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I've found that the best way to speed things up is to not play the game.

Anywayz, smaller pt games is the way to go if you still want to play.

Don't listen to them... most of them are very experienced players with very streamlined everyday 40k experiences - most people aren't like that and struggle to get past turn 3 or 4 under 3 hours at a tournament.

The Americans especially seem to be able to finish full games in 2.5 hours, which may be due to their meta (5 Flyrants vs 5 IK or 5 Tau suits couldn't take very long I guess).

But here's the deal: I'm just as slow as you are and my 2000 points game will take 6 hours most of the time, because of the following:
1) Trying to get all the rules right despite not knowing them enough
2) Trying to get all the moves / target priority right despite not playing often enough
3) Playing too many points despite not being fast at this game.


So here's how I would go about solving your problem (and mine):

1) Drop to 1000 points maximum
2) Leave the rules for after the game, take a note, roll a 4+, check later what was the answer
3) Leave tactical superiority to experience, go through your decisions quickly and just learn from your mistakes instead of trying to prevent them

I'm going to echo Morgoth, you guys are reale experienced and play highly streamlined it seems. At tournaments there are time limits so you learn how to play fast.

Cut down on number of models used on the table rather than
points. I have played games of 2K GK that went faster then 1K footslogging eldar. On the table is important sincee some armies (mostly DE) never really leave their transports so that doesn't add time.

You can save a lot of time by not splitting hairs about rules or shots or cover saves. for example: my gaming group uses a simple house rule for cover: we decide the basic cover terrain gives a model (usually 4+) and if it's on the base you get the cover, this saved us a lot of time.

Know your rules and list. Battlescribe is godsend especially the option to have a list of all weapons/ stats at the end of the print: have this handy.

There is a big factor you have no control over tough: your opponent. If he is a slow player your game is going to take time. I have a regular in my gaming group who cannot seem to remember his rules/wargear. Games with him take almost an hour extra then against someone else.

morgoth wrote:

Spoiler:

Don't listen to them... most of them are very experienced players with very streamlined everyday 40k experiences - most people aren't like that and struggle to get past turn 3 or 4 under 3 hours at a tournament.

The Americans especially seem to be able to finish full games in 2.5 hours, which may be due to their meta (5 Flyrants vs 5 IK or 5 Tau suits couldn't take very long I guess).

But here's the deal: I'm just as slow as you are and my 2000 points game will take 6 hours most of the time, because of the following:
1) Trying to get all the rules right despite not knowing them enough
2) Trying to get all the moves / target priority right despite not playing often enough
3) Playing too many points despite not being fast at this game.


So here's how I would go about solving your problem (and mine):

1) Drop to 1000 points maximum
2) Leave the rules for after the game, take a note, roll a 4+, check later what was the answer
3) Leave tactical superiority to experience, go through your decisions quickly and just learn from your mistakes instead of trying to prevent them

Earth127 wrote:

Spoiler:

I'm going to echo Morgoth, you guys are reale experienced and play highly streamlined it seems. At tournaments there are time limits so you learn how to play fast.

Cut down on number of models used on the table rather than
points. I have played games of 2K GK that went faster then 1K footslogging eldar. On the table is important sincee some armies (mostly DE) never really leave their transports so that doesn't add time.

You can save a lot of time by not splitting hairs about rules or shots or cover saves. for example: my gaming group uses a simple house rule for cover: we decide the basic cover terrain gives a model (usually 4+) and if it's on the base you get the cover, this saved us a lot of time.

Know your rules and list. Battlescribe is godsend especially the option to have a list of all weapons/ stats at the end of the print: have this handy.

There is a big factor you have no control over tough: your opponent. If he is a slow player your game is going to take time. I have a regular in my gaming group who cannot seem to remember his rules/wargear. Games with him take almost an hour extra then against someone else.

I was beginning to think I was alone! Glad other people are like me and my group. We're playing a 1500pts 2v2 this week (750 per player), so we'll see how long that takes.

 Kanluwen wrote:



Both parties to know their applicable rules, inside and out, and to have applicable FAQs on hand to curtail any arguments.

This, 100 times this...

I think more info is required. What, exactly, is taking the time?

