Forum adverts like this one are shown to any user who is not logged in. Join us by filling out a tiny 3 field form and you will get your own, free, dakka user account which gives a good range of benefits to you: No adverts like this in the forums anymore. Times and dates in your local timezone. Full tracking of what you have read so you can skip to your first unread post, easily see what has changed since you last logged in, and easily see what is new at a glance. Email notifications for threads you want to watch closely. Being a part of the oldest wargaming community on the net. If you are already a member then feel free to login now.

As there seems to be an escalation in everything else, how would people feel about the option of using blast templates instead of rolling d3s or d6s? Or the choice to use either on a tactical level, by which I mean choosing which you want to use when they are used.

If you are shooting at a single model, roll the d3 or the d6.

If you are shooting at a swarm or there is the possibility of hitting multiple units, or scattering onto separate units, go for the temp!ates.

For this to work, I'd suggest eliminating the blast rule, and using the 7th edition scatter rules.

As for the flamer template? Again either\or with the choice yours to make tactically. If they are a single model or outside the 8" range of the template, roll the dice. Otherwise? Template.

I'd hate to go back to blasts/templates to be honest, never liked those mechanics and I'm glad they're gone.

I'd like a buff to flamer weapons though.

As a Tyranid player I would hate to see templates brought back... I do not miss having to leave 2" between each of my 100 Gaunts. No templates, no scatter and no guess range weapons speeds the game up.

If I recall corectly there used to be a fun combo in the old Chaos codex where you could take a flamer relic and another thingy that let you stick your flamer template on the end of 12". Was tons of fun. I miss those days.

You could play 30k!

 Hairesy wrote:
If I recall corectly there used to be a fun combo in the old Chaos codex where you could take a flamer relic and another thingy that let you stick your flamer template on the end of 12". Was tons of fun. I miss those days.

Ah, the torrent rules! Didn't realize there used to be a special template for it.

But yeah, agree with everyone else. Templates slowed the game down by punishing a lack of meticulous model spacing and occasionally caused arguments over scatter. The random shots mechanic is pretty meh (works okay for blasts vs hordes) and doesn't feel terribly appropriate for flamers, but bringing back templates probably isn't the answer.

 AnomanderRake wrote:
You could play 30k!

Oh, silly! One does not play 30K, one merely collects very expensive display pieces! Haha!

I doubt GW will ever bring back templates, but I could see them tweaking blast to be better. The simplest change they could make is:

- Make blast work on every D3 or D6 dice. Then nerf 6 - 10 model blast on D3 weapons to minimum 2 shots. This means a 4D3 weapon would have minimum 8 shots against a unit with 6 - 10 models rather than not benefitting from the rule at all.

- Alternatively they could also reduce the models which trigger blast. It could change to 5 - 10 models. Which would definitely help against factions that spam 5 model MSU units.

I infinitely prefer templates. Yes, they were clunky and a little slower than just chucking tons of dice around, but they were much more fun. Nowadays all the things that used to be templates just feel so much weaker. Plus you get the dumbness that is flamers being used against flyers...

Yes, you should be punished for clumping your dudes up. If you're playing a huge horde of orks, just accept that either you take the time to space them out OR that you'll lose more dudes to templates. That is kinda the point.

That said, the slowness of unit cohesion could be fixed if unit cohesion was changed from daisy chaining each dude to be within 2" of at least 1 other member of the unit and instead each unit has a single designated unit commander that all the other members had to stay within some arbitrary distance of. IE: One Ork would be the leader, say the Nob if you have one or a boy with a flag, and as long as all the other boys were within 6" of him they were good. Then you wouldn't have to be so exact and it would be quicker to move your guys around and you could actually space them out a lot more since they could be more than 2" from each other.

The current system has actually made these types of weapons worse against the stuff they used to be good against and better against stuff they shouldn't. Blast weapons used to be bad against single targets, or at least losing their full potential. but now they gain a bunch of potential against a single target, while also losing much of their effectiveness against large hordes. Flamers especially are pretty garbage. It doesn't make sense that a flamer can get as few as 2 hits when there is a massive blob of orks right in front of the guy using it, but could also get 10+ hits vs a single Warboss in a different situation.

