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So... in order to play my unit of Rangers in this world where they have written: "Appear Unbidden: this unit has DEEP STRIKE", I would have to crack open another book just to read that blurb?

Blandness was only one facet of why they went away from USRs. USRs are great... after years of playing and having the time to integrate all of those things into your head. Otherwise, you're flipping to a unit sheet in the codex, then pulling out the BRB and flipping to that sheet, and then reading your opponent's codex to see how your rules interact with his rules... and then calling in a lawyer and English professor to argue over the tense and meaning and contractual obligations of...

You know...

Typical game in 7th edition.

I would never want to go back to USRs, having the full spread of unit abilities printed on my unit directly, while it may still have wording problems, at least cuts out SOME of the constant back-n-forth of USRs printed up in some other manual.

About the only thing that is really disappointing me with 8th right now is the lack of terrain rules and how bland it is: is it +1 armor or -LoS? But that can be easily fixed with homerules, sorry tourney players. Still, nothing in the game that says tournament organizers cannot houserule their terrain, a la ITC. So... really... why do we need 9th now? Just to have to buy more books? All the GW haters sure are empowering GW to rake you for more cash on disposable books (the ONLY part of your army that doesn't survive edition-to-edition).

Why would you have to open another book to read a USR? I havent seen anyone pro USRs say they must be handled stupidly like GW does it. You could still have the full rule on the datasheet. Have a summary of all USRs in both the core book and each codex. Only place you wouldnt have the full ruling would be in summary/reference pages that are only listing the models stats and the name of their rules.

Reason most people want USRs isnt to make the datasheets smaller but to set a standard and make the game clearer. If it works like "Deep Strike" it should probably have the USR "Deep Strike" so its easy to communicate with your opponent what it does. Hiding the rules would hinder what we most want out of USRs.

 Dysartes wrote:
If we did go back to having USRs - and it is something I'd agree with - I think two things would need to happen to improve the usability.

A, Any USRs used within an article or book are reprinted in full in the book.
B, A reference sheet of the full set of USRs is available as a download.

Realistically, a list In a rule book or play document would be enough. Free would be great. One of the reasons to have them in a seperate book, is so you can have them open alongside your army rules.
But the idea for USRs is that everyone is learning them to some degree, so they are quick reference if needed but are just something learned overtime. Like other rules in a rule book.

Of corse, this requires GW to write well. One of there big issues is a consistent horrible mess.

But take striking scorpions above. The unit can have its rules, infantry. Eldar. Everyone knows what armour means, when it’s not written on the sheet. Or even in the codex.
And it also has deep strike.
You give an exarch power strike from the shadows. This allows the exarch and there unit to be placed in combat when they Deep Strike.
Flavour both in game and in the rules usage.
Not that complicated on there own. And should be easy to pick up for most 40k players.

But now you give a seer a power, could use conceal or other spell like name. When cast place a unit within 12 inch into reserve.
3 layers of complexity that should be fairly easy to players to get.
And is very Eldar, and has special interaction with the scorpion unit.
For the opponents seeing scorpions, they only need to know that they can be put into combat via Deep strike, and a seer can put them back into deep strike range.

Purifying Tempest wrote:
So... in order to play my unit of Rangers in this world where they have written: "Appear Unbidden: this unit has DEEP STRIKE", I would have to crack open another book just to read that blurb?

You do realize that you do need to now? It's in multiple FAQs, and written out many times with minor variations.

Purifying Tempest wrote:
So... in order to play my unit of Rangers in this world where they have written: "Appear Unbidden: this unit has DEEP STRIKE", I would have to crack open another book just to read that blurb?

Blandness was only one facet of why they went away from USRs. USRs are great... after years of playing and having the time to integrate all of those things into your head. Otherwise, you're flipping to a unit sheet in the codex, then pulling out the BRB and flipping to that sheet, and then reading your opponent's codex to see how your rules interact with his rules... and then calling in a lawyer and English professor to argue over the tense and meaning and contractual obligations of...

You know...

Typical game in 7th edition.