Take the 2.5-hour, 1250-point, 2-turn game as an example. Can you roughly break down what those 2.5 hours were spent doing? I just can't figure out how it can take so long.

You clearly want to speed things up a bit so I'm going to assume you've already eliminated the obvious time sink of spending a lot of time talking about random stuff and not actually playing the game. So what parts of the game were taking the time?

In general I think the advice here has all been spot-on:

1. Know the rules - this includes the core rules, your own army rules and a decent idea about your opponent's rules

2. Know what stuff to measure accurately and what doesn't matter so much. It's a good idea to measure things like melta ranges before you even move models and agree with your opponent whether something will be in range or not. Then you can move units more quickly by accurately moving the closest models and not measuring movement for the rear models.

3. Think about what you're going to do while your opponent is measuring/thinking. (Note, this is also why games get so much quicker when random chat is reduced).

4. Perform mandatory actions quickly. I have a pet peeve when my opponent is doing a purely reactive action, such as taking saves or firing overwatch, and they take ages to actually roll the dice. Once you've decided on an action you just need to carry it out so don't mess about and get it done!

 TheCadreofFi'rios wrote:
Yea so I played my entire game today in about 2.5 hours at 1250 points. It was definitely a faster than normal game for me though because my opponent conceded half way through my 2nd turn after I blew up his command squad.

We're going to need more information than "Yeah, so". What you're describing is not "normal".

How experienced are the people involved?

Are both players moving each model painstakingly slow in order to have exactly 2" between models?

Is movement taking 30 minutes?

Are you having tons of side conversations?

What exactly is taking the longest in your games?

I think playing a bit fast and loose with movement is probably a good idea until you're more confident with rules.

Having an understanding that you're not going to be super strict on ranges, line of sight etc. will speed things up.

With units, move the front rank or front model then shuffle everything else up rather than measure individually.

You could argue this might give advantage but if both players are doing it, it's likely to even out during a whole game.

Finally know the weapons stats, roll to hit/wound/saves off by heart so you can quickly make large dice rolls.

For movement, I typically move the closest few models, the rearmost model, and just scatter the rest between. Much faster.

Earth127 wrote:
I'm going to echo Morgoth, you guys are reale experienced and play highly streamlined it seems. At tournaments there are time limits so you learn how to play fast.

I haven't gone to a 40k tournament in 4 years. And even before I went to 40k tournaments semi-regularly, games didn't last that long.

Quite frankly, taking 5-6 hours to play a 2k game is insane. You'd have to be practically dragging your feet, reading the rules for each phase almost verbatim each turn. Thats literally the only way I can see a 2k game taking that long. You would have to be deliberately trying to drag them game out for it to make it that long, assuming you actually are familiar with the rules.

- Think in your opponent turn, move in yours.
- Do not open up your books to look stuff up, and never argue about anything.
- Use multi coloured dice for multiple weapons or effects.
- Skip useless actions.
- Just remove models if they have nearly 0% of survival.

Well, obviously you should look stuff up if there is a question. But if you know a rule, don't waste time with double checking.

At what point do we start the clock? My games can take very long but thinking about it made me realize something.

I am counting the time for actually setting up the table. As in we need to move the actual tables around and back after the game.

Counting from the first die roll to the last a 1.5K game (wich is what we play most, I haven't played a game of 2K or more in over a year) can go from 90 minutes to 3 hours. And that difference mostly comes to the factors I mentioned in my ealrier post.

Well, even setting up shouldn't take all that long.

Depends on if the board already has terrain nicely laid out or if you need to set up a table from scratch, including removing bunched up terrain that might've been just lying around. Setting up can occasionally be one of the longest parts to games I play.

I don't see why setting up would take more than 15 minutes.

Slipspace wrote:
I think more info is required. What, exactly, is taking the time?

Take the 2.5-hour, 1250-point, 2-turn game as an example. Can you roughly break down what those 2.5 hours were spent doing? I just can't figure out how it can take so long.

10 min to set up table, 10-30 min to roll all pre-game stuff, 10-30 min to talk over all the rules ambiguities, 20-40 min to set up armies and here you can start the game. It usually lasts a bit longer that all the pre-game aspects.

 koooaei wrote:

Slipspace wrote:
I think more info is required. What, exactly, is taking the time?

