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Yes to all of those and yes it often creates very negative experiences unless you can get behind “thats just how the game works do i deal with it”

Karol wrote:
Not a AoS player, so maybe the question is going to be dumb. But wouldn't something like a double turn create huge problems with armies that can go all in on magic, shoting or getting where they want real fast

Yes, which is part of the problem. Even close combat heavy armies get it good because whilst close combat itself alternates who starts player to player; if you get two turns in a row you can maximise the targets you initiate combat with. You can go for the archers or the weaker units and pick the best fights to win and avoid those you might not come off to well in.

Wayniac wrote:
Funnily enough everyone I've spoken to don't use the Apocalypse rules at all. They haven't said they hate them but just use normal 40k rules with huge points which I find stupid since the whole point of the Apoc rules is to streamline and speed up big games so they don't take an entire day or more.

I doubt GW will ever get rid of IGOUGO, it's too ingrained in their design philosophy for the main Warhammer games. What I would like the most is for the double turn to become an optional rule so you have the choice to use it.

Did they actually play Apoc or look at the rules? B.c i know a lot that hasn't played but looked at the rules and said "looks bad" and never even tried. About the seed, it heavily does speed it up. We were able to do 2x the points in the same amount of time even with more models on the table. I played nids, with 30 Gargoyles, 100 gants, 60 Hgants, 60 Genestealers, 30+ was warriors/warrior size units (Hive guard, Tyrant guard, Venomthropes, Zoanthropes) and another 12 MC's. In total about 300 models.


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Karol wrote:
Not a AoS player, so maybe the question is going to be dumb. But wouldn't something like a double turn create huge problems with armies that can go all in on magic, shoting or getting where they want real fast. I get that if two bad armies plays vs each other it maybe doesn't matter much. But if someone can, or has to, counter a specific important unit or hero, this creates a very negative expiriance, when some drops down you can't do anything about them getting two turns of doing their thing, other then pray for bad rolls. And the fact that next turn you may get double turn yourself, doesn't matter as much, I think, if your army is already crippled.

It does if the two players are not experienced. Practicing for adepticon even with double turns i still won 90% my games, heck i went 1st more than second b.c they didn't want me to get a double turn (I was using a leafblower style army basically). Normally you don't put yourself in a position that makes you lose the game if they get the double turn. It is very hard to do for new players and for certain armies. But in general you play thinking you will be double turned on and it goes a lot better. I've haven't had a bad double turn in many games b.c of that. Its more just frustrating its in the game at this point.

PS: I practice all learn for the event and even bought an army just for it and now its cancelled

But back onto topic, it feels REALLY bad if you won b.c of the double turn, just for that i can't believe its part of the game, GW is more about the casual player, and double turns hurt them the most.
.

I'm not a fan of it. I've suffered major defeats due to it, and I think it sucks that you can loose the entire game just because you've literally had 1 bad roll. It's another one of those stupid random for the sake of random mechanics I don't much care for.

I've been working on a rules system of my own, as a stepping stone to my own game but atm it's good to 'practice' it on AoS. It uses Command Points as activation points for your units, with alternative unit activation. You still roll for initiative every turn, but that's only to see who gets to activate first. The aim is to cut down on the alpha strike and keep both players in the game at all times as much as possible.

Karol wrote:
Not a AoS player, so maybe the question is going to be dumb. But wouldn't something like a double turn create huge problems with armies that can go all in on magic, shooting or getting where they want real fast. I get that if two bad armies plays vs each other it maybe doesn't matter much. But if someone can, or has to, counter a specific important unit or hero, this creates a very negative expiriance, when some drops down you can't do anything about them getting two turns of doing their thing, other then pray for bad rolls. And the fact that next turn you may get double turn yourself, doesn't matter as much, I think, if your army is already crippled.

Yes, that is the primary issue. Especially when a skilled player is running said magic/shooting army, a double turn becomes game ending. I would know---that is exactly how my tourney army worked in first edition. It was set up to secure turn choice every game, I would always choose second, and if I won the first initiative roll I basically won the game automatically. In my entire history playing that army only three times did I get the double turn and lose, two were because of 'derp' mistakes on my part. I lost plenty of other times with the army, but they were games where I did not win the double.

