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So, I was thinking about the issue with First turn being so important in 8th edition, and what would be a simple, if not fix, but at least making it less painful. What do people think about if you go second, the momemnt the game begins you get +5 command points. There may be times that I would go second for that.

Also I think whoever goes second should be able to bring in reserves with no restrictions.

Just join the modern age of game design, get rid of IGOUGO, and replace it with an alternating activation system. Alpha strikes are much less of a problem when you don't get to fire with your entire army before anything can shoot back.

I think the dynamic now is to combat the players who take AGES putting models down and checking LOS for everything, by which time his or opponent is bored senseless.

I do agree that it is annoying that going second doesn't bring with it any perks....but +5 command points...too much iMO.

I think a balanced thing would be person going first has Alpha Strike ability. Person going second has Overwatch ability of a 4+ instead of a 6+

Alpha strikes are a problem because it's too easy to make every unit in your army attack an arbitrary model on the other side of the table at full efficiency. Alternating activations are one solution, revising terrain/weapons such that it's harder to get every unit attacking immediately are another (Warmachine doesn't have alternating activations, but it also doesn't have massive first-turn advantage problems because the scenario rules start scoring at the bottom of turn two and because it's a lot more difficult to make all the attacks you want to with every model against the target you want to.)

 AnomanderRake wrote:
Alpha strikes are a problem because it's too easy to make every unit in your army attack an arbitrary model on the other side of the table at full efficiency. Alternating activations are one solution, revising terrain/weapons such that it's harder to get every unit attacking immediately are another (Warmachine doesn't have alternating activations, but it also doesn't have massive first-turn advantage problems because the scenario rules start scoring at the bottom of turn two and because it's a lot more difficult to make all the attacks you want to with every model against the target you want to.)

Regarding WarmaHordes, most ranged models cannot hit anything on the opposite side of the board unless some significant amount of movement has occurred. The average ranged weapon is less than the rapid fire range of a Boltgun, and only a little bit farther then the shooter can Run. There are a few exceptions, and even fewer that have access to increasing that range beyond that.

Charge ranges in 40K have almost always been higher as well. Infantry used to have a 12" threat range with faster having 18" threat range. With 7th, that changed to 7-18" for Infantry, with the faster being 13-24". I can't say what the average is now in 40K due to the dropping of the movement normalization. The average Infantryman in WMH usually can move 5" in an Advance, 8" on the Charge, and 10" on the Run. Some are faster, some are slower. Some have to be within 1/2", while some can be up to 2" away to commit a Charge.

Of course, that's not getting in to scale and how the engine involves the interactions of models, which is a whole other matter of perspective. Even with all that, the amount of terrain is paltry in WMH when compared, but then it isn't needed as much due to the lower overall threat ranges that WMH provides to its units.

 Peregrine wrote:
Just join the modern age of game design, get rid of IGOUGO, and replace it with an alternating activation system. Alpha strikes are much less of a problem when you don't get to fire with your entire army before anything can shoot back.

This is always the go-to response to alpha strike threads, and I don't disagree, but what does alternating activation look like for a 1500 or 2000 point 40k game? I really don't think most people would be in favor of bookkeeping activation tokens for 20 different units or what have you.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Corennus wrote:
I think the dynamic now is to combat the players who take AGES putting models down and checking LOS for everything, by which time his or opponent is bored senseless.

That seems like a mostly-unrelated issue, no? And it's one that is countered somewhat by using chess clocks, although those aren't particularly enjoyable to play with in my limited experience.

I take it no one in this thread is particularly happy with the new "put your whole army in cover on turn 1" stratagem?

Wyldhunt wrote:
I really don't think most people would be in favor of bookkeeping activation tokens for 20 different units or what have you.

I don't see what the problem is. At 2000 points you aren't having 20 units on the table unless you're playing a pure MSU horde, and it's not that difficult to put a two-sided counter next to each unit and flip it over once the unit activates. 40k doesn't need to be designed with a target market of small children that can't comprehend anything more complicated than rolling dice to see who wins.

I take it no one in this thread is particularly happy with the new "put your whole army in cover on turn 1" stratagem?

Not really. It helps a bit, but it's an awkward fix that deals with one symptom instead of the disease causing it.

 Peregrine wrote:

Wyldhunt wrote:
I really don't think most people would be in favor of bookkeeping activation tokens for 20 different units or what have you.

