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The thing that is needed most, no matter the considerations of what style of rules they commit to, is planning and consistency in their rules. There should be no question as to what aspect of the game a special rule is addressing, period.

That way we don't need FAQs coming along and saying the exact opposite of what the written rules are saying.

I think invul saves should be a modifier to ap. So a terminator would be 2+ armor with a +1 invul vs ap. So that ap2 weapon that is now diminishing the save to a 6+ is partially negated and the term ends up with a 5+ instead.

 Galef wrote:
I'd have serious issues with this. I should not be expection to do ANYTHING that involves online. There is a reason I play 40K and not video games.
Online stuff is great for some, but by no means should it be a mandatory part of the game.

Hardcopy rules need to be an option. And unfortunately that makes "living rules" not very plausible. The other issue with living rules is that is make casual play frustrating as you have to take the time to make sure you know what updates have been made before you play. While FAQs kinda do that now, it would be much harder if the rules could be updated 10 more frequently because they are all online.

Depending on how its executed, I don't think anything about a subscription service would impinge at all on the way you want to play 40k. They'll still releases codexes and whatnot, but those things would be considered more of a "collectors item", rather than a requirement to play, and they will require the user to keep up to date with faq's. Nothing about having a subscription service to the rules would change that or require the subscription to be mandatory. It'll just be a nicer way to play for all the folks that want that, which I bet would be a sizeable portion of their market.

I could live with a more Necromunda-scaled skirmish game than the Apocalypse scaled game 40k has become. I love my big models, but I'd like to go back to the days when the likes of one Leman Russ was a terror on the battlefield.

I was looking through the old 3rd edition rulebook the other day. It was a thing of beauty- clear, concise, beautiful photographs and a little bit of lore mixed in

It would be great if a printed version of 8th was more like this

Changing how D works, or restricting things that can use it at full strength would be nice, maybe giving everything thats not gargantuan size has the D-scythe restriction negating the 6 roll.

Changing how stomp works, I understand its to help with tarpits, but just straight up removing models with no recourse isn't fun.

Vehicles getting blown up on a lucky 6 really grinds my gears. Ive had my monolith last till turn 4 in one game! Amazed it lasted that long.

Having dabbled a bit in AoS, and loving WH40K for its setting more than its rules per se... I give you six items I'd like to see (personal opinion alert!):

Simple to hit modifiers. Such as for size and cover. Maybe for (long) range as well. Having finished kindergarten and a bit more, I know how to add and subtract below and up to 10 and maybe a bit higher.

AoS style damage charts for vehicles, able to even differentiate between contemporary Imperial Rhinos and ancient Chaos Rhinos and show different strengths and weaknesses. Why not give Hellbrutes even an extra attack for being hit (and damaged) over and over, until they topple?

Armour Save modifiers instead of an AP system. and an end to app that AP1/AP2 spam by revising some weapons. Heck, while at it, revise a lot more weapons. Have grav weapons drop a gravity-counter and models in a unit or squadron struck must pass a Strength test or suffer some movement penalty for one turn, after which the counter is removed.

Make leadership count again. Put an end to all the fearlessness shenanigans so that the Fear special rule is, in fact, largely superfluous. I don't think a 'suffer casualties for suffering leadership' style rule is the solution (it, again, removes models faster than you can set them up), but something can be done about psychology in the game.

Far less randomness. I want to use point-buy to get specific psychic powers. Give my warlord one warlord trait of my choice, but balance them against each other. Have first turn be dependent on the Initiative value of the warlord (before rolling dice in case of a tie). That sort of thing. I roll enough dice as is.

Free rules and army lists online, in a living document. I understand all my codices are expensive books, but I'll still have them for their fluff and art and such. Balance issues could be solved in the living part of the rules, by monthly or bi-monthly updates.

I agree almost completely with Xcapobl except for initiative of warlord. First turn and seize the innitiative need their own subset of rules and modifiers and not be tied to a cc characteristic. Creed for instance should be really good at seizing the initiative but doe she look like a guy that strikes faster than a space marine?

