Forum adverts like this one are shown to any user who is not logged in. Join us by filling out a tiny 3 field form and you will get your own, free, dakka user account which gives a good range of benefits to you: No adverts like this in the forums anymore. Times and dates in your local timezone. Full tracking of what you have read so you can skip to your first unread post, easily see what has changed since you last logged in, and easily see what is new at a glance. Email notifications for threads you want to watch closely. Being a part of the oldest wargaming community on the net. If you are already a member then feel free to login now.

Refocussing games around smaller forces has nothing to do with the rules. There already are rules for smaller games. Blame the people who want to play with their entire collections and/or love huge utterly expensive centerpiece models.

Everyone seems to have forgotten the times when half this forum was complaining about how death guard being able to throw 10 plage grenades in one shooting phase was utterly broken.

 Strg Alt wrote:
Allow every trooper in a squad to throw a grenade in the same turn (Frag, Krak, etc.). If this turns out to be too powerful then you can add a "Cooldown" (ability not available in the next X turns) rule of one turn to it. This obviously means you need to use unit cards for all models on the table and indicate the status of units with tokens.

I played a while ago a scenario of 2nd and it added to the gameplay. Only allowing a single member to throw a grenade feels gamey/awkward.

Cool down wouldn't be much of a drawback in game that's decided in general turns 2 and maybe 3...And where often exposed unit gets deleted right away anyway. "woo can't use grenade next turn. Who cares? I'm dead anyway"

Better solution if it's too good: Up the point cost.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

The_Real_Chris wrote:

PenitentJake wrote:

A lot of folks say that 9th doesn't have strategy or tactics; what they mean by that is that strategies and tactics don't fit their definition of what strategies and tactics are. Doing this kind of thing- teasing a transhuman out of someone- IS a strategy or a tactic.

(I already know the answer- it's because one feels like it SHOULD be associated with a miniature game and the other feels like it should be associated with a card game- but it's crazy to me that people don't actually mind GOTCHA, as long as it's their particular flavour of GOTCHA)

Yes that's it exactly. I used to in 8th explain all my strats and orders to the oppo before a game to ensure nothing I id was a surprise. In a tourney you would (unreasonably) expect the oppo to know them all. Now there are so many that is impossible for the majority of us, so there is always going to be an element of 'surprise!' when something gets done. And because the game is in theory open to both sides with assumed perfect knowledge that doesn't come across as fun.

Now in a sprawling card game like magic you might expect that. In a wargame as we play with transparency on both sides we don't expect it. And we are primed to accept some surprises as fair as the concept generally exists (e.g. flank march from the side of the table or terminators deep striking in). I don't know how players would react to genuinely surprising military events (hmm, maybe you set up your army on table 1 only to find the enemy is attacking on table 5 ), but this type of surprise isn't 'fun'.

So rather than actual tactics you just want to win by gotcha's.

Ok...so you basically admit you are noob smasher level. Can win vs noob, lose when playing somebody who knows your strategy.

Okay...guess it's fun to admit you suck as a player and rely on opponent being noob...dunno appeal on that one but each to his own.

 Insectum7 wrote:
That's not how they were used. Frags were thrown on the way to CQB, which should be pretty intuitive.

Well that was German frags... Allied frags were defensive weapons with larger blast radius.

tneva82 wrote:
So rather than actual tactics you just want to win by gotcha's.

Ok...so you basically admit you are noob smasher level. Can win vs noob, lose when playing somebody who knows your strategy.

Okay...guess it's fun to admit you suck as a player and rely on opponent being noob...dunno appeal on that one but each to his own.

I don't know how you interpreted that from the post you replied to.

The game assumes perfect information. Your opponent's stats, stratagems, and list are available to you all the time. Getting blindsided by special abilities or stratagems is the result of not knowing the rules, rather than intentional concealment of information as a gameplay principle. But there is just too much bs in the game to actually explain it all to your opponent before the game starts.

I've had much the same experience. I'm not trying to catch my friends out with a 'gotcha', but I cannot convey every single capability that my army has, particularly when even I have trouble remembering it all and need to use cheat-sheets and Wahapedia to remember.

