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Well, if I was excited about the new Tyranid codex this thread brought me back down to earth.

 Void__Dragon wrote:
It affects me in the sense that I kind of just don't want to play. Custodes and Harlequins are two of my favorite factions. My boyfriend's favorite faction is between Sisters of Battle and Dark Angels. I'd like to play those two armies, but it wouldn't really be fair, would it? So we just do other things.

But if you play with your boyfriend specifically it would be quite easy to tone down you Custodes/Harlequin list to make it more interesting, would it not? If you have the models so switch around for example, play Custodes without Jetbikes or Trajann. Pick a Shield Host that's not as meta like Dread Host. If you don't have the models to make a variety of lists at 2000p, play a 1500p game. And if all else fails, you can start with a 100p handicap.

I guess thats the whole point of making this thread: if you have the opportunity to constructively talk to your gaming partner/group, the meta should not affect your enjoyment of the game that much. Well, IF the goal is to have fun together and not to play competitively or practice for a tournament.

Toning down someone's list can still affect their enjoyment.

Let's use me as an example. I super love Baneblades. If we suddenly lived in a world where Baneblades were mindbreakingly overpowered, then:
1) my opponent's enjoyment is diminished because Baneblades are stupid good
2) my enjoyment is diminished because these kickass models I spent plenty of time on (and which are my favorites!) won't see the table.

 TwinPoleTheory wrote:
The lethality and complexity of the game have been amplified to what I feel is an unhealthy degree. It doesn't seem to favor casual engagement and participation anymore.

I agree in the lethality, disagree on complexity. Most of the game is now decided during list building, just like MTG is determined by deck building. For the most part in 40k you are just kinda along for the ride.

 Backspacehacker wrote:
I agree in the lethality, disagree on complexity. Most of the game is now decided during list building, just like MTG is determined by deck building. For the most part in 40k you are just kinda along for the ride.

Possibly, tracking 6 static objectives, 3 of my secondaries, 3 of my opponent's secondaries, the running point total, and trying to have a working knowledge of my opponent's updated rules and gotchas reminded me why I play sober these days.

 Unit1126PLL wrote:
Toning down someone's list can still affect their enjoyment.

Let's use me as an example. I super love Baneblades. If we suddenly lived in a world where Baneblades were mindbreakingly overpowered, then:
1) my opponent's enjoyment is diminished because Baneblades are stupid good
2) my enjoyment is diminished because these kickass models I spent plenty of time on (and which are my favorites!) won't see the table.

If you talk to your opponent before the game, he might be able to skew more AV firepower into his list instead of a more TAC build.

One problem though in a rock/paper/scissors environment is how much list tailoring do you want on both sides? Ideally enough so everyone has a close, fun game. But that’s not an easy feat to achieve.

Zero,

As long as the opponents army is painted I'll play against some fancy tournament list.

Games are far more fun on a larger table/balanced armies/over a beer but as long as the visuals are there I'll have my marines get blown the feth out against some Eldar for some cool photos.

I don't play against grey tide or primed armies so that absolves me of most of the issues it seems people have here

 Nevelon wrote:

 Unit1126PLL wrote:
Toning down someone's list can still affect their enjoyment.

Let's use me as an example. I super love Baneblades. If we suddenly lived in a world where Baneblades were mindbreakingly overpowered, then:
1) my opponent's enjoyment is diminished because Baneblades are stupid good
2) my enjoyment is diminished because these kickass models I spent plenty of time on (and which are my favorites!) won't see the table.

If you talk to your opponent before the game, he might be able to skew more AV firepower into his list instead of a more TAC build.

One problem though in a rock/paper/scissors environment is how much list tailoring do you want on both sides? Ideally enough so everyone has a close, fun game. But that’s not an easy feat to achieve.

I mean if I am talking to my opponent in advance I can just ask them to play the much better 4th edition, haha.

The whole attraction of current 40k is it is popular enough that a PUG has a reasonable chance of occuring on game night.

 auticus wrote:
Where I came from the tournament meta was also your casual meta.

You couldn't escape it.

^ This is how it is for me. The entire region; not just one LGS, but all of the LGS's throughout the whole region... It's tourney-hammer all day, every day. You either play tourney-hammer or you don't play at all. Ask a fellow player, anyone, for a narrative game and it's an immediate response of "Pass... I'm practicing for a tournament.".

Do people you play with mostly bring tooled up meta lists?

Yes! That is a big, resounding 'yes'. It's the only thing anyone brings to the table around here.

