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I'd like to come in and update that in the entirety of my group we've just ditched the mechanic entirely. Why bother. Just playing straight up RAW but without the initiative roll - we roll once, and the second player gets the bonus CP the whole game.

Feels fine. No complaints.

 the_scotsman wrote:
I'd like to come in and update that in the entirety of my group we've just ditched the mechanic entirely. Why bother. Just playing straight up RAW but without the initiative roll - we roll once, and the second player gets the bonus CP the whole game.

Feels fine. No complaints.

In my campaigns thats exactly how we did it when we weren't using the alternate activation system and I will chime in that it also felt just as fine to us.

 the_scotsman wrote:
I'd like to come in and update that in the entirety of my group we've just ditched the mechanic entirely. Why bother. Just playing straight up RAW but without the initiative roll - we roll once, and the second player gets the bonus CP the whole game.

Feels fine. No complaints.

Yup, the extra CP does a great job compensating first-turn advantage

I wonder what is GW's aversion to alternating activations. It's much more fun and engaging imo.

Orangecoke wrote:
I wonder what is GW's aversion to alternating activations. It's much more fun and engaging imo.

Their design goal is to appeal to the broadest audience possible. Alternate activation is more complicated and thus not appealing to that design goal.

 auticus wrote:

Orangecoke wrote:
I wonder what is GW's aversion to alternating activations. It's much more fun and engaging imo.

Their design goal is to appeal to the broadest audience possible. Alternate activation is more complicated and thus not appealing to that design goal.

I mean, Star Wars Legion uses AA and I would definitely describe as a "Casual" wargame. I'd say that the main reason they dont go to it is because it can make a large-scale battle game feel less co-ordinated and epic. Having played GDF a few times, I honestly do not think that "Just AA 4Head" is the instant solution a lot of people seem to think it is - keeping the level of lethality the same while adding AA just makes the game MORE about glass cannon suicide units missiling across the board at each other.

IGOUGO with copious amounts of interplay between the active player and inactive player works perfectly well for a large scale game like this especially with alternating damage resolution to prevent mass alpha strikes...which Sigmar ALMOST has, it just needs to introduce an alternation system that includes shooting.

 auticus wrote:

Orangecoke wrote:
I wonder what is GW's aversion to alternating activations. It's much more fun and engaging imo.

Their design goal is to appeal to the broadest audience possible. Alternate activation is more complicated and thus not appealing to that design goal.

That is not true at all.....


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 the_scotsman wrote:

 auticus wrote:

Orangecoke wrote:
I wonder what is GW's aversion to alternating activations. It's much more fun and engaging imo.

Their design goal is to appeal to the broadest audience possible. Alternate activation is more complicated and thus not appealing to that design goal.

I mean, Star Wars Legion uses AA and I would definitely describe as a "Casual" wargame. I'd say that the main reason they dont go to it is because it can make a large-scale battle game feel less co-ordinated and epic. Having played GDF a few times, I honestly do not think that "Just AA 4Head" is the instant solution a lot of people seem to think it is - keeping the level of lethality the same while adding AA just makes the game MORE about glass cannon suicide units missiling across the board at each other.

IGOUGO with copious amounts of interplay between the active player and inactive player works perfectly well for a large scale game like this especially with alternating damage resolution to prevent mass alpha strikes...which Sigmar ALMOST has, it just needs to introduce an alternation system that includes shooting.

Alt actions for Shooting would be really cool actually. Melee works like that now. Maybe change some of the hero phase shooting stuff to be able to choose more than 1 unit at a time, could be a way to balance some shooting.

Or drawing for activation like bolt action. There's are lots of more fun ways they could do it.

That is not true at all.....

Except for that very conversation having happend on the TGA forum a few years ago where the designers have stated why they don't want to get into more complicated activation systems because their design goal is to keep things as simple as possible to prevent rules "gate keeping" (ie ... people complain about more complicated rules and feel that they are too intimidating so are put off of the game - ie... keep things simple to appeal to the broadest audience). They used to do those youtube videos with Ben Curry (the guy that runs TGA) and that was one of the topics of discussion.

 auticus wrote:

That is not true at all.....