The person you replied to isn't a seal clubber. Someone who really likes this paradigm may be, wielding superior game knowledge to their advantage.

Also, I'll disagree with PenitentJake on one major point here: The reason this paradigm feels dissatisfying isn't because it's not 'wargamelike', it's because imperfect knowledge is a byproduct of the game's sprawling complexity and utter lack of play aids rather than an intended part of the experience. It's decidedly not like most card games, where hidden information (not knowing the composition of an opponent's deck, what's in their hand, or what they're about to draw next) is a deliberate design.

The_Real_Chris wrote:

 Insectum7 wrote:
That's not how they were used. Frags were thrown on the way to CQB, which should be pretty intuitive.

Well that was German frags... Allied frags were defensive weapons with larger blast radius.

A grenade being categorized as 'defensive' just means it produces an injury radius greater than you can throw it due to fragmentation. They're still used offensively, but you need to either throw them into hard cover to contain the blast, or from a position where you can take cover after throwing.

Which is pretty much how 40K used to model frag grenades when they were an abstract mechanic rather than a statted weapon- they were used to flush the enemy out of cover and ignore their terrain benefits when charging, rather than just another weapon you could huck while shooting.

IMO an abstracted mechanic like that works much better for the scale that 40K currently operates at, but as long as this is still a system where we care what caliber the officer's personal sidearm is, I guess thrown grenades having a weapon profile makes sense.

 Jidmah wrote:
Everyone seems to have forgotten the times when half this forum was complaining about how death guard being able to throw 10 plage grenades in one shooting phase was utterly broken.

theres a difference between a frag grenade and a Blight grenade.

Frag : D6, 3, 0, 1
Blight: D6, 3, 0, 1 with these buffs :

+1 Strength, +1 Damage, Mortals on 6, +1 to wound, reroll 1's, full reroll on wounds, AP4 on 6's to wound

pretty HUUUUGE difference. And those were basically the only time shooting grenades was worth it

On the topic of grenades...

We've gone back and forth on this a bunch of times with ProHammer, and recently decided to take grenade throwing out again. The advantage of the classic editions though is that grenades served a purpose outside of them being "thrown as a shooting attack." Offensive/defensive grenades and their equivalent served a purpose in affecting melee, or could be used as a melee attack against vehicles etc. With the changes in 8th/9th, those reasons don't inherently exist anymore. The other consideration is that if it makes sense to throw a bunch of grenades at close range because the damage output is higher, what does that say about the balance and quality of the main weapon? Offensively, grenades are used used to negate cover or attack from out of LoS or as area denial. If your target is standing in the open in LoS, shooting them directly should be the faster and more direct option.

 VladimirHerzog wrote:

 Jidmah wrote:
Everyone seems to have forgotten the times when half this forum was complaining about how death guard being able to throw 10 plage grenades in one shooting phase was utterly broken.

theres a difference between a frag grenade and a Blight grenade.

Frag : D6, 3, 0, 1
Blight: D6, 3, 0, 1 with these buffs :

+1 Strength, +1 Damage, Mortals on 6, +1 to wound, reroll 1's, full reroll on wounds, AP4 on 6's to wound

pretty HUUUUGE difference. And those were basically the only time shooting grenades was worth it

I would agree, if not for the fact that one or two of those buffs were plenty to remove most units that weren't a fully buffed Magnus and that every faction can slap two or three similar buffs onto at least a few of their grenade-armed squads. For example, marines can easily get extra AP, +1 to hit and wound and re-rolls to hit on a squad of intercessors, and that is just the buffs I remember from memory.

When DG still had that stratagem I regularly blew up harlequin troupes by lobbing 7 plague grenades at them without any buffs whatsoever.

If you wanted to allow all members of a squad to throw grenades, your would have to reduce their power significantly.

 Jidmah wrote:


If you wanted to allow all members of a squad to throw grenades, your would have to reduce their power significantly.

Well lots of the grenades are fairly naff. At this point why bother with frag on say Imperial guard? It has one use - at close range for a basic sergeant who is stuck with a las pistol. Otherwise lasguns with FRFSRF shoot 4 times on average compared to a grenades 3.5. I suppose vs a horde it would be 6 times? Yay....

