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Yeah, you'd need to design it to be squad based rather than single model based. The more I think about it the more I think I would love a game like that.

The Newman wrote:
...Having played a fair bit of Bolt Action sometimes the winner winds up being determined by the random die draw to decide who gets to activate next, and that's not exactly a "feels good" moment either. Nothing like losing several activations because your opponent drew four or five dice in a row and now all your units are pinned...

Well, yeah. I've played a lot of game systems and I've never found any that are immune to "feels bad" moments. Misjudge your turn slightly in X-Wing and land on an asteroid. Roll all blanks on your twelve-dice super attack in Crisis Protocol. Anything to do with the Overlord hack in Infinity. I bring up Bolt Action because it's a game designed specifically for alternating activations, which lead to a very different set of core assumptions about what does what and how units interact from 40k. If you tried to apply Bolt Action's pinning system to 40k's discrete turns the resulting first-player advantage would break everything. If you tried to apply 40k's "all units get to do 5-6 things a turn" to Bolt Action the game would slow to a crawl and you'd never finish.

PenitentJake wrote:
Yes, there is disputing this, because I dispute it.

Chapter Approved has changed to "Grand Tournament" packs. They adopted the mission structure and scoring methods of some of the largest tournaments in the world. They went to tournament players for their playtesting. The missions are all slight variations on the same thing, over and over again, with little variety.

This is 40k Tournament Edition. Disputing it just makes you look silly.

 oni wrote:
The whole Crusade thing is and continues to be a non-starter. It will never gain traction no matter how hard GW may try. I applaud GW for trying something new but, this one didn't pan out.

What is this opinion based on?

Personally, I just want a return of 5th edition with the simplifications they made to the rules in 8th/9th edition.

So basically roll back the clock to 5th edition, but instead of trying to make the game "more cinematic" and convoluted like they did with 6th edition, then double downed in 7th, they streamline the rules more instead.

For me, 9th Ed is an improved 8th Ed. Regarding Winters' SEO's video, Matched Play is indeed tighter than 8th Ed. The rules are worded in a more "tight" manner to reduce arguments. The "book" missions are meaningful instead of the meaningless missions of the previous editions.

I agree with Winters that 8th Ed was more accessible, but I wouldn't say that it is a huge decrease in accessibility. Yes, if a player takes Ad Mech to a tourney for their first game ever they are in for brain melt. You don't have to do that. When I have played a "first game of 9th" for other players I suggest we play 500 to 1000 points with just the datasheet rules and Only War for the mission. Essentially Open Play with the core rules and the datasheets. If my opponent has studied their Codex and want to try some of it out I will say sure - lets use your Faction rules but park Strats for the first game. Then you build.

9th is much more accessible than the editions before 8th (I played 2nd through 6th). I understand that some have a love for older editions and I trust that people have fun playing the editions that they find fun!

TangoTwoBravo wrote:
For me, 9th Ed is an improved 8th Ed. Regarding Winters' SEO's video, Matched Play is indeed tighter than 8th Ed. The rules are worded in a more "tight" manner to reduce arguments. The "book" missions are meaningful instead of the meaningless missions of the previous editions.

I agree with Winters that 8th Ed was more accessible, but I wouldn't say that it is a huge decrease in accessibility. Yes, if a player takes Ad Mech to a tourney for their first game ever they are in for brain melt. You don't have to do that. When I have played a "first game of 9th" for other players I suggest we play 500 to 1000 points with just the datasheet rules and Only War for the mission. Essentially Open Play with the core rules and the datasheets. If my opponent has studied their Codex and want to try some of it out I will say sure - lets use your Faction rules but park Strats for the first game. Then you build.

9th is much more accessible than the editions before 8th (I played 2nd through 6th). I understand that some have a love for older editions and I trust that people have fun playing the editions that they find fun!

I simply can't agree with 9th being more accessible then previous editions.

Back in y old days your units had a stat and weapon profile and so did your opponents units with maybe 1 universal special rule that was in the rulebook for everyone to see. Any unit you never met before was quickly explained and absorbed by simply listing its stat and weapon profile. Now there is an aura in play, faction traits, subfaction traits and statagems.

