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We are not talking about what it lead to with pie plates though.

We can agree taht pie plate AP2 is not a good thing, and i would agree its not.

But tahts not what the discussion is about here, its about old AP vs new rending AP. Old AP had a direct check and balance to it, either it penned or it did not, and if the weapon did not pen it did not then continue to effect the same.

current AP everything gets its survivability reduced because of it.
Thats not even something you can aruge, its directly observable, we know that the reason for the problems is 40k are directly tied to the AP system.

the fact taht AP -1 and -2 can so drastically reduce the survivability of SV2 and SV3 models is what directly led to so many 2w models, which then it became a problem of these 2 wound models dont die, now its multi wound weapons, now things have invulns everywhere, now things just ignore invuln.
Its not even a debate that the current AP rending system is whats causing issues.


plasma: came with get hot risk reward removed in 8th
grav: Never should have been a weaon and fully agree that it being AP2 and even 3 was redicuous should have been AP -
battlecannons Its a russ, its guards gimick
demolisher cannons has always been a pie plate large blast and came on a very sub par platform that got glanced and stun locked

Again them existing was not the issue, the issue was they applied their AP only to things that were worse armor saves not better, thats the problem here.
We can aruge about codex creep all day and end up agreeing it sucked and it happens. But thats not what we are here to talk about, we are here to talk about the system as they work not what happened to them.
GW handing out ap 2 and 3 late in editions is no better then GW handing out ap -1 and -2 on multi damage all over the place. What im trying to point out is that its far worse now then it was before.

You have a point with Sv 2+, but Sv 3+ is actually more durable. Or are you ignoring the fact that AP -2 weapons used to be AP 3? a space marine gets a 5+ save against a missile launcher or a battle cannon, while previously he would have just died.

I find it weird you are defining the whole thing around 1 particular group of models: Sv 2+ models.

The main problem with narrative games is that they aren't really suitable for a pick-up culture. If you can assemble even a tiny group of narrative players, a TTG equivalent of a regular RPG "party", then narratives are pretty much an emergent way of exploring 40K and GW rules naturally become more of a guideline than the law. But if you want to play narratively within a pick-up environment, then each gaming night is a new beginning and people rely on the official, god given "law" to provide the functioning substitute for what can't ever be codified - companionship and likemindedness.

I think this is why narrative gaming is more of a thing in Europe, where wargaming had a strong tradition of historicals, where narrative and wider context were always a fundamental part of the experience, and preparing unique scenarios was the norm, so there was a different profile of a typical player. Some of that culture was passed on early 40k and lived on with veterans, who then nurtured new generations of players.

The bottom line is - no matter how tight narrative rules GW will provide, those won't ever be enough to provide you with a long term play partner. That's on you.

With standardised tournament/matched rules? You can pretty much enjoy "single serving" play companions and in extreme cases never bother with any kind of social interaction beyond "2000pts ITC", because games are one-off, disconnected encounters. In some cases, the player on the other side of the table is little more than an NPC.

Another huge difference - when you build your army with matched/tournament play in mind, then this build is universal, you can play against any other matched player and can very well be "crunched" at home solo. With a proper narrative however? Lists should fit the narrative, should be cross-tailored or even be entirely scenario driven, and require a joined effort. That is not something you can do on the fly on PUG night. Campaign systems like Crusade or Necromunda work well within a closed circle of players, otherwise they require an arbitrator to keep track of things, so a more organised event.

There is a huge overhead involved in narrative gaming when compared to the more straightforward matched, and an entirely different gaming culture required for (and at the same time generated by) narrative gaming.

I used to play WW2 Microarmour where we had a referee who designed the scenario and forces each week. We had a double-blind movement system with maps etc. Lots of fun narrative gaming, but it also required that our group had a common vision of how we wanted to have fun. Hard to attract new people, and it collapsed after a couple of years. People want to play with the miniatures that they have collected and painted.

Miniatures games that try to have set scenarios face the problem that players have varied collections of terrain, tablespace and miniatures.

I took a scan through my 4th Ed MRB. There are special missions etc, but I wouldn't call them narrative masterpieces. Especially when you work in the Secondaries for 9th Ed Matched Play you can indeed have a narrative for your game. If you want. There was a fellow in the old Flames of War forum who had in his signature line: "If you want the game to be narrative you have to play it narratively." You don't make a story for your dudes in the fight? If you want to abandon victory/throw away VPs to do something heroic with your dudes what exactly is stopping you?

Matched Play provides a framework, a lingua franca, for two players to have a fair fight with a minimum of pre-game negotiation. It seems to work. Over the years of Saturday pick-up games at the FLGS I can think of just a couple of times when we played a "Narrative" scenario instead of Matched Play (or the standard missions in previous editions). If you are a hard-core Narrative player then you can use the rules to make your own hard-core narrative games. Works great if you have like-minded players who want to play with you. Don't blame others, though, if they want to play another way.

