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 Aenar wrote:

 Eldarain wrote:
Tau having a ridiculous stunted design shouldn't hold back the game's core rules.

Tell that to the game designers, I'd be more than happy to have psychic or melee capabilities (or even decent movement across the board, not 8" on crisis suits).
They managed to write an horrible codex this edition, with a faction that works only thanks to the ridiculous shield drones.

You do realise that 8" isnt bad movement? especially not on a gun platform that flies.
Also,

ghostkeel : 12" fly
riptide : 12" fly
pirhanas : 16" fly
Yvarhna : 18" fly
hammerhead : 12" fly

Tau is still a mobile army, the problem is that the optimal build with them is Riptides + drones, so everyone castles up with them.

with tools like mont'ka i'm really suprised to see tau stay as static as they are right now.

I had too many windows open...

 H.B.M.C. wrote:
GW: Hey Sisters players.
Sisters Players: Yeah?
GW: You know how the Psychic Awakening books have a host of new custom chapter/regiment/Knight House/etc. rules for the various factions, along with a list of new relics, warlord traits and -tons- of stratagems?
Sisters Players: We sure do!
GW: Well feth you. You get a Harlequin.

I mean, I thought being relegated to White Dwarf was bad, but at least the Harlis got some half-way decent rules.

Hey, harlequins finally get a model, why would they complain!

Hes gonna make a cool troupe master conversion for sure. Glad hes playable in Imperium but not in harlies (i hope hes gonna end up being playable in both armies somehow)

I'm kind of fine with it.

Means that I can safely skip it.

They don't even get a frickin' name generator. That's harsh.

 VladimirHerzog wrote:

 Aenar wrote:

 Eldarain wrote:
Tau having a ridiculous stunted design shouldn't hold back the game's core rules.

Tell that to the game designers, I'd be more than happy to have psychic or melee capabilities (or even decent movement across the board, not 8" on crisis suits).
They managed to write an horrible codex this edition, with a faction that works only thanks to the ridiculous shield drones.

You do realise that 8" isnt bad movement? especially not on a gun platform that flies.
Also,

ghostkeel : 12" fly
riptide : 12" fly
pirhanas : 16" fly
Yvarhna : 18" fly
hammerhead : 12" fly

Tau is still a mobile army, the problem is that the optimal build with them is Riptides + drones, so everyone castles up with them.

with tools like mont'ka i'm really suprised to see tau stay as static as they are right now.

Congratulations the only units you see out of those is riptudes and Hammerheads is for a very simple reason they lack the range to be able to shoot without being automatically charged next turn.

Hammerheads arw fragile like most vehicals in 8th edition as they get malled by mid strength spam.

Spoletta wrote:
Firepower decreased from 7th to 8th.

In 7th edition with D weapons, grav spam, scat bikes and similar cheese, being tabled turn 1 was really easy if you weren't playing some cheese (read: Death star) of your own.

I agree with the sentiment - but this didn't chime with my experience in 2nd. Tabling was common - probably the typical way of winning a game certainly in the second half of the edition - but I don't think I ever saw anyone get fully tabled in the first turn.

I think the bigger point is that assault lists in older editions were usually death stars relying on invisibility and ward saves. If say we were in a world where you could make an assault unit only be hit on 6s and pack a 2++ rerollable save, assault would probably be the main concern in this game too. But I think it was pretty universally agreed that such rules were terrible and should never see the light of day again.

I think the real problem with assault is that its not that interactive. Playing say GSC for instance, it often feels like you are just rolling dice. Which... obviously you are - but it feels like you can't do anything to really conceal that fact. You are not making decisions to stack the odds of those dice in your favour - that's done in list building.

And so sometimes you will be lucky - and make all your charges - and usually surround/crush the enemy (obviously luck can intervene here - but the odds are now stacked in your favour).
And other times, you will be unlucky on those charges, so your units can do precisely nothing, and just get trivially wiped from the table next turn (unless they are really unlucky).

Statistically if you play enough games you are going to experience both. You should expect to fail 3 successive 7" charge rolls every 14 times the scenario plays out. Can't be bothered to calculate 2 fails out of 3 - but its going to be higher.

Broken down to extremes I guess shooting is like this too - but usually its stacked so much, that the luck has to really tell against you. Shooting is also less all or nothing - as you get really good results to make up for previous bad ones. By contrast rolling a double 6 for one unit to charge, will rarely make up for 2 or so other units failing.

