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A.T. wrote:

Karol wrote:
Yeah, ok, but what happens after the bug gets found? Most of the time the beta is a ready game or program, and people have been relocated to do other stuff, and the whole thing goes live with all the bugs that were reported durning the beta

If they weren't going to leave anyone on the project to fix the bugs they wouldn't release a beta... unless they were doing it for some other reason than bug testing.

Things will get grouped in into must fix now (game breakers), should fix later (significant issues), might fix if time (minor issues), and 'would be nice if we had the time' (probably won't fix)

Have you seen fallout 76 or the last battlefield? w40k is the same. Whole chunks of rules removed from codex and rule book, to sell as DLC or seson passes. Patchs that don't fix the really broken stuff, but deal with cosmetics or fix stuff that did not need fixing. To me it looks as if GW stops thinking about an army book as soon as they put it out. There is zero communication about what they are planning to do, or what they plan to fix. Now if 8th is great, as other people say, I have no idea how bad other editions had to be.

Ideally? It gets fixed before the full release. Realistically? It gets fixed after the release by a patch. But GW isn't writing software, so it's likely they'll do the former.

Well GK came out in 2017, since then there were 2 CA and god knows how many FAQ. They didn't fix a thing, in fact a lot of the rule book FAQ made GK worse. If all the changes they make are ment to fix GK, then they are doing some 3ed chess tier of design implementation. To me it looks more like they just don't care about some factions. Some faction seem to have rules writen by people that at least knew how they wanted the army to work, and even if the army doesn't come out as world breaking vide Space Wolfs, then at least the book isn't totaly unfun to play.

Karol wrote:
Have you seen fallout 76 or the last battlefield?

Yes. Are you going to try to assert that Games Workshop is that incompetent? Because far as I can tell, the transition from previous edition to this one was greeted with a great deal of applause from even cynical GW-haters at the time, and it's still regarded as one of their best editions balance-wise. I was there, I remember it quite clearly, it was rather exciting to see GW improve that much.

I don't know how GK looked in prior edtion, other then from stories, and you can never trust those. And if you are asking me if I think that GW is incompetent, I don't know. I don't know why they made GK bad and aren't fixing them. I generally struggle to understand people intention in the first place.

If what GK are now is considered good, then I do feel sorry for those people that played in 7th edition. I also now think I know why they sold me the army.

Karol wrote:
I don't know how GK looked in prior edtion

Generally, broken. Either superpowerful or weak and niche. They've gone back and forth. GK are a hard army to balance due to their super low model count.

Wayniac wrote:
Another issue I have with the way GW does beta rules is their beta rules are the result of data, which is good, but their data is often months old by the time they get around to it.

What they really should do is something like Privateer Press' CID (Community Integrated Development) where they frequently look at things and do adjustments, then put forth those adjustments as a public beta test with a way to get feedback, and then take that feedback and decide what to adjust.

CID has its own problems though and Warmahordes players are accusing it of getting power-creepy. It makes sense as the only people who will playtest the CID are people invested in the faction and they'll have a bias towards their own faction. Can you imagine if GW actually let Chaos Marine players influence their rules? OP would be an understatement.

 Sim-Life wrote:

Wayniac wrote:
Another issue I have with the way GW does beta rules is their beta rules are the result of data, which is good, but their data is often months old by the time they get around to it.

What they really should do is something like Privateer Press' CID (Community Integrated Development) where they frequently look at things and do adjustments, then put forth those adjustments as a public beta test with a way to get feedback, and then take that feedback and decide what to adjust.

CID has its own problems though and Warmahordes players are accusing it of getting power-creepy. It makes sense as the only people who will playtest the CID are people invested in the faction and they'll have a bias towards their own faction. Can you imagine if GW actually let Chaos Marine players influence their rules? OP would be an understatement.

That's happened before - i give you the 3.5 Chaos Codex...

Karol wrote:
Have you seen fallout 76 or the last battlefield? w40k is the same. Whole chunks of rules removed from codex and rule book, to sell as DLC or seson passes. / There is zero communication about what they are planning to do, or what they plan to fix.

Yes, I play a sisters army. It can best be described as 'whole chunks of rules removed' and 'zero communication'.

But at this point i'm glad they are beta rules. Ask me again next year I guess, not if the book is good or bad but if they fixed the flagrant issues that would indicate that they actually read the feedback rather than just double-dipping on codex sales.

leopard wrote:

 Melissia wrote:
However, I think GW has done well enough this edition to deserve the benefit of the doubt here.

They are at least trying, with luck they will get better, they just need to learn how their utterings are generally taken and when they mean something to be for experimental testing stick "open play only" all over it

That doesn't work, because then the people that need to test it block it, because they don't like it.

The fact that is becomes a defacto rule is *good*, because it provides more feedback.

