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Uptonius wrote:
Your chosen restrictions limit the potential of this exercise. You basically said, "You can build a house! Any kind you want! But ... It has to follow this blue print and use these predetermined materials."

So I guess I would have to answer ...
I wouldn't be interested.
Bring back 3.5. the greatest edition ever. The one that lasted almost a decade.

Well if you just let people say whatever their ideal 40k was we'd end up with a totally new game in most cases. GW doesn't want to reboot the game again so we're stuck with certain aspects of design (IGOUGO, d6 for sure, CP and strats probably) for another few decades.

 Sim-Life wrote:

Uptonius wrote:
Your chosen restrictions limit the potential of this exercise. You basically said, "You can build a house! Any kind you want! But ... It has to follow this blue print and use these predetermined materials."

So I guess I would have to answer ...
I wouldn't be interested.
Bring back 3.5. the greatest edition ever. The one that lasted almost a decade.

Well if you just let people say whatever their ideal 40k was we'd end up with a totally new game in most cases. GW doesn't want to reboot the game again so we're stuck with certain aspects of design (IGOUGO, d6 for sure, CP and strats probably) for another few decades.

Well, since we can't expect deviating from D6 based IGOUGO, and GW clearly thinks that one shotting is a good mechanics (they just released AOS character that can one shot anything with a single die roll), the best thing that could happen to 40K is taking this to the extreme:

- let just everything one shot everything on 4+, then you can buff or debuff this roll via stratagems card game, special rules and on board placement of units. If the roll is failed, then the unit loses some offensive capabilities (like, the next time it shoots it one shots a thing on a 5+) and if the unit is shot a second time, no roll is made, it is removed from the game outright.

This results in exactly the same gameplay as it is today, the entire affair just takes 15 minutes instead of two hours and you roll a single die instead of a 100+ dice per attack. The time density of decision making increases significantly and you can play 4-5 games in an evening, so now best-of-3 or best-of-5 matches are possible, so the inherent Alpha strike problem is less of a deal, the entire rulebook is just two or three pages and codices are 5-10 pages of rules. A nice, portable, fast, "no nonsense" game, that is more useful for tournaments and is 90% focused on list building with symmetrical missions and rigid terrain maps.

And then make a second version for narrative players, with all minutiae of a proper wargame, specifically designed for narrative players with all those templates, vehicle facings, focus on asymmetric missions and all those fluffy stuff tournament players consider bloat. Codices are full of background and non-rules content, special rules introduce mechanics outside of core rules/stats etc.

Basically, separate those two incompatible audiences on the foundation level while feeding them the same basic idea of full scale 40K.

I think 9th is the best edition ever, but it could use a few tweaks.

- Tone the lethality down to where it was with the 9th edition Marine & Necron codex release (maybe DG). I think the lethality is representative of a 41st millennium battlefield. But now where armies are being tabled in 2 turns is just ridiculous (apparently being tabled in 1 turn like SoCal is too much, but 2 turns is fine... o.O)
- GW needs to literally FIRE (terminate job employment) those people responsible for DE, Eldar, Custodes, Tau and Harli codexes, and the managers/salespeople/etc. who promoted this Codex creep. While they're at it, bring those codexes back in line
- I'm fine with Strats, WLTs, etc., just not so many of them on the battlefield at once. A Strat used every turn (or every 3/5 turns) shouldn't be a strat, it should be baked into the weapon profile, or make most of them 1-use only (like Insane Bravery). Let them actually be 'Heroic Moments' and not "Rambo & Commando part MMMCMXCIX"
- I like the Primary and Secondary VP system. Killing (which is so easy in 9th) should not be max reward, it should be capped at 10, as should those secondaries that don't involve leaving your DZ. Easier Secondaries like RND should be capped at 12, while hard Secondaries capped at 15. Now you can play hordes and/or tanks and not be auto-lose, and armies can't sit in their DZ (or just outside it) and have a big advantage.
- Less stuff ignoring cover. Cover is pretty meaningful at it's core, however the amount of stuff ignoring cover, either in shooting or movement is just too much, making cover almost meaningless.
- Drop the AP of all weapons by 1, and the Damage of most weapons by 1, and Character Wounds by 1-2, and drop mechanics like -1D, and drop most INV and FNP saves by 1. 2D weapons should be something REALLY special. This boosts the Marine 2W to mean something, toning down lethality creep, and leaving us where weapons like overcharged Plasma Guns at 2D really mean something.

Karol wrote:

Move away from both players showing up with equal-points sight unseen lists, randomly determining an objective for both sides, deploying all their forces on the board a simulated hundred feet from the enemy, and then rolling off for first turn in an immediate bloodbath that rewards pre-game number-crunching and skew lists.

