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I mean, it has been a quite consistent design that melee weapons are getting more lethal in 9th compared to 8th.

There is nothing confirmed about these leaks and GSC has seen its fair share of completely made-up codex changes in the past.

2D on 6s would be fluffy and reasonable in terms of power, but I am not looking forward to fast-rolling these only to watch the enemy throw out most of the extra damage.

Slow rolling genestealers isn't an option.

Kitane wrote:
There is nothing confirmed about these leaks and GSC has seen its fair share of completely made-up codex changes in the past.

2D on 6s would be fluffy and reasonable in terms of power, but I am not looking forward to fast-rolling these only to watch the enemy throw out most of the extra damage.

Slow rolling genestealers isn't an option.

Why? You're already doing it for your rends. Aren't you?

Saves and wound allocation? Sure, but all the damage is D1 now. Well, no one is using Toxin sacs, no one sane.

But with D1 and rending D2 on 6s to wound the opponent will be able to allocate them in a way that wastes D2 wounds on overkill, making the buff mostly symbolic against 2W and even 3W models.

I don't track 40k competitively, but did someone literally lose a game on the top of Turn 1 recently?

That's what this thread seems to have said.

That's 7th edition levels of shenanigans. Let's see how long it takes to get fixed, since that's what GW's selling itself as - "we fix issues fast!".

 Unit1126PLL wrote:
I don't track 40k competitively, but did someone literally lose a game on the top of Turn 1 recently?

That's what this thread seems to have said.

That's 7th edition levels of shenanigans. Let's see how long it takes to get fixed, since that's what GW's selling itself as - "we fix issues fast!".

Yes, in the London GT. The excuse going around for this partially blames the bad terrain. There's some truth to that, but not a lot, IMO. The majority of the damage the AdMech player did was with 4 planes and a teleported blob of infantry, so terrain would have been a non-issue anyway. Basically the AdMech player turned on all their buffs and removed something like 4 Dreads, a relic Whirlwind and a bunch of infantry in one shooting phase (with a little help from the bombers in the movement phase). Deathwatch player conceded before the end of the shooting phase. Not exactly the mark of a tactically deep game.

There were some mitigating circumstances though. The tourney structure seemed pretty stupid. They had ~600 players but nowhere near enough rounds to determine a winner properly so they used VPs as the tie-breaker, leading to people building armies to score max points, kind of like an all-or-nothing approach. So there were, I think, 16 undefeated players but only the best 4 made it to the semi-finals.

Slipspace wrote:

 Unit1126PLL wrote:
I don't track 40k competitively, but did someone literally lose a game on the top of Turn 1 recently?

That's what this thread seems to have said.

That's 7th edition levels of shenanigans. Let's see how long it takes to get fixed, since that's what GW's selling itself as - "we fix issues fast!".

Yes, in the London GT. The excuse going around for this partially blames the bad terrain. There's some truth to that, but not a lot, IMO. The majority of the damage the AdMech player did was with 4 planes and a teleported blob of infantry, so terrain would have been a non-issue anyway. Basically the AdMech player turned on all their buffs and removed something like 4 Dreads, a relic Whirlwind and a bunch of infantry in one shooting phase (with a little help from the bombers in the movement phase). Deathwatch player conceded before the end of the shooting phase. Not exactly the mark of a tactically deep game.

There were some mitigating circumstances though. The tourney structure seemed pretty stupid. They had ~600 players but nowhere near enough rounds to determine a winner properly so they used VPs as the tie-breaker, leading to people building armies to score max points, kind of like an all-or-nothing approach. So there were, I think, 16 undefeated players but only the best 4 made it to the semi-finals.

Thanks. My little Steel Legion Chimeras feel just like they would in 7th in light of that. Disheartening.

 Gadzilla666 wrote:

Kitane wrote:
There is nothing confirmed about these leaks and GSC has seen its fair share of completely made-up codex changes in the past.

2D on 6s would be fluffy and reasonable in terms of power, but I am not looking forward to fast-rolling these only to watch the enemy throw out most of the extra damage.

Slow rolling genestealers isn't an option.

Why? You're already doing it for your rends. Aren't you?

With current rend, it affects saves. So it doesn't matter which order you roll rends vs non-rends in, the successes add up in the end and then wounds are allocated. That makes them easy to fast-roll; just roll all the normal saves and then roll all the rend saves.

