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How do people who complain that the 3.5 ed codex was broken reconcile the fact that the 4th edition one has Lash of Submission?
4th edition chaos is badly designed, full of obviously good and bad choices that mean that armies are incredibly samey.

Gw is a company not darth vader and his attendants....

OMG WHAT?
YOU MEAN GW IS A BUSINESS!
No one ever pointed that out before. This changes everything.

Hmmm...let me dig out my 3.5 CSM codex. Wow. So many great things in that old codex. I'm so glad my cousin never had to see his Word Bearer's felled by the new 'dex.

I dun sweat most changes because I think I can win almost any battle with and codex army, I have the newest CSM codex and my only problem is no allies so go fig I just want to use about 1,000 pts of Traitor Guard in my CSM listing what is so wrong about that?

The new Codex has removed every bit of originality that the old one was rich of

...

due to the simplification and streamlining

I think THIS is what has been bugging me most since I started getting back into 40k. The whole "streamlining" thing is a good idea in principle, but the way it has been, and is being implemented is completely silly.

The second edition of 40k was awesome, full of richness and variety. Wargear cards allowed you to turn nearly any IC into what would now be considered a SC. Vehicle upgrade cards did the same thing for vehicles. There was so much detail put into every little aspect. Flamers could set people on fire and leave them running about randomly taking damage every turn while their buddies tried to beat out the flames, many other weapons went into similar detail as to their effects. Troops could be poisoned, frightened, terrified, stupid, mad, frenzied, blinded and hate each other. There was a warp card deck which made the psychic phase into what was almost a game in itself, and psychic energy could be stored into force weapons and unleashed for amazing destructive power. There were chaos gifts, summoning points for demons, strategy (fate) cards, combat drugs, viruses, booby traps. Units could hide, and set overwatch to fire on enemy when they emerged from cover. Tanks could overrun troops and kill them (not just tank shock). And pretty much everything in the Ork codex had a 50/50 chance of either being awesome or exploding, or sometimes both... (gretchin 'ed-bangerz' were a personal favourite of mine).

In my opinion this stuff wasn't 'too complicated' it was the most fun part, that added interest and personality to the game.

Second edition wasn't perfect though. There were a few things that could have really done with fixing and streamlining... For starters "choosing a target" for shooting, was very over complicated and confusing. Close combat between ICs was great, but was a bit slow for squads fighting. There was an annoying disparity between Armour Penetration, Armour Save, and Toughness which probably didn't need to exist. And psychic powers (though interesting and fun) were poorly integrated with the rest of the game.

When I look at the game today I see that most of the stuff that needed fixing then, still needs fixing. Choosing a target is as complicated as ever, the combat system seems to have become even more complicated and nonsensical, while also managing to loose the level of detail it had during IC fights (fumbles, critical hits, parry etc...). And the same disparity exists between AP, Armour Save and Toughness.

All of this stuff seems to have been completely ignored during the 'streamlining' process. And what has gone are all the parts that made the game rich and interesting. And the army lists have become so ridiculously oversimplified that they or on the verge of making anything different to 'out of the box' against the rules. I used to look at the army lists in 2nd Ed and see possibilities. Now all I see are oppressive limits that force every army to bland.

In all of this streamlining I feel that games workshop have essentially... Cut away the meat and left the fat.

SmackCakes wrote:Everything was better before!

Most of this is just plain wrong. I didn't play 2nd ed, but I've played necromunda (that's pretty close to the 2nd ed rules). It is a very nice rule-set for small skirmishes, but try throwing the amount of models we use today on the table and play be 2nd ed rules. It would take days to finish a game. From what I know of 2nd/3rd ed, it was very poorly balanced, some things like virusbombs and eldar disruption could win the game with a few rolls. (the eldar thing even happened before the game started)

The armybooks we have gotten since Orks have all had lots and lots of options, introducing many new units and many different build-options.

