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Makumba wrote:
Good for you . out of the 73 people that played at the last big tournament here 0 played csm . In the last new player league out of 16people 0 were csm. I can't remember the last time , I saw csm as something else as helldrake ally . And considering this is a few months after two new codex , it seems to be a bad time for csm players.

CSM have had this problem since 4th ed.

I have small complaints, but overall I absolutely love this rule set. I have both shooty and stabby armies, and have won with both strategies. Competitively, 6th edition is obviously geared towards the Shooting Phase, but I think that's a good thing, we have WHFB for all the stabby action you could ever ask for.

 Blacksails wrote:

xruslanx wrote:
Thing is, it seems strange to me that the people who regard 40k as having so many problems that it's basically unplayable, just happen to be people who also slag off GW over anything and everything they do, and complain about declining quality of GW models,

Whereas people who don't spend all day whinging about GW tend to find 40k very easy to play with genuinely game-breaking glitches few and far between. That's an interesting coincidence, isn't it?

Well, it makes sense people who don't complain about GW tend to be the ones who like it. I would expect that to be the norm, for well, just about anything that exists. Don't know what point you're trying to make with that line.

The people who have problems with the rules have repeatedly stated what issues there are and what systems exist that are better rules for their game. One of the underlying issues with 40k is the drive to sell more models, which has constantly tried to push the size of games steadily upwards. Now, 28mm is supposed to be a skirmish level game by its very nature. We're talking at most two dozen units with a vehicle or two. Assuming a standard 4x6 or even 4x8 board, this allows for a lot of movement and freedom, while also being able to implement realistic and reasonable ranges and movement.

40k has shoehorned itself into trying to be a 15mm game played with 28mm figures. If all the models were shrunk down to 15mm, and everything remained identical, the rules would work better and the game would have at least some semblance of true tactical depth.

Now, I want to go back to your first statement. Just like your last line that I commented on, this line actually says nothing. Its a contentless sentence that proves nothing besides the obvious. Of course the people who complain about 40k will have other problems with GW. GW makes a few other games of varying quality, but company policy as a whole tends to show through in all their work. All the criticism levied against them is valid to varying degrees. Disagreeing with it doesn't make you any more right, or the other side any less wrong.

The difference in a discussion is how you present your side.

So now I ask you, instead of throwing around meaningless statements with no content or thought or depth or even a smidgen of real attempt at a proper discussion, why not engage in a proper discussion. Raise counterpoints, acknowledge the other side and refute some of the points. Maybe even consider what the other side is saying instead of plugging your ears. Make a convincing argument and make me believe what you believe.

Because, if 40k was actually a good rule set, and the game was even a little more balanced, we wouldn't be having this discussion, would we?

You seem to have made several apparently unconnected points.

First you claim that GW are trying to make players play larger games in order to sell more models. While this was true, there are two problems with this argument - the first is that troops have gotten way better with successful rulesets. You can happily taken bucket loads of Eldar Guardians or Imperial guard squads, as well as existing ranges in general being more effective than the newcomers. Tau do not need riptides to stomp face, and eldar do not need their MC. Dark Angels don't need any of their new stuff, and any flyer that's not a helldrake or vendetta is useless. Surely all of these new units must be uber powerful in order to justify charging a shed load of money for a pay-to-win system? Instead new codex releases have actually made existing armies, in some cases, way better. Anyone who plays Iron Hands got a laughably powerful free upgrade, and about 200 extra points to boot. Yes games are getting bigger and yes, GW is making money because people need to buy more kits. But so what? Points value is *entirely* down to you, and if you feel like your battles are getting too large then scale down in point value. For this reason, it is an invalid argument against the validity of gw's ruleset.

Second, you claim that 40k is basically epic rules to the wrong scale. While I don't doubt this, you haven't supplied any evidence for why this is the case.

xruslanx wrote:
First you claim that GW are trying to make players play larger games in order to sell more models. While this was true, there are two problems with this argument - the first is that troops have gotten way better with successful rulesets. You can happily taken bucket loads of Eldar Guardians or Imperial guard squads, as well as existing ranges in general being more effective than the newcomers.

