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 auticus wrote:
I would go back to 3rd or 5th edition and play either of those, though with cleaned up codices. For example, I have no interest in playing on a table with 5th edition grey knights or space wolves if they aren't tweaked back into line with the rest of the armies. I got really tired of the color grey back then, and not grey plastic, but everyone running grey knights or space wolves because of their power level compared to everything else.

Wolves were a relatively easy fix - take out the freebies/wargear discounts and rein in the nid-invalidating jaws power and you are mostly done.
GK were an abomination best fixed by updating the DH/WH books and forgetting it existed.
Guard and Crons (and some forgeworld stuff) were the other big offenders of the edition but a few targetted changes would fix the worst of it.

 Da Boss wrote:

 Ishagu wrote:
Try 8th before you decide if it's for you or not

Nah, I had a read through it and watched some games, I am happy with my choice. I think my choice will suit my needs better. In any case, I do not have anyone to play with and would have to rebase my collection to play against strangers, so it is not really an option. I think 8th is over complicated to teach new people, so I would rather a simpler game.

I have been bringing people to the game since 5th and I assure you that this has never been easier than now. You need nothing but the battle primer and the datasheets of the units you have on the board to play your first games. It doesn't get any easier than that.

I'm curious, why do you need to rebase your units?

They changed the base size of units while not changing the impact of base size on the rules, so people get cranky if you do not rebase.

I think it looks quite easy, yes, but not as easy as the game I have chosen. I am pretty happy with it.

Ever since it came out I've thought that Warlords of Erehwon would be a good starting point for the 'Fantasy battles in Space' vibe that exemplifies Warhammer 40K.

A.T. wrote:

 auticus wrote:
I would go back to 3rd or 5th edition and play either of those, though with cleaned up codices. For example, I have no interest in playing on a table with 5th edition grey knights or space wolves if they aren't tweaked back into line with the rest of the armies. I got really tired of the color grey back then, and not grey plastic, but everyone running grey knights or space wolves because of their power level compared to everything else.

Wolves were a relatively easy fix - take out the freebies/wargear discounts and rein in the nid-invalidating jaws power and you are mostly done.
GK were an abomination best fixed by updating the DH/WH books and forgetting it existed.
Guard and Crons (and some forgeworld stuff) were the other big offenders of the edition but a few targetted changes would fix the worst of it.

How does that fix anything for GK players and their armies. SoB are cheaper, so no one would ever run GK. It would be the death of the faction, plus if they really removed a lot of the option, there may be even fewer units to build a GK around then it is now.

What recent rules ban the use of models in a non-tournament environment?

 Kroem wrote:
Ever since it came out I've thought that Warlords of Erehwon would be a good starting point for the 'Fantasy battles in Space' vibe that exemplifies Warhammer 40K.

Would be relatively easy to make Beyond the Gates of Antares work for that I would say.

 Da Boss wrote:
They changed the base size of units while not changing the impact of base size on the rules, so people get cranky if you do not rebase.

I think it looks quite easy, yes, but not as easy as the game I have chosen. I am pretty happy with it.

I have 120+ models on old bases. We have some people still playing their daemons with square bases. Ignore people that bitch about it, because the actual impact is much lower than anyone thinks.

 Da Boss wrote:

 Kroem wrote:
Ever since it came out I've thought that Warlords of Erehwon would be a good starting point for the 'Fantasy battles in Space' vibe that exemplifies Warhammer 40K.

Would be relatively easy to make Beyond the Gates of Antares work for that I would say.

Whilst I'm sure that's true, I've never played that one!

As far as I understand it Bolt Action, Gates of Antares and Warlords of Erehwon all use the same system with Warlords being the latest refinement of the idea.

Well, if legends if to live up to its name, I would like to see rules for old named characters.

For orks:
- Wazdakka Gutsmek
- Nazgred
- Old Zogwort

As well of all the index options that were left out of the codex, that are not few.

Karol wrote:
How does that fix anything for GK players and their armies. SoB are cheaper, so no one would ever run GK. It would be the death of the faction, plus if they really removed a lot of the option, there may be even fewer units to build a GK around then it is now.