I just feel like it broke a key element of immersion in the game in the name of dumbing it down so that it is faster. When really its not scattering a template that is taking sooo long, it was the ork player having to measure between 100+ ork boys to make sure they're all within 2" of each other. Just making simpler cohesion rules would have sped the game up way more without getting rid of something that was cool.

Jarms48 wrote:I doubt GW will ever bring back templates, but I could see them tweaking blast to be better. The simplest change they could make is:

- Make blast work on every D3 or D6 dice. Then nerf 6 - 10 model blast on D3 weapons to minimum 2 shots. This means a 4D3 weapon would have minimum 8 shots against a unit with 6 - 10 models rather than not benefitting from the rule at all.

- Alternatively they could also reduce the models which trigger blast. It could change to 5 - 10 models. Which would definitely help against factions that spam 5 model MSU units.

Making it work against units of 5+ models gets kind of tedious on its own though as you then have an incentive to spend extra time figuring out optimal fire solutions that guarantee a higher number of attacks the first time you shoot at each of your opponent's units.

My pitch that no one ever likes: Have anti-horde "template" weapons (blasts, flamers, etc.) get more shots based on the size of the enemy unit. Not a higher minimum number of attacks like the current blast rules; higher total shots. So a flamer might do something like 3 shots vs units of 1-5 and 6 shots vs units of 6+ models. Maybe a frag missile/grenade gets 2 shots for every 5 models in the enemy unit to a max of X. Whatever the exact numbers, the idea is that you have more shots against larger squads and thus you have a higher average and maximum damage output against such units while still having a chance to whiff entirely if the dice turn against you (representing blasts scattering way off course even against larger clumps of enemies).

Grey Templar wrote:
Yes, you should be punished for clumping your dudes up. If you're playing a huge horde of orks, just accept that either you take the time to space them out OR that you'll lose more dudes to templates. That is kinda the point.

Not a personal attack: do you play orks? I don't, but I remember my ork player pal being really frustrated that he had to choose between wasting time spreading out his dudes or being punished for not wasting time. Plus, the melee rules make you clump your dudes up tight if they want to actually swing attacks in close combat. So he often found himself being punished for getting his ork boyz into melee because the aftermath left him clumped up to get barbequed.

Also, I'd argue that forcing people to space their models actually isn't the point of such weapons. I think the idea is that such weapons are meant to be good against units of greater size; not that they're supposed to punish people for clumping models together. Or, if I'm mistaken and they are meant to punish clumping, I'd argue that's annoying and detracts from the game experience.

That said, the slowness of unit cohesion could be fixed if unit cohesion was changed from daisy chaining each dude to be within 2" of at least 1 other member of the unit and instead each unit has a single designated unit commander that all the other members had to stay within some arbitrary distance of. IE: One Ork would be the leader, say the Nob if you have one or a boy with a flag, and as long as all the other boys were within 6" of him they were good. Then you wouldn't have to be so exact and it would be quicker to move your guys around and you could actually space them out a lot more since they could be more than 2" from each other.

It's a neat idea, though you'd have to add to it to make it work. Like, does a squad with 5 models in it (still) benefit from the leader's 6" cohesion bubble? Could you spread two or three models out across a 12"+ diameter to score objectives on opposite sides of the table at once? And if the range shrinks at some point, how does that interact with cohesion tests?

