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PenitentJake wrote:
The situation we are in though, is one where we don't have the option. I'm just explaining that from my POV I think it makes fluff sense to keep Jetbikes and Skyboards out of the hands of Archons and Haemonculi, who would would spend much of their time outside the arenas where those particular pieces of gear are far more prevalent.

To be fair, Archons come from a variety of backgrounds, so there is no fluff reason they shouldn't have stuff like jetbikes.

The best example is Vraesque Malidrach, Archon of the Kabal of the Flayed Skull who was once a notorious Reaver death racer, and still modelled with jetbike helmet.

SemperMortis wrote:
For the first time in a long while I am rather hopeful. GW seems to be moving in a more customer oriented direction. Responding to criticism and errors in the game markedly faster than in previous editions. GW seems to have realized they overloaded the market with new Marine kits and has moved towards a more balanced approach, Orkz getting new kits, Necrons, SOB, Mech. Its honestly a golden age in comparison to 5-7th.

Much as I disliked the Marine flood, what finally killed any hope I had of 9th being or getting good was not Marines, not exactly. It was the rather more recent realization that everyone will share to a greater or lesser extent in their egregious rules bloat.

With the engine that they have trying to run the sheer amount of rules each faction is supposed to have, the game will not be a better game in a year no matter who gets codexes, how well balanced they are, or how quickly they are released, because the balance and distribution problems, while present, obscure the fact that 40k just isn't designed for what they're trying to make it do, which is represent dozens of disparate and possibly still-proliferating factions with ever more rules and specialties within an even more limited span of core mechanics and design space than prior editions, all while simultaneously trying to appeal to casual, narrative, and competitive gamers.

(The fact that they charge out the toxic megacolon for these rules is a separate topic, as expensive rules don't by themselves make a bad game - 40K 9th is a mediocre game at best regardless of its price tag.)

The game will not magically become good in 9th with a codex release or points update; it will require total restructuring and this is not happening until 10th.

SemperMortis 798472 11137137 wrote:For the first time in a long while I am rather hopeful. GW seems to be moving in a more customer oriented direction. Responding to criticism and errors in the game markedly faster than in previous editions. GW seems to have realized they overloaded the market with new Marine kits and has moved towards a more balanced approach, Orkz getting new kits, Necrons, SOB, Mech. Its honestly a golden age in comparison to 5-7th.

Ah yeah how customer oriented they are. People tell them for a year that they are late with updating various marines to the same statline, and their anwsers to this is, that because they have a 3 months delay and they need the big sellers out with new kits, at all costs, instead of puting out the books that should be out right now, they would rather update factions who are already doing fine or great in the game. Litteral golden age, when you have to wait for an update that could be writen by a clerk in lets say 3 days, if they said clerk was really lazy and took a lot of breaks, and the text had to be proof read and accepted by 2 different tiers of managment.

Karol wrote:
Ah yeah how customer oriented they are. People tell them for a year that they are late with updating various marines to the same statline, and their anwsers to this is, that because they have a 3 months delay and they need the big sellers out with new kits, at all costs, instead of puting out the books that should be out right now, they would rather update factions who are already doing fine or great in the game. Litteral golden age, when you have to wait for an update that could be writen by a clerk in lets say 3 days, if they said clerk was really lazy and took a lot of breaks, and the text had to be proof read and accepted by 2 different tiers of managment.

Yeah, all that sucks too, don't get me wrong, I'm saying 40K 9th is flawed on so fundamental a level by this point, with tiny lungs suffocating so completely under its own folds of blubber, that there is no coming back and making a good game from it no matter who gets what or how responsive GW gets. Even if they moved to digital rules releases with slashed prices, did proper points updates, faq'ed Dark Technomancers inside a week and gave CSM 2 wounds from the launch of 9th, the game would still be a painful slog to play, and it's only going to be a more painful one as more Stuff is added.

8th and 9th edition looked promising at the start but GW are just making it more and more convoluted. Each 9th edition codex has so many damn rules and interactions to keep track of.