9th basic bare minimal rules are a little simpler then previous editions but not even by much. Once you move beyond the basic rulebook accessibility goes down the toilet as layers upon layers get added in quick succession.

 H.B.M.C. wrote:


Chapter Approved has changed to "Grand Tournament" packs.

Which are intended for use only in Matched Play games. Crusade players have three other mission packs designed specifically for the Crusade Variant of the game, while Open play has the open war deck. Maelstrom rules were also printed in WD. And yes, while it is true, as others have pointed out that there's nothing stopping people from using the open war deck in matched play, and there's nothing stopping people from battle forging open play armies, neither of those points negate the fact GW designed three distinct ways to play the game and provided both BRB and supplemental materials intended to support each of those three ways to play.

One of those three ways to play absolutely was clearly designed with the tournament circuit in mind.

The other two, equally clearly, were not.

 H.B.M.C. wrote:


They adopted the mission structure and scoring methods of some of the largest tournaments in the world.

Yes, matched play did. Kindly show me a single printed Open play or Crusade resource that scores secondaries for VPs.

 H.B.M.C. wrote:

They went to tournament players for their playtesting.

Yes, I'm sure TO's and tourney play testers were involved in the testing of Matched play rules.

I suppose it's possible that they were involved in playtesting Open and Crusade- I don't follow studio interviews and blogs as much as some people do, so please, if you could point to any source of reliable information about the contributions of tournament players and organizers to Open and Crusade, I'm prepared to stand corrected.

 H.B.M.C. wrote:

The missions are all slight variations on the same thing, over and over again, with little variety.

Could you be more specific about which missions provide these slight variations?

I'm inclined to believe you're referring to the GT mission pack ones, but I don't want to judge unfairly.

Are you including the missions generated by the Open war deck, the Crusade Mission Packs, or the campaign book missions?
Do you use Theatre of War modifiers to missions?

Do you find a greater range of variety in these other missions from the GT ones? Do you classify a mission as just the mission rule set, or do you consider the interaction of Secondaries in matched play? If so, do you find that Crusade's decoupling of Agendas from victory conditions facilitates greater use of fluffy, non-optimal Agendas- and therefore non-optimal army lists?

Honestly, this could be a topic of its own.

 H.B.M.C. wrote:

This is 40k Tournament Edition. Disputing it just makes you look silly.

As a guy who has played absolutely nothing but 25-50PL campaign-based Crusade since 9th dropped, I have to profoundly disagree. I am far more interested in whether or not my Ascendant Lord can find and recover his poison distillery in order to convince a Lhameaen to join his court, or whether or not my Bloody Rose Celestians who took the Penitent Oath after their shrine was destroyed can redeem themselves, than I am about any notion of competitive performance. These days? I wouldn't play in a tournament if YOU paid me! I'd much rather spend time advancing a story-line.

I assure you that all of these things are represented by official 9th edition rules, and that few if any of said rules will ever find their way anywhere near a tournament.
As such, I'm almost offended that you don't acknowledge the capacity of this edition to provide the experiences I'm describing.

You choosing to play Crusade exclusively doesn't change the fact that this edition was designed around tournament play. It took elements from existing tournaments and just made them part of the core rules.

You can split hairs and say "Oh, but that's just matched play!" all you want, but in the end that's how most people interface with this game.

This is Tournament Edition 40k.

 Ordana wrote:

TangoTwoBravo wrote:
For me, 9th Ed is an improved 8th Ed. Regarding Winters' SEO's video, Matched Play is indeed tighter than 8th Ed. The rules are worded in a more "tight" manner to reduce arguments. The "book" missions are meaningful instead of the meaningless missions of the previous editions.

I agree with Winters that 8th Ed was more accessible, but I wouldn't say that it is a huge decrease in accessibility. Yes, if a player takes Ad Mech to a tourney for their first game ever they are in for brain melt. You don't have to do that. When I have played a "first game of 9th" for other players I suggest we play 500 to 1000 points with just the datasheet rules and Only War for the mission. Essentially Open Play with the core rules and the datasheets. If my opponent has studied their Codex and want to try some of it out I will say sure - lets use your Faction rules but park Strats for the first game. Then you build.