With D2, it suddenly matters a lot the exact order you allocate hits in, because against W2 models the order determines how many of the D2 attacks are wasted as overkill.

Example: Against five Intercessors, if you score 2 1-damage wounds and 2 2-damage ones, this sequence of allocation:
1-2-1-2
Results in two dead Intercessors, while this sequence:
2-1-1-2
Results in three dead Intercessors.

There is no statistically-equal to fast-roll it; you have to slow-roll every single hit. The double-damage-on-6s mechanic has always struck me as the surest sign that GW doesn't really playtest the rules they write.

 catbarf wrote:

 Gadzilla666 wrote:

Kitane wrote:
There is nothing confirmed about these leaks and GSC has seen its fair share of completely made-up codex changes in the past.

2D on 6s would be fluffy and reasonable in terms of power, but I am not looking forward to fast-rolling these only to watch the enemy throw out most of the extra damage.

Slow rolling genestealers isn't an option.

Why? You're already doing it for your rends. Aren't you?

With current rend, it affects saves. So it doesn't matter which order you roll rends vs non-rends in, the successes add up in the end and then wounds are allocated.

With D2, it suddenly matters a lot the exact order you apply wounds in, because against W2 models the order determines how many of the D2 attacks are wasted as overkill.

Example: Against five Intercessors, if you score 2 1-damage wounds and 2 2-damage ones, this sequence of allocation:
1-2-1-2
Results in two dead Intercessors, while this sequence:
2-1-1-2
Results in three dead Intercessors.

There is no statistically-equal to fast-roll it. The double-damage-on-6s mechanic has always struck me as the surest sign that GW doesn't really playtest the rules they write.

You almost have to roll the wounds one-at-a-time to ensure they're applied in the correct order...

Yeah, I guess nothing stops your opponent rolling the 1 wound saves until one fails, then rolling the 2 wound saves until one fails, then going back to the one wound saves.

Seems kind of a "that guy" approach though. We usually just say you can roll all the one wound or two wound saves together as you choose.

Tyel wrote:
Yeah, I guess nothing stops your opponent rolling the 1 wound saves until one fails, then rolling the 2 wound saves until one fails, then going back to the one wound saves.

Seems kind of a "that guy" approach though. We usually just say you can roll all the one wound or two wound saves together as you choose.

Well, that would be illegal, since Fast Rolling is supposed to be a shortcut, not the rules.

What the legal way to do it would be to roll the wounds from the Genestealers one-at-a-time, applying each single result in turn (so I roll a 6, 2 wounds, a not-6, 1 wound, a 1, no wound, a not-6, 1 wound, a 2, no wound...)

etc etc.

 Unit1126PLL wrote:
You almost have to roll the wounds one-at-a-time to ensure they're applied in the correct order...

Yep. If double-damage triggers on a wound roll of 6, that means once you've fast-rolled to hit, you then have to slow-roll from to-wound onwards.

So allocate a hit, roll to wound, see if you get double damage or not, work all the way through saves, repeat...

In practice, I suspect most players are opting to batch the double-damage and just allocate it all at once, but in certain matchups this can dramatically reduce the effectiveness like Kitane said. And there's no RAW way to do so; it's a workaround for a very clunky mechanic.

Kitane wrote:
Saves and wound allocation? Sure, but all the damage is D1 now. Well, no one is using Toxin sacs, no one sane.

But with D1 and rending D2 on 6s to wound the opponent will be able to allocate them in a way that wastes D2 wounds on overkill, making the buff mostly symbolic against 2W and even 3W models.

Ah, ok, got it. Yeah, that's not good.

GW rules have a blind spot for how to handle single rolls and allocation vs. fast rolling with loads of dice. The rules technically only are designed to address single rolls, with fast rolling being a nebulously defined option. It's really lazy.