That would be a gigantic buff to horde armies and armies who are on the top tiers. It would drasticly hurt armies with less granular point distribution among its points per unit. Just imagine rolling something like 1500pts game, and the opponent has knights that cost 400pts. I guess he is going to have to enjoy a 1200 vs 1500pts game. Same for elite armies where squads cost 200-300pts. Specially if GW didn't give those armies any filler options. And this is before even considering the cost of an army and the collection size, and transport. Tell people that they have to take 3000pts by bus or bike to the store, just in case the game ends up beign 1450pts would make some people quit, and others would just ignore it and play what ever is the avarge game size localy.

The thing I find most frustrating in these threads is always the people who jump straight to 'that won't work' with no thought given to how else a game might change to accommodate the proposed alterations. Particularly when they invent straw men to critique: who said anything about bringing 3000pts to every game or rolling for battle size?

Maybe you'd bring 2000pts and have a 2000pt game, but only start with 500pts on the board, and bring in some fraction of the remainder with each new turn. Maybe you'd have some ability to recycle units and in effect field more than 2K points over the course of the game. Maybe you'd bring 2000pts with the expectation that you're using 1500pts of it, with 500pts of leftover sideboard. Maybe your roster would be fixed but your units could swap around wargear pre-game, so you're not bringing heavy bolters against Knights. Maybe you could spend leftover points on non-army assets like artillery or air strikes. Maybe you'd have influence on what objectives you get. Maybe you'd have influence on battlefield conditions (Night fighting? Mud? Comms interference? Smoke? Minefields?) that could help or hinder your army. Maybe you'd have control over deployment zones via a pre-game scouting mechanic. Maybe a combination of the above.

The point is that there's no intrinsic reason why the game has to revolve around building a fixed army list before your opponent, goals, or battlefield are known, determining the objective completely at random, then deploying your force in its entirety within the effective range of the enemy. That paradigm is a frequent contributor to balance and gameplay issues and there are a multitude of ways to address it that have been successfully used in other games.

A game doesn't run on maybies. It runs on math, rules and interaction of both of those, influanced by GW policy to sell models and have people play with armies as large as it possible for the avarge player to run. If w40k was or would have been able to be balanced at lower points, within GW own rules structure people would be playing it. I don't think many people dream of having to buy 5 NDKS or 9 voidweavers, if they could play games with 1/5th of those they would. But w40k rule set does not work well when it gets downgraded to smaller points.


And the reasons to build an army and have structure in the game, are the same reason why we have rules in sports. The times of "football" being two villages fighting it out with brass knuckles and clubs etc are gone. A lot of people enjoy the fact that they can go to another store or another town, and know that there they can also play a 2000pts matched play game of w40k. No matter how broken it is. And there are very few people who would want to get informed that at the given store, this month, the game is played with no monsters, cut FA and HVY slots or some other wierd house rules. And the why for it are easy to explain to. When I buy to play a 2000pts army I expect to play with it, at least for an edition. I, and I think many people too, don't want to be in a situation where some social and not company enforced rules make you unable to play, make the game even less fun to play etc.

As side boards go. They only work for armies that have units worth taking over what is an 2000pts list. There is also a problem of different armies being cut, point wise, in different ways. Adding 100-200pts to an horde army is different then adding something to an elite one. And with all games requing duplication for most units to be effective the side board would be, maybe a buff to armies tau or eldar. It would also create huge problems for new players. They already struggle to get 2000pts of a semi optimised list to play, if now they would have to have side boards for multiple factions we are talking about investing more money. Or more feels bad time if they can't afford it or their army doesn't have side board units worth taking.

Maybe you'd bring 2000pts and have a 2000pt game, but only start with 500pts on the board, and bring in some fraction of the remainder with each new turn.

Aha okey. So my units come in 200/400pts cost units. Assuming I run MSU. Characters cost the same or more. 500pts means I can bring one or two units. Meanwhile someone like an eldar player will deploy 5 of his void weavers or similar hyper efficient unit, and blow my units off the table. And then with our forces both arriving in parts, he would each turn get more and more of an adventage. If he went first and we were playing on a normal board, there maybe not even much need to play past turn 1, to check what is going to happen.

 catbarf wrote:
The point is that there's no intrinsic reason why the game has to revolve around building a fixed army list before your opponent, goals, or battlefield are known, determining the objective completely at random, then deploying your force in its entirety within the effective range of the enemy.

But there are practical reasons - you have to transport your army to and from games, you don't really want to be transporting a dozen armies worth of models so that you have a suitable selection of choices to pick from once you know what your opponent has and what the objective is.

Home field advantage / pay to win aside there is the issue of list tailoring - some factions (historically) are better at certain match-ups, or certain objectives, or certain table setups. All things that need to be considered when considering the benefits of building to a known target against a system that tries to encourage more adaptable all-comers lists.


