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.

Assault Vehicle. Not sure if was actually in the USR section or tucked into the vehicle rules.

 Captain Joystick wrote:
Someone who has better memory can confirm or deny this for me, but wasn't the Land Raider's super-incredible ability to let you charge into combat straight out of the vehicle due to a USR called 'boarding ramp' or something to that effect?

I know the rule itself existed back in 5th edition but I can't remember if it was USR or codex level. All I know for sure is that for a good long while Sisters and Grey Knights were too clumsy to run out of that front door, until they fixed it with an FAQ years later to confirm that only Sisters couldn't do it.

I think that was assault ramps, the USR for being able to get out and assault was open topped if i am recalling correctly

CSM had the Assault Vehicle special rule in 4th and 7th.

I cannot find the source of assault ramp, it seems SM had the USR as well.

 Polonius wrote:
USRs was at the peak of GW's policy of not listening to players, and it shows quite literally. Things that would make good USRs are things that players quickly come up with shorthand for. Feel no Pain hasn't been an official rule in what, five years now? But we all know what it means when we say "five up feel no pain." Damage Reduction is quickly becoming the shorthand for Duty Eternal and the like. Exploding sixes is cribbed from other games, but most people know what it means.

I feel like you could come up with a list of a dozen or so USRs just based on the organic way players eventually talk about the game.

Now, if you want to give GW a small amount of credit, I think that one thing 8th/9th edition implemented which was nice were super basic universal rules. Things like Fly, combined with a speed stat and some key words for infantry, bikes, etc. basically replace a laundry list of unit types. Even defining things like Aura, Blessing, Malediction, etc. helped. Now, it's easy to point out that other games have been using keywords for years prior, but hey, small victories.

7th had Blessings and Maledictions. Changing Infantry from a unit type to a keyword isn't a great invention, even if I think unit types had too many rules in 7th.

The problem is that nobody has units with Feel No Pain, so everybody has to be told at least once, even if it is in their first game.

There is hope. AoS has started to pick up USRs. They reintroduced "ward" as a mechanic that was basically WHFB's variant of FNP, and lumped on every save after save in this new "ward" USR.

I think they test everything in AoS then port it into 8th/9th. I've yet to see anything from 8th/9th port over to AoS.

Maybe one day we'll get AoS's command ability system to replace Strategems!

one can hope.

With USR not a lot.GW however really broke the camel's back by introducing to many not so universal USR's that could mean in order to have all the rules for one unit in just a codex you needed 3 pages in the codex and 3 more in the main rulebook.

what went wrong was easy, GW wrote USRs in the rulebook and stopped using those with the mid-edition design shift and instead created new USRs for that specific army

and because those were only in that Codex, the next army that got the same ones had to have them in the Codex as well, but with GW being lacy at copy&paste they made mistakes so the new USR that was supposed to be the same was different

and with GW being GW, they told people in the FAQ that this is intended as GW does not make mistakes and it started to become a mess

until the new Edition with the USR being in the RB again and it all started again

 kodos wrote:
what went wrong was easy, GW wrote USRs in the rulebook and stopped using those with the mid-edition design shift and instead created new USRs for that specific army

and because those were only in that Codex, the next army that got the same ones had to have them in the Codex as well, but with GW being lacy at copy&paste they made mistakes so the new USR that was supposed to be the same was different

and with GW being GW, they told people in the FAQ that this is intended as GW does not make mistakes and it started to become a mess

until the new Edition with the USR being in the RB again and it all started again

They didn't stop using them. On the contrary, they introduced formations and formations of formations that more often than not said: If you buy this bundle that offers no savings, get these 3-5 USRs for free!

xerxeskingofking wrote:
While i am an old player of 40K, i went into remission the back end of 4th and never played again until 9th edition. I understand the Universal Special Rules were implemented and removed form the game during that time, and they seem, in theory, to be a good idea, or at least not a bad idea. however, form comments on threads here on dakka i get the feeling the playerbase did not like them.

what was wrong with them? were they a bad idea conceptually, or did they screw up the execution? surely, having "deep strike" and "feel no pain" rules built into the core game seems a less wordy way than the current version where everyone gets these unique abilities that have the same rules text added to the datasheet, with the same wording on each. I mean, deep strike and feel no pain are still the preferred terms to refer to these abilities , even though no one actually has rules called that anymore.

so, what went wrong? why are USRs so badly thought of? im geniunely curious if it would not be a good idea to bring them back in some limited form.

