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 Backspacehacker wrote:

 Marmatag wrote:
If you bring back templates, expect my movement phase to take about 45-60 minutes. No complaining.

...sooooo your standard nid movement phase ok.

Without templates i can move in about 15 minutes. If you require me to measure the inches between 170 models, and get it right, it's going to take a lot longer.

RIP Templates. They were cool in theory. But driving a 2" wedge between every model moved is not my idea of a good time. I would honestly probably quit Tyranids if they brought back templates; it's already a challenging army to play right.

Templates make sense in an RPG or skirmish game with 10-20 models on the table and 30-60min game times with only a couple of template weapons present.

With 80-300 models on the table and 2-3 hour game times and sometimes literally dozens of template weapons, blast templates have three issues. First, at that scale of play, where we are talking about company ot battalion sized forces, that level of granularity isn't something the battlecommander really should be concerned with. Second, when you have that many models and template weapons, they add considerably to game time. As a third point, they create lots of other issues, its harder to balance and design template weapons (they had issues all through the 3E-7E paradigm), and cause additional points of player conflict ("that guy is barely touched so he's hit" or "thats not how that scatters...its a little more left", etc).

TL;DR templates make sense for Necromunda, not in a game with multiple Wyvern batteries and hundreds of infantry models on the table.

malcontent999 wrote:
I've always had fun with templates, and we still play older editions with them at home. As for everyone's issues with spacing and arguments, I had always thought the answer was just to not be such a tight arse. I usually had my opponent place my templates. Usually went quick, and I don't think anyone in almost 20 years of gaming was such a prick that I felt the need to argue with their job. And for spacing, did it really matter if you lost an extra guy because they were only 1 and 1/4 inches apart? Even if it cost the game/tournament? Of course not.
Now we don't get to have nice things.
Thanks a lot.

While I haven’t encountered a lot of people who are problematic when it comes to templates, having another part of the game contingent on your opponent being a kind and reasonable person does not exactly inspire confidence, especially when playing with strangers. It’s another “forge the narrative” problem where nothing goes wrong if everyone is polite and reasonable, but where any differences of opinion can add up to real problems.

I hope they don't reintroduce templates. I love that 8th edition doesn't use them.

I’m a fan of blast templates - in certain games and rulesets. I’m glad they introduced them into the 2nd edition of bolt action, for example. In a platoon sized game with FOC restrictions, they add a fun visual representation of what is happening. Generally in a game of BA there are only one or two units that use them.

In a game like WFB or 40k though, well, I’m glad they’re gone. If anything I think GW has not done enough to streamline their system. The hundreds of miniatures moving around, The buckets of dice that need to be rolled again and again, and the number of special rules involved for every model and weapon is more than enough for a game of this scale.

 Backspacehacker wrote:

 Marmatag wrote:
If you bring back templates, expect my movement phase to take about 45-60 minutes. No complaining.

...sooooo your standard nid movement phase ok.

Believe it or not a standard horde movement phase now should take at most 15 minutes if you're really trying to double check if your screens are correct and you've got your deepstrikes correctly blocked. Not having to worry about spacing as much is massive. Again you can not appreciate this kind of change unless you played a horde army

dosiere wrote:
I’m a fan of blast templates - in certain games and rulesets. I’m glad they introduced them into the 2nd edition of bolt action, for example. In a platoon sized game with FOC restrictions, they add a fun visual representation of what is happening. Generally in a game of BA there are only one or two units that use them.

In a game like WFB or 40k though, well, I’m glad they’re gone. If anything I think GW has not done enough to streamline their system. The hundreds of miniatures moving around, The buckets of dice that need to be rolled again and again, and the number of special rules involved for every model and weapon is more than enough for a game of this scale.

If we go much simpler then 8th we may as well just point the miniatures at each other and go "Bang bang your dead!"

LunaWolvesLoyalist wrote:


If we go much simpler then 8th we may as well just point the miniatures at each other and go "Bang bang your dead!"

The more I read these "Go simplier!" type posts the more I'm wondering if what these guys really want is to just play some old forgotten "beer-n-pretzels" one-page wargame. Get some old Epic minis, load up on squad bases, and have at.