No, you're just missing the point here. GW promoting bigger games to sell models isn't necessarily about selling new models, selling lots of old models is also good. If you're taking "bucket loads" of troops (probably because GW dropped the per-model point cost) then you're doing exactly what GW wants.

Second, you claim that 40k is basically epic rules to the wrong scale. While I don't doubt this, you haven't supplied any evidence for why this is the case.

Evidence has been stated. Let's review:

* Weapon ranges that are way too short for 28mm scale (tank guns at 72" are laughably wrong, for example) so that range actually matters for gameplay purposes.

* Flyer movement speeds that are way too slow (should be off-table air strikes instead, but GW needs to sell models).

* Army sizes that get too crowded on a standard 6x4 table and reduce movement options to "move into range and roll dice".

* Entire classes of units that shouldn't be present in a 28mm game (heavy artillery tanks that should be miles away, aircraft that can't plausibly fly in a 6x4 box, etc), with an expansion (Apocalypse) that adds even more classes.

And that's just some obvious easy ones. GW's design process for 40k has been taking the core mechanics of a 28mm skirmish game and bolting on rules to handle all the cool Epic-scale models.

 Peregrine wrote:

Evidence has been stated. Let's review:

* Weapon ranges that are way too short for 28mm scale (tank guns at 72" are laughably wrong, for example) so that range actually matters for gameplay purposes.

* Flyer movement speeds that are way too slow (should be off-table air strikes instead, but GW needs to sell models).

And how about, ludicrously proportioned marines with big heads... aliens that grow guns on their arms... metal dragons that spew flames out of their ass. None of this is backed up by science. The whole thing is ludicrously unrealistic. Can't understand what anyone would play it, because I demand scientific accuracy in all my games.

Hivefleet Oblivion wrote:
And how about, ludicrously proportioned marines with big heads... aliens that grow guns on their arms... metal dragons that spew flames out of their ass. None of this is backed up by science. The whole thing is ludicrously unrealistic. Can't understand what anyone would play it, because I demand scientific accuracy in all my games.

Sigh. Do you really not know the difference between "scientific accuracy" and "not breaking suspension of disbelief"? Flyer movement rules aren't stupid because a plane moving that slow would stall and crash (the ridiculous shapes of the models would ensure a crash long before that point), they're stupid because the "cinematic" version of 40k has planes flying past on high-speed strafing runs and obliterating whole units in seconds before disappearing as quickly as they arrived. But instead we get air superiority fighters leisurely floating around the battlefield while still somehow having trouble figuring out how to turn properly. It completely shatters suspension of disbelief and reduces your mental image of "Top Gun with 40k fighters" to "hey, if I take lots of Vendettas I win".

And this problem is entirely caused by scale issues. At Epic scale aircraft make sense, and function properly as fast units capable of delivering firepower anywhere on a huge battlefield (big enough that a tank can't shoot across the entire table). At 40k scale they're little more than standard vehicles that only get hit on 6s.

ClockworkZion wrote:

daisho wrote:
The rules are "ok", they could be really good if they would only make a core rule book and all army books at once - but GWS always makes new books choices stronger than before just for the sake of selling more stuff thus bringing inbalance _on purpose_, which is really the biggest downside of 40k.

Extra Credits sums up intentional imbalance as a game design technique well: http://www.penny-arcade.com/patv/episode/perfect-imbalance

For thise who didn't spend the 5 minutes watching it, basically the idea is to keep things just a bit off balance to keep the game from ever going stale.

As someone who's loves Extra Credit, I'd like to point out that you've missed a very important part of the video, IE the second half of it. For perfect imbalance to work, It still requires a professional, well made rules set and a mobile, player determined meta. Warhammer has none of these. What's better in each codex or edition is obvious, there are swaths of completely non-viable units, and the meta is very static that only really changes when a new codex or editions comes out (and even then it can be a dud).