As for deploying within effective range of the enemy - that is a movement and attack distance issue. Plenty of games in earlier editions of 40k would start out with little or no shooting of note on the first turn.

Karol wrote:
A game doesn't run on maybies. It runs on math, rules and interaction of both of those, influanced by GW policy to sell models and have people play with armies as large as it possible for the avarge player to run.

For feths sake, you're in a thread asking people what their ideal version of 40k WOULD be. Its ALL theoretical and obviously means that GW's gak policies wouldnt take place. Have some imagination, just because we say "i'd like to see X in the game" doesn't mean Y-Z wouldn't get changed.

Karol wrote:

Aha okey. So my units come in 200/400pts cost units. Assuming I run MSU. Characters cost the same or more. 500pts means I can bring one or two units. Meanwhile someone like an eldar player will deploy 5 of his void weavers or similar hyper efficient unit, and blow my units off the table. And then with our forces both arriving in parts, he would each turn get more and more of an adventage. If he went first and we were playing on a normal board, there maybe not even much need to play past turn 1, to check what is going to happen.

again, have some imagination. in an indeal world, voidweavers probably wouldn't be so cheap. Or maybe your dudes wouldn't be as expensive if you didnt only bring terminators. At one point you have to realise that not ever list is equal (and that goes for any wargame, no matter how balanced). If i show up to a game of infinity with 14 fusilier and one TAG, i'm gonna get fethed, even if the game does balance really well.

Stop with your repetitive "woe is me" about the lot you got off ebay.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

A.T. wrote:

As for deploying within effective range of the enemy - that is a movement and attack distance issue. Plenty of games in earlier editions of 40k would start out with little or no shooting of note on the first turn.

which is what catbarf seems to be looking for in their ideal version of 40k.

I know thats what I would like to see.

 VladimirHerzog wrote:
which is what catbarf seems to be looking for in their ideal version of 40k.
I know thats what I would like to see.

I just disagree with tagging it onto the blind army lists, random objectives, and setup.

From personal experience many of the shortest and most one-sided games of 40k have involved list tailoring and building towards known factors. Locally one of the reasons we used to allow heavy proxying was to avoid this very issue of being able to pre-empt a list based on what models you knew an opponent had available.

A game where fire and maneuver along with combined arms tactics are the emphasis.

Give me pinning, flanking, armor facing, and morale mechanics.

Aircraft should return to a form more similar to how they were in 7th edition. NO charging supersonic flyers with dudes on jetpacks only going like 50mph, or flame throwers attacking jets. Get an AA gun or another flyer if you want to do that.

A deployment mechanic similar to chain of command would be cool as well.

The game really should be played on a larger board, not a smaller one. 4x6ft should be the minimum table size for 2k points. Ideally it'd be larger to emphasize maneuver even more.

Deep strike should not be automatic or predictable for either party.

Take out strategems and cp.

Alternate activation.

A.T. wrote:But there are practical reasons - you have to transport your army to and from games, you don't really want to be transporting a dozen armies worth of models so that you have a suitable selection of choices to pick from once you know what your opponent has and what the objective is.

Well, I gave different examples of how you could implement sideboard mechanics without needing any more models than you currently field. And altering mission objectives or deployment has nothing to do with how many models you bring. I don't think expecting players to own 3K of models to play a 2K game is reasonable or realistic, which is why I never suggested it to begin with. So I'm not sure why you and Karol are talking about having to bring tons of extra models.

A.T. wrote:Home field advantage / pay to win aside there is the issue of list tailoring - some factions (historically) are better at certain match-ups, or certain objectives, or certain table setups. All things that need to be considered when considering the benefits of building to a known target against a system that tries to encourage more adaptable all-comers lists.

List tailoring is a problem because it isn't accounted for in the rules. The game's balancing mechanisms assume this take-all-comers style where units frequently overperform in specific matchups (eg tailoring), are never taken because their niche is too specialized to be worth including in a TAC list, or have wildly inconsistent utility depending on the context.

Similarly, random objectives create balancing issues. A fast army might be great at asset retrieval but decidedly not great at take and hold. GW's apparent solution to this problem has been to make the objectives as bland, symmetrical, and consistent as possible so that every TAC list is building to functionally the same objectives ahead of time. Then there's terrain- planet bowling ball and wall-to-wall jungle have wildly different impact on the gameplay, so competitive events use bland, symmetrical, consistent terrain, and more interesting setups can easily result in poor gameplay experience.

Assuming some level of list/objective/deployment tailoring in the rules makes for a more robust system. Rather than balancing units in a vacuum (handling skew with brute-force solutions), then having to design missions and terrain setups that can't inconsistently favor some armies over others, you can instead balance units around the assumption that they'll be taken in a suitable environment or against ideal targets- either because players will be swapping out the units that are inappropriate, or because they'll be pushing for objective/deployment conditions that favor them.