Used to know a guy who liked 40k but was huge on the "simpler and cheaper" to the point we ended up playing in 6mm...

 Infantryman wrote:

LunaWolvesLoyalist wrote:


If we go much simpler then 8th we may as well just point the miniatures at each other and go "Bang bang your dead!"

The more I read these "Go simplier!" type posts the more I'm wondering if what these guys really want is to just play some old forgotten "beer-n-pretzels" one-page wargame. Get some old Epic minis, load up on squad bases, and have at.

Used to know a guy who liked 40k but was huge on the "simpler and cheaper" to the point we ended up playing in 6mm...

Or one could remember that streamlining is not "Make it simpler" but more efficient rather then some strawman of "Down it dumb" that the previous post assumed.

 ZebioLizard2 wrote:

 Infantryman wrote:

LunaWolvesLoyalist wrote:


If we go much simpler then 8th we may as well just point the miniatures at each other and go "Bang bang your dead!"

The more I read these "Go simplier!" type posts the more I'm wondering if what these guys really want is to just play some old forgotten "beer-n-pretzels" one-page wargame. Get some old Epic minis, load up on squad bases, and have at.

Used to know a guy who liked 40k but was huge on the "simpler and cheaper" to the point we ended up playing in 6mm...

Or one could remember that streamlining is not "Make it simpler" but more efficient rather then some strawman of "Down it dumb" that the previous post assumed.

Except I see explicit references to needing 10-year-olds to get it in order for it to be acceptable.

 Vankraken wrote:
I really think 8th did far too much to remove the importance of positioning from the game which makes games play rather sloppy these days. Blast, terrain, cover, armor facings, wounds from the front, etc all made it important how you move your models and also made target priority less obvious (aiming that plasma cannon at those terminators seems like the more effective use of the weapon but that group of scouts only consolidated 1 inch out of combat so a blast would hit like 5-6 models). I personally loved blast weapons with Grotzookas being my favorite but I will say that guard arty lists with a gak ton of quad mortars and especially wyverns (barrage TL with 4 blasts per ~60 point vehicle in a squadron, probably thought up by the same person who though a unit of 20 master crafted snazzguns was a good idea) really started to drag on.

As to the whole "how many are actually under the model" argument, it just seems like proper courtesy to have some give and take where one blast might only get 5 hits when the 5th was questionable but the next questionable one goes in the favor of the other person. That being said the same arguments can crop up involving true line of sight, movement, cover (especially 8th's cover system if you can call it that), measuring who is in range to swing in close combat, etc. That being said relatively unbiased 3rd party opinion can make short work of such disagreements. Much rather have templates then that example from Planet Strike where you do the whole blast radius thing but without a proper template.

I agree completely.
But then again, reasoned discourse seems to be a virtue forgotten lately, at least in the West.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

LunaWolvesLoyalist wrote:
I honestly have a hard time buying that so many people got into so many arguments over Templates. I have never once had the issue in over a decade of gaming.

You people play with some fething cry babies.

Exactly.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Galef wrote:
Blast templates would be fine as a way to determine the # of shots a weapon gets.
For example: Weapons that currently roll D3 for their shots could instead place the small (3") template down on the target unit (with the center whole entirely on a model) and the number of models hit is the number of dice you roll to hit. Weapons that roll D6 would use the large (5") blast. I would also make it so that only 1 unit could get hit like this (no clipping)

These weapons could still roll D3/D6 against single model units so that they are not utterly nerfed against monsters/vehicles.

That said, I enjoy not seeing arguments over what models got hit, etc. Which might get reduced if we no longer use the scatter dice.

-

Good idea.
Use the d3/d6 system for the unreasonable players with fairness and objectivity issues.
Templates for adults.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

malcontent999 wrote:
I've always had fun with templates, and we still play older editions with them at home. As for everyone's issues with spacing and arguments, I had always thought the answer was just to not be such a tight arse. I usually had my opponent place my templates. Usually went quick, and I don't think anyone in almost 20 years of gaming was such a prick that I felt the need to argue with their job. And for spacing, did it really matter if you lost an extra guy because they were only 1 and 1/4 inches apart? Even if it cost the game/tournament? Of course not.
Now we don't get to have nice things.
Thanks a lot.

