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 rayphoton wrote:

 stonehorse wrote:

 rayphoton wrote:

 stonehorse wrote:
High production, click bait videos are sadly what gets the attention on YouTube.

Anyway, back to the actual topic.

Has anyone here tried the new MKIV rules. I haven't had chance to try them out, but after reading them they read like a decent progression of the game.

I'm still on the fence mainly due to how even at legacy it will mean a lot of models I have are not used. Got a few 5 model 40mm based units, which are going down to 3 models per unit max. Slightly annoying.

My friend and I are trying it today. I'll report on our thoughts

I look forward to reading your findings.

We played a 30pt game between cryx and menoth in which cryx got owned(menoth stuff seemed crazy strong). Its amazing how fast we fell into remembering the game. The no facing and the inch engagement range really make the game feel more streamlined. I had forgotten how much the game rely on the little icons...so..that was a learning curve of "what the feth does this do? moments. The "Gotchas" are still there if you don't ask your opponent what a unit does, but that was on me cause I was playing hard and fast and just trying to get back into the game. We had some real nice tactical moments but yeah..you gotta know your charge distances or your gonna get hammered. The rules are great. I'm not sure how this is gonna look when it comes to unit balance, list building etc etc....but it was hella fun to put my old models on the table and play again. I'm looking forward to my starter box to see how prime is gonna feel since I assume there focus is gonna be making sure thats all balanced

Thanks for the info, glad it plays well. Good to hear that you were both able to get back into the swing of things quite quickly. The new movement and no back arcs do sound like they will speed up the game.

The icons were something I was not a fan of initially back in MKII, but I have grown to really appreciate them. They are USR's dine in very short hand.

Good job on the Menoth win, always found Cryx to be a very slippery opponent.

MaxT wrote:

Toofast wrote:
9th 40k has way more gotcha moments than WMH ever did IMO

It’s not just a gotcha moment in WMH tho, it’s a gotcha game over, time to pack up your models because casterkill. 40K isn’t that level

See, I've always viewed that as the game has multiple paths to victory. Which can help give a player who is not doing so well in the mission a chance of winning still. It also means that your most powerful piece (warcaster/warlock), has to be used with some restraint, otherwise it can go south quickly. A way to keep their power in check.

Having said that, I have had games in the past where I have won before my opponent got to activate back in MKI. Advance deploy Widowmakers, Butcher moves up pops his feat, Widowmakers move forward and shoot Nemo with boosted damage rolls. My opponent to be fair did leave Nemo a bit exposed. It was a quick lesson. After that we just played a second game, and it never happened again.

At the beginning of my adventure with Warmachine I lost 2 potential players, my friends with whom I've played Warhammer Fantasy Battles for many years.

Basically for them WM, due to assassination felt like random chess - the version where you play chess normally and after the game you roll a D6 and on a 1 winner and loser swirch places.

I kind of agree, for me, the assassination victory condition has been a single biggest source of disappointing games of WM. I wouldn't mind seeing it go. Especially as losing the main battlegroup controler is already a crippling blow.

I actually like the caster kill mechanic as an alternate win mechanic much like 40K from 3rd-7th had the board wipe secondary win mechanic. and infinity has the flee/break mechanic. it is just tactics.

At the same time, we also play the WHFB version of WM/H where we bring no casters/worlocks and no jacks/warbeasts and play line infantry battles how 95% of how the battles are supposed to be fought in the universe. It is actually a pretty fun fantasy battle style game mode.

 aphyon wrote:
I actually like the caster kill mechanic as an alternate win mechanic much like 40K from 3rd-7th had the board wipe secondary win mechanic. and infinity has the flee/break mechanic. it is just tactics.

At the same time, we also play the WHFB version of WM/H where we bring no casters/worlocks and no jacks/warbeasts and play line infantry battles how 95% of how the battles are supposed to be fought in the universe. It is actually a pretty fun fantasy battle style game mode.

Problem then is how to keep scenario relevant when casterkill provides quick win regardless of scenario.

I think Caster Kill was a problem when the armies got bigger and bigger in MKII and the caster became more and more vulnerable because, as you say, caster kill was normally the breaking point for the game. Either you won outright or the power difference crippled one player at that point.

It's a neat idea, but I feel like after a certain points value the Caster Kill shouldn't happen. Or perhaps they should have introduced a system of a free "demi" caster per X points. So if you kill the main caster you've still lower level ones to keep things functional etc...



Ergo so that caster killing is important, but not the win/lose element.


In Warcaster they removed the caster from the playingfield entirely to get around that

Well, you learn how to play to avoid it, but mistakes still happen (and will happen, ad PP decided that streamlining and "decreasing the mental load"is removing front arcs but leaving the overload of special rules which are the main sources of Gotchas and confusion and unavoidable surprises and easy to forget interactions).

The thing for many critics of casterkill is whether a player who made 50 good moves and one bad (possibly just forgetting something about the opponent 's army) should lose to the other player who made 50 bad moves and was unknowingly given the good one on a silver platter.

My take on what'd be good changes from MKIII

* Mitigate model bloat
* * Lore based sub factions that does not limit model choice
* * Increased variety among unit types (example: warjacks for a faction often being redundant due to low variance in stats/game role)
* * Implement game modes (like Brawlmachine) and campaigns (like a specific conflict you can play trough that has limited model selection for that campaign) <- both these replaces theme lists
* * More reason to take multiples of a unit (more FA 3 or higher, cheaper units)
* Decrease mechanical complexity
* * Decrease need for memorization
* * * Decrease amount of stats
* * * Increase standard stats and special abilities
* * * Decrease amount of special abilities and remove as many unique special abilities as possible
* * Remove templates
* * Remove model by model activation
* Increase tactical complexity
* * Less hard questions/answers more soft questons/answers (example: Stealth - instead of auto miss make it a boost to defense, loss of line of sight not making you totally untouchable, etcetera)
* * Scenarios are fine, assassination is fine, retain those mechanics as a win condition.
* * Revamp terrain rules to be more important and designed for 3d terrain <- would also allow you to sell terrain kits
* * Less lethality. Some mechanics to allow you to react. Less gotchas.
* Remove theme lists
* Review and remove old design assumptions.
* Go trough each faction, define what they are - not according to lore or mechanics but what players think of them. If you want to reboot a faction reboot faction identity first and take care to get it right.

