a 22" charge into terrain in 5e or 6th from a rhino?

2, and already mentioned, is the change to fleet. I can ignore the terrain with my fleet roll in 5th, not so in 6th. I can charge after my fleet roll in 5th, not in 6th.

The last one is the afore mentioned snapfire. In fifth, I was guaranteed 6" in open ground, best of 2d6 into terrain. Now it's 2d6-c, where c represents the total length worth of models I lost from snapfire. That has a tendency to lower even our "average" of 7", though in a way that is extremely difficult to calculate given the number of variables involved.

DT is something I accepted because it made sense. Underbrush, rocks, hidden animal burrows, and sliding rubble can all prevent you from running full tilt across forests, mountains, and ruins. But suddenly being unable to get more than 6" across terrain I could have just walked across to engage the enemy is backwards thinking, illogical, and pitifully contradictory. Now, if my option was to walk up to the enemy 6" away and fight them with swords at base attacks or run at them pell-mell and let my momentum give me a bonus attack but requiring a 2d6 roll, I'd be happy for the gamble. Because at least there is a reward there, even if it is a nerf in over all value.

Just played my first game of 6th - got a few thoughts...

Pros

Wound allocation was so much simpler and just seemed to make sense. No need for all of the different coloured dice for differently armed people. Picked it up in no time, big improvement for me and big time saver.

Hull points and vehicle damage table - again, big improvement. Didn't seem like tanks were blowing up all over the place but it meant there were less 'wasted' hits on tanks which again just seemed to make sense. Vehicle movement was a lot easier to keep track of too.

Jump infantry and hammer of wrath - really liked this too, added another tactical element to moving.

Pre-measuring - everyone seemed to be happier with this, took away a lot of the guesswork and added to the tactical side for me, easier to plan moves/actions in advance.

Overwatch - added an interesting but not game breaking element to the game - only got one instance of overwatch being triggered and it didn't take any wounds off the attacking unit.

Victory conditions - being able to score VPs for first kill etc. made for an interesting game.

Psychic powers - really interesting, seesmed pretty powerful but again not game breaking, initial thoughts are these are a great addition.

Cons

Assault seems to have taken a big nerf in an already shooting heavy game. In a 4 way 1500 points a piece game [Wolves, 2 x CSM and Guard] there were 3 assaults over 5 turns. The biggest reason for this was not being able to assault out of rhinos, to assault meant that you had to endure at least a round of shooting.

Warlord traits - pretty useless all round, I got Íntimidating Presence' which was never triggered, my partner got 'Master of Ambush' which caused an interesting one because the Guard psyker could make him re-roll table edge which made it pretty useless. Too random and too many useless traits [especially for Monstrous Creature HQs]

So overall really happy with the rules although I'm disappointed that assault seems to have suffered a fair bit. Looking forward to etting some mroe games in!

Honestly I don't know why they don't use victory points instead of kill points. Victory points are totally balanced. Kill points are totally arbitrary.

Noisy_Marine wrote:Honestly I don't know why they don't use victory points instead of kill points. Victory points are totally balanced. Kill points are totally arbitrary.

But they do use Victory Points.
They just work like Kill Points (Sometimes. Depends on the mission)

What a lot of people forget about charge is yes 6" you were gaurenteed in 5th...but if your closest unit was just within 6", you essentially got a huge boost. One guy is within a mm, so now your entire assault squad is immune to shooting and will wear down the enemy. Congrats.
Now it may be random but pile-ins essentially add 3" to everyone's movement in assault, which is a HUGE buff to assault units.

This edition has just reversed a couple of rules found in previous editions, even introduced a few elements from 2nd edition which most gamers these days probably won't remember. It's a rinse, repeat cycle that has been going on since 3rd edition, and it will ensure that even if we were to leap forward 15 years in time and start to play a game with a 8th or 9th edition rules, you'd probably be able to pick up the differences in side of 10 minutes.

Works well in the movie industry as well (the new Spiderman for instance), and you get loads of people coming out of the woodwork saying it is the best thing since sliced bread, even though really you have seen it all before.

But yes it's fun.

Unless you remember that charging that unit of marines with, say Wyches, will not only increase the odds that I will be out of range to charge (leading to my murder) but also have a fair chance to be forced to make a panic check (especially after, once depleated, I only have 5 or less models left and the next charge I make will be pointless,) or reduce my unit to combat ineffective levels.

Overwatch does not cause panic checks.

Having to actually weather at least one round of shooting and not be able to hide forever in metal boxes balances out the two nicely.

With that said 'look out sir' and tough deathstar units are largely going to shrug off shooting and still do what they did. Witnessed a double nob biker army list game and while they lost a model, or two from each unit before charging it was a white wash. Same thing will happen with wraiths, pallies and death company to a degree. Very tough units are much easier to keep alive now since much of the great shooting has to be funneled into a tough character or spread around painfully with look out sir. Throw in rerolls like Eldar and Fateweaver you have a considerable ability to stick around.