GW is doing this 100% correctly, in my opinion.

Beta Rules and the more frequent FAQS/rules updates are good, however I think GW hasn’t fully figured out how to make them user-friendly. In my mind they should have a single download that encompasses all current Beta rules, and lump the “main rules” FAQS into a single document.

There's not much point to calling any rule in 40k a "beta" rule because pretty much all the rules are beta and subject to change at any time, as evidenced by how much this game changes over time.

 alextroy wrote:

The "Better Bolter" Rule only applies to Astartes, which means you feel like GW is making them better and you worst if you aren't playing Astartes. That feels "unfair", even if you know that Astartes are bad for their points.

Most of the animosity I've seen relates to Sisters, but they have Blessed Bolts so it not like they can't have supercharged bolters themselves.

 Daedalus81 wrote:


That doesn't work, because then the people that need to test it block it, because they don't like it.

The fact that is becomes a defacto rule is *good*, because it provides more feedback.

GW is doing this 100% correctly, in my opinion.

Wait, but wouldn't that mean, that the changes in 8th ed in all the errata and CA done to GK were right, by that logic?

 Brother Castor wrote:
Most of the animosity I've seen relates to Sisters

Beta rules have been ... underwhelming.
Since around 5th edition the sisters have seen a lot of their unique stuff handed off to marines and as a faction they are running out of defining strengths. The new bolter rule just shortened their odds in one of the few areas they are still clinging to.

I think lack of incremental changes or feedback from GW during this beta period has just been fuelling a bit of paranoia about them.

Karol wrote:

 Daedalus81 wrote:


That doesn't work, because then the people that need to test it block it, because they don't like it.

The fact that is becomes a defacto rule is *good*, because it provides more feedback.

GW is doing this 100% correctly, in my opinion.

Wait, but wouldn't that mean, that the changes in 8th ed in all the errata and CA done to GK were right, by that logic?

Removed - BrookM

Paranoia is by definition unreasonable fear. GW has had a really good record with the actual Beta process so far:

Battle Brothers: After Beta, they added some detachment options for the units that lack a Faction HQ and would therefore be unable to be fielded outside of Auxiliary Support Detachment

Psychic Focus: After Beta, changed Smite nerf from -1 to Cast to +1 to Warp Charge and exempted Grey Knights and Thousand Sons from the rule.

Targeting Characters: After Beta, cleaned up wording to clarify it less than 10 wounds on profile along with the intended changes.

Deep Strike Issues: After first Beta, they proposed a second Beta rules because they (or we) didn't like how the first proposal worked.

So really, there is no actual reason to fear GW's Beta process in 8th Edition to date. Might change in the future, but for we they have been solid.

 Dysartes wrote:

 Sim-Life wrote:

Wayniac wrote:
Another issue I have with the way GW does beta rules is their beta rules are the result of data, which is good, but their data is often months old by the time they get around to it.

What they really should do is something like Privateer Press' CID (Community Integrated Development) where they frequently look at things and do adjustments, then put forth those adjustments as a public beta test with a way to get feedback, and then take that feedback and decide what to adjust.

CID has its own problems though and Warmahordes players are accusing it of getting power-creepy. It makes sense as the only people who will playtest the CID are people invested in the faction and they'll have a bias towards their own faction. Can you imagine if GW actually let Chaos Marine players influence their rules? OP would be an understatement.

That's happened before - i give you the 3.5 Chaos Codex...

And it wasn't a good thing. At all. If it wasn't for Alessio Cavatore and Andy Chambers, I'd say that Chaos 3.5 is proof positive that the person writing an army book should NEVER be a person who plays that army religiously.

 Just Tony wrote:

 Dysartes wrote:

 Sim-Life wrote:

Wayniac wrote:
Another issue I have with the way GW does beta rules is their beta rules are the result of data, which is good, but their data is often months old by the time they get around to it.

What they really should do is something like Privateer Press' CID (Community Integrated Development) where they frequently look at things and do adjustments, then put forth those adjustments as a public beta test with a way to get feedback, and then take that feedback and decide what to adjust.

CID has its own problems though and Warmahordes players are accusing it of getting power-creepy. It makes sense as the only people who will playtest the CID are people invested in the faction and they'll have a bias towards their own faction. Can you imagine if GW actually let Chaos Marine players influence their rules? OP would be an understatement.

That's happened before - i give you the 3.5 Chaos Codex...

And it wasn't a good thing. At all. If it wasn't for Alessio Cavatore and Andy Chambers, I'd say that Chaos 3.5 is proof positive that the person writing an army book should NEVER be a person who plays that army religiously.

Certainly was the best time for Chaos when it came to customization, and actual fun. And then we got the awful gav dex and that's been it for Chaos being actual Chaos rather then Spikey Marines for a long while.

