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 catbarf wrote:

 Xenomancers wrote:
The point I am making is they are just making it easier for top lists to win. On that GW board that they just posted. You literally can not win without jetpack/fast melee units - massive indirect fire - or ignore terrain abilities. It is not hard for good players to figure that out.

I am far from a tournament player, but the idea of needing to consider things like engaging targets in cover, engaging without LOS, or taking objectives on a cluttered battlefield sounds a lot more interesting than just optimizing for sheer killiness and durability.

Maybe it'll help out armies that have access to effective units that tick all those boxes, but I don't think devaluing the board is ever the right answer.

Edit: To be clear, I 100% agree that having a mix of boards is better, and the game is more interesting when you have to design for and react to a variety of layouts. It's a staple of online gaming and for good reason.

For sure - these are great abilities to have on any battlefield. Their value on a table like that though...is overbearing. Which is why terrain should be random. Or people just spam that type of unit because it will always be overbearing.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Jidmah wrote:
The different types of terrain benefit different types of units and armies.

Ruins primarily just benefit melee infantry and those units that ignore ruins, so if your entire board is just covered in ruins, the meta is going to tilt heavily towards units like terminators, blade guard and similar stuff. If you have no ruins but all dense terrain, heavy shooting units will reign supreme.

Xeno's worries about tournament games being too easily trained could easily be alienated by creating a pool of 12-18 boards and not telling people which ones they are playing before the event starts.

I totally agree. Maybe not 12-18 but as others have stated. If there were 6-8 different set ups. With a variety of density - some industrial - some jungle - some city fight. That is what I would call fair.

 catbarf wrote:

 Jidmah wrote:
The different types of terrain benefit different types of units and armies.

Ruins primarily just benefit melee infantry and those units that ignore ruins, so if your entire board is just covered in ruins, the meta is going to tilt heavily towards units like terminators, blade guard and similar stuff. If you have no ruins but all dense terrain, heavy shooting units will reign supreme.

With how terrain is currently implemented, this is unavoidable to a degree. An army with BS3+ and 3+ saves across the board is going to benefit more from save-boosting cover and be hurt less by -1 to hit than an army that's BS4+ and 5+ saves.

So the quantity of terrain can skew how two armies stack up, in addition to the type.

The difference between the terrain types is mostly how well they can protect from shooting and how easy it is to move across them.
Ruins are easy to move across for infantry and terrible to move across for vehicles and give great protection from shooting.
Craters/Forests/Industrial mediocre to move across for everyone, and give mediocre at protecting from shooting.
Crates/Rocks are terrible to move across for everyone and give good protection from shooting.
Barricades/pipes are difficult to move across for everyone, and give a little protection from shooting.

The trick is bringing an equal mix of all four, allowing players to use the parts of the battlefield that benefits their units most.
You don't need indirect fire when you can maneuver a tank to shoot objective campers through a forest. On the other hand, indirect fire isn't worthless because your opponent can still utilize ruins to hide valuable units behind them.
You are also free to move your melee troops through forests and ruins, but some ranged units protected by barricades and containers are not easily reached.
If everything is ruins, every player will place their units in the same spot, and infantry will never move

A set of 'official maps' would be a good way to ensure variety in a regulated competitive environment. Vary the types and quantity of terrain per map. 12-18 might be a burden for TOs to build, but if you had six different types, then in a typical six-round tournament each player would be playing on each map once.

Yeah 12-18 is probably a bit much when your average tournament only goes for 4-5 rounds, but there should definitely be at least one more map than turns - just so a TO can know one out of the rotation if it proves to be too unbalanced.
As for the burden on TOs - currently GW essentially requires 4 large ruins, 4 small ruins and 4 dense terrain features. Add an ADL (or barricade of similar length) and four containers and you're already in a position where you can just shuffle around those terrain pieces into multiple interesting boards.
If you want to go wild, you could even create "slots" for faction terrain pieces which get auto-filled with a large rock when unused.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Xenomancers wrote:
I totally agree. Maybe not 12-18 but as others have stated. If there were 6-8 different set ups. With a variety of density - some industrial - some jungle - some city fight. That is what I would call fair.