9th is much more accessible than the editions before 8th (I played 2nd through 6th). I understand that some have a love for older editions and I trust that people have fun playing the editions that they find fun!

I simply can't agree with 9th being more accessible then previous editions.

Back in y old days your units had a stat and weapon profile and so did your opponents units with maybe 1 universal special rule that was in the rulebook for everyone to see. Any unit you never met before was quickly explained and absorbed by simply listing its stat and weapon profile. Now there is an aura in play, faction traits, subfaction traits and statagems.

9th basic bare minimal rules are a little simpler then previous editions but not even by much. Once you move beyond the basic rulebook accessibility goes down the toilet as layers upon layers get added in quick succession.

I just pulled my 4th Ed rulebook from the trunk. It has something like 76 pages of dense rules that a new player has to penetrate to get their first game in. 9th Edition core rules has 44 pages with a lower word count per page. That is better accessibility. If a new player tries to play their first game at a tourney then yes, they are in for a rough time. Just like every other edition. 9th Ed is easier to access as a new player than previous editions with the exception of 8th - and that is due to writing rules to mitigate the rules-lawyers.

The 9th Ed rules may be, but the rules don't stand on their own without the Codices. 9th Ed Codices are not accessible.

I'm in my second year at AdMech University, and I've only completed Canticles 102. I've got 6 more semesters of this stuff and we can't even apply for the class on Stratagems until we have at least 4 credits in Warlord Traits and Forge World special rules. And that AdMech Relics final? Man that was tough. Taking that "Skitarii Veteran Cohort" elective was also a bad idea...

 the_scotsman wrote:

10 Ruststalkers, Chordclaws+Razors, Ryza subfaction trait, Assassin Constructs stratagem, Conqueror Protocol. On average rolls they should kill about 8, but they ended up killing 10. the response from the Hellions was Cursed Blade wych cult which killed a couple with mortal wounds, they had Strength+WS drugs making them hit on 2s, wound on 2s, kill on 5s to save - they rolled about average taking out 7 with their attacks - average is 7.4.

the amount of buffs, stratagems, auras, subfactions, turn-by-turn effects, purity bonuses, heck relics and WLTs because you can put THOSE on a ruststalker sergeant at potential play with current competitive units has turned the game into an absolutely un-theorizable shibboleth that generally results in things being far, far, far deadlier than you think they ever ought to be...but there it is anyway.

AA isn't a panacea but BOY does the ability to take some kind of action during your opponent's turn make a deadly game feel a whole lot less deadly. And how could you possibly create a LESS friendly for new players game situation than the current state of rules for factions like Space Marines, Drukhari and Admech? 9th edition codexes are absolute nightmares of complexity, and the second you step out of that for a second and look at any other wargame you'll find yourself asking "wait....what? That's it? That's all I need to remember? Just one single army-wide ability? one table of to-hit modifiers that applies to EVERY unit universally? One statline for a rifle, a submachine gun, an LMG, an HMG, and that's IT for infantry weapons, are you SURE I dont' need to memorize thirty-two different boltgun statlines?"

40k might have upsides compared to other wargaming systems...but its NOT accessibility to new players, holy hell.

So the Admech player leaned into melee. They got +1 to hit ( effectively ), +1 to wound, and +1A. And clearly this was an important fight for you to push 2CP to 'protect ya neck', but Cursed Blade can't get a 4++ since that's locked to Strife, right? You also got lucky-ish getting both those drugs on random rolls.

Right, so, shibboleth. You're taking a melee focused unit against another. Expectations should be something that helps them in melee. You already know what White Scars VV will do in turn 3, right? Ryza = WS in a very rough comparison. I would always expect WS LC VV to be scarier than UM LC VV. ( Note : you just read a bunch of gibberish and understood it and you didn't learn ) IH = good with vehicles and heavies, IF = good with bolters, Wych Cult = good for Wych units and good in melee, etc.

