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Sgt. Cortez wrote:
In Star Trek attack Wing you just put the ships on longer and shorter pegs when they are too close to each other (you can even switch while playing). Works most of the time.

In most starship miniature games I play, battleships get a longer base stem than cruiser class, which are in turn longer than escorts.

Has always whirled out fairly well.

Hah, I always went the other way just for stability reasons

 Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote:

Not sure I’ve explained that well. Star Wars. Imperials have larger, more individually powerful ships, made ponderous by greater planning needed. Rebellion has smaller ships which need to be used in concert, but are more reactive. Both sides have advantages and disadvantages. BFG lacks that fairly stark difference in ship types, if not classes across the fleets, so may not need it in the same way?

Hmm don't really agree with that - smaller escorts and light cruisers are very maneuvorable compared to major capital ships and the various Xenos fleets do play very differently - especially Eldar.

 Mr Morden wrote:

 Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote:

Not sure I’ve explained that well. Star Wars. Imperials have larger, more individually powerful ships, made ponderous by greater planning needed. Rebellion has smaller ships which need to be used in concert, but are more reactive. Both sides have advantages and disadvantages. BFG lacks that fairly stark difference in ship types, if not classes across the fleets, so may not need it in the same way?

Hmm don't really agree with that - smaller escorts and light cruisers are very maneuvorable compared to major capital ships and the various Xenos fleets do play very differently - especially Eldar.

I always put BFG down in the 'deceptively simple base rules' pile - unless you have direct play experience with or against a particular fleet, they all look pretty same-ish on the face of it, a statblock, some lances some batteries some ordnance yadda yadda yadda, with nary a special rule in sight. That's very different from the current style of e.g. 40k, where there's a huge armoury of very different equipment, stacked with special rules on top.

For BFG, it’s all in the ranges.

Chaos typically had longer ranged weapons, which seems an advantage until you remember your opponent will be looking to close that range as quickly as possible, so simply standing back and shooting was rarely an option.

Eldar had fairly swingy weapons. Comparatively underpinned compared to others, but adept at directing the flow of the engagement.

Orks? Well you never really knew what an Ork ship was going to do, due to randomised firepower values. A decent Orky Admiral accounted for that, assuming lower rolls, whereas opponents might bank on those lower rolls.

Tau had turreted weapons, making them harder to properly outmanoeuvre.

Necrons were just super hard - but vomitted up loads of VPs when crippled or destroyed.

It’s a truly great little game.

 Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote:
For BFG, it’s all in the ranges.

Chaos typically had longer ranged weapons, which seems an advantage until you remember your opponent will be looking to close that range as quickly as possible, so simply standing back and shooting was rarely an option.

Eldar had fairly swingy weapons. Comparatively underpinned compared to others, but adept at directing the flow of the engagement.

Orks? Well you never really knew what an Ork ship was going to do, due to randomised firepower values. A decent Orky Admiral accounted for that, assuming lower rolls, whereas opponents might bank on those lower rolls.

Tau had turreted weapons, making them harder to properly outmanoeuvre.

Necrons were just super hard - but vomitted up loads of VPs when crippled or destroyed.

It’s a truly great little game.

The Necrons didn't work in terms of balance. VPs alone are not a good way to balance. Sure, the opponent might "win" a battle by scratching the Necron flagship, but it sure doesn't feel like victory when the rest of their fleet is burning wreckage and space dust while the Necron fleet is still battle worthy. Imagine you get tabled/wiped out in a 40K game while the enemy army is almost intact, but you win on VPs. Technically you won but it leaves a bad taste in the mouth as it sure doesn't feel like victory. Sure, in universe that may be how the Imperium counts victories, but in terms of game design it's not a good experience for the player.

The BFG campaign system didn't have a good answer to this. A canny Necron player could "lose" the first few battles but utterly destroy the enemy fleet. As new ship replacements for destroyed ships had low Ld, this meant the replacement fleet had difficulty doing anything that required Ld tests, and was vulnerable. This led to a runaway advantage for the Necron player who could then sweep the later battles and win the campaign.

BFG's major weakness is not so much that but in the faction imbalance.

Orks really stood no chance against a competent Eldar player.

Eldar stood no chance against even a novice Necron player.

BFG had a clever balance between Imperial and Chaos fleets, Andy Chambers knew his trade, the fleets do not appear balanced but they are. Chambers knew how to factor in a soft criteria. The problem is the creep when adding other factions. The BBB was never properly balanced because Orks vs Eldar was included in the most elementary portion of th4 game, and the only mitigation against being picked apart by Eldar for the Orks, which are roks were not included in this iteration. Even Andy Chambers feths up on occassion, but in reality both Eldar and Orjks were Opfor to be played against the two mainstay factions that game was all about, so it could be forgiven.

Necrons on the other hand tipped the game over the edge. Yes Chaos and Imperial can beat them, Orks also had a reasonable chance because of the quirks of that fleet.
You had to play the psychology game with Necrons and force them to choose to brace or not brace and react accordingly. This reaction could not be via manoeuver but by target allocation.
For this reason the less scary Necron fleets are the most dangerous. There are plenty of mind games you can play with a Tombship, many of them can reduce it to a paperweight while you destroy his fleet. Yes you can out and out win against Necrons, but it is never easy, and if you don't see the meta then you are reliant on a whole lot of luck.

Eldar of all stripes simply don't have a chance. Necrons are the one fleet that can outmanoeuver them, and Necron weapons wipe Eldar from space bypassing all their normal defences. Frankly the Necron rules were due a top down rewrite before this matchup was even remotely playable.

Tyranids were somewhat different also, but handlable and not unfair. Tau, Space Marines, Admech etc were all 'the same' just stat flips on top of normal fleet dynamics. That isn't a criticism by the way, not every fleet has to behave radically differently.

.

 lord_blackfang wrote:

Backfire wrote:
My hopes are not up for any potential BFG rerelease. If it happens, it will probably have greatly simplified rules "to make it more accessible",

Which happened with exactly one out of all the specialist games they've re-released and the rest of what you said mostly didn't either.

Which game was that Lord Blackfang? I would say both Necromunda and Blood Bowl have been made more complicated with the new releases, certainly if you try to use all of the expansion material.
Adeptus Titanicus I can't comment on as I have not played either old or new versions, although I can hazard a guess looking at the number of rule and campaign books.

The Necrons were just straight out overpowered.

They literally as originally written had incredible durability with their brace ability (the armor reduction effect only came in later as an attempt to weaken the ability), weapons that had all the advantages of the Eldar ones in ignoring target aspect and holofields, and then also ignoring holofields and void shields on a 6 for the particle whip lance equivalent, and then also be the fastest fleet in terms of straight speed on AAF special orders. Basically the Necrons got given durability, firepower, and speed. They had no weaknesses in their first rules version. Then to top it off they had their sepulchre ability which caused permanent Ld reduction on a failed Ld test, and even on a successful Ld test, the enemy ship still took damage, which almost meant auto kill on any enemy escort in range. The star pulse ability which was an AoE that could wipe out small craft and most critically also detonate all Eldar escorts in the area since they ignored holofields. Some of the Necron rules were written seemingly as a hard counter to the Eldar.

It was frankly obscene how ridiculously overpowered their rules were. Then they tried to "balance" by using VPs, but as I wrote earlier, it's still no fun as a game for the opponent. Then they tried to weaken some abilities (and limit sepulchres to just 1 per fleet), but I would say it was still too little too late.

Tsagualsa wrote:


The Vengeance class and their sister classes nicely show the step between 'Arrow'-style Heresy hulls and 'Hammer Prow' current-era imperial designs. Note the intermediate prow design and the Arrow-style stern:

Vengeance is a very clumsy visual design, with Chaos and Imperial ships mashed together like by a beginner kitbasher. I admit the ship actually looks good if you only look the side profile, but on tabletop, it is an ugly ungainly duckbill.


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Iracundus wrote:

 Haighus wrote:

IIRC, each Segmentum has its own pattern of ships produced in the Segmentum Fortress, plus some other patterns from major forgeworlds, so it is easy to introduce new patterns. The classic Imperial armoured prow is either Jovian or Martian IIRC, the "Chaos" design is from Cypra Mundi, and there are designs for (I think) Bakka and Voss pattern ships and prows in the old model range. I may be mixing up Bakka and Kar Duniash for the Rogue Trader cruiser model.

The "newer" Imperial designs now favored by the 40K Imperium are a concession to loss of technology. The arrowhead designs seen now in the Chaos fleets had more powerful engines and more high powered energy weapons (lances), which over time it seems the Imperium found more and more difficult to produce and maintain. The Martian or Jovian school of design ("armored prow") seems to have become dominant as the simple expedient of slapping on slabs of armor over the front and using torpedo tubes was more doable than maintaining long range lances.

Also, the "Chaos" designs, or "Cypra Mundi" pattern, proved to be more vulnerable to various Warp influences.
Supposedly, Vengeance was a sort of 'prototype' which attempted to correct perceived problems of the earlier patterns and subsesquent 'Mars pattern' ships were developed from that. However, all of these designs are extremely ancient, probably predating Horus Heresy.

Third pattern is the Voss type, but it is only used for cruiser sized vessels and smaller.

Any way, the "Patterns" are more akin to specification lists, rather than blueprints, so the ships of the same 'class' may look substantially different depending on where they were built.

There are Voss-pattern battleship prow designs as well- the Apocalypse/Oberon model has the Voss prow.

Are Cypra Mundi vessels more prone to warp corruption, or is that superstition and they merely make better raiding vessels and were therefore targeted by traitors before they unveiled their true colours? Speed and independence from logistical supply are important for pirate activity.

 Haighus wrote:
There are Voss-pattern battleship prow designs as well- the Apocalypse/Oberon model has the Voss prow.

Are Cypra Mundi vessels more prone to warp corruption, or is that superstition and they merely make better raiding vessels and were therefore targeted by traitors before they unveiled their true colours? Speed and independence from logistical supply are important for pirate activity.

The Apocalypse class had the option to have a torpedo prow instead of the nova cannon, and this prow would have looked like the Retribution style prow. There can be all sorts of variations to the original ships depending on where they are assigned, battle damage, etc... No nova cannon in the entire sector to replace the destroyed one? Let's put torpedoes on instead and get the ship back out there.

Some ship designs did seem more prone to corruption though a more thorough reading of the BFG background also suggests other more mundane reasons. The Warp Storm BFG supplement has a section on Styx class carriers and how some captains denounced the Imperium as they found their ships neglected in terms of refitting and rearming compared to the newer Martian style battlecruisers. The reasons may be political but perhaps also technical. Maybe the older ships were neglected because the Tech Priests couldn't maintain and refit them anymore but did not want to admit it.

Iracundus wrote:

 Haighus wrote:
There are Voss-pattern battleship prow designs as well- the Apocalypse/Oberon model has the Voss prow.

Are Cypra Mundi vessels more prone to warp corruption, or is that superstition and they merely make better raiding vessels and were therefore targeted by traitors before they unveiled their true colours? Speed and independence from logistical supply are important for pirate activity.

The Apocalypse class had the option to have a torpedo prow instead of the nova cannon, and this prow would have looked like the Retribution style prow. There can be all sorts of variations to the original ships depending on where they are assigned, battle damage, etc... No nova cannon in the entire sector to replace the destroyed one? Let's put torpedoes on instead and get the ship back out there.

Some ship designs did seem more prone to corruption though a more thorough reading of the BFG background also suggests other more mundane reasons. The Warp Storm BFG supplement has a section on Styx class carriers and how some captains denounced the Imperium as they found their ships neglected in terms of refitting and rearming compared to the newer Martian style battlecruisers. The reasons may be political but perhaps also technical. Maybe the older ships were neglected because the Tech Priests couldn't maintain and refit them anymore but did not want to admit it.

That is the kind of stuff I was thinking- factors not based in some warp flaw, but in reasons that favour the crew going rogue. I think there are a couple of classes that did seem to have an issue with warp contamination, but cannot remember which off the top of my head.

Neglect due to technical decline and political factors feels very likely.

 Haighus wrote:

Iracundus wrote:

 Haighus wrote:
There are Voss-pattern battleship prow designs as well- the Apocalypse/Oberon model has the Voss prow.

Are Cypra Mundi vessels more prone to warp corruption, or is that superstition and they merely make better raiding vessels and were therefore targeted by traitors before they unveiled their true colours? Speed and independence from logistical supply are important for pirate activity.

The Apocalypse class had the option to have a torpedo prow instead of the nova cannon, and this prow would have looked like the Retribution style prow. There can be all sorts of variations to the original ships depending on where they are assigned, battle damage, etc... No nova cannon in the entire sector to replace the destroyed one? Let's put torpedoes on instead and get the ship back out there.

Some ship designs did seem more prone to corruption though a more thorough reading of the BFG background also suggests other more mundane reasons. The Warp Storm BFG supplement has a section on Styx class carriers and how some captains denounced the Imperium as they found their ships neglected in terms of refitting and rearming compared to the newer Martian style battlecruisers. The reasons may be political but perhaps also technical. Maybe the older ships were neglected because the Tech Priests couldn't maintain and refit them anymore but did not want to admit it.

That is the kind of stuff I was thinking- factors not based in some warp flaw, but in reasons that favour the crew going rogue. I think there are a couple of classes that did seem to have an issue with warp contamination, but cannot remember which off the top of my head.

Neglect due to technical decline and political factors feels very likely.

The flaw was I think IIRC for the Despoiler class battleship and maybe Hades heavy cruiser. I think it was claimed that some hidden flaw in the hull design or the gellar field attracted corruption and daemonic attention. Maybe that was deliberate sabotage either in the design and/or construction stage. Alternatively maybe it was just a purely innocent technical error resulting in a leaky field letting in dark thoughts that over time wear away at a crew's mental fortitude and sanity.

What we do know is that the forces of Chaos have certainly built more of some ships like the Despoiler class battleship. Only 3 were ever built by the Imperium, and all their names are known. However in the various GW and BL stories, there are other Despoiler battleships with ship names given, which cannot be possible unless Chaos forces have been able to make more.

 Haighus wrote:

Are Cypra Mundi vessels more prone to warp corruption, or is that superstition and they merely make better raiding vessels and were therefore targeted by traitors before they unveiled their true colours?

If one believes it is, then it is

Been nosing around eBay for the BFG and Armada books.

Good Gravy, Maureen, I wish I’d never sold my originals!

Keep a bit of your sanity by remembering that often as not these days a LOT of trading happens on Facebook trade groups and what gets left on ebay of the rare stuff is often the stuff that's just way overpriced. Which is why its still there month after month.

Sure they can sell at those prices, but often not very quickly.

True.

Besides, this year’s Grail is a copy of Titan Legions. Just need to wait until May when I should have sufficient disposable to splash out a wee bit.

Not terribly fussed re the models, but I want the books, templates and cards etc.

 Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote:
For BFG, it’s all in the ranges.

It's a lot of little things. Chaos ships have generally greater range than their Imperial counterparts, but also slightly higher speeds, and prow-mounted weapons- often with 270-degree arcs. While Imperial capital ships in addition to shorter range have the 6+ armored prow and prow-mounted torpedoes. You put those together and you get Imperial ships that want to present front to the enemy, close as quickly as possible, and launch torpedoes before settling in for a knife-fight broadside duel. Meanwhile, Chaos fleets want to stay at range and whittle the enemy down, raking them across the prow as they close.

It's elegant design in that the fleets are strongly differentiated through their weapon availability and basic statlines, and not through an avalanche of special rules or bespoke weapon profiles for each faction. Even when you bring in fleets other than the core two, most of their special rules and equipment work within the existing paradigm, rather than inventing totally new mechanics.

I have very little confidence that a GW remake would/will retain that elegance, but the community-maintained rules aren't going anywhere, and same for the 3D-printable ships.

 Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote:
True.

Besides, this year’s Grail is a copy of Titan Legions. Just need to wait until May when I should have sufficient disposable to splash out a wee bit.

Not terribly fussed re the models, but I want the books, templates and cards etc.

Give me a nudge I've got Titan Legions - and a bunch of epic 40K stuff too.

FB groups are definitely the way to go. You get hobbyists selling to hobbyists and very reasonable prices for the most part. I wouldn't have been able to complete my Epic collection without them.

Ebay has become a joke, with a handful of accounts like Goldfish Blue buying up everything and then doing things like re-listing just Marneus Calgar's arm for £15

Ebay doing that also makes it a nightmare for people looking to make an honest sale because it skews the perception of value of things.

It's elegant design in that the fleets are strongly differentiated through their weapon availability and basic statlines, and not through an avalanche of special rules or bespoke weapon profiles for each faction. Even when you bring in fleets other than the core two, most of their special rules and equipment work within the existing paradigm, rather than inventing totally new mechanics.

Except for Eldar. One of the core 4 fleets that completely changes everything about the game, from movement to special weapons to swapping shields for holofields. It makes sense fluffwise that Eldar should be very different, but gameplaywise they were just not very fun, the holofields made lances worthless but barely protected you against weapons batteries. I bought a used Ork fleet from somebody back in the day and instantly had a lot more fun playing, even though the Orks were a much weaker fleet. Recently played BFG for the first time many many years using the Eldar and it really sealed how unfun the game design for them is. both playing with them and against them. Somewhere on my computer I have a fan list that completely revamps the fleet and brings them in line with the other 3 fleets, removes Holofields completely and gives them normal shields and also basic movement, just faster and with better turnrates than Imperials. I'd like to see the same thing happen for a BFG rerelease, but unfortunately I don't trust GW to get it right and it's probably better if they just the rules alone. Pull a Blood Bowl 2016 and release new pretty plastics with new pretty rulebooks but fundamentally unchanged rules

 Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote:
Been nosing around eBay for the BFG and Armada books.

Good Gravy, Maureen, I wish I’d never sold my originals!

There is the remastered consolidated books available online...


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 catbarf wrote:

It's elegant design in that the fleets are strongly differentiated through their weapon availability and basic statlines, and not through an avalanche of special rules or bespoke weapon profiles for each faction. Even when you bring in fleets other than the core two, most of their special rules and equipment work within the existing paradigm, rather than inventing totally new mechanics.

I have very little confidence that a GW remake would/will retain that elegance, but the community-maintained rules aren't going anywhere, and same for the 3D-printable ships.

Yes it would be changed to a bluntly designed special rulesfest. The game has several design problems for modern GW. It requires card bits. It has a low model count. It takes a long time to play. No way it would survive in its old form.

 Pacific wrote:

 lord_blackfang wrote:

Backfire wrote:
My hopes are not up for any potential BFG rerelease. If it happens, it will probably have greatly simplified rules "to make it more accessible",

Which happened with exactly one out of all the specialist games they've re-released and the rest of what you said mostly didn't either.

Which game was that Lord Blackfang? I would say both Necromunda and Blood Bowl have been made more complicated with the new releases, certainly if you try to use all of the expansion material.
Adeptus Titanicus I can't comment on as I have not played either old or new versions, although I can hazard a guess looking at the number of rule and campaign books.

Necromunda if anything is less accessible rules-wise than it was in the 90s

Aeronautica is the only one that actually has dumbed down "accessible" rules. And it's also the only one that sells like gak, so GW got its feedback.
I really woulnd't worry about BFG on that account.

To be fair Aeronautica also got the least model releases. Heck I'm still waiting for Tyranids!!

Aeronautica is an example of GW prying failure out of the jaws of success, and then kicking success in the kidneys a couple of times just to keep it from getting up.

Kalamadea wrote:Except for Eldar. One of the core 4 fleets that completely changes everything about the game, from movement to special weapons to swapping shields for holofields. It makes sense fluffwise that Eldar should be very different, but gameplaywise they were just not very fun, the holofields made lances worthless but barely protected you against weapons batteries. I bought a used Ork fleet from somebody back in the day and instantly had a lot more fun playing, even though the Orks were a much weaker fleet. Recently played BFG for the first time many many years using the Eldar and it really sealed how unfun the game design for them is. both playing with them and against them. Somewhere on my computer I have a fan list that completely revamps the fleet and brings them in line with the other 3 fleets, removes Holofields completely and gives them normal shields and also basic movement, just faster and with better turnrates than Imperials. I'd like to see the same thing happen for a BFG rerelease, but unfortunately I don't trust GW to get it right and it's probably better if they just the rules alone. Pull a Blood Bowl 2016 and release new pretty plastics with new pretty rulebooks but fundamentally unchanged rules

Yup, I didn't mention them but Eldar were the odd duck. I really like the fanmade MMS (move-move-shoot) ruleset. They still have the unique movement mode of turning and then moving in a straight line, but do it twice in a row in the movement phase rather than once in the movement phase and again in the ordnance phase. It also gives them conventional shields, and while they retain holofields, they're changed to a saving throw against certain weapon types that depends on distance and doesn't get better than 5+. And the crit chance is reduced from 4+ to 5+, so they still get critted more often than other races, but not excessively so. All in all it brings them more in line with the other factions while still keeping some distinct character.

 BobtheInquisitor wrote:
Aeronautica is an example of GW prying failure out of the jaws of success, and then kicking success in the kidneys a couple of times just to keep it from getting up.

It could have been a nice, not overly demanding sidegame for 40k players that expanded on an aspect of the background that is by necessity rather underrepresented.

Instead it's two dozen imperial planes against what feels like a total of a dozen for all other factions combined, and extremely lame.

Tsagualsa wrote:

 BobtheInquisitor wrote:
Aeronautica is an example of GW prying failure out of the jaws of success, and then kicking success in the kidneys a couple of times just to keep it from getting up.

It could have been a nice, not overly demanding sidegame for 40k players that expanded on an aspect of the background that is by necessity rather underrepresented.

Instead it's two dozen imperial planes against what feels like a total of a dozen for all other factions combined, and extremely lame.

Aeronautica suffered from the classic one-two punch of Games Workshop releasing way too many Imperial things and then not giving much of anything to any other faction.

The Imperium has 11 plastic kits and 4 resin ones.

Orks have 4 plastic kits and 1 resin one.
Eldar have 2 plastic ktis and 3 resin ones.
T'au have 2 plastic kits and 1 resin one.
And then Necrons have a glorious one singular resin kit.

Meaning that, in total, all other factions combined have less stuff total than the Imperials. And, I don't know about you, but playing a faction that has a grand total of a three things avalible to it doesn't exactly sound appealing to me.