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Hello,

I'm putting the following propositions under your scrutiny:

- Long distance aiming :
Weapons with 72+ range suffer -2 to hit penalty when the target is at over 48 the distance. This penalty applies in any and all case, regardless of special rules, stratagems, psychic powers etc.
Weapons with 48+ range suffer -2 to hit penalty when the target is at over 36 the distance. This penalty applies in any and all case, regardless of special rules, stratagems, psychic powers etc.
Weapons with 36 range suffer -1 to hit penalty when the target is at over 24 the distance. This penalty applies in any and all case, regardless of special rules, stratagems, psychic powers etc.
Weapons with 24 range suffer -1 to hit penalty when the target is at over 18 the distance. This penalty applies in any and all case, regardless of special rules, stratagems, psychic powers etc.

- Avoid fire :
during the shooting phase, when a unit is targeted for shooting purposes, it can choose to avoid fire. The units uses its move characteristic as if it were the movement phase for that unit ; the unit that wants to shoot cannot cancel its action, and will only hit the targeted unit on 6+, regardless of any other special rules or stratagem. It cannot shoot any other unit after during this turn. If it shot twice or more at the same target, the same penalty apply to the hit roll for every shot.
During the following regular movement phase, the unit that avoided fire cannot move, but it can charge.

- Return fire :
instead of avoiding fire, units targeted during the shooting phase can fire back after being shot at, and before resolving their wounds losses, if they didn’t shoot before during this turn. They can only do it once per turn, and doing so disables them from shooting again during this turn, except during overwatch.

- Too tough for you :
weapons without an AP characteristic suffer -1 to each of their wound rolls against T6+ targets (ie a weapon without AP and with a dmg characteristic of 1 makes 0 damage. A weapon with a dmg characteristic superior to 1 makes that damage -1).

Thanks !

Siegfriedfr wrote:
Hello,

I'm putting the following propositions under your scrutiny:

It would be great if you explained what problems you are trying to solve and how your proposed rules fix those, what I'm looking for in rules changes is different from what you are looking for so if you don't post what you want I can only judge the changes from how well I believe they will achieve my ends.

⯈ Max Shooting distance capped at ½ or 2/3 of the board

So 24" or 36"? That seems very low, it's already kind of weird that some weapons have as little range as they do.

⯈ No more « have no line of sight and can hit you » shooters, except for artillery-type weapons

That's kind of unfair to the armies that don't get artillery, why shouldn't a faction be able to achieve with superior technology something that Astra Militarum can do with tech that looks a lot like 19th-century technology?

⯈ Point values removed. Power rating remains (maybe with more granularity)

Absolutely terrible idea, one of the worst things 40k can do is encourage people to break their models if they assemble them in a way that isn't optimized for the game and by removing any incentive to not maximize the damage output of the guns by introducing the option of optimizing the points-efficiency then you're ensuring more models will get broken which is why I hate this idea.

⯈ « Primaris marines » as a distinct unit from « regular marines » gone, they are just new models to replace marines

Completely unfair from a balance perspective to allow both kinds of models to fill the same role, completely unfair from a hobby perspective to expect people to replace their entire collection.

⯈ Pruning of unsupported units
⯈ Pruning of redundant units

Incredibly subjective, some units are redundant, but I also think it's cool when armies use more than 6 datasheets.

⯈ Battle phases order changed, and turn players alternate not turns but phases :
• Deploy (place) armies
• Psychic phase (armies alternate)
• Shooting phase (armies alternate)
• Movement phase (armies alternate)
• Charge phase (units alternate)
• Fighting phase (units alternate)
• Morale phase

I don't think you've explained how this works very well, do I get to shoot all my units before my opponent has?

Siegfriedfr wrote:
⯈ Max Shooting distance capped at ½ or 2/3 of the board

Why?

⯈ No more « have no line of sight and can hit you » shooters, except for artillery-type weapons

Why?

⯈ Point values removed. Power rating remains (maybe with more granularity)

We already have an option to play this way.

⯈ « Primaris marines » as a distinct unit from « regular marines » gone, they are just new models to replace marines

Not all units have a Primaris replacement. Not all players want to use Primaris units.

⯈ Pruning of unsupported units

That's what legends just did.

⯈ Pruning of redundant units

Why invalidate existing models and armies?

⯈ Battle phases order changed, and turn players alternate not turns but phases :
• Deploy (place) armies
• Psychic phase (armies alternate)
• Shooting phase (armies alternate)
• Movement phase (armies alternate)
• Charge phase (units alternate)
• Fighting phase (units alternate)
• Morale phase

This works better for smaller skirmish scale games than it does for games that can feature 300+ models in dozens of units.

You need to give more details about why you want to make these changes. Then the next step is to detail your changes and what you expect them to do to the game. Then you need to look at how this changes the balance of literally every unit in the game and detail your fixes to make this work.