Which is basically why fall back is such a problem. You have this huge chance to fail - so if you connect, you have to make it count. So we have tripointing and all the rest of it. But if people can now just wander off - even if they lose 1/6th of the unit - its probably another nail in assault armies (points and other rules depending). You are just making them statistically less likely to succeed.

Hrm, firepower in general has definitely risen in 8th overall. 7E had some definite outliers, but the available average of firepower has definitely risen. We've seen far more firepower on the level of 7E Scatterbike units diffuse throughout the game in general, and we didn't have basic troops units that could shoot 4 shots each or get rerolls to everything with enough AP to turn a squad with infantry bolt weapons into more effective tank killers than quadlas Predators.

There's absolutely melee that works in 8E, but there's a lot that doesn't also, and most of what does work does so because it's got a gimmicky rule or ability, while many units that in previous editions were decent melee units or melee capable generalists simply do not function in such a role now (e.g. Kroot, basic CSM's, etc).

Ice_can wrote:

Congratulations the only units you see out of those is riptudes and Hammerheads is for a very simple reason they lack the range to be able to shoot without being automatically charged next turn.

Hammerheads arw fragile like most vehicals in 8th edition as they get malled by mid strength spam.

Ghostkeels can get in close now and use fusion without stressing about getting tied up in melee forever.

Maybe our concept of melee should transition more to CQC? Though The GK is about the only in codex option. If Battlesuits were 'Monster' they might have a play.

I know the way I play my Daemon Engines will get flipped on their head. I might actually use the daemon jaws of my FF, the heldrake won't mind being in longer combats, and the Defiler isn't going to be waffling between moving to combat and shooting.

Ice_can wrote:

Congratulations the only units you see out of those is riptudes and Hammerheads is for a very simple reason they lack the range to be able to shoot without being automatically charged next turn.

Hammerheads arw fragile like most vehicals in 8th edition as they get malled by mid strength spam.

so the problem isn't their mobility, its the lack of range then?

which makes crying about their mobility a non valid point because tau have highly mobile units.

 VladimirHerzog wrote:

Ice_can wrote:

Congratulations the only units you see out of those is riptudes and Hammerheads is for a very simple reason they lack the range to be able to shoot without being automatically charged next turn.

Hammerheads arw fragile like most vehicals in 8th edition as they get malled by mid strength spam.

so the problem isn't their mobility, its the lack of range then?

which makes crying about their mobility a non valid point because tau have highly mobile units.

I never said mobility was their issue, it's that the whole mobile gunline with short range weapons doesn't work when you have armies built around yeeting units into CC from 20-30 inches away in 1 turn 90%+ makes the short range mobile gunline concept unworkable.
CC is horrific to balance with those sort of threat ranges as it has no counterplay.
I suspect that maybe why primaris marines have such silly ranges on their weapons.

Ice_can wrote:

 VladimirHerzog wrote:

Ice_can wrote:

Congratulations the only units you see out of those is riptudes and Hammerheads is for a very simple reason they lack the range to be able to shoot without being automatically charged next turn.

Hammerheads arw fragile like most vehicals in 8th edition as they get malled by mid strength spam.

so the problem isn't their mobility, its the lack of range then?

which makes crying about their mobility a non valid point because tau have highly mobile units.

I never said mobility was their issue, it's that the whole mobile gunline with short range weapons doesn't work when you have armies built around yeeting units into CC from 20-30 inches away in 1 turn 90%+ makes the short range mobile gunline concept unworkable.
CC is horrific to balance with those sort of threat ranges as it has no counterplay.
I suspect that maybe why primaris marines have such silly ranges on their weapons.

the thing is that melee units need to be able to reach the enemy before dying, so the only playable ones are the ones that have a good delivery method.
So its a vicious circle, you cant play short range stuff in tau so melee delivery need to be strong as it is

 VladimirHerzog wrote:

Spoiler:

Ice_can wrote:

 VladimirHerzog wrote:

Ice_can wrote:

Congratulations the only units you see out of those is riptudes and Hammerheads is for a very simple reason they lack the range to be able to shoot without being automatically charged next turn.

Hammerheads arw fragile like most vehicals in 8th edition as they get malled by mid strength spam.

so the problem isn't their mobility, its the lack of range then?

which makes crying about their mobility a non valid point because tau have highly mobile units.