Not so much fix the GK as not break the game for everyone else.

Daemonhunters was a very different kind of faction to the power sword wielding ultramarines that 5e gave us, though it certainly was the weakest in 5th. A merger with WH giving them faith points (rebranded word of the emperor or some such) would immediately close most of that gap IMO, especially if some of the parking lot issues of 5th were addressed (+1 to damage rolls while immobile for instance).

Interceptors are really just PAGK with jump packs, paladins and purifiers were just codex creep, all fliers should die, and that just leaves the baby carrier to deal with. It's a lot less work that trying to rewrite the GK book after half the faction was stuffed into a single unit and the 'daemon'hunters became specialist power armour hunters who struggled against things with invulnerable saves... like daemons for instance.

tneva82 wrote:

Fictional wrote:
Would seem more logical to make sure you play with people that let you use Legends in their games, rather than those that start braying like a bunch of Beastmen about "recommendations being absolute rules in all non-Tournament games".

Problem is that you assume people wanting to play with same ruleset are braying like bunch of beastmen.

Not at all, I assume nothing of the sort.

I assume that there are varying levels of people, I just happen to mention the 2 extreme ends, those that are fine with it and those that take all "recommended" rules are absolutely mandatory in all circumstances. Rules such as the "recommended for Tournaments" Rule of 3.

There are also a great many people in between those two groups, but they don't require me to individually identify them.

It is you, Sir, who assume.

ccs wrote:
*Mean that we'd lose access to more recent cool models - the exact problem people with Index units (might) face now, just in reverse.

You say that as if losing access to Mary Sue Marines and Baby Carriers is a bad thing.

Actually, the extreme opposite wouldn't "is fine with it". It would be "braying like a bunch of Beastmen because their opponent asked if they were ok with using that recommendation".

Here's what's really interesting about 40k editions: Pretty much everybody agrees on the biggest flaws of them in retrospect. 3rd edition had gonzo sweeping advance and rhino rush, 4th edition overcompensated with making transports death traps, 5th edition had deeply unsatisfying wound allocation, and 6th/7th were just too complicated. there are plenty of additional problems, but virtually everybody agrees about what was bad in the past.

However... complaints about new or current editions tend to be incredibly specific. Discounting evergreen complaints like balance, the things that people are most passionate about hating in the current edition are all over the place.

So that's why going back to an old edition, or creating a new edition, seems so simple: people conflate what we all agree upon with retrospect with what we would change now. Look at this thread: people dislike things that have high approval ratings in the community overall, like changes in deepstrike. Hell, I've seen people argue for firing arcs back.

My point is, it's easy to point out what you don't like, and it's actually not all that hard to come up with new rules. It's very tough to thread the needle of making enough people happy that people accept it though.

My "favorite edition" is probably 5th, when I started. However I can absolutely confirm that it's exclusively because of nostalgia goggles for the games I played at the time with the units I and my friends had; I would not enjoy playing 5th so much with much of the things present in modern 40k [like Riptides]. I miss the days where it was Vanquishers vs. Hammerheads in tank duels, when having multiple wounds was like a strange Tyranid thing [and being a monster as opposed to a tank was a liability rather than a strength]. But even if we went back to 5th today, those games won't return.

I can confidently say that as far as things go, 8th is by far the best edition I've played.

Yeah, while 5th would probably be my edition of choice to go back to if I had to, it was certainly no perfect ruleset.

Dumb wound allocation rules, the entire stupid concept of Kill Points (as opposed to the earlier Victory Points) began there, vehicle damage rules that meant gun tanks were shut down any time anything met the armor value but left Rhinos to ignore 5/6 glancing and 50% of penetrating results, vehicle shooting rules that turned gun tanks into stationary pillboxes, No Retreat rules that were monstrously punitive, etc. EDIT: forgot 4+ cover for everything all the time

Lots of stuff wrong with that edition, just...less so than other editions

 Vaktathi wrote:
Looking back at older editions, I might be tempted to play 5th again, or 4th with something other than Guard (a seriously nonfunctional army in that edition), but probably not any others. Absolutely not 6th or 7th ever again, nothing of value was lost when that particular era ended (and GW's loss of market share proved it rather decisively). 3rd had a lot of wonkiness that I'm not sure I'd want to deal with in general, playing 2E or RT is essentially a different game entirely.