Pros: Not much really. Glancing hits doing something over time to vehicles is good. Better rules for who can die (only peoples visible) and focus fire (although I wonder if, in the long term, this will lead to sniping tricks with Line-of-sight blocking models.) Reserves are better (not your whole force, and not possible to lose units until turn 5 anymore, better odds that they show up earlier.)

Cons:

- Okay, so if you're going to put all sorts of swingy random rolls in the game, why even pretend that there's any balance at all? Why have both players make 1500 point armies, only to give one FnP and the other "you can have it be nightfight". Why not roll for how many points each player gets while we're at it. My objective blows up my guys, yours gives you a bonus, yup, that's fair.

- Random psychic powers. Actually overheard at GW design HQ: "we couldn't figure out how to balance the powers and not have people always pick the same one, so we'll make it random instead." Let's randomly roll for weapon upgrades too. I rolled a lascannon, you rolled a heavy bolter, thems the breaks.

- Wound allocation. Having played a few games now, I have to say that the inclusion of "look out sir" makes this the absolute most tedious aspect of any game I've ever played. I had to roll something like 36 dice to resolve 12 wounds at one point (each one separately rolling LOS, Save, FnP). It has also led to massive amounts of time micromanaging model positioning in units. Then the really abusive units (nob bikers, paladins, thunderwolves, bloodcrushers, etc) are even worse in 6th, so they didn't fix the one glaring problem with the old system, they made it worse. As long as I can keep an IC up front (or better yet, in base contact during assault), I can distribute wounds throughout a multi-wound unit however I want, without having to spend points on extra upgrades just to diversify a unit.

- Terrain distribution. So, first we pick sides, and then we put the terrain down? So I can essentially guarantee that a 2'x2' section of table will be empty by putting a small, insignificant object in a corner of it, as long as it has a density limit of 1. Great. Or, you put down your expensive fortification, and I take a large LOS blocker and just put it right in front of it. Yup, that's great too.

- Objective distribution. Again, we put the objectives out after we know who will be on which side? And this is fair to the player who places fewer objectives how? Not to mention 'first blood' - sorry if you're an assault army and actually have to get to your opponent to do anything...

- Challenges. So, now any sort of combat character can run through a unit and single out the one model that has a realistic chance to do anything to him (the powerfist guy) and drop him right off the bat. I'm sure some people thought "hidden" powerfists were cheap, but they served an important role in game design, that being that a hero could try to take on an entire unit alone, but he'd have to sit through some attacks that threatened him as he was doing so. Not so much anymore. What's more, if the monster challenges the Sgt on the first turn, he can only win combat by one, increasing the odds that the unit sticks in the fight and doesn't get to shoot him the next turn.

- Too many AP- effects. Sure, marines basically shrug it off if the building they're in collapses, but xenos armies essentially lose their entire unit.

Well let’s see

Rogue Trader was good if you liked SI-FI role playing, but not good for large games.

2nd was an attempt to streamline things but failed, there were so many rules with in rules it would take hours to play even the smallest game.

3rd was a nice change from the previous 2 versions and succeeded in stream lining the game and changed it from a character skirmish to actual armies fighting. Problems though vehicles were death traps. “Oh you put down your $40-$50 tank… its dead turn one” (every game this happened). Rhino rushing blood angels and old school sweeping advance were a root canal if you were on the other side of the table. If you didn’t live through it you don’t understand, kind of like the 70s. The force org chart was new and restrictive at first to older players, but a lot of this eased up when WH & DH came out. In all it was a more solid system that what we had before.

4th cleaned up most of the problems with 3rd. fixed some of the combat problems such as the rhino rush, vehicles were still death traps though. Terrain and cover saves were balanced. Best variety of scenarios, especially once the Battle Mission Book came out.

5th plagued with weak codex’ in the beginning and over powered ones in the end. Way too much terrain on the tables. Nobody read the part in the book about only 25% of the board should be terrain trying to exploit the standard 4+ cover save. Wound allocation was a terrible idea that slowed down the game. True line of sight also a terrible idea… many arguments ensued, honestly if you want to play a first person shooter pick up a video game. One best things done in 5th was the vehicle damage chart. A tank is supposed to be a beast on the battle field. A standard pistol should have very little chance if any to harm a tank. Out flank added a fun exciting aspect to the game that made infiltrators and scouts worth taking. Too much FNP going around, but that was a codex issue not a game problem.

6th well what can you say. No assault for reserves, pretty much means don’t do it unless it’s a shooty unit. Vehicles are now rolling graves again. Fleet just makes no sense now. Challenges should have stayed in fantasy. I am pretty sure that I don’t remember General Schwarzkopf running across Kuwait challenging Sadam to a duel, General Patton maybe but he was a special case. Wound allocation is now worse than before. Random terrain effects are stupid in fantasy and stupid in 40k. Varied AP to power weapons, nice idea but only opens things up for more arguments. “It’s a power maul… no it’s a power sword”. Random charge… really we survived many editions without this did we really need it now. It is stupid in fantasy and stupid in 40K. In all it’s really the “hay Eldar/DE players your f$%ked and everyone else has to spend lots of $$ to rebuild their army” edition of 40K. Kidding aside it really seem like they are trying too hard to gram in too many of the RPG elements of Rogue Trader and the first person shooter elements of 5th. Though the allies and expanded force org is a good idea, better for playing larger games

In retrospect it seems like if you take the vehicle rules and out flank rules for 5th and put them in 4th you might have one kickin game, but that doesn’t sell models.