There is nothing complicated about choosing a target for shooting, you pick your target, check LOS and range and you're done, what is difficult about that?
What disparity exists between AP, armour save and toughness?
Melee rules are pretty easy actually, there are some slightly complicated rules there, but that is for the more complex situations with many units involved, and IMO, the rules are good, they are well written, not muddy, but you do have to dedicate some time to learn them right.


I think that 5h ed have brought with it the most balanced 40k game ever, and a bunch of very nice new codexes with tons of options.

The only thing that has been lost since 4th ed is the wargear options. Most of them were too complicated anyways, and tons of the stuff was totally useless.

Melissia wrote:

Samus_aran115 wrote:Ha

Also,I allied celestine with some marines, just for kicks. My god she's amazing I'm taking her in every witch hunters list I make in the future.

She can be instantly killed in one hit by any weapon which is S6 or greater. Like, say... multi-lasers or autocannons. And she can be singled out in close combat. And when she dies, you lose faith points.

Don't take her unless you know full well what you're getting into, because she has way too many drawbacks.

Faith points will probably be non existent come september when the Inquistition codex arrives!

I'm horrified by the current trend for upscaling codex! Blood angels and Space Wolves seem to be very strong compared to the other forces around. If a new Chaos codes was on its way I'd love to see what they'd do to even the playing field. as it is you'd have to be a pretty experienced player to get one over these two Marine forces with the current Chaos codex! It'd also be nice to see them get Drop pods and a full range of vehicles! Bloody GW!

IHEARTLARGEBLASTTEMPLATES wrote:Gw is a company not darth vader and his attendants....

They'd be so much cooler if they were though!

"Impressive... most impressive!"

Vader rules!


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Sorry for the blurry pic!

candy.man wrote:When I first read the current Tau book I was like where the hell is Anghkor Prok and Aun'Shi? They were favourites of mine.

God I know right? it got so bad I actually went off the deepend and started rewritting it myself with the rational for every change...it works out pretty well, cause it brings back a lot of the mobility the tau used to rule at...

Kurgash wrote:The moment I lost my chainaxes for my World Eaters I devoted my remaining days to utterly destroying the man responsible. You can take away my chainaxes but I'm taking something from you as well!

...his skull?

Samus_aran115 wrote:

Kurgash wrote:The moment I lost my chainaxes for my World Eaters I devoted my remaining days to utterly destroying the man responsible. You can take away my chainaxes but I'm taking something from you as well!

What? Did chainaxes have a bonus at any point? They're just CCWs...

They were "heavy CCWs" just like ork choppas and any armour save better than 4+ was reduced to 4+

It made terminators cry.

sniperjolly wrote:

Samus_aran115 wrote:

Kurgash wrote:The moment I lost my chainaxes for my World Eaters I devoted my remaining days to utterly destroying the man responsible. You can take away my chainaxes but I'm taking something from you as well!

What? Did chainaxes have a bonus at any point? They're just CCWs...

They were "heavy CCWs" just like ork choppas and any armour save better than 4+ was reduced to 4+

It made terminators cry.

Yeah I have fond memories of getting absolutely murdered by Chain-Axes by someone when I first started 40K

Melissia wrote:At least the current one doesn't leave people confused about the army list.

If the last Codex confused anyone, then those people were stupid, and lacked reading comprehension skills.

Complex =/= complicated.

Melissia wrote:For all its flaws, it is actually playable.

Another fantastic comment. The last Codex was playable... playable in lots of different ways. The new one... well it's certainly playable, and quite powerful - if you like one flavour vanilla. It's powerful vanilla - a very strong flavour - but it's only one flavour, and quite dull because of that.

The problem with the new codex was that GW was caught up in the whole badab thing, and wanted more of a Codex: Renagades (and Black Legion) than Codex: Traitor Legions That Went Rouge In The Horus Heresy. That would be OK, except that they went halfway and precluded a new "Legions" book because they put Failbbadon and Typhus in there along with the Thousand Sons and Emperor's Children.