An increasingly large problem with older editions is that so much new stuff has come out that there's no rules for, and no scale to fit a lot of it, so lots of people's collections don't necessarily work, you lose a lot more going back to any significantly older edition than you gain from retaining any sunsetting Index units. In some ways thats not necessarily a bad thing, but does narrow a lot of things.

As much as I'd like to say I'd want to consider playing a fan-made 9th age format, unless there was significant local support and a venue behind it, can't say I'd be terribly interested.

I would absolutely go back to 5th in a heartbeat. My Daemons wouldn’t suffer any major losses except
Shalaxi would be a regular KoS, Syll’Esske would be a regular DP and the epitome and enrapturess would have to be regular heralds/mounted heralds. No other changes at all. 5th would be a welcome return!

No. 6th and 7th were terrible and Legends only matters for a percentage of tournament play.

Also, Call of duty 4 was the best one. By modern warfare two it was pretty crap.

tneva82 wrote:

Problem is that you assume people wanting to play with same ruleset are braying like bunch of beastmen. But thing is people want to play on same page. If players are playing on different rules then that's kind of hard to play then. Ergo pickup games tends to be under standard rules. Easiest which is tournament rules. If you want to play under non-tournament rules it's basically having to set up ahead. If you go to FLGS and pick up random game often opponent has tournament styled army because that's the general standard. So you wanting different standard is not convenient. Army list needs to be changed. He might not even have models with him to suit that if he just took his standard army with him.

What? Any army adhering to tournament suggestions is perfectly legal under the normal matched play rules, as those suggestions merely add additional limitations. So you play with your non-tournament list and they play with their tournament list and it works just fine. No one needs to change their list, there literally is no problem.

 Eldarsif wrote:

tneva82 wrote:

ccs wrote:
In the end? For the duration of the edition I think it'd just be best if the only time you paid attention to GWs (or anyone elses) tourney rules/suggestions when you were actually in a tourney.

Except those are generally accepted elsewhere either. I would bet most play 1500 or 2000 pts matched play with Ro3 in use for example. Guess what? Tournament rules.

Ultimately it is about finding friends who are willing to play and share the same vision you have for the game. As individuals stuck on this galaxy travelling mothball it comes down to us to find like minded individuals to share a story or two. To establish camaraderie with other journeying souls and experience the deep sense of wonder life can provide when you look in the right places.

For life is nothing without fellow travelers willing to take to the road alongside with us.

Also, legends are MUCH more likely to be considered legal than going non-ro3. I doubt even all tournaments will ban legends.


My guess is it will end up like Maelstrom of War. Not everyone likes it and some people hate it, but it's ultimately considered a perfectly acceptable way to play the game.

 Vaktathi wrote:
Yeah, while 5th would probably be my edition of choice to go back to if I had to, it was certainly no perfect ruleset.

Dumb wound allocation rules, the entire stupid concept of Kill Points (as opposed to the earlier Victory Points) began there, vehicle damage rules that meant gun tanks were shut down any time anything met the armor value but left Rhinos to ignore 5/6 glancing and 50% of penetrating results, vehicle shooting rules that turned gun tanks into stationary pillboxes, No Retreat rules that were monstrously punitive, etc.

Lots of stuff wrong with that edition, just...less so than other editions

I mean, Wound Allocation in 5th had issues but it was still miles ahead of 6th and 7th.

I actually liked Wound Allocation in 5th...it kept units going longer. Plus, Bloodcrushers were actually playable back then with their armor and wound shenanigans.

 BaconCatBug wrote:

ccs wrote:
*Mean that we'd lose access to more recent cool models - the exact problem people with Index units (might) face now, just in reverse.