Take the 2.5-hour, 1250-point, 2-turn game as an example. Can you roughly break down what those 2.5 hours were spent doing? I just can't figure out how it can take so long.

10 min to set up table, 10-30 min to roll all pre-game stuff, 10-30 min to talk over all the rules ambiguities, 20-40 min to set up armies and here you can start the game. It usually lasts a bit longer that all the pre-game aspects.

See, much of that seems like way too much time.

It should take at most 5 minutes for both players to roll their psychic powers and warlord traits. I play a GK list where I need to roll for 11 psychic powers. It takes me less than a minute to roll 3 sets of dice and write down the powers on my army list.

Discussing rules ambiguities is something that should happen only rarely with players who aren't complete noobs. Likewise, deployment shouldn't last more than 5 minutes per player, unless there is a horde army which still shouldn't take more than 10 minutes or so unless you take a long time measuring out max coherency for each model.

5-6 hours is more the realm of outright in person apocalypse games in my experience. Games that often have teams rather than just being the usual 1v1.

Even horde Orks vs horde Guard don't tend to take six hours at 2k points. How have you been taking that much time?

Know your rules, looking up stats and/or answering queries takes time.

Plan your turn during your opponent's turn. Deciding what to do takes time. You can have that time overlap with something else though.
Thinking about how your army deals with certain things when not playing helps too (e.g. I know my FMC's stay in the sky around knights, no weighing benefits to take time).

Know and accommodate time consuming aspects of your army, find a way to get it done more efficiently. If you play Tzeentch daemons, have a quick way to roll and record powers and rewards; have a quick way to get models moved if you play orks or IG; etc.

Have your dice arranged so that they are quick to counts; e.g: have dice in piles of 10, taking out 2 and rolling is faster than counting out 8.

I usually play two 1850 games each saturday (our local GW is open 11 - 8) and usually have a ton of extra time for painting or kill team or the such. I could probably play 3 games if table space wasn't so limited. We play maelstrom too, usually a good amount of models too.

I don't see what's taking so much time.

my gaming group did a 44k point apocalypse game (8 player vs 6 players) last month and it "only" took 8 hours

biggest part is know your rules, know your codex, have quick reference sheets available.

lists need to be done for the points total ahead of time. if I agree to an 1850 point game I pull out my take all comers 1850 list for fluff/fuin if that is game desired, competitive, or straight up waac tournament level list (depends on opponent and what they want) I keep lists for 750, 1000, 1250, 1500 , 1750, 1850, and 2k up to date for my main armies printed out in binders for the army I brought that day.

table should either be set or quickly terrained clubs vary but mine we do divide tale into 6 pieces, at least one large piece of los blocking terrain per 1/6 (fairer to assault armies) then small stuff to taste rarely takes more than 5 min of shuffling.

roll for mission type and place objective should be quick and setup / counter deploy should be sub 10 min a side.

I would be shocked if any phase took over 7 min after that and over 20 min per player turn (increase to 25-30 min for 2 player games due to waiting for consulting each other) would be considered slow.

the biggest factor there is many of us know the rules and know the basics of other codex rules for every army. so long as you see the other person's army as wysiwyg or they explain it will rules arguments are few and far between. even then it is usually just a quick book glance and if not found within a min and no other table knows then roll it off though if it is my table I just give it my opponent's favor if I am ahead to help make things closer.

I am just going to echo what other people have said, know your rules, play wysiwyg and be planning in your opponent's turn. Also when moving squads, measure for a couple of them and the rest of the squad just moves up behind. If there is a rules disagreement don't waste time arguing over it, just roll a dice to see which way it goes and check what it should have been after the game (or if it is a universal rule ask the guy at the next table).
That being said most of my 2000 point games do take about 4.5 hours, but only because we let them. That's just how long we tend to have to spend at our flgs and we prefer to take our time over one game (chatting and getting food and such) than try and rush and fit in 2 games.

 roflmajog wrote:
be planning in your opponent's turn.

It's been said a few times, but it bears (bares, barres, Le Bares) repeating. Plan ahead.

I don't play pick up games much, nor many tournaments, but when I have, if the other player start's saying "What to do, what to do?" and stares at the board for 5 minutes, I know we won't be finishing the game within the time limit.

