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Apple fox wrote:
I would suspect that multi model combat will just be, activate and pick target. Roll.

The problem with this is that attacking someone inherently needs them to also attack you, since attack and defence are the same roll in melee.
That works fine if it's 1v1, but what if you want to attack multiple targets?
I don't think there's any obviously correct solution, and each approach has it's positives and negatives.

I think its likely that all models currently in base contact (or whatever "locked in combat" equivalent is used) roll their dice and they can be assigned to targets as the players see fit.

Imagine I have a combat;
GOG
O
G = Guardsman, O = Ork (K for Krieg and K for Kommando didn't work out )
All are in base contact together, it's the top left Guardsman's turn, he only wants to attack the top Ork.

Do both Orks roll all their attacks, using them to parry/attack as they see fit? This makes attacking when outnumbered total suicide as it's likely all your hits will just be parried. But that's fairly realistic so maybe it is.
Plus, when you add the second Guardsman that's a huge messy combat and a nightmare to resolve with the parry/attack system.

Or maybe the only Ork that gets to react is the top one, as that's the only the Ork declared as a target. In this case the second Ork would probably interfere in some way, and the second Guardsman would assist in some way.

 kirotheavenger wrote:

Apple fox wrote:
I would suspect that multi model combat will just be, activate and pick target. Roll.

The problem with this is that attacking someone inherently needs them to also attack you, since attack and defence are the same roll in melee.
That works fine if it's 1v1, but what if you want to attack multiple targets?
I don't think there's any obviously correct solution, and each approach has it's positives and negatives.

There are a number of ways to combat this, could just only respond once. Negative dice each attack made a round. Or a outnumbering bonus, could also stack them.
GW I hope has thought about that, I Hope..

It’s why I think GW has done themselves a bit of a disservice with there hype, as it feels kinda backwards. And just feels we are missing bits needed to see where it’s going.

Apple fox wrote:

It’s why I think GW has done themselves a bit of a disservice with there hype, as it feels kinda backwards. And just feels we are missing bits needed to see where it’s going.

Well, it seems they've stopped doing the rule preview articles.

 Crimson wrote:

Apple fox wrote:

It’s why I think GW has done themselves a bit of a disservice with there hype, as it feels kinda backwards. And just feels we are missing bits needed to see where it’s going.

Well, it seems they've stopped doing the rule preview articles.

I had notice that, could be this was all planned. Or something wasn’t working. But they sorta got the hype going, and then let it drop off.
I feel like they should have just given the book to someone like glass half dead and then highlight a few things they liked and let someone else do videos on it for them to share at his point.
The rules have seen positive response, it’s the unknowns that are getting more negative. And the jokes at the shapes.

Also seen the post above by kirotheavenger.
I agree entirely it’s a issue, but not one I don’t think can’t be built around. We don’t know how powerful they intend a marine to be right now. So it’s up in the air how much of a issue it is or how much of a design space it needs.

Apple fox wrote:

The rules have seen positive response

Have they? That hasn't been my impression. How it seems to me that the previews elicited a negative response so they just stopped doing them.

 kirotheavenger wrote:
Imagine I have a combat;
GOG
O
G = Guardsman, O = Ork (K for Krieg and K for Kommando didn't work out )
All are in base contact together, it's the top left Guardsman's turn, he only wants to attack the top Ork.

Do both Orks roll all their attacks, using them to parry/attack as they see fit? This makes attacking when outnumbered total suicide as it's likely all your hits will just be parried. But that's fairly realistic so maybe it is.
Plus, when you add the second Guardsman that's a huge messy combat and a nightmare to resolve with the parry/attack system.

Or maybe the only Ork that gets to react is the top one, as that's the only the Ork declared as a target. In this case the second Ork would probably interfere in some way, and the second Guardsman would assist in some way.

Good example. I don't see it being an issue though. Players roll all the dice for the models in combat, and then they take their turns to assign dice to cause damage or to parry attacks. Simple to implement.

I agree that a guardsman ganged upon in that way is doomed, but it seems reasonable. Doing this kind of gang up may be the only way low level troops can have any chance of beating a beatstick. If the beatstick doesn;t manage to take their target down first time, they are vulnerable to group activations ganking them with increasing assistance, but equally the person being ganged up on might decide to make no defence and try to blast damage through the enemy parries as they come.

So a lone guardsman ganged up on by 2 orks, if the Guardsman somehow is the attacker and the guardsman has 3 successes and the orks have a combined set of 5 successes, then it would be :
G - damage, O - parry, G - damage, then Orks have 4 remaining successes to splat the guardsman.

Given the Guardsman was probably dead anyway, they can suicide out as much damage as possible.

alternatively, if its per-combatant, then it might be :
G - damage, O - parry, O - parry, then Orks have 3 remaining successes to splat the gaurdsman, having limited damage to the orks.