Karol wrote:
Not a AoS player, so maybe the question is going to be dumb. But wouldn't something like a double turn create huge problems with armies that can go all in on magic, shoting or getting where they want real fast. I get that if two bad armies plays vs each other it maybe doesn't matter much. But if someone can, or has to, counter a specific important unit or hero, this creates a very negative expiriance, when some drops down you can't do anything about them getting two turns of doing their thing, other then pray for bad rolls. And the fact that next turn you may get double turn yourself, doesn't matter as much, I think, if your army is already crippled.

I haven't played against a Disciples of Tzeentch (arguably one of the most magic based factions) too many times, but I found AoS magic doesn't generate tons of damage easily. Even the Smite equivalent, Arcane Bolt, does less damage. Then again, nearly all my Slaves to Darkness army has a +5 resistance to Mortal Wounds with Runic Shields/Armor. So I might be bias. Honestly, I focus on buffing spells for the most part, so I glad to have Double Turns used against me sometimes as I don't have to try and recast the buffs again.

Shooting is straight up annoying since I army has no ranged attacks not counting magic or 'summoning' Warcy Cults. However, I feels like mass Shooting doesn't hit as often as is does in 40k even though I think -1 Rend seems to occur a little bit too often at Range (or I haven't been playing on tables that provide as much Cover as the game is intended). At the same time, I haven't encountered ranged units that weren't push overs in melee. And I think Age of Sigmar is still a primarily melee game. Double shooting makes it a little worst on me, but not by much. Even being focused fired upon, I don't usually lose more than 6 wounds from main units. With Look Out, Sir!, even my weaker Heroes (and I have a few) can survive an double turn onslaught. I don't really think they are force multipliers effective enough to necessarily warrant that amount of resources to take them down. I lose a Sorcerer Lord or Chaos Lord on foot, and I lose Fearlessness (Chaos Undivided) and basically the ability to attack twice (whether and actual double attack or re-roll hits/wounds). Realistically, my army has low damage out put so I don't really do that much damage even with the double attack and they are fairly resilient so I tend not to loose warriors in droves having me fail Bravery checks.

The Double Turn is not equally good across all factions. My army is only really affected by Movement Phase as I have a fairly slow army. For Battleplans (read: Missions) with known static objectives even that doesn't bother me as my Chaos Warriors will run to them and basically form square around them with my Hero Character in the center of the square. My Warriors don't really care to be the ones charging. The job is to be as tough as old boots and hold the ground they have. My knights/Varanguard are a little different in that I would like to have the Initiative to activate them before their target's can activate (AoS has alternating activation for melee combat if you aren't aware). Especially my Cursed Lance Knights which I don't like fielding becuase they need the Charge just to maybe be as good as my Ensorcelled Weapons Knights. In games with moving or unknown objective locations the double turn can really swing the game for me.

I wonder if, outside of player skill variation, another thing that has "masked" the doubleturn for a while is the fact that until recently, not all armies were running 2.0 editions. It might be that with many armies running under-powered players losing with them were attributing it more toward having and out of date tome, rather than perhaps getting a double turn used against them.

With the game now fully running with 2.0 rules it might be that eventually more players start to realise that the doubleturn does swing win results very significantly in favour of whoever gets it.

 Saturmorn Carvilli wrote:

I haven't played against a Disciples of Tzeentch (arguably one of the most magic based factions) too many times, but I found AoS magic doesn't generate tons of damage easily. Even the Smite equivalent, Arcane Bolt, does less damage. Then again, nearly all my Slaves to Darkness army has a +5 resistance to Mortal Wounds with Runic Shields/Armor. So I might be bias. Honestly, I focus on buffing spells for the most part, so I glad to have Double Turns used against me sometimes as I don't have to try and recast the buffs again.

I wasn't thinking about killing stuff with spells, or not just that. I was more thinking about something like summoning. Powerful demons running amok for two turns, and summoning what is best suited for two turns, would be like playing against an army and a half, specialy if your own army doesn't summon.
But am basing this on seeing AoS being played on a table next to me playing w40k, so I doubt what am saying here is super accurate.


