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Lanrak wrote:
Not in the same way, no.

Using model reactions in a alternating game turn , is fine for skirmish rules like Infinity and its A.R.O. system.
But I am not sure if using individual model reactions in a game focused on UNIT interaction is a elegant and efficient solution.

It may work , and it may be better than the 'over watch' that GW inflicted on the game.

It works fine and we tested it from small 500 points games up to 100 models per side (bugs against orks)
Because reactions are limited to small range, it adds more "details" when units are getting closer which is most of the time later in the game were units getting into close combat and less models are on the table.

As soon as models getting closer to each other, movement and placing units gets more important and the system becomes more deadly which speed up the game (and compensate the time needed to resolve the reactions)

Using Alternating phases, the reactions you listed could be achieved by...

Return Fire,
Simply achieved by the unit that was fired on in the enemies shooting phase. Firing back at the enemy that fired on them in their shooting phase.
A Shoots at B in As shooting phase., then B shoots at A in the next phase, Bs shooting phase.

Retreat,
Move away from the advancing enemy in your movement phase.
A moves towards B in As movement phase.B moves away from A in Bs movement phase.

Note if assaults only last for one turn.Any unit may attempt to break from assault after one round.

Counter Attack and counter charge
Simply arrived at by unit declaring charges on enemy units after they have charged into assault in their movement phase.

But this also applies to an IGYG System and is nothing specific of an alternating phase system.
I already can do this in the current rules and shoot/charge/move away from an enemy unit in my own phase

 Blitzen the Solitaire wrote:
I've been wanting to try this in place of 1 player at a time doing 4 phases consecutively.

Players roll off for Go first, go Second to determine who moves or acts first in the event of an initiative tie.
During each phase both players move,psychic, shoot and assault by Units Initiative.
I.e. Movement phase: Player 1 (go first) moves 1 initiative7 unit. Player 2 moves 1 init7 unit. Repeat until all Initiative 7s have moved. Begin Initiative 6 moves.
Apply this to all phases.

The idea of consecutive turns is great, and I'm convinced it's the way to go for those of us who desire a less swingy game. But I wouldn't base it off initiative for afoementioned reasons of massive advantages to armies with higher initiative. Just have player A move a unit, and then player B, and you're golden.

@thegreatchimp.
I totally agree!

@Kodos.
The point is alternating phases lets the opposing player react IMMEDIATELY after the active player takes an action with all their units..

IGOYGO, makes the opposing player wait THREE ACTION PHASES, before they can respond.

And the other important fact is most new rules that use alternating unit activation with 40k units, tend to adopt reaction mechanics, and or activation scheduling.

Alternating phases can allow more player interaction and tactical depth with 40k units with less in the way of additional layers of complication.

Lanrak wrote:

The point is alternating phases lets the opposing player react IMMEDIATELY after the active player takes an action with all their units..

which is only a psychological thing and no change to the actual situation
(the same thing like the opponent rolls for armour saves instead of the acting player)


I don't say that alternating phases is a bad thing or would not work
It brings more dynamic gameplay but it does not give more tactical depth by default

@kudos.
Allowing units to respond directly after the opponent has taken one action is just a psychological effect, in your opinion?

How is fully this structured interaction in the game turn.Less meaningful than allowing some models to take a 'reaction action' after the opponent has taken one action sometimes?

With alternating phases, players can read and understand the game turn,without the need for lots of additional sequencing rules, and explanation of how these additional rules work, to improve the level of interaction.

The interaction given by alternating phases ,gives the players a clear and defined structure that is accepted as 'balanced', by most players.

It does not automatically increase the level of tactics in the game .However, it gives a clean straight forward foundation to build a more straight forward and tactically complex version of the rules.

I will be honest about this, I have grown tired of pointless complication in the rules to games.I am therefore drawn to using game mechanics and resolution methods that deliver the maximum depth of game play with the minimum amount of fuss.

And to this end I believe that alternating phase game turn is a good place to start with a 40k re-write/restructure.
(I have tried the all 4 basic game turn options with several variations on each BTW. )

Allowing units to respond directly after the opponent has taken one action is just a psychological effect, in your opinion?

Allowing units to directly react is not, but alternating phases does not allow units to directly react.
It allows to act after the opponents army has acted.

So a unit cannot retreat after it gets attacked by an enemy unit, only after the whole enemy army has attacked it.
So if you opponent focus his fire, the unit that should react is already gone.

So direct model reaction is something different than just alternating phases and not something comparable

e.g. direct model reaction are already in the game.
In close combat, models in a specific range can "react" by attacking in melee if they get charged.

alternating phases would mean that those models can only strike back after the whole enemy army has charged and resolved their melee attacks (if you allow the attacked unit to resolve their attacks in the opponents phase and not only in their own, you break your game right from the start)

How is fully this structured interaction in the game turn.Less meaningful than allowing some models to take a 'reaction action' after the opponent has taken one action sometimes?

Can you please explain this sentence (english is not my native language and I am not sure if I read/understand this correctly)

It does not automatically increase the level of tactics in the game .However, it gives a clean straight forward foundation to build a more straight forward and tactically complex version of the rules.

I will be honest about this, I have grown tired of pointless complication in the rules to games.I am therefore drawn to using game mechanics and resolution methods that deliver the maximum depth of game play with the minimum amount of fuss.

This is something different.
if you want to keep the rules as simple as possible than alternating phases is one of the better options.