True, though you could just theme boards irrespective of the terrain set-up. A ruin in a jungle setting could just be an ancient ruin that has the same base size as the one used in the industrial board next to them.

The terrain I bought for games at my home is half ork themed and half imperial themed - even if we set up the sides to mirror each other boards, the ork side is never truely symmetric to the imperial side, simply because the ruins, industrial structures and barricades have different shapes, heights and sizes.

This is the problem with the current game design. Units have specific roles dictated by their datasheets and stat line. It's not like I can pin units down with artillery and then send in a squad of infantry to clear them out. My unit is either good or not in any given situation universally based on their stats / special rules and there is little I can do as a player to change that.

You take the units not the player.
If you don't have the tools, you can't win.

What can I do as a guard player on a board like that? Take Ogryn and basilisks? It's not like guardsmen are getting a lot of kills.






Furthermore this might not become the norm for narrative 40k games, but as seen with the board sizes the more organized and explicit formats for a game system are always going to inform the standard for the less organized iterations. It also creates a perception of there being a "right" way to play the game, especially when endorsed by the central rules body.

 Sledgehammer wrote:
This is the problem with the current game design. Units have specific roles dictated by their datasheets and stat line. It's not like I can pin units down with artillery and then send in a squad of infantry to clear them out. My unit is either good or not in any given situation universally based on their stats / special rules and there is little I can do as a player to change that.

And "current game design" means "(at least) since 3rd edition in 1998". This is not a game with interactions like these and I doubt it ever will be. Critisizing a game for something it doesn't try to be is a moot point.

Coming from a few months of infinity playing, i have really grown fond of asymetric boards. It makes chosing Deployment actually important over Turn order.

Having lots of obscuring terrain also makes a lot of sense IMO not all your weapons should be able to shoot the whole board without navigating. Sure it gives a bonus to melee units but you can still navigate around them (unless they get stuff that allows them to charge you on turn 1 but then terrain doesnt really matter considering its all breachable anyway)

a_typical_hero wrote:

 Sledgehammer wrote:
This is the problem with the current game design. Units have specific roles dictated by their datasheets and stat line. It's not like I can pin units down with artillery and then send in a squad of infantry to clear them out. My unit is either good or not in any given situation universally based on their stats / special rules and there is little I can do as a player to change that.

And "current game design" means "(at least) since 3rd edition in 1998". This is not a game with interactions like these and I doubt it ever will be. Critisizing a game for something it doesn't try to be is a moot point.

I can't advocate for that? I mean, its not like vehicle facing wasn't a toe dip into that department either.....

 Sledgehammer wrote:

a_typical_hero wrote:

 Sledgehammer wrote:
This is the problem with the current game design. Units have specific roles dictated by their datasheets and stat line. It's not like I can pin units down with artillery and then send in a squad of infantry to clear them out. My unit is either good or not in any given situation universally based on their stats / special rules and there is little I can do as a player to change that.

And "current game design" means "(at least) since 3rd edition in 1998". This is not a game with interactions like these and I doubt it ever will be. Critisizing a game for something it doesn't try to be is a moot point.

I can't advocate for that? I mean, its not like vehicle facing wasn't a toe dip into that department either.....

Your original comment makes sense to me, i didnt play pre-8th but from what i've heard vehicle facings did encourage positioning and the pinning weapons also were a step in a more tactical game than what we have now

Dude...in this game flamethrowers can hit airplanes...

Armor facings has no role in a game like this.

Personally I wish the game was more complicated. Sadly it's not. Marines only have transhuman philology when you pay CP for it -without their philology ever changing.

 Xenomancers wrote:
Dude...in this game flamethrowers can hit airplanes...

Armor facings has no role in a game like this.

