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 aphyon wrote:
No, it is a unit by unit activation for movement and charges* only.

*charges are effectively tank shock where you are forgoing shooting/melee and running into the enemy in the movement phase comparable to 7th edition impact attacks. it allows the enemy a chance to overwatch as the impact attack occurs during the shooting action phase.

all units move and once movement is done all shooting takes place-damage is applied. then all close combat takes place-damage is applied, then cleanup phase takes place- destroyed units are removed etc...

It would make for 40K to be very tactical as to what units move first/last while allowing units to do sometthing at least instead of just being removed from the table because you didn't go first.

Apocalypse does that pretty well already. Alternating activations, where attacks cause blast markers that will be saved against at the end of the round when all moves are done. You don't know if you've done enough to destroy units unless you way overcommit into it before the end phase and they still had their chance to attack.

Unless houseruled, this of course means there is no real drawback to the timing when you activate different things, besides maneuver opportunities and charges et cetera. Some may like it that way.

 aphyon wrote:
No, it is a unit by unit activation for movement and charges* only.

*charges are effectively tank shock where you are forgoing shooting/melee and running into the enemy in the movement phase comparable to 7th edition impact attacks. it allows the enemy a chance to overwatch as the impact attack occurs during the shooting action phase.

all units move and once movement is done all shooting takes place-damage is applied. then all close combat takes place-damage is applied, then cleanup phase takes place- destroyed units are removed etc...



It would make for 40K to be very tactical as to what units move first/last while allowing units to do sometthing at least instead of just being removed from the table because you didn't go first.

This sounds good. So just for clarity, this basically has three phases yes? Moving/Charging, Shooting/Assault Attacks, then Close Combat, all with alternative activation in each phase? And damage is resolved at the end of each phase?

I could see this happily mixing with some of the other ideas: rolling for initiative at the start of the turn for example.

you got it mostly right

each turn would flow like so-

1.roll initiative
2.alternating movement/impact attacks
3.simultaneous shooting-apply damage/remove casualties
4.simultaneous close combat/melee attacks-apply damage/remove casualties
5.cleanup

Now classic battletech being a skirmish game has alot more complex rules in each phase such as modifiers based on firing unit/target movement, weapon range brackets, level of damage received, piloting checks, critical damage, ammo explosions, heat management etc... that do not work with 40K so what you would be dealing with instead in the cleanup phase would be things like leadership checks and such. with this system going back to editions 3-5 for psyker abilities where they are used in the phases they apply to would make more sense.


So by comparison say you alternate actions to move both armies. in the movement phase a unit of genestealers moves into CC range of a squad on intercessors. in the shooting phase the intercessors would shoot. tyranid casualties would be removed as the stealers have no guns they have no return shots(if it was say khorne berserkers they would return fire with their pistols for example). then in melee both the remaining stealers and intercessors would swing at the same time, casualties would be removed and then when the turn ends all LD checks are taken.

You can swap out units and ranges but the mechanics remains the same.


Like i said before- choosing what units move when would become a major tactic of gameplay, but i think players would feel alot better that units actually get to participate in the battle instead of just being removed because of the IGOUGO system.

 Brutus_Apex wrote:
The future is alternating activations.

Please GW, get rid of IGOUGO. It's terrible and skews the game so heavily in favour of first turn/heavy shooting.

Played a game an hour ago, 1000pts...

Tempestus Drop Force, flew a Valkyrie across the board, dropped both Melta squads and their Prime next to the enemy's 2 LRBT - they didn't make it... The game was over before the other guy got his first turn.

LRBT usually come with 24" of screens in every direction lol.

Martel732 wrote:
LRBT usually come with 24" of screens in every direction lol.

That's a LOT of screen. Like, an absolutely ridiculous amount.

Screening exists, screening is something good players do, but 24" deep screens? Even spread out, that's still an INSANE number of Guardsmen.

Sherrypie wrote:Unless houseruled, this of course means there is no real drawback to the timing when you activate different things, besides maneuver opportunities and charges et cetera. Some may like it that way.

