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For me?

Eldar Guardians with power-fists and melta guns.

Not being around to play as squats. As I hadn't started playing 40k yet.

Indeed!

For me, close combat where models allocated their attacks to other models they were touching in BTB!

Vehicle rules where a vehicle could move and shoot, and shoot at different targets with different weapons... y'know, like real tanks, not the glass-hammer pseudo-vehicles we have now.

Not much. I regard it as a not-fun, unplayable mess.

That being said I do miss the Imperial Agents and the tons of wargear options for some characters.

Overwatch is also missed.

And squats.

Tactically flexible psykers that were as threatening as the fluff.
(put that down for what I miss most about rogue trader as well)
oh, and Zoats

FWIW I also missed the vehicle turning rules. Being able to move and fire a tank was nicely balanced by only being able to turn it a certain arc.

Overwatch was brutal, I think it gave way too much power to sit and fire armies. e.g. Two guardians manning a D-Cannon were standing on a hill, they go overwatch and are charged by 5 assault marines. D-Cannon takes out one, the shurikan catapult rolls two rapid fire dice, gets 6 shots and blasts apart two more of the emporers finest. In hand to hand the marine butchers one guardian, but because of the extra roll his buddy gets for being the second combatant, a Guardian hands the assaulter his hat.

Definitely the vehicle rules. You know, when vehicles could move faster than an infantry could run in a turn.

-

How blisfully nostalgic!

I enjoyed:
1) vehicle-specific rules and charts, that was nice. And the ability to move a decent distance, and fire at multiple targets.
2) Overwatch
3) though this isn't really something we were supposed to do, I enjoyed being able to shamelessly abuse rules and great über-powerful Chaos lords...my buddies and I have fond memories of epic battles between 4 chaos lords, all summoning greater daemons who in turn fight...stupid, really, and totally not within the rules...but hilarious.
4) Building stats, and being able ot wreck the environment
5) sustained fire dice were fun. Especially with Assault Cannons

One word: FUN!!!

Black Codex, blind grenades and mad boyz.

-The Ork battlewagon rules: it can transport as many as you can fit on it - but if they fall off they die.

-All of the ridiculous area of effect grenades (Anti-Plant, Blind, Choke, Hallucinogen, Photo Flash, Radiation, Scare, Tanglefoot, etc.)

-All of the wonky modifiers that made it possible to need a 7+ to hit.

-Orks with Lascannons.

-3 different flame templates.

-Wargear cards.

Chaos was as powerful as Chaos should be

Also the general feel... I dont know what it was, but 2nd edition really struck the 'high gothic' feel home for me. All these newer editions just seem to feel too soft and bright to me. It's supposed to be GRIM DARKNESS!! Where did that go?

There's so many other things that I miss... but such is life. Must adapt to change. *stares at Tzeentch*

2nd Ed Orks. I miss them.

The bland-i-fi-cation of Orks started with Gorkamorka when all Orks became generic Goffs, and is only just starting to errode thanks to the new Ork Codex bringint the 'fun' back to the race, but 2nd Ed Orks were great. Orky psychic powers were fun (the psychic head-butt you could do to enemy psykers was fantastic!). The crazy artillery they had (Splatta Kannonz, Traktor Kannonz, Smasha Gunz) and the fact that the various Orky Klanz actually meant something more than just being a paint job.

I loved 2nd Ed Orks and Tyranids. Great fun to be had with them.

der Wiskinator wrote:FWIW I also missed the vehicle turning rules. Being able to move and fire a tank was nicely balanced by only being able to turn it a certain arc.

Overwatch was brutal, I think it gave way too much power to sit and fire armies. e.g. Two guardians manning a D-Cannon were standing on a hill, they go overwatch and are charged by 5 assault marines. D-Cannon takes out one, the shurikan catapult rolls two rapid fire dice, gets 6 shots and blasts apart two more of the emporers finest. In hand to hand the marine butchers one guardian, but because of the extra roll his buddy gets for being the second combatant, a Guardian hands the assaulter his hat.