 Lord Xcapobl wrote:
Having dabbled a bit in AoS, and loving WH40K for its setting more than its rules per se... I give you six items I'd like to see (personal opinion alert!):

Simple to hit modifiers. Such as for size and cover. Maybe for (long) range as well. Having finished kindergarten and a bit more, I know how to add and subtract below and up to 10 and maybe a bit higher.

AoS style damage charts for vehicles, able to even differentiate between contemporary Imperial Rhinos and ancient Chaos Rhinos and show different strengths and weaknesses. Why not give Hellbrutes even an extra attack for being hit (and damaged) over and over, until they topple?

Armour Save modifiers instead of an AP system. and an end to app that AP1/AP2 spam by revising some weapons. Heck, while at it, revise a lot more weapons. Have grav weapons drop a gravity-counter and models in a unit or squadron struck must pass a Strength test or suffer some movement penalty for one turn, after which the counter is removed.

Make leadership count again. Put an end to all the fearlessness shenanigans so that the Fear special rule is, in fact, largely superfluous. I don't think a 'suffer casualties for suffering leadership' style rule is the solution (it, again, removes models faster than you can set them up), but something can be done about psychology in the game.

Far less randomness. I want to use point-buy to get specific psychic powers. Give my warlord one warlord trait of my choice, but balance them against each other. Have first turn be dependent on the Initiative value of the warlord (before rolling dice in case of a tie). That sort of thing. I roll enough dice as is.

Free rules and army lists online, in a living document. I understand all my codices are expensive books, but I'll still have them for their fluff and art and such. Balance issues could be solved in the living part of the rules, by monthly or bi-monthly updates.

Great suggestions

 Insectum7 wrote:

 G00fySmiley wrote:

agreed, they make sense in some cases the big close combat guys challenge eachother, luscious the betrayer challenges captain sicarius to a duel, the stadium is sold out. meanwhile though I could not see a nob accepting and instead sending a boy in... now's your chance to shine little boy grug, win this and you may have a future! meanwhile I want multiple oomies on my claw.

What?! That's some good ol' Ork cunning right there. I imagine the Nob doing the shifty-eyes right before giving the order.

Another way I envision it I the noble space marine sarg beholden to his men and out of duty and honor raises his sword and calls out a challenge to the nob... who completely ignores him

 Klowny wrote:
Changing how D works,

Vehicles getting blown up on a lucky 6 really grinds my gears. Ive had my monolith last till turn 4 in one game! Amazed it lasted that long.

No, D is fine. WBB and Living Metal needs massive nerfing.

 Klowny wrote:
Changing how D works, or restricting things that can use it at full strength would be nice, maybe giving everything thats not gargantuan size has the D-scythe restriction negating the 6 roll.

Changing how stomp works, I understand its to help with tarpits, but just straight up removing models with no recourse isn't fun.

Vehicles getting blown up on a lucky 6 really grinds my gears. Ive had my monolith last till turn 4 in one game! Amazed it lasted that long.

In 3th and 4th editions there was no Str D weapons and the game was completely fine. And SHV's or GMC's did not exist. Obviously I'm sugarcoating the old editions, but then there wasn't ridiculous nearly indestructible units that could both 1) shoot 1 unit off the table a turn 2) wreck your dedicated cc units in assault. And back then assaulting was much more effective than now.

Mostly I would prefer seeing Str D disappear, and also all the nearly indestructible MC's and GMC's should be nerfed by allowing all the armies to have really hard counter units available.
As extension, the hard counter shouldnt be another MC or GMC, I do not want the game to turn into Godzilla vs. Mothra, the Boardgame.

If GW does adopt the warscrolls/battletomes/GHB model (which I think would be a good idea) I'm hoping that Forgeworld follows suit. They have lots of cool models, but it's hard to spend a bunch of money trying to get an out of print book to use one model and then not have the rules updated for a long, long time.

Don't get me wrong, a lot of the Forgeworld books are cool and I'll probably still buy the ones that have a bunch of the stuff I want in them.