Except for that very conversation having happend on the TGA forum a few years ago where the designers have stated why they don't want to get into more complicated activation systems because their design goal is to keep things as simple as possible to prevent rules "gate keeping" (ie ... people complain about more complicated rules and feel that they are too intimidating so are put off of the game - ie... keep things simple to appeal to the broadest audience). They used to do those youtube videos with Ben Curry (the guy that runs TGA) and that was one of the topics of discussion.

It doesn't matter what He/She said is, Alt actions are not complicated, heck some other games are made easier with it.....

It matters what the game devs say yes because what the game devs say is why they do the things that they do.

To the game devs it makes the game more complicated.

And I have been scorched dozens of times in this very forum for wanting alt activation with the counter argument being AOS doesn't need a more complicated system, so it is a belief held by a great many people that it is more complicated.

I'm not arguing with you that I think its more complicated. It is my preferred way of playing. I dont think its grossly more complicated, but for whatever reason that people have many say it is more complicated and don't want it.

Thats why I primarily play Conquest - it is built on an alternate activation system that makes the gameplay tons better because you get to react every other activation instead of waiting through an entire turn of doing nothing (thats not to even touch the AOS double turn of waiting through two whole turns of doing nothing)

Getting rid of Double Turn would make me interested in playing AOS again.

Having an official alt activation sequence would make me excited to play AOS again. I used one in my campaign games and it worked great. It was one of the only houserules that DIDNT cause a lot of complaints becauase even my most die hard of tournament RAW-ONLY players saw and enjoyed the difference between double-turn IGOUGO vs alt activation.

Yeah just to be clear not arguing you, just what those people said.

And the funny part is that both Warcry and Kill Team both utilize Alternate Activations.

Maybe they just think it would be too hard for THEM to implement on the number of units that one may be fielding, like say between a horde army like skeletons or Skaven versus the Dragons or Giants.

It's not like various different AA-style systems haven't existed for decades like Battletech (though BT usually has a much smaller model count on the table).

I think you hit the nail on the head with the model-count variable.

3d edition actually aims to reduce model count but increase squad count. Because now you can only take a limited number of "reinforced" units per arm (based on the point level) you're encouraged to take more minimum unit squads. Heck at 2K points you can only take 2 full units. That's 4 reinforcement points all used up.

So that would work against alternate activation which might have worked better with 2nd edition which had no such limit.


Indeed the reinforcement limit is a curious one and I'm surprised its not more spoken about. One net loss is that you lose some of the big units fighting aspects; but one net gain is that I think it makes smaller elite unit groups a bit more viable as now they aren't as strongly competing with big infantry blocks. Point for point its hard to beat an infantry block so things like, in Slaanesh, fiends were ok stats wise, but always competing with a big block of deamonettes or such.




But that's a bit of a side topic. I think alternate activation isn't in AoS nor 40K because GW has become the BIGGEST in the market almost uncontested seriously for 30 years without alternate activation rules systems in their core games. Like it or not that is going to give the rule writers and the managers osme pretty clear evidence that it at very least WORKS. Even if there's a potentially superior option there might well be the concern that such a fundamental change could push people away. It might well be that we have to wait until key rules/managerial staff retire/move on to get a fresh wave of thinking in GW

 Charistoph wrote:
And the funny part is that both Warcry and Kill Team both utilize Alternate Activations.

So does Necromunda and Adeptus Titanicus. That's probably why I've only felt like playing specialist games for the last couple of years. Every time I try to get back into 40k/AoS, I realize what a clusterfeth it is and just start another necromunda or AT campaign.

 Toofast wrote:

 Charistoph wrote:
And the funny part is that both Warcry and Kill Team both utilize Alternate Activations.

