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 H.B.M.C. wrote:

 Insectum7 wrote:
5th ed didn't have Hull Points Those came on in 6th.

Wow... really? Man... tells you how much attention I paid in 5th.

*checks rulebook*

Ok, up Defensive Weapons to S5. The idea that sponson Heavy Bolters aren't a "defensive" weapon is silly. Either that or all "pintle" and "sponson" weapons count as defensive regardless of what the weapon is.

Except that Lascannons and Plasma Cannons can be sponson weapons...

 Just Tony wrote:
Except that Lascannons and Plasma Cannons can be sponson weapons...

Yep. And?

 Just Tony wrote:
Except that Lascannons and Plasma Cannons can be sponson weapons...

Which is fine. The whole point of a sponson is that it's an independent gun, regardless of whether it has a heavy bolter or a plasma cannon. The sponson gunner on the left side of the tank isn't going to magically stop shooting at targets on the left side just because the turret gunner is engaging something on the right side.

Aecus Decimus wrote:

 Just Tony wrote:
Except that Lascannons and Plasma Cannons can be sponson weapons...

Which is fine. The whole point of a sponson is that it's an independent gun, regardless of whether it has a heavy bolter or a plasma cannon. The sponson gunner on the left side of the tank isn't going to magically stop shooting at targets on the left side just because the turret gunner is engaging something on the right side.

It wasn't about whether gun on right shoots at target but how many guns can fire on the move. Unlike now vehicles couldn't move full speed without any penalties. Defensive weapons gave ability to move and shoot with more light weapons.

tneva82 wrote:
It wasn't about whether gun on right shoots at target but how many guns can fire on the move. Unlike now vehicles couldn't move full speed without any penalties. Defensive weapons gave ability to move and shoot with more light weapons.

Oh right, splitting fire with the secondary guns was an upgrade on my Tau tanks in 5th, not a core rule. Still, it doesn't make a lot of sense that a secondary weapon with an independent gunner would care if the main turret has fired or not. The whole point of the sponson is that it acts independently from whatever the main gun is doing.

(TBH the whole mechanic didn't make much sense anyway and led to absurdities like a Vendetta only being able to fire one twin lascannon if it moved too fast despite all of them being fixed-mount guns that would fire simultaneously with one trigger pull.)

 H.B.M.C. wrote:

 Just Tony wrote:
Except that Lascannons and Plasma Cannons can be sponson weapons...

Yep. And?

Just seems counterintuitive to fairness or balance to include weapons capable of inflicting instant death as defensive weapons. Other than that, I totally agree with bringing back that mechanic.

Because they're sponson guns. They should be able to fire independently of the main guns. And a tank shouldn't have to fire all its guns at the same target, especially sponson weapons on the opposite side of the tank. Ditto for pintle weapons.

Anything "defensive" should be use as such - to defend the tank - and not be bound to fire at whatever the turret/main gun is dealing with.

 Gadzilla666 wrote:
Ehhh, I think that the "few pages of Core Rules" is a contributing factor to the current rules bloat mess, as the rules writers try to make up for the lack of substantial Core Rules by adding stuff into the codexes.

the current 40k core rules could probably fit on a single page if they weren't written in lawyer speech.

 VladimirHerzog wrote:

 Gadzilla666 wrote:
Ehhh, I think that the "few pages of Core Rules" is a contributing factor to the current rules bloat mess, as the rules writers try to make up for the lack of substantial Core Rules by adding stuff into the codexes.

the current 40k core rules could probably fit on a single page if they weren't written in lawyer speech.

If anything the last 5 years or so have reinforced they need to be in lawyer speak.

Dudeface wrote:

 VladimirHerzog wrote:

 Gadzilla666 wrote:
Ehhh, I think that the "few pages of Core Rules" is a contributing factor to the current rules bloat mess, as the rules writers try to make up for the lack of substantial Core Rules by adding stuff into the codexes.

the current 40k core rules could probably fit on a single page if they weren't written in lawyer speech.

If anything the last 5 years or so have reinforced they need to be in lawyer speak.

Amen, brother. 40K players will torture any rules ambiguity into the exact opposite of the designers intent.

 alextroy wrote:

Dudeface wrote:

 VladimirHerzog wrote:

 Gadzilla666 wrote:
Ehhh, I think that the "few pages of Core Rules" is a contributing factor to the current rules bloat mess, as the rules writers try to make up for the lack of substantial Core Rules by adding stuff into the codexes.

the current 40k core rules could probably fit on a single page if they weren't written in lawyer speech.