That what was I thought before I played Apocalypse, but after playing I found that those maneuver and charge opportunities really do matter. As did one of my opponents, who wasn't expecting a Flyrant and two Trygons to charge his pair of Predators and Land Raider before they got a chance to shoot. Once they were surrounded in melee, they had no chance.

In fact, it was activation order that ultimately decided the game- my teammate shoved a Hierophant between the enemy battle line and the main objective, blocking their movement and allowing us to score the last VP we needed.

We also had a situation where by stalling to activate a Tigershark as late as possible, we were able to force a Knight to come out into the open, providing a shot opportunity that wouldn't have existed if the Tigershark had gone first. Said Tigershark then proceeded to inflict enough damage to instakill the Knight in one shot, while the Knight, having already activated, couldn't return fire.

I think the only case where the timing wouldn't matter is if you're playing two totally static gunline armies with no terrain... And let's be honest, that's an incredibly boring matchup regardless of the ruleset. If there's any movement (and in an objective-based game, there certainly should be!), timing becomes very important- even though the mechanics still allow everyone to shoot before they get wiped off the table.

And I gotta say, I like it. It's such a simple system but it works really well. Change it into chit draw a la Bolt Action and throw it into 40K and I'd be over the moon.

Martel732 wrote:LRBT usually come with 24" of screens in every direction lol.

24"? Certainly not in a 1K game. Scions with the right subfaction can Rapid Fire their Plasma Guns from 15" away. You need at least two full lines of infantry to screen that out, and at that point you're paying more for the screens than for the tanks.

I play a Scion drop army too. I love the concept, but the IGOUGO system means it wins or loses on the basis of a turn 1 drop. The alpha strike is thematically fitting, but it's not terribly fun to play under current 40K rules. A different activation system that turns the drop into a point-blank high-lethality knife fight where both sides are involved- rather than the Scions acting with impunity and then totaling the damage to see if they did enough before the enemy reacts- would make it much more interesting.

@catbarf:

Glad to see people liking it. Just to clarify, I don't mean the timing doesn't matter, because it naturally does on deciding where things are, who gets surrounded and so on, but the nature of damage being applied at the end of round means there is less pressure to get some things done ASAP before your things are dead or neutralized. In contrast with Epic Armageddon, the closest relative of Apoc, where you can wipe out or suppress detachments by attacking them with superior initiative. Apoc is much more forgiving on this front, even if the activation system is still a lot more engaging and strategic than IGOUGO of 40k ever will be (whereas IGOUGO in less shooty games could be, say, Kings of War as an example).

I also like it, Apoc flows nicely and fits that company level itch when the more robust Epic system offers a step above that.

 Sherrypie wrote:
@catbarf:

Glad to see people liking it. Just to clarify, I don't mean the timing doesn't matter, because it naturally does on deciding where things are, who gets surrounded and so on, but the nature of damage being applied at the end of round means there is less pressure to get some things done ASAP before your things are dead or neutralized. In contrast with Epic Armageddon, the closest relative of Apoc, where you can wipe out or suppress detachments by attacking them with superior initiative. Apoc is much more forgiving on this front, even if the activation system is still a lot more engaging and strategic than IGOUGO of 40k ever will be (whereas IGOUGO in less shooty games could be, say, Kings of War as an example).

I also like it, Apoc flows nicely and fits that company level itch when the more robust Epic system offers a step above that.

Gotcha, I understand what you meant now. You are absolutely right re: Epic; it does strongly incentivize initiative as a means of destroying the enemy before they can respond. I'd be quite happy with that model being implemented in 40K (I've ranted quite a bit about how the activation system makes Space Marines actually feel like elite special forces, and not just tougher grunts), but as GW seems allergic to modeling 'soft' factors like C&C in the game, the Apoc approach seems the next best thing.

 catbarf wrote:

 Sherrypie wrote:
@catbarf:

Glad to see people liking it. Just to clarify, I don't mean the timing doesn't matter, because it naturally does on deciding where things are, who gets surrounded and so on, but the nature of damage being applied at the end of round means there is less pressure to get some things done ASAP before your things are dead or neutralized. In contrast with Epic Armageddon, the closest relative of Apoc, where you can wipe out or suppress detachments by attacking them with superior initiative. Apoc is much more forgiving on this front, even if the activation system is still a lot more engaging and strategic than IGOUGO of 40k ever will be (whereas IGOUGO in less shooty games could be, say, Kings of War as an example).