So does Necromunda and Adeptus Titanicus. That's probably why I've only felt like playing specialist games for the last couple of years. Every time I try to get back into 40k/AoS, I realize what a clusterfeth it is and just start another necromunda or AT campaign.

For me it's just the idea of trying to build up another 2000 point army again that goes against it. Meanwhile, grabbing a box here or there for a faction can usually sate me. I can work within the rules, for the most part, but this double-turn thing comes across as a fiasco.

I haven't started on either one of them, yet, though, because when I went looking at starting up at a new local FLGS, I found out they had a thriving BT community, I already had models for that, and my wife is jealous of my time. One can lose initiative consistently there, and while it can be unfortunate, it's only devastating if you're doing a one-on-one and your opponent can maneuver out of your effective gun arcs.

Alternate activation very much breaks up the narrative aspect; it not longer feels like two armies clashing but rather a bunch of individual elements working together. For Warcry or Kill Team that is precisely the point, for mass battles not so much. It is also a matter of taste; warhammer has always been igougo and it would be a rather large crap on the heads of players to flip that.

Besides, people wave around AA like it is a magic bullet. It isn't. It has just as many problems as Igougo, they are simply different problems.

 NinthMusketeer wrote:
Alternate activation very much breaks up the narrative aspect; it not longer feels like two armies clashing but rather a bunch of individual elements working together. For Warcry or Kill Team that is precisely the point, for mass battles not so much. It is also a matter of taste; warhammer has always been igougo and it would be a rather large crap on the heads of players to flip that.

Besides, people wave around AA like it is a magic bullet. It isn't. It has just as many problems as Igougo, they are simply different problems.

Yea, I agree with this fully. As my second main game right now is Conquest: The Last Argument of Kings, which is fully AA, and I definitely miss the big sweeping maneuvers/coordinated turn of IGOUGO when I play it. To that end, games like Hail Caesar and Apocalypse have done alternating activation by detachment which is a system that matches the "feel" I like while also bringing some positives of AA.

In way I think the core issue with GW's style of balance is that the battle isn't like grand armies sweeping in formation at each other. GW armies are MUCH too fast to the kill for that. The result is a single turn can change the game state signfiicantly which means one person gets the feel of their armies moving into position an executing a powerful attack; the other player gets the sweeping early experience of defeat and a huge uphill struggle and their battle plans dashed on the rocks.


AOS does mute this a bit because close combat alternates who goes first; but ranged and magical abilities are all one side then the other side. In a way we almost need to bring ranged and magic into their own alternation turn sequence as well to balance things out.


Also I'd argue that alternating activation can still have the feeling of commanding powerful armies in sweeping manoeuvres because AA is more faithful to that model. No real army moves without input and feedback from the enemy; you move your horses toward their artillery and the enemy doesn't just stand there and let you; they sweep a unit in to protect the artillery or pull the artillery back if they can etc... They react.


AA allows you reactionary time and opportunity that is closer to real life; and also means that your plans remain more adaptive on the fly. You have a grand sweeping plan and the AA allows you to engage it whilst reacting and modifying to your opponents grand plan.

Rihgu wrote:

 NinthMusketeer wrote:
Alternate activation very much breaks up the narrative aspect; it not longer feels like two armies clashing but rather a bunch of individual elements working together. For Warcry or Kill Team that is precisely the point, for mass battles not so much. It is also a matter of taste; warhammer has always been igougo and it would be a rather large crap on the heads of players to flip that.

Besides, people wave around AA like it is a magic bullet. It isn't. It has just as many problems as Igougo, they are simply different problems.