The goal is not to encourage all-comers lists per se. It's to make the game more resilient to skew, diverse missions, or non-ITC-standard battlefields by allowing lists to tailor in response to those factors and/or giving players more direct control over those factors. There's already a hint of this concept in the form of secondary objectives, which you choose after reviewing the mission/battlefield/opponent's army, and can (at least in theory- I have criticisms of the implementation) counter skew.

Chain of Command has built-in list tailoring and it works well. You don't take panzerschrecks if the enemy has no tanks, so panzerschrecks can be balanced around the assumption that you'll be using them on tanks, and you never have the situation where you brought anti-tank against all infantry. On the flipside, if you try to load up on tanks, your opponent then has the opportunity to take anti-tank in response and hard-counter your attempted skew. And if you show up to a game and the battlefield is bocage, you haven't lost before it even starts because your list isn't suited to it; you just take flamethrowers instead of field guns.

And Dust Warfare has a system for tailoring battlefield conditions, where both players have points to spend on pre-game conditions along three tracks. You might be able to guarantee that your gunline army gets daylight and clear weather by spending your points on that track, but your opponent will then be free to push for closer deployment. There's a give-and-take that allows counteracting skew and creates for more variety.

Nothing I'm suggesting is particularly novel. I've played games that feature these sorts of mechanics, and I really don't think it would be a huge lift to retrofit any of them onto 40K.

A.T. wrote:As for deploying within effective range of the enemy - that is a movement and attack distance issue. Plenty of games in earlier editions of 40k would start out with little or no shooting of note on the first turn.

I agree. In an ideal world we certainly could scale back movement and attack ranges so that there's a turn or two of closing to contact like we used to have; although that's a much bigger lift than tweaking core rules. I also don't think it necessarily has to be one or the other- I'd be all for a general reduction in engagement range and more interesting deployment.

At the very least, a deployment style like AOS's Meeting Engagement would make for a more drawn out experience that is less likely to be decided via snowballing turn 2.

brainpsyk wrote:

- GW needs to literally FIRE (terminate job employment) those people responsible for DE, Eldar, Custodes, Tau and Harli codexes, and the managers/salespeople/etc. who promoted this Codex creep. While they're at it, bring those codexes back in line

Agree with a lot of your points, but wanted to mention something here:

DE, Eldar (which includes Harlies BTW) and Tau are three of the top five best Crusade Armies. The Crusade section of these books is some of the best work GW has done in years. The only two from the top five that are missing are GSC and Sisters.

So my proposal, instead of firing these guys, is to allow them to follow and develop their particular genius; I would make them responsible for ALL of the Crusade content. I'd also finance Crusade a bit differently- I'd release a single Crusade book and a single matched play book per season. These books would include rules and missions for the entire campaign. It's fewer resources to sell (Vigilus- 1 book, 2 Mission Packs (so far); Charadon and Octarius- 2 books, 2 MP). This is just two books. But they'd be better value, and done properly, they'd be worth an extra $10-20.

Kirioth, sledgehammer, catbarf seem to resonate.

And just because the game has cp and stratagems doesn’t mean that they need to be used. Imho the perfect game would offer layers of optional card gamey bling on top of a substantial rules system which is also layered, allowing for simpler mechanics governing basic games like d&d basic box rules, and advanced rules that can be added in as desired, before there are any more random nonsense noise layered on top but, sure, people might like the basic system plus the CCG gamey elements and this should be possible for them, too…

Tyel wrote:
Keep 9th's core rules.

Roll all faction rules back to where they were in May-July 2019 (after the Castellan/Ynnari slaying big FAQ and before Marines 2.0 nuked the edition).

I'd say to Index stalines. Or better yet, delete all the gak stat inflation from the last three editions or so, no handing out BS/WS 3+ like candy, demons and eldar go back to 4+, 3+ goes back to elite units only. 5+ armour being default again on mooks, 4+ for elite units, 3+ being reserved to power armor/elite necrons. No 2+ to hit on HQs (or especially comically, Eldar mook units), Wraith units need psyker handlers again, no bucket of mortal wounds Tau gun gak, W1 squats, no mass D2 spam without drawbacks such as gets hot, no orkstodes, no S5 guns on chaffiest Tyranids, none of the power creep cheese introduced recently

 catbarf wrote:
-Cut back massively on cognitive burden- use USRs when possible

I really like people repeat this comical statement when it does the exact opposite of cutting back on cognitive burden. I tried to test new, leak dreads from HH recently and was starkly reminded why I hate that gak - having to pause game to check SIX "USR" on ONE gun in different book then go check what NINE "USR" do for MC (having to flip back and forth between two unit types and USR table) which dreads now are is utterly insane especially seeing most of these could just be a statline modifier included in stats for usability or printed on datasheet. Now multiply it by dozens of weapons, each with its own pile of "USR" and try telling me with a straight face it 'decreases' anything instead of drastically adding to it and making rule mistakes virtually certain even for experienced players (especially for experienced players, seeing "USR" often radically change edition to edition and can go from huge drawback to a massive advantage, see Rage for one)