 Dakka Flakka Flame wrote:
If GW does adopt the warscrolls/battletomes/GHB model (which I think would be a good idea) I'm hoping that Forgeworld follows suit. They have lots of cool models, but it's hard to spend a bunch of money trying to get an out of print book to use one model and then not have the rules updated for a long, long time.

Don't get me wrong, a lot of the Forgeworld books are cool and I'll probably still buy the ones that have a bunch of the stuff I want in them.

Good point! I just recently bought Chaos Dreadclaw, as kind of dual-purpose as it's pretty handy also in 40k, but mostly for 30k. Now I am worried that it might get invalidated from future 40k edition by having no rules update. The FW should follow the suit.

Ghorgul wrote:

 Klowny wrote:
Changing how D works, or restricting things that can use it at full strength would be nice, maybe giving everything thats not gargantuan size has the D-scythe restriction negating the 6 roll.

Changing how stomp works, I understand its to help with tarpits, but just straight up removing models with no recourse isn't fun.

Vehicles getting blown up on a lucky 6 really grinds my gears. Ive had my monolith last till turn 4 in one game! Amazed it lasted that long.

In 3th and 4th editions there was no Str D weapons and the game was completely fine.

And in 3rd and 4th Edition Living Metal was really broken making the Monolith the hardest to kill Vehicle in the game. Lance was completely ignored and anything which added dice to the Armour Penetration Roll was ignored. The only things that really scared a Monolith were Phase Out and Tau Broadside Squads.

Ghorgul wrote:

 Klowny wrote:
Changing how D works,

In 3th and 4th editions there was no Str D weapons and the game was completely fine.

More importantly, at the start of 3rd Edition, there were neither Necrons nor Tau, and that alone made the game immeasurably better. Remove Necrons entirely, and I'll give up D weapons.

 JohnHwangDD wrote:

Ghorgul wrote:

 Klowny wrote:
Changing how D works,

In 3th and 4th editions there was no Str D weapons and the game was completely fine.

More importantly, at the start of 3rd Edition, there were neither Necrons nor Tau, and that alone made the game immeasurably better. Remove Necrons entirely, and I'll give up D weapons.

There were Necrons, they just didn't get a stand alone codex till later


Necrons were also in 2nd ed

Speed up the game! Several things can easily be changed to speed the game up. To name a few, remove cover saves and replace them with BS modifiers, remove or make Initiative test mandatory for Overwatch, remove the 7th turn altogether, remove random WL traits and Psychic powers. All of these could cut an hour or more out of every game!

 Mr Morden wrote:
Balance would be nice.

Updated rules for all Factions from day one.

Yeah, really this more than anything else. Incorporating the comment with a unified design vision.

Don't with the power level of factions halfway through an edition. I never expect the dozens of units across all armies to be truly balanced (way too many to be possible, IMO), but at least they can get as close as possible by taking everything into account from the get-go. They need to stop coming up with rules for models based on what they think is cool. As neat as that process is, the result is either a dud or a home run. They need to take into account units the army already has and how the new one fits in, how the prospective rules may be under/overpowered, and so on. As great as the rule of cool is, they've really got to go beyond that.

Cover as BS modifiers works only model-to-model interaction, not unit-to-unit like we have now.

It works fine in 2nd ed, it works in skirmish games like necromunda, but it will not work in current state of 40k.
Imagine the situation - unit of 5 marines is shooting at 10 guardsmens. From marine1 point of view there are guardsman2 and guardsmen5 in cover, but the closest model - guardsman1 in open ground, so his first shot will be at full BS, but if this first guardsmen will die, the second is in the cover, so for the second shot marine1 has -1 BS and go on. Too long, too complex, never happen.
Ofc we can use abstract cover system, so if the XX% of the models are in cover, then the entire shooting unit has BS penalty, but such system is pretty dull and still has point of view problem.

So it is better to leave cover as saving throw (perhaps the one after the failer armor save, like you always can have 2 saves - armor save and invul/cover save). This way guardsman1 has only armor save, while guardsman2 can rely on additional 5+ after failing his armor. Lets say the model has cover save only if it is covered against all shooting models. Easy and no measuring ordeal.