Yea, I agree with this fully. As my second main game right now is Conquest: The Last Argument of Kings, which is fully AA, and I definitely miss the big sweeping maneuvers/coordinated turn of IGOUGO when I play it. To that end, games like Hail Caesar and Apocalypse have done alternating activation by detachment which is a system that matches the "feel" I like while also bringing some positives of AA.

tbh I feel like sigmar is REALLY close. I've played an alternate version, where we combined the shooting and charge phase into one, and ran that alternating in the same manner as the fight phase, and it works pretty good (main side-effect is you run into chain-charges where a unit charges a unit and then a defending unit charges the charger, leading to armies that kind of slap together faster than they otherwise would have) but just, in general, if you removed the un-interactivity of an all shooting army, I think youd be basically where I want the game to be activation wise. The movement phase and command phase is there for your 'grand sweeping strategy maneuvers' and then make the ENTIRETY of the fighting and dying alternating to blunt the power of alpha strikes and sort of simulate the 'gak hitting the fan' of the battle.

 NinthMusketeer wrote:
Alternate activation very much breaks up the narrative aspect; it not longer feels like two armies clashing but rather a bunch of individual elements working together. For Warcry or Kill Team that is precisely the point, for mass battles not so much. It is also a matter of taste; warhammer has always been igougo and it would be a rather large crap on the heads of players to flip that.

Besides, people wave around AA like it is a magic bullet. It isn't. It has just as many problems as Igougo, they are simply different problems.

I disagree. ANY turn-based system will throw off narrative aspects for me. Think about that moment in Dragonball Z Abridged when Nappa charges Krillin, and Krillin yells out, "MY TURN! MY TURN! MY TURN!", then Nappa stops in mid-air. That's what turn-based combat feels like on the narrative level to me.

If I want the feel of an armies facing each other, I need to turn to computer RTS to get anything close (and even THEY have turn-based aspects, if very very subtlely).

 NinthMusketeer wrote:
Alternate activation very much breaks up the narrative aspect; it not longer feels like two armies clashing but rather a bunch of individual elements working together. For Warcry or Kill Team that is precisely the point, for mass battles not so much. It is also a matter of taste; warhammer has always been igougo and it would be a rather large crap on the heads of players to flip that.

Besides, people wave around AA like it is a magic bullet. It isn't. It has just as many problems as Igougo, they are simply different problems.

I don't know what it would be magic-bullet wise - its just a more interactive game using Alternate Activation. AA does not fix any of AOS problems other than double turn standing there for two turns in a row doing mostly nothing. What it does do is make the game a lot more reactive and interactive and prevents things like alpha strikes where you just stand there for a turn and watch your army evaporate unless you deploy mandatory bubble wrap, which is not a mechanic or game style that I enjoy (so for me AA is almost entirely a stylistic desire for an interactive game as I detest games where I stand there for a turn doing nothing but watching you remove my models (and vice versa)).

To me IGOUGO breaks up the narrative aspect watching my army stand there with thumbs up its collective asses while the other side alpha strikes them and removes them without reaction. (so its just a personal preference it would seem). Alternate Activation is more like everything moving at once like an RTS only broken down element by element, or taking other forms like LOTR does (alternate entire phases but not an entire turn) or like Battletech does (alternate move and targeting, then everything resolved at once) or Conquest does (pure Alternate Activation). There are many different ways to accomplish alternate activation and make the game more interactive and less stand there while the other side tries its best to annihilate you before you have any chance to respond (I can't for the life of me figure out why that is an enjoyable game experience but here we are and it apparently is)

To silver bulleting, AOS primary problems other than double turn for me is its god awful balancing. That isn't solved by activation, thats solved by creating a proper points algorithm and making points represent more than just a loose structure to slam plastic models into each other with that the company then changes several times a year to rotate whats viable and whats not to force people to buy new models to keep up with the power meta if they want to continue to have decent competitive games.

AA is the lowest level of narrative immersion for me, because both sides' entire armies just sit and watch while one unit carries out all of its actions. And it doesn't even work representively, because each activation distinctly happens in sequence.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Overread wrote:
No real army moves without input and feedback from the enemy; you move your horses toward their artillery and the enemy doesn't just stand there and let you; they sweep a unit in to protect the artillery or pull the artillery back if they can etc... They react.