FWIW in ProHammer, we designed the entire thing explicitly such that fast rolling is ALWAYS what you do (every model in a unit that wants to shoot at a specific target ALWAYS shoots all at the same time), and we then handle how the allocation of wounds + hits works accounting for the most convoluted cases - e.g. many different weapon profiles hitting a unit with mixed armor/toughness/cover and with different hit models having different equipment, being multi-wound, etc. Works perfectly (and also avoids the old 5th edition wound allocation shennanigans)

 Mezmorki wrote:
GW rules have a blind spot for how to handle single rolls and allocation vs. fast rolling with loads of dice. The rules technically only are designed to address single rolls, with fast rolling being a nebulously defined option. It's really lazy.

bUt 9tH eDiTiOn'S rUlEs ArE gReAt BeCaUsE tHeY'rE sO sHoRt AnD sTrEaMlInEd.

 vipoid wrote:

 Mezmorki wrote:
GW rules have a blind spot for how to handle single rolls and allocation vs. fast rolling with loads of dice. The rules technically only are designed to address single rolls, with fast rolling being a nebulously defined option. It's really lazy.

bUt 9tH eDiTiOn'S rUlEs ArE gReAt BeCaUsE tHeY'rE sO sHoRt AnD sTrEaMlInEd.

9th edition has a flaw? Throw that gak in the garbage!

 Insectum7 wrote:


I don't think Terminators fared much better. Combat was very different (and I'm not good at mathing it up) but if there were no die rolls to contest the number of hits (and Genestealers had a big advantage there) the outcome of a 1v1 match would be the Genestealer gets 4 hits at 2+ to wound at a -3 save modifier, excessively chopping up any Marine and giving a Terminator a tough combination of save rolls.

Terminators took their saves as 3+ on two dice. So with -3 save mod, all they had to do was roll a 7 on two dice, which is actually the most likely number to come up on 2d6.

Genestealers wrecked Marines in 2nd ed, not terminators. They actually did better against vehicles in 2nd than termies because CC attacks always used rear armour if I remember correctly.

And while Genstealers wrecked termies in Space Hulk, the marine player almost always killed somewhere in the neighbourhood of 5 stealers per marine before they could close to CC. If missions in Spacehulk had been built using points, the trading of casualties would be fairly even.

 H.B.M.C. wrote:

 Daedalus81 wrote:
Important details on that game. LGT had a lot of rounds meaning you needed to go 100 points to make it to the top brackets and people brought lists that gamble on first turn. Four planes is super hard to hide from and there's a case to be made for 1 flyer per detachment. Also, Admech planes are still huge value and super maneuverable. Their bombers are also not limited like others. Some tweaks to those models ( and Admech and DE in particular ) would go a long way to help.

He still wiped his opponent out first turn. The game is ultra-lethal. This shouldn't be possible, no matter the "risks" you're adding.

 Daedalus81 wrote:
A note for people who think equipment shouldn't be strats : chaff launcher is stupid cheap - this one should be a strat. Then you don't have all planes getting -1D.

If the chaff launcher is causing problems, then you change the rules of the chaff launcher, or change its cost. Making it a strat isn't a solution, and this in no way strengthens any "equipment should be strats" nonsense.

Not that the chaff launchers played any part in that game given that his opponent never actually got to play.

 Daedalus81 wrote:
That terrain was also impossible to hide in with 6 dreadnoughts. Still, he deployed aggressively banking on taking the first turn.

You shouldn't need to hide your entire army in order to play the fething game.

 Daedalus81 wrote:
I'm actually glad the game went that way, because it might get GW's attention a little more having such a dud game at a high profile event.

What will it achieve? They'll see how busted DE and AdMech are, do nothing to change them, and "tone down" any of the upcoming books, leaving us with a crop of books that suck compared to the still-reigning DE and AdMech.

Well, he wasn't wiped out - it was about 700 points. He was moody enough to concede and not attempt to go further. It is likely he would have lost, but since the only outcome is winning rather than picking up max points there was little desire for him to go on that uphill battle.

If chaff launchers didn't exist he could probably pull down 2 or 3 of the planes since Tome would have given him full rerolls to wound.

It's ok for things like chaff launchers to be strong, because you don't want everything to be -1 to hit or some variation of that. It is just that stronger things need to be more limited. More points is all well and good until you price it too high and then you overpaid for your planes when you come up against Thousand Sons with an Orrery.

Hiding your army is the only thing that prevents damage in an IGOUGO system. You can make everything hit like a wet noodle and have long games that favor large numbers of models, because everything takes so much to kill. I don't know that it would be fun.

People want tactics, but what kind of tactic is it where you can put your guys in the open and it doesn't matter than your opponent went first? That seems antithetical.

 Daedalus81 wrote:

Hiding your army is the only thing that prevents damage in an IGOUGO system. You can make everything hit like a wet noodle and have long games that favor large numbers of models, because everything takes so much to kill. I don't know that it would be fun.