Ruststalkers. As standard these guys do -- 10 wounds. Say only Ryza was on - ~13 wounds. Only Conquerors - ~13 wounds. Only Constructs - ~13 wounds. All together? Just about 20. So there wasn't any real multiplicative effect. Here's a good rule of thumb - as good as you think an enemy will perform - double it. As good as you think you will perform - halve it.



I play 40K, because I find those other systems kind of bland. I play WW2 games for the setting and not really for the stats. I don't give a gak about bonuses there as long as a Tiger feels like what a Tiger should feel like. It makes some sense for rifles and LMGs to be the same stat, because getting hit is going to kill you or wound you severely. Not so with a lasgun or heavy bolter hitting a marine. But, I don't need to memorize bolt gun stat lines. My opponent tells me the AP and the damage and that's all I need.

H.B.M.C. wrote:You choosing to play Crusade exclusively doesn't change the fact that this edition was designed around tournament play. It took elements from existing tournaments and just made them part of the core rules.

You can split hairs and say "Oh, but that's just matched play!" all you want, but in the end that's how most people interface with this game.

This is Tournament Edition 40k.

Yup, Crusade is wallpaper over tourney biased core rules. It may be fun(not for me) just to go thru yayy progression...hand motions. But the crappy core rules and then modifications/exemptions to said core rules do not a great game make.

And I'm one of those people who thinks Crusade is absolutely fantastic - and I will play the ever living feth out of it once my Tyranids get some actual Crusade rules - but I'm not about to pretend that it isn't a (very pretty) sideshow for what 40k has turned into.

As it happens, Chapter Approved would have been the kind of thing GW used to give everyone else some basic 'get you by' Crusade rules - 1-2 unique requisitions, a unique agenda, a battle trait tables, and maybe 1-2 unique crusade relics - as Chapter Approved used to be about adding to the game as much as it was fixing broken things.

Now Chapter Approved is this:


... and people want to sit there with a straight face and say that it's not "Tournament Edition 40k"? Give me strength...

 H.B.M.C. wrote:
The 9th Ed rules may be, but the rules don't stand on their own without the Codices. 9th Ed Codices are not accessible.

I'm in my second year at AdMech University, and I've only completed Canticles 102. I've got 6 more semesters of this stuff and we can't even apply for the class on Stratagems until we have at least 4 credits in Warlord Traits and Forge World special rules. And that AdMech Relics final? Man that was tough. Taking that "Skitarii Veteran Cohort" elective was also a bad idea...

- Doctrinas - 4 temporary buffs; one per turn; affects Skitari; upside and downside ( downside usually doesn't matter -- they should mix them up -- +1BS -1 Armor; +1Armor -1BS; +1WS -3M, etc )
- Canticles - 5 temporary buffs; same gak, but affects only Cult and no downside
- Tech Priest can be upgraded to a "Command Phase Psyker" - will affect CORE and/or Servitors - first part is active once and the second part sticks after that - also comes with a 1CP discount for one strat type
- Relics
- Traits
- Strats

Done

All that math has killed your sense of humour.

And you're starting to sound like Jidmah with his "40k isn't complicated. Take Death Gaurd! They only have 49 strats divided up into 7 broard categories".

 H.B.M.C. wrote:
All that math has killed your sense of humour.

And you're starting to sound like Jidmah with his "40k isn't complicated. Take Death Gaurd! They only have 49 strats divided up into 7 broard categories".

Yes, it probably has.

 H.B.M.C. wrote:
The 9th Ed rules may be, but the rules don't stand on their own without the Codices. 9th Ed Codices are not accessible.

I'm in my second year at AdMech University, and I've only completed Canticles 102. I've got 6 more semesters of this stuff and we can't even apply for the class on Stratagems until we have at least 4 credits in Warlord Traits and Forge World special rules. And that AdMech Relics final? Man that was tough. Taking that "Skitarii Veteran Cohort" elective was also a bad idea...

Well played!

Still, there is no requirement for a new player to absorb all of those, and even then its not really a high hill to climb if you want to play Ad Mech. You pick up your Codex and absorb what you want.