USR, like armory, and points in badly formatted table in the back instead of datasheets, is garbage from 80s and has no place in any sane ruleset made in 21st century. Period. If you really need a common rule for weapon X, at worst put it in codex, not rulebook, right next to unit entries to minimize flipping, and even then, there should be only 2-3 such rules per army not 80+ like ""USR"" (which were then used by 1-2 units per edition most of the time making any claim to being "universal" laughable). And even then you should do what Magic: The Gathering (to name one competently designed game but these days virtually everyone does it) does and print a reminder text next to "USR" for clarity (but then why you need this other than as a shorthand of "I am incapable of learning any ruleset more modern than the RT/they modernized it and I now hate it/I am still using Dos 3.22, who needs these fancy windows and gak"...)

 catbarf wrote:
I don't think expecting players to own 3K of models to play a 2K game is reasonable or realistic, which is why I never suggested it to begin with. So I'm not sure why you and Karol are talking about having to bring tons of extra models.

You suggested players bring in excess of 2000pts of army to a 1500pt game (500pt sideboard and an indeterminate number of weapon/wargear swaps).
Not unreasonable to assume by that same math that a 2k game would actually need 3k+ of models between a 500+ sideboard and swaps.

My own comment was more written more in the context of 'move away from both players showing up with equal-points sight unseen lists' which was a little open ended. You mentioned swapping in panzerschrecks for tanks, swapping out field guns in bocage - the idea that units are balanced around the assumption that they'll be taken in a suitable environment or against ideal targets - which means you need those models to hand. And from what little I know of chain of command it isn't exactly 40k in terms of unit count (and cost).

catbarf wrote:-Cut back massively on cognitive burden- use USRs when possible

 Irbis wrote:
I really like people repeat this comical statement when it does the exact opposite of cutting back on cognitive burden.

Narrator: He would then proceed to illustrate precisely how GW does USRs wrong, and how USRs could instead be written to reduce cognitive burden.

Thanks, I guess. Although I can't honestly tell if you actually support standardized rules or not when your post is all written with the same vacuous vitriol.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

A.T. wrote:
You suggested players bring in excess of 2000pts of army to a 1500pt game (500pt sideboard and an indeterminate number of weapon/wargear swaps).
Not unreasonable to assume by that same math that a 2k game would actually need 3k+ of models between a 500+ sideboard and swaps.

If the game is structured around the use of 2000pts 'on paper' but only 1500pts being deployed, then the required model count doesn't change.

I mean, yeah, you're then fielding fewer units, but I didn't see people start playing 2500pt games instead of 2000pts when 9th reset the points costs. People will play whatever the standard is set to. Just look at table sizes.

And again, that was one suggested possibility among many. How about recycling units? Or piecemeal deployment? Or player-driven objectives? Lots of options that don't involve bringing more models than you use.

A.T. wrote:
My own comment was more written more in the context of 'move away from both players showing up with equal-points sight unseen lists' which was a little open ended. You mentioned swapping in panzerschrecks for tanks, swapping out field guns in bocage - the idea that units are balanced around the assumption that they'll be taken in a suitable environment or against ideal targets - which means you need those models to hand. And from what little I know of chain of command it isn't exactly 40k in terms of unit count (and cost).

Sure, Chain of Command is a much smaller game with lower barrier to entry, so having a wide variety of support assets that you bring one of each of makes sense for it. I just cited it as an example of how list tailoring isn't necessarily a bad thing if the game is designed around it.

I don't have a problem with the idea of fixed army lists on its own. What I am trying to articulate is that the combination of fixed army lists against unknown opponents, random objectives, and standardized complete deployment makes for a system that is easily broken but a fairly homogenous play experience. It incentivizes netlisting and skew, and has a serious problem with alpha strikes, but can't do much in the way of mission or table variety without the balance going awry. That basic structure is something that can be tweaked without having to re-write the entire game from the ground up.

I mean, even just talking about deployment systems, check out Chain of Command's 'Patrol Phase' system, Conquest: The Last Argument Of Kings's escalation reinforcement mechanic, or AoS's Meeting Engagement gametype. There's no reason deployment has to be lining up all our forces on opposite sides of the board and then ringing a bell to start the fight, it's just a long-standing convention, and there are alternate systems out there.