Illumini wrote:

SmackCakes wrote:Everything was better before!

I did not say everything was better before at all, and I'll thank you not to twist my words into some straw man for you to argue against. Some things have improved. I like the way cover saves work in the new game as well as going to ground, and I like that psychic powers have become better integrated (though they still do feel a little 'patched on". I am sure that the game is more balanced now too.

illumini wrote:Most of this is just plain wrong.

Actually nothing I said was wrong. All of that stuff really was in second edition, that's a fact. A lot of it has been removed now that is also a fact. Does that detract from the richness of the game? It most certainly does. Is it worth trading richness for speed? That is a matter of opinion... I have my opinion, you may disagree. But that does not make anything I said untrue.

I didn't play 2nd ed, but I've played necromunda (that's pretty close to the 2nd ed rules). It is a very nice rule-set for small skirmishes, but try throwing the amount of models we use today on the table and play be 2nd ed rules. It would take days to finish a game.

So you haven't played 2nd ed. Necromunda is not the same, it was far more involved than 40k ever was and possibly closer to Rogue Trader in many respects. 2nd edition didn't have ammo rolls, downed units, pinned units and a lot of the other stuff that makes Necromunda slow. There were plenty of big games back then and they didn't take 'days'. I remember getting through a 3000 point game in an evening. I don't think games took significantly longer back then than they do now, being as vast majority of game time is always taken up by moving units, rolls for shooting, and removing pieces. All stuff that is still in the game... adding on 20 seconds to work out the effects of a wargear card that might only be used once a game is not a big deal.

From what I know of 2nd/3rd ed, it was very poorly balanced, some things like virusbombs and eldar disruption could win the game with a few rolls. (the eldar thing even happened before the game started)

Again! I never said 2nd edition was better. I never said the balance was better (I'm sure you are right that it wasn't). All I said is that 5th edition lacks the richness of older editions. And again I feel this is a fact, since 5th edition is essentially the same as just with less stuff.

And in any case, If something is unbalanced it would seem the obvious thing to do would be to balance it, or re-do it and make it better... not remove it completely forever!!!

There is nothing complicated about choosing a target for shooting, you pick your target, check LOS and range and you're done, what is difficult about that?

Things become complicated when units like a marine tac squad has a missile launcher and bolt guns in the same unit. Do they still all have to target the same unit still? Then you add in MCs intervening units, half in cover units, buildings that prevent LOS and it can become quite messy.

What disparity exists between AP, armour save and toughness?

Vehicles have armour and troops have armour. These are the same thing yet are dealt with completely differently. Vehicles have AP troops have armour save and a different AP.

Troops also have skin and muscle that might absorb a shot and protect them, this is called toughness... Except when the troops are Tyranids when for some reason their skin is counted as armour instead of toughness?

Why have so many different systems for what is essentially the same thing?

If someone really wanted to 'streamline' the game, they could half the number of dice rolls in the shooting phase by consolidating these things into one easy roll.

Melee ... there are some slightly complicated rules there, but that is for the more complex situations with many units involved

You admit the melee rules are complicated. I'm glad we agree.

Here is an example of them being complicated: http://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/list/304400.page

I think that 5h ed have brought with it the most balanced 40k game ever, and a bunch of very nice new codexes with tons of options.

Not counting new units which have obviously been added with the passage of time, the new lists are more restrictive than the old lists. Balance and richness are completely separate issues.

This topic is a perfect example of the new lists being too restrictive:

http://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/list/303752.page

I feel I am perfectly justified in what I said.

I will still defend that 5th is far better than 4th, and that I never played RT (the oldest I've ever played was 1st ed space hulk... unless 2nd ed Blood Bowl is older.) I loved reading things like 'ere we go, however, and respect that it was a different game. Hey, anyone remember an army consisting of two assassins, one with a vortex grenade, and one with a virus bomb? You basically had to circle the wagons and put your entire army on overwatch, praying that they would fumble it.

geordie09 wrote:Faith points will probably be non existent come september when the Inquistition codex arrives!