I don't see what the problem is. At 2000 points you aren't having 20 units on the table unless you're playing a pure MSU horde, and it's not that difficult to put a two-sided counter next to each unit and flip it over once the unit activates. 40k doesn't need to be designed with a target market of small children that can't comprehend anything more complicated than rolling dice to see who wins.

My dark eldar list at a local tournament this weekend included 7 vehicles, 7 troop units, 5 characters, and some mandrakes for a total of 20 units right on the nose. Granted, DE are pretty MSU in nature, and some of those units spent most of the game in a transport, but it's still 20 units on the table without even trying to be particularly MSU intensive. So maybe I'm unusual in that regard, but I don't feel it's all that unlikely to have, say, 15 units in your army at 2k. So let's say a 2k list only has 15 units in it instead of my 20. You're still talking about flipping 30 tokens all told at the start of your first few turns, and that's assuming that the alternating activation system lets a unit do its entire turn all at once rather than refreshing actions each phase or something. Plus, you potentially then have slowdown as one unit performing an important action suddenly changes the situation you find yourself in and you have to pause to readjust your plan, even if only for a couple of moments.

And then you potentially have issues like one player having significantly more units than his opponent and using that to gain advantageous information/positioning. I could, for instance, take a bunch of cheap beasts and court of the archon units and just have them shuffle around behind a wall so that my opponent is forced to commit/expose his more elite army, and then I could perfectly counter his decisions with most of my important units.

I'm open to alternating activations in 40k, and I like them in Kill Team, but I have yet to see a proposal for alternating actions in 40k that didn't look like a tedious slog. :( And we had a ton of threads on the topic for a while there.

I take it no one in this thread is particularly happy with the new "put your whole army in cover on turn 1" stratagem?

Not really. It helps a bit, but it's an awkward fix that deals with one symptom instead of the disease causing it.

I tend to agree with you there. There will certainly be matchups where +1 to saves on turn 1 matters, but there will also be plenty where the enemy is packing firepower that ignores saves entirely or simply doesn't care whether or not you have cover.

Trying to "fix" IGOUGO while keeping...IGOUGO is putting a band-aid on a sucking chest wound.

If you want to fix it? Get rid of it entirely and move on. I know that's the least favourite option for people, but you can't get a reasonable solution to 40K's first-turn-bonus without getting rid of the core behind it.

 Elbows wrote:
Trying to "fix" IGOUGO while keeping...IGOUGO is putting a band-aid on a sucking chest wound.

If you want to fix it? Get rid of it entirely and move on. I know that's the least favourite option for people, but you can't get a reasonable solution to 40K's first-turn-bonus without getting rid of the core behind it.

Same question to you as above. I'm all for getting rid of IGOUGO, but then what does that look like for a 1500 or 2000 point game?

Kill team allows for up to 20 models doesn't it? Most of my lists are 10 models. It would take units longer to activate since they tend to have individual special weapons in otherwise homogeneous squads and its more dice but imo rolling for one model at a time is tedious.

I wonder how well a checklist would work instead of tokens. I suppose that's less visible for the opponent but also less looking around the board or figuring out which unit the token belongs to.

Wyldhunt wrote:

 Elbows wrote:
Trying to "fix" IGOUGO while keeping...IGOUGO is putting a band-aid on a sucking chest wound.

If you want to fix it? Get rid of it entirely and move on. I know that's the least favourite option for people, but you can't get a reasonable solution to 40K's first-turn-bonus without getting rid of the core behind it.

Same question to you as above. I'm all for getting rid of IGOUGO, but then what does that look like for a 1500 or 2000 point game?

It looks fine.

Ive played it a bunch. Its a way better game.

Lets address some of the concerns talked about here.

1) Keeping track of who and what has been activated.

A) You do that right now, every phase. When you have 20 units do you forget which ones moved and which ones haven't in your movement phase? Is it really difficult for you and your opponent to pay attention to what got to shoot and what didn't? If so you don't need to flip anything. Take one of the buckets of dice you no doubt own and put one next to the unit. Pick a color of dice to represent this. We all have many dice of many colors. It's not rocket science.


2) Increased time.

A) If it adds ANY time it's strategic planning time. Which is good time to add. You should be spending no more time moving and measuring and rolling dice because you are doing all the same amount of all of that that you were doing before. Just now you have an actual ability to respond to what the enemy is doing instead of standing there getting steam rolled by his entire turn all in one big swing. Adding in some actual strategic and tactical choice is only a benefit. Well worth any time it adds.

