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Dudeface wrote:

Not Online!!! wrote:

Dudeface wrote:

I'm being silly yet we're showing off how killy space marines are by using space marines as an example of how easily things die in the same example? You're allowed to just admit that marines have survivability issues, otherwise I'd lose you to explain why AoC came into being in the first place and why it propped up some marine armies into the mid tiers. Stop pretending like every other army out there throws rocks around, there's plenty of 2d and/or reasonable ap attacks in literally every book.

I agree on transports though, I do feel they're underused atm and not well represented.

Shouldn't the case be then, that we actually look at the guns and weaponry? When even overly squishy marines can turn each other into paste easily (mind boltrifles already start that nonsense), And we certainly don't fix that by handing marines the key to the arsenal and tell them to go wild.

Shouldn't we also reintroduce larger tables and faster transports, as to facilitate a tactical need for transport, instead of infantry outspeeding in most cases transports? Is it a good thing that we can frontload slots of specific types without reprecussions now in arks of omen even more easily?

Shouldn't we consider a cover system that is beneficial to ALL infantry in order to actually create a need for indirect fire and artillery aswell as cover ignoring weapons, like flamers? Shouldn't that also be a niche that nade launchers could and should fullfill same as nades?
You know, f.e. a dualistic system that grants a "hard" cover save and improves the armor if the armor is better than the cover save? Because then both unit types, light aswell as heavy profit from cover in an equal manner, with light infantry benefitting more as they should, whilest heavy infantry can also take advantage whilest still being the choice assault unit?

You speak from my heart and yes 100%, it's what I'd love to see, but confined to the situation we're in, it's a dead duck I think.

And yet GW seem perfectly capable of running such a system with other core mechanics with HH with nighfighting and augury scanner equipment.

HH has problems as well but from a core mechanic standpoint it is far better off than 40k right now, nvm from a list building and modelling perspective which is absurd considering that there are not even alien factions in HH.
HH also still has the cheap transports which is a boon. Artillery reduced AP severly accross the board in most cases. Is that atm more favourable to terminators, dreads (mostly contemptors) and infantry than HH1 , sure, but it still has a place for tanks which themselves are less of a pushover than in 40k absurdly despite being able to be one-shot simply because you require dedicated AT for that and can't just scratch of the paint with lasguns if there's only one W left.

We are in a completly absurd situation right now in 40k.

As for the csm , tbh, 12 pts csm were better than the legionaires because you could spam them and achieve redundancy. Now we don't see legionaires but cultists or traitor guard as troops instead to supplement the elite and FA slot so prevalent in a csm list.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 vict0988 wrote:

I will admit Marines have survivability issues, but so does AdMech infantry, Necron infantry and Custodes infantry and every vehicle in the game. I am not pretending that attacks with reasonable AP attacks and a Damage characteristic above 1 are rare, that's the whole problem, they're too plentiful, that's what's making Marines have survivability issues despite having good defensive stats. The answer is not to increase SM stats further or give them defensive abilities. GW fethed the bed, now we have to lay in until 10th and then I hope they release a big errata lowering AP and Damage and then quickly release codexes with the lowered stats. You can't even make a joke thread about an insane boost to your faction's lethality or durability without people taking it seriously in 9th edition and saying "this seems like something GW would do".

The fact that choppas have AP-1, boltrifles somehow aswell and an autocannon just having -1 should make you pause because there's a whole class of weapons that shouldn't be AP -1 and yet are treated the same as a heavy bolter or autocannon.

And those are just some of the problematic guns.

Didnt gw say when they were previewing 8th that is was noticeably much more lethal? For them this is a feature not a bug I fear.

Dai wrote:
Didnt gw say when they were previewing 8th that is was noticeably much more lethal? For them this is a feature not a bug I fear.

Lethality is not an inherent issue au contraire high lethality can be beneficial for a wargame to make movement and manouvre matter far more aswell as putting more emphasis on terrain, if there is counterplay through mechanics aswell as listbuilding decisions not just reliant on skewing for a specific defensive statline.

F.e. If the cover system would be better e.g. actual benefit from cover, infantry and smaller vehicles would hug cover more, by extention unprepared and under manned offensive action would be far more punishable in such a system making positioning and manouvre matter more if you require to dislocate an enemy from an objective f.e.

Another exemple would be allowing units to dig in, basically allowing to alter the board minorly by building makehsift defensive barricades.

Remaining threats are also something that HH does with phosphex and grav weapons which are also tactical tools of area denial, beyond chaffing and screening deepstrikes.


Meanwhile the only counterplay right now is either skewing a defensive profile in your list, or redundancy if you have units that don't cost many points which is also skewing for a specific defensive profile.

Dudeface wrote:
Oh I agree on the csm, they weren't overly great, but they were sometimes seen as better than their loyalist counterparts for a while due to reduced wastage and points saved. There were some who actually were concerned at getting 2w in the end due to the increase price tags for gaining what felt like little in return.

Would you say you're for the changes at this point then in that case?

I guess I'm kind of mixed really. I think this may make Marines too good. I don't play Marines, I don't really like Marines and Marines being good (again) will probably get old real fast. Especially if 1 in 3 (pushing 1 in 2) players move back to playing them, as we saw in late 8th/early 9th.
But I equally don't like armies to be bad (well, except Grey Knights) and clearly they had become so (outside of certain specific BA lists).
I don't have a sacred cow on "gear must cost something" - because I think its fair plenty of gear is worthless, or units without specials are functionally bad, and splitting the difference is hard.

Aesthetically I prefer blinged out squads. Its always felt bad to me that say unit champions often come with fancy weapons and pistols, that you were just meant to ignore because they cost far too much. Other people may prefer to keep their guys with basic equipment but that feels a bit sad to me. Like not taking Standard Bearers and Musicians in WHFB (because they were often overcosted too.)