I can understand the idea behind it, but the system is no where near it and it's not an excuse for poor game mechanics.

 Peregrine wrote:

xruslanx wrote:
First you claim that GW are trying to make players play larger games in order to sell more models. While this was true, there are two problems with this argument - the first is that troops have gotten way better with successful rulesets. You can happily taken bucket loads of Eldar Guardians or Imperial guard squads, as well as existing ranges in general being more effective than the newcomers.

No, you're just missing the point here. GW promoting bigger games to sell models isn't necessarily about selling new models, selling lots of old models is also good. If you're taking "bucket loads" of troops (probably because GW dropped the per-model point cost) then you're doing exactly what GW wants.

So how does that relate to the ruleset? If you want to make another thread advocating that GW shouldn't be making money, take it to another thread.

Evidence has been stated. Let's review:

* Weapon ranges that are way too short for 28mm scale (tank guns at 72" are laughably wrong, for example) so that range actually matters for gameplay purposes.

* Flyer movement speeds that are way too slow (should be off-table air strikes instead, but GW needs to sell models).

* Army sizes that get too crowded on a standard 6x4 table and reduce movement options to "move into range and roll dice".

* Entire classes of units that shouldn't be present in a 28mm game (heavy artillery tanks that should be miles away, aircraft that can't plausibly fly in a 6x4 box, etc), with an expansion (Apocalypse) that adds even more classes.

And that's just some obvious easy ones. GW's design process for 40k has been taking the core mechanics of a 28mm skirmish game and bolting on rules to handle all the cool Epic-scale models.

Oh okay. Basically you're annoyed at GW making cinematic or heroic models rather than anything that would actually be on a futuristic battlefield.

But this is simply your personal taste for pragmatism over white is quite obviously a more cinematic experience. Were you one of those people who hated Star Wars because the stormtroopers are such bad shots, by any chance?

I'm also not a fan of a ruleset requiring as many FAQ's and Errata's as 40K. The rules and codexes should probably be out for more than 24 hours before an Errata is posted, hmmmm?

xruslanx wrote:
So how does that relate to the ruleset? If you want to make another thread advocating that GW shouldn't be making money, take it to another thread.

It relates to the ruleset because GW is pushing larger games while refusing to adapt the rules to those larger games. There's nothing wrong with making money by selling lots of models, but it's a problem when you're doing it with a ruleset that was designed for small skirmish games.

Oh okay. Basically you're annoyed at GW making cinematic or heroic models rather than anything that would actually be on a futuristic battlefield.

Sorry, but a Basilisk is not cinematic or heroic. A Vendetta being the ultimate dogfighter while the Thunderbolt gathers dust on my display shelf is not cinematic or heroic. Genetically-engineered super soliders that would fail the basic marksmanship test in a real-world army are not cinematic or heroic.

If anything, units like artillery/flyers/etc make the game less cinematic because it takes the focus away from the heroes. Instead of having an epic duel between the heroic sergeants and their squads (a proper 28mm skirmish game) the hero dies on turn 1 because the Basilisk is the ultimate sniper rifle.

But this is simply your personal taste for pragmatism over white is quite obviously a more cinematic experience.

No, it's GW utterly failing to provide a cinematic experience. For example, instead of the awesome cinematic experience of a "real" airstrike or dogfight we get Vendettas leisurely floating around the battlefield and optimizing how many TL lascannon shots you can get into a list. GW has somehow managed to make rules that are a clumsy mess while simultaneously failing to capture the "cinematic" events of the fluff.

Were you one of those people who hated Star Wars because the stormtroopers are such bad shots, by any chance?

No, because I understand that the main character can't die in the opening seconds of the fight if you want to have a story. Too bad we get the exact opposite in 40k, the hero is a worse shot than the average real-world conscript and gets sniped by an artillery tank that shouldn't even be on the same battlefield.

Oh, and go watch the Star Wars dogfights and compare that to what you get in 40k. Once you've done that come back and try to tell me that 40k's rules are cinematic.