What gets drastically reduced is DOWN TIME. Right now a single persons turn can take FOREVER and all you get to do is roll saves and remove models. MAYBE make some super ineffectual overwatches and MAYBE use a strategem. Whats WAY better in AA is how quickly 1 units plows through it's phases so that you get to do something meaningful more often.


3) MSU OMG!

A) No it doesn't. Well built AA systems offer a lot that makes both heavy hitters and smaller units valuable. Anyone who does all of one or the other would get crushed by a smart player with a mix of both. Which is the point here btw. Tactical thinking and planning and intelligent use of your resources should mean more than the current winning in the list building/deployment/getting lucky and going first that the game currently is. Strategic and tactical upsets should be common and critical components of the game that 40k just doesn't have at all.


Just.... go look at bolt action or BtGoA. They are made by the guy who used to make 40k and quit when GW didn't want to focus on game play growth and advancement. 40k easily runs on those rules. It just works. Even just stealing the terrain rules from BtGoA makes a WORLD of difference in 40k let alone the AA.

 Lance845 wrote:

Wyldhunt wrote:

 Elbows wrote:
Trying to "fix" IGOUGO while keeping...IGOUGO is putting a band-aid on a sucking chest wound.

If you want to fix it? Get rid of it entirely and move on. I know that's the least favourite option for people, but you can't get a reasonable solution to 40K's first-turn-bonus without getting rid of the core behind it.

Same question to you as above. I'm all for getting rid of IGOUGO, but then what does that look like for a 1500 or 2000 point game?

It looks fine.

Ive played it a bunch. Its a way better game.

Lets address some of the concerns talked about here.

1) Keeping track of who and what has been activated.

A) You do that right now, every phase. When you have 20 units do you forget which ones moved and which ones haven't in your movement phase? Is it really difficult for you and your opponent to pay attention to what got to shoot and what didn't? If so you don't need to flip anything. Take one of the buckets of dice you no doubt own and put one next to the unit. Pick a color of dice to represent this. We all have many dice of many colors. It's not rocket science.


2) Increased time.

A) If it adds ANY time it's strategic planning time. Which is good time to add. You should be spending no more time moving and measuring and rolling dice because you are doing all the same amount of all of that that you were doing before. Just now you have an actual ability to respond to what the enemy is doing instead of standing there getting steam rolled by his entire turn all in one big swing. Adding in some actual strategic and tactical choice is only a benefit. Well worth any time it adds.

What gets drastically reduced is DOWN TIME. Right now a single persons turn can take FOREVER and all you get to do is roll saves and remove models. MAYBE make some super ineffectual overwatches and MAYBE use a strategem. Whats WAY better in AA is how quickly 1 units plows through it's phases so that you get to do something meaningful more often.


3) MSU OMG!

A) No it doesn't. Well built AA systems offer a lot that makes both heavy hitters and smaller units valuable. Anyone who does all of one or the other would get crushed by a smart player with a mix of both. Which is the point here btw. Tactical thinking and planning and intelligent use of your resources should mean more than the current winning in the list building/deployment/getting lucky and going first that the game currently is. Strategic and tactical upsets should be common and critical components of the game that 40k just doesn't have at all.


Just.... go look at bolt action or BtGoA. They are made by the guy who used to make 40k and quit when GW didn't want to focus on game play growth and advancement. 40k easily runs on those rules. It just works. Even just stealing the terrain rules from BtGoA makes a WORLD of difference in 40k let alone the AA.

I'm with Lance on this one.

We already keep track of many things using dice and whatnot (wounds,Tokens,Rolls, ect.) so the argument of book keeping is a moot point. The only thing that actually requires actual bookeeping in 40k is psychic powers, which is a niche thing at best.

In terms of scale, unit by unit most armies actually don't have that many units. An average is about 12-15 units a standard 1500 points army (remember this is also counting for upgrades and whatnot. only people who want to spam something take a no upgrade unit) For an AA system (such like in Kill team) this actually isn't much to say about, considering you are moving whole units of models and not just 20 models each with their own separate loadouts and rules. (like in Kill team)

In VERY big games (apocalypse sized) this indeed would prove to be problematic in terms of time but then apocalypse is a different sort of beast in it's own right, and doesn't represent the average 40k game.