 Irbis wrote:

Tyel wrote:
Keep 9th's core rules.

Roll all faction rules back to where they were in May-July 2019 (after the Castellan/Ynnari slaying big FAQ and before Marines 2.0 nuked the edition).

I'd say to Index stalines. Or better yet, delete all the gak stat inflation from the last three editions or so, no handing out BS/WS 3+ like candy, demons and eldar go back to 4+, 3+ goes back to elite units only. 5+ armour being default again on mooks, 4+ for elite units, 3+ being reserved to power armor/elite necrons. No 2+ to hit on HQs (or especially comically, Eldar mook units), Wraith units need psyker handlers again, no bucket of mortal wounds Tau gun gak, W1 squats, no mass D2 spam without drawbacks such as gets hot, no orkstodes, no S5 guns on chaffiest Tyranids, none of the power creep cheese introduced recently

 catbarf wrote:
-Cut back massively on cognitive burden- use USRs when possible

I really like people repeat this comical statement when it does the exact opposite of cutting back on cognitive burden. I tried to test new, leak dreads from HH recently and was starkly reminded why I hate that gak - having to pause game to check SIX "USR" on ONE gun in different book then go check what NINE "USR" do for MC (having to flip back and forth between two unit types and USR table) which dreads now are is utterly insane especially seeing most of these could just be a statline modifier included in stats for usability or printed on datasheet. Now multiply it by dozens of weapons, each with its own pile of "USR" and try telling me with a straight face it 'decreases' anything instead of drastically adding to it and making rule mistakes virtually certain even for experienced players (especially for experienced players, seeing "USR" often radically change edition to edition and can go from huge drawback to a massive advantage, see Rage for one)

USR, like armory, and points in badly formatted table in the back instead of datasheets, is garbage from 80s and has no place in any sane ruleset made in 21st century. Period. If you really need a common rule for weapon X, at worst put it in codex, not rulebook, right next to unit entries to minimize flipping, and even then, there should be only 2-3 such rules per army not 80+ like ""USR"" (which were then used by 1-2 units per edition most of the time making any claim to being "universal" laughable). And even then you should do what Magic: The Gathering (to name one competently designed game but these days virtually everyone does it) does and print a reminder text next to "USR" for clarity (but then why you need this other than as a shorthand of "I am incapable of learning any ruleset more modern than the RT/they modernized it and I now hate it/I am still using Dos 3.22, who needs these fancy windows and gak"...)

But... you do realise, that USR does not mean, it has to be put somewhere else than the unit entry, right? Just like modern "tailored special rules" are not put somewhere obscure, but are right there on the profile, so USRs can also be put right there. What USR trully means, is that no two "tailored" rules that have exactly the same effect have different names and wording. So, e.g., there is only one FNP, not gazilion. But nothing prevents USRs being both universal and repeated wherever they are required. I understand your trauma of being exposed to GW's inability to not only write rules but also do DTP properly. But USRs are, by nature, significantly less of a cognitive burden than remembering dozens of names for the same rule from different codices.

30k with xenos books.

 catbarf wrote:
What I am trying to articulate is that the combination of fixed army lists against unknown opponents, random objectives, and standardized complete deployment makes for a system that is easily broken but a fairly homogenous play experience.

If you had a known opponent, a known objective, a known deployment... wouldn't you play optimal units for that scenario every time, at least within the limits of what you can change and what is kept hidden?

I'm curious as to how that works?

A.T. wrote:

 catbarf wrote:
What I am trying to articulate is that the combination of fixed army lists against unknown opponents, random objectives, and standardized complete deployment makes for a system that is easily broken but a fairly homogenous play experience.

If you had a known opponent, a known objective, a known deployment... wouldn't you play optimal units for that scenario every time, at least within the limits of what you can change and what is kept hidden?

I'm curious as to how that works?

I mean, aside from 'known opponent', that's pretty much 40K tournaments as it stands. Known objective and deployment (because they're all the same, because the system can't handle any real variety in mission types), work out the most effective list you can, execute a pre-planned strategy.

If there's some actual variety to missions, deployment, and battlefield conditions- be it random or player-driven- then maybe there does exist a set of optimal units in relation to your opponent's army and the scenario, but in the context of a sideboard mechanic you're going to have to make your choice on the fly with a whole bunch of variables taken into account.

nou wrote:

 Irbis wrote:

Tyel wrote:
Keep 9th's core rules.

Roll all faction rules back to where they were in May-July 2019 (after the Castellan/Ynnari slaying big FAQ and before Marines 2.0 nuked the edition).