So if the double turn mechanic exists there as a gatcha thing, so that even someone with a bad army or bad skill has a chance to win. doesn't it require a real lot of games to be played to feel that way? the chance of getting double turn, and not getting one is the same for all players right? this means someone with a weak army or who is a noob, get the chance to win half the time, but half the time he gets steam rolled even harder. And as others said there are probably difference between armies too. An army that uses its double turn to shuffle some units around or fight an extra melee or two, won't benefit from it as much as one that rises itself up from being dead with summoning. seems like a very swining mechanics, good when your lucky and your army is good, but not so fun when it is not the case.

Are there many armies in AoS that can't counter double turns, Like ones that are slow or who don't have chaff to screen the whole army?

It is also affected by the relative strength of battalions. Some armies have army encompassing battalions made up of their best units with excellent benefits across them while some armies have few/none worth including.

This hurts even more when it also gives the advantaged race the choice of initial turn order.

Karol wrote:



So if the double turn mechanic exists there as a gatcha thing, so that even someone with a bad army or bad skill has a chance to win. doesn't it require a real lot of games to be played to feel that way? the chance of getting double turn, and not getting one is the same for all players right? this means someone with a weak army or who is a noob, get the chance to win half the time, but half the time he gets steam rolled even harder. And as others said there are probably difference between armies too. An army that uses its double turn to shuffle some units around or fight an extra melee or two, won't benefit from it as much as one that rises itself up from being dead with summoning. seems like a very swining mechanics, good when your lucky and your army is good, but not so fun when it is not the case.

Are there many armies in AoS that can't counter double turns, Like ones that are slow or who don't have chaff to screen the whole army?

I feel the double turn is most useful at the time between Round 1 and Round 2 which is something a player does have some control of. In Age of Sigmar who ever finishes deploying first get to chose who goes first. That why when people are talking about optimization they talk about drops. Also in Age of Sigmar Battalions (kinda like Detachments you spend extra points to receive bonuses) also count as a single drop. They, apparently, are so important some players want to be able to spend 160 points or so just to have a generic Battalion to reduce drops and get an extra Command Point. Mind you, CP aren't nearly as plentiful or easy to get in AOS as they are in 40k. Even I like spending the extra 50 points for the one CP you can straight up buy so I can both summon a Warcry Cult and make use of my Chaos Warrior on foot Command Ability to allow a unit to attack twice in a single round.

There really isn't anyway to counter a double turn in my opinion. Hence the distaste of them in addition to how much they can swing a game. There are just factions/armies can that can survive them better than others. My army can, my most common opponent's armies (Kharadron Overlords and Tzeentch) can't really. So if I go second Round 1, get a double turn and pull off some good charges I can cripple his army while setting mine to secure the win conditions (usually some sort of objective) that he'll probably never talk away from or it will be far too late to catch back up. We had one game he conceded at the mid-point of Round 2 as he made a few mistakes pushing too far forward and with the double turn I basically broke his army and had nearly secured all objectives that he was probably never going to get me away from other than maybe one.

As for chaff, yeah my opponent probably should have something to screen me better. At the same time, my army can generate a lot of reliable (re-rolls is my faction's thing) if weak (No Rend) attacks that can usually punch through chaff. Conversely, I can teleport/ summon Warcry Cults to basically deep strike to tie him up too. I also have access to flying units to get around them if they don't screen well.

None of that is special to my army either. In fact, competitively speaking, my army is rather weak. I think I mostly win because I know how to execute the best plan for it win when my opponent doesn't. I think most players after regular play of Age of Sigmar will be able to beat consistently as I already feel like I am at the ceiling of my army can do. That ceiling is a long ways from what even a strong army can do even by a player that makes mistakes. I am genuinely surprised every win I get.

Again, I really don't have any issue with the Double Turn. I don't like it but don't care that it exists in the game either. It is just a thing that is. If I had to side, I would probably say get rid of it as I can definitely see how dismantles some factions with really no way to prepare for it.