Or we can use AOS covers - save midifiers. Guardsmen in cover has 4+ save. Nice and simple.

I don't mind online rules if they are easily accessed by any device. (Like a PDF file, or posted on the web) What I hate is the e book system. I don't mind paying a few bucks for an e book, but I am not going to buy an overpriced Apple device just to play some stupid game. I pretty much figure it's going to take some type of tablet/phone/Mac to even stay in the game when 8E drops. I already am locked out of the upgrades to Space Hulk. (i Tunes only) They need to keep the PC in the loop as well as the Apple stuff. Otherwise, the only way to get the rules is to wait for a Russian website to hack and post it.

I would like to see named units get a unnamed nit classification so that named units could be taken (for the appropriate amount of points) in formations where it would make sense.

Example: Orikan the Diviner - Cryptek.

Anything that would require you to take a cryptek would allow you to choose Orikan with any/all other restrictions being observed.

Do the same for named chapter/company masters. Commissars.


It would allow new characters to be added to the game as it expands without needing to write all new formations and the like to include them.

Like the keyword feature in AoS.
I dig that.

 Lord Xcapobl wrote:
Having dabbled a bit in AoS, and loving WH40K for its setting more than its rules per se... I give you six items I'd like to see (personal opinion alert!):

Simple to hit modifiers. Such as for size and cover. Maybe for (long) range as well. Having finished kindergarten and a bit more, I know how to add and subtract below and up to 10 and maybe a bit higher.

AoS style damage charts for vehicles, able to even differentiate between contemporary Imperial Rhinos and ancient Chaos Rhinos and show different strengths and weaknesses. Why not give Hellbrutes even an extra attack for being hit (and damaged) over and over, until they topple?

Armour Save modifiers instead of an AP system. and an end to app that AP1/AP2 spam by revising some weapons. Heck, while at it, revise a lot more weapons. Have grav weapons drop a gravity-counter and models in a unit or squadron struck must pass a Strength test or suffer some movement penalty for one turn, after which the counter is removed.

Make leadership count again. Put an end to all the fearlessness shenanigans so that the Fear special rule is, in fact, largely superfluous. I don't think a 'suffer casualties for suffering leadership' style rule is the solution (it, again, removes models faster than you can set them up), but something can be done about psychology in the game.

Far less randomness. I want to use point-buy to get specific psychic powers. Give my warlord one warlord trait of my choice, but balance them against each other. Have first turn be dependent on the Initiative value of the warlord (before rolling dice in case of a tie). That sort of thing. I roll enough dice as is.

Free rules and army lists online, in a living document. I understand all my codices are expensive books, but I'll still have them for their fluff and art and such. Balance issues could be solved in the living part of the rules, by monthly or bi-monthly updates.

I will only ever support point #5 if they heavily need Invisibility or outright remove it from the game. Deathstars can learn to play the same game as everyone else and actually deal with the high risk of putting all their eggs in one basket, instead of being rewarded heavily for doing so. It is the auto-include to end all auto-includes. Daemonology powers may need a bit of tweaking to prevent too much OP-ness.

spite
That or make it cost 200 points per Psyker that takes it.
/spite

Adding a set point cost per power allows them to bring balance, where powers that are considered meh right now would have to be low cost, and game breakers (I guess you have that opinion about Invisibility) would get high cost. I agree fully, there. Not up to 200 points per psyker taking it, fully, but quite full indeed.
Right now some psykers cost, for example, 75 points and get meh powers, others cost the same 75 points and break both fun and games.

Silver144 wrote:
Cover as BS modifiers works only model-to-model interaction, not unit-to-unit like we have now.