Personally I wish the game was more complicated. Sadly it's not. Marines only have transhuman philology when you pay CP for it -without their philology ever changing.

Why am i not allowed to say i wish we had more actual depth? Just because flamers can hit airplanes doesnt mean i can't ask for true tactical options.
(and while you're at it, just make aiplanes add 12" to the range of weapons shooting at them)

 Xenomancers wrote:
Dude...in this game flamethrowers can hit airplanes...

Armor facings has no role in a game like this.

Personally I wish the game was more complicated. Sadly it's not. Marines only have transhuman philology when you pay CP for it -without their philology ever changing.

Sigh.... Let's not get into that..... I already derailed the tank thread.


With that being said I think this change will have some small implications on narrative players, and will be more or less neutral to competitive play. It just creates a new environment for new metas to come about.

It's time for the game to make meaningful changes to make the game better for everyone.

Every type of play benefits from balanced rules. We should start there. (Too bad GW is moving away from this - current admech is the most busted crap to ever exist - expect 70% WR)

Every type of army has a preferred terrain setup - So the tables terrain should be variable as to not give preference to any type of army.

This is really common sense stuff IMO.

If there are 6 terrain set-ups, A, B, C, D, E, F and I play against 5 armies 1, 2, 3, 4, 5 I will benefit more or less than my opponent from the table we are playing on. How much I or my opponent benefit in any given game is based on luck that is decided before deployment has finished. Make boards and/or missions too beneficial and you risk deciding a game before it has even begun.

I might take a Monolith going to a tournament knowing there is a 17% chance in each game that I will be at a severe disadvantage, probably that'll come up once in 5 games, but it could be twice or never, frankly I'd rather know that it's a 100% chance (with GW's terrible terrain) and just pick units I know won't be completely screwed by terrain.

One thing that would be okay is coupling missions with terrain, mission xy is beneficial for gunlines so it needs more terrain, mission zz starts with armies close to each other so gunlines need better sight-lines so they can sit further back and draw lines of sight, etc. etc. But this is not possible under normal tournament formats, so every table and mission needs to be more or less the same in terms of which units it benefits to ensure games are not decided almost entirely by a combination of mission, matchup and terrain.

"Every type of army has a preferred terrain setup - So the tables terrain should be variable as to not give preference to any type of army."
If Space Marines lose every game against Tyranids and win every game against Daemons is that balanced?

 VladimirHerzog wrote:
Sure it gives a bonus to melee units but you can still navigate around them (unless they get stuff that allows them to charge you on turn 1 but then terrain doesnt really matter considering its all breachable anyway)

Craters and forests exist, they can slow down melee units without FLY.

 vict0988 wrote:

 VladimirHerzog wrote:
Sure it gives a bonus to melee units but you can still navigate around them (unless they get stuff that allows them to charge you on turn 1 but then terrain doesnt really matter considering its all breachable anyway)

Craters and forests exist, they can slow down melee units without FLY.

i know, i meant for the suggested layouts specifically

"Every type of army has a preferred terrain setup - So the tables terrain should be variable as to not give preference to any type of army."
If Space Marines lose every game against Tyranids and win every game against Daemons is that balanced?
What does that have to do with variable terrain? Seems to me this has nothing to do with terrain. I am pretty sure different terrain setups would influence those battles though - if the terrain is the same every battle or close to it - the result will be the same more often.

"I might take a Monolith going to a tournament knowing there is a 17% chance in each game that I will be at a severe disadvantage, probably that'll come up once in 5 games, but it could be twice or never, frankly I'd rather know that it's a 100% chance (with GW's terrible terrain) and just pick units I know won't be completely screwed by terrain."
Monolith is Titanic. So essentially the more terrain on the table the worse it gets. GW terrain setup has mandated that this unit see 0 play. That alone makes the setup bad. Full stop. Not that Monoliths would be incredibly good on a table with less terrain ether. It's a bad example because the unit just isn't that great for it's points. Just too easy to kill In my experience (played 2 of them last Sat) and they just die too easy.

