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yukishiro1 wrote:
The problem with Crusade is that by being primarily about rules, it encourages rules-centric behavior. The Crusade system doesn't stop you from developing your own narrative and playing according to it, but it doesn't help you do that, either, and in fact it actually makes it harder to do that, because it instead emphasizes a bunch of in-game bonuses that it sets out for you as carrots that you have to actively disregard in some cases in order to tell the story you want to tell.

I can agree with this (hence my complaint for instance that they need points built in). The game needs some limiters to be added in to encourage less gaming of the system.

 ClockworkZion wrote:

yukishiro1 wrote:
The problem with Crusade is that by being primarily about rules, it encourages rules-centric behavior. The Crusade system doesn't stop you from developing your own narrative and playing according to it, but it doesn't help you do that, either, and in fact it actually makes it harder to do that, because it instead emphasizes a bunch of in-game bonuses that it sets out for you as carrots that you have to actively disregard in some cases in order to tell the story you want to tell.

I can agree with this (hence my complaint for instance that they need points built in). The game needs some limiters to be added in to encourage less gaming of the system.

That's a player problem not a mechanical one.

Racerguy180 wrote:

 ClockworkZion wrote:

yukishiro1 wrote:
The problem with Crusade is that by being primarily about rules, it encourages rules-centric behavior. The Crusade system doesn't stop you from developing your own narrative and playing according to it, but it doesn't help you do that, either, and in fact it actually makes it harder to do that, because it instead emphasizes a bunch of in-game bonuses that it sets out for you as carrots that you have to actively disregard in some cases in order to tell the story you want to tell.

I can agree with this (hence my complaint for instance that they need points built in). The game needs some limiters to be added in to encourage less gaming of the system.

That's a player problem not a mechanical one.

It's both.

 AnomanderRake wrote:

yukishiro1 wrote:
The problem with Crusade is that by being primarily about rules, it encourages rules-centric behavior. The Crusade system doesn't stop you from developing your own narrative and playing according to it, but it doesn't help you do that, either, and in fact it actually makes it harder to do that, because it instead emphasizes a bunch of in-game bonuses that it sets out for you as carrots that you have to actively disregard in some cases in order to tell the story you want to tell.

How much of that is a Crusade problem and how much of that is a 9th problem? I don't know how true this is broadly but in my local community nobody's managed to make Crusade take off because the people who enjoy 9th are tournament players who don't care about narrative play when they could be practicing the tournament missions, and the people who might find a narrative campaign interesting have all quit 40k because of 9th and are playing other things.

In my local area we've got a healthy mix of casual, narrative and competitive players and even then Crusade hasn't really taken off because it is:

1) More complex than playing a normal game of 40K

and

2) Isn't actually all that narrative. It certainly doesn't provide a good framework for that sort of stuff. The Charadon campaign stuff has been a little bit more interesting for the narrative folks but the pricepoint vs amount of content is a severe barrier.

I'm starting to wonder if people are getting angry at an apple for having the temerity to not be an orange.

 Bosskelot wrote:
Isn't actually all that narrative. It certainly doesn't provide a good framework for that sort of stuff.

Shouldn't you be the one doing the narrative? Crusade is a progression system for narrative play, but not narrative itself.

 Unit1126PLL wrote:
I'll just do what I've always done and write my own campaigns, in which case Crusade helps only by adding progression systems for players.

So you'll use it as intended then?

 H.B.M.C. wrote:
I'm starting to wonder if people are getting angry at an apple for having the temerity to not be an orange.

In which case, if I understand correctly, the problem may be that it was pretty heavily marketed as an apple.

 CEO Kasen wrote:

 H.B.M.C. wrote:
I'm starting to wonder if people are getting angry at an apple for having the temerity to not be an orange.

In which case, if I understand correctly, the problem may be that it was pretty heavily marketed as an apple.

Where did they say it would write your stories for you?

I'm also pretty certain that if GW had written a campaign structure (rather than just a campaign progression system) we'd still have people going "I don't need more rules for my narrative campaign! This isn't narrative play!!!".

 ClockworkZion wrote:

 CEO Kasen wrote:

 H.B.M.C. wrote:
I'm starting to wonder if people are getting angry at an apple for having the temerity to not be an orange.

In which case, if I understand correctly, the problem may be that it was pretty heavily marketed as an apple.