"Accessible" does not mean knowing everything about every army in the game. Accessible means being able to get your first few games in without brain melt. 9th and 8th do that better that the previous editions that I played.

9th edition is quite a bit less accessible than 8th. There's no real arguing with this. The payoff is a better ruleset overall, but there's definitely a cost, particularly when it comes to parsing out the frankly ridiculous levels of rules you can now have. Base rules + single faction rules + single subfaction rules for some factions + extra supplement rules - we're back to 7th edition at this point in terms of needing to spend $200 and spend many hours learning just to get your rules the legal way.

What makes most people enjoy 9th edition more is that there are actually functional terrain rules which forces at least some movement around the board.

8th edition had very little tactical manoeuvres as the RAW ridiculous "any point" LOS meant gunlines could just nuke each other from their deployment.

At least now we have obscuring keyword, which by itself "saves" 9th edition from being worse than 8th.

Anyway we're only two years from 10th now so lets hope 10 is a monumental change!

yukishiro1 wrote:
9th edition is quite a bit less accessible than 8th. There's no real arguing with this. The payoff is a better ruleset overall, but there's definitely a cost, particularly when it comes to parsing out the frankly ridiculous levels of rules you can now have. Base rules + single faction rules + single subfaction rules for some factions + extra supplement rules - we're back to 7th edition at this point in terms of needing to spend $200 and spend many hours learning just to get your rules the legal way.

I guess we can argue about "quite a bit" and "less" accessible with regards to 8th (are you considering PA in your calculus?). I will absolutely argue that 9th is more accessible than 2nd through 6th (didn't play 7th). Again, if you are trying to play in a tourney for your first game you in for a steep climb. As you would have been in other editions.

Having said that, I do not like the campaign supplements thus far. While I am only tracking one that is a "must-have" from a competitive standpoint, it was still cynical for them to release it on the heels of the Drukhari Codex. I would rather have my Dark Angels in one book vs two (I am getting over it).

Still, I am happy to leave my old MRBs in the crawlspace!

 Gregor Samsa wrote:
What makes most people enjoy 9th edition more is that there are actually functional terrain rules which forces at least some movement around the board.

Really? You think the oddly worded, certainly somewhat convoluted, and in many cases non-scaling or counter-intuitive 9th Ed terrain rules are what makes "most people enjoy 9th edition more" than previous ones?

 H.B.M.C. wrote:

 Gregor Samsa wrote:
What makes most people enjoy 9th edition more is that there are actually functional terrain rules which forces at least some movement around the board.

Really? You think the oddly worded, certainly somewhat convoluted, and in many cases non-scaling or counter-intuitive 9th Ed terrain rules are what makes "most people enjoy 9th edition more" than previous ones?

Usually this argument comes from people who didn't play before 8th, and treat "9th has better terrain rules than 8th!" as "9th has the best terrain rules ever!"

8th's terrain rules were so broken every competitive event used their own terrain rules.

 Ordana wrote:
Back in y old days your units had a stat and weapon profile and so did your opponents units with maybe 1 universal special rule that was in the rulebook for everyone to see.

How far could an Eldar jetbike move?

 H.B.M.C. wrote:
As it happens, Chapter Approved would have been the kind of thing GW used to give everyone else some basic 'get you by' Crusade rules - 1-2 unique requisitions, a unique agenda, a battle trait tables, and maybe 1-2 unique crusade relics - as Chapter Approved used to be about adding to the game as much as it was fixing broken things.

Now Chapter Approved is this

Spoiler:

:

... and people want to sit there with a straight face and say that it's not "Tournament Edition 40k"? Give me strength...

You're going to call that tournament edition? It's a god damn cashgrab, barely any changes to the missions of last year and only fixes for a handful of the idiotic points costs of last year, rather than the full points revamp the game needed to become competitive, secondaries for Astra Militarum, Tau and GSC at least or at the very least updated mission secondaries so they weren't all trash or the one auto-take one.

 vict0988 wrote:
You're going to call that tournament edition? It's a god damn cashgrab, barely any changes to the missions of last year and only fixes for a handful of the idiotic points costs of last year, rather than the full points revamp the game needed to become competitive, secondaries for Astra Militarum, Tau and GSC at least or at the very least updated mission secondaries so they weren't all trash or the one auto-take one.