I never said mobility was their issue, it's that the whole mobile gunline with short range weapons doesn't work when you have armies built around yeeting units into CC from 20-30 inches away in 1 turn 90%+ makes the short range mobile gunline concept unworkable.
CC is horrific to balance with those sort of threat ranges as it has no counterplay.
I suspect that maybe why primaris marines have such silly ranges on their weapons.

the thing is that melee units need to be able to reach the enemy before dying, so the only playable ones are the ones that have a good delivery method.
So its a vicious circle, you cant play short range stuff in tau so melee delivery need to be strong as it is

Tau aren't the only ones with long range basic troops anymore, Primaris are the same range.
Heck Tau dont even shoot the best anymore, Admech, Guard and Marines 2.0 all do better gunline than Tau. Marines also with the same list are no slouches in Melee either.

Tau play keepaway as best they can while using drones to play attritional warfare. (Which people keep demanding are nerfed, because balance means their army should be better than everyones)
Personal Experiance with Tau is you lose turn 1 &2 always, even out in 3/4 and have to win the game turns 5&6.

The fact that units have 90% success rate with turn 1 DZ to DZ charges with nothing the defender can do about that, has gutted the design space for slower melee and a bunch of other codex's playstyles.

The game is go first and kill it or get wrapped and loose, or go first charge wrap and rinse repeat. that's bad design as it's no fun for either side.

Wouldn"t a lack of Fallback only encourage Gunlines further? If you just get fethed the moment you're in melee wouldn't you be more likely to just hang back in your deployment zone and avoid your opponent as much as possible rather than striking forward and fighting it out at shorter ranges?

Changing the way objectives work and points are scored in such a way it forces you out of your deployment zone is a much better way to nerf gunlines than just nuking fallback.

Yeah, 8th edition got into a really bad spot by constantly inflating shooting damage and then responding by inflating melee movement.

This is why I'm not optimistic about melee vs shooting balance in 9th. Without going back and removing all that movement stuff, I don't see how they are going to restore melee to a working state without overpowering all the units that can now make 40" inch charges.

MalfunctBot wrote:
Wouldn"t a lack of Fallback only encourage Gunlines further? If you just get fethed the moment you're in melee wouldn't you be more likely to just hang back in your deployment zone and avoid your opponent as much as possible rather than striking forward and fighting it out at shorter ranges?

Changing the way objectives work and points are scored in such a way it forces you out of your deployment zone is a much better way to nerf gunlines than just nuking fallback.

Far more impactful terrain rules, more defensive mechanics (not stratagems but actual core mechanics that many units can do), reduce the effectiveness of blobbing (or punishing it with attacks that factor in model density of an area.... old school blast weapons), and overall greatly reduce the effectiveness of all combat is better at de-incentivizing gun lines / castling. Problem is that the classic Tau strategy of winning the objective game by total annihilation is basically the best strategy outside of some very convoluted missions that attempt to downplay the value of killing everything.

Spoletta wrote:
Firepower decreased from 7th to 8th.

In 7th edition with D weapons, grav spam, scat bikes and similar cheese, being tabled turn 1 was really easy if you weren't playing some cheese (read: Death star) of your own.

Right now we complain about units which sometimes in particular conditions and on good targets can take out 50% of their point cost in a single shooting phase, which is an enormous amount.

In 7th a 50 point model could easily remove a 200 point model every shooting phase.

Tie this with casualties taken from the front and melee was simply impossible (outside of some death star).

Vehicles were 100% unplayable, so forget transports.

Let's not forget that if your unit didn't have pathfinder, it was even more difficult to reach the target.

Also, the charges had to go straight to the target and you couldn't play around with movement in melee.

I understand that many don't like the current situation of melee, but let's remove our nostalgia tainted glasses and be objective for a second. This is the best melee has been in the last 3 editions.
I've played a lot of melee lists in 8th, and have won a lot. Nothing top level sure, but still much much more than I could ever do in 7th without using a Death Star.

I disagree about your statement regarding firepower. There were a few changes that increased it's effectiveness. The first being the to wound chart. Guardsmen were getting twice as many wounds against a unit like Thunder Cav in 8th over 7th edition. Bolter weaponry became more effective against Dreadnaughts (SW's have some good CC ones). This is compounded by Bolter Discipline as the edition wore on. If your meta was spammed D weapons, Eldar cheese, etc, I can understand you saying that fire power decreased, but that wasn't mine.