I was more thinking about something like summoning. Powerful demons running amok for two turns, and summoning what is best suited for two turns, would be like playing against an army and a half,

In some cases double your army. Which is why I have been 100% anti-summoning how GW lets you summon since they let it be free summoning, and why its one of my barriers of wanting to play.

I've watched that scenario you've described many times. It feels dirty and it doesn't feel like much of a fun game unless you can summon equal amounts.

Otherwise it turns the game from a 2000 point affair to upwards of 3000 - 4000 pts vs 2000 points (depending on the army that is spam summoning and especially given a double turn to double the pleasure double the fun)

The thought of having to play 3000 or 4000 pts vs 2000 pts as an actual "balanced matched play" game baffles me. For special scenarios - absolutely. Siege games were often this, the attacker got double the defender because of the walls. But for normal games? Absolutely no.

Please don't talk about summoning here, if you want to talk about that go to another thread, or make 1 just for it. B.c i fully feel summoning is that bad and only new players or non-experience ones has problems with it.
For example Enlighten on Disks are more costly than Morrsarr Guard, but Morrsarr guard are better in every way, they even get better supporting rules, then why are TEoD more costly? B.c they can be summoned. Its the values of Rules plus points, not just straight points. IDK are still a top tier army and they don't summon for that reason)

This is suppose to be about double turns, if you rant about 1 aspect that effects doubles turns, then talk about them all like "fight first" or "fight twice" or "healing" i know some people take 2-3 healing spells with Life swarm just to heal 3++/5+++ units. Sure its not competitive, but against an inexperience player its deadly to have a tank unit hold the line, or Horrors for example, phoenix guard works too, etc..

So if you don't want to have a back and forth rant, lets top now.

Edit: englsh bad sorry.

That would indeed be a great thread. How someone could explain how 4000 pts vs 2000 pts is a good thing for a balanced matched play system.

If someone wants to create that thread, that'd be awesome to read.

Wayniac wrote:
Funnily enough everyone I've spoken to don't use the Apocalypse rules at all. They haven't said they hate them but just use normal 40k rules with huge points which I find stupid since the whole point of the Apoc rules is to streamline and speed up big games so they don't take an entire day or more.

I doubt GW will ever get rid of IGOUGO, it's too ingrained in their design philosophy for the main Warhammer games. What I would like the most is for the double turn to become an optional rule so you have the choice to use it.

Very few people use the Apocalypse rules because they have to invest in what amounts to a new game boxset, as opposed to just a rulebook, then learn what is 'technically' sold as a game unto itself (like Kill Team).

The fandom in general is just really uncomfortable about using any kind of additional rulesets, which is why things like Cityfight never appear outside of one guy convincing his mates to test the rules as a one-off.

 Arbitrator wrote:

Wayniac wrote:
Funnily enough everyone I've spoken to don't use the Apocalypse rules at all. They haven't said they hate them but just use normal 40k rules with huge points which I find stupid since the whole point of the Apoc rules is to streamline and speed up big games so they don't take an entire day or more.

I doubt GW will ever get rid of IGOUGO, it's too ingrained in their design philosophy for the main Warhammer games. What I would like the most is for the double turn to become an optional rule so you have the choice to use it.

Very few people use the Apocalypse rules because they have to invest in what amounts to a new game boxset, as opposed to just a rulebook, then learn what is 'technically' sold as a game unto itself (like Kill Team).

The fandom in general is just really uncomfortable about using any kind of additional rulesets, which is why things like Cityfight never appear outside of one guy convincing his mates to test the rules as a one-off.

Which in a rather funny twist, Cityfight provides additional rules that resolve a lot of common complaints about the game. By no means perfect, it is a step in the right direction for helping balance, and deepen 40k's gameplay with improved and meaningful terrain rules and makes melee units stronger. However, getting back to AoS.

Personally, I'm all for trying out whatever weird additional rules I find or are put out in some official manner, like the Siege rules in Wrath of the Everchosen. Had a great game with them where there were three people who wanted to game at my group's last meet up, so we did a big 2v1 of Khorne Mortals and Nurgle Daemons vs Ossiarchs in a siege. I abnormal games every now and again to try out different things, because the mission objectives don't vary the actual gameplay up enough. My test match of having no Double turn/Initiative roll off also included rolling for first turn (+1 to roll for finishing alternate deployment first) and rolling for first control of Endless spells at the start of battle rounds. Next time I try without Double Turns, I think I'd rather play around with sole control of Endless Spells for the player that bought them.