MSU offer their own advantage and disadvantages in this system. The fact you have more options to hit your opponent by sacrificing full unit power potential (delayed units responses, Diluted power output) but the opposite is that you are offered the flexibility to hit many things at once instead of relying on a single unit to take all these different things together.

And also, removing downtime as much as possible and getting people involved all the time means that both players are interacting during the whole game, not just one person while the other is stuck just doing dice rolls and removing models.

New players that play 40k either like playing it or get bored or disapointed really easy. Especially when people are expecting a fast paced game that makes you contemplate your opponents moves as they move them. That ain't 40k in it's current state.

It is Kill team however, but it's not perfect either.

A game that gets both players interacting in it's mechanics all the time is more fun that one person a turn doing it.

Wyldhunt wrote:

 Elbows wrote:
Trying to "fix" IGOUGO while keeping...IGOUGO is putting a band-aid on a sucking chest wound.

If you want to fix it? Get rid of it entirely and move on. I know that's the least favourite option for people, but you can't get a reasonable solution to 40K's first-turn-bonus without getting rid of the core behind it.

Same question to you as above. I'm all for getting rid of IGOUGO, but then what does that look like for a 1500 or 2000 point game?

The answer is it takes more time. However, the larger point games are only necessary because you need so many models on the board to avoid being tabled in turn one. I don't know what other people are playing, but we've been doing tokenhammer, and while we reduce our game size a small amount (playing mostly 1250 and 1500), the only drag we discover is when token counts get too high (more than 20 units per player). Thus you could have larger games, but for speed you'd want to do larger, more costly units instead of MSU. I won't go into tokenhammer in this thread, but there are solutions to IGOUGO which fit quite well into 8th edition basic rules.

For everyone tying to fix the first turn issue the the alternating activation, I don't think that is a realistic way to discuss fixing first turn. 1. GW has never indicated making such a drastic change to the game. 2. It would be a major major change to the game, that would probably require a re-think of how many aspects of the game function and how units and unit abilities interact. Examples include things like physic powers. Do you cast when activated, or is there special activation for physic powers? how long do they last, game turn, till activated again? What about regeneration abilities? Do they work beginning of turn, or when activated? When activated do you move, shoot, charge fight or something different? Does the unit your in combat with get to fight back or can they only fight if they were activated? And I am sure there are 100s of different questions that would need to be resolved if you change Warhammer 40k to alternating activation.

And the main reason I bring this up is that to really change the game to alternating activation every core rule and every unit rule would need to be reviewed and potentially changed. Which means you probably couldn't use the current books etc. Which means you would have to scrap the whole game and start over, which GW just did 18 months or so ago. So realistically, GW is not going to re-do the game again, and considering that the only other time GW made such a major change was over 20 years ago, we probably have a few decades before such a change is made again. I go/you go is here for the foreseeable future, and the first turn issue needs to be addressed in that context. Saying we need alternating activation to fix the first turn issue, is like me telling my wife that we will just fix any financial issue we have by winning the lottery, yes it is technically possible, but so unlikely that using that answer is not answering the question at all.

Also, I am not advocating for I go/you go. I actually think alternating activation would be interesting and could be a fun change. But saying we need alternating activation as the only fix to the first turn problem is not actually providing an answer because it is sooooooooo unlikely to happen, the game needs something that can actually be done to fix the first turn issues, which is why I made my suggestion.

Yes, fixing IGOUGO would be an extensive re-write. But so would fixing the first turn problem that is inherent to IGOUGO. Either way you're completely re-writing the game, so why choose the option that doesn't fix the bad mechanic at the core of the problem?

 xeen wrote:

Spoiler:

For everyone tying to fix the first turn issue the the alternating activation, I don't think that is a realistic way to discuss fixing first turn. 1. GW has never indicated making such a drastic change to the game. 2. It would be a major major change to the game, that would probably require a re-think of how many aspects of the game function and how units and unit abilities interact. Examples include things like physic powers. Do you cast when activated, or is there special activation for physic powers? how long do they last, game turn, till activated again? What about regeneration abilities? Do they work beginning of turn, or when activated? When activated do you move, shoot, charge fight or something different? Does the unit your in combat with get to fight back or can they only fight if they were activated? And I am sure there are 100s of different questions that would need to be resolved if you change Warhammer 40k to alternating activation.