Here is my gripe with USRs from 40K 7th edition.

There were three, entirely different rules in the game with the name "Crack Shot." God that was annoying.

One thing that I don't see get as much attention but was a huge, massive issue with USRs was the way they created unintended effects when combined.

This was mostly due to being able to add characters to squad but you would have situations where a USR would say 'a unit with USR X has Y ability" so one character with USR X added to unit 1 would give the whole unit that Y USR.

This lead to people putting multiple characters in the same unit to stack USRs so you'd end up with something that had Zealot, Hit and Run, etc, etc, until it was an unstoppable ball of rules.

Sgt. Cortez wrote:

They didn't stop using them.

As an example, more than half the USRs from 4th Edition Rulebook were not used by a single faction by the end of the Edition

 Arschbombe wrote:
Assault Vehicle. Not sure if was actually in the USR section or tucked into the vehicle rules.

It was, but for almost the entire lifetime of the game it existed only on the Land Raider and variants.

 kodos wrote:

As an example, more than half the USRs from 4th Edition Rulebook were not used by a single faction by the end of the Edition

One of the part of USR's that worked poorly was the update schedule. If you ended up with a codex that was certainly one of the long runner ones without you could end up with relying on USR's that were meant to do entirely different things now working either against you or drastically overpowering you because of a single change.

 AnomanderRake wrote:

 Arschbombe wrote:
Assault Vehicle. Not sure if was actually in the USR section or tucked into the vehicle rules.

It was, but for almost the entire lifetime of the game it existed only on the Land Raider and variants.

Yeah. It wasn't a USR or in the vehicle rules. It was in the Land Raider entry in the Space Marine codex.

 Tannhauser42 wrote:
My problem with USRs is that, eventually, they stop being universal. Armies start getting their own minor variations of the same USR, or have other rules that otherwise change/ignore the USRs.

But that's not a problem with USRs, that's a problem with implementation. If someone has the discipline to not to that, USRs remain just that: Universal.

 Togusa wrote:
Here is my gripe with USRs from 40K 7th edition.

There were three, entirely different rules in the game with the name "Crack Shot." God that was annoying.

Fair enough that that is a gripe - but how is that a problem with USRs, when there doesn't appear to be a "Crack Shot" USR in 7th (going by the mini-rulebook, at least)?

That reads more as a problem of "bad rule name management" by the Studio.

Pretty much every complaint about USRs doesn't refer to the concept of standardised special rules, but to their implementation by GW.

I've not seen a single compelling argument for why standardising special rule types (ie deep striking, furious charging etc) is a bad thing.

The main argument I've seen is it reduces army flavour, which is a bit subjective.

From a balance and simplicity perspective, standardising common rules across armies is a no brainer.

While we are thinking about USRs, I think we should start a petition for 10th Edition the they add Invulnerable Save to the Statblock. This is probably the most common "ability" in the entire game.

ERJAK wrote:
One thing that I don't see get as much attention but was a huge, massive issue with USRs was the way they created unintended effects when combined.

This was mostly due to being able to add characters to squad but you would have situations where a USR would say 'a unit with USR X has Y ability" so one character with USR X added to unit 1 would give the whole unit that Y USR.

This lead to people putting multiple characters in the same unit to stack USRs so you'd end up with something that had Zealot, Hit and Run, etc, etc, until it was an unstoppable ball of rules.

This wasn't unintended.

In older editions (3rd through 7th - I've no experience with 2nd and earlier), Characters were very much designed to join squads. That was their intended function, and they were given rules with the full understanding that they would pass these rules on to the squads they joined. The rules were quite literally designed to with this way, with clauses pretty specifically stating that characters shared special rules with the squads they joined and vice versa.