Alternatively, they could do:
G - damage, O damage, O - damage and the guardsman isn't dead already, then it would go on to G - damage, O - damage, O - damage, G damage, O-damage.

 Crimson wrote:

Apple fox wrote:

The rules have seen positive response

Have they? That hasn't been my impression. How it seems to me that the previews elicited a negative response so they just stopped doing them.

I think it depends where you look, if I had to break it up. The movement being glossed over with the shapes and the reinvented ruler was a mistake. Movement is huge in skirmish games, so it should have been important to go over.

Things like how fast units interact with the system, when they said all units use cercle. Is that just in the box, or all factions.
I play systems already that are similar, but not many are going to have factions with the power fantasy of marines. So outnumbering has to be a system that supports it. This wasn’t covered.

So I do think there is positive reception, but since so many players are asking questions. There own marketing has not really met enough of that and fallen a bit flat.
Glass half dead gave more info on how systems may work, than GW did the selves.
They seem to be hyping the box up, but forgetting the game.

Activations article

Most actions cost one AP, including moving, charging, shooting, and fighting in hand-to-hand combat, while falling back costs two – it takes a lot of concentration to disengage when the bullets and power swords start flying, after all.

But here’s the clever bit – most baseline humans and xenos have two AP, allowing them to move and shoot in a single activation, for instance, or charge and fight (though you can’t typically repeat an action). However, Astartes and Chaos Space Marines, as imposing transhuman paragons of war in the 41st Millennium, get a princely three AP per activation* which is a neat way to demonstrate their effortless superiority. Custodes, meanwhile, get four – enough said.

* As do Harlequins for that matter, though not Rubricae.**

** The designers really have thought of everything.

Well that was enlightening.. they could do a little more.
Just a little. Put a few rosters up. Since baseline Xeno seems so vague.

Activation points may help with the problem Elite armies often have in alternate activation games... Looks interesting.

They make it sound like you can only perform an action once, which is probably going to nullify a lot of that one extra AP advantage compared to just bringing more warm bodies who get another shot/swing off in their activation.

Nothing unexpected from this article and nothing really new either. Although it does confirm suspicions.

And, just like the last article that seemed to have new terrain in it, in case anyone started wondering, this:


... is the FW Realm of Battle Landing pad.

CorwinB wrote:
Activation points may help with the problem Elite armies often have in alternate activation games... Looks interesting.

But, it highlights the big issue with to many elite units. That they can kill more than there worth, and other army need something to even the odds. Often being they outnumber.
Until we see marines, the current stats we have gives a big advantage to resilience and powerful units. How much and where it’s spread out is very important to know.

So what’s the point of having 3 or 4 action points if you can’t repeat actions? Sure Move-Charge-Attack or Shoot-Charge-Attack are cool, but you can’t do that every round.

You can almost certainly repeat move actions. This will allow them much greater mobility before and after an attack.
Custodes might even have a rule to shoot twice or something.

 Chairman Aeon wrote:
So what’s the point of having 3 or 4 action points if you can’t repeat actions? Sure Move-Charge-Attack or Shoot-Charge-Attack are cool, but you can’t do that every round.

The new Kill Team rules are far more flexible. Operatives now have a stat called Action Point Limit (APL for short) – and you can spend these points (AP) on any action that’s available to them. Actions include dashing for cover, charging into combat, taking a shot, or using an ability that’s unique to a particular combatant. Here’s a choice selection of a few actions available to your operatives.

That's where it would, likely, come more into play. The Veterans had a few datacards with unique actions.

 Chairman Aeon wrote:
So what’s the point of having 3 or 4 action points if you can’t repeat actions? Sure Move-Charge-Attack or Shoot-Charge-Attack are cool, but you can’t do that every round.

fallback and shoot is a big one as well.
It’s situation related powerful.
Honestly I am surprised to see charge, since that’s a huge one and if marines and such can do both move and charge could make them crazy fast.
It’s a strange choice, and makes me a little hesitant.

My guess is charge is like it is in Warcry where it just moves you into combat range and does grant a free attack. Which still makes marines faster as they can move twice and then melee, but not insanely so.

Who needs repeats (although note they said typically, not never) when a Custodes could:

Shoot
Move
Charge
Fight.

Or
fight (kill enemy)
move (round corner where enemy hiding)
shoot (enemy who no longer hiding)
charge. (a 3rd enemy)

Marines and Custodes etc could be pretty deadly even without repeats.

Custodes: fight - darn he isn't dead.
Fallback
shoot guy in face.

you don't need to do those every round for it to make them feel way better than normal guys.