Two biggest issues: Model bloat and theme lists (who I think was intended to fix the bloat)
Second biggest issues: Fiddly, unfun complexity, and price of models.

But yeah, total reboot instead it seems.

Cyel wrote:
At the beginning of my adventure with Warmachine I lost 2 potential players, my friends with whom I've played Warhammer Fantasy Battles for many years.

Basically for them WM, due to assassination felt like random chess - the version where you play chess normally and after the game you roll a D6 and on a 1 winner and loser swirch places.

I kind of agree, for me, the assassination victory condition has been a single biggest source of disappointing games of WM. I wouldn't mind seeing it go. Especially as losing the main battlegroup controler is already a crippling blow.

I have my issues with caster kill too, but... this is a truly bizarre way to view it. Your caster is your king. If you lose your caster in WMHDs, you are losing your king in chess. In both games the outcome is the same, regardless of whether or not you played "normally". Theres nothing random about that.

The thing for many critics of casterkill is whether a player who made 50 good moves and one bad (possibly just forgetting something about the opponent 's army) should lose to the other player who made 50 bad moves and was unknowingly given the good one on a silver platter.

That basically never happens - you very rarely make 50 bad moves and then suddenly get the opportunity to nail your opponents caster. The only time anything close to that happens is if your opponents decides to make an assassination run in order to end the game early and fails.

* Mitigate model bloat Being accomplished by all armies in the game essentially being "limited factions" that will not be endlessly expanded
* * Lore based sub factions that does not limit model choice Not sure what this means, the idea of lore based subfactions which don't have any limitations on what you can field within them is completely at odds with itself
* * Increased variety among unit types (example: warjacks for a faction often being redundant due to low variance in stats/game role) well, I think this is fixed with each subfaction only have 5-6 units and 2 warjacks available
* * Implement game modes (like Brawlmachine) and campaigns (like a specific conflict you can play trough that has limited model selection for that campaign) <- both these replaces theme lists Well, theres definitely game modes in mk4, but maybe not the way you meant. Theme lists are entirely gone, and I don't see campaigns happening the way you want them to - very few people outside of historical gamers want to play a narrative campaign where they are restricted to playing only the units that the campaign tells them to play
* * More reason to take multiples of a unit (more FA 3 or higher, cheaper units) This is purely a personal choice, but is mainly driven by game size considerations. WMHDs isn't 40k and nobody really wants it to be, you would have to grow game model count in order for people to justify redundant units over having a more diverse toolbox
* Decrease mechanical complexity The game isn't that mechanically complex, in fact its incredibly simple, everything is simply 2d6+stat vs target number
* * Decrease need for memorization You don't really need to memorize all that much, what you do need to do is learn to ask the right questions to get the information you want from your opponent (really a community issue, too many players are donkey-caves and will only answer the exact question you answer them rather than elaborating
* * * Decrease amount of stats There aren't all that many stats to begin with, theres fewer stats than most games, theres nothing you could eliminate without requiring a complete rewrite of the games core mechanics
* * * Increase standard stats and special abilities your previous bullet point was "decrease amount of stats" - make up your mind, do you want them decreased or increased?
* * * Decrease amount of special abilities and remove as many unique special abilities as possible there aren't all that many unique special abilities in the game, for the most part its just feats - which are supposed to be unique. also, again, your previous bullet point is increase special abilities, now you want to decrease them - make up your mind
* * Remove templates done, templates are thankfully gone
* * Remove model by model activation errr, this was never a thing to begin with. individual models activate as individual models, units activate as uints. This is how its always been.
* Increase tactical complexity the game is already one of the most tactically complex on the market
* * Less hard questions/answers more soft questons/answers (example: Stealth - instead of auto miss make it a boost to defense, loss of line of sight not making you totally untouchable, etcetera) stealth is already a soft question - get within 5" and it doesn't exist. there are plenty of soft questions/answers in the game already (seriously, the majority are soft) and very few "hard" ones. this concern is overstated
* * Scenarios are fine, assassination is fine, retain those mechanics as a win condition. your wish is granted
* * Revamp terrain rules to be more important and designed for 3d terrain <- would also allow you to sell terrain kits we'll see how this goes, but this isn't a rules issue so much as it is a community issue. The rules have been rewritten so that some of the concerns that players had with 3d terrain are less of a factor, but its up to the community to break away from playing with felt and neoprene
* * Less lethality. Some mechanics to allow you to react. Less gotchas. the game is already incredibly non-lethal, this is a big reason for why games of warmachine become a center table scrum, because more often than not clustering together into the center of the table provides various defensive bonuses that help keep models alive
* Remove theme lists already done
* Review and remove old design assumptions. this statement is completely meaningless
* Go trough each faction, define what they are - not according to lore or mechanics but what players think of them. If you want to reboot a faction reboot faction identity first and take care to get it right. similarly nonsensical, warmachine is the game with perhaps the strongest sense of faction identity, there is no need to "define" them further, there is nothing that separates player perception from the way the factions are designed

chaos0xomega wrote:


I have my issues with caster kill too, but... this is a truly bizarre way to view it. Your caster is your king. If you lose your caster in WMHDs, you are losing your king in chess. In both games the outcome is the same, regardless of whether or not you played "normally". Theres nothing random about that.

I disagree, there's very often a lot random about that. How often do you hear about going for a 25% or 30% assassinations? Or even 50-50 ones where a coin toss overrides the entire game up to that point?

That was the exact comment of one of those friends, a wargaming vet with many gold medals for being the captain of the Polish ETC team in Warhammer Fantasy - so not an amateur's opinion: "We play a strategy game and one player gets the upper hand so now we roll dice and on a 4+ (or sometimes on a 5+ or 6+) the other player wins. I pass on such a game".