TangoTwoBravo wrote:
I used to play WW2 Microarmour where we had a referee who designed the scenario and forces each week. We had a double-blind movement system with maps etc. Lots of fun narrative gaming, but it also required that our group had a common vision of how we wanted to have fun. Hard to attract new people, and it collapsed after a couple of years. People want to play with the miniatures that they have collected and painted.

Miniatures games that try to have set scenarios face the problem that players have varied collections of terrain, tablespace and miniatures.

I took a scan through my 4th Ed MRB. There are special missions etc, but I wouldn't call them narrative masterpieces. Especially when you work in the Secondaries for 9th Ed Matched Play you can indeed have a narrative for your game. If you want. There was a fellow in the old Flames of War forum who had in his signature line: "If you want the game to be narrative you have to play it narratively." You don't make a story for your dudes in the fight? If you want to abandon victory/throw away VPs to do something heroic with your dudes what exactly is stopping you?

Matched Play provides a framework, a lingua franca, for two players to have a fair fight with a minimum of pre-game negotiation. It seems to work. Over the years of Saturday pick-up games at the FLGS I can think of just a couple of times when we played a "Narrative" scenario instead of Matched Play (or the standard missions in previous editions). If you are a hard-core Narrative player then you can use the rules to make your own hard-core narrative games. Works great if you have like-minded players who want to play with you. Don't blame others, though, if they want to play another way.

We just wrote basically the same post in parallel and posted it at the same time

 Tyran wrote:
You have a point with Sv 2+, but Sv 3+ is actually more durable. Or are you ignoring the fact that AP -2 weapons used to be AP 3? a space marine gets a 5+ save against a missile launcher or a battle cannon, while previously he would have just died.

I find it weird you are defining the whole thing around 1 particular group of models: Sv 2+ models.

Im fine with a marine not getting a save. I use the Sv 2 because its the most easy to show the issues of the sytem.
Even something as a minus 1 and its spamability along with the spam ability of AP -2.

Take a look at just an AP-1 that would have been an AP 4 weapon previously doing nothing to a 3+ save which would have been a 66% save chance, now its very easy to spam -1 resulting in a 50% save chance, but that -1 also reducing a model that you end up paying for the 2+ save, but are getting knocked down to a 3+ save as a result.

Over all the rending system created so much more killing potential, and thats causing a problem because, because it turns balancing into an arms race of making things counter act or negate the effects of previous bandaid fixes.
Previous editions had their issues yes, but nothing to the degree that this ap system is causing.

This run away AP system is what's causing things like Vehicles to be worthless to field, before they relied on their amrmor now they can get spammed with -1 and -2 weapons dropping most to a 5 or 6+ save, monster's creatures can get away with it because most of them have some invuln, keyword, or FNP to fall back on.
The AP screwing over vehicles is even proveable in the recent guard FAQ buffing russ from a 3+ to 2 + which again, means nothing in the game anymore with all the spamable AP -1,2,and 3.
so looking at vehicles you have to ask, well whats the solution here? Have them ignore -1 and -2? have them ignore the AP of weapons that dont reach stregth x?
Any fix you give just results in the same problem, its all because of the rending AP system.

nou wrote:

TangoTwoBravo wrote:
I used to play WW2 Microarmour where we had a referee who designed the scenario and forces each week. We had a double-blind movement system with maps etc. Lots of fun narrative gaming, but it also required that our group had a common vision of how we wanted to have fun. Hard to attract new people, and it collapsed after a couple of years. People want to play with the miniatures that they have collected and painted.

Miniatures games that try to have set scenarios face the problem that players have varied collections of terrain, tablespace and miniatures.

I took a scan through my 4th Ed MRB. There are special missions etc, but I wouldn't call them narrative masterpieces. Especially when you work in the Secondaries for 9th Ed Matched Play you can indeed have a narrative for your game. If you want. There was a fellow in the old Flames of War forum who had in his signature line: "If you want the game to be narrative you have to play it narratively." You don't make a story for your dudes in the fight? If you want to abandon victory/throw away VPs to do something heroic with your dudes what exactly is stopping you?

Matched Play provides a framework, a lingua franca, for two players to have a fair fight with a minimum of pre-game negotiation. It seems to work. Over the years of Saturday pick-up games at the FLGS I can think of just a couple of times when we played a "Narrative" scenario instead of Matched Play (or the standard missions in previous editions). If you are a hard-core Narrative player then you can use the rules to make your own hard-core narrative games. Works great if you have like-minded players who want to play with you. Don't blame others, though, if they want to play another way.