Orrrrrrrrrrr you could give more ways for units to interact with each other and the table than "kill, die, or become harder to kill/die"

Like, say, suppression mechanics (your shooting can interfere with enemy shooting) or pinning mechanics (your shooting can interfere with enemy mobility) or disruption mechanics (your shooting can interfere with enemy leadership/c2) or battlefield manipulation mechanics (like being able to fire smoke rounds / smoke grenades to obscure areas of open ground and facilitate maneuver).

Heck, it's a whacky sci-fi game - all of those above are "only" World War 2 considerations. Have drones with cool decision trees, so your opponent can muck with them in strange ways (like the old Robot decision trees from 1ed). Have units with concerns like Honor or Wrath that forces them to maneuver in a certain way, allowing the opponent to counter-play them but also giving them a buff against units they bonk on the head! Represent real command-and-control to give your opponents something to attack other than just your bodies on the field!

I was reading the 2nd edition rulebook the other day and was reminded of the rules for "hiding" units. Units in cover relative to enemy LoS could declare they were hiding on their turn, and would be totally out-of-sight unless the enemy got within detection range (which was their initiative value I think). Units stayed hidden until they moved or shot. Could combine this with overwatch to setup ambushes. You could also fire blast weapons and template weapons towards hidden units, and of course those had a chance to hit/wound. Pretty epic really.

 Daedalus81 wrote:
Hiding your army is the only thing that prevents damage in an IGOUGO system. You can make everything hit like a wet noodle and have long games that favor large numbers of models, because everything takes so much to kill. I don't know that it would be fun.

People want tactics, but what kind of tactic is it where you can put your guys in the open and it doesn't matter than your opponent went first? That seems antithetical.

There's a solution provided by 3rd-4th. Reduce the number of high power weapons, and reduce the effective ranges of battle rifles. Then make Morale worth something, especially in CC.

Then armies spend a turn or two jockying for position and advantage to gain the initiative and advantage over where and how the devastating CQB takes place. When much of the on-board firepower is limited in range (and the boards are bigger), then single-turn-annihilation becomes far less of a thing.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Mezmorki wrote:
I was reading the 2nd edition rulebook the other day and was reminded of the rules for "hiding" units. Units in cover relative to enemy LoS could declare they were hiding on their turn, and would be totally out-of-sight unless the enemy got within detection range (which was their initiative value I think). Units stayed hidden until they moved or shot. Could combine this with overwatch to setup ambushes. You could also fire blast weapons and template weapons towards hidden units, and of course those had a chance to hit/wound. Pretty epic really.

If I were to rework 40K, there is A LOT I would take from 2nd edition.

 Daedalus81 wrote:
Hiding your army is the only thing that prevents damage in an IGOUGO system.

Or you can have cover provide a significant defensive benefit, not just a binary can't-be-targeted/instant-death. Were you around when being in ruins gave you a 4+ invuln? That made a huge impact to durability.

Or you can have soft damage effects like morale/suppression rather than just pulling models off the board.

Or you can have range limitations that ensure armies must close the distance to perform effective fire.

Or you can have reaction mechanics (even within an IGOUGO structure) that permit units in defensive positions to interrupt attackers and damage/disrupt them to preemptively impair their ability to inflict damage.

Or you can have equipment that mitigates damage, like smoke to obscure LOS.

Or you can have go-to-ground mechanics where units sacrifice actions later for resilience now.

Daed, serious question- what non-GW wargames have you played? The idea that blocking LOS is the only way to prevent damage seems like the kind of weird notion that someone who's only ever played 40K (and modern 40K at that) might come up with. Tons and tons of IGOUGO wargames don't have this problem, and the idea that you have to choose between armies getting irrecoverably destroyed on turn 1 or everything hitting like a wet noodle is really, really weird.

I've been mulling over a Suppression mechanic, and posted a thread on it.

I cannot claim credit for the ideas entirely-they've certainly been suggested before, and I've seen them suggested before. But it's still worth a gander, methinks.

I totally agree that a ton of 2nd ed mechanics could be integrated into the "modern" game.

Racerguy180 wrote:
I totally agree that a ton of 2nd ed mechanics could be integrated into the "modern" game.

There's definitely some kind of optimal combination of the past editions that's possible to do. Prohammer looked pretty decent (though I haven't spent enough time looking at it to fully assess it), but there are certain things about 2nd that were very nice. Hidden and Overwatch, use of grenades, mechanics around troops firing from vehicles. 2nd had a number of interesting additional tactical options that allowed for more creativity when tackling problems.