Surely you mean....5 Assault Marines charge the D-Cannon on Overwatch. One Guardian fires the D-Cannon, missing horrifically as the weapon had to scatter twice (or was it one scatter, re-roll the direction die, and flip the template in the indicated direction, using the little arrow on the 'hit' side should that come up) thus hitting precisely two thirds of fifty percent of bugger all, the Shuriken Catapult fired one Sustained fire dice of shots, with the number rolled being fired at effectively BS2, thus leading to the Assault Marines making combat, and in short order ramming their pointy little heads up their chuffs?

2nd Edition was a mess. Some bits were fun, like Overwatch and the more varied movement, but then you remember the interminable end of turn phase, where you got to spend half an hour, half a bloody hour, possibly more, working out what happened to the various markers and grenade effects still lurking from 3 turns ago.

Sure, 3rd Editon sucked all the character out of it, and it was quite a massive shock to the system (both the games and my own I suppose) but for the most part it was necessary to make 40k playable.

Well, in my opinion at least!

Not much really, the game is far better now.

But if I could bring anything back it would be the wacky stuff like electro priests, squats, beastmen guardsmen, the psychic phase (they way it was, but not so overpowering). Grenades actually being thrown at and damaging the enemy.

What I do not miss:

Ridiculously overpowered characters and monsters, incredibly long games, arguments over the rules (happened a lot more back then), vortex grenades, virus grenades, rad grenades, the ugly models.