I would never want to go back to USRs, having the full spread of unit abilities printed on my unit directly, while it may still have wording problems, at least cuts out SOME of the constant back-n-forth of USRs printed up in some other manual.

About the only thing that is really disappointing me with 8th right now is the lack of terrain rules and how bland it is: is it +1 armor or -LoS? But that can be easily fixed with homerules, sorry tourney players. Still, nothing in the game that says tournament organizers cannot houserule their terrain, a la ITC. So... really... why do we need 9th now? Just to have to buy more books? All the GW haters sure are empowering GW to rake you for more cash on disposable books (the ONLY part of your army that doesn't survive edition-to-edition).

This honestly sounds mostly like 8th anyway, or GW still sucks at rules so much that they make something simple to complicated for there players. Anyone that can handle 8th, should be able to handle USRs done to a competent level.
We can teach 8 year olds this stuff without much issue in other games.

Paying money is fine for a quality product as well, it’s just not something coming out of GW now in any way for 40k

Also, years of playing to learn rules is a bit worrying. I not sure I have encounter a modern rule set that is complicated enough that it should take years to learn. No one will be perfect, but learning the basics of two dozen USRs should not be that hard for you over a few weeks.

The other note is that if you have a smaller corpus of more common USRs (Deep Strike, FNP, etc), it's easier to keep track of. It only takes a game or two to know what Deep Strike does. You can consult the book (ideally any of the books that reference it should have it), but you'll probably only need to once every couple dozen games - even when using it.

If you have hundreds of USRs, though, you'll never remember many of them. And it'll be hard to find the right one.

It's a balancing act.

Bharring wrote:
The other note is that if you have a smaller corpus of more common USRs (Deep Strike, FNP, etc), it's easier to keep track of. It only takes a game or two to know what Deep Strike does. You can consult the book (ideally any of the books that reference it should have it), but you'll probably only need to once every couple dozen games - even when using it.

If you have hundreds of USRs, though, you'll never remember many of them. And it'll be hard to find the right one.

It's a balancing act.

GW has just handle them so bad for the last few editions that it has ad a lot to the mental burden, but even now players do not realise how many rules they probably remember. A well written rule set does wonders for mental retention.

It also serves as quick hand for telling a player what a unit does during a game. It’s building blocks, you use USRs so you can have more unique rules, not less.

Personally, 8th edition is fine. We don't need a 9th. 8th is more of a living game system that updates as we go along and that's fine. If I had to suggest any updates or changes they would simply be:

1. Make terrain usable again. At the moment terrain is almost pointless.

2. Update every army equally, not just focusing on space marines.

Otherwise the game is perfectly fine in my opinion.

 BlackLobster wrote:
Personally, 8th edition is fine. We don't need a 9th. 8th is more of a living game system that updates as we go along and that's fine.

If so, they should still publish a new version of the core rulebook (edition 8.1, 8.2, etc.) every three years or so. It's annoying to have the rules spread between several books, FAQs and erratas.

Also maybe make points costs available for free, in a printable document that gets updated every year. When they correct a unit's points cost and only publish it in Chapter Approved, they are essentially making us pay for their poor calibration of the unit.

.

Putting aside the structure of the rules, the basic problem with 8th edition's gameplay is that compared to prior editions, it plays less like a tabletop wargame and more like Magic: The Gathering, due to:

- A focus on combos, buffs, and power-ups (auras, strategems, etc) that boost units to insane levels of capability.

- Bad terrain rules means everything can see and shoot everything else and nobody is slowed down by anything; scenery is basically just decorative and plays little real role in the average game.

- Existence of Imperial Knights makes everyone load up on anti-tank guns so that vehicles smaller than Knights generally stand no chance, ruining realistic take-all-comers combined-arms armies and encouraging rock-paper-scissors armies that chase the metagame.

- Excessive access to speed-boosting abilities (Advance, 2D6" charge ranges, charge-after-advancing rules, "move twice" strats) means that everything is fast so you can't really outmaneuver anything anymore, and there's no point in taking transport vehicles.

Unless they fix these problems at the root causes, nothing will really change.