This is basically why characters existed. Auras were incredibly rare prior to 8th edition, with most similar effects being tied to characters themselves and transferred to units they joined. If characters had been limited to only buffing themselves, and not transferring any of their special rules (universal or not) to the units they joined, the ONLY measuring stick to judge them would've been how killy they were for their points.

 Mezmorki wrote:


3rd edition had 0 USRs (but 8 ranged weapon types and 5 special weapon attacks).

Not to be incredibly nit-picky, but 3rd edition did have USRs. There were less than a dozen of them (basically Deep Strike, Infiltrate, Fleet, and a couple of others) and they were the rules which truly did appear in ALMOST every codex to some extent.

3rd Ed didn't really do USRs though. I believe that, towards the end, there were 4 different versions of True Grit (Death Guard, Grey Knights, Space Wolves and one one other).

 alextroy wrote:
While we are thinking about USRs, I think we should start a petition for 10th Edition the they add Invulnerable Save to the Statblock. This is probably the most common "ability" in the entire game.

Nah man! It's all about the bespoke rules! Got to make sure that Invulnerable Save is called out on every data sheet as a separate item in the same way as we have to keep telling you how Melta, Flamer and Plasma weapons every time we print them (sometimes more than once on the same sheet!).

40k players wanted their armies to be special snowflakes, so shared "universal" rules didn't work for them.

As a result, every army, every unit, every weapon has it's own special rules that appear to be unique to itself.

Personally, I'm against the entire thing, but it's not my call.

Just my two cents on the original reason on why USR's are hated. Nothing new here...
GW's rules writing goal continues to be NEW!NEW!NEW! MORE!MORE!MORE! Which translates to power creep. More units, more powers, more abilities, is their hook.
Yes, this isn't always a bad thing if it's your thing. In my opinion though...I know they claim balance a goal, and not every single unit in new codices have it, but power creep is their theory. So:
USR's are a good Idea.
GW cannot do USR"s because USR's cannot be made more powerful with each new codex easily (although it could be done).
Therefore: USR's good, GW theory of codex creep plus USR's? Mud.

Go play two games of OPR and see how well their USR's work in a game kept simple.

Assault vehicle was the rule

Also, the problem was that there was a LOT of redundant USR's, particularly ones that do the same thing but with one or two extra things. "Fearless" and "Zealot" being a good example.

Fearless was auto pass morale,

Zealot was auto pass morale, with re roll hits......

yea, this was a thing

I think we have to make a distinction between good use of USRs and bad use of USRs

As our group still plays 5th ed-the BRB has 2 1/2 pages of USRs for a grand total of 22 that included things like "fleet".

For example some tyranid units had fleet of claw, some eldar units had fleet of foot. both fall under the "fleet" USR and use the same rule.

It is easy to keep track of and does not overburden the rule set.


Where it went sideways was with 7th where they used the old BRB USR system and expanded it to the point it became bloat much like stratagems now.

Someone who has better memory can confirm or deny this for me, but wasn't the Land Raider's super-incredible ability to let you charge into combat straight out of the vehicle due to a USR called 'boarding ramp' or something to that effect?

"assault vehicle" USR. it applied to all vehicles that were open topped or had special assault ramps like the land raider.

What was wrong with USR in the past from my point of view:

1) They published a full list of USR for all units in the game as the first thing of an edition and never changed or extended it.
2) You had to reference the BRB to find out what a unit does. A codex by itself was not sufficient to find all the rules for a model.
3) There were too many of them. To many did similar things, some were just handing out other USR.
4) The whole "confers USR" mess with independent characters joining units.
5) USR were almost exclusively written with guard, marines and craftworld eldar in mind, making them fit badly with armies that worked differently.
6) Bad/no rules updates.