The issue comes in convincing others to try it, as others said earlier.

Those rules do look cool, but discussing them is for another thread I'm afraid.


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 auticus wrote:
That would indeed be a great thread. How someone could explain how 4000 pts vs 2000 pts is a good thing for a balanced matched play system.

If someone wants to create that thread, that'd be awesome to read.

Since APPARENTLY no one else wants to start threads...

Since APPARENTLY no one else wants to start threads...

When it comes to the AOS section, no I don't start threads

Jackal90 wrote:

Actually, I just dislike the whole Alt activation idea.
Been playing epic for a good 15 years or so and the game suffers badly because of the way it’s done.
It’s also insanely clunky and adds a lot of time to games.

Just dropping in here as am thinking of taking up AoS with a friend (just ordered the rule book!)
It's interesting to read some of the comment here and it sounds for sure like the double turn will be an interesting thing to happen - I'm not very keen on sitting around (playing on my phone?) while my opponent spends a turn using all of their stuff for a second time. I can see how it would be very frustrating, as even the concept of 'all army move' (without any option to 'overwatch' or making some kind of counter) is not very fashionable in current game design, let alone having two turns.

What I will say for Epic is I find alternative activation works really well, but as a risk/reward mechanic. You can 'risk' it and go for multiple activations, but there is a chance your troops will stand like plums and get hammered. Also, it does mean that you have to consider your opponent getting to attack before you do for each of your moves. So there is a lot more player and tactical choice involved, rather than the game swinging on a lucky (or unlucky) dice result.

Surprisingly I have found great peace with the Double-Turn. I find it an interesting mechanic that I have to plan around and expect.

However, there are caveats, and that are armies that have been given a toolset to ignore the Double-Turn in a way and what it means.

The thing is, alternating activation of melee units is a counter to the double-turn, but the problem lies with shooting(CoS) units that are completely one-sided activations, as well as units that get something like always strike first(Slaanesh) and/or double attack(FEC).

This is of course one of the oldest problems with all GW games. They make a mechanic that requires some explicit game designs around it, but then go and make armies that ignore the mechanic or play completely around it.

The double turn mechanic, along with the sheer amount of MW spam, is one of the main things stopping me from picking up AoS. There's a lot of stuff in the game that do appeal to me and I like the look of the Lumineth, but having watched plenty of batreps and reading the rules the double turn concept turns me off of the game entirely. Like others have mentioned, there also doesn't really seem to be any solid information or tactical counterplay to it aside from vague statements like "you've got to play around it."

Obviously there's lots of rumours surrounding a 3rd edition of the game in 2021, but is there any possibility that GW would just outright remove the mechanic entirely or is it something that Jervis Johnson and his team are just obsessively wedded to?

Who knows. I doubt it. The Double Turn is a sacred cow that people cling to and love. It is also one of my pillars for not touching the game anymore and was always houseruled out until the lockdown on houserules came about in my main stores.

I'm waiting on the Old World project to come out. Hopefully they move away from IGOUGO in the first place and give us a form of alternate activation. LOTR works that way. So its not entirely out of the question.

I'm not even convinced it was intentional in the first place. More like an unintended consequence of a hasty four page rules document that was meant more as a starter set to get in quick games. But there it is to stay.

The Old World will for sure have a refined version of WHFB of old. They would piss so many people off, which they produce the Old World for.
So any old WHFB player would not like massive changes in game design.

My hope is that they use 6th edition refined.

Old world is not guaranteed to be anything unfortunately, we have no news.

If you go to the big facebook old world group, more than half want the old world to just be aos reskinned for the old world. So I'm not entirely sold or put my emotional investment into it, because part of me thinks thats exactly what it will be. AOS rules in the old world.

I'm going to chime in with stating that I actually didn't even "catch" the whole double-turn thing when I first read the rules for AoS.