And the main reason I bring this up is that to really change the game to alternating activation every core rule and every unit rule would need to be reviewed and potentially changed. Which means you probably couldn't use the current books etc. Which means you would have to scrap the whole game and start over, which GW just did 18 months or so ago. So realistically, GW is not going to re-do the game again, and considering that the only other time GW made such a major change was over 20 years ago, we probably have a few decades before such a change is made again. I go/you go is here for the foreseeable future, and the first turn issue needs to be addressed in that context. Saying we need alternating activation to fix the first turn issue, is like me telling my wife that we will just fix any financial issue we have by winning the lottery, yes it is technically possible, but so unlikely that using that answer is not answering the question at all.

Also, I am not advocating for I go/you go. I actually think alternating activation would be interesting and could be a fun change. But saying we need alternating activation as the only fix to the first turn problem is not actually providing an answer because it is sooooooooo unlikely to happen, the game needs something that can actually be done to fix the first turn issues, which is why I made my suggestion.

Unfortunately, Dakka is full of these 'great suggestions' that will never happen.

GW have shown great promise in using the Big FAQs and Chapter Approved to tweak the rules using points, CP and errata (unprecedented in their history), and yet some folks think that a full codex or rulebook re-write is somehow within scope for such releases. There is actually (occasionally) some good constructive thought going into these discussions, but as you say whats the point if they cannot possibly be action-ed within the scope of an edition.

A good suggestion that is outside the realm of reasonable possibility is not a good suggestion.

Alternatively, "proposed rules" means proposals for house rules used by players, not suggestions to GW (which we know will never be used).

 Peregrine wrote:
Alternatively, "proposed rules" means proposals for house rules used by players, not suggestions to GW (which we know will never be used).

I get that. And I think a robust discussion on alternative activation, or new stratagems, or point values or anything is great. But people should not dismiss other peoples suggestions by saying the only way to fix something is this major change to the game, and there is a lot of that on Dakka with the alternating activation discussions. If someone posts an alternate activation thread with detailed rules on how it would work, for all unit interactions (or maybe it is on here I have not seen it) I would love to read it and maybe try it. But again saying you can't fix IGOUGO first turn issues without make that huge change doesn't advance the discussion. I want to talk about fixing IGOUGO, and if someone wants to answer IGOUGO sucks, alternate activation is the only way to go, that is their opinion but it brings nothing to this conversation, which is proposed rules to fix first turn under the current rules.

Also, while it is cool to wish list, or propose all kinds of rules you might like (crap I have done that many times) there is also something to be said for keeping the discussion in the realm of what is actually possible in the current game.

 xeen wrote:

 Peregrine wrote:
Alternatively, "proposed rules" means proposals for house rules used by players, not suggestions to GW (which we know will never be used).

I get that. And I think a robust discussion on alternative activation, or new stratagems, or point values or anything is great. But people should not dismiss other peoples suggestions by saying the only way to fix something is this major change to the game, and there is a lot of that on Dakka with the alternating activation discussions. If someone posts an alternate activation thread with detailed rules on how it would work, for all unit interactions (or maybe it is on here I have not seen it) I would love to read it and maybe try it. But again saying you can't fix IGOUGO first turn issues without make that huge change doesn't advance the discussion. I want to talk about fixing IGOUGO, and if someone wants to answer IGOUGO sucks, alternate activation is the only way to go, that is their opinion but it brings nothing to this conversation, which is proposed rules to fix first turn under the current rules.

Also, while it is cool to wish list, or propose all kinds of rules you might like (crap I have done that many times) there is also something to be said for keeping the discussion in the realm of what is actually possible in the current game.

No. People SHOULD be dismissive of band aid patches over a broken mechanic that doesnt actually fix the root issue. Dont start a discussion pointing at the major symptom of the problem but insist that the problem must stay intact.

Nobody on dakka actually thinks anything we discuss here will be seen or acted on by GW. These discusions are for us and they will only ever go as far as our individual play groups.


That being said, psychic powers. They happen when you activate the unit. They last until you activate the unit again. It create interesting choice. Do you activate early to buff up or do you wait for the oponent to show their hand? Do you sit in a bad spot to garantee your previous powers keep running or do you activate and risk not getting them running again? These types of strategic choices are what the game needs.