-Guardsman- wrote:

 BlackLobster wrote:
Personally, 8th edition is fine. We don't need a 9th. 8th is more of a living game system that updates as we go along and that's fine.

If so, they should still publish a new version of the core rulebook (edition 8.1, 8.2, etc.) every three years or so. It's annoying to have the rules spread between several books, FAQs and erratas.

Also maybe make points costs available for free, in a printable document that gets updated every year. When they correct a unit's points cost and only publish it in Chapter Approved, they are essentially making us pay for their poor calibration of the unit.

.

I said something similar to my opponent at our club meet last week, although i was referring to points, I find that if I don't use Battlescribe I get lost as to what the current points values are. We've got the codex, any updating FAQ and an annual CA.

use USR's like MTG does.

just put DEEP STRIKE : this unit can blah blah blah... on the datasheet.
If you want a fluffy explanation of how the deepstriking is done exactly, just read the codex's unit description : Scarab occults emerge from a rift in reality to join the fight, Sicarian infiltrators hide unseen, etc.

Also add an appendix to the BRB and codex that describes the USRs if needed.

the datasheet doesn't need to have fluff in it since people that care about the fluff will actively look for the details on how a unit operates. The datasheet should only have the rules needed for the tabletop.

The main benefit from USR's is to get rid of abilities that "are the same but actually not really because someone copy pasted from memory".

How many abilities are : "your warlord/relic holder can reroll one x,y,z roll per game and some form of CP regeneration" but with slight variations.

Having Monitor malevolus be :

Once per battle, you can re-roll a single hit roll, wound roll, or damage roll made for your warlord. In addition, if your army is battle-forged, roll a d6 each time you or your opponent uses a stratagem. On a 6, you gain a command point,

and Labirinthine cunning be :

Roll a d6 each time you or your opponent spends a command point to use a stratagem. On a 6, you gain one command point.

is ridiculous in my opinion, it adds memory issues and opens up cheating possibilities (oh, sorry, i was playing monitor malevolus as if it was labirinthine cunning)

Pointed Stick wrote:
Putting aside the structure of the rules, the basic problem with 8th edition's gameplay is that compared to prior editions, it plays less like a tabletop wargame and more like Magic: The Gathering, due to:

- A focus on combos, buffs, and power-ups (auras, strategems, etc) that boost units to insane levels of capability.

- Bad terrain rules means everything can see and shoot everything else and nobody is slowed down by anything; scenery is basically just decorative and plays little real role in the average game.

- Existence of Imperial Knights makes everyone load up on anti-tank guns so that vehicles smaller than Knights generally stand no chance, ruining realistic take-all-comers combined-arms armies and encouraging rock-paper-scissors armies that chase the metagame.

- Excessive access to speed-boosting abilities (Advance, 2D6" charge ranges, charge-after-advancing rules, "move twice" strats) means that everything is fast so you can't really outmaneuver anything anymore, and there's no point in taking transport vehicles.

Unless they fix these problems at the root causes, nothing will really change.

Just to say a bit of a point. Saying it resembles MTG now, more than ever before is silly. It still only shares similarity’s in the most vague sense to card games.
The game can be bad on its own, and really I think if they take the time to study a game like magic it would probably help the dev team as a whole. The amount of effort that goes into every set is quite a lot, and they also talk about there failures and things they learn.
And a hell of a lot about balance.
Removing the combos, buffs and power ups in there entirety would probably be a mistake as well. It’s basically the bread and butter of some of the factions be design since 3rd. But has been taken to the extreme recently :(
Otherwise I do agree with what you point out as issues.

The knights I am still baffled it made it though design without someone bringing up that issue. These are payed professionals i am lead to beleave.

Gw and payed professional playtesters?

Are you having a laugh?

The real great issue with USR was twofold, and both are easily solvable.

1 - Rules nesting: Referencing rules in two-deep references. You had something like "Reign of terror (codex p89)" and then you flip to codex p89 and it would say "Reign of terror: This unit has the Implacable Conqueror and Relentless rules." and then you had to flip over the BRB to search for those two rules, meaning you just had to flip through one book to start flipping on another book.