For a long time now I think GW have struggled with "basic Marine", 13 points, 1 T4 3+ save 1 wound, bolt gun and naked fist. This model was kind of tough but toothless.
Now lets buy him a lascannon or something for say 20 points, making him 33 points. Well he's still 1 T4 3+ save 1 wound model. So now he has a respectable gun (ymmv on whether a lascannon is that good these days) but is incredibly fragile. Theoretically there is probably some sort of tipping point here - but it may not be possible to identify. Certainly across the whole game with its thousand or so variations.

I also think part of the problem with the game is deciding what is meant to counter what. I.E. "Choppers shouldn't have AP-1". Well, without it, you'd need on average 18 Chopper Swings to kill a 2 wound marine. (18*2/3*1/2*1/3=2). Should say 30 boyz on average just kill 5 tactical marines? That seems kind of terrible for a unit which has token shooting, isn't especially fast or is especially tough. You can I guess go "its fine, make Boyz 5~ points" - but then they would be tough *for the points* and people would turn up with say 300~ to just sit on Objectives. The same applies to things like Wych Elves.

But as people said, the problem is if most units are at least "okay" into Marines, then marines start to drift down the pecking order. So Marine damage output needs to be buffed up to match. Which brings us to 9th's "everything counters everything" model. Which is sort of balanced, but has often been too lethal as a result.

Maybee sm shouldn't have 2 wounds to beginn with, atleast not normal marines and aswell not primaris...
But that is another discussion tieing back to ap beeing handed out, abandoning the binary armor system whilest doing so and then being surprised why we see marines not taking hits well.

Dudeface wrote:
Those grav cannons kill 33 marines at 18 points, they also only kill 33 guardsmen at 6.5 points. Feels hard to justify the cost of that defensive profile at that point, which takes us back to where we started before AoC but with more guns.

I'm not so sure I have a problem with Grav Cannons killing Marines effectively or efficiently. It's kinda what they're there for.

 H.B.M.C. wrote:

Dudeface wrote:
Those grav cannons kill 33 marines at 18 points, they also only kill 33 guardsmen at 6.5 points. Feels hard to justify the cost of that defensive profile at that point, which takes us back to where we started before AoC but with more guns.

I'm not so sure I have a problem with Grav Cannons killing Marines effectively or efficiently. It's kinda what they're there for.

Well in the past you had to trade your HS slots for that many grav cannons.

Now you can pick the arks of omen detachment and still slap in more HS slots if you so choose.

Not Online!!! wrote:
Well in the past you had to trade your HS slots for that many grav cannons.

Now you can pick the arks of omen detachment and still slap in more HS slots if you so choose.

The "I want more Heavy Support slots!" detachment has been part of the game for a while. I fail to see the difference.

The FOC is as useless now with the the Ark of Omen detachment as it was prior to its existence. All it does is cut out the clutter, so now you can bring whatever the feth you want with a single detachment rather than whatever the feth you want with multiple detachments.

 H.B.M.C. wrote:

Not Online!!! wrote:
Well in the past you had to trade your HS slots for that many grav cannons.

Now you can pick the arks of omen detachment and still slap in more HS slots if you so choose.

The "I want more Heavy Support slots!" detachment has been part of the game for a while. I fail to see the difference.

The FOC is as useless now with the the Ark of Omen detachment as it was prior to its existence. All it does is cut out the clutter, so now you can bring whatever the feth you want with a single detachment rather than whatever the feth you want with multiple detachments.

Oh absolutely 8th and 9th already facilitated this. 7th aswell with certain formations and movement of unit types to troops etc.
But atleast before you had to pay an additional CP and pts tax for an HQ.

As it stands the opportunity cost for fielding 3 units of devastator has dropped from old FOC to kinda severe before 8th to 8th/9th Pts for an additional HQ and some CP and now to no CP and no additional points.

Dudeface wrote:
As above, in the grav cannons example, they're just as easy to kill as guardsmen. They are for a lot of weapons.

I don't see any problem with there existing dedicated anti-MEQ weapons that kill Marines well, and talking like that makes Marines no more durable than Guardsmen is silly. Guardsmen get mulched by bolt rifles, Marines don't.

Now if you're staring down armies of just grav cannons, then that's proof positive that (a) unrestricted FOC makes access to heavy weapons too easy, (b) free wargear makes spamming heavy weapons too easy, and (c) you play a game where a majority of armies on the table are power armor so of course people are going to zero in on anti-MEQ weapons. None of which is really about the utility of a T4/W2/3+ profile, which is pretty great when it's bolt rifles shooting at you rather than your hard-counters, and buffing Marine defensive profiles until they can survive a table full of grav cannons would be insanity.

Every army in the game is having durability issues because every army in the game has seen an escalation of offensive capabilities, from a combination of statline creep and expanded availability, on top of 9th Ed factors like less impactful terrain and smaller tables. This isn't a Marine-specific thing.

Not Online!!! wrote:
it's not just AP that is an issue.

It's also range and boardsize, terrain, mechanics that would significantly weaken ranged out put, etc.

That's one of the things I think had an underrated affect on the game - shrinking board sizes with increased ranges. The original bolt gun was 24 inches if you stand still on a 4 foot board and a generally speaking not-within-24 no-man's-land. Now you've got 30 inches at 16ish inch no man's lands.

tneva82 wrote:


You keep posting that list as example of why that's bad. So yes you ARE making that claim. Your words and actions don't match and actions ALWAYS trumps words so your words don't matter. Your actions do.

So you are in error in your words compared to actions or you are lying, Either way you are saying TH in dev is equal value to elsewhere.

Sorry Tneva, not to be rude, but you don't get to decide the "hidden" meaning of my words when I bluntly state my position and do so for the purposes of understanding. The list I made was just to highlight the stupidity of this. From what i'm seeing the more competitive builds will take TH/SS assault termies and Plasma Inceptors like crazy..but again, i'm not a SM player so I don't know for certain.

Dudeface wrote:

I honestly can't tell which side of this you're stood on. Are you highlighting that marines are super squishy so need to be cheap, or super killy now that they're cheap? Both?

The point is they have all the extra output but still fart and die in a stiff breeze. Showing off how easily they die isn't a good argument for showing how overpowered they are at the same time.