It requires very little reworking or any ability in 40k. The changes are all very logical. Each activation runs through its phases. Anything that can be used in that phase can be used in that phase. Anything that can be used once a game turn now (stratagems) can be used once a game turn in aa. That means you have to pick and choose which enemy activation shooting phase to use that strat in (again. Strategic choice).

Its very simple. It takes WAY less work then has been implied. It just works. Search for beyond the gates of 40k. Several fuly functional rule sets including a d12 and d6 version.

My personal fix for that would be a mix of alternating activation and a system already in the game : detachment.

When you play, you activate a detachment. You then do the whole turn for all the units in the detachment : moving, shooting, assault, etc.

Then the opponents does the same, and it alternate until every detachment has been activated once. Then the next round start. It would alleviate booktracking, since you never have more than 3 detachment in matched play.

You would of course also probably need to change the CP certain detachment gives, so that player are not too advantaged if they decide to only take a single huge detachment. However this is also a fix for ''pure'' army, something that people have been asking for a long time. You can take a ''pure'' ultramarine army, and activate it all at once for a massive strike. However, a brigade would only give you +2 CP.

Patrol detachment and more specialised detachment could give your more CP, something like 3 maybe. The tradeoff is that you must take an activation on something probably really small, like 1 hq and 2 troops.

This also fix soup, since combining a maximum of difference source of buff and stratagem would split your activation further, and potentially have models not moving at the same time, either losing certain aura buff, or leaving gaps in the defense that an opponent can exploit.

TLDR, activate one detachment at a time, change CP a bit, and I think we can fix : Alpha strike, soup, give buffs to pure army all at once!

I made a house rule called Return Fire. I kept it simple and gave units overwatch when shot at but only if they did not previously shoot, advance, charge, attack, manifest psyk, or execute an insubordinate. I think normal moving might be ok.
I learned this from reading about Heavy Gear Blitz or something, where you can leave units waiting to attack like an ambush, but I figured a modified overwatch would work.

So, here's how I played with Return Fire with my friends.
When your unit is holding position (did not shoot, advance, charge, attack, or psyk) and they start taking shots, any saves of 6 will be your shots to return fire directly after the attacker's shoot phase is resolved. No model may shoot more than once and your BS will be a minimum of 6+.
We haven't been playing with morale so the Return Fire phase would happen after the slaying and removal of units.

Example: If your 5 model unit saves 7 6's like some super lucky bastards, the extra 2 shots will be wasted, as no model can return fire more than once in that engagement. If only 2 6's were saved, only 2 of the 5 models can Return Fire.
I wouldn't say you can't Return Fire more than once per turn but maybe others would.
The BS is a minimum of 6+ so you can't Return Fire on any -1 BS stealthers.

I've only played with this house rule twice and half the time we forgot so it's a WiP!

I'd love your thoughts unless you hate it...

AOS has a roll of each battle round to see who goes first. This makes to think it twice before to go first as it might expose you to the possibility of a double turn. It works well and it brings another interesting tactical level to the game.

However, AOS is not as a shooty game as Warhammer 40K.

psipso wrote:
AOS has a roll of each battle round to see who goes first. This makes to think it twice before to go first as it might expose you to the possibility of a double turn. It works well and it brings another interesting tactical level to the game.

However, AOS is not as a shooty game as Warhammer 40K.

I don't think that would work, simply put a double turn against a castellan is not particulry fun experience.

psipso wrote:
AOS has a roll of each battle round to see who goes first. This makes to think it twice before to go first as it might expose you to the possibility of a double turn. It works well and it brings another interesting tactical level to the game.

However, AOS is not as a shooty game as Warhammer 40K.

Completely random nonsense isn't tactical.

Not Online!!! wrote:

psipso wrote:
AOS has a roll of each battle round to see who goes first. This makes to think it twice before to go first as it might expose you to the possibility of a double turn. It works well and it brings another interesting tactical level to the game.

However, AOS is not as a shooty game as Warhammer 40K.

I don't think that would work, simply put a double turn against a castellan is not particulry fun experience.

I wouldn't be fun when this happens when the castellan is at full health, so probably if I went first I would have focus fire to the castellan as much as I can to cripple it or alpha strike at turn 1, maybe getting 1-2 brackets. That would be a fun experience at that moment. When doing this I would have to be careful to not overdo it too much and left part of the army in defensive position, in cover or out o sight. Probably the double turn of the crippled castellan and the rest of the army then would be devastating, as the first strike would have been by the castellan owner, but not a game over.