I'd say to Index stalines. Or better yet, delete all the gak stat inflation from the last three editions or so, no handing out BS/WS 3+ like candy, demons and eldar go back to 4+, 3+ goes back to elite units only. 5+ armour being default again on mooks, 4+ for elite units, 3+ being reserved to power armor/elite necrons. No 2+ to hit on HQs (or especially comically, Eldar mook units), Wraith units need psyker handlers again, no bucket of mortal wounds Tau gun gak, W1 squats, no mass D2 spam without drawbacks such as gets hot, no orkstodes, no S5 guns on chaffiest Tyranids, none of the power creep cheese introduced recently

 catbarf wrote:
-Cut back massively on cognitive burden- use USRs when possible

I really like people repeat this comical statement when it does the exact opposite of cutting back on cognitive burden. I tried to test new, leak dreads from HH recently and was starkly reminded why I hate that gak - having to pause game to check SIX "USR" on ONE gun in different book then go check what NINE "USR" do for MC (having to flip back and forth between two unit types and USR table) which dreads now are is utterly insane especially seeing most of these could just be a statline modifier included in stats for usability or printed on datasheet. Now multiply it by dozens of weapons, each with its own pile of "USR" and try telling me with a straight face it 'decreases' anything instead of drastically adding to it and making rule mistakes virtually certain even for experienced players (especially for experienced players, seeing "USR" often radically change edition to edition and can go from huge drawback to a massive advantage, see Rage for one)

USR, like armory, and points in badly formatted table in the back instead of datasheets, is garbage from 80s and has no place in any sane ruleset made in 21st century. Period. If you really need a common rule for weapon X, at worst put it in codex, not rulebook, right next to unit entries to minimize flipping, and even then, there should be only 2-3 such rules per army not 80+ like ""USR"" (which were then used by 1-2 units per edition most of the time making any claim to being "universal" laughable). And even then you should do what Magic: The Gathering (to name one competently designed game but these days virtually everyone does it) does and print a reminder text next to "USR" for clarity (but then why you need this other than as a shorthand of "I am incapable of learning any ruleset more modern than the RT/they modernized it and I now hate it/I am still using Dos 3.22, who needs these fancy windows and gak"...)

But... you do realise, that USR does not mean, it has to be put somewhere else than the unit entry, right? Just like modern "tailored special rules" are not put somewhere obscure, but are right there on the profile, so USRs can also be put right there. What USR trully means, is that no two "tailored" rules that have exactly the same effect have different names and wording. So, e.g., there is only one FNP, not gazilion. But nothing prevents USRs being both universal and repeated wherever they are required. I understand your trauma of being exposed to GW's inability to not only write rules but also do DTP properly. But USRs are, by nature, significantly less of a cognitive burden than remembering dozens of names for the same rule from different codices.

The foul taste of USRs comes from 7th when they put in to many redundant ones and bloated the system much like 9th is now.

In 5th ed there were 22 that covered 2 1/2 pages in the main rulebook. after about 3 games of 40K you had them all memorized and it worked just fine. take for example fleet. rather you were fleet of foot, fleet of claw or fleet of hove. the rule was exactly the same game mechanic. simple and easy to remember.

 Irbis wrote:

USR, like armory, and points in badly formatted table in the back instead of datasheets, is garbage from 80s and has no place in any sane ruleset made in 21st century. Period.

Is that why most other tabletop wargames use them?

A USR system works fine if you have about 12 (maybe 20 at a push - but I already think that's getting on a bit). And you use those to cover everything that can exist in the game - from your untrained conscript to your super giant tank. As a result other wargames that *successfully* use USRs are almost always much smaller than 40k. Almost all games end up in the same situation as they expand their rosters, and start trying cover more and more slightly niche ideas.

GW has never bound themselves like that - and we all know they never will. They were still making up unique special rules despite near a 100 USRs to use in 7th. This was however the natural evolution - as initially special rules became USRs through the editions.

As an example of the issues:
1. You need a USR for rerolling charges.
2. And rerolling advances.
3. And being able to advance and charge.
4. And roll an extra dice to charge and use the highest two.
5. And being able to fall back and charge.
6. And being able to fallback and shoot.
7. And being able to ignore movement penalties for charging over normally slowing terrain.
8. And being able to move that unit through models.

I'm at 8 of my 12 USRs and I'm probably not yet entirely through "rules in current 40k impacting movement." You can (and a sensible designer possibly would) just say "fine, just we won't have those rules in our game" - but then you are somewhat cutting 40k as we know it apart.

 Irbis wrote:

USR, like armory, and points in badly formatted table in the back instead of datasheets, is garbage from 80s and has no place in any sane ruleset made in 21st century. Period.

The majority of board games, card games and miniature games on the market utilize USR's...

The divergence away from them in 8th was an experiment, and it failed. I suspect an 8th/9th edition built upon the core of 3-7th would have been just as successful as the 8/9th we have now if they also got the same marketing and 6month support/supplement schedule and expedient codex rollout.