Like random chess.

I also disagree about mechanical complexity not being a thing in WM. Dice rolling may be easy but I had to show the rulebook on many occassions even to tournament veterans sotheycan see what models outside of formation can do or how differently slams and throws work or how model size affects LOS (for so many people the size of the attacker matters!) Because there are somany misconceptions about these rules.

GMG has recently published a few Brawlmachine reports. For the McBain one I wrote the entire huge list of mistakes I noticed - it's in the comments for the video. It tells a lot about the complexity of the game even at such a small model count. Hell, even the SR rulespack is longer than instructions for most board games I have.

Yeah, gonna roll my eyes and disagree. Theres no difference between "I was controlling the zone and killing all your dudes and then I lost because I left my caster exposed" and "I was controlling the board and killing all your pawns and then I lost because I left my king exposed".

Both games are equally "random" in their outcomes. The only difference here is that in chess taking a king is a binary outcome whereas caster kill has some dice rolling involved - but if you lose your caster it isn't because it happened randomly, its because you suck (or, yknow, your opponent outplayed you, either/or).

Really? Does it really rarely happen to you that you kill the enemy caster with the last available attack and if it fails it's game over for you?

Similarly, when losing attrition in chess do you sometimes decide "ok, I will take this 20% chance of check-mate, it's the best I can do" and then let RNG decide the outcome?

In fact it's one of the reasons I rarely if ever attempt casterkill - I don't want to fall victim to the dice. I am a steady scenario player because I don't trust the dice

Cyel wrote:
Really? Does it really rarely happen to you that you kill the enemy caster with the last available attack and if it fails it's game over for you?

That actually happens to me quite often... because I suck and I often play myself into a corner such that my only hope of winning a game is to perform a long-odds assassination attempt. Thats not a problem with the rules, thats a problem with *me*. And I go into those assassination runs knowing what the cost is and what the consequences are. Its a *choice* I make because I often don't find myself with better options (or if there are better options I don't necessarily see them until after the fact when my opponent points them out to me - because I suck).

My regular opponents for the game are legitimately world class players (seriously, one of the guys I basically taught how to play the game is now the captain of this years WTC team) - they very rarely fail their assassination attempts, because they are good and they don't put themselves into a corner where its "assassination or bust", and when they do go for an assassination run they do it with the surety that they will succeed because they have sufficient tools and resources to put the necessary damage into the caster, strip the opposing casters defensive abilities, etc. The amount of influence RNG has on a well planned and properly executed assassination run is being grossly overstated. If you regularly find yourself not successfully pulling off assassinations, thats (again) more of a "you" problem than it is a game problem, it means you're reaching and attempting to assassinate a caster that you aren't properly set up to take down.

Interestingly, my local players are also WTC players from the top Polish team and they all rarely if ever attempt assassinations because they don't want to gamble on their win ;D

chaos0xomega wrote:

Cyel wrote:
At the beginning of my adventure with Warmachine I lost 2 potential players, my friends with whom I've played Warhammer Fantasy Battles for many years.

Basically for them WM, due to assassination felt like random chess - the version where you play chess normally and after the game you roll a D6 and on a 1 winner and loser swirch places.

I kind of agree, for me, the assassination victory condition has been a single biggest source of disappointing games of WM. I wouldn't mind seeing it go. Especially as losing the main battlegroup controler is already a crippling blow.

I have my issues with caster kill too, but... this is a truly bizarre way to view it. Your caster is your king. If you lose your caster in WMHDs, you are losing your king in chess. In both games the outcome is the same, regardless of whether or not you played "normally". Theres nothing random about that.

The thing for many critics of casterkill is whether a player who made 50 good moves and one bad (possibly just forgetting something about the opponent 's army) should lose to the other player who made 50 bad moves and was unknowingly given the good one on a silver platter.

That basically never happens - you very rarely make 50 bad moves and then suddenly get the opportunity to nail your opponents caster. The only time anything close to that happens is if your opponents decides to make an assassination run in order to end the game early and fails.

* Mitigate model bloat Being accomplished by all armies in the game essentially being "limited factions" that will not be endlessly expanded
* * Lore based sub factions that does not limit model choice Not sure what this means, the idea of lore based subfactions which don't have any limitations on what you can field within them is completely at odds with itself
* * Increased variety among unit types (example: warjacks for a faction often being redundant due to low variance in stats/game role) well, I think this is fixed with each subfaction only have 5-6 units and 2 warjacks available
* * Implement game modes (like Brawlmachine) and campaigns (like a specific conflict you can play trough that has limited model selection for that campaign) <- both these replaces theme lists Well, theres definitely game modes in mk4, but maybe not the way you meant. Theme lists are entirely gone, and I don't see campaigns happening the way you want them to - very few people outside of historical gamers want to play a narrative campaign where they are restricted to playing only the units that the campaign tells them to play
* * More reason to take multiples of a unit (more FA 3 or higher, cheaper units) This is purely a personal choice, but is mainly driven by game size considerations. WMHDs isn't 40k and nobody really wants it to be, you would have to grow game model count in order for people to justify redundant units over having a more diverse toolbox
* Decrease mechanical complexity The game isn't that mechanically complex, in fact its incredibly simple, everything is simply 2d6+stat vs target number
* * Decrease need for memorization You don't really need to memorize all that much, what you do need to do is learn to ask the right questions to get the information you want from your opponent (really a community issue, too many players are donkey-caves and will only answer the exact question you answer them rather than elaborating
* * * Decrease amount of stats There aren't all that many stats to begin with, theres fewer stats than most games, theres nothing you could eliminate without requiring a complete rewrite of the games core mechanics
* * * Increase standard stats and special abilities your previous bullet point was "decrease amount of stats" - make up your mind, do you want them decreased or increased?
* * * Decrease amount of special abilities and remove as many unique special abilities as possible there aren't all that many unique special abilities in the game, for the most part its just feats - which are supposed to be unique. also, again, your previous bullet point is increase special abilities, now you want to decrease them - make up your mind
* * Remove templates done, templates are thankfully gone
* * Remove model by model activation errr, this was never a thing to begin with. individual models activate as individual models, units activate as uints. This is how its always been.
* Increase tactical complexity the game is already one of the most tactically complex on the market
* * Less hard questions/answers more soft questons/answers (example: Stealth - instead of auto miss make it a boost to defense, loss of line of sight not making you totally untouchable, etcetera) stealth is already a soft question - get within 5" and it doesn't exist. there are plenty of soft questions/answers in the game already (seriously, the majority are soft) and very few "hard" ones. this concern is overstated
* * Scenarios are fine, assassination is fine, retain those mechanics as a win condition. your wish is granted
* * Revamp terrain rules to be more important and designed for 3d terrain <- would also allow you to sell terrain kits we'll see how this goes, but this isn't a rules issue so much as it is a community issue. The rules have been rewritten so that some of the concerns that players had with 3d terrain are less of a factor, but its up to the community to break away from playing with felt and neoprene
* * Less lethality. Some mechanics to allow you to react. Less gotchas. the game is already incredibly non-lethal, this is a big reason for why games of warmachine become a center table scrum, because more often than not clustering together into the center of the table provides various defensive bonuses that help keep models alive
* Remove theme lists already done
* Review and remove old design assumptions. this statement is completely meaningless
* Go trough each faction, define what they are - not according to lore or mechanics but what players think of them. If you want to reboot a faction reboot faction identity first and take care to get it right. similarly nonsensical, warmachine is the game with perhaps the strongest sense of faction identity, there is no need to "define" them further, there is nothing that separates player perception from the way the factions are designed