We just wrote basically the same post in parallel and posted it at the same time

Too funny. As it all loaded I thought - Nou's post is what I wrote but better!

I do agree that narrative does not offer the ability to pickup and play nearly as easy if at all.

My issue im having now with GW leaning so hard into the tournament scene, is that its to far on the spectrum one way. Where you cant have the game be 100% narrative because then it would be impossible to do pick up games, but the other side of that coin is, you cant have it be as heavy tournament focused as it is now, because you just end up sanitizing the game.

40k now has, imo, never been more boring to play, because they have standardized the game so much that basically anywhere i go, its the same match, the same table, the same ITC terrain, everything, 40k has been horribly sanitized and sterilized that every game feel like you are playing in a clean room, and its just a match to get ready for the next tournament.
Any more a game of 40k to me feels like a game of MTG, most of the time is spent on list building and making your deck/army, when you get to the table, you are mostly just there for the ride.

 Backspacehacker wrote:

 Tyran wrote:
You have a point with Sv 2+, but Sv 3+ is actually more durable. Or are you ignoring the fact that AP -2 weapons used to be AP 3? a space marine gets a 5+ save against a missile launcher or a battle cannon, while previously he would have just died.

I find it weird you are defining the whole thing around 1 particular group of models: Sv 2+ models.

Im fine with a marine not getting a save. I use the Sv 2 because its the most easy to show the issues of the sytem.
Even something as a minus 1 and its spamability along with the spam ability of AP -2.

Take a look at just an AP-1 that would have been an AP 4 weapon previously doing nothing to a 3+ save which would have been a 66% save chance, now its very easy to spam -1 resulting in a 50% save chance, but that -1 also reducing a model that you end up paying for the 2+ save, but are getting knocked down to a 3+ save as a result.

Over all the rending system created so much more killing potential, and thats causing a problem because, because it turns balancing into an arms race of making things counter act or negate the effects of previous bandaid fixes.
Previous editions had their issues yes, but nothing to the degree that this ap system is causing.

This run away AP system is what's causing things like Vehicles to be worthless to field, before they relied on their amrmor now they can get spammed with -1 and -2 weapons dropping most to a 5 or 6+ save, monster's creatures can get away with it because most of them have some invuln, keyword, or FNP to fall back on.
The AP screwing over vehicles is even proveable in the recent guard FAQ buffing russ from a 3+ to 2 + which again, means nothing in the game anymore with all the spamable AP -1,2,and 3.
so looking at vehicles you have to ask, well whats the solution here? Have them ignore -1 and -2? have them ignore the AP of weapons that dont reach stregth x?
Any fix you give just results in the same problem, its all because of the rending AP system.

...?

What is killing vehicles is AP -3 or better weapons with Damage D3+3 or better, you know weapons that used to be AP 2 or 1. Autocannons are not killing vehicles, because to be blunt no one brings autocannons.

Reverting back to the binary system would do nothing to help with that.

I get that weapons dealing that kinda damage are made for that.
Autocanons are pointless to bring because of the wounding system.

And it would because it would no longer require these constant bandaid fixes we get.

If we went back to the old AP system, every weapon now that is doing -1, would go back to AP4, there would not be no reason to hand out multi wounds to models that live or die on a 2 or 3 + save, because they are no longer at great threat from the AP-1 their save is not getting knocked down while still paying he point for a 3+ save. Which is why they went up to 2 wounds in the first place.


There would then be no need to start handing out all these multi wound weapons, there would be no need to start handing out all these invulns and wound only of 4+

The game went along fine, for 10+ years under the old system and we never once had the amount of changes we have seen in the last 2 editions because of this AP change.

The game got a long just fine with almost every weapon being a single wound weapon and being an all or nothing save.

 Backspacehacker wrote:

 Tyran wrote:
You have a point with Sv 2+, but Sv 3+ is actually more durable. Or are you ignoring the fact that AP -2 weapons used to be AP 3? a space marine gets a 5+ save against a missile launcher or a battle cannon, while previously he would have just died.

I find it weird you are defining the whole thing around 1 particular group of models: Sv 2+ models.

Im fine with a marine not getting a save. I use the Sv 2 because its the most easy to show the issues of the sytem.
Even something as a minus 1 and its spamability along with the spam ability of AP -2.

Take a look at just an AP-1 that would have been an AP 4 weapon previously doing nothing to a 3+ save which would have been a 66% save chance, now its very easy to spam -1 resulting in a 50% save chance, but that -1 also reducing a model that you end up paying for the 2+ save, but are getting knocked down to a 3+ save as a result.

Over all the rending system created so much more killing potential, and thats causing a problem because, because it turns balancing into an arms race of making things counter act or negate the effects of previous bandaid fixes.
Previous editions had their issues yes, but nothing to the degree that this ap system is causing.