You say that as if losing access to Mary Sue Marines and Baby Carriers is a bad thing.

If those are the models you own it is. If those are the models your friend has it is. If those are the models the new guy who just joined has it is.

My stance is, has always been, & always will be, in favor of you being able to use the models you own.
I don't care if they're the new gak looking hotness fresh out of the box yesterday or date from the RT days.
The only reason you should stop using a model you own is because you choose to.

So yeah, going backwards? We'd lose more than we'd gain.

That's kind of a pointless argument though isn't it?

If you don't own minis from an older edition then surely you wouldn't go back and play that edition? I doubt very highly anyone has the means to force you to do so.

I still play 2nd edition on occasion, and my buddy has a new Primaris army. It doesn't mean I simply won't play him (if anything he's one of the few people I'll bother playing 8th with).

I am surprised yet amused that the 5th edition is high up on the list as the edition to go to these days for a classical game for a lot of people. I would have thought that 2nd would have been it given the support on other sites for it.

Personally I am a fan of the 5th. On the issue of wound allocation, I always assumed that a guy would "pick up" what the guy that got shot left. So in my mind, a space marine would pick up the flamer when his battle brother was wounded too much to go on and start at the same point. That is pretty common in modern military history, likewise that is why most military personnel get some training on M-2's, SAW's, etc during training,(Basic or Advanced) if not fully qualified to use said weapons. Why would that be different 38K years from now?

For models that were made post 5th or really any edition that you are playing but still want to, I would compare the points of existing units to see what the point inflation or deflation is from edition to edition. For instance I would look at a Land Raider, or Predator for any of the new vehicles that came out for Space Marines in the past few editions i.e. Stormtalons, etc. Now I am well aware that this is not perfect, but it is better than nothing, and subject to tweaking of course.

Support for 2nd is always disappearing simply because of age. How many people on Dakka have really been doing 40K for 20 years or more? I'd argue not a ton.

If you go to an Oldhammer site or community you'll see tons of support for it, but what does the average 25-30 year old even know about 2nd edition? Not much if anything.

ERJAK wrote:
No. 6th and 7th were terrible and Legends only matters for a percentage of tournament play.

Also, Call of duty 4 was the best one. By modern warfare two it was pretty crap.

7th wasnt bad honestly, a few to many special rules (which you could get rid of some of them) but the worst part was the bloat of formations and power creep, its by far one of the my fun editions if you didnt play with D weapons/Formations.


I'm really hoping 9th goes back to USR's, Fly, DS, Scout, etc.. there should be at least a good handfull of USR to make balancing and changing/updating things much easier/more balanced, example right now Walkers (all of them) and MC's NEEDS a USR to let them fallback and shoot, let them fight ruins up to 2nd floor, etc... Do you think a Trygon can not hit you 10ft off the ground? The damn thing is 20ft tall FFS

 Elbows wrote:
Support for 2nd is always disappearing simply because of age. How many people on Dakka have really been doing 40K for 20 years or more? I'd argue not a ton.

If you go to an Oldhammer site or community you'll see tons of support for it, but what does the average 25-30 year old even know about 2nd edition? Not much if anything.

My first game back in 8th since 2nd ip played an ork player. I related a story about how my Squats had killed an actual WAAARGH's worth of Orks. The kid looked at me and said "what's a Squat"? At that point I had to tell him about where the term "Squatting" came from, he thought it was just a saying.

I'm always down to play some RT. The modern game is really missing a GM.

But I guess it would be more like kill team with all the tables to roll on....to see which table you roll on.

For those who seem to understand what I'm getting at, as admittedly my OP wasn't the clearest, Maybe I should break things down a bit more:

What rule set would you prefer to have for the breakdowns of troop types?

Would you prefer...
-5th for vehicles?
-8th for Characters/HQ?
-3rd for Troops?

If a fan-made rule set was to be made, how would you structure the basics according to editions? With the obvious caveat that some points and rules tweaks would be in order to balance the amalgamation of rule sets. The idea would be total inclusivity for past and future units and updates for units as they come out.