Where did they say it would write your stories for you?

First, I did bugger up that analogy, and should have said it was heavily marketed as an orange, but I see the point wasn't lost.

But with their marketing? They - and everyone caught up in the heady hype of 9th before a seemingly endless parade of Space Marines stepping on a human face ground that enthusiasm into the asphalt - all but said it'd make you immune to gravity and give you a handjob/fingerblast.

Most marketing's like that though, but me point is that it can be a source of disappointment and thus resentment, thus explaining why there may exist annoyance with the apple.

Sisters Crusade review on Goons!!!

Repent!

https://www.goonhammer.com/codex-adepta-sororitas-crusade-review/

PenitentJake wrote:
Sisters Crusade review on Goons!!!

Repent!

https://www.goonhammer.com/codex-adepta-sororitas-crusade-review/

It does some stuff and doesn't do other stuff but none of that matters because it's a narrative game mode and the whole point of narrative is to houserule the hell out of everything so you can tell the story you want to tell and relying on GW to do that for you is silly.

Saved you a click.

Nahh.

You should read before judging.

Come at me heretic. Prepare to be cleansed!

(All in good fun of course... Said with smilies in my most over the top "For the Emprah!")

It's fantastic.

Let me clarify my stance here. I despise 9th edition, but Crusade isn't really in my top 20 reasons. It's not great, and definitely something that can exacerbate some of 40K's worst structural playability issues, but being so optional it's not really that big a deal in the grand scheme of things and doesn't significantly factor into why I rate 9th 40k so low.

Regarding Crusade, I don't mind it existing but I do find it extremely frustrating when stuff that used to be standard wargear instead gets locked behind Crusade.

For example:
- Archons used to be able to buy Combat Drugs as standard. Now they only way to access them is through Crusade.
- Archons used to be able to buy Soul Traps as standard. Now they only way to access them is through Crusade.
- Archons used to be able to choose between Shadowfields and Clone Fields. Now they only way to access clone Fields is through Crusade.
etc.

If they want to make new wargear specifically for Crusade, fine. But don't just take stuff that already exists and make it Crusade-only.

But GW already did that in the past. They changed a lot of basic gear options to be one per turn stratagems. So it isn't even that suprising for the game as whole.

Comments on the Sororitas Crusade content:

1) Finally, there are stakes! A character can die. Admittedly, it's only the Saint Potentia, and it's a boon rather than a bust, but that's fluffy for Sisters. Too bad other armies still have immortal units.

2) The article says it'd be about 10 games (2 per trial) to get your sister from "regular joe" to Living Saint, so I was almost bang on the money.

I think the Agendas can be cool, they give you something to work on between games.

Although I find the execution a bit flat. My Blood Angels ones is stuff like "kill a bunch of stuff in melee" k, I do that anyways. Or "Have a Sanguinary Priest running to every objective marker doing nothing else all game". K, I get what they're going for but it feels weird to be rummaging around random areas of the battlefield exclusively in the middle of an intense battle, whilst also slitting my own throat gamewise as I lose a pretty expensive character for almost no benefit.

So if those agendas were fine tuned, I think that'd be rad.
I'd also like to do away with all the xp and relics and stuff. 40k already struggles with so much minor stat buff bloat piling on more is the last thing it needs.

 AnomanderRake wrote:

yukishiro1 wrote:
The problem with Crusade is that by being primarily about rules, it encourages rules-centric behavior. The Crusade system doesn't stop you from developing your own narrative and playing according to it, but it doesn't help you do that, either, and in fact it actually makes it harder to do that, because it instead emphasizes a bunch of in-game bonuses that it sets out for you as carrots that you have to actively disregard in some cases in order to tell the story you want to tell.

How much of that is a Crusade problem and how much of that is a 9th problem? I don't know how true this is broadly but in my local community nobody's managed to make Crusade take off because the people who enjoy 9th are tournament players who don't care about narrative play when they could be practicing the tournament missions, and the people who might find a narrative campaign interesting have all quit 40k because of 9th and are playing other things.

It's definitely in large part a Crusade problem imo. My group does a bit of every play style but enjoys a solid narrative game/campaign more than anything and we've not enjoyed Crusade at all. We like the idea of it, and there are some really cool elements in some of the books (Space Marine characters becoming Dreadnaughts, "design your own virus" for DG, etc), but that system is just all about book keeping and rules tracking. It's cumbersome as hell to play and it really bogs down if yo try to push those games past 50PL.