The current system has actually made these types of weapons worse against the stuff they used to be good against and better against stuff they shouldn't. Blast weapons used to be bad against single targets, or at least losing their full potential. but now they gain a bunch of potential against a single target, while also losing much of their effectiveness against large hordes. Flamers especially are pretty garbage. It doesn't make sense that a flamer can get as few as 2 hits when there is a massive blob of orks right in front of the guy using it, but could also get 10+ hits vs a single Warboss in a different situation

Largely agree with you here. That's why I kind of like my "more models = more shots" approach. I can kind of squint and understand a flamer getting multiple hits versus single model targets. Basically blasting the warboss with a sustained stream of prometheum rather than sweeping the weapon around to splash a wider area. The difference between spray a bunch of dudes with one quick sweep of a garden hose versus spraying a single dude with a garden hose for several seconds.

I just feel like it broke a key element of immersion in the game in the name of dumbing it down so that it is faster. When really its not scattering a template that is taking sooo long, it was the ork player having to measure between 100+ ork boys to make sure they're all within 2" of each other. Just making simpler cohesion rules would have sped the game up way more without getting rid of something that was cool.

To me, scattering a template didn't take much time. The bigger issue with scatter mechanics was that they could lead to disagreements. My group is pretty cordial, but there were definitely times where I didn't completely agree with my opponent's take on where the scatter should have landed but didn't want to waste energy challenging it. And the bigger issue than that is, again, that it punishes people for wanting to play orks (hordes) instead of marines (small squads).

An alternative cohesion system could help, but even a 6" radius is still going to be pretty crowded for a squad of 30 boyz. Conspicuously template-shaped too. Which is weirdly courteous of the boyz to put themselves in perfect formation to get blasted. Also weird that it would force some boyz to stay further away from the fight in the back. Plus, whatever amount of cohesion you give them, they're still going to be punished for not meticulously spreading their dudes out as much as possible. If spacing out carefully means that I only take 4 casualties instead of 8, then I'm going to feel punished for not taking the time to space out precisely. It's not fun to watch someone take time to measure like that. It's not fun to be punished for not measuring. It's not especially "cinematic" to see ork boyz in perfectly spaced formations due to the existence of templates.

Basically, I'm open to ideas, but it sounds like we'd be reintroducing a lot of negatives just to have the rewarding visceral feeling of catching a bunch of dudes with a template. Which is a valid upside, to be clear. I just don't think it's worth slowdown and bad feels that come from being on the receiving end.

We play with miniatures in a tactical game
It's just, I want it to feel more TACTICAL.

Positioning should matter.

And a WMH esque CMD mechanic would be a decent idea too.

No to templates. Too imprecise, too argument prone, resulted in too much of a timesink encouraging players to partake in behavior that wasn't value-added (theres nothing "TACTICAL" about spending 5 minutes per movement phase making sure all of your minis are precisely 2" separated from all of your other minis), are based on false assumptions and premises about how explosive weaponry actually function, etc. They still exist in GWs other (Specialist) games, but are thankfully gone from the flagship games.

The current system is broken however, there are numerous ways that it can be changed to fix the issues it currently has while adding back in some of the supposed "tactical" flavor that people feel is missing.

 Grey Templar wrote:


Yes, you should be punished for clumping your dudes up. If you're playing a huge horde of orks, just accept that either you take the time to space them out OR that you'll lose more dudes to templates. That is kinda the point.

If that is the point it isn't a good one, because it mostly just punishes the other player as he waits for the orc player to space everything out perfectly.

chaos0xomega wrote:
there are numerous ways that it can be changed to fix the issues it currently has while adding back in some of the supposed "tactical" flavor that people feel is missing.

May I ask how?
I have seen some weapon profiles that have 'bleed-over' rules, that other units within 3" get hit too.
But it is the exception, not the norm.
And just as subject to abuse as templates.

I don't like templates but I also don't like random shots/damage. Just make the weapon a set amount of shots with a bonus if the enemy unit is over a certain amount of models.

They're nostalgic, but I do not want to go back to them. They caused way too many arguments. The current rules for flamers and Blast weapons are clean and unlike their predecessors, do not require multiple pages of rules to explain how they work.

Grail Seeker wrote:

 Grey Templar wrote:


Yes, you should be punished for clumping your dudes up. If you're playing a huge horde of orks, just accept that either you take the time to space them out OR that you'll lose more dudes to templates. That is kinda the point.