There is a truly gargauntaun amount of boring, fiddly, completely unnecessary mechanical complexity that could be massively simplified while retaining tactical complexity in warmachine III. You need to memorize thousands of different stats, keyword abilities, special abilities, spells, feats and rules for units just to play against a couple of factions. Warmachine is blatantly excessive in this regard, even for a wargame. This fiddlyness is not limited to stat memorizations either. Model by model activation is another good example. Positioning, facing, declaring and rolling for twenty models one by one is a drag. If you have even more infantry it gets worse. Due to the extreme high lethality in the game you get another big problem with warmachine, the prevalence of gotchas.

They're keeping the themelists in mark 4. It's mentioned earlier in this thread. All the factions are going to split up with a secondary unlimited playmode that is not intended as a default. They're even going with huge 'subfaction starter set'.

Whenever you're talking about caster kill odds you should remember how it works from the other side. In almost every instance you can put your caster somewhere where they are 100% safe. The downside is that they may not be able to contribute as much to the game from those locations. You make the choice to give your opponent a 20% chance of winning the game in order to gain an advantage in other means. Whether or not they go for it often comes down to what other roads to victory are available to them. The more cornered you get your opponent, the more you have to consider whether its a good idea to give them a slim out.

StaevinTheAeldari wrote:


There is a truly gargauntaun amount of boring, fiddly, completely unnecessary mechanical complexity that could be massively simplified while retaining tactical complexity in warmachine III. You need to memorize thousands of different stats, keyword abilities, special abilities, spells, feats and rules for units just to play against a couple of factions. Warmachine is blatantly excessive in this regard, even for a wargame. This fiddlyness is not limited to stat memorizations either. Model by model activation is another good example. Positioning, facing, declaring and rolling for twenty models one by one is a drag. If you have even more infantry it gets worse. Due to the extreme high lethality in the game you get another big problem with warmachine, the prevalence of gotchas.

All of this is grossly overstated. Grievous Wounds is grievous wounds. Iron Flesh is Iron Flesh. You will not find other abilities that do the same exact thing but with different names (unlike 40k). The game is already incredibly well standardized, and the amount of memorization actually needed is exaggerated. If you're getting hit by gotchas its because you have gakky opponents who aren't forthcoming with information (to be fair, thats a large segment of the remaining community for the game) or just aren't asking the right questions to get the information you need. "Whats that models DEF? Do you have any way of increasing it?", should be a standard question every time you play before you make any decision in which you are relying on certain outcomes, ditto ARM, SPD/threat range, MAT/RAT. Likewise, asking your opponent if they have any means for out-of-activation movement/attacks is a fairly simple question, as is the ability to move/reposition/control/knockdown/freeze your models. Those handful of questions will cover 98% of all potential gotchas, no need for memorization needed. Ask the questions up front at the start of the game so you know what you're going into and if you need a reminder ask for clarification as to which model could do whatever. Its not hard.

Likewise your "model by model activation" argument is a bit nonsensical. You activate a warjack, you move it, and you attack, and then you move on to the next one. This is no different than how you move and shoot one model at a time in a game like x-wing or Armada, etc. (except in X-Wing you have to activate each unit twice due to the separate of actions from movement), or for that matter 40k (except, again, done all at once instead of needing to activate the same unit each phase). Now when it comes to units, you aren't activating one model at a time - as you move the entire unit at the same time (just like in 40k), but resolve the attacks individually (just like you would in 40k if you had a unit where every model in the unit was attacking a different target, which is effectively what tends to happen in Warmachine - though many units have combined attack options that allow them to pool their attacks instead of resolving them separately).

They're keeping the themelists in mark 4. It's mentioned earlier in this thread. All the factions are going to split up with a secondary unlimited playmode that is not intended as a default. They're even going with huge 'subfaction starter set'.

Theres a difference between theme lists in mk3 and armies in mk4. There are no theme lists in mk4, instead they have replaced the idea of "playing a faction" with "playing an army" - which is a subtly different concept. For one thing you never have to worry about buying a unit for your army that doesn't work with your theme list ever again, as the armies are self contained and any unit for that army will be playable in it at all times and designed to synergistically operate with the other units in it.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 LunarSol wrote:
Whenever you're talking about caster kill odds you should remember how it works from the other side. In almost every instance you can put your caster somewhere where they are 100% safe. The downside is that they may not be able to contribute as much to the game from those locations. You make the choice to give your opponent a 20% chance of winning the game in order to gain an advantage in other means. Whether or not they go for it often comes down to what other roads to victory are available to them. The more cornered you get your opponent, the more you have to consider whether its a good idea to give them a slim out.