 AegisGrimm wrote:
I'm also not a fan of a ruleset requiring as many FAQ's and Errata's as 40K. The rules and codexes should probably be out for more than 24 hours before an Errata is posted, hmmmm?

So after a codex has gone to the printer's, they shouldn't even bother looking at it or playtesting it? I get that people don't like the mistakes in rulebooks but complaining about day 1 fixes to some of the worst ones seems hypocritical.

I personally believe that itmis the best ruleset since RT. It is the reason why I came back to WH40K after a 12 year hiatus.

xruslanx wrote:

You seem to have made several apparently unconnected points.

First you claim that GW are trying to make players play larger games in order to sell more models. While this was true, there are two problems with this argument - the first is that troops have gotten way better with successful rulesets. You can happily taken bucket loads of Eldar Guardians or Imperial guard squads, as well as existing ranges in general being more effective than the newcomers. Tau do not need riptides to stomp face, and eldar do not need their MC. Dark Angels don't need any of their new stuff, and any flyer that's not a helldrake or vendetta is useless. Surely all of these new units must be uber powerful in order to justify charging a shed load of money for a pay-to-win system? Instead new codex releases have actually made existing armies, in some cases, way better. Anyone who plays Iron Hands got a laughably powerful free upgrade, and about 200 extra points to boot. Yes games are getting bigger and yes, GW is making money because people need to buy more kits. But so what? Points value is *entirely* down to you, and if you feel like your battles are getting too large then scale down in point value. For this reason, it is an invalid argument against the validity of gw's ruleset.

Second, you claim that 40k is basically epic rules to the wrong scale. While I don't doubt this, you haven't supplied any evidence for why this is the case.

Fail to see how they're unconnected, seeing as we're talking about 40k as a game/rule set, and you can't quite divorce their sale policy from the rules, as I explained. But I'll elaborate for you.

I was making a point about the rules wanting larger games to push sales. This makes sense regardless of the power level of a unit, because everyone would just need more of whatever unit is good, and not necessarily new. The points value may be dependent on me and my opponent, but the point is that the rules are designed to accommodate increasingly larger games. I can assure you that a version of 40k explicitly designed for 1000pts or less games would look very different, and likely play much better, as it would better represent an appropriate 28mm skirmish game.

The point your making about the new units is all fine and dandy; none of us have to buy them, and not all them are powerful. But many of them are. And they do sell. Sure, Tau can work without Triptides, but they work significantly better with them. I do hope you admit that some of those units are blatantly better and a product of poor rule design and bad balancing. This argument would work if it weren't for the fact that most of the new Chaos kits (barring the Heldrake, of course) are awful rules-wise. But I'm not arguing that point, nor did I even allude to it. My point was simply that the rules are being designed for increasingly larger games.

The second point you brought up is mostly incorrect.

Epic is a 6mm game. That scale is significantly different from 15mm, which is significantly different from 28mm.

Think of it this way.

Using space marines as an example, a proper 28mm skirmish game would be a squad or two, with a vehicle, maybe a dread, and a low level officer, like a Librarian. A 15mm game would be company level battles using marines, so about 10 squads plus support, in a larger game. A 6mm game would be chapter level. Most of the 10 companies could be present in a reasonable 6mm game. Now, this is a rough idea, but I hope it illustrates the general scale.

Now, the evidence shouldn't need to be explicitly stated, and I'm assuming you haven't played a 15mm or a 6mm wargame, otherwise you'd probably understand without going into detail.

Basically, shrink everything down, but keep all the movement and ranges mostly the same. Vehicles would move faster, but not much. Now what you have is a force that takes up a lot less of the table, with more terrain (and small hills too, for that extra real feel), and ranges where you feel like your tanks will actually outrange your infantry most of the time. Its hard to explain without a bunch of pictures or a demo, but the ranges of 40k would make a lot more sense if it were 15mm...but even, not really.