That whistling sound you hear Dudeface is the point sailing happily over your head. Complaining that Marines are squishy right after they got hundreds of points of free heavy/special weapons which are almost always better at killing MEQs than they are GEQs is stupid. "Ohh woe is us, we lost AoC and now look how fast we die...definitely doesn't have anything to do with the 3x times the # of Heavy/specials on the table, totally because Marines are squishy".

Dudeface wrote:

 vict0988 wrote:
2W T4 3+ Sv is not squishy, go play Custodes.

Yet 500 points of marines removes 33 of them a turn as per 2 posts prior....

Now take away the 800+pts of free wargear and redo the math. Oh, its the ridiculous amount of free things that are killing those Marines.

Dudeface wrote:

I'm being silly yet we're showing off how killy space marines are by using space marines as an example of how easily things die in the same example? You're allowed to just admit that marines have survivability issues, otherwise I'd lose you to explain why AoC came into being in the first place and why it propped up some marine armies into the mid tiers. Stop pretending like every other army out there throws rocks around, there's plenty of 2d and/or reasonable ap attacks in literally every book.

I agree on transports though, I do feel they're underused atm and not well represented.

Marines don't have durability issues, what they have is the #1 problem i've been stating for years, the most common defensive profile in the game. I build lists with T4 3+ in mind because...MOST ARMIES HAVE THAT PROFILE; or a derivative of. (Marines, CSM, Special Marines, SoB etc).

My last GT I placed 5th overall and by points it would have been 2nd, my best units were 3x10 Kommandos, A unit of Burnas and 3x3 Squigriders. Against Marines Kommandos get no benefits because they lose -1AP on their choppas. So 9 of them do 27 attacks, 18 hits, usually 12 wounds (Sometimes 15 if in cover) and after saves they end up with...2 dead Marines. The nob swings and gets 4 attacks, 2 hits, 1.66 wounds and after AoC its like 1 more dead Marines. So a CC specialist unit kills 3 Marines a turn. Marines aren't squishy, its the lethality of the game for a bunch of different factions, and now Marines just jumped to hte head of hte line in terms of lethality.

Dudeface wrote:
As shown, the correct idea is to reduce AP game wide as has been stated repeatedly for over a year by pretty much everyone.

Honest questions -

What do you do with AP0 guns? Is it worthwhile to even take primaris when the standard issue is just as good and the flexibility is better on tacticals? Or would everyone just use stalker bolt rifles?

The first point of AP is the most crucial in this system. How will you prevent units who have access to change from AP0 to AP1 costed in a way that doesn't discourage either?

How are you going to handle AP improving abilities and the uneven access to them and the weapons they affect?

 Daedalus81 wrote:

Dudeface wrote:
As shown, the correct idea is to reduce AP game wide as has been stated repeatedly for over a year by pretty much everyone.

Honest questions -

What do you do with AP0 guns? Is it worthwhile to even take primaris when the standard issue is just as good and the flexibility is better on tacticals? Or would everyone just use stalker bolt rifles?

The first point of AP is the most crucial in this system. How will you prevent units who have access to change from AP0 to AP1 costed in a way that doesn't discourage either?

How are you going to handle AP improving abilities and the uneven access to them and the weapons they affect?

Honestly, primaris were a mistake... they launched 2 w troop nonsense. They launched baseline better boltguns and made marines obsolete, probably by design. They are not an actual tactical flexible unit at all and are supposed to be one respectivly replace one.

Breton wrote:

Not Online!!! wrote:
it's not just AP that is an issue.

It's also range and boardsize, terrain, mechanics that would significantly weaken ranged out put, etc.

That's one of the things I think had an underrated affect on the game - shrinking board sizes with increased ranges. The original bolt gun was 24 inches if you stand still on a 4 foot board and a generally speaking not-within-24 no-man's-land. Now you've got 30 inches at 16ish inch no man's lands.

uh? No Man's land' size is the same, deployments are usually 12" from the centerline, not from the board edge

Breton wrote:

Not Online!!! wrote:
it's not just AP that is an issue.

It's also range and boardsize, terrain, mechanics that would significantly weaken ranged out put, etc.

That's one of the things I think had an underrated affect on the game - shrinking board sizes with increased ranges. The original bolt gun was 24 inches if you stand still on a 4 foot board and a generally speaking not-within-24 no-man's-land. Now you've got 30 inches at 16ish inch no man's lands.

The boardsize shrinking alone was problematic because artillery alread had too small tables to perform and transports worked borderline but moresoe as cheap protection units for it's contents.
Size increases on infantry guns are merely the tip of issues caused by the smaller tables.

Breton wrote:

Not Online!!! wrote:
it's not just AP that is an issue.

It's also range and boardsize, terrain, mechanics that would significantly weaken ranged out put, etc.

That's one of the things I think had an underrated affect on the game - shrinking board sizes with increased ranges. The original bolt gun was 24 inches if you stand still on a 4 foot board and a generally speaking not-within-24 no-man's-land. Now you've got 30 inches at 16ish inch no man's lands.

Plus there were very deliberate and specific interactions that have been undermined- although I have to point out that the no man's land has stayed the same size; it's the deployment zone that has shrunk.

For a long time, a boltgun was 24" max range in a game where you start more than 24" away from one another, and which could only shoot at 12" if you moved. So, barring exposed infiltrators and the like, it was impossible to shoot the enemy with boltguns if you got the first turn.

Heavy weapons couldn't move and shoot. If you didn't have ideal targets from deployment (and if you did, your opponent screwed up), you might need to spend a turn moving to get in better position.

Speeds generally maxed out at 12" move and 6" charge, or vice versa. A very few units could move 12" and charge 12"- still not enough to cross the > 24" to the other army.

Go figure that when you can feasibly shoot with every model in your army T1 (including moving into ideal positions at no or minimal cost to shooting), or pull off a charge T1, that the game will have problems, even if the raw lethality math were to be scaled back.

 Daedalus81 wrote:
What do you do with AP0 guns?