I think you're missing the point.

 H.B.M.C. wrote:
All that math has killed your sense of humour.

And you're starting to sound like Jidmah with his "40k isn't complicated. Take Death Gaurd! They only have 49 strats divided up into 7 broard categories".

Wow, you must be really but hurt about that for bringing it up weeks later in a completely different thread. I'm truly sorry for not being able to dumb it down to your level so even you could understand. But then again, you are struggling with properly equipping plague marines.

 H.B.M.C. wrote:

 vict0988 wrote:
You're going to call that tournament edition? It's a god damn cashgrab, barely any changes to the missions of last year and only fixes for a handful of the idiotic points costs of last year, rather than the full points revamp the game needed to become competitive, secondaries for Astra Militarum, Tau and GSC at least or at the very least updated mission secondaries so they weren't all trash or the one auto-take one.

I think you're missing the point.

Yes, can you try making your point in another way? I think your point was "I want make your own Land Raider version rules and temporary Relics, you want points and missions, you got what you wanted, I didn't get what I wanted, therefore you are privileged". My point is that, unless the points and missions are balanced then they are not fit for competitive play. Nobody got what they wanted in CA20/CA21, stop saying that competitive players are privileged.

 Jidmah wrote:

 H.B.M.C. wrote:
All that math has killed your sense of humour.

And you're starting to sound like Jidmah with his "40k isn't complicated. Take Death Gaurd! They only have 49 strats divided up into 7 broard categories".

Wow, you must be really but hurt about that for bringing it up weeks later in a completely different thread. I'm truly sorry for not being able to dumb it down to your level so even you could understand. But then again, you are struggling with properly equipping plague marines.

Well you did spend like half that thread calling people stupid for wanting less convoluted rules. It was a pretty bad look.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 vict0988 wrote:

 H.B.M.C. wrote:

 vict0988 wrote:
You're going to call that tournament edition? It's a god damn cashgrab, barely any changes to the missions of last year and only fixes for a handful of the idiotic points costs of last year, rather than the full points revamp the game needed to become competitive, secondaries for Astra Militarum, Tau and GSC at least or at the very least updated mission secondaries so they weren't all trash or the one auto-take one.

I think you're missing the point.

Yes, can you try making your point in another way? I think your point was "I want make your own Land Raider version rules and temporary Relics, you want points and missions, you got what you wanted, I didn't get what I wanted, therefore you are privileged". My point is that, unless the points and missions are balanced then they are not fit for competitive play. Nobody got what they wanted in CA20/CA21, stop saying that competitive players are privileged.

His point is that the book literally has"Tournament" printed on the cover.

Just because GW tries to sell it as "Tournament" Edition does not man it is one

What GW marketing say a game is, and what the rules really are, are 2 different things

and of course 40k 9th is marketed at the Tournament Community, for the very reason that GW finally realised that those people throw a lot of money at GW for a changing meta and if GW does not give them the rules to play, they make them on their own

but this does not make the rules better or more focused on tournaments than the previous version

In my opinion 5th is still king in tournament play, for the very reason that there were very good community rules for events not related to anything GW tried to sell
and still would improve tournament games now, but with official event rules available something like this is not an option any more


PS: and this also caused the problem that people are now going the way that "competitive" and "tournament" play is the same

were "competitive" play was not related to tournament play in the past, as it just meant using equal victory conditions (no matter if objectiv scoring, Kill Points etc) and without a story behind
were narritive was much more like "I win if my Gernal survives, you win if your Scouts survive"

and tournament play was really about playing an event with fixed scenarios, table/terrain setups and additional rules/restrictions specific for that event (like no named units etc.)

 Sim-Life wrote:
Well you did spend like half that thread calling people stupid for wanting less convoluted rules. It was a pretty bad look.

Fair point. Though I stand by my statement that most people whining about 40k being too hard to understand either aren't even trying or want-to-win-always types that are too lazy to invest time.