I won't disagree that the change to where you take casualties from was an improvement.

In regards to vehicles, I actually had great success in playing an Ironwolves list at the end of 7th. Lots of vehicles (10+ rhinos, razorbacks, etc). But it was a skew list that overwhelmed my opponents anti-tank. But they certainty weren't 100% unplayable.

It appears that our experiences have been different however as I feel there were considerably more viable melee units and builds in 7th than those that currently exist in 8th.

I wanted to say two things:
First as someone else just said removing fall back would just mean more shooty oriented armies would stay back and just destroy everything before it comes close encouraging castles (i play guard in a dynamic way getting close with infantry and using orders, that would be impossible if fallback was removed).
Secondly i hear mentioned time and again “yeah the unit falling back is not the problem the rest of the army wiping it out is” and i want to ask, is your point that a single unit should withstand an entire army? Where exactly is the rest of YOUR army? People shooting at a uni is people not shooting at others.

Kaneda88 wrote:
I wanted to say two things:
First as someone else just said removing fall back would just mean more shooty oriented armies would stay back and just destroy everything before it comes close encouraging castles (i play guard in a dynamic way getting close with infantry and using orders, that would be impossible if fallback was removed).
Secondly i hear mentioned time and again “yeah the unit falling back is not the problem the rest of the army wiping it out is” and i want to ask, is your point that a single unit should withstand an entire army? Where exactly is the rest of YOUR army? People shooting at a uni is people not shooting at others.

no, that's not the point.

Martel732 wrote:

Kaneda88 wrote:
I wanted to say two things:
First as someone else just said removing fall back would just mean more shooty oriented armies would stay back and just destroy everything before it comes close encouraging castles (i play guard in a dynamic way getting close with infantry and using orders, that would be impossible if fallback was removed).
Secondly i hear mentioned time and again “yeah the unit falling back is not the problem the rest of the army wiping it out is” and i want to ask, is your point that a single unit should withstand an entire army? Where exactly is the rest of YOUR army? People shooting at a uni is people not shooting at others.

no, that's not the point.

That’s... eloquent. What is the rest of your army doing while the entire enemy army is destroying one of your units?

Kaneda88 wrote:

Martel732 wrote:

Kaneda88 wrote:
I wanted to say two things:
First as someone else just said removing fall back would just mean more shooty oriented armies would stay back and just destroy everything before it comes close encouraging castles (i play guard in a dynamic way getting close with infantry and using orders, that would be impossible if fallback was removed).
Secondly i hear mentioned time and again “yeah the unit falling back is not the problem the rest of the army wiping it out is” and i want to ask, is your point that a single unit should withstand an entire army? Where exactly is the rest of YOUR army? People shooting at a uni is people not shooting at others.

no, that's not the point.

That’s... eloquent. What is the rest of your army doing while the entire enemy army is destroying one of your units?

Well, they're also getting destroyed because the units they were engaged in cc with also fell back. Or they were chewed up trying to make it across the board. Or failed their charges. The point is cc armies have to put in the work to get there and then gun lines can just waltz out of combat with no penalties or effort. That's not an even playing field.

I'm just explaining this on behalf of players of other factions btw. I play Night Lords. You're not running away from us unless we let you.

Yup. I knew someone would explain it. It doesnt take anything close to a full army to wipe my units. DC die to throw away shots in droves.

I've always thought it's very weird that you have to roll 2d6 to charge somebody, but you can move your entire movement value with no randomness at all when disengaging.

At some point, GW decided that punching was bad.

yukishiro1 wrote:
I've always thought it's very weird that you have to roll 2d6 to charge somebody, but you can move your entire movement value with no randomness at all when disengaging.

How else would one forge a narrative without random charge distances?

"And then they were upon us; these monstrous xenos beasts. Hissing and snarling, multiple limbs that ended in razor sharp claws or talons. Teeth as long as rifle barrels. They were terrifying, and I saw the blood drain from our commanders face as they drew near. We had been firing upon them for what seemed like days, yet they always got closer, one step at a time. As each one of the monstrosities fell, another took its place. They were endless."