That they can kill more than there worth

That's seems a daft comment. Any model can kill more than its worth. Equally, Any model will be too powerful overall if not costed right.

Whilst they may get it wrong, I think you have to assume the intent will be to cost stuff by what it can do in terms of winning games.

puree wrote:
Who needs repeats (although note they said typically, not never) when a Custodes could:

Shoot
Move
Charge
Fight.

Or
fight (kill enemy)
move (round corner where enemy hiding)
shoot (enemy who no longer hiding)
charge. (a 3rd enemy)

Marines and Custodes etc could be pretty deadly even without repeats.

Custodes: fight - darn he isn't dead.
Fallback
shoot guy in face.

you don't need to do those every round for it to make them feel way better than normal guys.

That they can kill more than there worth

That's seems a daft comment. Any model can kill more than its worth. Equally, Any model will be too powerful overall if not costed right.

Whilst they may get it wrong, I think you have to assume the intent will be to cost stuff by what it can do in terms of winning games.

In the context I was using is, if you attack a marine with your guard. And it dies, then you charge a second and it’s Likly to just die as well. In a skirmish game that just makes horde army’s unviable.
It’s a common use in skirmish games, and it’s just referring to ability to trade blows.
Marines probably get more dice, so they are likly to get a extra hit. If they can shrug off more damage they are more able to put those dice towards damage. Even if they are defending.

Apple fox wrote:

In the context I was using is, if you attack a marine with your guard. And it dies, then you charge a second and it’s Likly to just die as well. In a skirmish game that just makes horde army’s unviable.

This is a problem with combat in Necromunda, since the enemy gets to retaliate in melee every time you attack them, it makes cheap melee fighters pretty useless as you're basically giving the enemy a free opportunity to kill you.

Killteam is in danger of falling victim to the same problem, but I reserve judgement until we've seen all the rules.

In a skirmish game that just makes horde army’s unviable.

That depends on all sorts of stuff, and could be said about small elite armies being unviable etc. Until we see more info such statements are more or less worthless.

E.g. I often used to play a 3 or 4 figure nid force in kill team, someone one else had a 'massive' guard force, I can't remember how many, but there were a lot of grunts. I often struggled to win against him for the simple reason that I could wipe half his force out for no loss and still be out numbered on objectives. Game with kill points favored me to some extent, games with objectives favored him to some extent. Overall it was fairly good.

puree wrote:

In a skirmish game that just makes horde army’s unviable.

That depends on all sorts of stuff, and could be said about small elite armies being unviable etc. Until we see more info such statements are more or less worthless.

E.g. I often used to play a 3 or 4 figure nid force in kill team, someone one else had a 'massive' guard force, I can't remember how many, but there were a lot of grunts. I often struggled to win for the simple reason that I could wipe half his force out for no loss and still be out numbered on objectives. Game with kill points favored me to some extent, games with objectives favored him to some extent. Overall it was fairly good.

We actually have enough stats to run some numbers and get some outcomes. It’s more about how far and how elite GW wants marines to be.
It’s part of why I think the response has not been as positive as it could have been, since we are sorta only missing enough to not be able to understand GW, but can already understand the ideas of the game.

From my own experience with AA games having more activations can be a big benefit, as you can leave important fighters until last to react to enemy movements. Often keeping them out of LoS until the enemy has finished, then move out to strike, free from any immediate retaliation.

So the ability for elites to make multiple actions is very significant, they will still fall victim to this. I think the two have the capacity to balance out nicely.

Except stats and numbers are not enough to draw conclusions. Scenarios victory conditons play into it massively. Which is the point I was making.

Stats and numbers could probably have shown my nids were going to tear apart the guardsmen, but so what? if that isn't how you win. The guard grunt horde weren't 'unviable' because they died in droves (as any good guard player expects), as there was plenty of variety in scenarios that meant that small elite armies would struggle in some and be good in others.


I'm pretty sure thinking back that there were scenarios where I started with less models than objectives, never mind ended with.

It might be a special rule for bolt weapons that they can fire twice.

puree wrote:
Except stats and numbers are not enough to draw conclusions. Scenarios victory conditons play into it massively. Which is the point I was making.

Stats and numbers could probably have shown my nids were going to tear apart the guardsmen, but so what? if that isn't how you win. The guard grunt horde weren't 'unviable' because they died in droves (as any good guard player expects), as there was plenty of variety in scenarios that meant that small elite armies would struggle in some and be good in others.


I'm pretty sure thinking back that there were scenarios where I started with less models than objectives, never mind ended with.

Yes, until we know more. It’s why I think they are kicking themselves with such poor articles. People are discussing these, and it’s not like GW is trending unknown ground here.
It’s basic stuff. And we know GW.
Missions can only effect so much, and it’s only a small extra to dice in this system that can make something extremely powerful.