Now, I find it funny you claim my criticism of GW's/40k's expected point values is not valid. Again, I could play smaller games, certainly, but the game is inherently designed to play from skirmish (kill team, 40k with some mods at 200-400pts) to near apocalypse with 2500pts dual force org madness. The rule set tries to do both ends and everything in between, and because of it, fails to adequately make any point value feel like a proper gaming experience - compared to other tighter rulesets.

Also, everything Peregrine said before me.

Also also, I'd like to hear you try and prove that 40k is actually a *good* if not *great* wargame, from a rules only perspective.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

xruslanx wrote:

 AegisGrimm wrote:
I'm also not a fan of a ruleset requiring as many FAQ's and Errata's as 40K. The rules and codexes should probably be out for more than 24 hours before an Errata is posted, hmmmm?

So after a codex has gone to the printer's, they shouldn't even bother looking at it or playtesting it? I get that people don't like the mistakes in rulebooks but complaining about day 1 fixes to some of the worst ones seems hypocritical.

A day 1 fix means that it wasn't properly reviewed or play tested or really anything.

Do you sincerely not see that as being a sign of very poor quality?

xruslanx wrote:
So after a codex has gone to the printer's, they shouldn't even bother looking at it or playtesting it? I get that people don't like the mistakes in rulebooks but complaining about day 1 fixes to some of the worst ones seems hypocritical.

The point is these things should have been caught earlier, but GW doesn't playtest properly. Obviously if you catch a mistake between printing the book and putting it up for sale you release a day-1 fix, but it feels like GW is doing it because their standard publishing method is to throw some garbage together and FAQ it later if people complain enough.

And we're not talking about small issues here. The community found things like Tau missile drones or C:SM command squad special weapons within a few minutes of reading the codex. Everyone who read the book immediately thought "hey, missile drone spam!" or "WTF you killed my plasma spam command squad!!!", so the fact that these issues made it to print suggests that GW never took the basic playtesting step of asking someone who wasn't involved with the design process to read the book and try to build an army.

I like 6th edition. I've been playing this game since RT days, and I can say this is my preferred version. The balance between shooting and assaulting is far better than in previous editions where it was heavily skewed one way or the other.

Rogue Trader was an unplayable mess, but it established the ground rules, such as the To Hit and To Wound tables.

2nd edition is probably the real start to the game as we know it today. But it had its share of issues, and the game took freakin' forever to play, thanks to old Overwatch rules and a horde of modifiers to account for. I also hated having to lug around a box full of psychic cards, wargear cards, vehicle data faxes, and other cards in addition to the rule books and codex. 2nd edition was too focused on shooting, and assault was largely non-existent.

3rd edition was a major overhaul, and greatly streamlined the game, but unfortunately, it sacrificed too much of the complexity, and focused waaaay too much on the assault phase. It seemed that 3rd edition is where the various armies finally started to play a bit differently from each other, as some armies such as Orks and Nids were purely assault, while others were hybrids. We also got new races, which was nice. Unfortunately, there wasn't a lot of variety in most army builds.

4th wasn't a big update from 3rd to me. It was more of a slight tweak, almost 3.5 instead of a true 4th edition. That just so happened to be when life interfered and I went on a long hiatus.

I got back into the game almost exactly when 6th edition was released, so I have no opnion on the 5th edition rules.

Now, on to what I like about 6th edition. I like that some of the 2nd edition complexity is creeping back in without sacrificing the speed of play that 3rd edition introduced. I love that each of the new 6th edition armies have become really focused on a particular style and each army plays much differently from the next, and most of them have a number of different builds. I like that I only have to carry a small rule book and a codex with my army, instead of several decks of cards, multiple books, and my army. I like that ICs don't dominate the game, and that troops are actually useful.

I'm NOT a big fan of the vehicle rules at all. Tanks that have to stand still to fire all of their weapons (even though their movement is about brisk-walking speed) are just ridiculous, especially when you consider relentless infantry such as Centurions can fire 2 weapons while walking. Walkers are so far outclassed by MC, it ridiculous. A dreadnaught should be able to go toe-to-toe with a MC, but it can't by a long shot. Hulls points are bad, plain and simple. Transport capacity is a bit off on a few of the vehicles, such as the Landraider (3 times the size of a Rhino, same capacity).