If they don't adhere to fluff and good game design in terms of how killy they are? Lower S, shots or Damage. 1 shot S3 AP- D1 weapons don't have a lethality problem.

Is it worthwhile to even take primaris when the standard issue is just as good and the flexibility is better on tacticals? Or would everyone just use stalker bolt rifles?

Points will solve it. Tacticals aren't flexible, you take whatever loadout you want for your army, you don't get to change between battles, the flexibility doesn't actually matter in terms of balance. If every datasheet is worth bringing and every option on a datasheet is good in some situations then it's fine.

How are you going to handle AP improving abilities and the uneven access to them and the weapons they affect?

Design with intent. If something is supposed to boost anti-vehicle weapons then have it increase AP for weapons with AP-3 or better, if something is supposed to boost the regular soldiers then just let it give AP-1 to everything. When assigning points to upgrades like a storm bolter and a combi-plasma you just have to keep in mind what sorts of upgrades are available, cheap re-roll 1s means combi-plasma probably needs to be a little more expensive, easy access to an AP boost means a storm bolter should probably cost a little more than otherwise. You'll only get a range of acceptable points when doing math for the unit anyways. Post-release-æ you look at whether people are spamming combi-plasma in SM lists that constantly win tournaments while SM lists that don't run those lose more and then you nerf combi-plasma. If Space Marines are doing poorly and nobody takes storm bolters then you buff storm bolters. The buffs/nerfs stop at the point where it mathematically doesn't make sense to continue buffing/nerfing the unit further, like no free plasma pistols for Astra Militarum Sergeants even if people don't take them at 1 point.

Dudeface wrote:

 Insectum7 wrote:

Dudeface wrote:

 catbarf wrote:

Dudeface wrote:
The point is they have all the extra output but still fart and die in a stiff breeze. Showing off how easily they die isn't a good argument for showing how overpowered they are at the same time.

It's not like they're easier to kill than Guardsmen. Everyone dies quickly in 9th Ed, and T4/W2/3+ is still one of the toughest basic troop profiles in the game.

As above, in the grav cannons example, they're just as easy to kill as guardsmen. They are for a lot of weapons.

Yes, but it requires those more powerful guns.

A bolt rifle shot kills a Guardsman as well as a Grav Cannon shot kills a Space Marine. Wounds on 3, leaves a 6+ save. Bolt Rifles are easier to get than Grav Cannons.

Duh?

You mean in number? Yes. In cost? No. A Grav cannons now costs less than a bolt rifle when you add the body holding it.

Uhhh, how the heck do you come to that conclusion? Both Intercessors and Tacs cost 18 ppm. Intercessors have 5 Bolt Rifles. Tacs get one Grav Cannon.

The lethality was too high, they put AoC in because marines died too easily. They took AoC out and put up lethality further. Marines now die even easier as a result.

The state of the game means that a marine profile is too squishy. GW admit it, I think the vast majority of the playerbase know it, you're highlighting it unironically, but refusing to acknowledge it.

As shown, the correct idea is to reduce AP game wide as has been stated repeatedly for over a year by pretty much everyone. That won't happen however, so instead just accept that in this game, at this state, a marine defensive profile means very little.
.

You're barking up the wrong tree there. I've accepted the Marine profile not living up to bolter-porn hype since 2nd ed. However, their profile still means that they're much more resilient than GEQ. Not realizing that is pants-on-head territorry.

Marines feel "squishy" because of a combination of game mechanics, and the fact that they're fighting against armies that also need to be able to deal with a table full of Knights or tanks.

 catbarf wrote:

Plus there were very deliberate and specific interactions that have been undermined- although I have to point out that the no man's land has stayed the same size; it's the deployment zone that has shrunk.

For a long time, a boltgun was 24" max range in a game where you start more than 24" away from one another, and which could only shoot at 12" if you moved. So, barring exposed infiltrators and the like, it was impossible to shoot the enemy with boltguns if you got the first turn.

Heavy weapons couldn't move and shoot. If you didn't have ideal targets from deployment (and if you did, your opponent screwed up), you might need to spend a turn moving to get in better position.

Speeds generally maxed out at 12" move and 6" charge, or vice versa. A very few units could move 12" and charge 12"- still not enough to cross the > 24" to the other army.

Go figure that when you can feasibly shoot with every model in your army T1 (including moving into ideal positions at no or minimal cost to shooting), or pull off a charge T1, that the game will have problems, even if the raw lethality math were to be scaled back.

You highlighted some stuff there that has been swirling around in my head for a while now.

It wasn't that the guns in older editions were much less lethal than they are now. It was that you basically could barely move and use them at the same time. Plasma was king, hordes barely got saves, tanks could die to one hit, and morale would force you to run away. The guys who set up in fire lanes first or that had circumvention was going to do better -- OOLOS artillery, scatbikes, etc.

It's as much a movement thing as it is a stats thing. MM is the only weapon that took on a lot of change compare to others and it started as a 1 shot with 2D6 pick highest damage. The real proliferation wasn't the old weapons themselves, but the Primaris line and army rule add-ons.

In terms of movement I feel as though this system is better and I think most people agree that the go-first advantage is either gone or not significant enough to be worth mentioning. Go first in older editions could be quite rough especially considering how little terrain there was and how preventing a tank kill was a coin-flip.

I don't think the board size change hugely mattered. 8th was a famously assault-unfriendly edition, where a lot of armies just castled up in the corner with the intention of shooting you for 3 turns and then claiming the objectives. Many expected the same in 9th - but it turned out this wasn't the case, because you need stuff on the midboard contesting Primary objectives. Assault is the best way of getting models on to an objective - and killing the models your opponent has placed there.

The issue of taking something with 40"+ range and hiding in the corner is that it should end up LOS-blocked from a lot of the table, and even if it isn't, it needs to contribute hideous firepower, because its likely contributing almost nothing to your objective game. (I guess it can sit on an objective in your deployment zone, but again, terrain shouldn't make that the best place to park long-range guns.)