It is difficult to find fellow narrative players in my area. A lot of the narrative players have quit, turned to other games, because of the competitiveness that has turned W40K sour. Even now, I question staying involved and have begun selling off my backlog of projects. The competitive players are sadly blind to the damage they have done and to the damage they continue to do. They drive off players who just want to enjoy playing with their models. They drive off new players by pushing negative game experiences onto them. Communities are starting to dwindle and some have completely dried up. So many people want to push the blame onto GW for not enjoying 9th edition, but the reality is that it's the competitiveness that's making the game unenjoyable.

 Backspacehacker wrote:

 TwinPoleTheory wrote:
The lethality and complexity of the game have been amplified to what I feel is an unhealthy degree. It doesn't seem to favor casual engagement and participation anymore.

I agree in the lethality, disagree on complexity. Most of the game is now decided during list building, just like MTG is determined by deck building. For the most part in 40k you are just kinda along for the ride.

If you disagree that 40k is absurdly complex on the tabletop ATM, I would encourage you to try teaching a new person who is not initiated to play.

"Ok, so here's our 500-point engagement. I've got my HQ character, a Techpriest Manipulus, and my troops unit, a unit of skitarii, and one squad of kataphron battle servitors"

"So we've got the distant forgeworlds sub-faction which I've chosen this trait A as my primary and this trait B as my tertiary. My manipulus has been upgraded to Logi, which means I can use a battle tactic stratagem for free once per turn, and also all friendly CORE units within 6" ignore AP-1 and AP-2 until I perform an action with the manipulus to change that ability to a different ability. Now, the Kataphrons aren't usually CORE, but i've got a warlord trait on the manipulus that allows them to become CORE for rules purposes temporarily, and also a Relic which allows me to select an enemy unit to fight last. Now, of course, by fight last, that means after all units have fought, unless you are under the effect of a Fight First rule which means we fight normally, but because of the sequencing I would still select the first unit during the fight normal fight subphase of your turn, so I would get to swing first if I selected you for that relic rule. The manipulus can also repair a friendly unit within 3" for D3 damage at the end of the movement phase, and can select a friendly unit in the Command Phase to grant them additional range and a point of AP. Are you following so far? So the skitarii have a stratagem..."

At the moment the largest effect is an increase in Custodes players.
Custodes are now probably the 3rd most played force in my area. (1st place: SM of assorted chapters/colors - because everyone has marines...., 2nd: Necrons - thank you Indomitus & a wave of really cool looking stuff)
Some of this is existing players switching/adding factions.
Some of this is new players who're hopping into the game. They looked at the price tags & went the time tested route of a high pt cost/low model count army in order to get up to speed without going completely broke. Good rules and the easy to accomplish basic paint scheme is also a draw for them.

After that is the effect I'm most happy to see: Tau back on the tables!
Until the new Codex landed? There hadn't been a single Tau model in play since I came back to 8th in the fall of 2018. The closest we came to seeing a Tau force was early 2021. One of the guys started building a force for the coming Crusade league. And then he caught Covid at work, was sidelined for a bit over a month, missed about 1/2 the Crusade, & opted not to jump in that late. Then the leagues switched to Kill Team 2 & Sigmar for awhile. So he put the project on hold until now.
Now? There's at least 4 Tau forces in play & at least 2 more being built. And the existing 4? Don't look anything like each other.

There also seems to be alot of interest in the coming Tyranids.

 Stevefamine wrote:
Zero,

As long as the opponents army is painted I'll play against some fancy tournament list.

Games are far more fun on a larger table/balanced armies/over a beer but as long as the visuals are there I'll have my marines get blown the feth out against some Eldar for some cool photos.

I don't play against grey tide or primed armies so that absolves me of most of the issues it seems people have here

...except when I play a game against a tourney-hammer list, it doesnt matter what the models look like, the game plays absolutely nothing like the narrative of the 40k universe.

40k isnt supposed to be a setting about a bunch of cowardly wimps who cluster up behind obscuring terrain, waving flags and crouching in the mud, terrified of poking their heads out for fear of being evaporated in a single turn by the opposing team's weaponry. Space Marines aren't supposed to be vaporized the second they walk out into the open. Character duels arent supposed to end in 1 second as whichever participant in the duel charged unleashes a dozen attacks that re-rolll hits, re-roll wounds, deal exploding mortal wounds on a 6 to instantly kill their opponent. Huge unstoppable warmachines should not be effortlessly shattered by the first volley of firepower that's flung their way, before they even fire a single shot.