Exactly this. Its a systems of tradeoffs that need to be evaluated and weighed. If your opponent kills your caster, or if you kill your opponents caster, its largely because you chose to prioritize benefits over risks. The exception to that is when you have no idea what you're doing and aren't aware of all of the potential means by which the caster you thought you had protected is actually fully exposed. This is an issue for newer players mainly, but after a few games it isn't hard to wrap your head around (and the elimination of the ability for your opponent to attack their own models in order to open up charge routes, etc. eliminates the main "gotcha" that exists in this regard, as it was previously very easy for an opponent to unjam an assassination route by picking off their own guys).

Theme list, army. Different name, same function limiting models from same faction so your armies are illegal

chaos0xomega wrote:


-cutting down the quote to reduce clutter -

Well to demonstrate how model by model activation is fiddly look at how it occurs at the table:

10 man pikeman unit (all same weapons, bannerman and leader ignored) - wants to charge.

Unit declares a charge.
Measure for all models that are in range.
Model 1 - Declares target.
Model 1 - Move to engage target.
Model 1 - Change Facing to point at target
Model 2 - Declares target.
Model 2 - Move to engage target.
Model 2 - Change Facing to point at target
Model 3 - Declares target.
Model 3 - Move to engage target.
Model 3 - Change Facing to point at target
Model 4 - Declares target.
Model 4 - Move to engage target.
Model 4 - Change Facing to point at target
Model 5 - Declares target.
Model 5 - Move to engage target.
Model 5 - Change Facing to point at target
Model 6 - Declares target.
Model 6 - Move to engage target.
Model 6 - Change Facing to point at target
Model 7 - Declares target.
Model 7 - Move to engage target.
Model 7 - Change Facing to point at target
Model 8 - Declares target.
Model 8 - Move to engage target.
Model 8 - Change Facing to point at target
Model 9 - Declares target.
Model 9 - Move to engage target.
Model 9 - Change Facing to point at target
Model 10 - Declares target.
Model 10 - Move to engage target.
Model 10 - Change Facing to point at target

After all models have moved one by one.

Model 1 - Rolls to hit
Model 1 - Rolls to damage
Model 2 - Roll to hit.
Model 2 - Roll to damage.
Model 3 - Roll to hit.
Model 3 - Roll to damage.
...

And so on and so on and so on.


Models activates one by one. Units don't declare targets, models do, they don't roll attacks or damage, models do, units don't have facing models do, units don't move as one, models do. It's fiddly.

If it was unit activation:

Unit declares a charge.
Units checks if charge is in range.
Unit moves.
Unit changes facing.
Unit attacks.
Unit rolls damage.

6 steps to resolve instead of 50 steps. Oh yeah if they charge two or three units they have to add... 4 more steps, two for each additional unit.

I don't see what's difficult to understand about warmachine being fiddly. And there'd be nothing wrong with simplifying it. It wouldn't make the game less tactical. You can make immensely tactical game with very simple mechanics.

As for memorization, a single card has 10 basic stats you need to memorize. Then there are keyword abilities, then there are special abilities. The special abilities are almost all unique. Most weapons are to.
You need to do this for every unit in your army.
Also because the game lacks the ability to react mid turn to an opponent when he does something unexpected you need to predict what he'll do at your turn.
This means you also need to memorize this for every unit in his army.
Then you play more than one individual, using more than one army.

And yes, the way people try to handle that is they will constantly ask about threat ranges, defense, special abilities etcetera, because it's simply not possible to memorize all of that stuff. They'll miss some stuff and they get wrecked. And it doesn't have to be like that either, and it's an obvious area for improvement, and it would make the game better if it was improved.

That's only two of the many many reason why the game is in the state it is today. No exaggeration.

Also lol at 'uh they're gonna call themelists something else that means it's different'.

 Overread wrote:
I think Caster Kill was a problem when the armies got bigger and bigger in MKII and the caster became more and more vulnerable because, as you say, caster kill was normally the breaking point for the game. Either you won outright or the power difference crippled one player at that point.

It's a neat idea, but I feel like after a certain points value the Caster Kill shouldn't happen. Or perhaps they should have introduced a system of a free "demi" caster per X points. So if you kill the main caster you've still lower level ones to keep things functional etc...



Ergo so that caster killing is important, but not the win/lose element.


In Warcaster they removed the caster from the playingfield entirely to get around that

We solved that problem simply by keeping our games 99% of the time (outside of special requests) to 50 points, no steamroller and no theme lists. the game is a skirmish game and should be played as one.

As for memorization, a single card has 10 basic stats you need to memorize. Then there are keyword abilities, then there are special abilities. The special abilities are almost all unique. Most weapons are to.
You need to do this for every unit in your army.
Also because the game lacks the ability to react mid turn to an opponent when he does something unexpected you need to predict what he'll do at your turn.
This means you also need to memorize this for every unit in his army.
Then you play more than one individual, using more than one army.

Sometimes i do not remember what the little symbols mean so i printed out a copy of the master list quick reference sheet to keep with my stuff, otherwise everything else is on the stat card if needed. this is far easier than bringing the pile of books that current GW requires for you to bring and buy to play a game and do not get me started on the pile of strats that each faction have that often have different names for very similar effects.

If it was unit activation:
Unit declares a charge.
Units checks if charge is in range.
Unit moves.
Unit changes facing.
Unit attacks.
Unit rolls damage.
6 steps to resolve instead of 50 steps. Oh yeah if they charge two or three units they have to add... 4 more steps, two for each additional unit.

