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 CthuluIsSpy wrote:

the_scotsman wrote:

 BrotherGecko wrote:

Doohicky wrote:
So blast weapons that do D3 attacks get max attacks on groups of 6 or more?

If such a weapon exists then yes it sounds like it.

I mean there are a bunch of d3 shot weapons...

Yes, but are they blast?
I think even the Doomsday Cannon on low power is Heavy D6.

Of course, this all assuming that GW will not update the weapon profiles to go with the new rules, so it could very well be that any hypothetical D3 blast weapon gets changed to D6 blast.

They listed the D-Cannon which is a D3 shot weapon.

I like this new rule but it's clearly not perfect, the threshold for max shots is way too low, should have been 15 at the minimum.

This one has no obvious way it will improve the game

Well, the obvious improvement is that it supposedly reduces tilting, ie. rolling 1 attack all rounds and therefore getting minimal use out of your battletank sucks and you end up paying more points than your tank was worth. Now, whether that this is a good implementation or not remains to be seen on the battlefield.

 Eldarsif wrote:

This one has no obvious way it will improve the game

Well, the obvious improvement is that it supposedly reduces tilting, ie. rolling 1 attack all rounds and therefore getting minimal use out of your battletank sucks and you end up paying more points than your tank was worth. Now, whether that this is a good implementation or not remains to be seen on the battlefield.

But that can still happen against stuff like Knights.

If they really wanted to avoid whiffing for stuff like that, they'd've just made weapons do a flat amount of shots. Or at least something with a bell curve-2d3, for instance.

 Eldarsif wrote:
I am going to wait with a verdict on whether it is bad or not when I can actually get a game in using the entire ruleset and new points.

I think it is no coincidence we'll be getting some terrain previews tomorrow. Could very well be that terrain and cover has changed so drastically that tank and blast weapons are just balancing that mechanic out.

Either way, I am excited for all of this.

How would blast weapons balance out terrain, when they key off how many models are in the unit, not how many models are in a given area?

Blast weapon fires at 11 ork dudes spread across 25 inches of board space - max shots!

Blast weapon fires at 60 models packed into a 6 inch radius castle in deep cover - no shot bonus at all, because they're all 5-man squads or lower.

How does this balance anything?

The only thing I can think of is that if the terrain rules, for example, say that the whole unit gets the full benefit of terrain (including LOS blocking) even if only one model is in it. This would mean there's a huge advantage to a big unit of 30, because you could "be in cover" based on one model 30 inches away from where your front models are. Blast would then serve to partially punish the advantages of having big squad sizes.

Needless to say, this would be a very stupid way to do cover, though. So it would be a case of one stupid rule compensating for another stupid rule.




Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Eldarsif wrote:

This one has no obvious way it will improve the game

Well, the obvious improvement is that it supposedly reduces tilting, ie. rolling 1 attack all rounds and therefore getting minimal use out of your battletank sucks and you end up paying more points than your tank was worth. Now, whether that this is a good implementation or not remains to be seen on the battlefield.

But it will only improve tilting against units of 11 or more, or, to a very small extent, against units of 6 or more. How does that improve the game to smooth dice rolling only when targeting large units? Why is tilting problematic shooting at units of 11 but not when shooting at individual vehicles?

Given all we've seen so far looking like it's working against more numerous factions and specifically large units, I wonder if we might end up getting something like AoS where expanding existing units costs fewer points than taking new ones?

 JNAProductions wrote:

 Eldarsif wrote:

This one has no obvious way it will improve the game

Well, the obvious improvement is that it supposedly reduces tilting, ie. rolling 1 attack all rounds and therefore getting minimal use out of your battletank sucks and you end up paying more points than your tank was worth. Now, whether that this is a good implementation or not remains to be seen on the battlefield.

But that can still happen against stuff like Knights.
'
If they really wanted to avoid whiffing for stuff like that, they'd've just made weapons do a flat amount of shots. Or at least something with a bell curve-2d3, for instance.