Edit: Mind you, there are MANY things I would not lift from 2nd, lol. Such as individual model facing, layered force fields and expanding Plasma Grenades

 catbarf wrote:
Or you can have cover provide a significant defensive benefit, not just a binary can't-be-targeted/instant-death. Were you around when being in ruins gave you a 4+ invuln? That made a huge impact to durability.

Yeup. I liked this best from 3rd + 4th edition (and in ProHammer). Hard cover is a 4+ save, Light cover is a 5+. If you actually have terrain features that are "bunkers" and hardened terrain, it's a 3+ save.

 catbarf wrote:
Or you can have soft damage effects like morale/suppression rather than just pulling models off the board.

Yeup. All editions prior to 8th did this for failed morale / pinning tests. Being forced to fall back often let you move towards cover/terrain or get out of LoS as well (or even just out of range).

 catbarf wrote:
Or you can have range limitations that ensure armies must close the distance to perform effective fire.

Yeup. Ranges were generally shorter in older editions. Far less 18" + ranged weapons. Also - charging was locked to 6" for the most part in 5th edition and earlier. Random charge rolls mean you potential threat range is increased, and the average is at least 7" - so you have longer charges generally.

 catbarf wrote:
Or you can have reaction mechanics (even within an IGOUGO structure) that permit units in defensive positions to interrupt attackers and damage/disrupt them to preemptively impair their ability to inflict damage.

Yeup. ProHammer added in a true overwatch mechanism based more around 2nd edition. We ALSO have reaction mechanics for being shot or charged. Units can take "reactive fire" once per turn when shot or charged. There are some restrictions on how strong this is, and it means your shooting NEXT turn is limited to snap fire only. Between overwatch and reactive fire there isn't that much need to rethink IGOUGO.

 catbarf wrote:
Or you can have equipment that mitigates damage, like smoke to obscure LOS.

Yeup! Probably would be good to add more of this into the ruleset.

 catbarf wrote:
Or you can have go-to-ground mechanics where units sacrifice actions later for resilience now.

Yeup! This existed starting in 5th edition. Removed in 8th. +1 cover save but only shot with snap fire on their next turn.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Insectum7 wrote:

Racerguy180 wrote:
I totally agree that a ton of 2nd ed mechanics could be integrated into the "modern" game.

There's definitely some kind of optimal combination of the past editions that's possible to do. Prohammer looked pretty decent (though I haven't spent enough time looking at it to fully assess it), but there are certain things about 2nd that were very nice. Hidden and Overwatch, use of grenades, mechanics around troops firing from vehicles. 2nd had a number of interesting additional tactical options that allowed for more creativity when tackling problems.

Edit: Mind you, there are MANY things I would not lift from 2nd, lol. Such as individual model facing, layered force fields and expanding Plasma Grenades

ProHammer is exactly an attempt to do this - as well as to address some other long-standing issues in the game that no editions have really addressed well.

This was an early endeavor to map out differences between editions and was the basis for the first versions of ProHammer:
https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1al0RietrhVVuo10iuaIZCo1MjVjyEp9SviFTKkVCnNo/edit?usp=sharing

ProHammer does have 2nd edition style Overwatch.

 JNAProductions wrote:
I've been mulling over a Suppression mechanic, and posted a thread on it.

I cannot claim credit for the ideas entirely-they've certainly been suggested before, and I've seen them suggested before. But it's still worth a gander, methinks.

I like the idea, but I think the issues with lethality in the current iteration of 40K are more fundamental than the simple lack of suppression.

A long time ago I played Squad Leader with my dad, and that game hammered home three lessons:
1. Potshots at 500m aren't effective at killing or eliminating units, but can temporarily suppress them to pin them in place.
2. Firefights at point-blank are extremely lethal and can result in both sides quickly becoming combat-ineffective, but a suppressed unit can be eliminated at much lower risk.
3. Cover is life, and units that would be eliminated in the open by a volley of fire may be unfazed in cover.

So, logically, the resulting gameplay is then all about using fire to pin the enemy in place (#1) so that you can concentrate your forces to eliminate the enemy up close (#2) and simultaneously maximize your use of cover while minimizing your opponent's (#3). And go figure, that's more or less how modern real-world warfare works.

The issue with tactics and lethality in 40K, as I see it, is that none of these three principles apply.