Solution: Instead of nesting rules like that you must list out the full rules on a unit entry.

2 - Exceptions: Aforementioned nested rules changing the mechanic of said USR, i.e. "This unit has the Implacable Conqueror USR, but may consolidade 6'' instead of the normal" meaning that you are not really referencing a USR but making it your own.

Solution: Have gradings of USRs, as in "Implacable Conqueror I - Consolidade 3'', Implacable Conqueror II - Consolidate 6''." Meaning you can have a single rule that governs fodder models, veteran models and heroic models with different gradings of those rules.

Avoiding nesting rules and changes to USR are combating the two major issues, in my view, that bloated 7th edition, especially after you piled on nested, modified USR from formations, character bonuses and such.

Please make:

Allies between all factions legal, but there are penalties for unusual combinations like Custodes with Tyranids. Aeldari and Imperium should be trusted allies.

Your army must have a Primary Detachment from which the Warlord is chosen. Only Strategems for the Codex/Index of the Primary Detachment can be used. Having 32 Guardsmen in a Knight list no longer allows you to use Astra Militarum Strategems.

bibotot wrote:
Please make:

Allies between all factions legal, but there are penalties for unusual combinations like Custodes with Tyranids. Aeldari and Imperium should be trusted allies.

Your army must have a Primary Detachment from which the Warlord is chosen. Only Strategems for the Codex/Index of the Primary Detachment can be used. Having 32 Guardsmen in a Knight list no longer allows you to use Astra Militarum Strategems.

They should just do them as part of a narrative group of rules, with Some units put into a mercenary like group with points for them in the army’s that can take them. Knights should just get its own household guard and access to some of the IG vehicles.
Harlequins should have some of the craftworld tanks. Inquistors having access to space marines that make sense for there order, all supported within there own lists and pointing as such.

Pointed Stick wrote:
Putting aside the structure of the rules, the basic problem with 8th edition's gameplay is that compared to prior editions, it plays less like a tabletop wargame and more like Magic: The Gathering, due to:

- A focus on combos, buffs, and power-ups (auras, strategems, etc) that boost units to insane levels of capability.

- Bad terrain rules means everything can see and shoot everything else and nobody is slowed down by anything; scenery is basically just decorative and plays little real role in the average game.

- Existence of Imperial Knights makes everyone load up on anti-tank guns so that vehicles smaller than Knights generally stand no chance, ruining realistic take-all-comers combined-arms armies and encouraging rock-paper-scissors armies that chase the metagame.

- Excessive access to speed-boosting abilities (Advance, 2D6" charge ranges, charge-after-advancing rules, "move twice" strats) means that everything is fast so you can't really outmaneuver anything anymore, and there's no point in taking transport vehicles.

Unless they fix these problems at the root causes, nothing will really change.

I can't exalt this hard enough. It really is the hammer hitting the nail on the head.

40k has morphed into something that is unrecognisable as a wargame.

 stonehorse wrote:

I can't exalt this hard enough. It really is the hammer hitting the nail on the head.

40k has morphed into something that is unrecognisable as a wargame.

Thanks, I appreciate the kind words.

Here's a specificexample: In a recent game my opponent was looking worried about the huge blob of Orks across the table. "Don't worry, "Orks are slow." I reassured him. After all, they only have a 5" move, right?

LOL

- 5" move + 1" for being Evil sunz
- D6" advance +1" for being Evil Sunz
- Re-rollable 2D6" charge, +1" for being Evil Sunz, and I can charge after advancing from being near a Warboss who grants this aura buff

Wow, my Orks on foot are now regularly making 20-24" charges. Not so slow, huh?

It used to be that I needed a Trukk to pull this kind of long-range surprise attack. I would try to hide the Trukk behind LOS-blocking area terrain, and my opponent would try to maneuver his troops to shoot it or set up interlocking lines of fire so that it would be vulnerable once it moved out in the open. It was fun, and tactical. I felt good when I pulled it off, because it was tricky and effective.