But blast weapons weren't made to take down knights. Blast weapons were made to take down hordes of infantry. It's a different mindset, similar to 5th Edition. If you want to take down knights, you use more reliable weaponry. I think it is pretty representative of what the weapons are meant to do.

 puma713 wrote:

 JNAProductions wrote:

 Eldarsif wrote:

This one has no obvious way it will improve the game

Well, the obvious improvement is that it supposedly reduces tilting, ie. rolling 1 attack all rounds and therefore getting minimal use out of your battletank sucks and you end up paying more points than your tank was worth. Now, whether that this is a good implementation or not remains to be seen on the battlefield.

But that can still happen against stuff like Knights.
'
If they really wanted to avoid whiffing for stuff like that, they'd've just made weapons do a flat amount of shots. Or at least something with a bell curve-2d3, for instance.

But blast weapons weren't made to take down knights. Blast weapons were made to take down hordes of infantry. It's a different mindset, similar to 5th Edition. If you want to take down knights, you use more reliable weaponry. I think it is pretty representative of what the weapons are meant to do.

Then GW needs to design it so that a Battlecannon is NOT effective anti-tank. Because right now, it's better than a Vanquisher Cannon against basically everything.

 JNAProductions wrote:

 ClockworkZion wrote:

 JNAProductions wrote:
To everyone saying "Wait and see" how long do we wait for?

Because first, it's "Wait for the full rules!"
Then, it's "Wait for it to play out on the tabletop-don't just theorycraft!"
Then, it's "Wait for the next Codex/Chapter Approved/Update!"

Wait for the full rules is all I ask the doomsayers to do because it's too easy to assume things that don't line up with how the rules work. Playing games could smooth that out too, but I don't push that too much. Codexes and Chapter Approved can make or break any system so that's a goal post I don't buy into.

Basically, claiming everyone wants to move goal posts on you because they want people to wait until the rules are out to call the game "broken" seems a bit much.

Alright-here's what I want to ask of you.

Full judgement should be reserved till the full rules are out-but can you agree that, especially for melee, things look grim as they are now? I won't claim that there's nothing in 9th rules that will fix that, but from what's been ACTUALLY SHOWN, it looks bad.

If you only accept things shown in picture form off the WHC articles, then yes, it looks bad. If you accept the few things they've said about terrain so far, then maybe not so much.

How would blast weapons balance out terrain, when they key off how many models are in the unit, not how many models are in a given area?

Because terrain might now offer a much more severe LOS blocking than before and/or better cover saves which could mean those tanks are going to have a hard time pushing those infantry off the board. Again, all very hypothetical until we have the end result in our hands and the models on the table. Even if weaponry gets the maximum amount of shots it does not automatically mean those models are going to die in droves. Frag grenades are S3(unless they have been boosted in str and ap) are still going to feel like small rocks on an intercessor in cover.

But it will only improve tilting against units of 11 or more. How does that improve the game to smooth dice rolling only when targeting large units? Why is tilting problematic shooting at units of 11 but not when shooting at individual vehicles?

Tilting is always problematic, don't get me wrong, and I would just love flat number of attacks in general. This will, however, mitigate some of that potentially, but only against certain targets. Again, I don't have the full ruleset so I can't speak of more than what I've seen so far.

I am also curious about point values. Who knows, maybe tanks and blast weaponry have gone up significantly up in point cost. I can't wait to see the points in the rulebook.

yukishiro1 wrote:

 Eldarsif wrote:
I am going to wait with a verdict on whether it is bad or not when I can actually get a game in using the entire ruleset and new points.

I think it is no coincidence we'll be getting some terrain previews tomorrow. Could very well be that terrain and cover has changed so drastically that tank and blast weapons are just balancing that mechanic out.

Either way, I am excited for all of this.

How would blast weapons balance out terrain, when they key off how many models are in the unit, not how many models are in a given area?

Blast weapon fires at 11 ork dudes spread across 25 inches of board space - max shots!

Blast weapon fires at 60 models packed into a 6 inch radius castle in deep cover - no shot bonus at all, because they're all 5-man squads or lower.

How does this balance anything?

The only thing I can think of is that if the terrain rules, for example, say that the whole unit gets the full benefit of terrain (including LOS blocking) even if only one model is in it. This would mean there's a huge advantage to a big unit of 30, because you could "be in cover" based on one model 30 inches away from where your front models are. Blast would then serve to partially punish the advantages of having big squad sizes.

Needless to say, this would be a very stupid way to do cover, though. So it would be a case of one stupid rule compensating for another stupid rule.




Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Eldarsif wrote:

This one has no obvious way it will improve the game

Well, the obvious improvement is that it supposedly reduces tilting, ie. rolling 1 attack all rounds and therefore getting minimal use out of your battletank sucks and you end up paying more points than your tank was worth. Now, whether that this is a good implementation or not remains to be seen on the battlefield.

But it will only improve tilting against units of 11 or more, or, to a very small extent, against units of 6 or more. How does that improve the game to smooth dice rolling only when targeting large units? Why is tilting problematic shooting at units of 11 but not when shooting at individual vehicles?

Hopefully tomorrow’s terrain preview will make things clearer. I can think of several ways terrain could mitigate blasts.

One possibility would be that being in cover cancels the blast rule so that blast weapons have to roll as normal. Another could be how the terrain interacts with line of sight and/or saving throws.

As it stands however, this does look to be seriously damaging large units. If the designers want people to have fun blasting at hordes they had best make sure the rules will encourage people to actually take hordes.

 ClockworkZion wrote:

 JNAProductions wrote:

 ClockworkZion wrote:

 JNAProductions wrote:
To everyone saying "Wait and see" how long do we wait for?

Because first, it's "Wait for the full rules!"
Then, it's "Wait for it to play out on the tabletop-don't just theorycraft!"
Then, it's "Wait for the next Codex/Chapter Approved/Update!"

Wait for the full rules is all I ask the doomsayers to do because it's too easy to assume things that don't line up with how the rules work. Playing games could smooth that out too, but I don't push that too much. Codexes and Chapter Approved can make or break any system so that's a goal post I don't buy into.

Basically, claiming everyone wants to move goal posts on you because they want people to wait until the rules are out to call the game "broken" seems a bit much.

Alright-here's what I want to ask of you.

Full judgement should be reserved till the full rules are out-but can you agree that, especially for melee, things look grim as they are now? I won't claim that there's nothing in 9th rules that will fix that, but from what's been ACTUALLY SHOWN, it looks bad.

If you only accept things shown in picture form off the WHC articles, then yes, it looks bad. If you accept the few things they've said about terrain so far, then maybe not so much.

Then enlighten me. What details have they actually given?

Given GW's track record, I do not trust them when they say "It's better!" without any backing details. So, given what we know FOR SURE-not just rumour, not just hearsay, not just corporate amping up-do you agree with what I said?

 Nazrak wrote:
Given all we've seen so far looking like it's working against more numerous factions and specifically large units, I wonder if we might end up getting something like AoS where expanding existing units costs fewer points than taking new ones?

Unless the points preview for the cultists specifically cut that out, or cultists just don't get that for some reason, it doesn't seem like the case.

yukishiro1 wrote:

 ClockworkZion wrote:

yukishiro1 wrote:
I don't see how any of that addresses how it makes the game better either.

"We don't know the full rules" isn't an argument for the benefit of this change, it's an argument that we don't know what the full effect will be.

Assume all the changes are very worked out to be totally "balanced" in terms of point values. How does it improve the game to add this feature? What is the gameplay benefit of punishing people significantly for taking 11 models instead of 10?

"We don't know the full rules" is more a plea for cooler heads until we know enough to definitively state that things are indeed actually broken.

But I didn't say it was broken. Please read what I'm writing. You're repeatedly responding to a straw man while ignoring what I've actually written.

I said: I don't see the gameplay benefit of this rule, whether it's broken or not. What is the gameplay benefit of punishing people for taking 11 model or more units? How does this improve the game?

If you can't come up with any gameplay benefit that's fine, you can just say that.

Who said it was aimed specifically at you? I was just explaining why I have mentioned full rules being important.

What benefit does the game have by making anti-horde weapons useless all of 8th ed? This is GW trying to make anti-horde weapons actually playable. We'll see what mess it actually gives us in the long run, but I don't feel what they've shown so far damns hordes.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

yukishiro1 wrote:

the_scotsman wrote:

yukishiro1 wrote:
Oh, well that definitely changes the point. 3 shots against 10, vs 12 against 11!

I don't see how your second sentence addresses the point. How does it improve the game to punish someone for taking the same number of models in a larger unit, rather than taking them in two smaller units?