If that is the point it isn't a good one, because it mostly just punishes the other player as he waits for the orc player to space everything out perfectly.

Well in a competitive environment that is why chess clocks are a thing. Ork player can waste his time spacing dudes out if he wants, but he's gonna lose automatically if he wastes too much time.

Yes, I played orks in the past. I just accepted my fate as far as templates went and spaced my dudes out probably within 1" of each other instead of the max 2 to save time.

And making these weapons do more hits vs larger units is just as clunky. Because then you'll have to sit there and count if that unit of ork boys has 19 models left or 20 models left. You'd have to recount each time they got shot at.

I have seen people try to throw down in the parking lot over how many models were under a template so I doubt that mechanic is coming back. I find it far more fiddly than simply counting the amount of guys left in a squad, which doesn't leave any room for interpretation or arguments and speeds up gameplay.

 carldooley wrote:

chaos0xomega wrote:
there are numerous ways that it can be changed to fix the issues it currently has while adding back in some of the supposed "tactical" flavor that people feel is missing.

May I ask how?
I have seen some weapon profiles that have 'bleed-over' rules, that other units within 3" get hit too.
But it is the exception, not the norm.
And just as subject to abuse as templates.

Thats not nearly as abusable, ensuring that there is a space between models in two different units is a much speedier process than ensuring every model on the board is properly spaced from every other model on the board - which is what the situation was with templates. Other than that its a fairly objective standard - this unit is effected because it is in range and therefore suffers a precise number of attacks/hits from this weapon as determined by the roll of a dice. Theres no room to argue "you moved the template while you were holding it, theres no way that guy is underneath it" or "its because you're looking at the template from a weird angle that makes it look like this guy is underneath it, but that model isn't actually there", etc.

But yeah, thats the gist of it at the most basic level, to cause "bleed over" to adjacent units, you can play with it in various ways (I wrote pages worth of different ways you can address it in another thread) to achieve all sorts of different results and balance considerations, some weapons could bleed further than others or cause more/less damage to units it bleeds to, etc. Here are some examples from the aforementioned thread, these would literally just be a rule in the weapon abilities section of the weapons profile:

"Each unit within 6" of the target unit suffers 2 hits from this weapon."

"This weapon does d3 hits to the nearest unit within d6" of the target unit."

"If the target unit has 6 models or less, this weapon does d3-1 attacks to the closest unit within 2" of the target unit."

"If the target unit has 10 models or fewer, make d6 additional attacks against the 2 closest units within 6". If the target unit has between 11 and 20 models, make d6 additional attacks against the closest unit within 3". (to be used with a modified "Blast" rule that says you add an extra d6 or whatever for every 10 models in the target unit above 10 (i.e. +1D6 for 11-20 models in target unit, +2D6 for 21-30 models, etc.) - the goal with this is to make it so that you would deal a consistent 3d6 attacks regardless of the size or number of units to address one specific scenario that one specific person was very bothered by)

"Each time an attack made with this weapon targets a unit with 10 models or less, make an additional attack using this weapon profile against the 3 closest units within 4" of the target unit."

You can include a clause that at least half the models in the adjacent unit need to be within whatever distance of the target unit in order for that unit to be hit, or a clause that says they cannot take more than half as many hits (rounding down) as the target unit in order to limit the impact, or borrow a page from warmachine and say that the blast is reduced to half strength for units other than the target unit


If you wanted to go deeper you could also adopt a "formation" or "posture" system, where each unit has to set a formation in the movement phase (tight, loose, standard, etc. - you can get more complex and do things like line, echelon, column, wedge, etc. as well but for the purposes of this discussion its not relevant). Being in tight formation would come with a benefit (example - the unit is immune to attrition, or gets a reroll to morale tests, or a +1 bonus to hit with ranged weapons, etc.) but come with the detriment of doubling the effects of blast damage, whereas being in a loose formation would come with a detriment (example - the unit suffers double attrition, or -1 leadership, or a -1 bonus to hit in melee, etc.) but comes with the advantage of halving the effects of blast damage, etc. The formation would be noted with a marker, rather than dependent on the precise placement of your minis (its an abstract game, theres no value added in forcing players to physically spread or contract the placement of their models, that actually causes more problems than it solves if you do require that, etc.).