Now I can't use a Trukk this way because the passengers can't charge after disembarking if it moves, and the Trukk is always visible now so it gets blasted off the table almost instantly. And even if these problem were fixed, there still wouldn't be any point since the Orks are already fast enough on foot now with Advance moves and charge-after-advancing and the 2D6 charge range and the Orks' re-roll charge buff and the ridiculous Evil Sunz movement buff. Nonsensically, they're faster on foot than in a transport vehicle! Also, a large footprint on the tabletop has no disadvantages because terrain no longer slows down infantry. So why not spread out and have more board control?

Just one example of how the game's core rules push people to do the same set of like 3 or 4 good tactics, making games static, boring, and predictable.

There is a lot I'd hope for in a 9th ed release but there are three things that would make/break the release for me:

1) Everything needs to be playable at launch. Even if I have to buy an index, I'm cool with that solution so long as my mini can hit the table

2) Alternating Activations. 40k has been the hallmark of all the problems with an IGOUGO system for years and even all its variant forms (kill team, apoc, etc) have started working on alternating activations of some form or the other. The game just involves too many models to keep the other player engaged while his opponent gets through a 20 minute turn. Its incredibly boring right now

3) A better system for rules updating. 8th ed is stuck between this older paper stack of books tradition and the newer digital system. Even if they just release a key for an (Up to date!) digital copy with the paper book or try that binder concept some other games did, something needs to be done. We want rules balancing, but having to shift through a bunch of documents to play is getting tedious

Some things that would put me over the top:

1) Drop specialist detachments and just go with this system we saw in SM 2.0 and is being teased in Psychich awkening. If I go classic faction, give me those bonuses, and if I go custom subfaction, give me a different set.

2) Figure out what deathwatch are now that SM2.0 has taken their breakfast.

3) A mercenary Xenos faction that could do Ork, Tau, Necron. C'mon - you know you want them

4) Abstracted line of sight. I really, really want to do away with this true line of sight nonense that creates problems for those of us who do conversions or don't want to bend down three fett to argue about a vehicle corner

5) PP-style conversion rules. I loved the PP 50% rule. If the model could be recognized for what it was and used at least 50% PP parts they would allow it. It was simple, good for players, and just worked.

5) PP-style conversion rules. I loved the PP 50% rule. If the model could be recognized for what it was and used at least 50% PP parts they would allow it. It was simple, good for players, and just worked. <quote from above, I tried I failed :(

When I look at 40k now, I often think it looks like a hoshposh of rule ideas found in war machine and hordes. Taken to an extreme and misunderstood a little. If you squint a little.

The command system kinda looks like how warcasters and warlocks sort of function and there army’s around them. Some other little things has made me wonder in recent years.
But it’s never really taken the ideas that would probably work very well for the game, a command system on a warlord. With a resource would probably play very well, and have served as a way to tone down but still make characters effect and interesting on the battlefield. >

Apple fox wrote:
5) PP-style conversion rules. I loved the PP 50% rule. If the model could be recognized for what it was and used at least 50% PP parts they would allow it. It was simple, good for players, and just worked. <quote from above, I tried I failed :(

When I look at 40k now, I often think it looks like a hoshposh of rule ideas found in war machine and hordes. Taken to an extreme and misunderstood a little. If you squint a little.

The command system kinda looks like how warcasters and warlocks sort of function and there army’s around them. Some other little things has made me wonder in recent years.
But it’s never really taken the ideas that would probably work very well for the game, a command system on a warlord. With a resource would probably play very well, and have served as a way to tone down but still make characters effect and interesting on the battlefield. >

Mostly agree; I keep seeing all the reasons I left WMH for 40k make the jump to 40k - and, often, becoming worse.

USRs are a bad idea as any adjustments affect multiple units across multiple books.

The more unique and bespoke stuff the better, even if it's very similar.

 Ishagu wrote:
USRs are a bad idea as any adjustments affect multiple units across multiple books.

The more unique and bespoke stuff the better, even if it's very similar.

On the other hand, you get stuff like KMB and Imperial Plasma getting hot in different ways, even though they should mechanically work the same.
There's no reason why KMB overheats on natural 1s and Imperial Plasma doesn't.