The double turn autoregulates the current first strike problem that it exists in the game. With the double turn then I would be needed to remove all the deep strikes and first turns patches.

 Lance845 wrote:

psipso wrote:
AOS has a roll of each battle round to see who goes first. This makes to think it twice before to go first as it might expose you to the possibility of a double turn. It works well and it brings another interesting tactical level to the game.

However, AOS is not as a shooty game as Warhammer 40K.

Completely random nonsense isn't tactical.

I'm not totally sold on this assessment. For example, the actual mechanic to determine who goes first. Even if you design your army to have fewer drops than anybody then you don't have more than 60% changes to go first. 58% approx i remember. Then I guess that we can agree on that this could be almost completely random. What do this rings then? That when you begin a match you don't know if you will end by going first or second, then you will think twice on to place certain units in certain places. You will be thinking about all the possibilities during the deployment. Therefore the deployment will have much more tactical deepnes. What would happen instead if the first turn were totally deterministic, for example, according to the number of drops or a pre-agreement? That then everything will be plainer. If you know that you go first then you will deploy for the attack, otherwise for defence. This example is just to il.lustrate the fact that randomness inside an order and rules it could be tactical. Maybe is my particular vision, but the times that I've played AOS, I use to think much more on the following turns than when I play in 40K, and not to do that in AOS is much more fatal than in Warhammer 40K. AOS is different than in 40K thought as shooting is not as important as in 40K

Finally, there is a quote o a famous person that somehow is related to this:

“He who fails to plan is planning to fail" ...Winston Churchill

Great tactician knows how to adapt to changes in the battlefield. And actually in this game, in my opinion, is part of the fun. If not why do we use dices?

psipso wrote:

 Lance845 wrote:

psipso wrote:
AOS has a roll of each battle round to see who goes first. This makes to think it twice before to go first as it might expose you to the possibility of a double turn. It works well and it brings another interesting tactical level to the game.

However, AOS is not as a shooty game as Warhammer 40K.

Completely random nonsense isn't tactical.

I'm not totally sold on this assessment. For example, the actual mechanic to determine who goes first. Even if you design your army to have fewer drops than anybody then you don't have more than 60% changes to go first. 58% approx i remember. Then I guess that we can agree on that this could be almost completely random. What do this rings then? That when you begin a match you don't know if you will end by going first or second, then you will think twice on to place certain units in certain places. You will be thinking about all the possibilities during the deployment. Therefore the deployment will have much more tactical deepnes. What would happen instead if the first turn were totally deterministic, for example, according to the number of drops or a pre-agreement? That then everything will be plainer. If you know that you go first then you will deploy for the attack, otherwise for defence. This example is just to il.lustrate the fact that randomness inside an order and rules it could be tactical. Maybe is my particular vision, but the times that I've played AOS, I use to think much more on the following turns than when I play in 40K, and not to do that in AOS is much more fatal than in Warhammer 40K. AOS is different than in 40K thought as shooting is not as important as in 40K

Finally, there is a quote o a famous person that somehow is related to this:

“He who fails to plan is planning to fail" ...Winston Churchill

Great tactician knows how to adapt to changes in the battlefield. And actually in this game, in my opinion, is part of the fun. If not why do we use dices?

In order for it to be tactical you need to have some level of predictability so that you can make educated, but not guaranteed, choices about what is about to happen.

A tactical choice looks like...

"If I move this unit into this position it presents too good of an opportunity to my opponent. Based on his current lay out I think he will go for it which will bait out these things that I otherwise can't get to."

Or

"If I attack with these 5 threats all at once he will be overwhelmed. Either a) he will focus fire on one threat... maybe 2, and those are acceptable losses, or he will shoot at all of them and not hurt any of them enough to stop me. Something will get through".

Those are tactics. That is tactical planning. That is tactical game play. And of course the opponent doesn't have the follow through with your predictions. They could surprise you with their own plans.

a 50 50 chance on a single dice roll that because of circumstances means 1 person might be acting twice in a row isn't tactical.

 Lance845 wrote:

psipso wrote:

 Lance845 wrote:

psipso wrote:
AOS has a roll of each battle round to see who goes first. This makes to think it twice before to go first as it might expose you to the possibility of a double turn. It works well and it brings another interesting tactical level to the game.

However, AOS is not as a shooty game as Warhammer 40K.

Completely random nonsense isn't tactical.