 Mezmorki wrote:
On the topic of grenades...

We've gone back and forth on this a bunch of times with ProHammer, and recently decided to take grenade throwing out again. The advantage of the classic editions though is that grenades served a purpose outside of them being "thrown as a shooting attack." Offensive/defensive grenades and their equivalent served a purpose in affecting melee, or could be used as a melee attack against vehicles etc. With the changes in 8th/9th, those reasons don't inherently exist anymore. The other consideration is that if it makes sense to throw a bunch of grenades at close range because the damage output is higher, what does that say about the balance and quality of the main weapon? Offensively, grenades are used used to negate cover or attack from out of LoS or as area denial. If your target is standing in the open in LoS, shooting them directly should be the faster and more direct option.

It worked beautiful in 2nd. I don´t understand where the problem is. One thing though: Templates should be mandatory and models whose bases are touched by the template are also automatically hit in order to buff the grenade and speed up play.

Only time I remember using grenades being good was throwing a full squad of tankbusta bombs with more dakka put on em cause full rerolls to hit exploding 5’s and 6’s if you were throwing at a knights.

Okay, I am going to go all out and put out my full wish-list of things I would like changed. Now that I started thinking about it I can't stop and need to get these ideas out of my head.


1) Rules Deployment

Core rules: A book that you buy

Competitive missions: A book that you buy, released yearly/seasonally. Includes the competitive missions and secondary objectives. I would charge for the missions to lower the barrier to entry for beginning players by not charging for the "competitive rules" below.

"Competitive rules"/"Basic rules": Digital rule set. This would include stat blocks for units, some stratagems/relics/traits, and other army wide rules. Go digital so that the rules can be updated at a regular pace beyond simple fixes or point adjustments. Do not charge for these so a player can come to the store, buy a box of cool models, and play right away, rather than needing to commit to a $50 codex to get the rules for the models they bought.

"Narrative Codex": A book that you buy. In addition the large sections of short stories, art work and fluff have "Optional" rules for designing narrative games. for example: Sub-factions and armies of renown. Rules for progression between missions (ie. crusade). Faction specific secondary objectives. More granular wargear and stratagems. ect. These books would essentially be evergreen as the rules are added to the base rules for the faction. A section on how to design narrative missions and campaigns for this faction in particular. What do they want? How would that look on a tabletop? Could be updated to a new version every few years without invalidating the older version per se. as these rules are not used in competitive games.

GW still gets to sell you a paper codex for $50-$60 bucks, but also gets to have digital rules that they can regularly update so there can be an attempt at competitive balance. I would charge the more enfranchised players for rules (competitive missions) while making the base unit/faction rules free to lower the barrier to entry for the hobby.



2) Core rules content: Slight combat phase restructuring

I really dislike the fact that "Fight First" rules do not work. I charge into a unit with fight first, I get to activate my unit first, and the unit that literally has the rule "Fight First" does not fight first, but actually fights second. I think that this style of combat phase has favored glass cannon style combat units, as when they charge, they are guaranteed to fight first if there is only one combat on the board. It also punishes players for charging with multiple units, as you give your opponent a chance to interrupt, unless you have a way to apply fight last.

Move to a simultaneous combat system, similar to how initiative levels used to work in previous editions, but simplified.

Essentially have 3 initiative levels, Fight First, Normal, Fight Last. Any units that Charged, or have the fight first rule all attack "at the same time". determine who can fight and make attacks before removing models. (The stratagem to Interrupt would just move a unit up one initiative level. Form normal to Fight First, or from Fight Last to Normal) repeat for fight normal and fight last, Just like currently, Fight Last and Fight First cancel each other out and become fight normal.

Right now, many of the top armies have units that can charge and wipe a unit with no chance for the opponent to respond, in combat. Simply being able to spend 2CP to interrupt and deal some damage back would encourage more durability in the combat phase and move the game away from high damage and fight last being the end all be all in the combat phase.