I just don't see the reason for this change. It doesn't "make sense." It leads to very strange and arbitrary results based on how you choose to take your models, and to bizarre incentives where you will be upset that one of your models lived because it means you'll get smashed with far more firepower than if you didn't from the next volley. It doesn't punish castling.

So what's the gameplay benefit?

I mean the stream said the reasoning was basically just "because we thought blowing up hordes was cool!"

Right, which is what makes me worried. GW themselves have not articulated any reason that this will actually improve gameplay.

A lot of the changes they have made have obvious arguments for them - the tank changes, changes to the "haha you can't fight my grot cause he's on a crate," etc.

This one has no obvious way it will improve the game, and GW hasn't explained why they think it will improve the game. It seems a case of "let's do this because it would be cool," not because it actually improves the game. And those decisions are always problematic.

GW hasn't fully explained any of the rules they've previewed. They toss just enough scraps out to watch us go at it like a pack of hungry dogs. Basically if they can keep us wound up, it's working in their favor in keeping hype up to see if the new edition is going to crash and burn or not.

GW hasn't fully explained any of the rules they've previewed. They toss just enough scraps out to watch us go at it like a pack of hungry dogs. Basically if they can keep us wound up, it's working in their favor in keeping hype up to see if the new edition is going to crash and burn or not.

That's a good line that sums it all up.

 puma713 wrote:

But blast weapons weren't made to take down knights. Blast weapons were made to take down hordes of infantry. It's a different mindset, similar to 5th Edition. If you want to take down knights, you use more reliable weaponry. I think it is pretty representative of what the weapons are meant to do.

To be fair, there are blast weapons made to take down Knights and other such units, the Volcano cannon springs to mind. Likewise, many blast weapons (overcharged Plasma, Battlecannons, etc) often tend to be as good or better than many dedicated single shot AT guns, both because they get more shots (with fewer chances to flubb) and because the Invul saves on something like a Knight negate the high AP of many AT weapons, though this appears to be more an unintended effect than an intentional design choice.

 JNAProductions wrote:

 ClockworkZion wrote:

 JNAProductions wrote:

 ClockworkZion wrote:

 JNAProductions wrote:
To everyone saying "Wait and see" how long do we wait for?

Because first, it's "Wait for the full rules!"
Then, it's "Wait for it to play out on the tabletop-don't just theorycraft!"
Then, it's "Wait for the next Codex/Chapter Approved/Update!"

Wait for the full rules is all I ask the doomsayers to do because it's too easy to assume things that don't line up with how the rules work. Playing games could smooth that out too, but I don't push that too much. Codexes and Chapter Approved can make or break any system so that's a goal post I don't buy into.

Basically, claiming everyone wants to move goal posts on you because they want people to wait until the rules are out to call the game "broken" seems a bit much.

Alright-here's what I want to ask of you.

Full judgement should be reserved till the full rules are out-but can you agree that, especially for melee, things look grim as they are now? I won't claim that there's nothing in 9th rules that will fix that, but from what's been ACTUALLY SHOWN, it looks bad.

If you only accept things shown in picture form off the WHC articles, then yes, it looks bad. If you accept the few things they've said about terrain so far, then maybe not so much.

Then enlighten me. What details have they actually given?

Given GW's track record, I do not trust them when they say "It's better!" without any backing details. So, given what we know FOR SURE-not just rumour, not just hearsay, not just corporate amping up-do you agree with what I said?

Well I've mentioned them a few of times now:
Terrain density blocks more of the table. Specifically "it'll be harder to draw line of sight across the entire table."

We also know that Obscuring is going to be a pretty common keyword since most GW terrain has a lot of holes and they want to shore that up.

I know it's not a lot to go on, but it is enough to sound like it'll balance shooting out a bit.

 Eldarsif wrote:

How would blast weapons balance out terrain, when they key off how many models are in the unit, not how many models are in a given area?

Because terrain might now offer a much more severe LOS blocking than before and/or better cover saves which could mean those tanks are going to have a hard time pushing those infantry off the board. Again, all very hypothetical until we have the end result in our hands and the models on the table. Even if weaponry gets the maximum amount of shots it does not automatically mean those models are going to die in droves. Frag grenades are S3(unless they have been boosted in str and ap) are still going to feel like small rocks on an intercessor in cover.