Me too.
Exalted for goodness.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 MrMoustaffa wrote:


If 40k is to bring back these more in depth rules, it has to drop army size down, drastically Something in the 1,000pts range and less would be a good spot. Then you have a much more manageable table for even horde armies to work with and can incorporate more terrain and fancy rules.

One thing I will agree on is terrain rules are way too simplistic. I do not miss random move through cover one bit, but it feels wrong to advance through it with no penalty. It also feels wrong that intervening terrain has almost 0 point, making most terrain functionally pointless. Something like bolt action has, where certain area terrain blocks line of sight, even if you can see through it physically would be a nice start.

I prefer small scale games on larger tables that give due weight to positioning, feinting, denying flanks, ... All that is lost on 1st turn coin flips over who goes first. But yeah, I agree with some of what you are getting at in this long post. Play smaller games. Collect large armies. Use only some of them at a time...


Automatically Appended Next Post:

LunaWolvesLoyalist wrote:

 Grimtuff wrote:

 lolman1c wrote:
Pls no templates ever again! I'd rather have a crap unreliable system than spending hours (I am not joking! I saw one argument that lasted 3 hours!) Over how many units are below some green plastic.

Then the problem there is with the operator, not the system.

Exactly this.

If blast templates added HOURS to your games then look, maybe you need to either game with some folks who are less strict ass darts or go back to school because counting plastic soldier under a clear circle is not that fething hard.

The biggest groups of people I have heard bitch about templates is competitive 40k players, and honestly who really cares about them anyway?

^^

So, a trolley is headed for a junction and you are standing next to the switch. You can choose to throw the switch, diverting the trolley. If let to travel as it is, 5 competitive 40k players will be smashed. If you throw the switch, 10 competitive 40k players will be smashed. What do you do? What is the RIGHT thing to do?


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Vaktathi wrote:
Templates make sense in an RPG or skirmish game with 10-20 models on the table and 30-60min game times with only a couple of template weapons present.

With 80-300 models on the table and 2-3 hour game times and sometimes literally dozens of template weapons, blast templates have three issues. First, at that scale of play, where we are talking about company ot battalion sized forces, that level of granularity isn't something the battlecommander really should be concerned with. Second, when you have that many models and template weapons, they add considerably to game time. As a third point, they create lots of other issues, its harder to balance and design template weapons (they had issues all through the 3E-7E paradigm), and cause additional points of player conflict ("that guy is barely touched so he's hit" or "thats not how that scatters...its a little more left", etc).

TL;DR templates make sense for Necromunda, not in a game with multiple Wyvern batteries and hundreds of infantry models on the table.

10-20 models?
Hmmm.
Really?



Automatically Appended Next Post:

LunaWolvesLoyalist wrote:

dosiere wrote:
I’m a fan of blast templates - in certain games and rulesets. I’m glad they introduced them into the 2nd edition of bolt action, for example. In a platoon sized game with FOC restrictions, they add a fun visual representation of what is happening. Generally in a game of BA there are only one or two units that use them.

In a game like WFB or 40k though, well, I’m glad they’re gone. If anything I think GW has not done enough to streamline their system. The hundreds of miniatures moving around, The buckets of dice that need to be rolled again and again, and the number of special rules involved for every model and weapon is more than enough for a game of this scale.

If we go much simpler then 8th we may as well just point the miniatures at each other and go "Bang bang your dead!"

Couldn't agree more.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Marmatag wrote:

 Backspacehacker wrote:

 Marmatag wrote:
If you bring back templates, expect my movement phase to take about 45-60 minutes. No complaining.

...sooooo your standard nid movement phase ok.

Without templates i can move in about 15 minutes. If you require me to measure the inches between 170 models, and get it right, it's going to take a lot longer.

RIP Templates. They were cool in theory. But driving a 2" wedge between every model moved is not my idea of a good time. I would honestly probably quit Tyranids if they brought back templates; it's already a challenging army to play right.