If you're within range, it doesn't matter if you're in your deployment zone or right in the enemy's face. It used to be that Rapid Fire was used to enforce some range limits on effective fire, and Heavy limited your ability to move and shoot, but those are much less relevant with 30" ranges, Bolter Discipline, smaller boards, and the penalties for Heavy getting neutered over time.

Because the only consequence of fire is killing, that means that tuning a unit to be weak at 24" means it can't kill the enemy at 6" either. There's no pinning while you maneuver to stack advantages and turn suppressive fire into effective fire. You just shoot the enemy and they die.

And cover being reduced to a +1 save modifier means not only is it less relevant than ever, it's also downright irrelevant for armies that logically really ought to care about getting some cover or concealment (eg Guard). So being in cover or caught in the open makes some difference, but not much.

These situational, stacking modifiers are where the tactics come from in a WW2 or modern game, and the lack thereof is a big part of why 40K is so heavily list-dependent. Your ability to kill the enemy comes entirely from your own list and the abilities you can stack; targeting is an exercise in maneuvering to get LOS on optimal targets, rather than maneuvering to achieve LOS, optimal range, cross-force coordination, flanking, or take advantage of covering or suppressing fire.

That's the requirement to have lethal combat without having games decided turn 1. Just make it so that you need to do something other than declare targets in order to deliver unit-wiping firepower- and while you're at it, maybe having forces regularly able to deposit all of their firepower right in the enemy's face before they have any opportunity to act is bad design.

 Mezmorki wrote:

 Insectum7 wrote:

Racerguy180 wrote:
I totally agree that a ton of 2nd ed mechanics could be integrated into the "modern" game.

There's definitely some kind of optimal combination of the past editions that's possible to do. Prohammer looked pretty decent (though I haven't spent enough time looking at it to fully assess it), but there are certain things about 2nd that were very nice. Hidden and Overwatch, use of grenades, mechanics around troops firing from vehicles. 2nd had a number of interesting additional tactical options that allowed for more creativity when tackling problems.

Edit: Mind you, there are MANY things I would not lift from 2nd, lol. Such as individual model facing, layered force fields and expanding Plasma Grenades

ProHammer is exactly an attempt to do this - as well as to address some other long-standing issues in the game that no editions have really addressed well.

This was an early endeavor to map out differences between editions and was the basis for the first versions of ProHammer:
https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1al0RietrhVVuo10iuaIZCo1MjVjyEp9SviFTKkVCnNo/edit?usp=sharing

ProHammer does have 2nd edition style Overwatch.

Yeah I remember seeing the 2nd Ed Overwatch in there, although I didn't remember the details about it (so it might wind up manifesting differently) Sorry I haven't played it yet. I do want to try it out, GW irritates me atm.

Oh and big +1 to equipment that block LOS. I used Blind Grenades A LOT in 2nd ed to cover movement and retain the initiative for firing opportunity. In 3rd, there was a WD article that gave Blind Grenades back to Assault Marines, but it only gave a 5+ cover save to the unit, which I felt was inadequate. Not that laying down a bunch of blast markers to block LOS is the right solution necessarily, but something that could effect not just the unit that put smoke down would be nice. (although tricky to figure out how to do mechanically)

On a related note, finding out that Smoke Launchers for vehicles had been turned into a Stratagem was one of the breaking points for me on 9th ed.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 catbarf wrote:

Spoiler:

 JNAProductions wrote:
I've been mulling over a Suppression mechanic, and posted a thread on it.

I cannot claim credit for the ideas entirely-they've certainly been suggested before, and I've seen them suggested before. But it's still worth a gander, methinks.

I like the idea, but I think the issues with lethality in the current iteration of 40K are more fundamental than the simple lack of suppression.

A long time ago I played Squad Leader with my dad, and that game hammered home three lessons:
1. Potshots at 500m aren't effective at killing or eliminating units, but can temporarily suppress them to pin them in place.
2. Firefights at point-blank are extremely lethal and can result in both sides quickly becoming combat-ineffective, but a suppressed unit can be eliminated at much lower risk.
3. Cover is life, and units that would be eliminated in the open by a volley of fire may be unfazed in cover.

So, logically, the resulting gameplay is then all about using fire to pin the enemy in place (#1) so that you can concentrate your forces to eliminate the enemy up close (#2) and simultaneously maximize your use of cover while minimizing your opponent's (#3). And go figure, that's more or less how modern real-world warfare works.