I also like it, Apoc flows nicely and fits that company level itch when the more robust Epic system offers a step above that.

Gotcha, I understand what you meant now. You are absolutely right re: Epic; it does strongly incentivize initiative as a means of destroying the enemy before they can respond. I'd be quite happy with that model being implemented in 40K (I've ranted quite a bit about how the activation system makes Space Marines actually feel like elite special forces, and not just tougher grunts), but as GW seems allergic to modeling 'soft' factors like C&C in the game, the Apoc approach seems the next best thing.

Sign of the times, less games focus on those factors as absolute information rules the day. Having umpired a bit of fully blinded, fog of war'd Epic kriegspiel with friends to pass time in isolation (https://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/list/786958.page), I've come to appreciate how utterly critical reliability and superior initiative is to what makes marines feel like the elites they should be on the tabletop. The other big factor, which weaves into operational reliability, is of course the ability to keep it cool and carry on kickin' while under fire and mounting casualties without getting suppressed too much, which currently is badly missing from GW's main games as they tend more towards board game-ish battle shows than any simulations of war. Oddly enough I don't mind the current 40k morale system as such given the games are small scale skirmishes anyway, but it is a clear point of lost opportunity where faction identities could have been displayed.

Cool, thanks for helping to clarify it. That all sounds good to me. Certainly much better than how things go at the moment. But I’m wondering if it’s possible to simplify things even more so?

Something like this:

Initiative Phase: both players roll off to see who has initiative the turn.
Movement Phase: starting with who has the initiative, both players alternate between moving units. Units can either stand still (possible bonus to shooting), move normally, embark/disembark from a transport, arrive from reserve (including deep striking), charge, retreat (the only move they can make if engaged in combat) or go to ground (so long as enemy units aren’t too close).
Attack Phase: again, players alternate between attacking with units. Units can shoot if enemy units aren’t too close, or attack in melee instead if they are.
Damage Phase: resolve all damage inflicted in the attack phase
Morale Phase: units take morale checks. Could be as it currently is, or it could be a system were units who fail can only perform certain actions.

I know that going through this looks really complicated, possibly stupid, but I’ve played it out in my head and it sorts...sort of.

I prefer not having simultaneous damage, I think that shooting or fighting sequentially is a thing that allows for target prioritization/tactics and unit abilities.

If I were to design the round I think I'd mostly have it work like Killteam. But I don't think I would remove the charge phase or have readying - I want to encourage mobility
A round would be something like:
Initiative roll off - winner chooses move first or shoot first.
Player 1 moves everything (note, units can embark in transports now)
Player 2 moves
Deepstriking and disembarking Starting with P1
Psychic - alternating units
Shooting - Alternate unit activation, starting with P1.
Charges - Alternating units starting with P1.
Fights - alternating starting with player 1, charging units first.

Some stratagems/units abilities would allow you to get out of order sometimes, like delay a units move into the charge phase or force someone to shoot last.

All-at-once movement is to streamline stuff a bit, I think alternating there puts too many things to think about between each unit's move.
Units can get in and out of a transport in a single turn - lets you shuttle folks around more. But if they get out they're potentially exposed to fire.
Part of the idea here is that I want dual-purpose units with CC and Guns to have the chance to shoot and charge, unlike in KT's merged move/charge phase. I want deepstrike to come in after movement so it can catch both players off guard on positioning.

rbstr wrote:
I prefer not having simultaneous damage, I think that shooting or fighting sequentially is a thing that allows for target prioritization/tactics and unit abilities.