 VladimirHerzog wrote:

 Strg Alt wrote:

 VladimirHerzog wrote:
Grenades in melee feels so fething stupid IMO.

"Watch out boys, i'm gonna frag these dudes that we're fighting in hand to hand"

There was a mini-story of Ragnar Blackmane either thrusting a krak grenade or melta bomb into the throat of a Carnifrx or Hive Tyrant while fighting it in hand-to-hand combat. There is nothing wrong about using a magnetic grenade or bomb vs. a vehicle in close combat either.

There was also a rule in 2nd that allowed models using grenades/bombs vs. vehicles to move away a few inches to avoid the resulting explosion.

thats what melta bombs are for, throwing a nade in combat against infantry is dumb as feth

If we consider melee a fist fight or sword duel then grenades don't make much sense, but if we mean close combat then why not? House clearing has grenades thrown at very close range. "Posting" a grenade into a trench involves getting to within a few feet (and perhaps closer) to the enemy while someone else keeps their heads down with fire. Having said that, I am not sure that most grenades really belong at the scale of 40K? Well, except Vortex Grenade and Virus Grenades of course. Any maybe Anti-Plant grenades? They all belong.

What would I like to see for 10th Ed? Thanks for asking!

- I like faction flavour, but remove Combat Doctrines and all the equivalents. Make weapons -1AP if you mean to. Keep Chapter Tactics etc, but strip out the doctrine layer.

- I like Stratagems, but perhaps make it so that a unit cannot receive more than one Strat a phase.

- Cap all MW powers/strats/attacks at 3 MWs.

- Reduce non-interactive moments. Reign in non-LOS shooting. It should not be all that effective.

- Make melee alternating like AoS.

- Add a Strat for "Reaction Fire." You have to declare when targeted without knowing the results of the enemy fire, but the selected/targeted unit could fire with simultaneous results. The unit could not fire in the following player turn. Or something like that. Not a game designer.

- Occupants of a transport are killed on a DR of 1-3 when their vehicle is destroyed. Yes - I played 2nd Ed where occupants were destroyed automatically. Get off my lawn Drukahri/Harlies!

TangoTwoBravo wrote:
- Occupants of a transport are killed on a DR of 1-3 when their vehicle is destroyed. Yes - I played 2nd Ed where occupants were destroyed automatically. Get off my lawn Drukahri/Harlies!

You want to turn transports into deathtraps that no one will ever use, or you just have a thing against transports and don't want people to use them?

 H.B.M.C. wrote:

TangoTwoBravo wrote:
- Occupants of a transport are killed on a DR of 1-3 when their vehicle is destroyed. Yes - I played 2nd Ed where occupants were destroyed automatically. Get off my lawn Drukahri/Harlies!

You want to turn transports into deathtraps that no one will ever use, or you just have a thing against transports and don't want people to use them?

Guilty. I admit it!!!! Although I do have transports and do field them from time to time.

You do not lead with mounted infantry against a threat with anti-armour weapons, unless you want to lose those infantry with the vehicle. Just saying. You plays the game you takes your chances.

There were many things wrong with 3rd Ed, and the new-fangled transport rules were among them. Not as bad as the FOC mind you.

Well that's the first time I've seen someone longing for the days of "Do I put my minis in this transport, or should I just smash them with a hammer to simulate what will happen to them if I do?" from 2nd Ed...

 H.B.M.C. wrote:
Well that's the first time I've seen someone longing for the days of "Do I put my minis in this transport, or should I just smash them with a hammer to simulate what will happen to them if I do?" from 2nd Ed...

Glad to be able to brighten your day with a surprise! Surprise, we must never forget, is a principle of war.

So is not leading with mounted infantry. Fire baaad! No, seriously, it is.

Oh, I forgot one request. Make Assault Cannons Damage D6. And I want a cup holder with heated seats.

 H.B.M.C. wrote:
Well that's the first time I've seen someone longing for the days of "Do I put my minis in this transport, or should I just smash them with a hammer to simulate what will happen to them if I do?" from 2nd Ed...

The flipside was that things like a Rhino made the occupants invulnerable to lighter weapons, and fast. Also you could still fire (and throw grenades) out of the Rhino on the move with 6(?) models.

