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At which point every army is trying to copy-cat space marines and then it gets REALLY Messy.


It would also start to dilute army profiles even more if every army had the super good close combat subfaction and the super good ranged subfaction and the super good magic/psy subfaction etc...

It would actually lean closer toward a models-agnostic game system.



I think subfactions can have weight in subtle ways, its just about GW not putting in the "this is the no brainer choice" option in the list. +1 to save is a no brainer in a wargame on basically any army.




The biggest thing is that GW just doesn't seem interested/skilled in aiming for a flat level playing field of balance with minor exceptions. They always lean toward extremes of either too much or too little. They also have the issue that every single edition re-writes a lot of the core of the game so they can't polish things edition to edition because the field of play changes. They just about get the hang of an edition before its all change.



If they improved feedback and interaction with beta-testers (ergo don't just send pre-written armies, send the whole book); if they improved the pay and support their rules writers had and perhaps even pushed toward writing most of the rules in advance of a release so that even if the books come out staggered; they are all working from the same base-line.


GW is like Cheddar Cheese with rules. Overall its nice, but the holes are big and obvious most of the time.

 Blackie wrote:

 H.B.M.C. wrote:

 Some_Call_Me_Tim wrote:
I honestly don’t even get the problem. “Commander, higher ups say that we aren’t allowed to split companies, the assault troopers must stay with the artillery guns.” That doesn’t make sense, I feel like they’d promote splitting it up, you’d have to buy more paints at least.

You can't mix Ork Clanz. That seems wrong to me.

Fluffwise you can justify it by saying that the dominant klan gathered orks from different klans merging them into their klan. Those orks still have their colours on, but only because orks don't really wear proper uniforms and don't bother replacing them with the new ones . It makes sense that an evil sunz ork fighting under a goff leader becomes a goff himself.

If there's one army whose paintjob should be completely irrelevant ruleswise that's orks!

The other thing people are missing is that GW has said that the battles we fight are just one small piece of a larger war. They didn't do subfactions right for some armies - especially orks and guard - But their description of our battles is basically a strategic point held by the Cadian 327th against an assault from just a small Goff portion of the WAAGH! At the same time the Space Wolves were going after a Genestealer cult, the Sisters and Guard were fighting some Orks, while the White Scars were taking on Speedkult orks elsewhere, and the Ravenwing were off on one of their agendas, and Marneus was duelling Abbadon

Breton wrote:

The other thing people are missing is that GW has said that the battles we fight are just one small piece of a larger war. They didn't do subfactions right for some armies - especially orks and guard - But their description of our battles is basically a strategic point held by the Cadian 327th against an assault from just a small Goff portion of the WAAGH! At the same time the Space Wolves were going after a Genestealer cult, the Sisters and Guard were fighting some Orks, while the White Scars were taking on Speedkult orks elsewhere, and the Ravenwing were off on one of their agendas, and Marneus was duelling Abbadon

Certainly this is true of a great many battles in the 40k lore- maybe even most of the battles.

But the fact that Torchbearer Fleet and War of Faith Crusade rules exist very clearly communicates that sometimes armies of multiple factions do fight side by side by side to achieve shared objectives.

What's missing is the similar rules for some of the other factions. I fully expect guard and chaos to have exceptions.

Either way, this change is very, very specifically a Nachmund Gauntlet Matched play game rule. If you take a Matched play mission from any other book, the rule literally does not exist. If you play Crusade or open, the rule literally does not exist. I was extremely worried before we saw the actual details of the way this change was implemented, because it had the potential to be written in such a way that it impacted the entire game. As it turns out, the way the rule was implemented limits it's impat even beyond what I had seen as a best case scenario.

Breton wrote:

 Blackie wrote:

 H.B.M.C. wrote:

 Some_Call_Me_Tim wrote:
I honestly don’t even get the problem. “Commander, higher ups say that we aren’t allowed to split companies, the assault troopers must stay with the artillery guns.” That doesn’t make sense, I feel like they’d promote splitting it up, you’d have to buy more paints at least.

You can't mix Ork Clanz. That seems wrong to me.

Fluffwise you can justify it by saying that the dominant klan gathered orks from different klans merging them into their klan. Those orks still have their colours on, but only because orks don't really wear proper uniforms and don't bother replacing them with the new ones . It makes sense that an evil sunz ork fighting under a goff leader becomes a goff himself.

If there's one army whose paintjob should be completely irrelevant ruleswise that's orks!

The other thing people are missing is that GW has said that the battles we fight are just one small piece of a larger war.

I love that people say GW says this*. But it often isn't reflected in the fluff or novels. They happily have small warbands and teams operating on their own all the time.


*in some books they have said something like it (though the only one where I _know_ they said it is an old edition of fantasy). But the actual statement is closer to 'One can imagine that the armies fighting on the tabletop are just a small piece...'