Warhammer 40,000 9th edition is a USELESS system for re-creating the background fiction of the warhammer 40,000 universe.

Go on - try to replicate Marneus Calgar's epic duel with the swarmlord. I'll save you the mathhammer - he dies. Instantly. Probably about twice over.

Set up a huge ork horde assaulting a skitarii strongpoint - watch 150 ork boyz melt like butter under a blowtorch during the first admech player's turn.

 the_scotsman wrote:
If you disagree that 40k is absurdly complex on the tabletop ATM, I would encourage you to try teaching a new person who is not initiated to play.

I would call the cops if I came across this in public.

"No, officer, he's on page 3 of the stratagems, you may need to call SWAT."

Honestly, the thing that really made it clear to me was playing AoS, some friends were playing around with PtG, I had never played before, but I play chaos, I have a bunch of daemons and such, I gave it a try. It's like night and day, it's like any designer with half a brain ended up on the AoS team and every idiot intern was banished to 40k.

 the_scotsman wrote:

 Backspacehacker wrote:

 TwinPoleTheory wrote:
The lethality and complexity of the game have been amplified to what I feel is an unhealthy degree. It doesn't seem to favor casual engagement and participation anymore.

I agree in the lethality, disagree on complexity. Most of the game is now decided during list building, just like MTG is determined by deck building. For the most part in 40k you are just kinda along for the ride.

If you disagree that 40k is absurdly complex on the tabletop ATM, I would encourage you to try teaching a new person who is not initiated to play.

"Ok, so here's our 500-point engagement. I've got my HQ character, a Techpriest Manipulus, and my troops unit, a unit of skitarii, and one squad of kataphron battle servitors"

"So we've got the distant forgeworlds sub-faction which I've chosen this trait A as my primary and this trait B as my tertiary. My manipulus has been upgraded to Logi, which means I can use a battle tactic stratagem for free once per turn, and also all friendly CORE units within 6" ignore AP-1 and AP-2 until I perform an action with the manipulus to change that ability to a different ability. Now, the Kataphrons aren't usually CORE, but i've got a warlord trait on the manipulus that allows them to become CORE for rules purposes temporarily, and also a Relic which allows me to select an enemy unit to fight last. Now, of course, by fight last, that means after all units have fought, unless you are under the effect of a Fight First rule which means we fight normally, but because of the sequencing I would still select the first unit during the fight normal fight subphase of your turn, so I would get to swing first if I selected you for that relic rule. The manipulus can also repair a friendly unit within 3" for D3 damage at the end of the movement phase, and can select a friendly unit in the Command Phase to grant them additional range and a point of AP. Are you following so far? So the skitarii have a stratagem..."

My point to this would be.
Try teaching someone current 40k. Now try and teach them HH, or 7th ed.

 the_scotsman wrote:

If you disagree that 40k is absurdly complex on the tabletop ATM, I would encourage you to try teaching a new person who is not initiated to play.

Spoiler:

"Ok, so here's our 500-point engagement. I've got my HQ character, a Techpriest Manipulus, and my troops unit, a unit of skitarii, and one squad of kataphron battle servitors"

"So we've got the distant forgeworlds sub-faction which I've chosen this trait A as my primary and this trait B as my tertiary. My manipulus has been upgraded to Logi, which means I can use a battle tactic stratagem for free once per turn, and also all friendly CORE units within 6" ignore AP-1 and AP-2 until I perform an action with the manipulus to change that ability to a different ability. Now, the Kataphrons aren't usually CORE, but i've got a warlord trait on the manipulus that allows them to become CORE for rules purposes temporarily, and also a Relic which allows me to select an enemy unit to fight last. Now, of course, by fight last, that means after all units have fought, unless you are under the effect of a Fight First rule which means we fight normally, but because of the sequencing I would still select the first unit during the fight normal fight subphase of your turn, so I would get to swing first if I selected you for that relic rule. The manipulus can also repair a friendly unit within 3" for D3 damage at the end of the movement phase, and can select a friendly unit in the Command Phase to grant them additional range and a point of AP. Are you following so far? So the skitarii have a stratagem..."

I like how your example is basically tailormade to make things as complicated as possible by having the army be one of the more complex ones from the outset while also using custom Forge World traits and one of the most mealy-mouthed characters to date in the form of the Manipulus.


The key to doing any kind of introductory games, at any point in time in 40k's history, has always been starting small and building up. Your example isn't teaching anybody anything.

 the_scotsman wrote:

If you disagree that 40k is absurdly complex on the tabletop ATM, I would encourage you to try teaching a new person who is not initiated to play.