WintersSEO did a review of it when it first came out and pretty much slagged it. Our group kind of eye-rolled the review because he came off a bit like a grognard, but, come to find out, everything that was true for him ended up being true for us as well. I think where they really went "wrong" (purely subjective here obviously as many groups really like the system) was trying to make a system that worked whether your opponent was "playing crusade" or not. That's why the focus is on the things its on.

 addnid wrote:
I just want to say:
#lifeinasharktank
#karolliveyourlifedontletthemtellyouhowtoliveit

I originally typed up a comment, but it was out of place and I've redacted it. my apologies.

Karol wrote:
But GW already did that in the past. They changed a lot of basic gear options to be one per turn stratagems.

Yes, and I opposed those as well.

The fact that GW made crap design choices in the past doesn't magically justify further crap design choices in the future.

 kirotheavenger wrote:
I think the Agendas can be cool, they give you something to work on between games.

Although I find the execution a bit flat. My Blood Angels ones is stuff like "kill a bunch of stuff in melee" k, I do that anyways. Or "Have a Sanguinary Priest running to every objective marker doing nothing else all game". K, I get what they're going for but it feels weird to be rummaging around random areas of the battlefield exclusively in the middle of an intense battle, whilst also slitting my own throat gamewise as I lose a pretty expensive character for almost no benefit.

So if those agendas were fine tuned, I think that'd be rad.
I'd also like to do away with all the xp and relics and stuff. 40k already struggles with so much minor stat buff bloat piling on more is the last thing it needs.

You know you could write a story to explain it. Like maybe he's looking for peices on Sanguinius' spear, or maybe there are fallen brothers there and he's collecting the geneseed.

Story is what you make it.

Yeah but rules are supposed to help tell the story. If I have to make the narrative to justify the rules, that is backwards.

The rules should be informed by the narrative, not the other way around.

 Unit1126PLL wrote:
Yeah but rules are supposed to help tell the story. If I have to make the narrative to justify the rules, that is backwards.

The rules should be informed by the narrative, not the other way around.

The rules gave you objectives on the table and you ran a character to those objectives which means he's running around for something. It's on you to decide what he's running around to those objectives for, not for the game to explain every single thing you're doing. It's a toolbox, not a GM in a box.

That basically is the justification given by the agenda, he's searching for hints and artifacts that might lead to a cure to the Black Rage.

But why is he exclusively doing it in the middle of a major battle? Can't he help see off the foul xenos, then have a rummage through the rubbish bin in the ensuing peace?

That's the point, it doesn't feel like a logical objective to me. It feels like jumping through arbitrary hoops.

 kirotheavenger wrote:
That basically is the justification given by the agenda, he's searching for hints and artifacts that might lead to a cure to the Black Rage.

But why is he exclusively doing it in the middle of a major battle? Can't he help see off the foul xenos, then have a rummage through the rubbish bin in the ensuing peace?

That's the point, it doesn't feel like a logical objective to me. It feels like jumping through arbitrary hoops.

In a universe driven by narrative causality? Maybe he's trying to secure the things he needs to prevent their possible destruction by the hands of the enemy. Or they're incredibly fragile so could be easily broken or destroyed by combat.

 ClockworkZion wrote:

 kirotheavenger wrote:
That basically is the justification given by the agenda, he's searching for hints and artifacts that might lead to a cure to the Black Rage.

But why is he exclusively doing it in the middle of a major battle? Can't he help see off the foul xenos, then have a rummage through the rubbish bin in the ensuing peace?

That's the point, it doesn't feel like a logical objective to me. It feels like jumping through arbitrary hoops.

In a universe driven by narrative causality? Maybe he's trying to secure the things he needs to prevent their possible destruction by the hands of the enemy. Or they're incredibly fragile so could be easily broken or destroyed by combat.

Both of those things are reasons NOT to dig them up until after the enemy is already gone.

And my point is that it's a dumb agenda narratively. Yes, it isn't a GM in a bottle, but it also just isn't really narrative at all. It doesn't make sense narratively. So you could never take it, but then it's just wasted space to have published in the first place.

I will say that I think Marines may have suffered a bit from going first- I see a lot of depth in in Crusade content for Drukhari, Admech and Sisters that does seem to be lacking for marines.