This run away AP system is what's causing things like Vehicles to be worthless to field, before they relied on their amrmor now they can get spammed with -1 and -2 weapons dropping most to a 5 or 6+ save, monster's creatures can get away with it because most of them have some invuln, keyword, or FNP to fall back on.
The AP screwing over vehicles is even proveable in the recent guard FAQ buffing russ from a 3+ to 2 + which again, means nothing in the game anymore with all the spamable AP -1,2,and 3.
so looking at vehicles you have to ask, well whats the solution here? Have them ignore -1 and -2? have them ignore the AP of weapons that dont reach stregth x?
Any fix you give just results in the same problem, its all because of the rending AP system.

The old AP system was broken, favoring an all-or-nothing approach where you either got the best possible AP or didn't care at all, and the best possible armor or didn't care at all. Power Swords were useless because they got AP3, leading to everyone either taking Axes or Mauls. Similarly, the way it interacted with shooting made it worse - most units didn't care if they had armor against range unless they had really good armor, because they'd probably just grab cover instead.

The new AP system also has issues, favoring weapons that can get a point or two of AP, but isn't nearly as bad as the old all-or-nothing system. New changes like New Storm Shields and more generally cover actually mattering for 2+ armor helps balance out terminator durability against weapons that try to deal chip damage.

Vehicles have *always* been hard to balance because you're ultimately putting a huge amount of points into a single vulnerable model that you can sink multi-damage hits into with peak efficiency. In older editions they could explode, now they can just take 6+ wounds in a single pop without wasting damage. Without making the system more complex or inventing a good rule that I can't even imagine that would increase durability without being exploitable or overpowered, I don't know how you propose fixing that.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Tyran wrote:

... plasma, grav, battlecannons, demolisher cannons, Ion weapons, long fang spam. There were plenty of armies that could indeed spam AP 2 and 3, even as large blasts so they were efficient even against horde units.

Oh god, those were the days. Five Long Fangs with Plamsa Cannons, buffed by prescience or if you were lucky and brought an inquisitor, Psycollum. You could drop small blasts with almost perfect accuracy and take out pretty much any infantry target with hilarious efficiency.

*Shudders*.

I get the old system was not the best, but its miles better then what it is now, because it worked and did not cause the multitude of problems we have now.

Waaaghpower wrote:
The old AP system was broken, favoring an all-or-nothing approach where you either got the best possible AP or didn't care at all, and the best possible armor or didn't care at all. Power Swords were useless because they got AP3, leading to everyone either taking Axes or Mauls. Similarly, the way it interacted with shooting made it worse - most units didn't care if they had armor against range unless they had really good armor, because they'd probably just grab cover instead.

Wait, so you're saying well-armored models, basically walking tanks like Marines in Power Armor, didn't need cover, while lightly-armored models, like Guardsmen in Flak jackets, did need cover?
Instead of cover being basically useless for a 6+ armor cultist, even against AP0, but a massive durability buff for a Marine against that same weapon?

How horrid! /s

 JNAProductions wrote:

Waaaghpower wrote:
The old AP system was broken, favoring an all-or-nothing approach where you either got the best possible AP or didn't care at all, and the best possible armor or didn't care at all. Power Swords were useless because they got AP3, leading to everyone either taking Axes or Mauls. Similarly, the way it interacted with shooting made it worse - most units didn't care if they had armor against range unless they had really good armor, because they'd probably just grab cover instead.

Wait, so you're saying well-armored models, basically walking tanks like Marines in Power Armor, didn't need cover, while lightly-armored models, like Guardsmen in Flak jackets, did need cover?
Instead of cover being basically useless for a 6+ armor cultist, even against AP0, but a massive durability buff for a Marine against that same weapon?

How horrid! /s

And thats why they cost more to take space marines, because you were paying for that 3+ an 4 stat line, and the only thing that robbed you of that, was specifically being targeted by a weapon designed to strip that save. Now that save is stripped by anything that was once ap4
The issue is worse on models that you payed for 2+ saves on, because now that also gets stripped by a previously AP4 weapon.

 JNAProductions wrote:
So, I like a well-balanced game. I like a game where player skill at the table is the main determinant of victory and defeat.

I used to believe this, but have come to the conclusion that the current level of balance, or lack thereof, is perfectly fine as long as:

1. There are a few choices at the very top that are contain a meta-balanced amongst themselves. These should be mono-builds designed to extract the maximum revenue from WAAC players chasing the meta, and cycle out with every Codex release or two. GW host Official Tournaments with rules that strongly enforce WYSIWYG that includes locks SM faction color schemes, bans proxies of named models, and so forth to ensure that tournament players must pay through the nose if they want to stay on top.