I just want a return of universal special rules to reduce some of the duplicates. We don't need every army having their own version of objective secured, feel no pain, etc. It's a D6 game there's a very limited amount of interactions that can be explained across a few pages in the core rulebook.

A switch to d10 based rules would allow for more meaningful interactions. There's only so much design space a d6 based to hit/wound system has.

But USR's would be welcomed. GW has doubled down on wombocombo to make up for the limitations they have self imposed.

 Sim-Life wrote:


There's a difference between mismanagement and a bad game. I agree there was a lot wrong with Mk3 but it was still a good game (at least in its first year, if you didn't play Skorne). Warmahordes is dead because of PP, not because the game itself is bad.

I agree, MK3 was fine for a while, but man, once CID hit, the game just exploded into a fireball of whining, stupidity, crying, and bullshittery the likes of which no human had ever laid witness too. I liked early MK3 a lot and thought it was better than MK2 for most purposes. There was the stupid stuff with gang and flank not working properly as USR's but that stuff got fixed and released. But, then things like the clockatrice happened, and it just wasnt long before the game really began to spiral out of control under its own weight.

 CEO Kasen wrote:
The game will not magically become good in 9th with a codex release or points update; it will require total restructuring and this is not happening until 10th.

I disagree, a single Chapter Approved book could remove most of the bloat from the game. Invalidate all Stratagems, Warlord Traits, Relics, Chapter Tactics and Combat Doctrines from all codexes. Print universal Stratagems and WL traits and a small unique Relic set for each army and only print and update these rules in Chapter Approved, no army gets left behind and once you know what's in Chapter Approved there'll be no more surprises. That and a solidly tested mission pack and set of points would fix matched play. Errata Codex ability names to generic old-school terminology. Release a crusade pack with crusade content for every faction. Release indexes instead of codexes when datasheets need updates, just datasheets and the rules that follow with the datasheets like weapon profiles and rules like Reanimation Protocols, nothing else, not art or pictures. Release collector's guides for each army with fluff, narrative missions, terrain and miniature displays and guides.

 vict0988 wrote:

 CEO Kasen wrote:
The game will not magically become good in 9th with a codex release or points update; it will require total restructuring and this is not happening until 10th.

I disagree, a single Chapter Approved book could remove most of the bloat from the game. Invalidate all Stratagems, Warlord Traits, Relics, Chapter Tactics and Combat Doctrines from all codexes. Print universal Stratagems and WL traits and a small unique Relic set for each army and only print and update these rules in Chapter Approved, no army gets left behind and once you know what's in Chapter Approved there'll be no more surprises. That and a solidly tested mission pack and set of points would fix matched play. Errata Codex ability names to generic old-school terminology. Release a crusade pack with crusade content for every faction. Release indexes instead of codexes when datasheets need updates, just datasheets and the rules that follow with the datasheets like weapon profiles and rules like Reanimation Protocols, nothing else, not art or pictures. Release collector's guides for each army with fluff, narrative missions, terrain and miniature displays and guides.

So... 10th edition+

 vict0988 wrote:

 CEO Kasen wrote:
The game will not magically become good in 9th with a codex release or points update; it will require total restructuring and this is not happening until 10th.

I disagree, a single Chapter Approved book could remove most of the bloat from the game. Invalidate all Stratagems, Warlord Traits, Relics, Chapter Tactics and Combat Doctrines from all codexes. Print universal Stratagems and WL traits and a small unique Relic set for each army and only print and update these rules in Chapter Approved, no army gets left behind and once you know what's in Chapter Approved there'll be no more surprises. That and a solidly tested mission pack and set of points would fix matched play. Errata Codex ability names to generic old-school terminology. Release a crusade pack with crusade content for every faction. Release indexes instead of codexes when datasheets need updates, just datasheets and the rules that follow with the datasheets like weapon profiles and rules like Reanimation Protocols, nothing else, not art or pictures. Release collector's guides for each army with fluff, narrative missions, terrain and miniature displays and guides.