@Kudos.
Its just in my experience, 40k players have got used to taking actions with their entire army/force.And using set action phases.

And so to get existing players to take up re-written rules , it is best to keep the things that players are familiar with where possible.
(Apart from pointless complication, and poor definition , obviously.)

I actually think we are both trying to achieve similar things.

It is just I have decided to try to get there using the most straight forward rules that deliver the intended game play.
(After lots of rule set developments I have been involved in over the last ten years, have collapsed under the weight of pointless complication.It starts with a few compromises and additional rules at the start..and then it bloats slowly over time ...)

40k game play is all about unit interaction.
Therefore any rules that focus on allowing some models (part of a unit) to react individually to the actions of enemy units, is pointless micro management , and diffuse rules writing.IMO

40k game play is all about unit interaction.
Therefore any rules that focus on allowing some models (part of a unit) to react individually to the actions of enemy units, is pointless micro management , and diffuse rules writing.IMO

That is the main problem, because most players don't want unit interaction.
They want stuff like "look out sir" direct duels of unit leaders, per model wound allocation and reactions

At least here 40k is seen and played as "Mass" Skirmish (of course no one is accepting this name because people like to set the difference between skirmish and mass battle with the number of models used and not by the game mechanic)

The same for Warhammer Fantasy.
A reason why a lot of people here prefer the 9th age over Kings of War, because T9A is a Mass Skirmish and not a true Mass Battle game like KoW.

My experience with 40k house/tournament rules over the last 10 years is that everything that removes per model mechanics to turn 40k into the game it should be is not accepted by the majority of the players.
(and those who would accept them are going to use the old Epic rules rather than turn 40k into an 28mm Epic)

Lanrak wrote:

I actually think we are both trying to achieve similar things.

I think so too
and our different opinion regarding those things seems to come from the different meta/gaming styles of our groups

and I don't see why there is not enough room to have more than one rule system
I see a system which is completely without per model rules as something that is used for bigger games (1500/2000+) while other rules would fit the usual 1000-1800 point games better

I am not saying it can not be done better.
But GW model focused rules seemed to have lost their way after the game went from large skirmish sized 2nd ed, to a battle game sized game in 3rd ed.

They seemed to start with skirmish rules , chop lumps out to speed up play, then add back more pages of special rules than the original rules they took out to speed up play! .
To end up with a horrible mess of a rule set 18 years later, that is 7th ed.(Less of rule set for a game , more of a sales promotion for a toy company. )

And as the current game size has more in common with larger battle games in sensible scales.(6 mm to 15 mm).
(Epic SM army sizes were on par with 5th 40k , before we got to into this Apocalypse is part of the standard game lunacy.)

I would prefer to start with simple battle game rules , and then ADD more detail to get the level of detail in the game play players expect from the detailed 28mm heroic minatures .

Detailed unit interaction , based on the revised models profiles within the unit is they way I would like to approach a 40k re-write.

Sorry for wandering off topic...

For my re-write I took what I thought was best from 2nd to 6th, streamlined it and added the next logic step for rules which were kind of unfinished.

And yes, the game now is way too big for its rules.
This was the funny thing when the Mantic Warpath author talked about the game and announced how many models would be used and that it would be a unit based system.
A lot of people mentioned that they rather want to have Warpath scaled down to a "40k size game" with single model rules.
But they did not realise that actual 40k use much more models than Mantic planed for their mass battle game. (so scaling down to 40k size means to make Warpath much bigger)

And as the current game size has more in common with larger battle games in sensible scales.(6 mm to 15 mm).
(Epic SM army sizes were on par with 5th 40k , before we got to into this Apocalypse is part of the standard game lunacy.)

While people got used to the bigger stuff, my solution to this would be easy.
Cut the game down to a standard size but still allow "big" stuff.
If someone want to play 3 Wraithknights he can do this, but than those 3 models are the only ones in his army.

IMO the game size and minature size are causing a disconnect in the perceptions of the player base in 40k.

The minature size is leading them to want detailed model interaction type skirmish rules.
But the size of the game requires detailed unit interaction focused rules, to arrive at intuitive game play for this size of game.

There are already loads of good FREE skirmish rule sets players can convert to cover 40k If they want to.(So I see little point in trying to write yet another one. )

I think there are some good basic concepts across the editions of 40k, the sparks of ideas of how to reflect the inspiring background in the game play.
But the way the rules were actually written was so poor, I think its best to just start from scratch.

I would like to drop back to 4th-5th ed sized games, get this size battle game working properly.Then add the expansion for all the bug stuff and get that working properly with the core game.

I think for a 40k battle game , with straightforward rules re-write.Alternating phase game turn is probably the best place to start from.IMO.

I disagree in this point and IHMO the best start would be to keep massive changes away and stay with the current phase system until the community accepted fan-made rules instead 7th edition.
(we made the mistake at the end of 6th that our version of the rules was to different from the existing ones and people preferred the GW rules instead because the hoped they will turn out better)

@Kodos.
Trying to fix 40k without addressing the core issues with the core rules, is what has lead to the current rules bloat and diffuse game development IMO.

I agree that massive changes without explanation can leave the 40k players not wanting to try the new rule set.And if the game play is radically different , they will stick to what they are familiar with.

However, my opinion is that reasonable changes to core mechanics and resolution methods , that are explained in designer notes , would be the best approach.

We can agree to disagree on the fine detail, but I believe we want to arrive at the same destination,but chose to go separate routes to get there.