2. The rest of the stuff is roughly balanced amongst themselves, where nothing is particularly good, nor particularly bad, giving casual players the freedom to select narrative armies without any significant penalty.

I believe that GW is missing an opportunity to adequately tax the tournament scene doesn't pay enough for being the tail that wags the dog. The vast majority of players are casuals and don't participate in the well-publicized major tournaments, so they should be given the freedom to play narrative armies without much penalty. The handful of 'serious' players spend $1,000s USD annually, so the cost of the hobby shouldn't be an issue.

Balance isn't my major concern.

IMO, 40k should be a lot simpler from a mechanics standpoint. GW ought to dial back the rules volume from what feels worse than the bloat of 2E back down to the streamlined 3E rulebook army era. Keep it simple, so that it's easy to get in, easy to play correctly. Make up the difference with more Fluff and Background, more varied Scenarios, and so forth.

 Backspacehacker wrote:

 JNAProductions wrote:

Waaaghpower wrote:
The old AP system was broken, favoring an all-or-nothing approach where you either got the best possible AP or didn't care at all, and the best possible armor or didn't care at all. Power Swords were useless because they got AP3, leading to everyone either taking Axes or Mauls. Similarly, the way it interacted with shooting made it worse - most units didn't care if they had armor against range unless they had really good armor, because they'd probably just grab cover instead.

Wait, so you're saying well-armored models, basically walking tanks like Marines in Power Armor, didn't need cover, while lightly-armored models, like Guardsmen in Flak jackets, did need cover?
Instead of cover being basically useless for a 6+ armor cultist, even against AP0, but a massive durability buff for a Marine against that same weapon?

How horrid! /s

And thats why they cost more to take space marines, because you were paying for that 3+ an 4 stat line, and the only thing that robbed you of that, was specifically being targeted by a weapon designed to strip that save. Now that save is stripped by anything that was once ap4
The issue is worse on models that you payed for 2+ saves on, because now that also gets stripped by a previously AP4 weapon.

In theory that might be true, but in practice it didn't work out that way because there were so many weapons that denied 3+ saves. In practice, Power Armor *sometimes* got you a +1 or a +2 over what even the most fragile of troops got, as often as not it did nothing, and marines were very easy to kill.

Now, Power Armor offers consistent, reliable increases in durability. A Space Marine in power armor will always get you +3 over what an Ork Boy gets, and +4 over TShirts. Cover is not broken on hordes, and denies cover doesn't need to be ubiquitous.

 Tyran wrote:
You have a point with Sv 2+, but Sv 3+ is actually more durable. Or are you ignoring the fact that AP -2 weapons used to be AP 3? a space marine gets a 5+ save against a missile launcher or a battle cannon, while previously he would have just died.

I find it weird you are defining the whole thing around 1 particular group of models: Sv 2+ models.

Even weirder when Terminators weren't even seen as good for editions unless they were Grey Knight Paladins (who came with 2 wounds instead of 1).

 JohnHwangDD wrote:

 JNAProductions wrote:
So, I like a well-balanced game. I like a game where player skill at the table is the main determinant of victory and defeat.

I used to believe this, but have come to the conclusion that the current level of balance, or lack thereof, is perfectly fine as long as:

1. There are a few choices at the very top that are contain a meta-balanced amongst themselves. These should be mono-builds designed to extract the maximum revenue from WAAC players chasing the meta, and cycle out with every Codex release or two. GW host Official Tournaments with rules that strongly enforce WYSIWYG that includes locks SM faction color schemes, bans proxies of named models, and so forth to ensure that tournament players must pay through the nose if they want to stay on top.

2. The rest of the stuff is roughly balanced amongst themselves, where nothing is particularly good, nor particularly bad, giving casual players the freedom to select narrative armies without any significant penalty.

I believe that GW is missing an opportunity to adequately tax the tournament scene doesn't pay enough for being the tail that wags the dog. The vast majority of players are casuals and don't participate in the well-publicized major tournaments, so they should be given the freedom to play narrative armies without much penalty. The handful of 'serious' players spend $1,000s USD annually, so the cost of the hobby shouldn't be an issue.

Balance isn't my major concern.

IMO, 40k should be a lot simpler from a mechanics standpoint. GW ought to dial back the rules volume from what feels worse than the bloat of 2E back down to the streamlined 3E rulebook army era. Keep it simple, so that it's easy to get in, easy to play correctly. Make up the difference with more Fluff and Background, more varied Scenarios, and so forth.

The irony being they have bloated it worse now then i think i have ever seen in my life. With the editions that was meant to make the game more streamlined its become more of a hot mess then i have seen.

 Tyran wrote:

 Backspacehacker wrote:

 Tyran wrote:
Except that AP2 weapons were just as good at killing sv3.