It works fine in 2nd ed, it works in skirmish games like necromunda, but it will not work in current state of 40k.
Imagine the situation - unit of 5 marines is shooting at 10 guardsmens. From marine1 point of view there are guardsman2 and guardsmen5 in cover, but the closest model - guardsman1 in open ground, so his first shot will be at full BS, but if this first guardsmen will die, the second is in the cover, so for the second shot marine1 has -1 BS and go on. Too long, too complex, never happen.
Ofc we can use abstract cover system, so if the XX% of the models are in cover, then the entire shooting unit has BS penalty, but such system is pretty dull and still has point of view problem.

So it is better to leave cover as saving throw (perhaps the one after the failer armor save, like you always can have 2 saves - armor save and invul/cover save). This way guardsman1 has only armor save, while guardsman2 can rely on additional 5+ after failing his armor. Lets say the model has cover save only if it is covered against all shooting models. Easy and no measuring ordeal.

Or we can use AOS covers - save midifiers. Guardsmen in cover has 4+ save. Nice and simple.

Actually the opposite is true, it doesn't work model to model (like we have now) it only works unit to unit. You are arguing that cover would be determined model by model, not by unit. It would be simple to say cover is determined by unit. If the majority of the squad is in cover the unit has cover. Then add focus fire, so you can choose to fire on only those models that don't have cover if you want. This means that if there are 10 guardsman and 9 are in cover, but one is not, you likely accept the penalty to your shooting, but if 6 are in cover and 4 are not you may choose to shoot only the 4 not in cover, giving up on wounding the 6 in cover, but forgoing the negative modifier.

I would actually like that a lot, it adds a lot of depth to the decision making in the shooting phase.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Lord Xcapobl wrote:
Adding a set point cost per power allows them to bring balance, where powers that are considered meh right now would have to be low cost, and game breakers (I guess you have that opinion about Invisibility) would get high cost. I agree fully, there. Not up to 200 points per psyker taking it, fully, but quite full indeed.
Right now some psykers cost, for example, 75 points and get meh powers, others cost the same 75 points and break both fun and games.

Yup, points costing powers is the best option. My only issue with it is that powers are not worth the same to all psykers or all armies.

Breng77 wrote:


Actually the opposite is true, it doesn't work model to model (like we have now) it only works unit to unit. You are arguing that cover would be determined model by model, not by unit. It would be simple to say cover is determined by unit. If the majority of the squad is in cover the unit has cover. Then add focus fire, so you can choose to fire on only those models that don't have cover if you want. This means that if there are 10 guardsman and 9 are in cover, but one is not, you likely accept the penalty to your shooting, but if 6 are in cover and 4 are not you may choose to shoot only the 4 not in cover, giving up on wounding the 6 in cover, but forgoing the negative modifier.

I would actually like that a lot, it adds a lot of depth to the decision making in the shooting phase.

Issue with that though is if say you need 50% in cover, if you have 4 in and 6 out the 4 in get zero benefit from being in cover.
I believe cover worked this way in 5th and it wasn't the most popular.

However, model-model cover that we have now still falls apart since shooting is done per unit, so if a model in in cover from the left side of the shooting Tactical squad but not the right, what does that mean?

I've been giving it a lot of thought when it comes to what I want in 8th edition. Having played 40k since early 2000, I've seen the game bloat to massive proportions.

1. Simplify. Even as a veteran player I get lost in the rules some times. DO NOT take this too far. I play miniature wargames because of a level of complexity. I am not looking for an alternative to CandyLand. Something like a smoother, streamlined 3rd edition would be great. I could see 25 pages of rules (not counting illustrations or missions)

2. Speed up the game a little. Certain aspects of the game are horribly bogged down. Psychic phase and assault are possibly the two worst offenders. I liked the rumor I heard of getting rid of templates. It would mean less worrying about model placement and spreading things out.

3. Clear and consistant proof-read rules. While day-one FAQs are nice you shouldn't need any FAQs to play a game.

4. Internal and external balance. Why would you take a Gorkanaut in an Ork army currently? Also, compare Gorkanaut with a Wraithknight, LOL

Ghorgul wrote:
In 3th and 4th editions there was no Str D weapons and the game was completely fine.

Wraithcannons in 3rd were basically S D.

"What would you most like to see added/changed in 8th Edition 40K?"

The rules.