GW used to produce a Magazine: Citadel Journal. It was all about GW designer, GW team member or Fan created rules and characters. It ran for over 50 issues/10 years.

It was Awesome. Not everything was perfect but it was Beta.

The game has always had that element. If you want to ban it from competitive play....sure go for it...but let the gamers have access to new fun twists and rules, new missions and every conversion and crazy stuff that we can imagine.

 ZebioLizard2 wrote:
Certainly was the best time for Chaos when it came to customization, and actual fun. And then we got the awful gav dex and that's been it for Chaos being actual Chaos rather then Spikey Marines for a long while.

It certainly wasn't fun to be on the receiving end of it. It was so "fun" that handicaps were put in to the main rules SPECIFICALLY to make it less effective.

Eh, it got less targeted then BA's Rhino Rush. Lots of powerful CC got knocked back by some of those rules.

The entire point of these beta rules is to simply give you some insight into what they are thinking and then looking at the reaction to them.

You don't like beta rules? Don't play with them. No one is forcing you to (unless you are at a tournament that is for some reason implementing them).

More information is always better than less information.

 Just Tony wrote:


And it wasn't a good thing. At all. If it wasn't for Alessio Cavatore and Andy Chambers, I'd say that Chaos 3.5 is proof positive that the person writing an army book should NEVER be a person who plays that army religiously.

But why isn't it a good thing?It couldn't be bad because chaos had good rules, was it bad because other armies didn't have fans writing their rules and them ending up kind of a bland? If yes, then the problem never was the chaos rules being good or too good, but other armies rules being horrible. From little I know of eldar were always at least a good army. Did they have an uphill fight vs a chaos 3.5 list?

Karol wrote:
If yes, then the problem never was the chaos rules being good or too good, but other armies rules being horrible.

3.5 chaos had a 10pt upgrade that made characters invulnerable to harm. Such a character could fly around the board summoning daemons directly into combat. It was not their strongest build.
But 3e had a lot of weird stuff like that from the Blood Angels turn 1 mass charges to the eldars disruption tables and invulnerable skimmers.

The classic example of writer gone wrong would be the warhammer fantasy daemons of chaos. IIRC Wards position on the army was along the lines of 'daemons should just be better'.
It goes both ways as Cruddace demonstrated with the 5e sisters of battle dex, if you look at his farce of a progress blog and units like the command squad (copy pasted costs from the marine codex and call the job a good un).

Karol wrote:

 Just Tony wrote:


And it wasn't a good thing. At all. If it wasn't for Alessio Cavatore and Andy Chambers, I'd say that Chaos 3.5 is proof positive that the person writing an army book should NEVER be a person who plays that army religiously.

But why isn't it a good thing?It couldn't be bad because chaos had good rules, was it bad because other armies didn't have fans writing their rules and them ending up kind of a bland? If yes, then the problem never was the chaos rules being good or too good, but other armies rules being horrible. From little I know of eldar were always at least a good army. Did they have an uphill fight vs a chaos 3.5 list?

Think, for a minute, about a simple power level number graph. Say your Warhammer armies were riding between 4-6 on the power level with Eldar and Blood Angels topping that paradigm. Chaos was around 5, not underpowered, not overpowered. Suddenly 3.5 hits and the power level is around 11. Were the other armies weaker/sucky/whatever, or was the Chaos army overpowered? Look at the wargear they had access to as mentioned before, and that was the tip of the iceberg. Bloodletters were essentially overstatted Incubi that could charge the turn they Deep Struck. NO OTHER ARMY had a unit that could do that, let alone the ridiculous wargear involved. I'd love to do a line by line with how borked that codex was, but there are FAR more defenders of that dex that won't sway at all. Universally all were Chaos players, ironically enough

 Just Tony wrote:

Karol wrote:

 Just Tony wrote:


And it wasn't a good thing. At all. If it wasn't for Alessio Cavatore and Andy Chambers, I'd say that Chaos 3.5 is proof positive that the person writing an army book should NEVER be a person who plays that army religiously.

But why isn't it a good thing?It couldn't be bad because chaos had good rules, was it bad because other armies didn't have fans writing their rules and them ending up kind of a bland? If yes, then the problem never was the chaos rules being good or too good, but other armies rules being horrible. From little I know of eldar were always at least a good army. Did they have an uphill fight vs a chaos 3.5 list?