Deathwatch, which are the only Marines I currently play, don't have the same sense of long term goals that other factions do; this may be due to what marines are- eternal, ever ready soldiers made only for war.

But Deathwatch could have had long term extermination mechanics built in- I'd like to have seen a bit more stuff to reflect the eclectic nature of "Vets from other Chapters" or some chapter tithe mechanics mentioned explicitly. There is some of this in there, mind you, but nothing like the glory of "Conquer Commorragh", "Build the ultimate Machine" or "Sainthood and Repentance."

One of the ideas I've mentioned elsewhere is sliding the experience scale to slow the approach of the "Endgame"; I do this myself as a player- it seems like the pace on becoming a Living Saint IS going to be fairly fast; for me, I already knew it would be slower than it will for most, because my candidate is going to start as a rank and file dominion- she won't even be eligible to be chosen as a Saint potentia when my Crusade begins.

But just like in DnD, I put in the work.

You can play DnD in such a way that it is literally a series of fights to get you to level 20. Nobody blames D&D for this possibility, and nobody is upset that it is up to players and DMs to ensure that there is more than just a series of fights.

The comparison to DnD aptly illustrates the problems with Crusade, though.

The DnD rules emphasize collaborative storytelling. They mandate a GM who is telling the story, and provide mechanics for interactions that are non-combat related.

Every combat encounter is "framed" by non-combat stuff. How much you see of the combat area is defined by what gear you have and the lighting conditions (dim light to 40 ft, bright light to 20 ft, for example). How many allies you have with you is determined by your diplomacy checks with the guard at the last town. The ammunition you have for your bows/crossbows is determined by how much you brought plus the amount expended in the last encounter. Your spell selection is split between combat and non-combat spells, and some of each may have been spent in your last encounter, etc. etc.

The framework for a Crusade game is: "Your armies are both here for the Relic. FIGHT! The winner gets a free relic."

Everything else is either handled by the core rules or totally absent.

Part of this is due to the core rules and how crappy they are at letting models do anything other than murder each other. As soon as someone says "GO" both armies are basically murderizing each other, so there's little incentive to carefully manage the narrative escalation or even try to figure out why these armies might be fighting.

I get that I can do all that myself, but I could always do all that myself whether Crusade existed or not. And DND gives me the tools to handle narrative situations and combat situations well. It gives me narrative reasons to put my sword away and punch the other guy, it gives me narrative reasons to conserve spell slots or ammunition, it gives me narrative reasons to avoid the fight entirely (while still gaining the XP/progression points). It gives me narrative reasons to scout the space ahead of time, or to ensure I've brought utility items such as torches/lamps or potions, etc. It gives me narrative reasons and mechanics for bringing an allied character whether NPCs or a player, and even gives me guidance on how command-and-control works with them (which is more than 40k does, ironically).

You can play DnD in such a way that it is literally a series of fights to get you to level 20. Nobody blames D&D for this possibility, and nobody is upset that it is up to players and DMs to ensure that there is more than just a series of fights.

Well, it was one of the biggest criticisms of 4th edition D&D, that there was basically combat time and nothing else; and rules presumed a static world where nothing happened if your PCs weren't there to witness it, so the idea that 'nobody blames the ruleset (or designers)' is... pretty wrong.

Fun anecdote in this regard from a live play experience at a Con... One of the WotC devs (Chris Perkins, if I remember) was running a session, and the party came upon a door they couldn't open. The group tried various tools, strength checks and then spells and clever combinations of spells (cold and fire, iirc) to get through the door and were met with a flat 'No, spells don't do that (environmental effects) and it's just immune to damage.' So they had to move on.

The Wizards folks never quite picked up on why the group was irritated and the audience was muttering. But it was because they ripped all the verisimilitude out of the game and reduced it to series of fights to level 20. It was a bad return to the very early days of the game, where it was just a squad tactics game and you either read Gygax's mind or you didn't get anywhere.

PenitentJake wrote:
...But just like in DnD, I put in the work.

You can play DnD in such a way that it is literally a series of fights to get you to level 20. Nobody blames D&D for this possibility, and nobody is upset that it is up to players and DMs to ensure that there is more than just a series of fights...

I absolutely blame D&D for being two hundred pages of ways to kill people and one page of skills in case you want to do something other than murder-hobo your way through level-appropriate combat encounters until you hit level 20.