It was not a check and balance system, it was an escalation system that inevitable lead to AP 2 large blasts blasting away anyone that didn't have an invulnerable save.

Like sure, the modifier system weakened sv 2 models. But sv 3, 4, 5 and 6? they all benefit more in a modifier system than in a binary one.

Also terminators really needed that extra wound, as it was easy to brute force through a sv 2 even without modifiers.

Yes and you paid the points for them.

AP 2 and 1 being able to kill sv 3 4 and 5 jsut as good was not a problem, because you could not spam AP 2 and 3 nearly as easy, you had like 1 or 2 a squad, or had dedicated units that cost a lot of points.
Now in current 40k you can spam AP -1 and -2 which drastically reduce the survivability of anything they look at.

... plasma, grav, battlecannons, demolisher cannons, Ion weapons, long fang spam. There were plenty of armies that could indeed spam AP 2 and 3, even as large blasts so they were efficient even against horde units.

Heck melta spam was extra good since it was AP1 AND S8 where it would trigger Instant Death on T4 or less models preventing them from being able to FnP out of it.

 ClockworkZion wrote:

 Tyran wrote:
You have a point with Sv 2+, but Sv 3+ is actually more durable. Or are you ignoring the fact that AP -2 weapons used to be AP 3? a space marine gets a 5+ save against a missile launcher or a battle cannon, while previously he would have just died.

I find it weird you are defining the whole thing around 1 particular group of models: Sv 2+ models.

Even weirder when Terminators weren't even seen as good for editions unless they were Grey Knight Paladins (who came with 2 wounds instead of 1).

DW were not have bad if you ran them with DW knights for that T5 and a command squad to get the FNP.
But you are correct yes.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 ClockworkZion wrote:

 Tyran wrote:

 Backspacehacker wrote:

 Tyran wrote:
Except that AP2 weapons were just as good at killing sv3.

It was not a check and balance system, it was an escalation system that inevitable lead to AP 2 large blasts blasting away anyone that didn't have an invulnerable save.

Like sure, the modifier system weakened sv 2 models. But sv 3, 4, 5 and 6? they all benefit more in a modifier system than in a binary one.

Also terminators really needed that extra wound, as it was easy to brute force through a sv 2 even without modifiers.

Yes and you paid the points for them.

AP 2 and 1 being able to kill sv 3 4 and 5 jsut as good was not a problem, because you could not spam AP 2 and 3 nearly as easy, you had like 1 or 2 a squad, or had dedicated units that cost a lot of points.
Now in current 40k you can spam AP -1 and -2 which drastically reduce the survivability of anything they look at.

... plasma, grav, battlecannons, demolisher cannons, Ion weapons, long fang spam. There were plenty of armies that could indeed spam AP 2 and 3, even as large blasts so they were efficient even against horde units.

Heck melta spam was extra good since it was AP1 AND S8 where it would trigger Instant Death on T4 or less models preventing them from being able to FnP out of it.

Which honestly i dont see the issue with that because i mean, thats a unit that you paid specifically to be a F U unit to anything it gets in range of. Like its designed to do just that.

 Backspacehacker wrote:
I get the old system was not the best, but its miles better then what it is now, because it worked and did not cause the multitude of problems we have now.

Then what caused the multitude of problems of the old system?

I mean, for all the problems of the new system, at least it does not have re-rolleable 2+ invulnerable saves, D strength weapons or snap shots.

 Backspacehacker wrote:
I get the old system was not the best, but its miles better then what it is now, because it worked and did not cause the multitude of problems we have now.

By that metric, the new system is miles better than the old one because the new one does not cause the multitude of problems we used to have.

Remember, binary AP was the system where:

- 5+ and 6+ saves were functionally useless since the vast majority of ranged weapons (including the basic weapons of every single Space Marine (spiky, square, or special enough to get their own dex)) were AP5 or better, but you still had to pay for them
- A model in power armor saw no difference between a lasgun and an autocannon (despite autocannons putting some serious hurt on light and sometimes medium vehicles and lasguns being, well... lasguns)
- A model in power armor was gak-scared of Battle Cannons, but a model in Terminator armor saw the Battle Cannon as basically the same as both an autocannon and a lasgun

And yes, I am aware that an autocannon had a much easier time wounding a Space Marine, and that Battle Cannons could Instant Death T4 (making it technically scarier to Terminators than autocannons). However, wounding was a different system - no amount of S was ever enough to modify even a 6+ save.