9th's issue of lethality is because GW upped the damage. To a degree this happened through 8th - but went into supernova with Marines 2.0 and specifically getting doctrines. I.E. Ironhands in super-doctrine, okay I ignore the -1 to hit from moving and I get to reroll 1s to hit. Ignoring the point of AP, that's a 55.5% (!!!) upgrade in expected output versus a scenario where neither of those buffs are in place. (I.e. I'd expect to hit 14 in 18 shots versus 9 in 18 shots). The cap on -1 to hit arguably makes it less valuable in 9th - but still.

Every army now has the equivalent - and most of these rules buff damage output rather than defense.

 Daedalus81 wrote:
It wasn't that the guns in older editions were much less lethal than they are now. It was that you basically could barely move and use them at the same time. Plasma was king, hordes barely got saves, tanks could die to one hit, and morale would force you to run away. The guys who set up in fire lanes first or that had circumvention was going to do better -- OOLOS artillery, scatbikes, etc.

It's as much a movement thing as it is a stats thing. MM is the only weapon that took on a lot of change compare to others and it started as a 1 shot with 2D6 pick highest damage. The real proliferation wasn't the old weapons themselves, but the Primaris line and army rule add-ons.

In terms of movement I feel as though this system is better and I think most people agree that the go-first advantage is either gone or not significant enough to be worth mentioning. Go first in older editions could be quite rough especially considering how little terrain there was and how preventing a tank kill was a coin-flip.

Cover gave you a 5+ or 4+ invuln, which kept those squishy hordes in the fight and gave Marines a chance against heavy weapons. You got your full save unless the enemy had enough AP to ignore it, so no 3+ saves getting degraded to 4+ or 5+, and most armies couldn't spam all plasma like armies today can spam AP-1/AP-2. Boards were big enough and ranges low enough that being out of range was reasonably common. Melee troops weren't regularly throwing 4+ attacks, because breaking the enemy through morale allowed melee to be decisive without needing to wipe out the enemy in one go. You couldn't split fire to ensure every weapon went into its optimal target. Twin-linked weapons got re-rolling hits, not twice as many shots. And maybe more than anything else, you did not get stacks of re-roll 1s, re-roll misses, +1 to wound, reduce saves by 1, mortal wounds on 6s, or stratagems conferring similar abilities whenever you want.

The requirement to choose between moving or shooting at full effectiveness was definitely part of what made lethality lower in older editions, but I don't think it was the main thing. Offensive capabilities have crept upwards through raw stat changes, core rule changes, and access to force-multipliers, while defensive capabilities have been degraded through the de-emphasis of cover, reduced board size relative to ranges, and permissive LOS/casualty systems. It's those factors plus the removal of limitations (on moving and shooting, targeting, and shooting and charging) that have dramatically increased lethality.

You could probably re-work the current game to significantly reduce lethality without going back on units being able to move and shoot as freely as they can now. But frankly, I think the game would benefit from more constraints on what capabilities a unit can employ in any given turn- beyond reducing lethality, it makes combat more driven by tactical decisions and less by raw weapon/target pairing spreadsheet optimization. Plus, maybe those anti-MEQ heavy weapons would be less oppressive if you could avoid them by just breaking LOS, rather than the impossible task of hiding from everywhere they could reach with a 6" move. And maybe Shuriken Catapults and Fleshborers wouldn't need lethality-boosting glow-ups if the Assault weapon type's looser restrictions actually mattered like it used to. Stuff like that.

 catbarf wrote:
Melee troops weren't regularly throwing 4+ attacks, because breaking the enemy through morale allowed melee to be decisive without needing to wipe out the enemy in one go.

No, it didn't. Because SM, Nids and cult CSM were immune to it and catching a unit with +2/+3 Initiative was super unlikely. It was a garbage rule and melee just dealing whatever damage it is supposed to do instead of that BS is a thousand times better.

Moving 6" with your marines and then firing your impressive 4 bolt pistols and a flamer (couldn't shoot with certain weapons if you wanted to charge and I think you could only shoot the target you wanted to charge) before doing that impressive 6" charge to hit them with your 8 basic CC attacks that most likely hit on 4+, wounded on 4+ and gave them a 3+ save. Then 3 power fist attacks after the opponent have hit back.
Not exactly a huge radius of "deadly" force compared to now. 12" threat when combining shooting and melee for the basic unit. If they did not charge they had only a 24" range if standing still or 18" if moving.

Now you can have 5 intercessors move/advance up to 13", shoot 3 shots at a target 24"(with the short range bolter) away and then charge a target up to 12" away. Then hit with at least 12 normal attacks and 4 powered up sergeant attacks. With stacking buffs almost everything could hit at 2+ with rerolls to hit. Most likely wound even tanks on a 4+ in both shooting and melee with at least ap 1 and perhaps even some rerolls here too. Depending on exact chapter you could easily add exploding 6s, additional damage, a bunch of extra attacks or even more ap. Thunderhammer on the sergeant and you could buff it up to easily kill a normal vehicle and perhaps in a more extreme scenario even kill a 24w knight.

Even the most basic troop choice for marines can now charge something up to 25" from its starting position (a lot of chapters have some access to advance + charge besides BA....) and at the same time also shoot at full capacity at a different target from what it is charging, up to 37" from where the intercessors began their turn.

Not only did the board become like 20% smaller, even the most basic unit marine unit can threaten stuff that isnt behind solid walls(so not ruins) 100% further with melee but in range also about 100% further (bit depending on what bolter and chapter). There also isn't always 24" no mans land. It can actually be much much shorter than that. The shortest distance between deployment zones is a distance the average unit can charge into with a 6" move and a 7" charge roll. It is only just below 13" the shortest distance between the corners when it is quartered deployment and at most 18" when going through the middle "circle".

 catbarf wrote:

 Daedalus81 wrote:
It wasn't that the guns in older editions were much less lethal than they are now. It was that you basically could barely move and use them at the same time. Plasma was king, hordes barely got saves, tanks could die to one hit, and morale would force you to run away. The guys who set up in fire lanes first or that had circumvention was going to do better -- OOLOS artillery, scatbikes, etc.