AA allows you reactionary time and opportunity that is closer to real life; and also means that your plans remain more adaptive on the fly. You have a grand sweeping plan and the AA allows you to engage it whilst reacting and modifying to your opponents grand plan.

See this is just disingenuous; the unit sweeping in to protect the artillery doesn't make another unit in melee on the other side of the battle stop and let the enemy slaughter them because they haven't activated yet. AA does that. Each activation is at the expense of another unit which spends that period standing there taking it to the face--exactly what people ciriticse about igouo. All it does it break it down into pieces then stack them up in sequence. The problem is different, but still entirely present.

And to come at it from the other end, AoS has rules to represent such a situation already; the example quoted above would be use of a redeploy command.

 NinthMusketeer wrote:

 Overread wrote:
No real army moves without input and feedback from the enemy; you move your horses toward their artillery and the enemy doesn't just stand there and let you; they sweep a unit in to protect the artillery or pull the artillery back if they can etc... They react.


AA allows you reactionary time and opportunity that is closer to real life; and also means that your plans remain more adaptive on the fly. You have a grand sweeping plan and the AA allows you to engage it whilst reacting and modifying to your opponents grand plan.

See this is just disingenuous; the unit sweeping in to protect the artillery doesn't make another unit in melee on the other side of the battle stop and let the enemy slaughter them because they haven't activated yet. AA does that. Each activation is at the expense of another unit which spends that period standing there taking it to the face--exactly what people ciriticse about igouo. All it does it break it down into pieces then stack them up in sequence. The problem is different, but still entirely present.

And to come at it from the other end, AoS has rules to represent such a situation already; the example quoted above would be use of a redeploy command.

While I agree with you, I understand Overread's concerns about IGOUGO. It's not a problematic activation mechanic in principle, but the way GW has developed their games the grand strategy aspect of it has been greatly diminished. For that to work and the clashing armies to feel like they're reacting to each other, you need a slower game. GW would have to remove run mechanics that can double a unit's movement, disallow cavalry, bikes and similarly fast units as core choices for armies, go back on the decreased board size, make impactful terrain rules, heavily restrict deep strike mechanics and more than anything, reduce damage output by a very large degree. In short, you can't give an army the ability to nuke enemy units where and when it pleases if you want interactivity between armies. It needs to be slower with opportunity for maneuvering and chipping damage so targeted units are actually around to react and a six turn game makes meaningful use of all six turns instead of effectively ending after the first turn or two.

Unfortunately especially in 40k you can clearly see that GW moves in the opposite direction, decreasing board size, increasing weapon ranges and killing power and enabling players to just strike whenever and wherever they want and removing whole units before they even get to act. Calls for alternate activation, in my opinion, have rarely been about the system being inherently superior to IGOUGO, although that is often how it's portrayed, but are deemed a means of mitigating the crippling effects GW's chosen game design has on IGOUGO. As such I'm wary of this grass is greener mentality that alternate activation is going to be a fix for everything. It could make dodgy game design less dodgy, if implemented correctly, But the argument falls flat if you consider that the same people who don't understand how to implement IGOUGO correctly are the ones who'd have to implement alternate activation. It's a question of competence of the designers and design direction rather than inherent superiority of one activation mechanic over another.

When I play a war game, FUN is the thing I prioritize. I don't need the "sweeping narrative" to take priority (especially in something fantastical like AoS) - I can get that from books and movies. AA is more fun imo, in that it is more engaging for both players moment-to-moment. It also has less likelihood of NPE where something like alpha strike or double turn just sucks the air out of the room.

I'd also argue (but have no data) that the majority of players want to have fun, not "forge a narrative". Ergo, the system that is more fun will grow the game faster.