Then again, these are not necessarily at odds. My happy medium would probably be sequential firing so that being fired upon lessens the targets ability to fight (pinning, supressing, breaking morale, what have you) so that there is a tangible incentive to take the initiative and give them hell before the opponent does, but not knowing exactly how bad the damage caused is until the end so that the players cannot precision manage every decision on the ground. The way Apocalypse leaves you some doubt as to if any given unit is finished or not unless you totally overkill them is cool, even more so if married to harsher penalties for being attacked first.

 Sherrypie wrote:

rbstr wrote:
I prefer not having simultaneous damage, I think that shooting or fighting sequentially is a thing that allows for target prioritization/tactics and unit abilities.

Then again, these are not necessarily at odds. My happy medium would probably be sequential firing so that being fired upon lessens the targets ability to fight (pinning, supressing, breaking morale, what have you) so that there is a tangible incentive to take the initiative and give them hell before the opponent does, but not knowing exactly how bad the damage caused is until the end so that the players cannot precision manage every decision on the ground. The way Apocalypse leaves you some doubt as to if any given unit is finished or not unless you totally overkill them is cool, even more so if married to harsher penalties for being attacked first.

I totally agree with you in principle, but the problem with 40k is you'd have to record all the kinds of damage (with weird and unique profiles) being dealt in order to resolve it later. Even if neither player rolls any dice until damage resolution at the end, you'd still have to record which unit was shooting which. Apoc gets away with simplifying an entire squad's damage down to one profile because of the scale; giving a squad a bazooka doesn't meaningfully improve their odds against a tank squadron.

This just reinforces that 40k straddles an awkward scale of warfare: it wants to field scores, maybe hundreds, of models in a game, but also wants the details of each model to matter. 40k wants to be a wargame, but can't let go of its hero-hammer/RPG roots. I get it, I grimaced at the idea of annihilating all the detail of my hand-crafted infantry squad when I read the Apoc datasheets. But the more I get caught up on the different GW games, the less I'm interested in playing 40k.

I'm just getting back into the hobby, still slowly working my way through a couple kits. I'm putting together a Kill Team, but beyond that I'll probably skip to power rating 50 Apoc or something and grow from there.

 DarkHound wrote:
I totally agree with you in principle, but the problem with 40k is you'd have to record all the kinds of damage (with weird and unique profiles) being dealt in order to resolve it later. Even if neither player rolls any dice until damage resolution at the end, you'd still have to record which unit was shooting which. Apoc gets away with simplifying an entire squad's damage down to one profile because of the scale; giving a squad a bazooka doesn't meaningfully improve their odds against a tank squadron.

This just reinforces that 40k straddles an awkward scale of warfare: it wants to field scores, maybe hundreds, of models in a game, but also wants the details of each model to matter. 40k wants to be a wargame, but can't let go of its hero-hammer/RPG roots. I get it, I grimaced at the idea of annihilating all the detail of my hand-crafted infantry squad when I read the Apoc datasheets. But the more I get caught up on the different GW games, the less I'm interested in playing 40k.

I'm just getting back into the hobby, still slowly working my way through a couple kits. I'm putting together a Kill Team, but beyond that I'll probably skip to power rating 50 Apoc or something and grow from there.

You're right. This is actually another big issue with 40k: because it can't decide on what scale it wants to play at, we get loads and loads of weapon profiles. But regardless of what these weapons are designed to too, some are just going to be the best, better than all the rest, plain and simple. So everyone gravitates towards them, and the other options never get a look in. So much so, Apocalypse ditches loads of them. So I'm thinking that 40k needs something in-between the full on detail of Killteam and the bare bones detail of Apocalypse. And we shouldn't be afraid to think in very abstract terms either.

Maybe we're all overthinking this? Maybe all we need to do is to take the Apocalypse system and just scale it down slightly? Unit by unit rather than detachment by detachment? Slightly more weapon profiles and rules?