The core rules of the game are far too limited in their current state to allow for depth of mechanics (which is what the game desperately needs). Game just bloats and has rampant power creep because the design space is so limited that you can't have much in the way of utility that doesn't just boil down to more killing power or durability. Stuff like USRs, universal game mechanics that aren't army specific, and bringing back stuff like proper cover saves will do a lot of help diversify the gameplay loop, unit roles/utility, and army interactions beyond just killing models.

That said I am the minority in that I despise current 40k due to the game being dreadfully boring. Despite my negativity of the game in its current state, a lot of the complaints going on now are stuff I sorta foresaw due to how small a foundation the core rules laid and the inevitable stacking of bonuses on top of bonuses because GW designed itself into a corner right from the get go of 8th (and completely ignored that issue when coming up with 9th).

 Vankraken wrote:
The core rules of the game are far too limited in their current state to allow for depth of mechanics (which is what the game desperately needs). Game just bloats and has rampant power creep because the design space is so limited that you can't have much in the way of utility that doesn't just boil down to more killing power or durability. Stuff like USRs, universal game mechanics that aren't army specific, and bringing back stuff like proper cover saves will do a lot of help diversify the gameplay loop, unit roles/utility, and army interactions beyond just killing models.

That said I am the minority in that I despise current 40k due to the game being dreadfully boring. Despite my negativity of the game in its current state, a lot of the complaints going on now are stuff I sorta foresaw due to how small a foundation the core rules laid and the inevitable stacking of bonuses on top of bonuses because GW designed itself into a corner right from the get go of 8th (and completely ignored that issue when coming up with 9th).

A minority? Maybe, but decidedly not alone. I've recently come around to this way of thinking. 9th is very boring, and the reason I didn't see it earlier was because of being too boggled and annoyed by the infinite train of hugs Marines were getting at the time; Now that a few more factions have some really powerful and convoluted rules, I could actually look at the game and go "Wait a minute, this is a train of watery dog spunk!"

Racerguy180 wrote:
A switch to d10 based rules would allow for more meaningful interactions. There's only so much design space a d6 based to hit/wound system has.

this would not change anything
stats in this game are 1-10, yet GW es effective using 2-8 and limiting the design space additional with their to wound table

you can get a game based in D6 were the dice roll needed are put directly into the profile instead of stats and tables, using +/-1 modifiers with hardcaps and and get much more interactions than 40k has now

the design space of D6 is limited but GW does not even use the full scale that is available

I've actually experienced a few local players, even some of the competitive ones, who are really wary of the direction the game is heading in with regards to rules complexity. The Admech Codex has what has been setting off real alarm bells with how needlessly convoluted it is and I've had a few people say that they actually dread their 9th Codex because they don't want to get some "Doctrine"-style army ability that is going to be more things to keep track of.

ccs wrote:

 vict0988 wrote:

 CEO Kasen wrote:
The game will not magically become good in 9th with a codex release or points update; it will require total restructuring and this is not happening until 10th.

I disagree, a single Chapter Approved book could remove most of the bloat from the game. Invalidate all Stratagems, Warlord Traits, Relics, Chapter Tactics and Combat Doctrines from all codexes. Print universal Stratagems and WL traits and a small unique Relic set for each army and only print and update these rules in Chapter Approved, no army gets left behind and once you know what's in Chapter Approved there'll be no more surprises. That and a solidly tested mission pack and set of points would fix matched play. Errata Codex ability names to generic old-school terminology. Release a crusade pack with crusade content for every faction. Release indexes instead of codexes when datasheets need updates, just datasheets and the rules that follow with the datasheets like weapon profiles and rules like Reanimation Protocols, nothing else, not art or pictures. Release collector's guides for each army with fluff, narrative missions, terrain and miniature displays and guides.