 Peregrine wrote:
And we're not talking about small issues here. The community found things like Tau missile drones or C:SM command squad special weapons within a few minutes of reading the codex. Everyone who read the book immediately thought "hey, missile drone spam!" or "WTF you killed my plasma spam command squad!!!", so the fact that these issues made it to print suggests that GW never took the basic playtesting step of asking someone who wasn't involved with the design process to read the book and try to build an army.

Similar issue with the almost immediate errata of Look Out Sir!... It took the gaming community 3 and a half minutes to notice that the rules as published allowed for more or less the same 5th ed wound-spreading shenanigans that the 6th ed mixed-unit wound allocation rules were supposed to have eliminated. That's most definitely something that should have been picked up in playtestting prior to the release of 6th edition.

If you're changing a core mechanic immediately after release, something has gone seriously awry in the studio.

 insaniak wrote:
Similar issue with the almost immediate errata of Look Out Sir!... It took the gaming community 3 and a half minutes to notice that the rules as published allowed for more or less the same 5th ed wound-spreading shenanigans that the 6th ed mixed-unit wound allocation rules were supposed to have eliminated. That's most definitely something that should have been picked up in playtestting prior to the release of 6th edition.

Honestly that example is even worse. With Tau missile drones and C:SM command squad special weapons it was just a typo (and in the case of the missile drones, only in some versions of the codex), so the most likely explanation is that everyone knew how the rule was supposed to work and just failed to spot the typo in the final copy before it was sent off to the printers. It's an unfortunate mistake that should be avoided by having final playtesters that aren't involved in the design team and don't have the "I know how this works" blind spot, but at least the designers had the right idea.

With LOS, on the other hand, you have one of the big new mechanics of the new edition and it hasn't been playtested enough for anyone to realize that it's utterly broken. It wasn't just an unfortunate typo, the entire design team managed to look at the LOS rules and say "yep, this is a pretty good idea". And that's just laughably unprofessional work.

xruslanx wrote:
So after a codex has gone to the printer's, they shouldn't even bother looking at it or playtesting it? I get that people don't like the mistakes in rulebooks but complaining about day 1 fixes to some of the worst ones seems hypocritical.

Its amazing that you can turn around the release of a half-finished, non-proofread product, and imply its a positive thing. Fancy working for a politician by any chance?
I think they should have looked at it, and playtested it before it went to the printers, rather than doing it as an afterthought. Simply put, they have been shown to have released a product for sale that is essentially a half finished work, which amply demonstrates GW's 'dont give a damn, why bother' approach to their rules.

the point is such glaring errors should never have gotten through in the first place.

its called 'quality control'. and its an extremely poor showing from GW.

I like the ruleset, and I gotta agree with the guy who said it on the first page whose name escapes me, that the reason I like the ruleset is because it lets me use my WH40k models. I could theoretically use a different ruleset for my models, but it just wouldn't be the same. To me, it'd be like playing a game of 40k with large plastic green army men as Sisters of Battle instead of representative models. I'll admit the ruleset could be a lot more precise and work a lot better, but the rules aren't why I play WH40k in the first place. I play it because I like the fluff, I like the models, and beyond that, I really can't explain it.

It reminds me of that time when I had read up on how unfair GW and Chessex dice are, and went to a local gaming store to order some straight-edged dice that would roll fairly. The owner talked me out of ordering them, because if I was concerned enough about the fairness of the dice to make me order new dice, I probably shouldn't be playing 40k at all, because the poorly balanced rules have more of an impact on game fairness than the bad dice. So I bought a couple of Chessex dice sets, because one of them was purple and the other was shiny. : D

 Luke_Prowler wrote:

ClockworkZion wrote:

daisho wrote:
The rules are "ok", they could be really good if they would only make a core rule book and all army books at once - but GWS always makes new books choices stronger than before just for the sake of selling more stuff thus bringing inbalance _on purpose_, which is really the biggest downside of 40k.