Why be such an anyl-ist about movement?
Not as if dudes on an actual battlefield run around measuring the distance between each other.
They just do their best to minimize losses by optimizing spacing.
And they do it fast, real-time fast.
Seems that people need a movement timer.
And to stop being so pedantic.
Makes me think that people are betting on the outcomes, like losing their cars or something...
measuring 2" between a thousand orks?
I would just box my dudes, say "You win" and find something else to do.
Like watching paint dry, and not a problem with the game, but a problem with the player.

Seems that people need a movement timer.

Movement timer punishes horde armies and favors elite armies.

I don't know why people are still crying over losing templates. They are still in Shadow War Armageddon and Horus Heresy, which by the way are games that are much better suited for templates than the Epic 40.000 current Warhammer 40k is more or less becoming.

The beauty of the issue is that if you and your buddies love templates...you can still use them. They didn't magically disappear. Loads of companies still make 40K sized/scaled templates, etc.

You want to substitute templates for your army in place of the dice rolls - no one is stopping you.

I miss templates, at least my lads could hit *something* with them!

 Infantryman wrote:

LunaWolvesLoyalist wrote:


If we go much simpler then 8th we may as well just point the miniatures at each other and go "Bang bang your dead!"

The more I read these "Go simplier!" type posts the more I'm wondering if what these guys really want is to just play some old forgotten "beer-n-pretzels" one-page wargame. Get some old Epic minis, load up on squad bases, and have at.

Used to know a guy who liked 40k but was huge on the "simpler and cheaper" to the point we ended up playing in 6mm...

I was referring to the mechanics of targeting, moving, shooting, etc... IMO 8th cut the wrong stuff out. They got rid of or didn’t add anything that makes the game interesting regarding player agency but kept all the layers of dice rolling and individual model placement in the movement, shooting and especially close combat phases. The terrain rules...don’t even get me started on how shallow they are.

What this game doesn’t need however is anything that adds to the already tedious mechanics of working out hits, misses, and casualties. Using templates at this point would just be adding complexity for no real benefit to the depth of the rules. Even if it did, there are bundles of lower hanging fruit to pick.

 Infantryman wrote:

LunaWolvesLoyalist wrote:


If we go much simpler then 8th we may as well just point the miniatures at each other and go "Bang bang your dead!"

The more I read these "Go simplier!" type posts the more I'm wondering if what these guys really want is to just play some old forgotten "beer-n-pretzels" one-page wargame. Get some old Epic minis, load up on squad bases, and have at.

I have no idea why using smaller miniatures would be simpler, but there's a skill to writing a short set of rules. There's plenty of historical rulesets which are incredibly short by the standards of popular fantasy/SF rulesets. Admittedly that's because in a historical game you don't need separate stats for an Ork Boy, and Eldar Guardian and a Space Marine, a shoota, ashuriken catapult and a bolter; you only need stats for a soldier with a bolt-action rifle and that'll do for the basic infantry for every faction in WW2 - and partly because they can assume that all the players will agree on what should happen in odd situations so they don't need to iron everything out.

But yes, I'[d like a return to the days of early 2nd edition or early 3rd edition - where every unit was distinguished only by the statline and the equipment - no need for piles of special abilities that I always forget.

Well, going forward, I will embrace the rule
use templates with adults
and the random system of 8th with people unable to handle themselves rationally.
That is the best idea I have come across.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Galef wrote:
Blast templates would be fine as a way to determine the # of shots a weapon gets.
For example: Weapons that currently roll D3 for their shots could instead place the small (3") template down on the target unit (with the center whole entirely on a model) and the number of models hit is the number of dice you roll to hit. Weapons that roll D6 would use the large (5") blast. I would also make it so that only 1 unit could get hit like this (no clipping)

These weapons could still roll D3/D6 against single model units so that they are not utterly nerfed against monsters/vehicles.

That said, I enjoy not seeing arguments over what models got hit, etc. Which might get reduced if we no longer use the scatter dice.

-

^^

Except skip rolls to hit and go straight to to-wound rolls, as tradition would have it.