So... 10th edition+

If the core rules don't change then it's not a new edition is it? 9,5 maybe. I think the core rules are pretty much perfect. There isn't much errata outside rare rules and there are no beta rules unlike 8th, a new edition would be totally unnecessary. The existing 9th edition codexes are fine-ish, I just think GW should hurry up and release a CSM index, how many people are waiting with baited breath for the fluff and art in the next book? CSM need updated datasheets.

If the core rules change a lot than it is a new game rather than a new Edition

Not many changes but corrections and updated Codex books = new Edition

so New³40k 3rd Edition instead of 9.5/10 (RT, 40k, New40k 1&2, New-New40k 1,2&3, New³ 1&2)

Sometimes it take as small change to make a huge impact on the game though. Sure the numbers and some of the rules between 8th and 9th are shared. But the terrain rules are, so different that they catapulted some armies to total game dominance.

A simple change to how doctrines work, was a death kneel to marine armies who had rules based around being in devastator doctrin. We don't see many/any Iron Hands or Imperial Fists being played nowadays. While technically the core rule set is more or less the same.

Some basic stat adjustments to bring all armies in line with each other, and to scale back overall lethality, could breathe a massive amount of life into the game. It really would not take that much.

Can't believe I'm saying this, as 40k has been a huge part of my life for the past 7 years, but I'm considering quitting the game.

GW are showing absolutely no sign of changing their stripes. Their codex release balance system is terribad - it cuts down forests to pump out hardbacks that are redundant in a year, and their balancing system is predicated on codex creep, with an eventual edition reset when the waterline gets too high. Which is to say they don't attempt to balance the game 'in toto' whatsoever.

Their initial ideas of 9e were promising but the latest CA speaks of a lack of will or imagination to take any positive risks, their model release has skewed horribly towards Primaris and AoS, and their latest points balancing is a thing of wonder, such is it's ineptness.

Coming back to the game after playing Infinity all year, it's just such a mess. While Infinity's system is much more advanced, 40k's simple system is straining under the sheer weight of the ad hoc rules they keep stacking on. If I have to commit a serius amount of time to learn a game, I choose one whose complexity yields a really rich tactical experience, rather than one that is just committing to memory the endless iterations of violations of a simple rule set.

Finally, short-term profit motive über alles is skewing the game unecessarily, with long-term game health and design being sacrificed for a quick buck. I can see why B-bone quit and sold his armies.

 grouchoben wrote:
Can't believe I'm saying this, as 40k has been a huge part of my life for the past 7 years, but I'm considering quitting the game.

GW are showing absolutely no sign of changing their stripes. Their codex release balance system is terribad - it cuts down forests to pump out hardbacks that are redundant in a year, and their balancing system is predicated on codex creep, with an eventual edition reset when the waterline gets too high. Which is to say they don't attempt to balance the game 'in toto' whatsoever.

Their initial ideas of 9e were promising but the latest CA speaks of a lack of will or imagination to take any positive risks, their model release has skewed horribly towards Primaris and AoS, and their latest points balancing is a thing of wonder, such is it's ineptness.

Coming back to the game after playing Infinity all year, it's just such a mess. While Infinity's system is much more advanced, 40k's simple system is straining under the sheer weight of the ad hoc rules they keep stacking on. If I have to commit a serius amount of time to learn a game, I choose one whose complexity yields a really rich tactical experience, rather than one that is just committing to memory the endless iterations of violations of a simple rule set.

Finally, short-term profit motive über alles is skewing the game unecessarily, with long-term game health and design being sacrificed for a quick buck. I can see why B-bone quit and sold his armies.

As someone who's been into the game for around 25 years all I can say is "meet the new boss, same as the old boss".

I think it's funny how people are talking about the game as if it's dying.

40k is more popular than it's ever been.

I'm not saying people are wrong for having the opinions they have, not at all, I just think it's worth noting that the game is bigger than it's ever been before.

Seabass wrote:
I think it's funny how people are talking about the game as if it's dying.

40k is more popular than it's ever been.

I'm not saying people are wrong for having the opinions they have, not at all, I just think it's worth noting that the game is bigger than it's ever been before.

