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I don't know why this hasn't occurred to me before, especially since I play AT-43 alot. I think Rackham has a good solution to the "KP Problem".

I also realize that no one hardly ever comes to this forum either, so this is really just an exercise in ranting towards GW at how utterly mistaken they were for making the KP rules that they have.

Its not something GW will ever consider however, as they are too stubborn to say "hmm... that wasnt a very good idea. We made a huge error of judgement" instead they fire people who have nothing to do with the problem in the first place to keep the people who cannot correct the problems they themselves make in the black.

I think AT-43 illustrates exactly how ass backwards GW's idea of KP really are.

In AT-43 the equivalent of 40K's KP is called "VP" which is not to be confused with 40K's idea of VP.

AT-43 is an objective based game. There are many types of objectives in their scenarios/missions.

Controlling a zone or a terrain element

Eliminating a specific kind enemy unit

Eliminating an enemy officer

Managing to extract a certain number of units from the battlefield through an access zone (which you also have to control)

...are merely a few examples.

Like I said, winning the game is based on the scenario being played and how you obtain the scenarios objectives, NOT the virtue of how many units you have.

(Everything except AFV's are scoring units to boot. Sometimes even AFV's can score if you take a certain type of variant list)

At the end of the game turn, whoever attains an objective gains the predetermined and variable amount of VP for its accomplishment.
Usually 1 VP but sometimes as high as 5 VP depending on the difficulty of obtaining or attaining different types of objectives.

That said, each scenario also has different amounts of VP to be earned before a 'cease fire' is attained.

As one example, the scenario whose objectives are to control key pieces of terrain, known as 'Hold the Position', states that:
"the game ends when one player reaches 10VP. If both players reach the number at the same time, the one who controls the primary objective wins.
If none of them controls more primary objectives than the other, the game goes on until one of them does."

Its actually quite amazing how such a young company as Rackham can learn from the mistakes of other game companies...even before other game companies make that mistake.
And yet the same game companies that they learn from still cant learn from their own mistakes by avoidance of adhering to the common and simple rule of "Keep it simple, stupid!"

GW could have easily used this game as an example of what to do right.
But they have failed and passed that failure to the consumer.
The consumer caught this rather ill thought out rule in the leaked version of 5th ed, and its still there.

Its because they could have listened to the masses of their consumers before its release is why I am so angry about the KP situation.
Its just pure negligent ignorance.

But for those of you who are not philistines and deign to use house rules, this could save you the heartache of being forced to use KP's.
This alternative is clearly superior to KP in every way.

So in closing:
The scenarios should be objective based.
Attaining the objectives dictate how you gain VP.
VP dictate how you win.

Two of the missions ARE objective based.

I don't see how there's a solution to the "KP problem" here

Personally I don't see an issue with Kill Points, other than the mission itself is pretty bland and boring.

Well Hellfury I'm with you on AT-43 having a grander overall game system.

Who knows, maybe GW will at some point accept the lower market share AT-43 will bring them as a boon? They can try even less then...

I agree, more interesting missions used to be nice - remember Mission Cards from 2ed??

We often play using the old 'Objectives' rules published in White Dwarf, which were really good - I'll try and find a link as you used to be able to download them from the GW site..

They may have gone missing since the advent of 5ed though..

[EDIT]

Here we go - they're not the perfect set of rules, but they make for a fun game...

http://uk.games-workshop.com/warhammer40000/rules-of-engagement/1/

Those are awesome. I have seen a lot of varients of those missions in GT and RTTs.

Not to threadjack, but maybe make them work more the way victory points did in 5th edition Fantasy, except with the values rounded down?

So a 299 point unit and a 200 point unit would each be worth two kill points, and a 99 point unit would be worth no kill points.

This would give screening and small infantry squads a point in kill point missions by reducing their list-crippling nature in KP missions, as well as putting the kibosh on KP denial lists.

Thinking about hit, I really like the proposed rounding down per hundred, as units up to 99 pts don't give up KPs.

This is awesome for Guard:
- Suicide Sentines don't give up KPs
- Suicide Storms with 2 Plasma are 70 pts each.
- Squads of Guardsmen are under 100 pts, even with Las/Plas, as long as you don't waste points on the Sergeant.
- AV14 Leman Russes in cover give up only 1 KP when Destroyed (good luck...)
So basically, the only KPs the opponent can score could be the obligatory Hellhounds.

But what's really awesome is how Drop Guard can easily be configured to give up NO KPs whatsoever. Too bad it's totally antithetical to how Guard are typically presented...

Hellfury wrote:II think AT-43 illustrates exactly how ass backwards GW's idea of KP really are.

- Eliminating a specific kind enemy unit
- Eliminating an enemy officer

GW's KPs are a step forward from GW's VPs. That still says very little, and doesn't pretend they're good.

It's easy to move GW's KPs to AT-43 type VPs, but scoring KPs for:
- Eliminating enemy Scoring units
- Eliminating enemy HQ units

wight_widow wrote:Not to threadjack, but maybe make them work more the way victory points did in 5th edition Fantasy, except with the values rounded down?

So a 299 point unit and a 200 point unit would each be worth two kill points, and a 99 point unit would be worth no kill points.

This would give screening and small infantry squads a point in kill point missions by reducing their list-crippling nature in KP missions, as well as putting the kibosh on KP denial lists.