A better example would be a shooting unit that doesn't want to be in CC. Why would you take a unit like this on a GW offical terrain setup ever? I mean that is even dumber than in previous version of the game when people would floot slog melee armies - because that actually has a chance of success because melee has huge upside. Taking shooting units that will inevitably end up locked in combat and likely destroyed in 1 round of combat while never having a chance to shoot...that is entirely unwinnable. Unless like you are admech...and you can just get every rule in the game in bundles and stacks and not pay points for it.

 Xenomancers wrote:

 vict0988 wrote:
I might take a Monolith going to a tournament knowing there is a 17% chance in each game that I will be at a severe disadvantage, probably that'll come up once in 5 games, but it could be twice or never, frankly I'd rather know that it's a 100% chance (with GW's terrible terrain) and just pick units I know won't be completely screwed by terrain.

Monolith is Titanic. So essentially the more terrain on the table the worse it gets. GW terrain setup has mandated that this unit see 0 play. That alone makes the setup bad. Full stop. Not that Monoliths would be incredibly good on a table with less terrain ether. It's a bad example because the unit just isn't that great for it's points. Just too easy to kill In my experience (played 2 of them last Sat) and they just die too easy.

Agree with everything you are saying here, what I am saying that I don't want every fifth game to be played on an open table to give Monoliths a chance to shine once in a while, I want them to be equally worth it in every game based on the terrain the TO has let the players know will be in effect before they submit their lists. So either, every game should be on tables where the Monolith isn't totally kneecapped or none of them should be. None is the best answer, but I don't want competitive games being decided by whether you play on table 1 in a jungle or table 2 on a savannah. In a casual game you can be more open and then negotiate with your opponent, try a hard table once in a while to test your army's mettle and let it run rampant on a more open battlefield if the opponent is up to the challenge.

 vict0988 wrote:
If there are 6 terrain set-ups, A, B, C, D, E, F and I play against 5 armies 1, 2, 3, 4, 5 I will benefit more or less than my opponent from the table we are playing on. How much I or my opponent benefit in any given game is based on luck that is decided before deployment has finished. Make boards and/or missions too beneficial and you risk deciding a game before it has even begun.

I might take a Monolith going to a tournament knowing there is a 17% chance in each game that I will be at a severe disadvantage, probably that'll come up once in 5 games, but it could be twice or never, frankly I'd rather know that it's a 100% chance (with GW's terrible terrain) and just pick units I know won't be completely screwed by terrain.

One thing that would be okay is coupling missions with terrain, mission xy is beneficial for gunlines so it needs more terrain, mission zz starts with armies close to each other so gunlines need better sight-lines so they can sit further back and draw lines of sight, etc. etc. But this is not possible under normal tournament formats, so every table and mission needs to be more or less the same in terms of which units it benefits to ensure games are not decided almost entirely by a combination of mission, matchup and terrain.

"Every type of army has a preferred terrain setup - So the tables terrain should be variable as to not give preference to any type of army."
If Space Marines lose every game against Tyranids and win every game against Daemons is that balanced?

I think you got it all wrong. All six terrain setups should not massively benefit one or another army. Of course, every kind of map is probably going to be slightly better for some armies than for others, but no more than the current missions are.

 vict0988 wrote:

 Xenomancers wrote:

 vict0988 wrote:
I might take a Monolith going to a tournament knowing there is a 17% chance in each game that I will be at a severe disadvantage, probably that'll come up once in 5 games, but it could be twice or never, frankly I'd rather know that it's a 100% chance (with GW's terrible terrain) and just pick units I know won't be completely screwed by terrain.

Monolith is Titanic. So essentially the more terrain on the table the worse it gets. GW terrain setup has mandated that this unit see 0 play. That alone makes the setup bad. Full stop. Not that Monoliths would be incredibly good on a table with less terrain ether. It's a bad example because the unit just isn't that great for it's points. Just too easy to kill In my experience (played 2 of them last Sat) and they just die too easy.