Toofast wrote:
I have seen people try to throw down in the parking lot over how many models were under a template so I doubt that mechanic is coming back. I find it far more fiddly than simply counting the amount of guys left in a squad, which doesn't leave any room for interpretation or arguments and speeds up gameplay.

That is a problem with the players, not the game mechanics.

 Grey Templar wrote:

Toofast wrote:
I have seen people try to throw down in the parking lot over how many models were under a template so I doubt that mechanic is coming back. I find it far more fiddly than simply counting the amount of guys left in a squad, which doesn't leave any room for interpretation or arguments and speeds up gameplay.

That is a problem with the players, not the game mechanics.

Game Design 101: "Don't blame players for behaviors encouraged by the mechanics".

 Grey Templar wrote:

Grail Seeker wrote:

 Grey Templar wrote:


Yes, you should be punished for clumping your dudes up. If you're playing a huge horde of orks, just accept that either you take the time to space them out OR that you'll lose more dudes to templates. That is kinda the point.

If that is the point it isn't a good one, because it mostly just punishes the other player as he waits for the orc player to space everything out perfectly.

Well in a competitive environment that is why chess clocks are a thing. Ork player can waste his time spacing dudes out if he wants, but he's gonna lose automatically if he wastes too much time.

Yes, I played orks in the past. I just accepted my fate as far as templates went and spaced my dudes out probably within 1" of each other instead of the max 2 to save time.

And making these weapons do more hits vs larger units is just as clunky. Because then you'll have to sit there and count if that unit of ork boys has 19 models left or 20 models left. You'd have to recount each time they got shot at.

So because you accepted that you were too lazy to space out your Orks we should bring Templates back?

 Grey Templar wrote:

Toofast wrote:
I have seen people try to throw down in the parking lot over how many models were under a template so I doubt that mechanic is coming back. I find it far more fiddly than simply counting the amount of guys left in a squad, which doesn't leave any room for interpretation or arguments and speeds up gameplay.

That is a problem with the players, not the game mechanics.

The same players don't have that argument with the new blast rules so maybe the mechanic had something to do with it. A mechanic with room for interpretation is always going to cause more friction between opponents than a cut-and-dried mechanic.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

EviscerationPlague wrote:
you were too lazy to space out your Orks

I think it's more likely he was trying not to lose to the clock or be a bad sport to his opponent by spending several minutes each movement phase making sure 100 ork boys are exactly 2" from each other, but whatever makes you feel better...

I also didn't bother to space my dudes out to the maximum extent possible, but I did so acknowledging that making that conscious choice and decision (on the basis that its a game of toy soldiers and the level of tedium that doing so entailed was detrimental to my enjoyment of actual gameplay) meant that I was playing at an inherent disadvantage relative to the majority of my opponents and made me that much less likely to win as a result.

But thats not a justification for templates, rather thats a condemnation of them - any mechanic which doesn't serve to add value to a players time playing the game should probably be eliminated. In this case, its hard to say that spending minutes measuring out precise 2" intervals is adding any value to anything at all. This is doubly true when said mechanic is an essential component to successful high-level play.

A lot of complaints about templates bogging the game down. Hard to see how hitting more models at once was slowing things down, but alright. I used to run Plas Cannon Devs in Las/Plas RBs and those games did not take any longer than normal or expected. Was fun throwing globs of death around actually. I mean, if you can't just SEE two inches and place your dudes I don't know what to say. Take a job in carpentry or something and get to know how to read a tape.

edit: To which I should add, if your buddy is placing their Orks and you're hovering with a tape to make sure they're all exactly 2" apart, you probably should be taken outside and hit with a Ghazkull in a gym sock.