This is extremely disingenuous and you know it. If you're going to include every little step for WMHDs (really, "change facing to point to target" is a separate step? Everyone just does that as part of their move, and you don't get to list "roll to hit, roll damage" for WMHDs without going through the full attack sequence for what you're comparing it to) you should do the same for a game with unit activation, lets look at 40ks unit activation for example:

Activate unit in movement phase:
Measure distance, then move model A
Measure distance, then move model B
Measure distance, then move model C
Measure distance, then move model D
Measure distance, then move model E
Measure distance, then move model F
Measure distance, then move model G
Measure distance, then move model H
Measure distance, then move model I
Measure distance, then move model J

Activate unit in shooting phase:
Check range and LOS, declare target for model A
Check range and LOS, declare target for model B
Check range and LOS, declare target for model C
Check range and LOS, declare target for model D
Check range and LOS, declare target for model E
Check range and LOS, declare target for model F
Check range and LOS, declare target for model G
Check range and LOS, declare target for model H
Check range and LOS, declare target for model I
Check range and LOS, declare target for model J
Pool attacks for each target, roll them separately
Roll to hit (re-rolling as needed)
Roll to wound (re-rolling as needed)
Opponent rolls saves (re-rolling as needed)
Roll for damage (if applicable, re-rolling as needed)
Opponents rolls disgustingly resilient/feel no paint (if applicable, re-rolling as needed)
Rinse/repeat for each target unit as needed

Activate unit in charge phase:
Declare target for charge
Roll charge distance
Measure distance, then move model A
Measure distance, then move model B
Measure distance, then move model C
Measure distance, then move model D
Measure distance, then move model E
Measure distance, then move model F
Measure distance, then move model G
Measure distance, then move model H
Measure distance, then move model I
Measure distance, then move model J

Activate unit in fight phase:
Check if in fight range and declare target if multiple eligible for model A
Check if in fight range and declare target if multiple eligible for model B
Check if in fight range and declare target if multiple eligible for model C
Check if in fight range and declare target if multiple eligible for model D
Check if in fight range and declare target if multiple eligible for model E
Check if in fight range and declare target if multiple eligible for model F
Check if in fight range and declare target if multiple eligible for model G
Check if in fight range and declare target if multiple eligible for model H
Check if in fight range and declare target if multiple eligible for model I
Check if in fight range and declare target if multiple eligible for model J
Pool attacks for each target, roll them separately
Roll to hit (re-rolling as needed)
Roll to wound (re-rolling as needed)
Opponent rolls saves (re-rolling as needed)
Roll for damage (if applicable, re-rolling as needed)
Opponents rolls disgustingly resilient/feel no paint (if applicable, re-rolling as needed)
Rinse/repeat for each target as needed

Activate unit in Morale Phase, roll if needed to see if unit breaks, remove casualties if failed, roll attrition if failed, remove more casualties if needed

That looks way more fiddly to me. Especially once you realize the new edition has eliminated facings and completely reprogrammed movement and charging. Big hint - the entire unit declares a charge against a single enemy model/unit, only the first model is actually moved, the other models in the unit are placed within 2" of it and only get the charge bonus if they direct their attacks against a model/unit that the first model is in melee with - and units are now 3 or 5 models (plus attachements) instead of 10). So now the sequence is:

Unit declares a charge
Measure distance and move model A
Place model B within 2" of model A
Place model C within 2" of model A
Place model D within 2" of model A (if needed)
Place model E within 2" of model A (if needed)
Place model F within 2" of model A (if needed)
Model A -Roll to hit
Model A - Roll damage
Model B - Roll to hit
Model B - Roll damage
Model C - Roll to hit
Model C - Roll damage
Model D - Roll to hit (if needed)
Model D - Roll damage (if needed)
Model E - Roll to hit (if needed)
Model E - Roll damage (if needed)
Model F - Roll to hit (if needed)
Model F - Roll damage (if needed)

Oh look how much shorter that actually is. Even if you add in extra attacks for each model, it still works out ot be shorter, less fiddly, and more streamlined than the 40k process.

I don't see what's difficult to understand about warmachine being fiddly. And there'd be nothing wrong with simplifying it. It wouldn't make the game less tactical. You can make immensely tactical game with very simple mechanics.

Because its a false premise that isn't actually supported by reality, as I just demonstrated. Over 60 steps to describe the sequence of steps for a unit in 40k with its unit based activation, only 18 to describe nuMachine (even if there were the same number of models in the warmachine unit, nuMachine would still be half as many steps as 40k).

As for memorization, a single card has 10 basic stats you need to memorize. Then there are keyword abilities, then there are special abilities. The special abilities are almost all unique. Most weapons are to.
You need to do this for every unit in your army.

Not sure where you're getting 10 basic stats that you need to memorize - SPD, STR, MAT, RAT, DEF, ARM, CMD are it. Even if you add the additional stats for nuMachine (AAT, ARC, CTRL, which only some models have. CMD and STR have thats been removed entirely, so that situationally gets you to 8 max, but only 5 for most models, plus the base size which you absolutely don't need to memorize for obvious reasons). Lets compare to 40k though - M, WS, BS, S, T, W, A, LD, SV = thats 9 right off the bat, more than WMHDs has or had. To this you can also add invul saves - which should be on the datasheet but are only ever represented via wargear, except for daemons for some reason, and also in the case of some models bracket degredation, and then theres also psychic power casts and denies which should likewise be in the datasheet but are stuck in abilities text instead. And then there are the important keyword bits that you need to track (infantry vs monstroust creature vs vehicle vs beast, etc. being the most important) which add even more.

Speaking of abilities, do you like two abilities that do the exact same thing but with different names? How about two abilities with the exact same name that do different thigns? Because thats the reality in 40k (though thankfully recent faq/errata has fixed a lot of that). Either way, most units have a list of 2-3 abilities (sometimes more) that aren't even explained on their datasheet that you have to refer to a different section of the rulebook to read the text of, on top of another 2-3 (sometimes 6-7) separate special rules and abilities that might have anywhere from a sentence to a 3 paragraph explanation of how to use. WMHDs is much more manageable by comparison.