I wish termintors would cost no more then double the point cost of a primaris. That would be good.

 stonehorse wrote:

Pointed Stick wrote:
Putting aside the structure of the rules, the basic problem with 8th edition's gameplay is that compared to prior editions, it plays less like a tabletop wargame and more like Magic: The Gathering, due to:

- A focus on combos, buffs, and power-ups (auras, strategems, etc) that boost units to insane levels of capability.

- Bad terrain rules means everything can see and shoot everything else and nobody is slowed down by anything; scenery is basically just decorative and plays little real role in the average game.

- Existence of Imperial Knights makes everyone load up on anti-tank guns so that vehicles smaller than Knights generally stand no chance, ruining realistic take-all-comers combined-arms armies and encouraging rock-paper-scissors armies that chase the metagame.

- Excessive access to speed-boosting abilities (Advance, 2D6" charge ranges, charge-after-advancing rules, "move twice" strats) means that everything is fast so you can't really outmaneuver anything anymore, and there's no point in taking transport vehicles.

Unless they fix these problems at the root causes, nothing will really change.

I can't exalt this hard enough. It really is the hammer hitting the nail on the head.

40k has morphed into something that is unrecognisable as a wargame.

To add something very important overlooked, there is almost no penalties for anything anymore, were moving extra fast meant you couldn't shoot, or at least 50% less powerful when shooting, there used to be tactical options b.c of penalties, not i can move + advance + shoot + charge + fallback all in the same turn sometimes given special rules + stratagems.

 Ishagu wrote:
USRs are a bad idea as any adjustments affect multiple units across multiple books.

No, that's a good thing. It means fixing a problem once, not fiddling about fixing the same problems several dozen times.

The more unique and bespoke stuff the better, even if it's very similar.

Which... defeats the purpose. If its similar, it isn't even bespoke (how many different ways do you need to reroll 1s?) and definitely not unique. You're trading out any dubious advantage of having bespoke rules in first place to create additional problems for no reason.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

Apple fox wrote:
5) PP-style conversion rules. I loved the PP 50% rule. If the model could be recognized for what it was and used at least 50% PP parts they would allow it. It was simple, good for players, and just worked. <quote from above, I tried I failed :(

When I look at 40k now, I often think it looks like a hoshposh of rule ideas found in war machine and hordes. Taken to an extreme and misunderstood a little. If you squint a little.

The command system kinda looks like how warcasters and warlocks sort of function and there army’s around them. Some other little things has made me wonder in recent years.
But it’s never really taken the ideas that would probably work very well for the game, a command system on a warlord. With a resource would probably play very well, and have served as a way to tone down but still make characters effect and interesting on the battlefield. >

Really? I had the opposite view. PP took GW's problems on, and made them worse, and discarded a lot of their distinctiveness in their own edition race.

No it doesn't. A rule could be powerful in combination with one unit, whilst being perfectly fine with another.

That's why adjusting the rule could be punishing to units not intended, or create broken combos in others.

USRs did not make a good game out of 7th.

 Ishagu wrote:
No it doesn't. A rule could be powerful in combination with one unit, whilst being perfectly fine with another.

That's why adjusting the rule could be punishing to units not intended, or create broken combos in others.

USRs did not make a good game out of 7th.

USRs don't make a good game at all. They're a reference tool, used to great effect in 5th and 6th.

The issues with 7th had nothing to do with USRs (or the main rules, which were 6th ed with a few pages of errata), and everything to do with the added 'bespoke' junk in individual books: formations, free stuff and special rules.
Well, and a little to do with importing the most broken version of the magic system in from Fantasy for no reason.

 Ishagu wrote:
No it doesn't. A rule could be powerful in combination with one unit, whilst being perfectly fine with another.

That's why adjusting the rule could be punishing to units not intended, or create broken combos in others.

USRs did not make a good game out of 7th.

7th sucked because there were like 50 USRs and a bunch of them just referenced each other. It was typical GW being unable to stop themselves from turning a good thing into a mess.

Prior editions had a smaller number of unique USRs and it was just fine.