It's as much a movement thing as it is a stats thing. MM is the only weapon that took on a lot of change compare to others and it started as a 1 shot with 2D6 pick highest damage. The real proliferation wasn't the old weapons themselves, but the Primaris line and army rule add-ons.

In terms of movement I feel as though this system is better and I think most people agree that the go-first advantage is either gone or not significant enough to be worth mentioning. Go first in older editions could be quite rough especially considering how little terrain there was and how preventing a tank kill was a coin-flip.

Cover gave you a 5+ or 4+ invuln, which kept those squishy hordes in the fight and gave Marines a chance against heavy weapons. You got your full save unless the enemy had enough AP to ignore it, so no 3+ saves getting degraded to 4+ or 5+, and most armies couldn't spam all plasma like armies today can spam AP-1/AP-2. Boards were big enough and ranges low enough that being out of range was reasonably common. Melee troops weren't regularly throwing 4+ attacks, because breaking the enemy through morale allowed melee to be decisive without needing to wipe out the enemy in one go. You couldn't split fire to ensure every weapon went into its optimal target. Twin-linked weapons got re-rolling hits, not twice as many shots. And maybe more than anything else, you did not get stacks of re-roll 1s, re-roll misses, +1 to wound, reduce saves by 1, mortal wounds on 6s, or stratagems conferring similar abilities whenever you want.

The requirement to choose between moving or shooting at full effectiveness was definitely part of what made lethality lower in older editions, but I don't think it was the main thing. Offensive capabilities have crept upwards through raw stat changes, core rule changes, and access to force-multipliers, while defensive capabilities have been degraded through the de-emphasis of cover, reduced board size relative to ranges, and permissive LOS/casualty systems. It's those factors plus the removal of limitations (on moving and shooting, targeting, and shooting and charging) that have dramatically increased lethality.

You could probably re-work the current game to significantly reduce lethality without going back on units being able to move and shoot as freely as they can now. But frankly, I think the game would benefit from more constraints on what capabilities a unit can employ in any given turn- beyond reducing lethality, it makes combat more driven by tactical decisions and less by raw weapon/target pairing spreadsheet optimization. Plus, maybe those anti-MEQ heavy weapons would be less oppressive if you could avoid them by just breaking LOS, rather than the impossible task of hiding from everywhere they could reach with a 6" move. And maybe Shuriken Catapults and Fleshborers wouldn't need lethality-boosting glow-ups if the Assault weapon type's looser restrictions actually mattered like it used to. Stuff like that.

I would be curious to see a couple of pros really take the screws to an older edition and see what happens.

The no pre-measure was a factor as well given the limited tolerances to get it right against incoming melee. It's why I loved my Rubric marines who could move and pop off at 24" regardless.

Terrain then might give better protection when dice get rolled, but terrain now gives better protection overall - at least that's my gut feeling. That and morale potentially forcing you to move back from only 25% casualties made getting in range pretty tough for some.

Toss initiative and grenades ( and units lacking both ) as well as removing casualties in initiative order and overrun - pretty brutal.

You're right about the layered rules. Rerolls were pretty rough for all of 8th. Strats are a factor, but they're a bit more sensible ( mostly ).

EXECUTE ORDER 66.

Tyel wrote:

Spoiler:

Dudeface wrote:
Oh I agree on the csm, they weren't overly great, but they were sometimes seen as better than their loyalist counterparts for a while due to reduced wastage and points saved. There were some who actually were concerned at getting 2w in the end due to the increase price tags for gaining what felt like little in return.

Would you say you're for the changes at this point then in that case?

I guess I'm kind of mixed really. I think this may make Marines too good. I don't play Marines, I don't really like Marines and Marines being good (again) will probably get old real fast. Especially if 1 in 3 (pushing 1 in 2) players move back to playing them, as we saw in late 8th/early 9th.
But I equally don't like armies to be bad (well, except Grey Knights) and clearly they had become so (outside of certain specific BA lists).
I don't have a sacred cow on "gear must cost something" - because I think its fair plenty of gear is worthless, or units without specials are functionally bad, and splitting the difference is hard.

Aesthetically I prefer blinged out squads. Its always felt bad to me that say unit champions often come with fancy weapons and pistols, that you were just meant to ignore because they cost far too much. Other people may prefer to keep their guys with basic equipment but that feels a bit sad to me. Like not taking Standard Bearers and Musicians in WHFB (because they were often overcosted too.)

For a long time now I think GW have struggled with "basic Marine", 13 points, 1 T4 3+ save 1 wound, bolt gun and naked fist. This model was kind of tough but toothless.
Now lets buy him a lascannon or something for say 20 points, making him 33 points. Well he's still 1 T4 3+ save 1 wound model. So now he has a respectable gun (ymmv on whether a lascannon is that good these days) but is incredibly fragile. Theoretically there is probably some sort of tipping point here - but it may not be possible to identify. Certainly across the whole game with its thousand or so variations.

I also think part of the problem with the game is deciding what is meant to counter what. I.E. "Choppers shouldn't have AP-1". Well, without it, you'd need on average 18 Chopper Swings to kill a 2 wound marine. (18*2/3*1/2*1/3=2). Should say 30 boyz on average just kill 5 tactical marines? That seems kind of terrible for a unit which has token shooting, isn't especially fast or is especially tough. You can I guess go "its fine, make Boyz 5~ points" - but then they would be tough *for the points* and people would turn up with say 300~ to just sit on Objectives. The same applies to things like Wych Elves.

But as people said, the problem is if most units are at least "okay" into Marines, then marines start to drift down the pecking order. So Marine damage output needs to be buffed up to match. Which brings us to 9th's "everything counters everything" model. Which is sort of balanced, but has often been too lethal as a result.

100% on board with this, you hit the nail on the head.

H.B.M.C. wrote:

Dudeface wrote:
Those grav cannons kill 33 marines at 18 points, they also only kill 33 guardsmen at 6.5 points. Feels hard to justify the cost of that defensive profile at that point, which takes us back to where we started before AoC but with more guns.