"What do you mean 'What to do?' You had my whole turn to figure that gak out!?"

Speed up a game of 40k? The answer is less points.

If you are inexperienced and need to learn rules. Use less points for less models for less rules to take care of.

Playing against a guy who just takes forever to make a decision? Less points means less models means less decisions to mull over.

Playing in an escalation league and your 2500 point match takes 7 hours? Tough luck bro. There's no timers for some players.

Your first tournament game ends at turn 2 and you lost? Chess clocks would be amazing for this, but requires all attending to be on board.

Points are already part of the game everyone uses. Tone down the points and you'll tone down the time

 gummyofallbears wrote:
I usually play two 1850 games each saturday (our local GW is open 11 - 8) and usually have a ton of extra time for painting or kill team or the such. I could probably play 3 games if table space wasn't so limited. We play maelstrom too, usually a good amount of models too.

I don't see what's taking so much time.

There have been a lot of comments similar to this "what's taking so long" and "there's no way it can take that long".

The difference is, as you've said, you play 2 games every Saturday. Try being a new player (I'm not, but others are) who only gets to play maybe once or twice a month. That's plenty of time to forget that particular unit's Ld characteristic, or what you need to hit in assault with WS3 versus WS5 or whatever. I'm surprised at how many people here are being so dismissive - stating outright that it's just wrong that it takes that long.

There have also been lots of useful comments (no point in me repeating them).

OP, ignore the people who seem to think everyone should know every rule from every faction from their first game. Listen to those giving advice - a lot of it is good. And it's right that knowing rules will speed things up, but you're not necessarily going to remember everything overnight. The more games you play, the quicker you'll get.

(@gummy - I don't mean this to be aimed solely at you, it's just your comment really highlighted the experience factor that many seem to be forgetting)

The WS thing doesn't make sense. The WS chart is very easy to remember. If you are higher than the target, you hit on 3s. If you are equal or lower(but not half) than their WS, you hit on 4s. If their WS is double yours or higher, you hit on 5s.

Ballistic Skill? Rule of 7(7-your BS=dice roll needed. If BS6 or higher, you get a reroll equal to how much higher your BS is above 5. BS6 hits on 2s with a 6+ reroll, BS7 with a 5+ reroll, and so on)

Ld characteristic is something that should take maybe 5 seconds, most of which is picking up your codex and flipping to that handy dandy quick reference chart on the back page.

So yes, it is absolutely unreasonable for a 2k game to take 5-6 hours unless one or both players are total newbs, in which case they should be playing much smaller games.

 Grey Templar wrote:
The WS thing doesn't make sense. The WS chart is very easy to remember. If you are higher than the target, you hit on 3s. If you are equal or lower(but not half) than their WS, you hit on 4s. If their WS is double yours or higher, you hit on 5s.

Thanks for highlighting my point so well - "If you are equal or lower(but not half) than their WS, you hit on 4s. If their WS is double yours or higher, you hit on 5s". So if I'm WS4 and they're WS8, you're saying I hit on 5s. BRB says I'm hitting on 4s.

Turns out it's not that easy to remember, is it?

The last few comments highlight another suggestion that in my opinion every 40k player should have: quick reference sheets.

On 3 sheets of A4 paper you can get 99% of the information you'll need to refer to in any game of 40k.

Start with your codex table of all your units stat lines and your armies weapons.

Tables for to hit and to wound (you should know these off by heart pretty quick but occasionally you'll need to check if S3 can wound T7 and the like.)

While it may seem obvious the BS to hit table and reserve roll table are worth including because you will brain fart sometime and forget them.

The D6 lists for penetrating hits, perils of the warp and deep strike mishap. If it's relevant catastrophic damage and stomp tables for super heavies.

I personally have my warlord traits table included to save time trying to find the damn thing.

You can also include the special codex rules you find yourself looking up on a regular basis

If you don't have the cards i'd also have another page for psychic powers and tactical objectives.

Beyond that i keep editing mine so once i'm certain i know a rule i take it off the sheet, if i find myself checking the same thing - put it on the reference.

If you give someone who just understands the basics of 40k a good reference guide they should be able to play only slightly slower than a veteran who knows the rulebook by heart.