"Finally the order came - fix bayonets, prepare for the charge - and I knew our doom had arrived. At once the entire line of purple and white aliens sped towards us; their speed and vigour renewed at the thought of fresh kills. We braced, as for some reason only one squad could fire in response these days, and awaited the inevitable."

"Yet it never arrived, for the howling masses had stopped just short. The frustration through the Tyranids was so palpable I almost thought I heard the Hive Mind scream 'All I needed was a 6!!!', but I pushed the feeling aside, and readied my weapon for the next shot."

It's enough to make you believe in God-Emperors.

Kaneda88 wrote:
First as someone else just said removing fall back would just mean more shooty oriented armies would stay back and just destroy everything before it comes close encouraging castles (i play guard in a dynamic way getting close with infantry and using orders, that would be impossible if fallback was removed).

I play Guard too. Take Bullgryns. Take Crusaders. Use terrain to your advantage to keep melee enemies at range. Use alpha strike units like Veterans to kill potential chargers at close range. Space out your troops, and accept that if a 40pt Infantry Squad gets engaged in melee, it's going to die.

This is how we did it in every other edition. The current state of affairs is a very recent development, and it's a brainless way to play. There is little skill involved in positioning screens to intercept chargers, then falling back without penalty so you can shoot some more.

If anything, the way it is now greatly encourages castles. You don't need to heavily space out because you only need to fall back half an inch to be able to shoot, without worrying about a unit being able to Sweeping Advance into your lines.

Kaneda88 wrote:
Secondly i hear mentioned time and again “yeah the unit falling back is not the problem the rest of the army wiping it out is” and i want to ask, is your point that a single unit should withstand an entire army? Where exactly is the rest of YOUR army? People shooting at a uni is people not shooting at others.

Here's the rest of the army:
-Also in combat, and also getting the same enemy-fell-back treatment.
-Dead, because the army had to spend two turns getting shot up before they made it here.
-Waiting for another try because they whiffed the charge.
-Off on an objective, because melee units have to choose between playing the objective and contributing to the fight.

Being able to inflict a lot of damage (fighting on both turns) and avoid getting shot are the only incentives to get into melee in the first place. Shooting has the advantage in every single other respect. In prior editions, getting an assault army into melee with a gunline was a gamble, but if you made it there with a significant proportion of your force intact, you had the upper hand. Now it's just suicide.

And no, a single unit should not be able to withstand an entire army. But unless there's some way for melee units to stay in melee, then for every round they get to fight in combat, the enemy gets a round to shoot, and a round of swinging back, and a round of Overwatch (at least that's going away somewhat), on top of the 1-3 rounds they already had to shoot unopposed.

The current meta of successful melee units being able to make 24+" turn 1 charges or Deep Strike charges and wipe out whatever they hit is entirely a product of the current melee mechanics. Units that take casualties over several turns of hoofing it up the field, or can't inflict a lot of damage in one assault phase, can never win the attrition game against an enemy that never stops shooting them. It's only going to get worse if Fall Back isn't changed, as more and more melee units are given mobility or lethality buffs to make it viable.

yukishiro1 wrote:
I've always thought it's very weird that you have to roll 2d6 to charge somebody, but you can move your entire movement value with no randomness at all when disengaging.

Because GW decided they wanted to add more swing to charges. Back in 5th Edition, there was no overwatch and charges were always 6", but you couldn't pre-measure anything in the game. Then in 6th they changed charges to 2d6", added overwatch, causalities from the closest model, and premeasuring to the game. This resulted in more variation in the success rate of charges, which made the game less clinical in execution.

 alextroy wrote:
but you couldn't pre-measure anything in the game

God I am so glad that is dead. *shudders*

 alextroy wrote:

yukishiro1 wrote:
I've always thought it's very weird that you have to roll 2d6 to charge somebody, but you can move your entire movement value with no randomness at all when disengaging.

Because GW decided they wanted to add more swing to charges. Back in 5th Edition, there was no overwatch and charges were always 6", but you couldn't pre-measure anything in the game. Then in 6th they changed charges to 2d6", added overwatch, causalities from the closest model, and premeasuring to the game. This resulted in more variation in the success rate of charges, which made the game less clinical in execution.

Well right, but the point is: why not apply that to other things? Why just charge distance? Why not have fall back variable too?

For that matter, why not make guns variable range? Bolters could be 18+2d6, you don't roll until you fire. That would make the game less clinical too!