To use the exact word that Jervis Johnson said, the combined codexis "utter fanwank". There has never been any official support behind it, just some rumor mongers that wish to destroy the four armies involved by mashing them all together into one incoherent mess.

It's believed that either Dark Eldar or Grey Knights will be in september/october/november, and then the other one of those two will be in mid-January (probably Grey Knights).


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H.B.M.C. wrote:[snip]

Insulting people is hardly a good way to make your point. No, I've heard many complaints that the wargear and gifts and whatnot were overly complex.

sniperjolly wrote:The problem with the new codex was that GW was caught up in the whole badab thing, and wanted more of a Codex: Renagades (and Black Legion) than Codex: Traitor Legions That Went Rouge In The Horus Heresy. That would be OK, except that they went halfway and precluded a new "Legions" book because they put Failbbadon and Typhus in there along with the Thousand Sons and Emperor's Children.

Personally I reckon your opinion is more or less correct however the current book seems to be more of a Red Corsairs and marines that when rogue after the horus heresy codex rather than a veteran foes from the Heresy codex. This is apparent because there are no veterans/veteran skills of any kind. CSM according to fluff have a longer lifespan due to living in the warp and are therefore evil veteran foes and champions are even more powerful due to chaos blessings. The fact that the current book doesn't have a combat tactics equivalent (or veteran skills from the previous book) suggests that the 1000+ years of training since the heresy, they are less trained than basic SM tact marines . I don't think super sneaky chosen who are rich enough to equip 5 meltaguns doesn’t count as veterans. I also reckon that the current book is not a Black Legion codex either. As soon as there is some kind of elite, fearless terminator vanguard unit/veteran unit, then it will be a Black Legion book.

Off Topic: I don’t know why people think bland = Black Legion. Bland is more of the case with Red Corsairs or some other generic piratical Chaos Warband.

Melissia wrote:Insulting people is hardly a good way to make your point.

No, passive aggressive trolling is a far better strategy.

Melissia wrote:No, I've heard many complaints that the wargear and gifts and whatnot were overly complex.

... from idiots.

You'd have to be stupid not to understand the last Codex. Low IQ. Dense. Village idiot level intelligence. Dumb. Not in command of one's mental faculties.

Morons.

candy.man wrote:Personally I reckon your opinion is more or less correct however the current book seems to be more of a Red Corsairs and marines that when rogue after the horus heresy codex rather than a veteran foes from the Heresy codex.

He is correct. The Powers That Be wanted to separate Chaos from Chaos Marines, and if everything had gone there way there would be no Daemons of any sort in the current 'Chaos' Codex. As Gav Thorpe said, the 'Generic Daemons' we have were a compromise. Those up stairs wanted the Daemons out because they wanted to give them their own book. Gav (and some others I'd imagine) argued against that, and the results were the Lesser and Not-Quite-So-Greater Daemons that stink up the 'Chaos' Codex with their blandness.

I wrote a review a while back - a big long review of the Chaos Codex - when it first came out and one of my comments was how long it took to actually talk about the Horus Heresy. It spends pages talking about Renegades, then finally mentions the Heresy (almost because it can't avoid it), but then goes and lumps all the Traitor Legions in with the various Renegade Chapters, hitting home the point that Legions in 40K now are just paint jobs, rather than distinct armies or combat doctrines (unlike Marines - who have to have three different Codices because there are three Chapters that fight in HTH slightly differently from one another).

Melissia wrote:

H.B.M.C. wrote:[snip]

Insulting people is hardly a good way to make your point. No, I've heard many complaints that the wargear and gifts and whatnot were overly complex.

HBMC's points are valid. I don't know if I would go so far as to deem someone stupid for being confused by the wargear rules, but I would definitely say that there is a problem if you can't understand the wargear rules, and a bigger problem if you think that the new codex was a good solution to the perceived problem.