While I'm at it - how do you feel about 40k requiring a paragraph of text per datasheet to explain a models psychic abilities vs warmachine just giving you the relevant stats for the magic and a quick one sentence explanation of what each spell does? Right on the card, so you don't even have to memorize it (hell, you don't really have to memorize *anything* in warmachine because you have the cards right in front of you, no need to flip back and forth through your codex or refer back to other rulebooks for all the stuff your army can do that is printed elsewhere). In 40k you (once again) need to go to a different section of the book to read the 2 paragraph explanation of how each psychic power works.

And don't get me started on the 30+ strategems per codex...

Oh and back to units, lets look at weapons, 40k profile - Range, Type, ROF, S, AP, Damage, Abilities. WMHDs profile - RNG, ROF, AOE, POW (+ Abilities if applicable), melee weapons reduce this to RNG, POW, and P+S. Numachine has simplified this further to eliminate the P+S stat from melee weapons.

Also because the game lacks the ability to react mid turn to an opponent when he does something unexpected you need to predict what he'll do at your turn.
This means you also need to memorize this for every unit in his army.
Then you play more than one individual, using more than one army.

I must have missed all that mid-turn reaction I get to do in 40k when my opponent does something unexpected. Most games out there, especially the ones that you would likely believe to be less fiddly and more streamlined, don't feature any sort of mid-turn reaction and are simply "stand and wait while your opponent does his thing, then do it in reverse".

And no, you don't need to memorize your opponents entire army any more than you do in 40k or any other game. This is and always has been absolute bs as an argument.

And yes, the way people try to handle that is they will constantly ask about threat ranges, defense, special abilities etcetera, because it's simply not possible to memorize all of that stuff. They'll miss some stuff and they get wrecked. And it doesn't have to be like that either, and it's an obvious area for improvement, and it would make the game better if it was improved.

That's only two of the many many reason why the game is in the state it is today. No exaggeration.

Its not possible to memorize every strategem in 40k, nor every subfaction ability (especially once various codex build-you-own subfaction systems are introduced), nor every psychic power, warlord trait, relic, unit profile, weapon, etc. There are significantly more datasheets and rules in 40k then there are in WMHDs, and those datasheets and rules contain way more information on them just in terms of basic stats, even before you begin to account for all the additional rules sources like strats and relics. If 40k, with all of that, is the most popular game on the planet despite all of that then ipso facto "fiddliness" and "complexity" are not the reason for WMHDs being in a gutter.

Also lol at 'uh they're gonna call themelists something else that means it's different'.

Theres a huge difference in oldmachine theme lists vs numachine armies and its disingenous (once again) to pretend otherwise. The most obvious point is that theme lists came with inherent advantages and benefits, be it additional abilities and benefits granted to your units by the theme, free bonus models/units that you could add to your army at no additional cost, or out-of-faction models that you could bring in that would unlock synergies and capabilities that you wouldn't have access to otherwise. This is the reason why theme lists were basically played almost exclusively and as a result alienated so many people who wanted to play, say, Man O Wars + Doom Reavers (two sets of models that ostensibly can be played together by virtue of the fact that they are both part of the same army) but couldn't because doing so would break theme and put you at a disadvantage vs your opponent.

All of that is gone now and your army in nuMachine is just your army, no free bonus models, no additional advantages or benefits to be had, etc. You get what you pay for and nothing else. You probably still can't run Man O Wars + Doom Reavers (unless they release a cadre for one of those), but thats okay because Man O Wars and Doom Reavers are no longer being sold to you as compatible products that fight alongside one another - in much the same way that Astartes and Sisters of Battle are not being marketed to you that way either despite both being "Imperium".

The issue is if your problem with theme lists is at a conceptual level, the nuanced differences between them and mk4 armies don't really change what you're taking issue. They ARE different, but they're also the same, and in this case people are arguing that the aspects that are the same are the aspects they take issue with.

chaos0xomega wrote:

This is extremely disingenuous and you know it. If you're going to include every little step for WMHDs (really, "change facing to point to target" is a separate step? Everyone just does that as part of their move, and you don't get to list "roll to hit, roll damage" for WMHDs without going through the full attack sequence for what you're comparing it to) you should do the same for a game with unit activation, lets look at 40ks unit activation for example:

The only real problem with massed combat in WARMACHINE is that it's difficult to roll all the attacks at once, unless a player has ten sets of differently-coloured dice pairs. 2d6 for every roll is no problem when it's casters and a few jacks facing off, but blobs of infantry can be slow and fiddly.

Yea, but that doesn't mean that the conceptual issue is necessarily valid. The conceptual issue people have with theme lists principally boils down to the idea of "these guys both fight for the same nation, so I should be able to field them together", but they only really think that way by virtue of the fact that they used to be able to do so but can not do so any longer.

You see the same dynamic in 40k - "why are my chaos daemons a separate army from my chaos space marines, they should be together like they used to be" - but you don't see people make the same argument about imperial knights, despite the fictional relationship between those forces being basically identical to that of daemons and CSM. Why? Because Chaos Knights were never part of CSM the way daemons were.

You see the same on the Imperium side - people will bitch and moan about Inquisitors and "Imperial Agents" not being fieldable as part of guard/space marine factions the way they used to be - but you don't see people argue about Imperial Knights, Sisters, Imperial Guard, Space Marines, and Custodes all being separate factions. Why? Because they never were in the first place.

To me, it really seems more that the problem is really the perception that something was
"taken away" from players by changing it from what it was before, rather than an actual legitimate concern or issue based on an inherent concern. In other words, if the game had launched from the very beginning with the theme/army concept and players were locked into Man O Wars or Doom Reavers as separate armies from the very start, I very much doubt anyone at all would care or complain about it, in much the same way that nobody complains about Space Marines and Guard being different armies in 40k.

chaos0xomega wrote:

You see the same dynamic in 40k - "why are my chaos daemons a separate army from my chaos space marines, they should be together like they used to be" - but you don't see people make the same argument about knights, despite the fictional relationship between those forces being basically identical to that of daemons and CSM. Why? Because Chaos Knights were never part of CSM the way daemons were.