If anything the last 5 years or so have reinforced they need to be in lawyer speak.

Amen, brother. 40K players will torture any rules ambiguity into the exact opposite of the designers intent.

It's a twofold thing really. On the one hand you 100% have people trying to miss-interpret rules to gain advantage.

On the other hand GW has core rules, then they make a codex that changes some of those core rules, then they make another codex that also changes those core rules.

When those two codex meet the player ends up stuck trying to work out how to resolve things.


This is the whole layers of complexity thing. Because the information is often scattered around multiple pages and because its often breaking some rules and doing different things you end up in a muddle. Many times you can work it out, but its always open to interpretation and shifting around.




So one part is players, but another is 100% on GW

Regarding the number of weapons fired in 5th Ed, it also had that weird restrictions of MC only being able to fire 2 weapons, which was annoyingly restrictive on Tyranid MC which can have way more than 2 weapons.

While I understand the need for more complex core rules, I have been re-reading the 5th Ed core book and I have come to the conclusion that it is quite restrictive to armies that don't play the traditional Space Marine way.

E.g. the weapon rules are pretty much written with Imperial wargear on mind, specially the melee weapon rules which name drop power weapons and lightning claws and power firsts and chain fists. Maybe the weirdest examples with hindsight are poison rules which are only found in the melee weapons section and the complete lack of an armourbane rule even though melta rules are on the core book.

This has led me to doubt GW's ability to write a complex core rules without restricting and possibly crippling Xenos factions, or requiring Xenos books to break core rules to properly function.

"Breaking" core rules is fine so long as its done in one rule pass so that interactions cna be checked. Eg allowing Tryanid Monstrous creatures to fire more than 2 weapons is fine so long as its account for when the rule is made. Then they check to see if any abilities might counter that - eg some psychic power that only lets you fire 1 - and then review if that needs to change or not as its now more impactful to the Tyranid etc...


A lot of this comes from the fact that GW rebuilds their rules - now every 3 years - which means that they just don't have time to build the whole system in the background, test it, fix it, then test it in the wild and keep fixing.

In theory after 35 years they should have a super iron tight rules system. In reality they've a rules system that is only 3 years old and still teething before its all redone again.

Heck maybe the disjointed nature of how they publish rules in books (let alone between books) comes from staff who just don't care to streamline and organise the information because they will hardly have time to finish before they have to write it all out again.



Personally I wonder if GW might slow down and go to 5 year editions at some stage. I think the 3 year cycle (esp after 2 years of corona) is burning bridges with players new and old wanting to buy in all those rule books and codex and even on apps a 3 year cycle is insanely fast

It ought to be completely unnecessary to release a new edition every 3 years with all the balance dataslates and pts updates they are doing.

They should have at least made a beta rules thing for terrain, get that stuff tested on a wide scale before finalizing it for 10th. Scrap Stratagems for 6 months and try out the HH reactions or whatever crazy stuff they are planning for 10th. Reintroduce vehicle armour values for all I care.

They need to get that stuff out of their system with beta rules instead of dumping it into the edition update like 6th did with hull points, flyers and allies. Problems like "99% of factions have no way to deal with Flyers" or "haywire will kill a Land Raider in 5 hits" might have shown up on Dakka.

Hey, at least they aren't dumping the rules to entire factions on a WD article like they did with Inquisitors or The Fallen. I mean, imagine if LoV or Daemons dropped in a 1 page article in WD.

ccs wrote:

 H.B.M.C. wrote:

ccs wrote:
... and those of us left could just get on with playing.

... a massively inferior and hamstrung game.

8th & 9th are already that wether the pts you tally up have 1/2/3/or 4 digits to them. And 10th will be no better. Different yes, better no.

Compared to what? 7th?

FezzikDaBullgryn wrote:
Hey, at least they aren't dumping the rules to entire factions on a WD article like they did with Inquisitors or The Fallen. I mean, imagine if LoV or Daemons dropped in a 1 page article in WD.

Ah yes, because entire factions with full line-ups of units are obviously directly comparable to a bunch of random traitor Marines who've only ever been a single unit and one character, and the equivalent of the Imperium's secret police /s

Hecaton wrote:

ccs wrote:

 H.B.M.C. wrote:

ccs wrote:
... and those of us left could just get on with playing.

... a massively inferior and hamstrung game.

8th & 9th are already that wether the pts you tally up have 1/2/3/or 4 digits to them. And 10th will be no better. Different yes, better no.

Compared to what? 7th?

From context, 8th and/or 9th.

Hecaton wrote:

ccs wrote:

 H.B.M.C. wrote:

ccs wrote:
... and those of us left could just get on with playing.