I am inclined to agree as well as an owner of the 3.5 book since it was first released. There were some broken combos but compared to BA and SW, it is sorta even. Funny enough if GW were to take the 3.5 book, re-cost it, tweak the upgrades to reduce synergy, you would have a good 5th codex that would be comparable to other 5th edition books

I might shed some light on what was the perceived issue with the 3.5 book. There were too many passive upgrades that gave strength bonuses that could be stacked. When people state that the 3.5 book was overpowered, they are usually over exaggerating at this. This was only an issue for the HQ type units, which 3.5 players were only allowed 2 of. (not 4 like SW) Normally this resulted in 1 unstoppable 200-300 point “hero” and the rest of the army being average. All an opponent had to do was tie up a CSM player's “hero” with gretchins/fodder and deal with the rest of the army. Now comparing this to reclusiarch death company or blood talons and it is not so bad.

The whole Iron Warriors being allowed to swap fast attack for Heavy support wasn't an issue in my opinion (as a player would usually run points and have hardly any bodies on the field) when you compare it to LOS + vindicator spam or hose guard (which is much much worse)

blood reaper wrote:Evil Games Workshop leader : "Jervis, It is time to ruin the Chaos space marines, execute Order 55 " .

Jervis : " Yes, my lord."

Kid : "Yay a new chaos codex , time to beg my parents for more cash!"

1 day later

Kid : "OH GOD WHY! MY BRAIN! IT'S MELTIIING!! MELLLTING!! HOW COULD THIS EXIST!!" *Rolls on the floor babbling blasphemic incoherencies while foaming at the mouth*.

Fixed that for you.

I gotta agree with you all on the flavor aspect...and the fact that GW loves their smurfs...But to be honest unless you're an uber tournie nut (which if you are more power to you) CSM has as much flavor as you want it to. I know a guy who made an entire (and pretty kick ass) Emperor's children army, and even fluffed a way to get khorne berzerkers in (he said they were high on life sort of thing...like lucius the eternal) So to be fair, as long as you're not DOOM DOOM I MUST WIN EVERYTHING you can still have lots of fun with an army list and still be effective...you just gotta, i dunno, try to be? rather than saying urgh that sucks I mean you spent the 25 bucks, might as well make it worth it?

Ribon Fox wrote:Bring back the anti-Jervis, Andy Chambers!!

Yes, because 3rd ed was a wonderful time for 40K. For feth's sake, nostalgia is nice but reality matters.

The 3.5 Chaos Codex was a great read, awesome to build lists with and absolutely horrible to play with or against. There were a million options but no strategic framework, resulting in armies built around one dimensional lists, then tooled up with most underpriced options.

The 4th ed codex is not a great codex, the HQ options aren't that exciting, and a few units are poorly designed and costed. It did shown design considerations that were badly needed, there was a focus on units as filling a unique role on the battlefield, and in making troops valuable as versatile units (previously troops were typically either good because they were as killy as elite and heavy options, or they were junk). Even still, criticism of the codex is not out of place, it simply isn't as well designed as the subsequent Ork, Space Marine and IG codices.

But it has to be remembered that for all the fun in reading the 3.5 codex and building lists with it it was a poor codex in play, and that for all the faults of the 4th ed Chaos codex, at least it was part of the process that saw the game end up in a pretty fun place.


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Illumini wrote:Most of this is just plain wrong. I didn't play 2nd ed, but I've played necromunda (that's pretty close to the 2nd ed rules). It is a very nice rule-set for small skirmishes, but try throwing the amount of models we use today on the table and play be 2nd ed rules. It would take days to finish a game. From what I know of 2nd/3rd ed, it was very poorly balanced, some things like virusbombs and eldar disruption could win the game with a few rolls. (the eldar thing even happened before the game started)

Mate, you have no idea how ridiculous 2nd ed could get. You would throw smoke grenades to cover your advance, and then spend the first twenty minutes of every turn rolling to see if each grenade got smaller, or where it scattered to. Each grenade. Each turn.