I think the general consensus is that USR would work well and even improve the current edition if
- they were an actual living document that is updated and extended regularly
- there was reminder text on the datasheet so you roughly know what a USR does without referencing another page, book or document.
- there is just one USR to display the same thing across armies
- no snowflake USR are given to an army as a slightly better version of an existing USR.
- no USR give USR

 Jidmah wrote:
5) USR were almost exclusively written with guard, marines and craftworld eldar in mind, making them fit badly with armies that worked differently.

They were a consolidation of commonly re-used rules and veteran skills for the most part. 3e Marines had almost no special rules being an early book.

Fleet and tank hunters originated with the eldar (most of their stuff didn't make it into USRs). I'd be curious to know if furious charge, counter attack, slow and purposeful, and hit and run started with CSM 3.5 or a prior supplement.

 Jidmah wrote:
What was wrong with USR in the past from my point of view...

None of these are problems with USRs though, just GW's application of USRs and how they failed over and over again.

Aside from that, the points you raised a correct. The only thing I'd add is that USRs should be as scalable as possible. The more [Rule Name] (X), where the X allows for variables, the better.

A.T. wrote:

 Jidmah wrote:
5) USR were almost exclusively written with guard, marines and craftworld eldar in mind, making them fit badly with armies that worked differently.

They were a consolidation of commonly re-used rules and veteran skills for the most part. 3e Marines had almost no special rules being an early book.

Fleet and tank hunters originated with the eldar (most of their stuff didn't make it into USRs). I'd be curious to know if furious charge, counter attack, slow and purposeful, and hit and run started with CSM 3.5 or a prior supplement.

My recollection is that furious charge came first in the blood angels Dex and it's where it's name originated. The BA Dex was iirc the second Dexc released after marines.

Counter attack was first in the 3rd ed space wolves Dex.

SaP I think was in the first chaos codex with obliterators/thousand sons iirc.

Hit and run I think was an Eldar exarch ability on 3rd.

 Hellebore wrote:
Hit and run I think was an Eldar exarch ability on 3rd.

Withdraw had similarities in function, but the USR hit and run was the Raptor (and later seraphim) style.
Similarly furious chage by the looks of it - part of black rage in the BA book while the USR-style version appeared later in CSM. Closing in on the end of the edition it may have been that GW were already consolidating its common rules at that point.

 Jidmah wrote:
What was wrong with USR in the past from my point of view:

1) They published a full list of USR for all units in the game as the first thing of an edition and never changed or extended it.
2) You had to reference the BRB to find out what a unit does. A codex by itself was not sufficient to find all the rules for a model.
3) There were too many of them. To many did similar things, some were just handing out other USR.
4) The whole "confers USR" mess with independent characters joining units.
5) USR were almost exclusively written with guard, marines and craftworld eldar in mind, making them fit badly with armies that worked differently.
6) Bad/no rules updates.

I think the general consensus is that USR would work well and even improve the current edition if
- they were an actual living document that is updated and extended regularly
- there was reminder text on the datasheet so you roughly know what a USR does without referencing another page, book or document.
- there is just one USR to display the same thing across armies
- no snowflake USR are given to an army as a slightly better version of an existing USR.
- no USR give USR

1. Yes, this is literally the point of a UNIVERSAL special rule.
2. Again, this is the point of a universal special rule, the rules are consolidated in the core rulebook, these rules are hypothetically common enough that you should know what they do without needing to refer to any rulebook, no different than how the rules for things like "Rapid Fire" or "Assault weapon" are not reprinted in every codex... because those are defined in the core rulebook and you know what they mean.
3. In 4th edition there were ~22 of them as was already explained by another poster. This is not too many. The 80 or so in 7th edition was a different story.
4. This only really got messy when when both the character and the unit had conflicting USRs that created weird interactions, but generally wasn't all that complicated.
5. Universal is universal. I don't see how deep strike was written only with space marines/guard in mind. Same with infiltrate, fleet, etc.
6. Not sure I understand this one, has nothing to do with USRs. If anything it would make it easier because now you would just errata the USR in the core rulebook and it would update the rule as it applies to every unit in the game with it, as opposed to having to update each and every datasheet individually.