In short, your scope is way too large for your lack of any details.

Siegfriedfr wrote:
Hello,

I'm putting the following propositions under your scrutiny:

⯈ Max Shooting distance capped at ½ or 2/3 of the board

do you mean length, width or diagonal? I would agree on reducing the range of all weapons a bit to make the board feel bigger, but an earthshaker (currently 240" range, I believe) suddenly dropping to 36" or so isn't ideal. In response to the theme, yes to reducing weapon ranges a bit.

⯈ No more « have no line of sight and can hit you » shooters, except for artillery-type weapons

Agree. there's n oreason for every army to have every trick. guard artillery should be special, in some way.

⯈ Point values removed. Power rating remains (maybe with more granularity)

Nope. Power level is grossly warped and terrible. 10 nobs with choppas = 10 nobs with powerklaws, under power level. PL exists for casual games, if you want granularity, use points. However, hey should go back to how they used to be - all the points on the unit's page, with weapons included! it shouldn't need an app (or half an hour to spare) to accurately work out the points!

⯈ « Primaris marines » as a distinct unit from « regular marines » gone, they are just new models to replace marines

I'd prefer them to simple have a different codex, maybe a fluff-advancement where they exist to replace oldmarines, leading to oldmarine rebel factions which are loyal to the emprah but hunted by the primaris.

⯈ Pruning of unsupported units
⯈ Pruning of redundant units

I would prefer a revamp of these instead, so that they can be used again. More options > less options. if you only leave the best units, the game stagnates.

⯈ Battle phases order changed, and turn players alternate not turns but phases :
• Deploy (place) armies
• Psychic phase (armies alternate)
• Shooting phase (armies alternate)
• Movement phase (armies alternate)
• Charge phase (units alternate)
• Fighting phase (units alternate)
• Morale phase

Thanks !

There's always been a huge, huge issue with alternating phases, and that is that the shooting army moves away in their movement as the chargey army moves forward, net result is no charge. Shooing armies will dominate even more than they do now.
However, if you implement:
1: Charges go before movement, but include movement distance (EG move + charge in one go) and before the enemy can run away.
2: Shooting imposes limitation on movement (ALA old rules, rapidfire at full range stops you moving)

Then it could work. You can shoot, or move away, but not both. Run if you want, but it will cost you.

Thanks for your answers.
I dont mind harsh criticism, im here for that.
We re trying to set New rules for the local non-competitive scene
Here is an updated version :

Goals :

- greatly reduce turn 1 boardclearing advantage for shooty lineups
- removes the terrible feeling of having brought a model that is immediately destroyed turn 1 without having done nothing
- slightly reduce amount of dice rolls

⯈ Shooting distance capped at 36 for all units (ie all units with a shooting distance > 36 are reduced to 36) – To force movement and positioning of all units, reduce backline of shooters across the board
⯈ All rules allowing some units to shoot without line of sight are removed
⯈ Can shoot a unit if you see a model, but can only kill the model you see. Cannot kill models that are not in line of sight.
⯈ Wings (mechanical or biological) do not count for « seeing » a model


⯈ Complete Pruning of stratagems, no exceptions
⯈ Complete Pruning of Feel No Pain mechanics and dice rolls
⯈ Character protection extended to all HQ up to 12 wounds


⯈ Battle phases :

• Deploy (place) armies (no change)
• Psychic phase (players alternate unit per unit)
• Movement phase (players 1 moves all their army, then player 2 moves all their army)
• Shooting phase (players alternate unit per unit)

New rule :

« Last shot » : if a model that didn’t shoot this turn, suffers enough wounds during the shooting phase to be removed from the board, it can immediately shoot one of its weapon at any target in sight and at proper range, as if it had full wounds, before being removed from the board.

• Charge+Fighting phase combined (players alternate unit per unit)

New rules :

A charge is immediately followed by a fight
Overwatch mechanic removed
Morale check removed

Siegfriedfr wrote:
⯈ All rules allowing some units to shoot without line of sight are removed

Should be extended to Psychic powers and powers of the C'tan to make it more even, possibly also to charges so you cannot fight or charge things you cannot see.

⯈ Wings (mechanical or biological) do not count for « seeing » a model

Should include banners and spears.

⯈ Complete Pruning of Feel No Pain mechanics and dice rolls

Needs to be replaced with other rules or be accompanied by fair pts reductions to make it more balanced.

« Last shot » : if a model that didn’t shoot this turn, suffers enough wounds during the shooting phase to be removed from the board, it can immediately shoot one of its weapon at any target in sight and at proper range, as if it had full wounds, before being removed from the board.