... a massively inferior and hamstrung game.

8th & 9th are already that wether the pts you tally up have 1/2/3/or 4 digits to them. And 10th will be no better. Different yes, better no.

Compared to what? 7th?

I think what ccs is saying is that 9th's balance cannot get meaningfully worse and balance-concerned players are problematic. H.B.M.C. believes that balance could be meaningfully worse and that balance getting meaningfully worse would make the game less enjoyable.

 vict0988 wrote:

Hecaton wrote:

ccs wrote:

 H.B.M.C. wrote:

ccs wrote:
... and those of us left could just get on with playing.

... a massively inferior and hamstrung game.

8th & 9th are already that wether the pts you tally up have 1/2/3/or 4 digits to them. And 10th will be no better. Different yes, better no.

Compared to what? 7th?

I think what ccs is saying is that 9th's balance cannot get meaningfully worse and balance-concerned players are problematic. H.B.M.C. believes that balance could be meaningfully worse and that balance getting meaningfully worse would make the game less enjoyable.

I'm also saying that 8th & 9th overall are just gak editions to begin with rules wise. Compare to whatever other edition or other game you prefer.
Better than previous editions in more limited ways, worse in more.

THEN you add in balanced obsessed players, constant errata & rules shifts, the tourney worship, etc....

So no, I don't think making upgrades free makes things any worse.

If GW suddenly decided to give eldar easy to do secondaries or cut the point costs of csm or SoB by 1/6 th, the game would become substentialy worse. Like in a visible way. Pre last rules update, stuff may have been good for some, bad for some and got worse for others over time. But since 8th we didn't have armies that played soliter.

ccs wrote:


I'm also saying that 8th & 9th overall are just gak editions to begin with rules wise. Compare to whatever other edition or other game you prefer.
Better than previous editions in more limited ways, worse in more.

THEN you add in balanced obsessed players, constant errata & rules shifts, the tourney worship, etc....

So no, I don't think making upgrades free makes things any worse.

Why do you have more fun playing an unbalanced game, i.e. one where one of the players has an unearned advantage?

Hecaton wrote:

ccs wrote:


I'm also saying that 8th & 9th overall are just gak editions to begin with rules wise. Compare to whatever other edition or other game you prefer.
Better than previous editions in more limited ways, worse in more.

THEN you add in balanced obsessed players, constant errata & rules shifts, the tourney worship, etc....

So no, I don't think making upgrades free makes things any worse.

Why do you have more fun playing an unbalanced game, i.e. one where one of the players has an unearned advantage?

I never said I have more fun.
I have said, or at least implied, that I have the same amount of fun.

Slipspace wrote:

FezzikDaBullgryn wrote:
Hey, at least they aren't dumping the rules to entire factions on a WD article like they did with Inquisitors or The Fallen. I mean, imagine if LoV or Daemons dropped in a 1 page article in WD.

Ah yes, because entire factions with full line-ups of units are obviously directly comparable to a bunch of random traitor Marines who've only ever been a single unit and one character, and the equivalent of the Imperium's secret police /s

The fallen were literally a good 3rd or so of the DA if I recall correctly, and personally I think worth putting in a supplement or subfaction. At least make the option available via the DA rules. Inquisition has had several codexes in the past. Two (and a planned third) back in 3rd ed, and the weird Hybrid book in 7th called Imperial Agents. Then they give Half-gaked rules in a WD that doesn't even have a troops option. It's been in this weird limbo of faction/not a faction ever since Grey Knights and Sisters were split off circa 5th.

Sisters had their own book in 2nd. In 3rd they added in some inquisition in Codex Witch Hunters. Grey knights were in 3rd in Codex Daemon Hunters.

Didn't Sisters get the WD treatment for most of 8th and the first half of 9th as well?

You are thinking 6-7th. Sisters were in the 8th Edition Index and received one of the final 8th Edition Codexes.

 alextroy wrote:
You are thinking 6-7th. Sisters were in the 8th Edition Index and received one of the final 8th Edition Codexes.

Thank you. I appreciate the correction.

My most enjoyable experience in the last 20 years was during the first six months of 8E when we all had an Index to work with... Everyone's rules came out at the same time, and there was no 'Flavor of the Month'...

 Slayer6 wrote:
My most enjoyable experience in the last 20 years was during the first six months of 8E when we all had an Index to work with... Everyone's rules came out at the same time, and there was no 'Flavor of the Month'...

There most certainly was and not all index rules were made equal. It was also incredibly bland imo.