Agree with everything you are saying here, what I am saying that I don't want every fifth game to be played on an open table to give Monoliths a chance to shine once in a while, I want them to be equally worth it in every game based on the terrain the TO has let the players know will be in effect before they submit their lists. So either, every game should be on tables where the Monolith isn't totally kneecapped or none of them should be. None is the best answer, but I don't want competitive games being decided by whether you play on table 1 in a jungle or table 2 on a savannah. In a casual game you can be more open and then negotiate with your opponent, try a hard table once in a while to test your army's mettle and let it run rampant on a more open battlefield if the opponent is up to the challenge.

This is more of a problem with aberrant unit types than it is with the terrain setups though. They need to figure out a way to balance titanic units around not having obscuring without making them so indestructible that they can just walk into your backlines and kill everything.

 Jidmah wrote:
All six terrain setups should not massively benefit one or another army. Of course, every kind of map is probably going to be slightly better for some armies than for others, but no more than the current missions are.

Agree 100%, but some do want "melee terrain" on table 1 and "gunline terrain" on table 2, bad idea outside team tournaments. GW only coming up with 2 is probably logistics-related, not even following the objective placement rules is just lazy.

 vict0988 wrote:

 Jidmah wrote:
All six terrain setups should not massively benefit one or another army. Of course, every kind of map is probably going to be slightly better for some armies than for others, but no more than the current missions are.

Agree 100%, but some do want "melee terrain" on table 1 and "gunline terrain" on table 2, bad idea outside team tournaments.

Well that sound a lot like "each player gains 2d6 VP" to me. Anything replacing player skill with luck is a terrible idea for tournaments.

 Jidmah wrote:

 vict0988 wrote:

 Jidmah wrote:
All six terrain setups should not massively benefit one or another army. Of course, every kind of map is probably going to be slightly better for some armies than for others, but no more than the current missions are.

Agree 100%, but some do want "melee terrain" on table 1 and "gunline terrain" on table 2, bad idea outside team tournaments.

Well that sound a lot like "each player gains 2d6 VP" to me. Anything replacing player skill with luck is a terrible idea for tournaments.

Exactly, in team tournaments it's different as you can have players defend their ideal terrain and the attacker might struggle despite having a counter army.

People think that everyone will be making balanced lists, but I don't think we've seen more balanced lists than in 9th, people aren't even straining that much under Ro3 most of the time and the missions are all samey.

ERJAK wrote:

 vict0988 wrote:

 Xenomancers wrote:

 vict0988 wrote:
I might take a Monolith going to a tournament knowing there is a 17% chance in each game that I will be at a severe disadvantage, probably that'll come up once in 5 games, but it could be twice or never, frankly I'd rather know that it's a 100% chance (with GW's terrible terrain) and just pick units I know won't be completely screwed by terrain.

Monolith is Titanic. So essentially the more terrain on the table the worse it gets. GW terrain setup has mandated that this unit see 0 play. That alone makes the setup bad. Full stop. Not that Monoliths would be incredibly good on a table with less terrain ether. It's a bad example because the unit just isn't that great for it's points. Just too easy to kill In my experience (played 2 of them last Sat) and they just die too easy.

Agree with everything you are saying here, what I am saying that I don't want every fifth game to be played on an open table to give Monoliths a chance to shine once in a while, I want them to be equally worth it in every game based on the terrain the TO has let the players know will be in effect before they submit their lists. So either, every game should be on tables where the Monolith isn't totally kneecapped or none of them should be. None is the best answer, but I don't want competitive games being decided by whether you play on table 1 in a jungle or table 2 on a savannah. In a casual game you can be more open and then negotiate with your opponent, try a hard table once in a while to test your army's mettle and let it run rampant on a more open battlefield if the opponent is up to the challenge.