Been there, done that. Several times in the past few weeks in fact. And I expect to do it several more times soon.
It went relatively smoothly every time. The biggest hurdle any of the new players faced was remembering their own strats.

 Backspacehacker wrote:

 TwinPoleTheory wrote:
The lethality and complexity of the game have been amplified to what I feel is an unhealthy degree. It doesn't seem to favor casual engagement and participation anymore.

I agree in the lethality, disagree on complexity. Most of the game is now decided during list building, just like MTG is determined by deck building. For the most part in 40k you are just kinda along for the ride.

People say this and then go 0-5 with tooled up turbo cheese all the time. Same with MTG actually.

List building is incredibly important (just like any game that allows you to construct your own force), but people over-estimate how important it is because they forget that eventually they're going to have to play against good players ALSO using powerful armies. I guarantee that you or I could do 100 matches against Sean Nayden or Nick Nanavati with both players using the exact same list and still lose 80 of them.

 Kanluwen wrote:

 the_scotsman wrote:

If you disagree that 40k is absurdly complex on the tabletop ATM, I would encourage you to try teaching a new person who is not initiated to play.

Spoiler:

"Ok, so here's our 500-point engagement. I've got my HQ character, a Techpriest Manipulus, and my troops unit, a unit of skitarii, and one squad of kataphron battle servitors"

"So we've got the distant forgeworlds sub-faction which I've chosen this trait A as my primary and this trait B as my tertiary. My manipulus has been upgraded to Logi, which means I can use a battle tactic stratagem for free once per turn, and also all friendly CORE units within 6" ignore AP-1 and AP-2 until I perform an action with the manipulus to change that ability to a different ability. Now, the Kataphrons aren't usually CORE, but i've got a warlord trait on the manipulus that allows them to become CORE for rules purposes temporarily, and also a Relic which allows me to select an enemy unit to fight last. Now, of course, by fight last, that means after all units have fought, unless you are under the effect of a Fight First rule which means we fight normally, but because of the sequencing I would still select the first unit during the fight normal fight subphase of your turn, so I would get to swing first if I selected you for that relic rule. The manipulus can also repair a friendly unit within 3" for D3 damage at the end of the movement phase, and can select a friendly unit in the Command Phase to grant them additional range and a point of AP. Are you following so far? So the skitarii have a stratagem..."

I like how your example is basically tailormade to make things as complicated as possible by having the army be one of the more complex ones from the outset while also using custom Forge World traits and one of the most mealy-mouthed characters to date in the form of the Manipulus.


The key to doing any kind of introductory games, at any point in time in 40k's history, has always been starting small and building up. Your example isn't teaching anybody anything.

Yeah, me giving an example of a 500-point game with 3 units sure was disingenuous

Nothing in 40k scales. At all. You play a 500-point intro game? You've got to deal with Relics, Warlord Traits, Doctrines, 2 subfaction rules, Auras, micro equipment options, CORE, Detachments, 3 pages of stratagems, all at once, and the lethality inherent in the system gets really REALLY stupid when you have your 1 unit (1/3 of your army) obliterate 1 of your opponent's units (1/3 of their army) in a single shooting attack. Which happens. A lot.

An intro game of Sigmar? None of that.

-Detachments? Optional. And if you do include them? They give you one, fairly easy to remember bonus.

-Command Abilities? Youre going to each have the same core set of 6 or so, 1-2 per phase, and you might, might have 1 leader character who adds 1 additional one, printed right on their datasheet.

-Relics? Warlord traits? 1 each, again, far less impactful than in 40k. No option to buy more for your units.

Subfactions? Maybe 1 with 1 rule. No real way to soup any allies in at the 500-point level because AOS actually has limits on that.

Hell - you can play an intro game of AOS on a table with NO TERRAIN if you want, and it FEELS LIKE A GAME instead of a hilarious elaborate practical joke you're playing on your friend where they go "no, no, seriously - what do you actually do with these little models? it's not this. Is it really this?"

You CAN introduce 40k by ignoring like 75% of the meaningless add-on rules layers. You can just bring 500 points of miniatures, and ignore Detachments. You can ignore CP and Strats. You can ignore subfactions/traits/relics/doctrines/preferred sandwich flavors.

But other games dont actually require you to do that, is the thing. Other games, you can just introduce someone by playing the game. And it works. Hell - what, 4 years ago? I could introduce someone to 40k without any of that needless crap - and that WAS the whole game!

 the_scotsman wrote:
An intro game of Sigmar? None of that.