I'm not so sure I have a problem with Grav Cannons killing Marines effectively or efficiently. It's kinda what they're there for.

Fair enough point, it's more the s5 ap-1 fleshborers of the world which are more a problem in this circumstance.

catbarf wrote:

Dudeface wrote:
As above, in the grav cannons example, they're just as easy to kill as guardsmen. They are for a lot of weapons.

I don't see any problem with there existing dedicated anti-MEQ weapons that kill Marines well, and talking like that makes Marines no more durable than Guardsmen is silly. Guardsmen get mulched by bolt rifles, Marines don't.

Now if you're staring down armies of just grav cannons, then that's proof positive that (a) unrestricted FOC makes access to heavy weapons too easy, (b) free wargear makes spamming heavy weapons too easy, and (c) you play a game where a majority of armies on the table are power armor so of course people are going to zero in on anti-MEQ weapons. None of which is really about the utility of a T4/W2/3+ profile, which is pretty great when it's bolt rifles shooting at you rather than your hard-counters, and buffing Marine defensive profiles until they can survive a table full of grav cannons would be insanity.

Every army in the game is having durability issues because every army in the game has seen an escalation of offensive capabilities, from a combination of statline creep and expanded availability, on top of 9th Ed factors like less impactful terrain and smaller tables. This isn't a Marine-specific thing.

I'd argue marines also get mulched by tac doctrine bolt rifles far more than they should. All the tail end of that I agree with vigorously, lethality overall is too high and decision making is too narrow/fixated on killing.

SemperMortis wrote:

Dudeface wrote:

I honestly can't tell which side of this you're stood on. Are you highlighting that marines are super squishy so need to be cheap, or super killy now that they're cheap? Both?

The point is they have all the extra output but still fart and die in a stiff breeze. Showing off how easily they die isn't a good argument for showing how overpowered they are at the same time.

That whistling sound you hear Dudeface is the point sailing happily over your head. Complaining that Marines are squishy right after they got hundreds of points of free heavy/special weapons which are almost always better at killing MEQs than they are GEQs is stupid. "Ohh woe is us, we lost AoC and now look how fast we die...definitely doesn't have anything to do with the 3x times the # of Heavy/specials on the table, totally because Marines are squishy".

Back at you, I can see the vapour trail of my point in the distance - Marines got AoC to assist survivability because they were too easily killed by most lists/forces. Highlighting that they die faster/easier as an example of how amazing free gear is, is kinda like pointing out water is wet. Please, continue to fixate on "OMG FREE THINGS" rather than the reason they have them - they cannot reasonably rework marine survivability without altering the entire games lethality. Increasing marine lethality in turn accentuates their issues and actually highlights why AoC was brought in, this has a net gain for a lot of people playing into marines if you can get past the concept they have free stuff. They could have made devastators cheap per model and pay for the grav cannons to the same points value, but for some reason I don't think you'd be complaining as much then.

Dudeface wrote:

 vict0988 wrote:
2W T4 3+ Sv is not squishy, go play Custodes.

Yet 500 points of marines removes 33 of them a turn as per 2 posts prior....

Now take away the 800+pts of free wargear and redo the math. Oh, its the ridiculous amount of free things that are killing those Marines.

Again, the total end value in points can be kept the same and they can stop being free, would that help in your head? If so how cheap should a AoC-less marine be?

Dudeface wrote:


I'm being silly yet we're showing off how killy space marines are by using space marines as an example of how easily things die in the same example? You're allowed to just admit that marines have survivability issues, otherwise I'd lose you to explain why AoC came into being in the first place and why it propped up some marine armies into the mid tiers. Stop pretending like every other army out there throws rocks around, there's plenty of 2d and/or reasonable ap attacks in literally every book.

I agree on transports though, I do feel they're underused atm and not well represented.

Marines don't have durability issues, what they have is the #1 problem i've been stating for years, the most common defensive profile in the game. I build lists with T4 3+ in mind because...MOST ARMIES HAVE THAT PROFILE; or a derivative of. (Marines, CSM, Special Marines, SoB etc).

My last GT I placed 5th overall and by points it would have been 2nd, my best units were 3x10 Kommandos, A unit of Burnas and 3x3 Squigriders. Against Marines Kommandos get no benefits because they lose -1AP on their choppas. So 9 of them do 27 attacks, 18 hits, usually 12 wounds (Sometimes 15 if in cover) and after saves they end up with...2 dead Marines. The nob swings and gets 4 attacks, 2 hits, 1.66 wounds and after AoC its like 1 more dead Marines. So a CC specialist unit kills 3 Marines a turn. Marines aren't squishy, its the lethality of the game for a bunch of different factions, and now Marines just jumped to hte head of hte line in terms of lethality.

They just lost AoC, your Kommandos now do at least 1 extra marines worth of wounds in return but have to fear a free thunder hammer. Well done, those super lethal marines (because we're focusing on firstborn for some reason today) do the exact same damage in return rounding off as before because the thunder hammer cancels out the extra casualty. I'd agree they've gained a lot of oomph, more than I'd like to see from any faction, but I think they've shown that they can't rules stack marines into relevance.

Daedalus81 wrote:

Dudeface wrote:
As shown, the correct idea is to reduce AP game wide as has been stated repeatedly for over a year by pretty much everyone.

Honest questions -

What do you do with AP0 guns? Is it worthwhile to even take primaris when the standard issue is just as good and the flexibility is better on tacticals? Or would everyone just use stalker bolt rifles?

The first point of AP is the most crucial in this system. How will you prevent units who have access to change from AP0 to AP1 costed in a way that doesn't discourage either?

How are you going to handle AP improving abilities and the uneven access to them and the weapons they affect?

All good questions, I'm not smart enough to answer some of it comprehensively and don't want to be an armchair games designer. AP0 should be around a lot more than it is. Pulse rifles, bolter/bolt rifles, fleshborers, shuriken catapults (can be convinced there maybe) etc. should be AP0, they should also not fire more to compensate, sometimes even less than they do now. As a bone to Semper I actually think a bolter or chainsword at ap 0 is ok but accept a choppa at AP-1.