Should be all or nothing, it's not fair that one platform with one weapon gets to shoot all its (1) weapons, while another gets to shoot a quarter (1) of its weapons. The Gauss Pylon and the Obelisk are good examples, the Obelisk is already worse and it has 4 weapons compared to the 1 of the Gauss Pylon, this rule would further widen the power imbalance between these units. I get that resolving the 5 weapons of a Repulsor Executioner takes time, but this rule is unfair.

Morale check removed

I know the Ork players don't like it when people claim something is going to cause a horde meta, but this is going to cause a horde meta. It's also unfun for the few factions that rely on this mechanic. Some kind of negative effect could apply to models with negative leadership penalties to not punish factions like Night Lords. If nobody uses hordes or armies like Night Lords then it wouldn't be too bad.

Siegfriedfr wrote:
Hello,

I'm putting the following propositions under your scrutiny:

⯈ Max Shooting distance capped at ½ or 2/3 of the board
⯈ No more « have no line of sight and can hit you » shooters, except for artillery-type weapons
⯈ Point values removed. Power rating remains (maybe with more granularity)
⯈ « Primaris marines » as a distinct unit from « regular marines » gone, they are just new models to replace marines
⯈ Pruning of unsupported units
⯈ Pruning of redundant units

⯈ Battle phases order changed, and turn players alternate not turns but phases :
• Deploy (place) armies
• Psychic phase (armies alternate)
• Shooting phase (armies alternate)
• Movement phase (armies alternate)
• Charge phase (units alternate)
• Fighting phase (units alternate)
• Morale phase

Thanks !

1. Absolutely not
2. There's not a lot of non-artillery that does this. What are the problem units that you're making this statement for?
3. Power Level with actual granularity is points. Power Level is stupid so keep that in mind.
4. I'd be all for that, but it requires looking at CSM, Grey Knights, Deathwatch, and Space Wolves.
First 5 and 6, most people on this forum know I'm all for consolidation and getting rid of units that don't NEED an entry. I'd happily share that list to you later.

For alternating activation, most people on the forum said to look at either how Killteam does it or how Apocalypse does it. I haven't played Killteam but looking at the rules it fixes a LOT of issues. Apocalypse was more balanced when I played but the turn order thing was a bit odd.

I'm going to be parroting a lot of other posters, but...

Siegfriedfr wrote:
Hello,

I'm putting the following propositions under your scrutiny:

⯈ Max Shooting distance capped at ½ or 2/3 of the board

I think this could be interesting with some clarifications/adjustments. A simple -1 to hit for all weapons firing beyond, let's say, 30" could be an interesting way to take some of the edge off of gunline alphastrikes. It would be a penalty that would go away once the enemy army starts to close the gap, so you'd be at full power for most of the game; you'd just be a little worse at bullying things way across the table.

I'm not so sure about cutting off shooting completely after a point though. As others have pointed out, the fluff on already strangely short-ranged weapons would be felt even more, plus you'd be shrinking the design space a bit. One of the advantages of something like a night spinner is that it can engage at a large enough range to force enemies to move into position rather than plinking away at it downfield.

⯈ No more « have no line of sight and can hit you » shooters, except for artillery-type weapons

Eh. Is this really a problem in the modern game? I feel like cadian mortars and reapers with tempest launchers aren't really shaping the meta. Again, this would be shrinking the design space of the game. I don't see the benefit of this, and implementing this change would suddenly make many weapons significantly less desirable thus threatening to weaken them compared to other options.

⯈ Point values removed. Power rating remains (maybe with more granularity)

What would be the benefit of this? Considering we already have the option to play with PL instead of points, what is the advantage of removing the option to use points?

⯈ « Primaris marines » as a distinct unit from « regular marines » gone, they are just new models to replace marines

That's how I would have liked them to handle the primaris models, but I think the genie is out of the bottle on this one. We've got multiple rulebooks and novels hanging neon signs over the introduction of primaris marines, and their introduction is one of the biggest pieces of fluff introduced since they started moving the story forward. It would take a battlebarge-sized retcon to undo all that at this point. Personally, I'm kind of hoping they just sort of... merge normal marines and primaris together going forward so that they functionally become the same unit. That, or make all mini-marines into the grizzled "veterans" with better WS, BS, and weapon options. "Yeah, I'm short, but I've been killing orks for a hundred years longer than you have, kid."

⯈ Pruning of unsupported units

Is this not what legends is?

⯈ Pruning of redundant units

Eh.There's room for a little of this, mostly where marines are concerned. I'm sorry, space wolves, but long fangs don't really need to be different from devastators. However, I think a certain amount of redundancy is fine. If vanguard vets and reivers are both filling the "deepstriking melee" role, there isn't a ton of harm in letting people decide which rule nuances and models they prefer to use when filling that role. The biggest downside I see is that a lot of that redundancy is found in marines. Whose releases sort of choke out space that could be used by other factions. Craftworlders lost their collective gak over the 2nd edition Jain Zar model finally getting updated. How many primaris lieutenants have come out since 8th edition started?