You forgot to mention that pretty much all the rules for a given unit are on the dataslate for that unit.

Re: the complexity,
Being someone who just came back to the game after last playing during 5th edition, it definitely feels more complex. Back then, I think we always just played kill points (there were 5 of us in our college dorm that played together, so no clue about the LGS scene). I could be wrong, it's been a while...maybe there were objectives... I should go dig out the 5th edition rules again and check. Imperial Guard (my faction of choice) had orders, but strategems definitely weren't a thing. I feel like determining line of sight was simpler and terrain was waaay simpler for sure. On the other hand, the current reinforcement rules are simpler and gone are the days of scatter dice and templates (although I do miss my pie plates dearly). [edit: the post after mine also reminded me that vehicle armor and position is far simpler now] When I got back in I played a 500 point Imperial Guard vs (old) Tau match against my wife and taught her/learned the new edition. I think we would have been better off if we avoided strategems all together, but overall, it felt about on par with a moderately complex board game. My suggestion for teaching new folk is 500pt non-battleforged (thus cutting out all the strategems).

On the topic of the meta, I always play against the same opponent these days (one of my college friends) and we both like playing fluffy lists. So in terms of competitive meta? No impact on me personally as I don't play out in the wild. In terms of codex creep (which you may or may not feel is included in the term "meta")? Huge impact. I play guard and he plays thousand sons and eldar. I'm used to losing against him (he's better at the game than me and back in 5th eldar could do cruel things to vehicles), so I'm not bothered by losing to him now, but it'd be nice if I could at least make him work for it using the sort of army build I love (it's got to be getting a bit boring for him). I look at any secondary that requires me to remove a unit and immediately assume I will get very few points from it. A pair of tempestus scion squads with their tempestor prime in a valkyrie do most of the secondary objective work in my 1250pt list.

 Backspacehacker wrote:

 the_scotsman wrote:

 Backspacehacker wrote:

 TwinPoleTheory wrote:
The lethality and complexity of the game have been amplified to what I feel is an unhealthy degree. It doesn't seem to favor casual engagement and participation anymore.

I agree in the lethality, disagree on complexity. Most of the game is now decided during list building, just like MTG is determined by deck building. For the most part in 40k you are just kinda along for the ride.

If you disagree that 40k is absurdly complex on the tabletop ATM, I would encourage you to try teaching a new person who is not initiated to play.

"Ok, so here's our 500-point engagement. I've got my HQ character, a Techpriest Manipulus, and my troops unit, a unit of skitarii, and one squad of kataphron battle servitors"

"So we've got the distant forgeworlds sub-faction which I've chosen this trait A as my primary and this trait B as my tertiary. My manipulus has been upgraded to Logi, which means I can use a battle tactic stratagem for free once per turn, and also all friendly CORE units within 6" ignore AP-1 and AP-2 until I perform an action with the manipulus to change that ability to a different ability. Now, the Kataphrons aren't usually CORE, but i've got a warlord trait on the manipulus that allows them to become CORE for rules purposes temporarily, and also a Relic which allows me to select an enemy unit to fight last. Now, of course, by fight last, that means after all units have fought, unless you are under the effect of a Fight First rule which means we fight normally, but because of the sequencing I would still select the first unit during the fight normal fight subphase of your turn, so I would get to swing first if I selected you for that relic rule. The manipulus can also repair a friendly unit within 3" for D3 damage at the end of the movement phase, and can select a friendly unit in the Command Phase to grant them additional range and a point of AP. Are you following so far? So the skitarii have a stratagem..."

My point to this would be.
Try teaching someone current 40k. Now try and teach them HH, or 7th ed.

TBF, Horus Heresy and 7th were hard to teach because so many of the rules are so stupid. Also, the complexity they do have is purely topical. The old 7th edition rulebook required a player memorize 35 pages of rules (I counted, back in the day) just to be able to reach into their figure case, grab a model, place it on the table, and move it into cover. The easiest, most basic tactical decision you could possibly make, 35 pages of rules.

That extended to quite a lot of other aspects of those rulesets as well. 10 pages of rules for vehicle armor, only to realize that vehicles detonate like water balloons no matter where they get shot from. Another 10 pages for template rules, only to realize that template weapons are either completely worthless OR they kick out so MANY templates that you end up rolling fistfuls of dice regardless of where they land.

Dozens of pages and a big chart for assault rules, only to realize there isn't a SINGLE point of tactical interaction ANYWHERE in melee combat (challenges are so obviously either 'yes' or 'no' that they're not a tactical decision either.)