And they were cheap. A Rhino was 50 pts to a Tac Squads 360ish with Special and Heavy.

Oh, and you could plow through swarms of smaller models.

There were lots of interesting tactics you could pull with Transports. Much fun.

 Insectum7 wrote:

 H.B.M.C. wrote:
Well that's the first time I've seen someone longing for the days of "Do I put my minis in this transport, or should I just smash them with a hammer to simulate what will happen to them if I do?" from 2nd Ed...

The flipside was that things like a Rhino made the occupants invulnerable to lighter weapons, and fast. Also you could still fire (and throw grenades) out of the Rhino on the move with 6(?) models.

And they were cheap. A Rhino was 50 pts to a Tac Squads 360ish with Special and Heavy.

Oh, and you could plow through swarms of smaller models.

There were lots of interesting tactics you could pull with Transports. Much fun.

I don't always agree with Insectum7, but when I do, its about Transports.

My greatest transport memory from 2nd Ed was a game where Marneus Calgar and Commissar Yarrick were constantly stealing the same Rhino over and over again (the crew were dead), and running one another over with it.

 Jidmah wrote:


If you wanted to allow all members of a squad to throw grenades, your would have to reduce their power significantly.

You would have to reduce/control their scaling. As has been pointed out some grenades don't do enough(although they glossed over blast on Frag), and some would do too much. "Fixing" Grenades would probably involve fixing a lot of other things as well.

First thing to fix is Blast, Morale, and Squad sizes. There is almost never a benefit to taking a squad that risks Blast if one doesn't have to. Give the larger squad sizes a benefit to offset the drawback of Blast so it's a tough choice not a no-brainer - to use examples most people will be familiar with:

10 Intercessors vs 2x5 Intercessors
2 Sergeants, same cost.
Avoids the first level of Blast
Seriously diminishes Morale/Attrition.
10 Intercessors can combat squad into 2 groups of 5 - but still only the 1 sergeant - plus the 10 don't fit in the basic transport anyway, but if they did, they still would as two combat squads.
2x5 Intercessors can take the same two AuxGL's 1x10 can
2x5 Tactical can take two specials, two heavies, or one of each. 1x10 can only take 1 of each.
The only time its even close to a wash, let alone an advantage is on the variable cost strats. 1CP for 5, 2CP for 10 - you're not getting a discount, but you do get to hit "two" squads instead of 1. I know its still one squad, but its "two" squads worth of models.


Once Frags hit the first level of Blast they're equaling 4 shots vs 4 in FRFSRF - and potentially surpassing Rapid Fire 1 for Marines/Sisters etc. At that point you can start tweaking the grenades to make them better than FRFSRF to offset their limited range while keeping an eye on Marines and Sisters. No need to create some memes where the power armor runs up to 5.9" away and lobs grenades then spends the rest of the game trying to stay in that sweet spot.

After that, you'll want to fix vehicles in general so they're worth taking and can do something. Then tweak the Krak grenades with a vs Vehicle/vs Monster escalator and/or requirement. Infantry with anti-tank grenades within 6" should be about as scary to to a tank as a tank is 36" away from infantry on Planet Bowling Ball.

Once you have both of those, the faction specific grenades Plasma, Blight, Haywire, etc - can use the main two as a guide.

Finally make sure vs Character is take care of. Krak Grenades against a Tank Commander or Old One Eye should still be fairly dangerous. Krak Grenades against a Phoenix Lord, or an Apothecary not so much.

I think thrown grenades fit fine at 40k's scaling, and in fact I think the basic frag/krak are about right.

It absolutely makes sense that grenades thrown at short range are more lethal than small arms - that certainly tracks with real warfare.

But it's best if they're just a little bit better, and perhaps a little specialised.
The only time whole units throwing grenades has been a problem is when the grenades themselves have been too powerful for that.
This is a problem with grenades normally being "use one only", so the devs bump up the stats to make one grenade useful, which becomes too good when everyone does it.

No one would mind if a full squad of Astartes threw frag grenades.

 Insectum7 wrote:


There were lots of interesting tactics you could pull with Transports. Much fun.