The thing is that it won't get rid of the problem, it will just change it. If 99 or less is no kill points and I bring an eldar army with 1 giant wraithguard squad (400 points ish) a cheepy farseer or two (90ish points), several cheepy bike squads (76 points), 10 man scatter laser guardian squads (95 points) and 3 falcons (180ish each) then its just another denial army. You can't kill the wraithguard or the falcons and everything else isn't worth a kill point at all.

Lormax wrote:Two of the missions ARE objective based.

I don't see how there's a solution to the "KP problem" here

Personally I don't see an issue with Kill Points, other than the mission itself is pretty bland and boring.

You are missing the point, whether you enjoy KP's or not.

You yourself admit the missions are boring.

You solve the issue by addressing it at the root of the problem.

Missions.

Make them all objective based, whether the objective is killing the opponent or obtaining an area of terrain, etc. and then award KP/VP for that.

What we have now is simply being rewarded for killing enemy units, hence "Kill Points"

Eliminating the enemy is indeed the name of the game, but it isn't all of the game. GW's missions fail to adress this.

Stelek wrote:Well Hellfury I'm with you on AT-43 having a grander overall game system.

Who knows, maybe GW will at some point accept the lower market share AT-43 will bring them as a boon? They can try even less then...

Personally, after playing around 75 games of AT-43, I am convinced GW should just drop their 40K system and just make minis. Then people who want to play a good TTWG can do just that by employing AT-43 mechanics.

DUST sets a precedent there by doing exactly that.

I am quite tired of GW floundering around. Yes, 5th ed is better than 4th ed. But really, thats like gold plating a turd.

"I am convinced GW should just drop their 40K system and just make minis."

AMEN

AT-43 I've demo'ed, but it was one unit versus one unit. If you have say 3 units vs 3 units, is it I-go-with-one, then you-go-with-one, back and forth?

What I didn't like about AT-43 was that units are not locked into hand to hand. Seemed to make melee combat not worth the trouble

yeah,
I think one way to sort it would have been scaling unit type KP worth:

HQ : 3 KP

Troops : 1KP

Elites : 2kP

Fast : 2KP

Heavys : 2KP

That way if you bring the beef you loose the teeth!!! haha

---

another possible way to fix it is to release a big FAQ List that covers every codex entry and assigns a KP value to that unit type

SM Chaplin 2KP

Tau Drone squad 1KP

DevilFish including it 2drones 2KP (for both)

Guardsman squad 1KP

Plague marine squad 2KP

...
... and so on

Either way would be fine by me...
but as it is I'd feel bad playing CSM against a guard player and we roll annihilation...

PaniC...

Lormax wrote:AT-43 I've demo'ed, but it was one unit versus one unit. If you have say 3 units vs 3 units, is it I-go-with-one, then you-go-with-one, back and forth?

What I didn't like about AT-43 was that units are not locked into hand to hand. Seemed to make melee combat not worth the trouble

Yes. Units are alternately activated. Its still basically UGOIGO, but a lot more involved.

While they arent locked in the GW sense, they can only move away at half movement, so they can still be caught again easily by the squad they were previously engaged with.

If you get hit by a CC unit, don't worry about being able to move away. You'll usually be dead. lol Especially if they have a vehicle to run you over with.

To me, I think one of the more interesting concepts Hellfury addresses above in the OP is the concept of collecting VPs at the end of each turn and the battle being played to a certain number of VPs. I'd be interested in seeing that further explored in 40k.

i like Panics idea.

Deathmachine wrote:i like Panics idea.

So you mean you like the idea of having to remove an entire IG platoon just to get a single KP?

yeah,
I never said that, If you got the Kp by destroying the whole Platoon. The IG player one small squad from the Platoon somewhere else safe guarded behind his lines away from the rest of the platoon to safe guade it's KP...?

My ideas are based on

making expensive units worth more KPs by simply by identifying those units as being in the HQ, fast, attack, elites and heavys...

or

Listing what every unit type in the game is worth. this coud be a 2-3page list of units with KP values.

the second idea is similar to MTG.
In magic the gathering Tier 1 games 'Wizards of the coast' have a restricted Card List which tells you the overpowered cards that they have restricted, you may only have one of these cards in your deck (you may normally have between 1 and 4 copies of a card in your deck). they update the restricted Card list every few months to target the cards that are ruining the meta game. --- . Similarly GW could create a List detailing which units are worth 2 or 3 KP and re-visit this List every 6 months altering the KP values to shake up the meta game> did that make sense?

Panic...

Panic wrote:yeah,
I never said that, If you got the Kp by destroying the whole Platoon. The IG player one small squad from the Platoon somewhere else safe guarded behind his lines away from the rest of the platoon to safe guade it's KP...?

Panic wrote:yeah,
I think one way to sort it would have been scaling unit type KP worth:

HQ : 3 KP

Troops : 1KP

Elites : 2kP

Fast : 2KP

Heavys : 2KP

Looks that way to me.

Panic wrote:

Listing what every unit type in the game is worth. this coud be a 2-3page list of units with KP values.

I think this is what many people are hoping for, myself included. I think it is the easiest way for GW to fix this problem and still keep the KP rule close to what it is.

yeah,
Sorry it's not what i ment..
PaniC.