The tournament scene does infect everything I've seen. For a large portion of 9th my play group has been pretty well isolated and insulated from stores (mostly due to COVID, but we'll move on from that). Lately, though, we've been trying to counter that by playing narrative scenarios out at our local shops... just taking a table and having a lot of fun. We recruit based off of the experience we're making at the table, which isn't rooted in winning, losing, some grand epic narrative... just having a good time.

We're starting to bring in more players, no like huge explosion in our group... just one here or there. Like-minded people who play with us for the experience, and they understand what they're going to get out of the game going in. We're also around enough to know who just can't switch off, and we avoid them. We're not so desperate for a game that we'll throw down with someone who clearly has a different expectation of what they're getting out of the match.

I think a lot of the relaxed players got driven underground into their own little pods that slowly wither and die as life exerts its inevitable influence. And I just told me friends: we have a great time, we have great looking armies, why don't we share all of that instead of keeping it as some secret between ourselves. And sure enough, it's had at least a little impact on some of the other players around. Or at least shows a bit more of the original spirit of the game, that helps fight back against the current theme that seems to have the hobby in a deathgrip.

Be the change you want to see?

 the_scotsman wrote:

Yeah, me giving an example of a 500-point game with 3 units sure was disingenuous

No, you using Mechanicus with custom subfactions is disingenuous.
You using a Manipulus with a Holy Order is disingenuous.

Nothing in 40k scales. At all. You play a 500-point intro game? You've got to deal with Relics, Warlord Traits, Doctrines, 2 subfaction rules, Auras, micro equipment options, CORE, Detachments, 3 pages of stratagems, all at once, and the lethality inherent in the system gets really REALLY stupid when you have your 1 unit (1/3 of your army) obliterate 1 of your opponent's units (1/3 of their army) in a single shooting attack. Which happens. A lot.

Sounds like it should be way easier to teach 40k then, since it's going to be over "in a single shooting attack".

An intro game of Sigmar? None of that.

-Detachments? Optional. And if you do include them? They give you one, fairly easy to remember bonus.

Uh, no they really don't. There are 6 different perks that the different Battalions in the main rulebook can give.

-Command Abilities? Youre going to each have the same core set of 6 or so, 1-2 per phase, and you might, might have 1 leader character who adds 1 additional one, printed right on their datasheet.

Or you might have a subfaction specific one. Or a Realm specific one. Or, or, or.

I mean there's a whole category called "Enhancements" that can apply specifically to heroes. Aspect of Azyr lumps 4 potential additional rules onto Stormcast Eternals heroes, for example.

-Relics? Warlord traits? 1 each, again, far less impactful than in 40k. No option to buy more for your units.

Yet.

Subfactions? Maybe 1 with 1 rule.

...are you for real?

Subfactions in AoS can outright affect the way your army is built, courtesy of "Battleline If..." units.

No real way to soup any allies in at the 500-point level because AOS actually has limits on that.

Other than y'know, things like the Stormkeep rules.

Hell - you can play an intro game of AOS on a table with NO TERRAIN if you want, and it FEELS LIKE A GAME instead of a hilarious elaborate practical joke you're playing on your friend where they go "no, no, seriously - what do you actually do with these little models? it's not this. Is it really this?"

You CAN introduce 40k by ignoring like 75% of the meaningless add-on rules layers. You can just bring 500 points of miniatures, and ignore Detachments. You can ignore CP and Strats. You can ignore subfactions/traits/relics/doctrines/preferred sandwich flavors.

Or you CAN introduce 40k by simply playing a Combat Patrol box, right out of the box.

But other games dont actually require you to do that, is the thing. Other games, you can just introduce someone by playing the game. And it works. Hell - what, 4 years ago? I could introduce someone to 40k without any of that needless crap - and that WAS the whole game!

Code One was Infinity's "intro game".

Their game was so needlessly pants on head idiotically complex they needed to make a whole separate game to make it suitable for introduction.

I can scale 40k down. I'm not a wizard or Thanos, snapping my will into existence. It just requires actually playing the damn game rather than trying to introduce someone to everything all at once.

 Kanluwen wrote:

Code One was Infinity's "intro game".

Their game was so needlessly pants on head idiotically complex they needed to make a whole separate game to make it suitable for introduction.

N3 infinity was already much less complex than current 40k. N4 and Code one made the game even more simple.