One of the biggest problems transports currently have is that many units don't need a ride at all. With easy access to deepstrike, flying units, high range weapons, etc.... and the smaller tables, lots of stuff that in theory could benefit from a ride actually doesn't need it. Now I'm all in favor of smaller tables since it made home games much easier, but to give transports a purpose an interesting solution could be halving all the ranges, except transports M stats. This way first 1-2 turns would be mostly invested in positioning, spreading the game to all 5 turns much more frequently and transports with 10ish'' M would help a lot infantries with 3'' or 4'' M, D6 charge range, and/or 6''-12'' range for their weapons which would be the common and average values.

The_Real_Chris wrote:

 Jidmah wrote:


If you wanted to allow all members of a squad to throw grenades, your would have to reduce their power significantly.

Well lots of the grenades are fairly naff. At this point why bother with frag on say Imperial guard? It has one use - at close range for a basic sergeant who is stuck with a las pistol. Otherwise lasguns with FRFSRF shoot 4 times on average compared to a grenades 3.5. I suppose vs a horde it would be 6 times? Yay....

The issue is that you are comparing an unbuffed weapon to one that has been buffed to double its efficiency.

At the same range, a grenade is already significantly better than a lasgun and almost as good as FRFSRF lasguns. With their current profiles there would never be a reason to use your regular gun at short range instead of lobbing all the grenades all the time.

They should just raise the point floor like they were supposed to do when 9th dropped. Everything went up in points, but not significantly.

If 5 points is the floor, then all those 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, etc models need to go up. Actually justify things like Grots being 5 points.

For example could be something like:
- Grot: 5 points.
- Conscripts/Cultists: 6 points.
- Guardsmen: 7 points.
- Veterans: 8 points.
- Scion: 10 points.
- Skitarii: 11 points.
- Battle Sister: 12 points.
- Veteran Skitarii: 13 points.
- Celestian: 14 points.

Obviously those aren’t perfect but we should be pushing the point floor up. Not down. It’s too hard to balance otherwise.

It would be historically based though. Turkish infantry would often use hand guns from range and switch to grenades at closer range.

Why shouldn't IG use lasguns at ranges where they can not use grenades. In fact I find it funny that in melee a comissar or Lt armed with a plasma pistol has to try to poke a hive tyrant or a dread, instead of blasting him at close range with his pistol.

Karol wrote:
It would be historically based though. Turkish infantry would often use hand guns from range and switch to grenades at closer range.

Why shouldn't IG use lasguns at ranges where they can not use grenades. In fact I find it funny that in melee a comissar or Lt armed with a plasma pistol has to try to poke a hive tyrant or a dread, instead of blasting him at close range with his pistol.

Pistols can be fired in melee.
Read your rulebook.

Karol wrote:
It would be historically based though. Turkish infantry would often use hand guns from range and switch to grenades at closer range.

Why shouldn't IG use lasguns at ranges where they can not use grenades. In fact I find it funny that in melee a comissar or Lt armed with a plasma pistol has to try to poke a hive tyrant or a dread, instead of blasting him at close range with his pistol.

Indeed. That´s why units were allowed in 2nd to use pistol profiles to deal damage in hth.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 H.B.M.C. wrote:

TangoTwoBravo wrote:
- Occupants of a transport are killed on a DR of 1-3 when their vehicle is destroyed. Yes - I played 2nd Ed where occupants were destroyed automatically. Get off my lawn Drukahri/Harlies!

You want to turn transports into deathtraps that no one will ever use, or you just have a thing against transports and don't want people to use them?

Transports were supposed to be used in turn 1 transporting troops while avoiding firing lanes of the opponent during 2nd. If your troops ride inside the vehicle straight towards the opposition (3rd Rhino rush era and later editions) then they all deserve to die in the most horrible manner because of sheer stupidity. Rules back in the day for transport vehicles were fine. Just don´t play on planet bowling ball.

None of what you just said really has much to do with what I said.

Transports are important in a scenario where units move on the board from the table edge during deployment, and when they effect reserves. Thats not at all normal in ninth edition.