Who said the game is dying? We're saying the game is gak. If the Transformers movie have proved anything it's that popular things can still be gak.

I think a lot of it comes down to the problems because of Corona. They simply should not have started 9th edition when they didn't have the proper production capacities. The Indomitus Set was already a bad start, the App is still a mess and the Codizes we see are actually nice but with how slowly they are coming out we still can't see the whole picture. Their FAQ system seems to have broken down completely, the points decisions are still strange and CA has become totally useless outside of the tournament scene. I really hope GW tries to solve these problems when Corona is over and not force 10th edition on us in 2 years when half the factions got their 9th edition Codex. The foundations of 9th are actually good, better than in 8th and far better than in 6th or 7th which I don't miss one bit. GW just has to get their things together again.

Whats really frustrating to me with 9th is that they've got some good ideas, but theyre so utterly buried at the bottom of a gigantic pile of meaningless bloat that it's tough to cut down to them.

For AGES 40k has suffered from the fact that so many units are essentially identical statlines leading to each edition having a "best" weapon profile that everyone kind of gravitates towards.

with 9th we're finally getting fundamentally different forms of durability, between Dark Angel transhuman, Death Guard -1 damage, Necron regeneration, Orks high toughness, etc - that's fantastic, that's something that's been needed for so so long.

....but of course now you need to track 97 layers of army-wide special rules and detachment rules and doctrines and stratagems and relics and custom traits and standard traits and multipart abilities and bonus auras and actions and special objectives and just endless, endless piles of trash.

The problem is those types of durability aren't in any way universally applied.

We used have a typical dynamic where most factions had access to light, medium, and heavy armour for example.

But now, there's none of that. If you take a weapon that's resistant to -1 damage, that's great if you're playing Deathguard but absolutely useless against many other factions.
So, realistically, that dynamic of their being a best weapon remains but now there's a chance you'll face an army that hard-counters that weapon and you're boned.

These damage effects are handed out completely illogically as well. Why are Terminators suddenly so much more resistant to high strength weaponary if they paint their armour bone?

 kirotheavenger wrote:
The problem is those types of durability aren't in any way universally applied.

We used have a typical dynamic where most factions had access to light, medium, and heavy armour for example.

But now, there's none of that. If you take a weapon that's resistant to -1 damage, that's great if you're playing Deathguard but absolutely useless against many other factions.
So, realistically, that dynamic of their being a best weapon remains but now there's a chance you'll face an army that hard-counters that weapon and you're boned.

These damage effects are handed out completely illogically as well. Why are Terminators suddenly so much more resistant to high strength weaponary if they paint their armour bone?

You're boned....unless you *gasp* didn't arm your troops with only one type of heavy weapon!! it's almost like that's the point, and that's something 40k has been missing for a long time.

As to 'handed out illogically' I don't really care. All the different space marines in the game make up roughly 1/3 of the playerbase, they simply cannot all have the same exact defenses or else tailoring against MEQ will always be the correct choice regardless of how much creativity you put into the defensive profiles of Orks, Tau, Necrons, etc.

Most factions having access to "the six different profiles that exist in the game with minor variations" is exactly what the problem was for so long. Eventually, people would just take the rules for an edition, go "welp, looks like S6 Ap- is the absolute optimal profile for killing everything, everybody spam that!" and the edition would be instantly solved. Now you want completely different heavy weapon types to attack MEQs, traditional vehicles, necron vehicles, and drukhari vehicles.

GW has always come up with a system of defenses and then never strayed from the most boring and basic application of that system.

Now dont get me wrong: I think GW has actually managed to ruin this good thing basically out of the gate by just power creeping to all hell and back and pursuing an overall strategy of manufactured discontent, where every army gets a big old spike right when their codex (and new model range coincidentally) drops, and then just slowly dwindles in usefulness until you go from top of the world (GSC at codex launch) to bottom of the barrel (GSC at present) with no help coming from GW for any reason.