40k right now IS the hardest game to learn. hell, even as a semi-veteran, i have a harder time than ever parsing the codexes and understanding how every part moves

OP: To an extent it does. One LGS has more tourney minded folks and my games there tend to be quite challenging. At the other LGS, there are much fewer tourney players and I don't see the extreme Meta builds (flavor of the month armies).

Regarding teaching 40K.

I've actually been teaching my 15 y.o. son how to play 40K. To be honest, there is a LOT of layers in this game, by design. However, there was no reason to go all in the first few games. We've gradually increased in points and complexity each game. Below is how I opted to tackle the complexity issue to try and have fun games.

-I build the armies (I own them and he's using my Dark Angels). This allows a bit of control to not skew one army over another and to introduce various unit types.
-The games so far have been 750 pts., 750 pts., 1000 pts., 1250 pts.
-First game, no stratagems. Second and third game, just the basic rulebook stratagems. Fourth game, using some of the Codex stratagems.
-First two games were just force vs force. Third and fourth games utilized 2022 GT Missions, but only selected one Secondary Objective.
-He painted his first model (Dark Angels Lieutenant) to add to the collection. Now, as I type, he is learning the basics of airbrushing on a Repulsor tank. He was bugging me to be able to get the tank painted for the next game.
-Next game will be 1500 points.


The game is quite complex with all the layers, but it can be introduced in phases. I whole heartedly agree if I threw him into the game with a full 2000 point army with all the rules, I'd like see him go back to play X-Box instead of learning about the GW hobby. I've had a blast over the decades playling 40K and pretty stoked to see him getting into it.

There are several ways to teach 40K, I'm sure. This happened to work for me and circumstances are always unique to each individual. Phasing in complexity helped quite a bit.

If you feel the need to throw out 90% of the rules in an intro game, it's a complex game.
Whether that complexity is good or bad is a separate discussion. There's certainly something to be said for cool and fluffy rules.
But...

I've played games that have as much tactical depth as 40k that I can present all the rules to a player in their first game and have them using them.
They might not be using them effectively, because the depth comes from positioning and set ups and stuff, but they'll know all the rules.

In 40k you cannot throw the book at someone because their brain will simply melt.

I'm a seasoned wargamer who can handle information quite efficiently in general, yet I still need to keep my nose in the book playing because I can't keep everything I need in my head, it's too much.

 kirotheavenger wrote:
If you feel the need to throw out 90% of the rules in an intro game, it's a complex game.
Whether that complexity is good or bad is a separate discussion. There's certainly something to be said for cool and fluffy rules.
But...

I've played games that have as much tactical depth as 40k that I can present all the rules to a player in their first game and have them using them.
They might not be using them effectively, because the depth comes from positioning and set ups and stuff, but they'll know all the rules.

In 40k you cannot throw the book at someone because their brain will simply melt.

I'm a seasoned wargamer who can handle information quite efficiently in general, yet I still need to keep my nose in the book playing because I can't keep everything I need in my head, it's too much.

There is a lot to the game, I agree. That's why I didn't utilize everything. To be fair, when I learned how to play Rogue Trader in the late 80's, I'm fairly certain I didn't use all the rules back then. Not a big deal really. What's cool is I can literally play a very basic game of 40K or I can play more complex games in larger tourneys (which I do). It's fun and I've really enjoyed 9th edition.

 kirotheavenger wrote:
If you feel the need to throw out 90% of the rules in an intro game, it's a complex game.
Whether that complexity is good or bad is a separate discussion. There's certainly something to be said for cool and fluffy rules.
But...

I've played games that have as much tactical depth as 40k that I can present all the rules to a player in their first game and have them using them.
They might not be using them effectively, because the depth comes from positioning and set ups and stuff, but they'll know all the rules.

In 40k you cannot throw the book at someone because their brain will simply melt.

I'm a seasoned wargamer who can handle information quite efficiently in general, yet I still need to keep my nose in the book playing because I can't keep everything I need in my head, it's too much.

yeah, even teaching infinity doesnt throw out nearly as much stuff as 40k.

First game : no hacking, no fireteams
Second game : hacking
third game: everything
every game after : git gud and develop strategies that work

 Backspacehacker wrote:

 the_scotsman wrote:
If you disagree that 40k is absurdly complex on the tabletop ATM, I would encourage you to try teaching a new person who is not initiated to play.