The issue with tactics and lethality in 40K, as I see it, is that none of these three principles apply.

If you're within range, it doesn't matter if you're in your deployment zone or right in the enemy's face. It used to be that Rapid Fire was used to enforce some range limits on effective fire, and Heavy limited your ability to move and shoot, but those are much less relevant with 30" ranges, Bolter Discipline, smaller boards, and the penalties for Heavy getting neutered over time.

Because the only consequence of fire is killing, that means that tuning a unit to be weak at 24" means it can't kill the enemy at 6" either. There's no pinning while you maneuver to stack advantages and turn suppressive fire into effective fire. You just shoot the enemy and they die.

And cover being reduced to a +1 save modifier means not only is it less relevant than ever, it's also downright irrelevant for armies that logically really ought to care about getting some cover or concealment (eg Guard). So being in cover or caught in the open makes some difference, but not much.

These situational, stacking modifiers are where the tactics come from in a WW2 or modern game, and the lack thereof is a big part of why 40K is so heavily list-dependent. Your ability to kill the enemy comes entirely from your own list and the abilities you can stack; targeting is an exercise in maneuvering to get LOS on optimal targets, rather than maneuvering to achieve LOS, optimal range, cross-force coordination, flanking, or take advantage of covering or suppressing fire.

That's the requirement to have lethal combat without having games decided turn 1. Just make it so that you need to do something other than declare targets in order to deliver unit-wiping firepower- and while you're at it, maybe having forces regularly able to deposit all of their firepower right in the enemy's face before they have any opportunity to act is bad design.

Exhalted.

I've been thinking a lot about the cover mechanics of 2nd ed recently, which were all modifiers to hit iirc. -1 for light cover, and -2 for heavy cover. That doesn't address everything said above (hardly any, really) but the treatment of cover as obscuring shots rather than increasing armor save helps with it's effectiveness. A BS 4 model firing at a model in Heavy Cover is suddenly only hitting on 6s. and that obscuring behavior has a magnified effect over the +1 to armor save when were talking about Heavy Weapons. Cover doesn't help much vs a Lascannon if we're talking armor increase, but the Lascannon effectiveness is greatly reduced if it's only hitting on 6s now.

Now, the flipside to the argument is that it was refreshing in 3rd when my Marines didn't feel like they had to hug cover against small arms. Soooo. . . I dunno. (although some of that had to do with weapons-range reductions too.)

 catbarf wrote:

 Daedalus81 wrote:
Hiding your army is the only thing that prevents damage in an IGOUGO system.

Or you can have cover provide a significant defensive benefit, not just a binary can't-be-targeted/instant-death. Were you around when being in ruins gave you a 4+ invuln? That made a huge impact to durability.

Or you can have soft damage effects like morale/suppression rather than just pulling models off the board.

Or you can have range limitations that ensure armies must close the distance to perform effective fire.

Or you can have reaction mechanics (even within an IGOUGO structure) that permit units in defensive positions to interrupt attackers and damage/disrupt them to preemptively impair their ability to inflict damage.

Or you can have equipment that mitigates damage, like smoke to obscure LOS.

Or you can have go-to-ground mechanics where units sacrifice actions later for resilience now.

Daed, serious question- what non-GW wargames have you played? The idea that blocking LOS is the only way to prevent damage seems like the kind of weird notion that someone who's only ever played 40K (and modern 40K at that) might come up with. Tons and tons of IGOUGO wargames don't have this problem, and the idea that you have to choose between armies getting irrecoverably destroyed on turn 1 or everything hitting like a wet noodle is really, really weird.

Axies and Allies minis. Imperial Assault. Dabbled in Warmachine...meh. Bolt Action on rare occasions. Fantasy was my jam, really.

Form what I remember of older editions is that we house rules that umm...what was it called...whatever mechanic it was that it was nighttime round 1 ( and randomly still nighttime by turn ) and you could buy searchlights for your vehicles.

Same concept of "hiding". Some of what you mentioned have the same effect with a different window dressing.

^Dawn Attack or something.

I remember using Reserves a lot in order to mitigate first turn hazards too.

Deploy many units out of LOS, use screening to protect my own firebase, use Reserves to keep models off the table and then react to opponent moves as the game progressed. Things really heated up in turns 2-3-4 ish, while turn one was sort of exploratory fire and maneuvers. Felt good.