anticitizen013 wrote:Chaos was as powerful as Chaos should be
~~~~~~~~~~~~

LOL i remeber looking at the Chaos codex and thinking "Crap ... I dont want to fight these guys...."

Same with space wolves! Remember the way cyclone missle launchers could be? Wolf guard could all take them and an assault cannon, it was slowed.

Speaking of Chaos...I miss the 2nd Ed. Chaos Codex. (Well, I guess I don't miss it too terribly as I still have my copy..)

It was HUGE, weighing in at 144 Pages - the only other codex that long (that I know of anyways) is the new SM codex. It also had an awesome section on converting Chaos miniatures.

Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote:

der Wiskinator wrote:FWIW I also missed the vehicle turning rules. Being able to move and fire a tank was nicely balanced by only being able to turn it a certain arc.

Overwatch was brutal, I think it gave way too much power to sit and fire armies. e.g. Two guardians manning a D-Cannon were standing on a hill, they go overwatch and are charged by 5 assault marines. D-Cannon takes out one, the shurikan catapult rolls two rapid fire dice, gets 6 shots and blasts apart two more of the emporers finest. In hand to hand the marine butchers one guardian, but because of the extra roll his buddy gets for being the second combatant, a Guardian hands the assaulter his hat.

Surely you mean....5 Assault Marines charge the D-Cannon on Overwatch. One Guardian fires the D-Cannon, missing horrifically as the weapon had to scatter twice (or was it one scatter, re-roll the direction die, and flip the template in the indicated direction, using the little arrow on the 'hit' side should that come up) thus hitting precisely two thirds of fifty percent of bugger all, the Shuriken Catapult fired one Sustained fire dice of shots, with the number rolled being fired at effectively BS2, thus leading to the Assault Marines making combat, and in short order ramming their pointy little heads up their chuffs?

2nd Edition was a mess. Some bits were fun, like Overwatch and the more varied movement, but then you remember the interminable end of turn phase, where you got to spend half an hour, half a bloody hour, possibly more, working out what happened to the various markers and grenade effects still lurking from 3 turns ago.

Sure, 3rd Editon sucked all the character out of it, and it was quite a massive shock to the system (both the games and my own I suppose) but for the most part it was necessary to make 40k playable.

Well, in my opinion at least!

I don't remember nearly as many rules arguments as you seem to, perhaps the people I played with were not as persnickety as yours. And by the way, do the words "3rd edition sucked all the character out of it" mean the same thing in British English as they do in American English? Because when I brought home my 3rd edition rulebook, I spent the better part of a week repeating WTF? WTF? WTF? as if it were a mantra. By the time 5th edition came around, my love of the game had an inch of callouses and scar tissue on it!

Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote:Surely you mean....5 Assault Marines charge the D-Cannon on Overwatch. One Guardian fires the D-Cannon, missing horrifically as the weapon had to scatter twice (or was it one scatter, re-roll the direction die, and flip the template in the indicated direction, using the little arrow on the 'hit' side should that come up) thus hitting precisely two thirds of fifty percent of bugger all, the Shuriken Catapult fired one Sustained fire dice of shots, with the number rolled being fired at effectively BS2, thus leading to the Assault Marines making combat, and in short order ramming their pointy little heads up their chuffs?

2nd Edition was a mess. Some bits were fun, like Overwatch and the more varied movement, but then you remember the interminable end of turn phase, where you got to spend half an hour, half a bloody hour, possibly more, working out what happened to the various markers and grenade effects still lurking from 3 turns ago.

I find it hilarious that you yell at people for exaggerating, yet you make posts like this one Grotsnik. Maybe you aren't Dakka's Very Own Moral Compass, but rather Dakka's Very Own Rampant Hypocrite.

Guess you didn't make as much use of Smoke, Blind and Plasma Grenades/Missiles as my group used to.

But hey, nice of you to cut out the bit where I clearly state my previous post was purely my own opinion. Wonder why you'd take the effort to avoid putting that bit in?

Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote:Surely you mean....5 Assault Marines charge the D-Cannon on Overwatch. One Guardian fires the D-Cannon, missing horrifically as the weapon had to scatter twice (or was it one scatter, re-roll the direction die, and flip the template in the indicated direction, using the little arrow on the 'hit' side should that come up) thus hitting precisely two thirds of fifty percent of bugger all, the Shuriken Catapult fired one Sustained fire dice of shots, with the number rolled being fired at effectively BS2, thus leading to the Assault Marines making combat, and in short order ramming their pointy little heads up their chuffs?

That is so sigged.

I miss overwatch a little, and Space Wolves. How I miss them so.

Second edition was Rogue Trader, cleaned up. If you had a like minded group, the games were brilliant and the system could allow you to merge in Necromunda for some fantastic scenarios. (if you enjoy Necro, you're enjoying the son of 2nd Edition, with detail)

Games like Combat 40k, and Kill Team are actually folks harking back to the kind of games you could put together easily with 2nd. Also, overwatch wasn't all that powerful, I usually did something to disrupt the OW unit at range, then moved in for the kill. I think even the act of being shot at, could cause a unit to lose OW. It was a remarkable area denial tactic and suitably pseudo-real, the enemy is prepared.. and they are waiting for you..(evil grin)

That said, it could be easily abused by certain gamer types and games could take time, which really, didnt matter much if you were having a blast.

I miss:
1) Vehicle-specific rules and charts and the ability to move a decent distance, and fire at multiple targets. (Vehicles were scary, as they should be)
2) Overwatch
3) Actually..Throw a grenade.
4) The ability to wreck the table.
5) Tactical use of cover. Marines were near unstoppable if they used cover when closing.
6) Model specific Hand to Hand.


3rd edition I played a bit, 4th not so much and now 5th? Not at all. I personally feel the game has been streamlined to a sliver of it's former self.

I'm about to return to Necromunda ruleset and playing some small squad level games.

~ Tael.

Chaos space marine terminators getting an extra attack from the blade on their combi-bolters.
My big box of extra grenade templates and cotton-ball blind grenade markers.

warpcrafter wrote:Chaos space marine terminators getting an extra attack from the blade on their combi-bolters.

I'll second that. I used to swear blind even up to the previous Chaos Codex they retained that one! Wrongly of course, which tended to lead to a quick, honest apology and then frantic double, triple, quadruple and quintuple checking of the Codex on the bog when I got home!

Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote:

warpcrafter wrote:Chaos space marine terminators getting an extra attack from the blade on their combi-bolters.

I'll second that. I used to swear blind even up to the previous Chaos Codex they retained that one! Wrongly of course, which tended to lead to a quick, honest apology and then frantic double, triple, quadruple and quintuple checking of the Codex on the bog when I got home!

I have to wonder just how many pages of WD and Codex's have been read on the bog, learned more rules and fluff there than anywhere

Virus Bomb strategy cards.

But really, "cinematic moments" and the awesome descriptions of weapon effects. The best was the Cyclone misfire when your Terminator would spin around in a circle firing off all 12 missiles in random directions.

It's where I discovered one of the more obscure 2nd Edition rules! Namely that for every 12" a shot 'travelled' over the first 12", it knocked 1 of it's Armour Penetration Total.