 Future War Cultist wrote:

But regardless of what these weapons are designed to too, some are just going to be the best, better than all the rest, plain and simple. So everyone gravitates towards them, and the other options never get a look in

this is because they failed on the weapon design
if an Anti-Infantry weapon is better at killing tanks than the dedicated Anti-Tank weapon (and that has happend throughout all editions) there is something wrong with either the tank rules or the weapon rules

in 8th the basic defence value are Wounds (the more the tankier) and everything else is just there to add more layers/details and make similar units more different
but there is no rule design that helps against high rate of fire that also does not help against AT weapons

1 shot D6 damage is unreliable and not worth it if a 6 shot D1 damage is better against tanks and infantry

Maybe we're all overthinking this? Maybe all we need to do is to take the Apocalypse system and just scale it down slightly? Unit by unit rather than detachment by detachment? Slightly more weapon profiles and rules?

you would take those things that cost the most times and sum them up
a single AT weapon on a unit that fires on a different target is not the problem, if it is worth using it otherwise it is wasted time

wound allocation, model removal, movement, dice rolling are those steps that cost time and can be shorten without changing the game. With the core mechanic about rolling single dices and only use fast rolling if the outcame does not make a difference is something that costs much more time than needed.
(adding more different save also slows the game down without adding much is the problem that it tries to solve is a basic design problem)

the game was faster in the past and you just need to look what was the difference in 3rd and 8th

Maybe we're all overthinking this? Maybe all we need to do is to take the Apocalypse system and just scale it down slightly? Unit by unit rather than detachment by detachment? Slightly more weapon profiles and rules?

This would be awesome but wouldn't it require alot of book keeping if you started to add more complex weapon stats?

On the subject of Apocalypse I am thinking of completely doing away with the card deck (really don't enjoy cards) and using a cover and terrain system similar to cities of death (soft and hard cover)


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 kodos wrote:

 Future War Cultist wrote:


the game was faster in the past and you just need to look what was the difference in 3rd and 8th

Would you recommend 3rd over 8th? I've only ever played 8th

 Future War Cultist wrote:
Maybe we're all overthinking this? Maybe all we need to do is to take the Apocalypse system and just scale it down slightly? Unit by unit rather than detachment by detachment? Slightly more weapon profiles and rules?

I don't think even that is necessary. You can roughly break up a 40k army by battlefield role since Apoc specialist detachments don't need an HQ each. An Apoc list will look different than a 40k list because those detachments will often be 3 minimum sized squads.

Rocinante wrote:

Would you recommend 3rd over 8th? I've only ever played 8th

I prefered 5th with custom missions

 kodos wrote:

Rocinante wrote:

Would you recommend 3rd over 8th? I've only ever played 8th

I prefered 5th with custom missions

Winning!

i prefer 5th with a few tweaks IE good rules that existed in other editions that would work fantastically in 5th making it even better.

As an "army game" it is still the best incarnation of the game. to date (not to be compared to 2nd which was more skirmish).


think about how good 5th would have been if they had things like grenade throwing, overwatch and snap fire for example.

Honestly, just 5th without Grey Knights and Wound Shenanigans would be my choice too.

 BaconCatBug wrote:
Honestly, just 5th without Grey Knights and Wound Shenanigans would be my choice too.

well i still prefer the GKs via 3rd where they were super special at killing demons and chaos. sacred incense anyone? sanctuary? psycannons ignoring invul saves. etc..


5th still has some of the best and most fun codexes as well.

 aphyon wrote:
...think about how good 5th would have been if they had things like grenade throwing, overwatch and snap fire for example.

Eh? Throwing grenades sure, but snap fire and overwatch both force you to roll a lot more dice for not much more happening and ended up being really abuseable (scatterbikes as anti-aircraft weapons, Tesla weapons still hitting three times per 6, Markerlights for +1 to hit with snap shots...)

 aphyon wrote:

 kodos wrote:

Rocinante wrote:

Would you recommend 3rd over 8th? I've only ever played 8th

I prefered 5th with custom missions

Winning!

i prefer 5th with a few tweaks IE good rules that existed in other editions that would work fantastically in 5th making it even better.

As an "army game" it is still the best incarnation of the game. to date (not to be compared to 2nd which was more skirmish).


think about how good 5th would have been if they had things like grenade throwing, overwatch and snap fire for example.