But it will only improve tilting against units of 11 or more. How does that improve the game to smooth dice rolling only when targeting large units? Why is tilting problematic shooting at units of 11 but not when shooting at individual vehicles?

Tilting is always problematic, don't get me wrong, and I would just love flat number of attacks in general. This will, however, mitigate some of that potentially, but only against certain targets. Again, I don't have the full ruleset so I can't speak of more than what I've seen so far.

I am also curious about point values. Who knows, maybe tanks and blast weaponry have gone up significantly up in point cost. I can't wait to see the points in the rulebook.

But again, how does this improve gameplay? How does terrain being more evident on the table benefit bigger units rather than smaller ones, such that there would be a need to balance it out by punishing bigger units? Whatever benefit a larger unit gets from terrain, a smaller unit gets too.

Similarly, improving tilting only against certain units actually increases tilting over the entire game, it doesn't reduce it.

You've come up with a variety of reasons why the change may not break the game. But that's not what I'm asking. I'm asking how it improves the game to have rules that mean that a unit of 11 spread across 20 inches of table space take far more damage from the same weapon than two units of 5 all in base to base contact each eachother in a tightly packed blob. Or even more generally, how it improves the game to punish people for taking larger units rather than smaller ones.

I haven't seen a single person in this thread actually advance any argument as to why it makes sense to punish people for taking an 11th model in a unit.

yukishiro1 wrote:

 Eldarsif wrote:

How would blast weapons balance out terrain, when they key off how many models are in the unit, not how many models are in a given area?

Because terrain might now offer a much more severe LOS blocking than before and/or better cover saves which could mean those tanks are going to have a hard time pushing those infantry off the board. Again, all very hypothetical until we have the end result in our hands and the models on the table. Even if weaponry gets the maximum amount of shots it does not automatically mean those models are going to die in droves. Frag grenades are S3(unless they have been boosted in str and ap) are still going to feel like small rocks on an intercessor in cover.

But it will only improve tilting against units of 11 or more. How does that improve the game to smooth dice rolling only when targeting large units? Why is tilting problematic shooting at units of 11 but not when shooting at individual vehicles?

Tilting is always problematic, don't get me wrong, and I would just love flat number of attacks in general. This will, however, mitigate some of that potentially, but only against certain targets. Again, I don't have the full ruleset so I can't speak of more than what I've seen so far.

I am also curious about point values. Who knows, maybe tanks and blast weaponry have gone up significantly up in point cost. I can't wait to see the points in the rulebook.

But again, how does this improve gameplay? How does terrain being more evident on the table benefit bigger units rather than smaller ones, such that there would be a need to balance it out by punishing bigger units? Whatever benefit a larger unit gets from terrain, a smaller unit gets too.

Similarly, improving tilting only against certain units actually increases tilting over the entire game, it doesn't reduce it.

You've come up with a variety of reasons why the change may not break the game. But that's not what I'm asking. I'm asking how it improves the game to have rules that mean that a unit of 11 spread across 20 inches of table space take far more damage from the same weapon than two units of 5 all in base to base contact each eachother in a tightly packed blob.

You might as well ask the same question in the current rule set. In 8th firing a 4d6 weapon at a 5 model unit standing near 2 other 5 model units the shots don’t spill over either.

Also it won’t be every random shot weapon just certain ones so plasma cannons might be or not. Sounds like some grenades will be so I might actually look at using my now guaranteed 6 shot frag grenade (that is at ap-1 as I’m using them in the Devastator doctrine)

Aash wrote:

You might as well ask the same question in the current rule set. In 8th firing a 4d6 weapon at a 5 model unit standing near 2 other 5 model units the shots don’t spill over either.

Right, but that's precisely my point. We already have lots of mechanics that tend to favor MSU units. Why do we need more?

Does anyone really think that the problem in 8th was there was too much incentive to take big units?

If anyone wants to argue that they're free to do so. But nobody actually has. And I think that is telling. The defenses of this are all "we don't know how it will shake out in practice," they are not conceptual arguments about how large unit sizes needed to be discouraged.

I can think of a few arguments against big unit sizes, but nobody has actually made them in this thread. GW didn't make them itself, either. And I find that interesting.

Because sacrifices have to be made if you want to make a ruleset that is playable. Old blast rules punished large units, this is a simplified version of doing the same thing.