Assault was resolved in individual combats, model by model.

Terminators rolled their armour saves on two dice, which sounds like a fun idea until you try to bring them down with massed smalls arms fire from multiple units. Try rolling 2D6 thirty times and see how fun it gets.

2nd was a collection of fun ideas, with little consideration given to how the idea interacted, and the result was a hopelessly bloated game that would take hours to play out each moment or irrelevant minutiae, while giving few if any actual tactical decisions.

I think that 5h ed have brought with it the most balanced 40k game ever, and a bunch of very nice new codexes with tons of options.

The only thing that has been lost since 4th ed is the wargear options. Most of them were too complicated anyways, and tons of the stuff was totally useless.

Yeah, very much that. Wargear tended to be mandatory or useless, it rarely made games more interesting.


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H.B.M.C. wrote:... from idiots.

You'd have to be stupid not to understand the last Codex. Low IQ. Dense. Village idiot level intelligence. Dumb. Not in command of one's mental faculties.

Morons.

Or, you'd be a person who didn't have to remember the minutiae of every other codex to be able to make basic tactical decisions when playing against the old Chaos codex.

The complexity of a codex isn't just a factor for the guy playing it, it's a factor for the guy he's playing against as well.

I don't play CSMs, but as my brother does, they have been my regular opponent since 3rd edition~ (Although I was absent from the hobby for 4th edition). I think the new codex is very good from an opponents perspective. He plays Iron Warriors, and although he has had to retire his Basilisk and by choice his havocs, he still has a very themed army that is a real challenge to play against and fares well against all his regular opponents and in all mission scenarios (although he has only beaten my nids once ).

The centre piece of his army is a 10 man squad of noise marines, who in his army's fluff are actually not noise marines at all, but cyberneticly and bionically enhanced marines (all converted up they look great)~ their guns that can choose to be Assault 2 24" bolters, or Heavy 3 36" bolters, cause some serious dakka, and are very in theme with Iron Warriors ^^

His Warlord has a mark of khorne, but this is simply a way for him to get another attack represented by all the servo-arms on his back pack~

I'm not quite sure of the exact point I was trying to make, just that his army is really fun to play with and that you don't need tailored lists for each legion to make themed armies ^^
He's told me a couple of times that he prefers the new codex over the old one in terms of playability.

Melissia wrote:

Samus_aran115 wrote:Also, a SoB Terminator would require me to wash my pants

That's what Repentia were originally going to be, but then they let their artists have fun with it and we ended up with fetish models instead.

You're just hatin' cuz you can't fill out a razorwire thong like they can.

ph34r wrote:

Melissia wrote:

H.B.M.C. wrote:[snip]

Insulting people is hardly a good way to make your point. No, I've heard many complaints that the wargear and gifts and whatnot were overly complex.

HBMC's points are valid. I don't know if I would go so far as to deem someone stupid for being confused by the wargear rules, but I would definitely say that there is a problem if you can't understand the wargear rules, and a bigger problem if you think that the new codex was a good solution to the perceived problem.

I never said it was a good solution.

Only that it wasn't the devil incarnate...

Apparently not bashing the latest CSM codex as "THE WURST TIHNG EVAR!" is flamebait.

sebster wrote:

Mate, you have no idea how ridiculous 2nd ed could get. You would throw smoke grenades to cover your advance, and then spend the first twenty minutes of every turn rolling to see if each grenade got smaller, or where it scattered to. Each grenade. Each turn.

You forgot about vortex grenades just bouncing around the field the whole game, randomly wiping stuff out....theirs and yours...

Since we're talking about crazy editions, I hope 6th edition 40K is half-Epic, much like 8th WFB is half-Warmaster. Make the Spearhead vehicle rules part of the core rules, drop the cost of everything by like 25-50%, and streamline everything so you can still get a 2000 point game in under two hours. They'd make so much damn money! And I'd field sooo many damn guardsmen!