I'm not totally sold on this assessment. For example, the actual mechanic to determine who goes first. Even if you design your army to have fewer drops than anybody then you don't have more than 60% changes to go first. 58% approx i remember. Then I guess that we can agree on that this could be almost completely random. What do this rings then? That when you begin a match you don't know if you will end by going first or second, then you will think twice on to place certain units in certain places. You will be thinking about all the possibilities during the deployment. Therefore the deployment will have much more tactical deepnes. What would happen instead if the first turn were totally deterministic, for example, according to the number of drops or a pre-agreement? That then everything will be plainer. If you know that you go first then you will deploy for the attack, otherwise for defence. This example is just to il.lustrate the fact that randomness inside an order and rules it could be tactical. Maybe is my particular vision, but the times that I've played AOS, I use to think much more on the following turns than when I play in 40K, and not to do that in AOS is much more fatal than in Warhammer 40K. AOS is different than in 40K thought as shooting is not as important as in 40K

Finally, there is a quote o a famous person that somehow is related to this:

“He who fails to plan is planning to fail" ...Winston Churchill

Great tactician knows how to adapt to changes in the battlefield. And actually in this game, in my opinion, is part of the fun. If not why do we use dices?

In order for it to be tactical you need to have some level of predictability so that you can make educated, but not guaranteed, choices about what is about to happen.

A tactical choice looks like...

"If I move this unit into this position it presents too good of an opportunity to my opponent. Based on his current lay out I think he will go for it which will bait out these things that I otherwise can't get to."

Or

"If I attack with these 5 threats all at once he will be overwhelmed. Either a) he will focus fire on one threat... maybe 2, and those are acceptable losses, or he will shoot at all of them and not hurt any of them enough to stop me. Something will get through".

Those are tactics. That is tactical planning. That is tactical game play. And of course the opponent doesn't have the follow through with your predictions. They could surprise you with their own plans.

a 50 50 chance on a single dice roll that because of circumstances means 1 person might be acting twice in a row isn't tactical.

I understand your point and I share it somehow. Also, I have my doubts that random first turn every battleground could apply it as it is to 40K without risks. If I insist in the double turn is because I think it has some potentially good things that are often misunderstood and that could be worth considering for 40K, not as it is but in a refined way. I might be wrong though.... probably .... but anyway here we are to have fun by discussing creative rules proposals of our favourite hobby

 Lance845 wrote:

"If I move this unit into this position it presents too good of an opportunity to my opponent. Based on his current lay out I think he will go for it which will bait out these things that I otherwise can't get to."

Or

"If I attack with these 5 threats all at once he will be overwhelmed. Either a) he will focus fire on one threat... maybe 2, and those are acceptable losses, or he will shoot at all of them and not hurt any of them enough to stop me. Something will get through".

Those are tactics. That is tactical planning. That is tactical game play. And of course the opponent doesn't have the follow through with your predictions. They could surprise you with their own plans.

I believe that I understand this argument and I agree. I would like you to take now the same argument and try to apply it on the time lime rather than in a time snapshot that would be a turn inside a battle round. Just guess that you get the first turn at the beginning of the battle. Then your opponent goes second and he/she get lucky and win the initiative for the second battle round. Crap, a double turn. This gonna be devastating! ok well. But what comes next? Then who will get the next double turn? You. That's granted. When it will happen? that is not granted, but you can estimate the probabilities that this will happens after a certain number of turns or less or the probability that this won't happen the next particular number of rounds and when this happens you will have the advantage towards the end / mid of the battle when for example scoring objectives in many missions could be potentially much more worthy than in the first battle round.

You can even prepare a strategy around that for when it happens according to this chance, in the same way, that you decide to take the tactical decision inside a turn to, for instance, attack there 5 threats at once. But in this way the tactical decision is a plan that it spans multiple battle rounds.

 Lance845 wrote:

a 50 50 chance on a single dice roll that because of circumstances means 1 person might be acting twice in a row isn't tactical.

yeah. Maybe the real problem of the alternate battle round is not that when the double turn happens it will allow somebody to act twice but is the total lack of control of this roll. Then what's about the following:

1) Who decides to go first at the beginning of the battle is determined as now
2) Remove all the current nerfs against who goes first
3) Each battle round there is a roll off to see who goes first
4) After the first battle round, the player who went last in the previous turn can choose to modify the result of his result by +1 or -1