Think, for a minute, about a simple power level number graph. Say your Warhammer armies were riding between 4-6 on the power level with Eldar and Blood Angels topping that paradigm. Chaos was around 5, not underpowered, not overpowered. Suddenly 3.5 hits and the power level is around 11. Were the other armies weaker/sucky/whatever, or was the Chaos army overpowered? Look at the wargear they had access to as mentioned before, and that was the tip of the iceberg. Bloodletters were essentially overstatted Incubi that could charge the turn they Deep Struck. NO OTHER ARMY had a unit that could do that, let alone the ridiculous wargear involved. I'd love to do a line by line with how borked that codex was, but there are FAR more defenders of that dex that won't sway at all. Universally all were Chaos players, ironically enough

4-6? I'm sorry? Altoic "Half your army is gone" Eldar (Not even counting the others) and "Good luck I've won turn one with Turbocharged rhino assaults" Blood Angels? There's some massive bias in there and it's showing. (Yes I play Chaos. )

First off, you'll NEVER hear me sing accolades for those two books. Ever.


Second, what would have been the responsible thing to do as a games design team: replace the overpowered books with something that is more in line with the game's other codices, or to throw the nuclear option down and overpower Chaos past what those two books were?


Third, even at the height of their cheesiness those books aren't as OP as Chaos 3.5 was. There were at least counters to the cheese, whereas you didn't really have counters for what Chaos got.

Overcharging Rhinos? Deploy back instead of nestling up against the table edge. Large armor ahead of your crunchier troops. Tarpit troops. SEVERAL options. ALL of that hinges on BA getting 1st turn, so basically half the time. Past that: SHOOT THE RHINOS FIRST!!!!!!!

Alaitoc Disruption could only affect so many units a game, and that's assuming they threw down every slot they could with the units that generated disruption. THEN you have an army that really can't excel at much of anything that could be steamrollered by ANY other army if run as a combined arms force.

Tell me how there's a counter for veteran skills? For CSMs with the same abilities as Blood Angels without the overcharged Rhinos? For Tank Hunter? For 10 Bloodletters with 4 attacks each with power weapons at St. 5 (may have to double check this with the book at home since I'm at work and going by memory) that appear magically via Deep Strike with no way to whittle them down first and they have 3+ with a 5+ Invulnerable? And I haven't gotten to the overcharging Khorne Bikers.

Karol wrote:

 Daedalus81 wrote:


That doesn't work, because then the people that need to test it block it, because they don't like it.

The fact that is becomes a defacto rule is *good*, because it provides more feedback.

GW is doing this 100% correctly, in my opinion.

Wait, but wouldn't that mean, that the changes in 8th ed in all the errata and CA done to GK were right, by that logic?

I'm unsure what you're getting at. Do you mean the smite nerf that was repealed on GK? Then, yes, absolutely that's how the system should work. They put a test rule out there, people notified them of the issue, and it was corrected.

I tend to agree with the OP to a point. While I know there haven't been a lot of Beta Rules yet, they aren't treated as Beta Rules by GW. I could be mistaken, and please let me know if I am, but I believe every Beta Rule has become an Actual Rule (for lack of a better phrase).

From what I can tell of Beta Rules (regardless of any other concern) is that they aren't Beta Rules. Seems GW calls them Beta Rules but treats them as "Here are new rules that will become permanent. We're just giving you a heads up that they are coming."

If a Beta Rule is put out there that doesn't get put in place by GW, then I may look at the situation differently. But, that hasn't happened yet. Again, please correct me if I'm wrong.

SG

 ServiceGames wrote:
I tend to agree with the OP to a point. While I know there haven't been a lot of Beta Rules yet, they aren't treated as Beta Rules by GW. I could be mistaken, and please let me know if I am, but I believe every Beta Rule has become an Actual Rule (for lack of a better phrase).

From what I can tell of Beta Rules (regardless of any other concern) is that they aren't Beta Rules. Seems GW calls them Beta Rules but treats them as "Here are new rules that will become permanent. We're just giving you a heads up that they are coming."

If a Beta Rule is put out there that doesn't get put in place by GW, then I may look at the situation differently. But, that hasn't happened yet. Again, please correct me if I'm wrong.

SG

The Tactical Reserves rule got heavily modified and put into a second round of beta testing, and the Smite Scaling got changed between the beta rule and final rule.

Sumilidon wrote:
Morning all,

I don't know about you but I find GW's idea of adding beta rules into White Dwarf to be a really terrible idea for several reasons:

It adds to the "bulk" of books to bring
They are mostly untested and could be really overpowered vs existing model cost (that Bolter one for example is a massive boost)
It can cause friction in games

The latter point being for example where you are playing at a club, you want to play your new beta rule because it's a huge advantage and your opponent doesn't. It's a good way to cause friction in a game where the rules should be a constant.

Don't get me wrong, beta missions and scenarios wouldn't be so bad, but look at some of the major impacts previous rules have had / are having:

Deepstriking was heavily nerfed
Spamming units was nerfed
Fly units were nerfed

Ultimately, the above have arguably helped to balance the game, but at the same time demonstrated how such beta rules can have a major impact

What do you guys think?

I think that the "cutting of bulk" for 8th ed is funny.

Thank god for Horus Heresy.