"Ok, so here's our 500-point engagement. I've got my HQ character, a Techpriest Manipulus, and my troops unit, a unit of skitarii, and one squad of kataphron battle servitors"

"So we've got the distant forgeworlds sub-faction which I've chosen this trait A as my primary and this trait B as my tertiary. My manipulus has been upgraded to Logi, which means I can use a battle tactic stratagem for free once per turn, and also all friendly CORE units within 6" ignore AP-1 and AP-2 until I perform an action with the manipulus to change that ability to a different ability. Now, the Kataphrons aren't usually CORE, but i've got a warlord trait on the manipulus that allows them to become CORE for rules purposes temporarily, and also a Relic which allows me to select an enemy unit to fight last. Now, of course, by fight last, that means after all units have fought, unless you are under the effect of a Fight First rule which means we fight normally, but because of the sequencing I would still select the first unit during the fight normal fight subphase of your turn, so I would get to swing first if I selected you for that relic rule. The manipulus can also repair a friendly unit within 3" for D3 damage at the end of the movement phase, and can select a friendly unit in the Command Phase to grant them additional range and a point of AP. Are you following so far? So the skitarii have a stratagem..."

My point to this would be.
Try teaching someone current 40k. Now try and teach them HH, or 7th ed.

My sudden moment of 'what on earth is going on with 40K?' clarity came when I had a local new player try HH and then try 9th, and the latter gave him a lot more trouble.

Horus Heresy is unnecessarily complex in the core mechanics (particularly unit types and vehicles), and the USRs aren't laid out in an especially intuitive way, but he was able to mostly play along just by checking Battlescribe when necessary and being reminded about core rules. Whereas when we got to 40K it was constantly flipping back and forth to understand how doctrines work, how subfaction traits work, what stratagems he could use, what warlord traits and relics units had, and what auras were active, and he clearly was having a hard time understanding the capabilities of adversary units. We dramatically pared down the rules for the next game- but we didn't have to do that for a 1000pt HH game.

Scotsman makes a great point that nothing scales in 40K. In a 1000pt HH game we didn't have to deal with the complexity of monstrous flying creature rules, Rites of War, or all the layered rules of Primarchs. Just playing a smaller game means lesser complexity. 40K doesn't work that way; the complexity comes from things that are present regardless of what scale you play at.

 VladimirHerzog wrote:

 kirotheavenger wrote:
If you feel the need to throw out 90% of the rules in an intro game, it's a complex game.
Whether that complexity is good or bad is a separate discussion. There's certainly something to be said for cool and fluffy rules.
But...

I've played games that have as much tactical depth as 40k that I can present all the rules to a player in their first game and have them using them.
They might not be using them effectively, because the depth comes from positioning and set ups and stuff, but they'll know all the rules.

In 40k you cannot throw the book at someone because their brain will simply melt.

I'm a seasoned wargamer who can handle information quite efficiently in general, yet I still need to keep my nose in the book playing because I can't keep everything I need in my head, it's too much.

yeah, even teaching infinity doesnt throw out nearly as much stuff as 40k.

First game : no hacking, no fireteams
Second game : hacking
third game: everything
every game after : git gud and develop strategies that work

What you're meaning to say is, in reality:
First game: no hacking, no fireteams, no sectorials, no real interactions between things.
Second game: hacking gets introduced.
Third game: Camo, MSV
Beyond that: Git gud and netlist.



But, again, this also feels like it goes back to a lack of someone who actually can teach a wargame.
And for what it's worth? You shouldn't be paring back one game while just dumping everything for another game out there. I wouldn't ever try to teach someone something by just throwing them in.

If you're teaching someone who has ZERO reference point for a wargame? Don't just dump it all on them. Stagger it out.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 catbarf wrote:

Scotsman makes a great point that nothing scales in 40K. In a 1000pt HH game we didn't have to deal with the complexity of monstrous flying creature rules, Rites of War, or all the layered rules of Primarchs. Just playing a smaller game means lesser complexity. 40K doesn't work that way; the complexity comes from things that are present regardless of what scale you play at.

The complexity comes from players and what they tend to do, not from "things that are present regardless of what scale you play at".
And by this, yes I am taking shots at anyone who suggests you need to memorize everything in a codex or the rules. There's nothing preventing you from making a cheat sheet, index cards, or using things like the datacards.

If I'm teaching someone the game?
I'm not throwing a full 1500 point list at them the first game. I'm not throwing a Mechanicus list with a Magos, Servitors, etc in it. I'm also not going to make them write their own list to start with. I'm going to ask them what they have and what they want to learn first, then write a list accordingly or help them write their list to match what they want to do.

Also not gonna enforce WYSIWYG because who the hell does that in an intro game?