Extra Credits sums up intentional imbalance as a game design technique well: http://www.penny-arcade.com/patv/episode/perfect-imbalance

For thise who didn't spend the 5 minutes watching it, basically the idea is to keep things just a bit off balance to keep the game from ever going stale.

As someone who's loves Extra Credit, I'd like to point out that you've missed a very important part of the video, IE the second half of it. For perfect imbalance to work, It still requires a professional, well made rules set and a mobile, player determined meta. Warhammer has none of these. What's better in each codex or edition is obvious, there are swaths of completely non-viable units, and the meta is very static that only really changes when a new codex or editions comes out (and even then it can be a dud).

I can understand the idea behind it, but the system is no where near it and it's not an excuse for poor game mechanics.

As I made a comment earlier, MtG also has a imperfectly balanced system that settles into static patterns, they can shift the meta quicker than GW can though thanks to the shorter turn around time for people to adopt new cards vs build and paint models.

I'm not saying GW is right or wrong writing the game the way they do, I was just offering what I feel is the best explanation for why things are done the way they do. I believe GW intentionally tries to shake the game up a little bit ever new release to keep things interesting and to promote people to change their armies a bit and so on so they fit this model of game design even if the shifts are done slower and less often than they are in video games.

Any rule system that says "if their is a problem, dice off for it!" is suspect to me.

The Dark Angels codex was the biggest pile of unedited crap I have ever seen from GW. The digital release was FULL of errors, including half a page taken directly from the Warhammer Fantasy Vampire Counts army book that was used as a place holder for the actual fluff. There were massive amounts of typographical errors, layout issues, and even missing rules entries! All these were eventually fixed in a series of patches, but when I pay GW's prices for the digital edition, it should have been edited.

The paper edition of the DA Codex wasn't much better. GW messed up the Veteran Squad so badly that they had to errata the entire unit entry in a FAQ. They gave rules to vehicles that couldn't use them- Missile Lock, and Strafing Run to the Nephilim Fighter, and then there is the Plasma Talon with it's two different wargear entries... Another good one- none of the HQ units have Bolt Pistols/Guns, and they didn't have the option to purchase one either. GW gave the DA the Banner of Devistation- and then didn't bother to define what a bolter was until the FAQ came out. They had to FAQ that one 2, 3 times I think? It's not as good as you would think now. How about a vehicle that gives Shrouded to everything within 6"... except the vehicle itself? All of the Command Squads have been errated for options- because GW simply cut and pasted text that made no sense at all for the entries themselves (like only 3 bikes for a Ravenwing Command Squad and no special weapons). Oh, and finally, what about Seraphicus? You know, that special character in Dark Vengeance that apparently wasn't special enough to be included in the Codex?

The Dark Angels Codex shows that GW does not proofread or edit any codex before it's printed/shipped. It took most DA players less then 15 minutes to point out the Bolt Pistol issue, the Vampire Counts fluff, and the Plasma Talons. This book turned me off from GW and 6th Edition in general more than anything else. I can't believe I dropped over $150 on the limited edition and digital codex. It's a very pretty book though... and like so many GW products, that's what's important.

Do I enjoy the GW rule set? Only when I don't care about winning a game and how much myself and my opponent screw up the rules because they make to sense. I still have to reread the wound allocation section before every game and try to puzzle out the FAQ about it. I just can't for the life of me understand that rule.

Good things: Pre-measuring, Snap Fire, Hull Points (but not the way GW did it; great rule, just poor implementation)
Bad Things: Random charge ranges, True LoS (the most abused rule ever), the way MC's, area terrain and cover saves work (my little toe/appendage/pseudopod is touching that terrain, so I get a 5+ cover, but not your tank...), wound allocation (don't get me started on that one), Psychic Powers in general (when I'm paying over 100+ points for a Psyker, why is it random which power he gets?).