Different strokes for different folks. 5th was the first edition I actually played, and I got really burnt out on how durable vehicle lists were and how you basically auto-lost once your troops were dead (only troops were allowed to hold objectives back then).

Craftworlders were my first army, and 5th edition was the only edition where their rules were kind of bad. "Good" eldar lists were all about either a bland, unkillable warlock deathstar or about sticking dire avengers in semi-unkillable falcons that spent the whole game zooming around in circles rather than shooting and praying that the game ended while they were floating over an objective. I didn't have the budget or interest for those lists, so 5th was largely about seeing if my opponent could kill my anti-tank guns before I killed theirs. First person to lose the last of their reliable anti-tank generally lost because the rest of their opponent's mechanized army was basically invulnerable at that point.

Spending a lot of extra time fishing for snapshot 6s wouldn't really improve that experience for me. But hey, do what's fun for you and your opponent.

Different strokes for different folks. 5th was the first edition I actually played, and I got really burnt out on how durable vehicle lists were and how you basically auto-lost once your troops were dead (only troops were allowed to hold objectives back then).

Hense the point of taking the best rules from every edition and putting them in 5th. something like objective secured would fix the troops only scoring problem while making troops still important to bring.

Also if you were having that much problem with vehicles it sounds like your lists were not diverse enough. heavy vehicles are SUPPOSED to be hard to kill. which is why every tac squad had a powerfist and melta bomb on the sarg to deal with light or heavy armor(or bugs...always bugs....). i had several friends who ran tough eldar builds in 5th with different lists centered around corsairs, wraiths and saim han bikers


also -

Eh? Throwing grenades sure, but snap fire and overwatch both force you to roll a lot more dice for not much more happening and ended up being really abuseable (scatterbikes as anti-aircraft weapons, Tesla weapons still hitting three times per 6, Markerlights for +1 to hit with snap shots...)

There were alot less shots/wounds and close combat attacks back in 5th so it wasn't as bad as you remember.

let me dig up the combined rules for 5th i have on doc we came up with as a local group at the FLGS.

we still use it-


40K 3rd-7th edition add-ons to improve 5th ed-

.rapid fire weapon rules (6th/7th)

.snap fire(6th/7th)

.new weapon profiles(grav etc..)(6th/7th)

.overwatch(6th/7th)

.objective secure-troops choice(6th/7th)

.CCW AP value(6th/7th)

.grenade throwing(6th/7th)

.fearless-no LD checks(3rd)

.3+ reserves(6th/7th)

.no hull points/formations/stratagems/command points

.flyer rules with 3 exceptions-jump units can assault, -12" range penalty to shooting attacks, immobilize result= destroyed(5th/FW)

.All AA units can choose to fire skyfire or ground fire same as aircraft(5th)

.4th edition vehicle assault rules-movement modified roll-to-hit +armor facing

.6th edition smash for MCs(half attacks rounded up max S 10)

.D/macro weapons-auto pen/wound, no cover or armor- invul only/ 1 damage against MCs/instant death non-MCs/ +1 on vehicle damage chart(5th)

.vehicle squads act as talons, can break and act independent but not reform during game.

.psyker powers used when in the proper phase(shooting attacks in shooting phase, melee in CC etc..) on ld check/selecting the known powers available at the start of the game as per 5th ed rules-includes all 7th edition disciplines.

.snipers-strength 3 always hits on 2+/wounds on 4+/rending on 6+ (3rd/4th)



Now this doesn't negate the IGOYOUGO system but combined with hard cover, difficult/dangerous terrain, random reserves/scatter/outflank, blocking LOS terrain , LOS from weapon mounts on vehicles and ornamental bits like banners not counting for LOS. it makes an already good system in the form of 5th even better while reducing the effect of first turn alpha strike armies. with that being said i still do not like it as much as i like the mechanics for DUST but it made 40K it's own unique system.

It is also why we have alot of players switch over to 30K with modified hull points rules (only loose them on pen hits confirmed on a 4+) and 5th ed psyker rules as it basically does all the above.....and all the units in the 30K army lists are worth taking. none of them feels like a "tax" to play a good army.