Orangecoke wrote:
When I play a war game, FUN is the thing I prioritize. I don't need the "sweeping narrative" to take priority (especially in something fantastical like AoS) - I can get that from books and movies. AA is more fun imo, in that it is more engaging for both players moment-to-moment. It also has less likelihood of NPE where something like alpha strike or double turn just sucks the air out of the room.

I'd also argue (but have no data) that the majority of players want to have fun, not "forge a narrative". Ergo, the system that is more fun will grow the game faster.

While I agree with a lot of this, I think the underlying premise is flawed. People like narrative in their games because they find it fun. The sources of fun are many and varied for different people.

 Stux wrote:

Orangecoke wrote:
When I play a war game, FUN is the thing I prioritize. I don't need the "sweeping narrative" to take priority (especially in something fantastical like AoS) - I can get that from books and movies. AA is more fun imo, in that it is more engaging for both players moment-to-moment. It also has less likelihood of NPE where something like alpha strike or double turn just sucks the air out of the room.

I'd also argue (but have no data) that the majority of players want to have fun, not "forge a narrative". Ergo, the system that is more fun will grow the game faster.

While I agree with a lot of this, I think the underlying premise is flawed. People like narrative in their games because they find it fun. The sources of fun are many and varied for different people.

I should have clarified:

- I think fun games create a narrative
- I think narrative enriches the fun
- I reject that AA diminishes the narrative
- by boosting the fun, reducing NPEs (which is huge), and creating more ongoing engagement, I think AA leads to a better game narrative for both players personally

Basically I don't think narrative should come at the expense of fun, and I believe that's a risk with double turns.

But the argument falls flat if you consider that the same people who don't understand how to implement IGOUGO correctly are the ones who'd have to implement alternate activation. It's a question of competence of the designers and design direction rather than inherent superiority of one activation mechanic over another.

The guys writing the rules aren't stupid. The ones I know and have seen their work I know that they can write excellent rules.

The company itself wants the game as fast and killer as you have described. Their marketing seems to indicate (and I agree with based on the projects I have also worked with similar marketing) that people want a game they can rock into their game store on a saturday afternoon and get 2 or 3 games in. I know that speed was at least a top priority a few years ago because on the warhammer videos that they were doing with the designers, they mentioned that about a dozen times about how speed of play was very important to them.

That means games have to be an hour to an hour and a half tops, so mechanics have to be deadly to facilitate a fast game AND sell lots of plastic to have large armies.

Decreased board size, super alpha strikes, being able to erase units before they even go... those are all intentional and side with the get the game over as fast as possible design goal.

Tournaments also push on that "get the game done as fast as possible so we can have more rounds".

While that is their design goal, the grand strategy stuff just can't coexist.

And other games outside of GW follow suit. Conquest is a rank and file fantasy game and their stated intent is games done in 60 minutes and in playtesting were introducing similar gw style mechanics to allow for stuff to die fast.

Alternate Activation can actually slow the game down due to analysis paralysis, though I can't say that that is why GW is so adamant to keep it out of their main games but keep it in their smaller games.

As to the narrative - we'd need a proper global poll to get an idea of what the real story is. In my own experience (so anecdotal and obviously limited to the people i have interacted with) games were more narrative 20 years ago, and that started eroding as new player style became predominant and the older players phased out. I would agree that most of the players I have known the past ten years or so aren't really interested in narrative at the table. Then again they also love alpha striking their opponent off the table before they get a response, and I don't see how that is fun, but they find that great fun... but telling the story etc... seems to be in the minority compared with just showing up and slamming models together and rolling dice and socializing and getting as many games as they can in a day (so the need for a fast game as opposed to older games of yore that took 3-4 hours to tell the story and get the grand strategy in)

You have to dig deep for games like that these days, not only to find the game itself, but to find players willing to do it on a regular basis.

I'm very in favour of faster/shorter games for sure. I just think "by making them unpleasant for one of the players" is misguided. But also, frankly I have found 40K and AoS are very long games so they are doing something wrong if fast games is their goal imo.