This is more of a problem with aberrant unit types than it is with the terrain setups though. They need to figure out a way to balance titanic units around not having obscuring without making them so indestructible that they can just walk into your backlines and kill everything.

Or maybe, for competitive, organized tournament play, you don't. To give a quick example from a game I played previously - Monsterpocalypse had a mechanic whereby players would build the city they were going to be playing on by bringing a collection of buildings that synergized with their list of little minions. So for example the UFO faction, which was immune to radiation damage, would bring tons of Nuclear Power Plants to throw the opposing monster into and the city would end up looking like a 12 year old's Sim City setup.

One of the expansions introduced 'faction buildings' which were like bases dedicated to the various factions, which compared to the benefits of every other building in the game were HUGELY powerful. If someone could roll up as the UFO faction with an entire building list just full of the martian laser-towers they'd have a massive advantage, it just broke that aspect of the game.

So TOs just didnt play with them, they were ruled 'for casual play only' when it was supremely unlikely that a player just buying random booster packs would wind up with more than 1 or 2 of the faction building.

Of the wargames I've played competitively over the years, 40k is the only one where TO's regardless of the balance of a feature will basically tie themselves in knots to try and accommodate any scrap of rules that the company that produces the game puts out. Other games are far more apt to take a feature and label it 'not for tournament play, sorry.'

I think the fundamental problem with terrain in 9th, is its mixture with the missions, the secondaries, strong melee units, and the infantry keyword.

Specifically, if you happen to have strong melee units, access to secondaries which allow you to hold off on taking and holding the central points, then all you have to do is advance into threat range of the central points, and force your opponent into a no win situation. Strong melee units behind breachable solid walls in the mid field create, in my opinion an oppressive game state.

secretForge wrote:
I think the fundamental problem with terrain in 9th, is its mixture with the missions, the secondaries, strong melee units, and the infantry keyword.

Specifically, if you happen to have strong melee units, access to secondaries which allow you to hold off on taking and holding the central points, then all you have to do is advance into threat range of the central points, and force your opponent into a no win situation. Strong melee units behind breachable solid walls in the mid field create, in my opinion an oppressive game state.

Yeah, I think 9th could have done with a few terrain keywords that were bad for infantry but benefitted non-infantry units in some way.

I'm not really a fan of fixed terrain layouts, but I understand them from a TO point of view as it's so much easier to do it that way than come up with fair, balanced set-ups across every table while making all of them different. However, I do think such a small selection of terrain types and layouts just pushes 40k further away from skill on the tabletop as yet another variable is accounted for before a single model is placed on the table.

 the_scotsman wrote:


Or maybe, for competitive, organized tournament play, you don't. To give a quick example from a game I played previously - Monsterpocalypse had a mechanic whereby players would build the city they were going to be playing on by bringing a collection of buildings that synergized with their list of little minions. So for example the UFO faction, which was immune to radiation damage, would bring tons of Nuclear Power Plants to throw the opposing monster into and the city would end up looking like a 12 year old's Sim City setup.

One of the expansions introduced 'faction buildings' which were like bases dedicated to the various factions, which compared to the benefits of every other building in the game were HUGELY powerful. If someone could roll up as the UFO faction with an entire building list just full of the martian laser-towers they'd have a massive advantage, it just broke that aspect of the game.

So TOs just didnt play with them, they were ruled 'for casual play only' when it was supremely unlikely that a player just buying random booster packs would wind up with more than 1 or 2 of the faction building.

Of the wargames I've played competitively over the years, 40k is the only one where TO's regardless of the balance of a feature will basically tie themselves in knots to try and accommodate any scrap of rules that the company that produces the game puts out. Other games are far more apt to take a feature and label it 'not for tournament play, sorry.'

I'm not sure your group or TOs were reading the rules properly if that was happening since the original MonPoc with the blind Boosters had a limit on how many of each building you could take(which IIRC was even lower for the Faction buildings). Yes, you could skew your building pool, but not to such an extent you needed to ban the Faction Buildings(which were legal in official events).