 Tyran wrote:
Because sacrifices have to be made if you want to make a ruleset that is playable. Old blast rules punished large units, this is a simplified version of doing the same thing.

Old blast rules punished densely-packed units, not necessarily large units, and also punished densely-packed MSUs. Despite the arguments they could cause, the templates were really a more realistic way of handling blasts and flamers.

 Tyran wrote:
Because sacrifices have to be made if you want to make a ruleset that is playable. Old blast rules punished large units, this is a simplified version of doing the same thing.

Old LARGE blasts maybe did, but Small ones did not.

Yes they were, but they slowed the game a lot by forcing optimization of unit coherency and debates of what was or was not under the template.

We don't want to go back to the times in which the Tyranid player needed an hour every movement phase to keep his 200+ gaunts at a perfect 2" of each other.

yukishiro1 wrote:

 Eldarsif wrote:

How would blast weapons balance out terrain, when they key off how many models are in the unit, not how many models are in a given area?

Because terrain might now offer a much more severe LOS blocking than before and/or better cover saves which could mean those tanks are going to have a hard time pushing those infantry off the board. Again, all very hypothetical until we have the end result in our hands and the models on the table. Even if weaponry gets the maximum amount of shots it does not automatically mean those models are going to die in droves. Frag grenades are S3(unless they have been boosted in str and ap) are still going to feel like small rocks on an intercessor in cover.

But it will only improve tilting against units of 11 or more. How does that improve the game to smooth dice rolling only when targeting large units? Why is tilting problematic shooting at units of 11 but not when shooting at individual vehicles?

Tilting is always problematic, don't get me wrong, and I would just love flat number of attacks in general. This will, however, mitigate some of that potentially, but only against certain targets. Again, I don't have the full ruleset so I can't speak of more than what I've seen so far.

I am also curious about point values. Who knows, maybe tanks and blast weaponry have gone up significantly up in point cost. I can't wait to see the points in the rulebook.

But again, how does this improve gameplay? How does terrain being more evident on the table benefit bigger units rather than smaller ones, such that there would be a need to balance it out by punishing bigger units? Whatever benefit a larger unit gets from terrain, a smaller unit gets too.

Similarly, improving tilting only against certain units actually increases tilting over the entire game, it doesn't reduce it.

You've come up with a variety of reasons why the change may not break the game. But that's not what I'm asking. I'm asking how it improves the game to have rules that mean that a unit of 11 spread across 20 inches of table space take far more damage from the same weapon than two units of 5 all in base to base contact each eachother in a tightly packed blob. Or even more generally, how it improves the game to punish people for taking larger units rather than smaller ones.

I haven't seen a single person in this thread actually advance any argument as to why it makes sense to punish people for taking an 11th model in a unit.

It gives them the ability to actually differentiate weapons meant for dealing with light infantry (which are what tend to come in large units) from those with other aims. That's the gameplay benefit.

Now a plasma gun can have it's niche as an elite killer, the grenade launcher as chaff clearer, and there's the possibility for a meltagun (assuming the noticed that it was worse than plasma and swapped it 2d6 damage at half range or something) to be the anti-tank option. Surely that's better?

As for it kicking in at 11, there has to be a break point in a game of physical dice. Much like how a guardsman that rolls a 4 for his save is reduced to ground beef but a 5 means he's totally and completely fine. A sliding scale of x hits per y models would have worked, but this involves a bit less counting (an extremely minor time saver), reflects the most common unit sizes, and leaves a some of the random element that they love (while also sort of hearkening back to the old days where getting the blast template hole over a model meant it was having a bad day).

 Tyran wrote:
Because sacrifices have to be made if you want to make a ruleset that is playable. Old blast rules punished large units, this is a simplified version of doing the same thing.

While fair on the abstraction part, the old blast rules punished grouping models too closely together, not large units in and of themselves. These have very different tactical implications.

 Tyran wrote:
Because sacrifices have to be made if you want to make a ruleset that is playable. Old blast rules punished large units, this is a simplified version of doing the same thing.

But again, this doesn't answer the question: what about taking 11+ model units is problematic that needs to be discouraged through a gameplay mechanic?