⯈ Battle phases order changed, and turn players alternate not turns but phases :
• Deploy (place) armies
• Psychic phase (armies alternate)
• Shooting phase (armies alternate)
• Movement phase (armies alternate)
• Charge phase (units alternate)
• Fighting phase (units alternate)
• Morale phase

Thanks !

Nah. AA is a good idea, but this specific iteration would run into a lot of problems. Swing a cat plushie around this forum. You'll hit a couple dozen threads discussing AA in detail.

Updated :

- Players alternate their turns during each phase

- During each phase, Alternative actions based on a « token drawn from the bag » system

- Stratagem activation is capped at 1 per phase per player. All « offensive » stratagems (ie the ones you activate during your own turn) removed,. Only « reactive » (ie the ones you activate during the opponent’s turn) stratagems remain.

- LoS requirement to target a unit is removed and replaced by :
Infantry : -1 hit when any part of the base of a model is hidden by any neutral object on the board.
For vehicles/monsters, the rule is that not only must be part of the base hiddden, the terrain feature must be higher than the model itself. Flags, banners do not count. Weapons count.

Siegfriedfr wrote:
Updated :

- Players alternate their turns during each phase

- During each phase, Alternative actions based on a « token drawn from the bag » system

- Stratagem activation is capped at 1 per phase per player. All « offensive » stratagems (ie the ones you activate during your own turn) removed,. Only « reactive » (ie the ones you activate during the opponent’s turn) stratagems remain.

- LoS requirement to target a unit is removed and replaced by :
Infantry : -1 hit when any part of the base of a model is hidden by any neutral object on the board.
For vehicles/monsters, the rule is that not only must be part of the base hiddden, the terrain feature must be higher than the model itself. Flags, banners do not count. Weapons count.

You may as well design a new game with the alternate activation and stratagem changes.

Siegfriedfr wrote:


- Players alternate their turns during each phase

- During each phase, Alternative actions based on a « token drawn from the bag » system

Wouldn't the token bag system make alternating turns pointless? Assuming you mean that players put a number of colored tokens into a bag each phase equal to the number of units they control, draw tokens out one at a time, and the player whose color is drawn gets to activate a unit of their choice.

If that is what you mean by the "token drawn from the bag" system, I don't think i'm a fan. For one thing, you're going to add a fair bit of slowdown to the game by tracking the number of tokens you need and drawing them. Keep in mind that you'd be refilling the bag six times per game round (once for each phase). If your goal is to prevent alpha striking and let players go back and forth more often, this method isn't guaranteed to do that. on average, there will be more back and forth, but unlucky draws will happen. You might be reducing the current problems, but you're not solving them, and you are creating new ones.

Ideally, I think I'd like to see a system for creating "fire teams", collections of several units worth about X% of your army, that activate together. But that's a topic for another thread.

- Stratagem activation is capped at 1 per phase per player. All « offensive » stratagems (ie the ones you activate during your own turn) removed,. Only « reactive » (ie the ones you activate during the opponent’s turn) stratagems remain.

Sincere question: are you aware that there are defensive stratagems used during your own turn? For instance, harlequins have one strat that lets them increase their durability if they suffer losses to overwatch and another one that lets them impose a -1 to hit penalty for a phase (useful both in your own fight phase and in your opponent's shooting and fight phases).

I feel like your goal with this change is to prevent people from stacking multiple offensive strats (like orks shooting twice and triggering DDD! on 5+ instead of just 6+). This change would do t hat, but it would also create a lot of casualties. For starters, you'll pick one or two offensive and defensive strats and then forget that every other stratagem you have access to exists because they're not as good as your first and second picks. Any army or gimmick that relies on multiple strats to work (regardless of whether those armies and gimmicks are competitive) will cease to work. Units and wargear that depend on a strat to be useful or fill a niche (torment grenade launchers come to mind) would become non-viable.

So again, this is a sweeping solution that might solve one problem but creates more.

- LoS requirement to target a unit is removed and replaced by :
Infantry : -1 hit when any part of the base of a model is hidden by any neutral object on the board.
For vehicles/monsters, the rule is that not only must be part of the base hiddden, the terrain feature must be higher than the model itself. Flags, banners do not count. Weapons count.

So a single guardsman with his foot behind a barrel grants his entire unit a -1 to being hit? Cutting the number of ork htis in half and reducing the number of tau (bs4+) hits by 33%? Also, how does this work with models that don't have bases (like most non-flying vehicles)? I don't think I like the idea of a guard gunline that's constantly at a -1 to hit because they hid their tail lights behind a shrub.

I'm not entirely sure what you're going for with this one, but it seems problematic.

I like the LOS rule, A similar (more detailed) variant is in Urban Conquest. I play with that rule whenever I can, even if I don't like a lot of the other rules in that book.