It's fine if you prefer the old system, but let's not pretend that the fact that it technically functioned makes it any better than the new system.

 waefre_1 wrote:
- 5+ and 6+ saves were functionally useless since the vast majority of ranged weapons (including the basic weapons of every single Space Marine (spiky, square, or special enough to get their own dex)) were AP5 or better, but you still had to pay for them
- A model in power armor saw no difference between a lasgun and an autocannon (despite autocannons putting some serious hurt on light and sometimes medium vehicles and lasguns being, well... lasguns)
- A model in power armor was gak-scared of Battle Cannons, but a model in Terminator armor saw the Battle Cannon as basically the same as both an autocannon and a lasgun

And to think a simple USR would've solved all of that, and would have been scalable for HTH combat, and covered even outliers like the dumb Choppa rules.

 H.B.M.C. wrote:

 waefre_1 wrote:
- 5+ and 6+ saves were functionally useless since the vast majority of ranged weapons (including the basic weapons of every single Space Marine (spiky, square, or special enough to get their own dex)) were AP5 or better, but you still had to pay for them
- A model in power armor saw no difference between a lasgun and an autocannon (despite autocannons putting some serious hurt on light and sometimes medium vehicles and lasguns being, well... lasguns)
- A model in power armor was gak-scared of Battle Cannons, but a model in Terminator armor saw the Battle Cannon as basically the same as both an autocannon and a lasgun

And to think a simple USR would've solved all of that, and would have been scalable for HTH combat, and covered even outliers like the dumb Choppa rules.

Nah, bringing back 2nd ed's AP system was better for fixing the way AP worked from 3rd through 7th. How binary that system was never felt right.

So I want to address some of the thoughts about narrative gaming:

The mission complexity you seek absolutely does exist. If you actually play a crusade over a season using the campaign books, crusade mission packs and White Dwarf Flashpoints, you have just a crazy amount of material to work with. Using these resources can also help with the pick-up game consistency piece, as can the notion of a campaign season.

If you've played Crusade, you'll know that every battle will include mission objectives which confer victory points for the army, agendas which confer experience points for individual units, and quest objectives which are the peculiar intangibles that are specific to each faction- like infiltrating the institutions of a planet to incite rebellion, the quest for sainthood or repentance, or the acquisition and control of territory in Commorragh. Often, these "quests" interact with Agendas and Requisitions.

All three of these types of objectives exist in dynamic tension- so you can fight to win the battle, but you might not be able to achieve as many goals for individual units or advance as many of your faction's long term goals. This combination of multiple goals means that even a lost game can feel like a win if your Captain becomes Chapter Master, or your Aspiring Saint completes one of the trials of sainthood.

In campaign settings, there's another layer of objectives because you're advancing a shared narrative on a faction-wide scale. You might choose to forego some of the unit-level goals and quests in order to win one of the legendary battles. Theatres of war also feature in campaign settings; they aren't usually mandatory in regular games, but they provide some of that whacky randomness that people say is missing from the game.

These campaigns DO work best if you have an Arbitrator to set ground rules for the progression of the campaign, and tracks its progress. All of the campaign setting books offer guidelines on various ways to do this. I don't think GW needs to do anything to improve the quality of narrative offerings, people just need to be in an environment where they can use these things.

 ClockworkZion wrote:
Nah, bringing back 2nd ed's AP system was better for fixing the way AP worked from 3rd through 7th. How binary that system was never felt right.

It never felt right because it didn't scale.

A simple "High Impact" rule that allowed for certain weapons to reduce armour saves whilst still allowing full saves against most things would've solved the issue. Marines would still get their 3+ save against most things (rather than now where they'll get 4+ or 5+ all the time, and 3+ hardly ever*), but you could avoid issues where a Battle Cannon does nothing to Terminator Armour or, worse, where a Choppa reduces a Terminator to a 4+ save, but somehow leaves a Guardsman's save perfectly in tact!




*Certainly better than 2nd Ed, where everyone and his dog has a -1 Save Mod, so Marines never got to take 3+ saves except against Gretchin with Autoguns.

PenitentJake wrote:
So I want to address some of the thoughts about narrative gaming:

The mission complexity you seek absolutely does exist. If you actually play a crusade over a season using the campaign books, crusade mission packs and White Dwarf Flashpoints, you have just a crazy amount of material to work with. Using these resources can also help with the pick-up game consistency piece, as can the notion of a campaign season.

If you've played Crusade, you'll know that every battle will include mission objectives which confer victory points for the army, agendas which confer experience points for individual units, and quest objectives which are the peculiar intangibles that are specific to each faction- like infiltrating the institutions of a planet to incite rebellion, the quest for sainthood or repentance, or the acquisition and control of territory in Commorragh. Often, these "quests" interact with Agendas and Requisitions.

All three of these types of objectives exist in dynamic tension- so you can fight to win the battle, but you might not be able to achieve as many goals for individual units or advance as many of your faction's long term goals. This combination of multiple goals means that even a lost game can feel like a win if your Captain becomes Chapter Master, or your Aspiring Saint completes one of the trials of sainthood.