 Hairesy wrote:
A lot of complaints about templates bogging the game down. Hard to see how hitting more models at once was slowing things down, but alright.

You don't see how placing a template, scattering the template, then arguing with your opponent about how many models are under said template is slower than counting to 14?

Toofast wrote:

 Hairesy wrote:
A lot of complaints about templates bogging the game down. Hard to see how hitting more models at once was slowing things down, but alright.

You don't see how placing a template, scattering the template, then arguing with your opponent about how many models are under said template is slower than counting to 14?

Fair. I sometimes forget that I have much less patience for baloney than most people. If an opponent doesn't want to call it the way it ought to be called in a game, then I have no further interest in wasting my time. I'm here to enjoy rolly-dicey games and if people can't be good sports then that's their problem. I think if more game shops adopted this attitude, you'd have a lot less rules lawyers. Besides, we have all these 3d printers now, I want some cool looking templates!

Toofast wrote:

 Hairesy wrote:
A lot of complaints about templates bogging the game down. Hard to see how hitting more models at once was slowing things down, but alright.

You don't see how placing a template, scattering the template, then arguing with your opponent about how many models are under said template is slower than counting to 14?

Yes, its technically faster. That doesn't mean its better.

Out of all the reasons 40k games took so long, templates were really the least contributing factor. They could have done so many things instead of just getting rid of something that added a lot of flavor to the game instead of just further reducing it to chucking buckets of dice around.

They could have made it a rule that if a model isn't fully under a template or there is otherwise disagreement you roll a dice to determine if they get hit or not. They could have made blast template weapons not scatter at all kinda like 4th edition, place template, roll to hit like normal, if you hit you get those hits. If you miss you hit nothing. That would have been a nice compromise instead of just getting rid of them completely.

 Hairesy wrote:

 AnomanderRake wrote:
You could play 30k!

Oh, silly! One does not play 30K, one merely collects very expensive display pieces! Haha!

I mean, I'm floating around this forum listening to people who started playing 40k post-7th complaining about power creep, and complaining about homogenization of damage, and complaining about the relationship of balance to the faction release schedule, and complaining about morale not mattering, and complaining about the mission design, and complaining about how vehicles die too fast, and complaining about how loyalist SM get all the attention and nobody else gets anything, and speculating about a return to templates and vehicle facings, and I'm just sitting here thinking "yeah, maybe not all the changes GW made going into 8th were good ideas, if only there was a version of 7e with fixed army books...wait a minute!"

(Though playing 30k wouldn't help a whole lot with scale creep. I hear Predator squadrons are going up to 1-5 in the next version.)

 Grey Templar wrote:

Toofast wrote:

 Hairesy wrote:
A lot of complaints about templates bogging the game down. Hard to see how hitting more models at once was slowing things down, but alright.

You don't see how placing a template, scattering the template, then arguing with your opponent about how many models are under said template is slower than counting to 14?

Yes, its technically faster. That doesn't mean its better.

Out of all the reasons 40k games took so long, templates were really the least contributing factor. They could have done so many things instead of just getting rid of something that added a lot of flavor to the game instead of just further reducing it to chucking buckets of dice around.

They could have made it a rule that if a model isn't fully under a template or there is otherwise disagreement you roll a dice to determine if they get hit or not. They could have made blast template weapons not scatter at all kinda like 4th edition, place template, roll to hit like normal, if you hit you get those hits. If you miss you hit nothing. That would have been a nice compromise instead of just getting rid of them completely.

That's not a bad idea, just skip the scatter dice, if you miss it's because it scattered. I'd go a step further and just say place the template, that's how many hits you get, roll that many to hit dice. If you miss, it's because it scattered. Miss a little, miss a lot, whatever.

Flamer templates need to come back though. There was something satisfying about just putting down autohits with that funny template. Especially with Torrent rules. Flamer dude on a bike with Torrent was peak 40K.