Regards the costing question in comparison, maybe tie that cost specifically to the upgrade, which needs to be a fixed upgrade at that, not an imaginary CP. If a unit can fundamentally shift the game like that there does need to be some balancing involved and I don't think temporary boosts like strats cover it well enough.

I don't think there should be AP improving abilities, I don't understand how a guy yelling makes someone's projectiles sharper/tougher/better designed. I see the value as a lever for GW to pull in terms of flavour and balance but it's not one that should be touched imo, same way very few auras should give a fnp type ability imo.

We're well into me being "some idiot attempting to rewrite the game" which isn't what we're going to get though. There's people out there on here who can do a far better job than me of these things, I don't envy the GW rules team one bit though.

As a concluding thought, firstly apologies to all I've had a sofa related existential crisis as the day went on. Other than that, there's a mix of "OMG FREE THINGS" with no conversation about what things should cost generally and a resigned "meh, what else were they supposed to do at this stage" on the other end of the spectrum with a few opinions dotted in between. I don't think 10th ed will fix a lot of this in honesty, but it also isn't going to go away with some heeavvvvyyyy editing and I'd rather see a game where having a lot of your force left top of T3 is normal and expected. Make hordes great again, make power armoured dudes feel tough, stop making pocket knives pierce armoured bunkers.

Dudeface wrote:
...with no conversation about what things should cost generally

What's the point of doing the math on what things should cost if you don't have the manpower to playtest the points costs you think things should be to find out where things are broken? Even if you did have the manpower to test it you wouldn't have the influence in even your local community to make them play with your points, because you certainly won't get the bigger community to accept it. Here's a shot in the dark.

4‑9 Devastator Marines 14/model
1 Devastator Marine Sergeant 20
• The Devastator Marine Sergeant’s bolt pistol can be replaced with one of the following: 1 grav-pistol +1; 1 plasma pistol +2; 1 Astartes chainsword; 1 lightning claw +1; 1 power axe +1; 1 power fist +2; 1 power maul +1; 1 power sword +1; 1 thunder hammer +3.
• The Devastator Marine Sergeant’s boltgun can be replaced with one of the following: 1 combi-flamer +2; 1 combi-grav +2; 1 combi-melta +3; 1 combi-plasma +3; 1 storm bolter +1; 1 bolt pistol +1; 1 grav-pistol +2; 1 plasma pistol +3; 1 Astartes chainsword +1; 1 lightning claw +2; 1 power axe +3; 1 power fist +3; 1 power maul +2; 1 power sword +2; 1 thunder hammer +4.
• Up to 4 Devastator Marines can each have their boltgun replaced with 1 grav-cannon +10; 1 heavy bolter +5; 1 lascannon +10; 1 missile launcher +5; 1 multi-melta +20; 1 plasma cannon +8.
• The unit can be equipped with 1 Armorium Cherub +10.

 vict0988 wrote:

Dudeface wrote:
...with no conversation about what things should cost generally

What's the point of doing the math on what things should cost if you don't have the manpower to playtest the points costs you think things should be to find out where things are broken? Even if you did have the manpower to test it you wouldn't have the influence in even your local community to make them play with your points, because you certainly won't get the bigger community to accept it. Here's a shot in the dark.

4‑9 Devastator Marines 14/model
1 Devastator Marine Sergeant 20
• The Devastator Marine Sergeant’s bolt pistol can be replaced with one of the following: 1 grav-pistol +1; 1 plasma pistol +2; 1 Astartes chainsword; 1 lightning claw +1; 1 power axe +1; 1 power fist +2; 1 power maul +1; 1 power sword +1; 1 thunder hammer +3.
• The Devastator Marine Sergeant’s boltgun can be replaced with one of the following: 1 combi-flamer +2; 1 combi-grav +2; 1 combi-melta +3; 1 combi-plasma +3; 1 storm bolter +1; 1 bolt pistol +1; 1 grav-pistol +2; 1 plasma pistol +3; 1 Astartes chainsword +1; 1 lightning claw +2; 1 power axe +3; 1 power fist +3; 1 power maul +2; 1 power sword +2; 1 thunder hammer +4.
• Up to 4 Devastator Marines can each have their boltgun replaced with 1 grav-cannon +10; 1 heavy bolter +5; 1 lascannon +10; 1 missile launcher +5; 1 multi-melta +20; 1 plasma cannon +8.
• The unit can be equipped with 1 Armorium Cherub +10.

OK, so no reason to ever take the chainsword unless you acknowledge you're not supposed to be in melee with them. Otherwise the tiny number of points means they're either an auto include due to negligible impact on the roster. Not really convinced 1bonus s4 ap-1 d1 attack is only worth 1 point less than a s5 ap-3 d1 profile for example.

I can't think of a situation where I would ever want the heavy bolter there, the points gaps are too small to differentiate clearly enough. I kinda feel plasma cannons are the easy go to point. For most issues with those points.

Why is the sergeant 20? Is a single melee attack worth 6 points? Do you think that 166 points for the 5 melta guys with a cherub seem a good choice? A whole 11 points less than the AoC version?

vict0988 wrote:

 catbarf wrote:
Melee troops weren't regularly throwing 4+ attacks, because breaking the enemy through morale allowed melee to be decisive without needing to wipe out the enemy in one go.

No, it didn't. Because SM, Nids and cult CSM were immune to it and catching a unit with +2/+3 Initiative was super unlikely. It was a garbage rule and melee just dealing whatever damage it is supposed to do instead of that BS is a thousand times better.

I remember Marines falling back but auto-rallying if they didn't get caught by Sweeping Advance, and Tyranids staying in combat but taking extra wounds that, ironically, was perceived as making them more vulnerable in melee rather than less. We're talking about a span of multiple editions here, in which melee changed a lot, so you'll need to be specific.

If you feel that none of them got it right and there's no possible way to reasonably handle the few exceptions to the normal morale system, suit yourself. I think the current system where melee troops have to be so lethal that they wipe out units on the charge kinda sucks.