The old blast mechnic didn't punish you based on unit size, it punished you for castling. It served a gameplay purpose. It made sense. It balanced risk-reward for castling around your auras. Removing it is partly what has led to the current 40k paradigm where many armies castle up around key characters.

Punishing you for taking larger units does not serve any obvious gameplay purpose. Nobody has articulated one in this thread, despite me asking about ten different people to do so. I find it really telling that nobody is willing to even try making an argument for why larger unit sizes should be discouraged.

 Tyran wrote:
Yes they were, but they slowed the game a lot by forcing optimization of unit coherency and debates of what was or was not under the template.

We don't want to go back to the times in which the Tyranid player needed an hour every movement phase to keep his 200+ gaunts at a perfect 2" of each other.

Agreed. But I don't think the proposed new blast rules in 9th are an ideal solution either. I get the sense that more thought was not given to this by GW and the playtesters given the numerous loopholes/issues Dakka members are finding just minutes after the announcement of the rules.

Because blast rules are not about balance, they are about immersion, because players wanted to regain some of that feel of a large blast template deleting a horde unit in one shot.

yukishiro1 wrote:

 Eldarsif wrote:

How would blast weapons balance out terrain, when they key off how many models are in the unit, not how many models are in a given area?

Because terrain might now offer a much more severe LOS blocking than before and/or better cover saves which could mean those tanks are going to have a hard time pushing those infantry off the board. Again, all very hypothetical until we have the end result in our hands and the models on the table. Even if weaponry gets the maximum amount of shots it does not automatically mean those models are going to die in droves. Frag grenades are S3(unless they have been boosted in str and ap) are still going to feel like small rocks on an intercessor in cover.

But it will only improve tilting against units of 11 or more. How does that improve the game to smooth dice rolling only when targeting large units? Why is tilting problematic shooting at units of 11 but not when shooting at individual vehicles?

Tilting is always problematic, don't get me wrong, and I would just love flat number of attacks in general. This will, however, mitigate some of that potentially, but only against certain targets. Again, I don't have the full ruleset so I can't speak of more than what I've seen so far.

I am also curious about point values. Who knows, maybe tanks and blast weaponry have gone up significantly up in point cost. I can't wait to see the points in the rulebook.

But again, how does this improve gameplay? How does terrain being more evident on the table benefit bigger units rather than smaller ones, such that there would be a need to balance it out by punishing bigger units? Whatever benefit a larger unit gets from terrain, a smaller unit gets too.

Similarly, improving tilting only against certain units actually increases tilting over the entire game, it doesn't reduce it.

You've come up with a variety of reasons why the change may not break the game. But that's not what I'm asking. I'm asking how it improves the game to have rules that mean that a unit of 11 spread across 20 inches of table space take far more damage from the same weapon than two units of 5 all in base to base contact each eachother in a tightly packed blob. Or even more generally, how it improves the game to punish people for taking larger units rather than smaller ones.

I haven't seen a single person in this thread actually advance any argument as to why it makes sense to punish people for taking an 11th model in a unit.

To give a more concrete speculation here, we know that morale has been significantly reworked.

Currently, morale has two problems

1) it basically only functions when your unit starts the turn really big, and ends the turn really small

2) it adds to the deadliness of the game by removing additional models that would otherwise be alive. This is distinct from how morale functions in many wargames, which is as a means to temporarily disable or reduce the effectiveness of models that would otherwise be fully active, which LOWERS deadliness.

Morale checks being triggerable against smaller units, even individual units, by a means other than models in the unit dying, and larger units getting a bonus to morale naturally rather than a natural penalty, would help put these blast rules into context. Especially if they used the same breakpoints, for example:

-A unit has 6+ models, +1LD
-A unit has 11+ models, +2LD

that way, the blast rule's spiky damage against units that are exactly at that breakpoint would serve as a convenient counterbalance to the natural optimization effort that would occur if GW implemented that sort of LD bonus alone. It would become a distinct advantage to field every one of your units at exactly 1 over minimum size to gain a morale bonus with very little cost.

Another thing that's been pointed out is that units could get cheaper the bigger they get, which is a mechanic in AOS. You're incentivized to bring a big horde because the natural disadvantages to having tons of models in the unit, like them not all being able to fight at once in close combat, are offset by a cheaper cost, so you can use hordes as damage soakers.