No one has been able to convince me yet that the success that 8th/9th have achieved has any correlation to their core rules. Any product (good or bad) can be successful if your marketing team and support is strong... look at the video game or movie industry, riddled with subpar products, but that marketing budget really goes a long way to polish the turd.

EDIT: To add clarity to my hyperbolic rant. In 5th-7th I was traveling around the country (US) and in the multiple communities that I would play in, I could always find leagues and game nights dedicated to 40k. Since the end of 8th (around Psychic Awakening time) in those same communities, it's impossible to find a pick up game or league. Everyone has moved onto other games (including some GW games). When I inquire, the sentiment seems to be the same... "9th is not fun" "there's too much book keeping" "the learning curve is too high for new players" etc etc

Tyel wrote:
You can (and a sensible designer possibly would) just say "fine, just we won't have those rules in our game" - but then you are somewhat cutting 40k as we know it apart.

Would anyone even notice is their "reroll one dice in a charge" just got condensed into "reroll charges" or "+2 to charges" or whatever?
No, they wouldn't, because it doesn't make any difference.

Stuff like Deepstrike and FNP absolutely need to be USRs. Especially when you have other rules referring to those rules. GW has to write really long and convoluted wording like "any rule that allows a unit to be deployed on the battlefield and then set up a variable distance away from the enemy..." just say "deepstrike" and be done with it.
I regularly get new players wondering "does that rule apply to me, or is Teleport Strike special? What about Manta Strike?". No mate, they're all exactly the fething same.

nou 804308 11336236 wrote:
But... you do realise, that USR does not mean, it has to be put somewhere else than the unit entry, right? Just like modern "tailored special rules" are not put somewhere obscure, but are right there on the profile, so USRs can also be put right there. What USR trully means, is that no two "tailored" rules that have exactly the same effect have different names and wording. So, e.g., there is only one FNP, not gazilion. But nothing prevents USRs being both universal and repeated wherever they are required. I understand your trauma of being exposed to GW's inability to not only write rules but also do DTP properly. But USRs are, by nature, significantly less of a cognitive burden than remembering dozens of names for the same rule from different codices.

Yeah why can't something FnP be (++X) , while on X being a number different based on army. Deep Strike be (DS X") with X being how close you can deploy to enemy etc. Forward Deployment being (FD X") etc.

Karol wrote:

Yeah why can't something FnP be (++X) , while on X being a number different based on army. Deep Strike be (DS X") with X being how close you can deploy to enemy etc. Forward Deployment being (FD X") etc.

Because GW rules writers are trying to reinvent the wheel, but they are barley capable of understanding the function the wheel served. Many other systems adopted variable USR's about 20+ years ago. I remember the WotC article on their old portal page when they introduced their first variable mechanics in 2003.

Even other GW games use USRs, lotr even expanded on them with their current edition, so saying "it's something from the 80s" is one of the... strangest things I've read on this board in a while.

Tittliewinks22 wrote:

Karol wrote:

Yeah why can't something FnP be (++X) , while on X being a number different based on army. Deep Strike be (DS X") with X being how close you can deploy to enemy etc. Forward Deployment being (FD X") etc.

Because GW rules writers are trying to reinvent the wheel, but they are barley capable of understanding the function the wheel served. Many other systems adopted variable USR's about 20+ years ago. I remember the WotC article on their old portal page when they introduced their first variable mechanics in 2003.

Lol. No, MTG introduced variable mechanics into the game right off the bat 10 years ealier. See Fireball, Life Drain, etc - any spell that reads: (manna cost) (x)

Even 40k has had to concede to some USRs - see Blast and Objective Secured.

Emperor knows why they're holding out such as they are.

 kirotheavenger wrote:
Would anyone even notice is their "reroll one dice in a charge" just got condensed into "reroll charges" or "+2 to charges" or whatever?
No, they wouldn't, because it doesn't make any difference.

Stuff like Deepstrike and FNP absolutely need to be USRs. Especially when you have other rules referring to those rules. GW has to write really long and convoluted wording like "any rule that allows a unit to be deployed on the battlefield and then set up a variable distance away from the enemy..." just say "deepstrike" and be done with it.
I regularly get new players wondering "does that rule apply to me, or is Teleport Strike special? What about Manta Strike?". No mate, they're all exactly the fething same.

Well yes. I do think - much like FLY - it would be very easy to include keywords/USRs for deepstrike, infiltrate, pre-game move. The Eldar Codex almost feels like they are inching towards that by defining the latter two before the datasheets.
FNP could probably be defined and covered in the core rules too.

I wouldn't mind if 10th edition did that. I think its when you want to USRify everything else beyond this that things get awkward if you want to avoid a 7th edition.