I suppose I enjoy the ruleset in as much as it allows me to field the cool Games Workshop miniatures with my friends. They take a bit of getting used to and I've tried to introduce them to other wargamers who generally prefer to go back to the game they were playing.

There are broken things that make no sense, sure, that's apparent with every game we'll ever play. However there are things inherently wrong and/or redundant with the 40k rules that really make you wonder if anyone bothered reading them. Coupled with the very odd release schedule they come up with for their supplements, I can only wonder if they plan to keep doing it this way.

I've played historical campaigns using rules that forced you to keep track of the amount of coal burnt per ship per fleet per day and I found that less confusing than 40k. /shrug

4th: hated it, very boring, very unbalanced... actually kinda sat out this edition and just collected/painted... worked on War@Sea collection

5th: Good, some wonky rules, a little too mechanized but still fun... necrons and GK at the end was unbalanced and SM had to watch everyone else get Marines +1, but other than that, not too bad

6th: Like it. A lot. But, GW needs to make all walkers MC or all walkers vehicles not this weird some are, some aren't. I would also like to see some of the new restrictions on assaults go away... but that's about it. I do know that at the tournament level the newest codices have dominated (TauDar), but I think this is more a symptom of being in the middle of the update/rebalance process and less of unbalanced armies.

Genuinely curious at the OP: have you ever tried playing any other game before? Because playing other games would more often than not make you realize that tight rules and fluffiness/coolness of the rules can coexist in harmony, like rainbows and unicorns.

I like it becasue it is better than all of the other table top games I play. kings of war, infinity warmachine/hoardes all rubbish. Nothing quite provides the variety, fluff, competitive games, tactics and lovely models that 40k does for me. Especially FW 40k.

 heartserenade wrote:
Genuinely curious at the OP: have you ever tried playing any other game before? Because playing other games would more often than not make you realize that tight rules and fluffiness/coolness of the rules can coexist in harmony, like rainbows and unicorns.

Most other wargames have mediocre to terrible fluff relative to GW's products, certainly nowhere near as developed.

Of course I'm one of those people who's mainly in it for the background.

I like the hobby and lore more than the gameplay, because it is extremely unbalanced. If I was in TTGs for gameplay I'd play a different TTG! I think it has a much better story than a lot of other TTGs but gameplay could be much better. Maybe I'm just butthurt because of how much the rules destroy my armies but it still stands.

 darthnatus wrote:
I like the hobby and lore more than the gameplay, because it is extremely unbalanced. If I was in TTGs for gameplay I'd play a different TTG! I think it has a much better story than a lot of other TTGs but gameplay could be much better. Maybe I'm just butthurt because of how much the rules destroy my armies but it still stands.

Worry not my young apprentice. Soon our vengeance shall be unleashed, terrible and raw. And all who once mocked us shall weep.

 heartserenade wrote:
Genuinely curious at the OP: have you ever tried playing any other game before?

No I haven't tried other TTGs. I also haven't had sex with non-humans, that doesn't mean I'm going to question whether or not I actually enjoy having sex with humans. See my point?

Stop telling other people that their version of "fun" is wrong. Does it annoy you that I enjoy 40k? Does it annoy you that far more people enjoy it than hate it?

 Kain wrote:

 darthnatus wrote:
I like the hobby and lore more than the gameplay, because it is extremely unbalanced. If I was in TTGs for gameplay I'd play a different TTG! I think it has a much better story than a lot of other TTGs but gameplay could be much better. Maybe I'm just butthurt because of how much the rules destroy my armies but it still stands.

Worry not my young apprentice. Soon our vengeance shall be unleashed, terrible and raw. And all who once mocked us shall weep.

FOR THE SWARM SKREEEEEE!!!!
XD I wouldn't be surprised if 'Nids and/or Blood Angels started getting called OP again after their updates and hopefully 6th will last longer because the ruleset is MUCH better than 5th except for how taking models off the board works. feth YOU GAMES WORKSHOP I WILL TAKE OFF WHOEVER I WANT NOT WHO YOU TELL ME TO... then my friends yell at me and I pretend I don't know that rule.