The continuous escalation is the problem here. THere are some fundamentally good ideas being thrown around, but theyre all so buried it doesnt matter.

 kirotheavenger wrote:


But now, there's none of that. If you take a weapon that's resistant to -1 damage, that's great if you're playing Deathguard but absolutely useless against many other factions.
So, realistically, that dynamic of their being a best weapon remains but now there's a chance you'll face an army that hard-counters that weapon and you're boned.

That's positive IMHO, means that you shouldn't spam just a few weapons but take a bit of everything. You'll never be perfectly optimized against anyone but neither screwed against someone. Which is how healthy lists should be based around.

I think it's better if armies show an approximately equal spread of all profiles.

Otherwise you just end up with every army being a skew of certain defensive measures.
"Ah feth, I'm playing Deathguard, I guess all these D2 weapons are useless" isn't fun or engaging gameplay as neither player has really made a choice in that.

The way you fixed the problem you described is avoid having one profile that's better against everything.
You need the S6 weapon to lack the anti-armour punch, necessitating S9 anti-tank.
But you need the S9 anti-tank to lack the RoF against medium armour, necessitating S6.
You also need the S6 to lack the RoF of S4 for hordes.
etc etc.
I can then bring a spread of that weaponary, and through tabletop play attempt to keep the S9 weapons firing effectively at tanks, the S6 firing effectively at light armour, and the S4 weaponary firing at troops.
That's good game design.
That's not what all these silly damage rules achieve. They just produce bloat and create feels-bad moments when which army you face determines which third of your army you write-off as obsolete.

If we were talking something like heavy tanks get -1 damage, heavy infantry can only be wounded on a 4+, etc, etc, I'd be more inclined to agree that it was a positive dynamic and helped to create the dynamic you're suggesting. But the present implementation isn't that, and I think it's gak.

I agree with your premise that GW has generally failed to get this dynamic right. I just disagree that they've done any better at the moment, I'd even say they've made it worse.

Single shot anti tank weapon in a world of inv saves are horribly bad, unless they would be doing something like 6-12D flat.

Sgt. Cortez wrote:
I think a lot of it comes down to the problems because of Corona.[...]GW just has to get their things together again.

My problem here is that Corona might be a reason, but GW decided to continue as usual and not even try to compensate or change anything because of it

I mean if there would have been problems with keeping up, making a statemant that because of Corona the books won't make it in time but they can by the e-book now and get a discount if they pe-order both and get the physical book as soon as it arrives

intead GW decided that the only way to buy the e-book is to buy the physical book which comes late because of Corona but this is not their problem if the costumers has the wait months until he can play

it is not that Corona and Brexit were big problems that brought some unexpected issues, but that GW's solution to the problem was the least costumer friendly by trying as hard as possible to pretend that there is no problem and continue as with buisness as usual (and this caused all the problem with an App not being ready, people not getting their orders etc.)

 grouchoben wrote:
Can't believe I'm saying this, as 40k has been a huge part of my life for the past 7 years, but I'm considering quitting the game.

Coming back to the game after playing Infinity all year, it's just such a mess. While Infinity's system is much more advanced, 40k's simple system is straining under the sheer weight of the ad hoc rules they keep stacking on. If I have to commit a serius amount of time to learn a game, I choose one whose complexity yields a really rich tactical experience, rather than one that is just committing to memory the endless iterations of violations of a simple rule set.

Yeah it is looking like its time to take a break again (played 1st, 2nd, 8th). I think not being slowly boiled in the pan and slowly absorbing each change as it came out, instead being confronted by a wall of chrome after Covid doesn't help.

Currently they seem stuck in a wave of super buffing everything, which is pointless, as it just delvers the same balance ultimately, just with a lot more dice rolling and time taken.

As a wise man once said 40k is complicated (with all the straightforward bits to remember) but not complex (on table tactics are limited and the afore mentioned bits don't create much threat, they just tend to be straight buffs to stats). It seems to be approaching the point where it gets too complex to be fun as a light game.