But they both have rules for being fielded together with CSM lmao

I'm not really arguing with you. I see it the same way and I suspect people will have more issue with legacy armies than new for the same perception based reasons. I just understand why explaining where they're different isn't going to really matter to people who are opposed to faction segregation on principle. It's just a different preference of list building that mostly comes down to a preference thing.

FWIW, I want my 8th edition Sister/DW/Grey Knight army to work again

 Shakalooloo wrote:

chaos0xomega wrote:

This is extremely disingenuous and you know it. If you're going to include every little step for WMHDs (really, "change facing to point to target" is a separate step? Everyone just does that as part of their move, and you don't get to list "roll to hit, roll damage" for WMHDs without going through the full attack sequence for what you're comparing it to) you should do the same for a game with unit activation, lets look at 40ks unit activation for example:

The only real problem with massed combat in WARMACHINE is that it's difficult to roll all the attacks at once, unless a player has ten sets of differently-coloured dice pairs. 2d6 for every roll is no problem when it's casters and a few jacks facing off, but blobs of infantry can be slow and fiddly.

Counterpoint: CMA and CRA exist, although admittedly they are only circumstantially useful (i.e. they aren't something you would want to use as a general attack by default into another unit for infantry). Another counterpoint, rolling to hit/dmg model by model generally moves a lot faster than the 40k buckets of dice approach where you need to hit, wound, save, roll damage, roll FNP, especially once you factor in re-rolls in the process). In my experience, the time it takes to process a unit of 10 models resolving one individual attack per model is roughly the same as processing a unit of 10 models in 40k chucking 20 dice for a rapid fire/assault 2/heavy 2, etc. type weapon. Just grabbing two dice, dropping them, adding the numbers together, grabbing them, dropping them again and adding the numbers together moves fast vs counting out 20+ dice, rolling them, picking out all the failures/successes, rerolling as needed, picking out the successes/failures again, rolling the successes, picking out all the failures/successes, rerolling as needed, picking out the successes/failures again, then counting them up so your opponent can pick up the appropriate number of dice, roll them, pick out failures/successes, reroll as needed, pick out failures/successes again, count them up and then tell you how many go through, so that you can potentially roll damage, reroll as needed communicate the damage dealt to your opponent so they can then apply damage one-by-one, potentially rolling FNPs with rerolls as needed to determine what model takes how many wounds, etc.. It only gets a little slower in WMHDs if your opponent is marking boxes/you're rolling hit locations (or if they need to make tough checks, etc.).


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Wha-Mu-077 wrote:

chaos0xomega wrote:

You see the same dynamic in 40k - "why are my chaos daemons a separate army from my chaos space marines, they should be together like they used to be" - but you don't see people make the same argument about knights, despite the fictional relationship between those forces being basically identical to that of daemons and CSM. Why? Because Chaos Knights were never part of CSM the way daemons were.

But they both have rules for being fielded together with CSM lmao

CSM/Daemons/Chaos Knights do. Aside from Imperial Knights, you don't really have that same flexibility on the Imperium side of the house (and I suspect the flexibility with daemons is only really there for legacy perception based reasons). Even still, just because you can mix the chaos factions doesn't necessarily mean you should/will want to (basically for the same reason you wouldn't want to run a WMHDs list out of theme) - I was very excited to run a trio of wardogs with my Thousand Sons, but in practice it turned out to be worse than just running pure TSons, the capability I gained did not make up for the amount of cabal points I lost by dropping ~450 points of TSons from my list. Likewise, I'm not really seeing daemons being able to bring anything to the table that would make them worthwhile in a CSM list - most of the capabilities that you would want from daemons are locked behind warp storm points and strats you can't use in an allied force, and when it comes to chaos knights in a CSM list, paying half of your starting CP for the privelege of running soup is something most people seem to agree is not a recipe for success.

I had to quote this bit because to me it’s really telling and obvious of what make WM an overly and unnecessarily complex game:

“… the amount of memorization actually needed is exaggerated. If you're getting hit by gotchas its because you have gakky opponents who aren't forthcoming with information (to be fair, thats a large segment of the remaining community for the game) or just aren't asking the right questions to get the information you need. "Whats that models DEF? Do you have any way of increasing it?", should be a standard question every time you play before you make any decision in which you are relying on certain outcomes, ditto ARM, SPD/threat range, MAT/RAT. Likewise, asking your opponent if they have any means for out-of-activation movement/attacks is a fairly simple question, as is the ability to move/reposition/control/knockdown/freeze your models. ”

Do you have any idea how long it would take to play a game when one has to ask these same questions almost every turn, for almost every model or unit?
This alone extends the turn by a factor of 10, easily. I don’t know about anyone else, but if I have to ask those questions as often as they need to be asked, I’d rather just play something else that doesn’t require as much memorizing or complexity.
If we’re playing with 5-10 models a side, this kind of complexity is fine. But with a potential 25-30 models or more? Crazy waste of time.

 Ghool wrote:
If we’re playing with 5-10 models a side, this kind of complexity is fine. But with a potential 25-30 models or more? Crazy waste of time.

Well, Warmachine is a skirmish game, so most forces should be less than 20 models. If anyone is playing games at a level where there are more than 20 models, I think the game isn't the one at fault there.

Looking at my 20pts forces they have the following models.

Khador 8
Cygnar 12
Menoth 17
Cryx 15
Retribution 16
Trollbloods 12
Legion 16
Circle 13
Skorne 15

But is this really different from 40k, where a normal army has 50-100 models, with unique rules, abilities, stratagems? And with 20+ factions. Or from malifaux, where you have tons of keywords. I think this is just a feature of complex wargames.

to clear up some thoughts from other people and to offer some changes that i think work really well.
- Mk4 had done away with facing
- Units sizes look to be cut in half
- I haven't played in 8 years..and ..still remembered most of the icons pretty easily
- The only gotcha that happened in my game was when I charged my opponent without asking about what they could do. And that was on me.

Admittedly..if you already hate warmachine's core rules set..then your not gonna like this one either. But in that case, start with "I don't like warmachine" so people know not to try to bother arguing the case.