I got really excited for the new game, bought a bunch of stuff, half painted it, then went for my first game and lost about 75% of my army before I even got to do anything aside from move forward a few inches.

That was fun.

After that I literally only played with the mechanic one more time. In that game I got the double turn, killed 75% of my opponents army, and then won without even feeling like I had played a game.

After that I've never used the rule. Before every game I make CERTAIN that the opponent knows that I just flat out won't play with that crappy rule. I honestly don't even care about being competitive/winning a lot. My favorite games are the ones that are super close and dramatic, with a lot of parts where the battle can go either way.

To me: double-turn does exactly the opposite of that. I hate it, I won't use it, and the day they get rid of it will be the single best day for AoS.

Sorry for the salt. Heck, I haven't even played a game since lockdown began! I just feel quite strongly on the subject is all.

The salt is warranted.

The refrain of "Double-turn can save armies loosing or that are against stronger foes!" is oft repeated and just incredibly wrong.

A roll-off mechanic like that ruins more games than it 'saves'. Even as a person with armies that benefit greatly from double turns (Sylvaneth, Skaven, now Lumineth) I would much prefer playing without the mechanic. However, it's hard to convince my opponents to cut out a core mechanic. Nevermind the fact that I've done exactly that, wiped out over 75% of their army and claimed a massive lead in objective points, time and time again.

I flat-out tell my opponent at the start that I will not be taking the double turn, even if it means I lose. Assuming we did not house rule it away already. 'Deploy-first-go-first' then alternate works very well.

Well, you could argue if it ruins your game, then you are not playing with it in mind and you need to change some parts of what you do on the table.

I personally don't like it, but i don't think its a bad mechanic for the game sense everyone knows it can happen every turn. Just like everyone knows someone can DS and charge.

There is no army in the game that can prepare for two rounds of shooting and magic in a row from Skaven, Lumineth, Tzeentch, Seraphon, Shootcast, CoS and others.

There is no army in the game that can prepare for the disgusting speed that Ironjawz with 4 movement phases (Hero and movement) and potentially 3 combat phases, one of them being uncontested in the second hero phase. Two rounds of uncontested Slaanesh magic and combat(to a lesser degree).

There are several notable and popular armies that absolutely wreck face with a double turn, compared to other armies.

While by no means perfectly balanced (or even well balanced) to begin with, these armies are disparately strong if they get two turns of hero move and shoot in a row.

@Ninth, I still take double turns, even after I argue that they should be taken from the game. I always hope that while my persuasion didn't work, perhaps beating my opponent over the head with the rulebook will make them realize.

 Amishprn86 wrote:
Well, you could argue if it ruins your game, then you are not playing with it in mind and you need to change some parts of what you do on the table.

I personally don't like it, but i don't think its a bad mechanic for the game sense everyone knows it can happen every turn. Just like everyone knows someone can DS and charge.

Except you can't deepstrike your entire army.

The problem with the doubleturn is its nothing like a random good or bad dice roll for a single unit, its a random dice roll that affects the entire army. As noted above you really can't "prepare" for it. The only arguments I've ever heard about preparing for it are mostly "screen your models." and that's not really protecting you against a doubleturn, its just basic tactics you'd be using anyway. Plus in a game with only 6 turns you really can't waste several turns at the start hiding at the back of the board incase your opponent gets a doubleturn. You have to advance, you have to push forward and you can't sacrifice turns.

Furthermore I don't think you need to change anything in the game to make it work without the doubleturn, because you can play games with the doubleturn and the dice rolls won't activate it. So the game plays out as normal. So to get rid of it you just take it out of the rules.


I've long said it should be retired to openplay and removed from matched play. It's just FAR too swingy a mechanic.

As noted above its not even fun for either side - one getting it wins far too easily and one getting it used on them loses far too easily. Heck this a game where a single turn can change the game result, having two in a row is utterly insanely powerful

The only change I would make regarding the removal of double turns involves Endless Spells. Either have a roll-off for who picks the first endless spell to use in the new battle round... Or my preferred method of "You Pay for it, you Own it" cause sorry, I don't want to pay between 30-100 points for one spell, only to have those points used against my army.