In campaign settings, there's another layer of objectives because you're advancing a shared narrative on a faction-wide scale. You might choose to forego some of the unit-level goals and quests in order to win one of the legendary battles. Theatres of war also feature in campaign settings; they aren't usually mandatory in regular games, but they provide some of that whacky randomness that people say is missing from the game.

These campaigns DO work best if you have an Arbitrator to set ground rules for the progression of the campaign, and tracks its progress. All of the campaign setting books offer guidelines on various ways to do this. I don't think GW needs to do anything to improve the quality of narrative offerings, people just need to be in an environment where they can use these things.

That definitely sounds interesting but it falls apart for me as the actual games will just be 9th 40k which with it's point and click lethality just doesn't strike me as very interesting as a narrative.

I fully admit I haven't read any of the crusade content so I'll try and find at least one to better understand how it works.

PenitentJake wrote:
One of the reasons that I'm CONSTANTLY harping on game size and ways to play is that almost all of the people talking about "how to balance better" are absolutely not thinking about this. They want to improve points-based competitive game play at the 2k level, and every single decision they would make would be through that lens.

And I think Auticus is right- I know that we have Dakkanaughts that could better balance the 2k, point-based competitive game. I just think they'd destroy everything else by doing it. At the very least, I don't think they'd care if they destroyed everything else when they did it.

And don't get me wrong- some of the suggestions I've seen would actually be good for all sizes and ways to play. But many proposed changes would not suit all the varieties of game, and some would outright destroy other varieties of game.

You cannot have one set of points that works as well for both 500 points and 2000 points, 2000 points is a priority because that's what I think 40k is best at, where you get the right amount of models and stuff. Did nerfing Skitarii Vanguard make them more or less balanced in 500 pts? I think with the errors of margin 40k is currently working under 95% of changes that would be good for 2k would be good for 500. I don't think making a big mission and points set is even worth it for sub-2k, even if you made the perfect 500 point mission set and points system you'd still be playing 500 point games. I'm kind of sad when I see someone playing their fifth or sixth 500 point game on tabletop simulator, models and painting is not an issue so I see no good reason why they would not move on to 1000 points and soon after 2000.

I don't even want balance when I'm playing 500 points, I don't need a fair chance to beat a noob and I'm not going to pull any punches on purpose once the first turn has started and I am certainly never going to play a 500 point game against another veteran, the exercise just doesn't interest me.

 Tyran wrote:

 Backspacehacker wrote:

EviscerationPlague wrote:

 Tyran wrote:

 Backspacehacker wrote:

Because a weapon that was designed to deal with MEQ at AP3 was pointed specifically to be able to deal with sv 3 models and nothing else.

And then it was either worhless if your opponent brought a Sv 2 skew, or overperforming if your opponent only had sv 3.

Plus the modifier system is actually less lethal than the old binary system, as Sv3 actually gets a save against former AP3 weapons.

Yeah, the old all-or-nothing system was bad. It's funny to bring up AP3 for the old system as well because it was actively AVOIDED. Most AP5-6 had enough shots/attacks you can force wounds and eventually failed saved on MEQ, and AP2 I'd honestly argue was a more common profile even in older editions than specifically AP3.

which, was the very specific points of bringing Sv2 units, because having Sv 2 units meant you had to deal with them, with heavy hitting weapons, you could not just turn weapons that were -1 or -2 AP and severely reduce their ability to live.
That is exactly why a bunch of sv2 models got 2W in 9th ed because 2 sv does not mean anything any more.
A 2 sv at one point was a really big deal, now its nothing, now it means jack all. And any weapon can turn a 2 sv into a 3 or a 4 quite easily where as before, you had to bring specific weapons or abilities against them, Thats my point.

The old AP system for its faults was the better system because it was a check and balance system. Weapons that were AP 3 did great at killing sv 3, but sv 2 showed up that weapon was not nearly as good.
Now you just have catch all weapons, that apply negative modifiers to everything which is directly what resulted in more wounds on things, which then resulted in multi damage weapons which led to more invulns and wound on 4+ only now we are at ignore invuln. I can already see it now taht we are going ot start getting "Ignore -1 and -2 AP" on more stuff.

Which as a rubric player make me sad as a side note.

Except that AP 2 weapons were just as good at killing sv 3. It was not a check and balance system, it was an escalation system that inevitable lead to AP 2 large blasts blasting away anyone that didn't have an invulnerable save.

You say this like its a bad thing.... Yet that's exactly the vision I've always had of a full on battlefield in M41.

ccs wrote:


You say this like its a bad thing.... Yet that's exactly the vision I've always had of a full on battlefield in M41.

Right, the setting is OVER over the top, just like the weapons/armour/technology etc...and the factions themselves.