Nagashek wrote:
But suddenly being unable to get more than 6" across terrain I could have just walked across to engage the enemy is backwards thinking, illogical, and pitifully contradictory.

That's a good way of putting it.

Redbeard wrote:- Okay, so if you're going to put all sorts of swingy random rolls in the game, why even pretend that there's any balance at all? Why have both players make 1500 point armies, only to give one FnP and the other "you can have it be nightfight". Why not roll for how many points each player gets while we're at it. My objective blows up my guys, yours gives you a bonus, yup, that's fair.

- Random psychic powers. Actually overheard at GW design HQ: "we couldn't figure out how to balance the powers and not have people always pick the same one, so we'll make it random instead." Let's randomly roll for weapon upgrades too. I rolled a lascannon, you rolled a heavy bolter, thems the breaks.

Yes exactly, why even use FOC or points just drop the models and have the cinematic battle with snakes eating space marines in the woods, hollywoodish duels and no matter who wins, it's fun and has a story. But wait, I can do that without a rulebook just throwing dice with odds taken out of my back, should be "fun" anyway.

Redbeard wrote:- Wound allocation. Having played a few games now, I have to say that the inclusion of "look out sir" makes this the absolute most tedious aspect of any game I've ever played. I had to roll something like 36 dice to resolve 12 wounds at one point (each one separately rolling LOS, Save, FnP). It has also led to massive amounts of time micromanaging model positioning in units. Then the really abusive units (nob bikers, paladins, thunderwolves, bloodcrushers, etc) are even worse in 6th, so they didn't fix the one glaring problem with the old system, they made it worse. As long as I can keep an IC up front (or better yet, in base contact during assault), I can distribute wounds throughout a multi-wound unit however I want, without having to spend points on extra upgrades just to diversify a unit.

The wound alocation itself (starting from closest unit, only visible models, focus fire) is great imo. I also actualy like the idea of micromanaging models, being forced to care about formations etc as opposed to more abstract whole unit aproach (I'm even thinking about implemeting to my own rules the 45 degrees fov from 2nd edition). How is it implemented is another topic though. Look Out Sir imo should be limited to one try or sth, or ICs just should be dropped in points and either you keep them in second line or they eat all the firepower first.

Redbeard wrote:- Terrain distribution. So, first we pick sides, and then we put the terrain down? So I can essentially guarantee that a 2'x2' section of table will be empty by putting a small, insignificant object in a corner of it, as long as it has a density limit of 1. Great. Or, you put down your expensive fortification, and I take a large LOS blocker and just put it right in front of it. Yup, that's great too.

Objective distribution. Again, we put the objectives out after we know who will be on which side? And this is fair to the player who places fewer objectives how? Not to mention 'first blood' - sorry if you're an assault army and actually have to get to your opponent to do anything...

We did objective distribution after deciding sides in 5th sometimes and suprisingly it worked quite well. I'm guessing only but adding control over objectives and terrain as tactical choices might add to the game (appart from obvious examples like your fortifications one), have to try it though to really judge.

Redbeard wrote:- Challenges. So, now any sort of combat character can run through a unit and single out the one model that has a realistic chance to do anything to him (the powerfist guy) and drop him right off the bat. I'm sure some people thought "hidden" powerfists were cheap, but they served an important role in game design, that being that a hero could try to take on an entire unit alone, but he'd have to sit through some attacks that threatened him as he was doing so. Not so much anymore. What's more, if the monster challenges the Sgt on the first turn, he can only win combat by one, increasing the odds that the unit sticks in the fight and doesn't get to shoot him the next turn.

Yeah those are bad, Hollywood at its worst. There were duels on the board before just not happening out of the rule but situation, that was so much better.

Mr. S Baldrick wrote:No assault for reserves, pretty much means don’t do it unless it’s a shooty unit.

I like it tbh, I'm running genestealer outflanking list and maybe I'll see something different than enemy turtling in the middle now. It could work assuming there's enough terrain.

ZebioLizard2 wrote:

Unless you remember that charging that unit of marines with, say Wyches, will not only increase the odds that I will be out of range to charge (leading to my murder) but also have a fair chance to be forced to make a panic check (especially after, once depleated, I only have 5 or less models left and the next charge I make will be pointless,) or reduce my unit to combat ineffective levels.

Overwatch does not cause panic checks.

Really? Oh great, I was honestly not aware of that. That is a piece of good news then. :nodnod: