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 Jidmah wrote:

 Insectum7 wrote:
Problems from previous editions mostly arose from the notion of "draw lines through the corners" of models that don't have corners. And ghosttown dakka is naturally still going to have contrarian positions because it's the internet.

But gaslighting I am not. Simple rules get you 95-99% of the way there, and the 4+ "arbitration roll" does the rest.

A rule failing 1-5% of the time means dozens discussions over the course of a crusade and hundreds in a large event.
A rule for something as elemental to the game as shooting vehicles needs to work 100%, with zero room for interpretation, which is what we have currently.

I don't interpret it as a "fail". If there's any question about facing then there's a roughly equal chance it could be either way, so a 4+ to decide is mathematically accurate.

And the upside of having facings in terms of making unit positioning matter is well worth it.

 Jidmah wrote:

But also for "modern games" are you discounting AI, which apparently works on quad-facing?

Are we talking about the game with the hexagonal bases which show facings?

I don't see bases on vehicles. I may be mistaking AI with LI. "New Epic". I guess I don't know what AI is then.

I don't like how 40k games are strictly limited to five turns. Of course, you can do anything with your friends in a casual setting, but the rule just seems so limiting. I think upping it to about seven would be good.

Get rid of the 'combi-weapon' designation for unique combi-weapons. They should not all have the same stats, and the way they work in-game makes them seem like some kind of weird shotgun.

 Orkeosaurus wrote:
Even if vehicle facings have a bit of ambiguity, surely True Line of Sight has that problem a million times over?

At least vehicle facings are only in two dimensions, I remember TLoS causing way more issues back when both were in place.

You're missing a very crucial distinction between TLoS and vehicle facings: TLoS is part of the current ruleset and therefore a fast-playing abstraction, while vehicle facings are part of older editions and therefore clunky and prone to arguments.

^Tee hee.

 catbarf wrote:

 Orkeosaurus wrote:
Even if vehicle facings have a bit of ambiguity, surely True Line of Sight has that problem a million times over?

At least vehicle facings are only in two dimensions, I remember TLoS causing way more issues back when both were in place.

You're missing a very crucial distinction between TLoS and vehicle facings: TLoS is part of the current ruleset and therefore a fast-playing abstraction, while vehicle facings are part of older editions and therefore clunky and prone to arguments.

Nah, TLOS can burn and I will bring smores.

Can we bring back the "no premeasuring" rule. I played a game Saturday where I thought my opponent was going to make blueprints of the table with the amount of measurements he took.

Heck. Then we can bring back targeters on Kasrkin.

 Lathe Biosas wrote:
Can we bring back the "no premeasuring" rule. I played a game Saturday where I thought my opponent was going to make blueprints of the table with the amount of measurements he took.

Heck. Then we can bring back targeters on Kasrkin.

By itself, I don't think "no premeasuring" adds anything at all to the game. It's basically just a "how good are you at eyeballing things" test that makes your mortar shell poof into the aether because actually you were 48.1" away (and it is literally impossible for any form of projectile to fly or scatter beyond it's max range, of course).
Now, if we included a change-up so that shots over the max range of the weapon kept going with a to-hit malus, that might be worthwhile (and would fit neatly with the addition of weapon range bands overall, which I like the idea of). Barring that, though, it's just a way to give people with forearms exactly 18" long an advantage over everyone else for unclear reasons.

 Lathe Biosas wrote:
Can we bring back the "no premeasuring" rule. I played a game Saturday where I thought my opponent was going to make blueprints of the table with the amount of measurements he took.

Heck. Then we can bring back targeters on Kasrkin.

I assure you, someone can find a way to be neurotic and annoying without premeasuring too

 Insectum7 wrote:

 Jidmah wrote:

But also for "modern games" are you discounting AI, which apparently works on quad-facing?

Are we talking about the game with the hexagonal bases which show facings?

I don't see bases on vehicles. I may be mistaking AI with LI. "New Epic". I guess I don't know what AI is then.

AI = Aeronautica Imperialis - the aircraft game.
LI = Legion Imperialis - "new, xenos-free, Epic" Or a friend calls it: Micro-Heresy

ccs wrote:

AI = Aeronautica Imperialis - the aircraft game.
LI = Legion Imperialis - "new, xenos-free, Epic" Or a friend calls it: Micro-Heresy

Ahh, thank you!

 LunarSol wrote:

 Lathe Biosas wrote:
Can we bring back the "no premeasuring" rule. I played a game Saturday where I thought my opponent was going to make blueprints of the table with the amount of measurements he took.

Heck. Then we can bring back targeters on Kasrkin.

I assure you, someone can find a way to be neurotic and annoying without premeasuring too

I got it! Turn time limits.

UGOIGO works better if its not I go, then while you are going, I can go do laundry, fix myself something to eat and you are still pondering how to move a tank.

 Insectum7 wrote:
Crossing the T is also a good one, but the loss of resolution is too much, imo. With Front/Side/Rear you get the opportunity to differentiate armor design more, such as having vehicles that are more armored on the sides, or even equal to the front, the way Eldar vehicles used to be. Or vehicles which really only benefit from narrow front angles, like the ol' Basilisk. I think that resolution is proper for 40k. As pointed out above, AI and old Epic iirc used quad-facing, and those are tiny models. Feels shameful for vehicle facing to have less resolution in a game where the models are 10x the size.

I'd be down with a hybrid system though. Smaller vehicles using the cross-T, like Vypers.

You can cross the T from both directions as well.

Just determine the general direction of the attacker's shots and cross the T on the front or back of the vehicle - whichever is closest to the attacker (you could cross it in both directions to make an I if you really want to make doubly sure). The resulting right angled locations are the same as a circular method, just perpendicular/parrallel to the vehicle rather than always at 45 degrees.

You're just trying to determine if the attacker is in the front or rear of the vehicle. Anything else is side.

^If I understand the proposal correctly, anything not front or back is a very narrow band defined by the two parallel lines.

 Insectum7 wrote:
^If I understand the proposal correctly, anything not front or back is a very narrow band defined by the two parallel lines.

They will be as narrow as the vehicle is long front to back. Given that the scheme for side armour was either the same as front or only slightly lower, it doesnt change things much.

its whether its in the rear or not is generally the most important

Question, Insectum, relating to your quartered diagram of the Eldar vehicle on the previous page - was that what you were suggesting people work out themselves for each vehicle as it comes up, or that GW include that as a template/reference in the 'dex (and/or assembly instructions, and/or as a PDF on WarCom if they're feeling helpful, and/or in some form of 40k app)?

 Jidmah wrote:

 Insectum7 wrote:

 Wyldhunt wrote:

Well, you'd have to address the biggest problem with armor facing, which was always, "Where exactly is the 'side' armor?"

I happen to have an image uploaded that solves this problem.
<image>
It's not rocket science.

Cool. Now do it for every single vehicle in the game. I'm especially curious about defilers, triach stalkers and battlewagons.

It would be easy to put a little diagram in the corner of every vehicle datasheet if GW brought the rule back for 11e.

A rule for something as elemental to the game as shooting vehicles needs to work 100%, with zero room for interpretation, which is what we have currently.

But we don't because you still need TLoS to shoot it.

This whole thing strikes me as a fake problem. I played 40k for years with vehicle facings and I played Warmachine for years with unmarked bases. I remember very few arguments concerning either. There were more arguments concerning move distances and ranges, and far more concerning line of sight.

I mean I'll believe that you've seen internet threads arguing over where the center of a falcon is, but did you see a real game where the players had that argument? I don't think I have. But I've seen lots of arguments over who can shoot or whether a model can make a charge. Those just don't make for good internet debates because they only exist for that table. So looking at internet debates gives you a distorted view of where ambiguity lies in a real game.

 Dysartes wrote:
Question, Insectum, relating to your quartered diagram of the Eldar vehicle on the previous page - was that what you were suggesting people work out themselves for each vehicle as it comes up, or that GW include that as a template/reference in the 'dex (and/or assembly instructions, and/or as a PDF on WarCom if they're feeling helpful, and/or in some form of 40k app)?

My ideal would be that players could work it out based on simple instructions like "center of mass" or whatnot. But then for "competetive" types, a free pdf file.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Hellebore wrote:

 Insectum7 wrote:
^If I understand the proposal correctly, anything not front or back is a very narrow band defined by the two parallel lines.

They will be as narrow as the vehicle is long front to back. Given that the scheme for side armour was either the same as front or only slightly lower, it doesnt change things much.

its whether its in the rear or not is generally the most important

The diffetences in angle between the two methods is pretty extreme though. Having the side arc extruded straight outwards seems wonky to me.

 Lathe Biosas wrote:
Can we bring back the "no premeasuring" rule. I played a game Saturday where I thought my opponent was going to make blueprints of the table with the amount of measurements he took.

Premeasuring only slows down the game when spacing is so critical that you're incentivized to heavily scrutinize distances. Eg, you must perfectly space out your units to deny Deep Strike or a suicide unit will drop into your backfield with 100% precision and nuke your commander and cost you the game. Whereas in older editions when Deep Strike was mediated by scatter, the exact distance was less important, you just made a heuristic call about how likely it was for your opponent to attempt it and how likely they were to scatter into an invalid location and die.

At the same time, the use of templates in those editions incentivized perfectly positioning all your dudes exactly 2" away from one another to minimize the effects of blast. You either spread out your dudes enough to not get templated, or you didn't. Exact positioning was extremely important and so players agonized over movement and spacing.

Make fractions of an inch less critical and people will stop worrying over fractions of an inch.

 catbarf wrote:

Make fractions of an inch less critical and people will stop worrying over fractions of an inch.

One of the best things about MCP I've realized is that its impossible to contest an objective without being in melee range of another model contesting the same objective.

 Orkeosaurus wrote:

 Jidmah wrote:

 Insectum7 wrote:

 Wyldhunt wrote:

Well, you'd have to address the biggest problem with armor facing, which was always, "Where exactly is the 'side' armor?"

I happen to have an image uploaded that solves this problem.
<image>
It's not rocket science.

Cool. Now do it for every single vehicle in the game. I'm especially curious about defilers, triach stalkers and battlewagons.

It would be easy to put a little diagram in the corner of every vehicle datasheet if GW brought the rule back for 11e.

A rule for something as elemental to the game as shooting vehicles needs to work 100%, with zero room for interpretation, which is what we have currently.

But we don't because you still need TLoS to shoot it.

This whole thing strikes me as a fake problem. I played 40k for years with vehicle facings and I played Warmachine for years with unmarked bases. I remember very few arguments concerning either. There were more arguments concerning move distances and ranges, and far more concerning line of sight.

I mean I'll believe that you've seen internet threads arguing over where the center of a falcon is, but did you see a real game where the players had that argument? I don't think I have. But I've seen lots of arguments over who can shoot or whether a model can make a charge. Those just don't make for good internet debates because they only exist for that table. So looking at internet debates gives you a distorted view of where ambiguity lies in a real game.

I played plenty of eldar vehicles when facing still mattered. The only reason I wasn't afraid of vehicle facing disputes was because the eldar tanks' side armor was exactly as tough as their front armor. Only the rear used av10, and getting rear shots was mostly avoidable so it didn't come up much. Thinking of it, maybe that's the reason gw made them 12/12/10 in the first place.

Insectum's diagram would've been pretty unpractical for me, simply because the center isn't really centered on an easily recognizable bit. It wouldn't help for the close calls, which are exactly the cases you might get an argument about. If they'd just put a tiny round soulstone, anything, at the intended dead center then it'd be awesome, but noooooo.

 Orkeosaurus wrote:

This whole thing strikes me as a fake problem. I played 40k for years with vehicle facings and I played Warmachine for years with unmarked bases. I remember very few arguments concerning either. There were more arguments concerning move distances and ranges, and far more concerning line of sight.

I mean I'll believe that you've seen internet threads arguing over where the center of a falcon is, but did you see a real game where the players had that argument? I don't think I have. But I've seen lots of arguments over who can shoot or whether a model can make a charge. Those just don't make for good internet debates because they only exist for that table. So looking at internet debates gives you a distorted view of where ambiguity lies in a real game.

In my experience, you seldom got full blown arguments about armor facings. What you *frequently* got were people allowing their opponent's interpretation of which facing the attacking unit saw in order to *avoid* those arguments. And accepting a disadvantageous result like that even when you were pretty sure your opponent was wrong got annoying over time.

It wasn't worth it to argue it or to stop the game and agonize over angles or debate where the rear armor on a wave serpent started. So if someone asserted, "Oh yeah, I'm definitely hitting rear armor," you just kind of rolled with it unless they were obviously and egregiously wrong. But like I said, being a good sport and rolling with bad takes could get annoying over time and definitely left me personally wishing we had a better system for figuring out that sort of thing.

Also, as was pointed out, side armor usually didn't matter. Frequently it was the same as the front armor, or else it was on a durable long-ranged vehicle that could comfortably ensure it was only showing you its front arc as it engaged from the back. Or you were playing eldar who didn't care that your front AV was 13 instead of 12 because our Lance weapons treated it as 12 anyway. So when armour facing actually mattered, it was *usually* really just a matter of whether you could hit rear armor specificcally. And it's a lot easier to unambiguously identify Front VS Back (just lay a straight line against the hull) than it is to figure out where the sides of a raider/devilfish/serpent begin and end.

But then, rear armor was usually pretty easy to hide. You could generally just turn your butt to a wall or board edge. And that's doubly true if we don't also bring back weapon arcs (which are their own can of worms) to incentivize exposing rear armor more often. So hypothetically if we did bring back armor facing, side armor wouldn't matter, and you'd mostly only be getting rear armor in melee or after deepstriking. At which point you could just grant bonuses for attacking vehicles in melee or deepstriking rather than bothering with an actual armour facing mechanic.

EDIT: I'm being a little reductive, but only a little. Outside of deepstrike sucker punches and melee, rear armor was *mostly* just a mechanic for when you were fighting imperial guard, knights, and a handful of heavier tanks like battlewagons and vindicators.

Epic A had a neat way of handling rear armour - it assumed a level of dynamic movement. So you get hit in the rear when surrounded. You were surrounded when you could draw a line from one of your model to another or your models crossing over the enemy unit or formation (further discouraging stringing formations out as the gap between two models could also be crossed). Can do something similar in 40k and it would encourage more dynamic moves to get behind enemies and make surging forward and getting surrounded more risky.

Simple rules like that really help to give some actual strategy to 40K rather than simply smashing units together and triggering abilities at the best time.

I am a fan of rules light games but it's undeniable that you lose some gameplay in making a rules light.

 Orkeosaurus wrote:

 Jidmah wrote:
Cool. Now do it for every single vehicle in the game. I'm especially curious about defilers, triach stalkers and battlewagons.

It would be easy to put a little diagram in the corner of every vehicle datasheet if GW brought the rule back for 11e.

Absolutely, but they would still have to take care of models whose footprint can change depending on how they were built (spider-like walkers) or have optional upgrades which change their footprint (deff rolla).

A rule for something as elemental to the game as shooting vehicles needs to work 100%, with zero room for interpretation, which is what we have currently.

But we don't because you still need TLoS to shoot it.

I agree that TLoS is a problem, but this would just multiply with the facing problem. Due to how cover works these days, you rarely have a discussion about whether models are visible. In the vast majority of cases, obscuring is the deciding factor which is not TLoS.
But yes, TLoS should go away for the same reason.

This whole thing strikes me as a fake problem. I played 40k for years with vehicle facings and I played Warmachine for years with unmarked bases. I remember very few arguments concerning either. There were more arguments concerning move distances and ranges, and far more concerning line of sight.

I mean I'll believe that you've seen internet threads arguing over where the center of a falcon is, but did you see a real game where the players had that argument? I don't think I have. But I've seen lots of arguments over who can shoot or whether a model can make a charge. Those just don't make for good internet debates because they only exist for that table. So looking at internet debates gives you a distorted view of where ambiguity lies in a real game.

During 5-6th I was hopping around stores near me a lot, I had two distinct groups of friends which played the game and was part of medium sized club which attracted all kind of players. Even against nice guy players, facings were a regular discussion - even if it was friendly and brief. Against less nice people, the argument could get heated and some WAAC player would even try to force the 4+ roll even if they were clearly wrong. One even argued that he had the right to roll a 4+ to see if we should roll a 4+.

I'm an ork player, so I had a ton of discussions about the battlewagon. A model which is pretty much a box until you people figure out a game deciding melta shot might be rolling against AV12 instead of AV14 because the special weapons guy has a pinky toe reaching into the side ark.
The next big offenders where eldar and tau hovertanks. Many points of contention from back then would be mitigated by providing a diagram, but there were people claiming that the thrusters weren't rear armor, that the pilot was the center of the vehicle and whether the fire prism would have the same arcs as a night spinner due to the gun. I actually don't think I've ever had an argument about the falcon itself
There was the issue of hover tanks that started spinning on their flying base because someone knocked against them and people couldn't agree where the rear was. Defilers and soul grinders build with movable legs which could change the footprint when you picked them up and necron players being gamey with the triarch stalker's front legs. The issue goes on with simple walkers like kanz, war walkers or deff dreads that built in asymmetrical. non-centered poses.

The core of the discussion has always been the same: A valuable model or transport carrying a valuable unit was being shot by weapon which was just barely in the side or rear arc.

It never has been an issue with guard or marine. Their vehicles leave little room for interpretation. I believe that is why so many people perceive this issue as a non-problem.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Wyldhunt wrote:
In my experience, you seldom got full blown arguments about armor facings. What you *frequently* got were people allowing their opponent's interpretation of which facing the attacking unit saw in order to *avoid* those arguments. And accepting a disadvantageous result like that even when you were pretty sure your opponent was wrong got annoying over time.

It wasn't worth it to argue it or to stop the game and agonize over angles or debate where the rear armor on a wave serpent started. So if someone asserted, "Oh yeah, I'm definitely hitting rear armor," you just kind of rolled with it unless they were obviously and egregiously wrong. But like I said, being a good sport and rolling with bad takes could get annoying over time and definitely left me personally wishing we had a better system for figuring out that sort of thing.

You worded it so much better than I ever could.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Insectum7 wrote:

 Jidmah wrote:

But also for "modern games" are you discounting AI, which apparently works on quad-facing?

Are we talking about the game with the hexagonal bases which show facings?

I don't see bases on vehicles. I may be mistaking AI with LI. "New Epic". I guess I don't know what AI is then.

AI is the new planes game...

AFAIK, Legious imperialis does not have any xenos and only considers front and back arcs. In a game which is all rectangular boxes and titans on bases, facings are not an issue.

I actually do think I remember an argument about a Hammerhead so I guess that's a counter-example. Its front profile is screwy from the drone bay things.

The_Real_Chris wrote:
Epic A had a neat way of handling rear armour - it assumed a level of dynamic movement. So you get hit in the rear when surrounded. You were surrounded when you could draw a line from one of your model to another or your models crossing over the enemy unit or formation (further discouraging stringing formations out as the gap between two models could also be crossed). Can do something similar in 40k and it would encourage more dynamic moves to get behind enemies and make surging forward and getting surrounded more risky.

This is a cool idea but working it into modern 40k sounds tricky. You also have scale problems, i.e. your Land Raider is flanked by this Grot therefore my Stompa gets a bonus against it. It's easier to work in something like Kill Team where each model is a rough peer.

Yeah, getting rid of formations/detachments. Just build your army the way you like, you don't need special strategems or rules for having a limited selection of units to build your force with, or minimum requirements to be included.

EDIT: I think I would have a good points formula published so that people could introduce/use their own "minor faction" army lists using any miniatures they have.

 Orkeosaurus wrote:

This is a cool idea but working it into modern 40k sounds tricky. You also have scale problems, i.e. your Land Raider is flanked by this Grot therefore my Stompa gets a bonus against it. It's easier to work in something like Kill Team where each model is a rough peer.

Oddly enough Land Raiders were one of the few (half a dozen?) units that had thick rear armour so ignored the -1 armour save from crossfire. But in general if an unbroken unit of grotz has gotten into your lines you have other problems, hence the abstraction.

 Wyldhunt wrote:

 Nightlord1987 wrote:

Edit: Hell, I'd be fine if overwatch was once a turn move OR charge, but not both.

Good news! Go re-read the Overwatch stratagem carefully.

Wow, I've been getting absolutely pummeled in Overwatch, because I'm using an old listing of the core strats.