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I see a lot of threads that have differing opinions on the play style, balance, turn sequence and overall direction of the “Nu 40k”. Personally, I think the move in the direction of stratagems and buff stacking was the wrong move, but that’s not this thread.

GW sometimes trots out their “3 ways to play” slogan with Kill Team (small but committed fan base), 40k (600 pound gorilla), and Apocalypse (DOA).

The new Apocalypse had a lot of people saying it was the new best way they enjoyed 40k, but with the marketing of BIG EPIC APOCALYPSE and no support post drop, it stood a very small chance of becoming a larger scene on its own and was DOA.

One reason I think people were so vocal about it was that it was accidentally the game a large group in the community has been asking for for a long time. A more engaging, less complex, less beardy 40k that I could teach to my nephew on a Saturday or convince my wife to take pity on me during lockdown and have a laugh.

Honestly I have had a blast with Grimdark Future, but a fully supported actually licensed version of Diet 40k I think would have a market that does not necessarily compete with the competitive scene. It could make it easier for us filthy casuals to find a game at a FLGW where both parties knew the vibe they were after.

If GW were to come out with this “Relaxed Fit” 40k how would you market it? To parents with kids? To old heads as a sort of 40k Classic? Would it compete too directly with 9th edition? Is it too against GW’s ethos of “Meta Chasing=Money Making”? Is there a chance in hell for a fabled 4th way to play?

I wouldn't be averse to the idea per se, as I don't get to play often and I wouldn't mind games being quicker to play with less rules-checking... Would make it easier to play with my kids too.

However, that's then a whole extra set of rules (and codexes?) that GW needs to keep on top of. And it feels like they're pretty much maxed out on that front at the moment...

The "3 ways to play" refers to open, narrative (crusade) and matched play, not kill team, 40k and Apocalypse.

The more casual version of 40k already exists - open and narrative/crusade. In addition, Matched play is not necessarily tournament play, it can and does get played as a casual game. 40k is often referred to as a game experience with friends by GW and is often referred to as a "beer and pretzels" game.

I doubt GW would make a licensed tabletop game as it would end up competing directly with their own primary product. AFAIK the primary market for 40k is not the competitive scene, but the casuals. Competitive 40k just seems to be more present online.

40k is what the player(s) make of it.

You want tournament play? Go for it. GW offer recommended rules, but many Tournaments do their own tweaks.

Want to run a campaign? Go for it. GW offer campaign settings, but many campaigns are homebrewed.

Want just a straight up bout of extreme tabletop violence? GW offer rules for that.

The level of seriousness and depth is entirely up to the players. So there’s no need for GW to split it further.

40k is already the casual version of 40k.

Aash wrote:
The "3 ways to play" refers to open, narrative (crusade) and matched play, not kill team, 40k and Apocalypse.

The more casual version of 40k already exists - open and narrative/crusade. In addition, Matched play is not necessarily tournament play, it can and does get played as a casual game. 40k is often referred to as a game experience with friends by GW and is often referred to as a "beer and pretzels" game.

The gameplay rules are the same for the open / narrative / crusade variants though. The only relaxation in the different variants is in terms of list building and playing at an equal points value.

Crispy78 wrote:

Aash wrote:
The "3 ways to play" refers to open, narrative (crusade) and matched play, not kill team, 40k and Apocalypse.

The more casual version of 40k already exists - open and narrative/crusade. In addition, Matched play is not necessarily tournament play, it can and does get played as a casual game. 40k is often referred to as a game experience with friends by GW and is often referred to as a "beer and pretzels" game.

The gameplay rules are the same for the open / narrative / crusade variants though. The only relaxation in the different variants is in terms of list building and playing at an equal points value.

And the mission rules. Nonetheless that is what the "3 ways to play" refers to.

As others have said, 40k is already a casual game, and it is entirely up to the players involved what they want to play. To simplify as much as possible, especially with a view to allowing children to get involved, then open play with only the "core rules" and the simplified datasheets provided in the miniature boxes allows for a game. No need for terrain rules, missions, stratagems, codexes, supplements etc. if that's how people want to play.

Apocalypse gave us those lovely transparent unit trays.

Crispy78 wrote:

Aash wrote:
The "3 ways to play" refers to open, narrative (crusade) and matched play, not kill team, 40k and Apocalypse.

The more casual version of 40k already exists - open and narrative/crusade. In addition, Matched play is not necessarily tournament play, it can and does get played as a casual game. 40k is often referred to as a game experience with friends by GW and is often referred to as a "beer and pretzels" game.

The gameplay rules are the same for the open / narrative / crusade variants though. The only relaxation in the different variants is in terms of list building and playing at an equal points value.

They really aren't.

Can you show me the objective card decks for matched play please? Oh, right, there aren't any.

How do I level up my characters in the post battle sequence of open play? Right, I don't.

What's the rule of three limitation in Crusade? Right, there isn't one.

It's true core mechanics are common. That's really it though. In the case of more advanced core mechanics- ie. terrain rules and battle forging, these things are designed to be used as players see fit. Playing 40k casually is something designers have worked hard to facilitate. People who use online forums, and this forum in particular, tend to be competitive types who choose not to use the casual play rules baked into the existing material.

It's those core mechanics I'm meaning - in terms of movement phase, shooting phase, etc. They are the same.

I wouldn't want to lose the current game, but a greatly simplified variant wouldn't hurt. It was talked about negatively back when it first came out, but an AoS-like version of 40K might be good for occasional casual players like myself...

the current version of 40k is the "casual" one

a less gamy and more competitive version would be fine

YES!

So, among my various rewrite projects I'm also toying around with something I'm calling HexHammer.

The idea of it is that the game translates all of the rules into a system built on "hexes" as opposed to a board with physical 3D terrain. Each hex would represent a 6" wide swath of land, and so all ranges would be re-scaled down to a number of hexes (e.g. a bolter could shoot 4 hexes at max range, most units would move 6" a turn, etc).

The "board" would be built by drawing and sequentially assembling a board to represent a 6x4 play area (12 x 8 hexes), with each hex being roughly 2-3" across (the whole game could fit on a 2-foot x 3-foot mat). Instead of placing all of a unit's models in a hex, you'd only need to place one representative model, and use X-sided dice to track how many wounds (and thus models) are left in the unit.

The hexes could stipulate the type of terrain and/or cover they provide, different edges or sides of the hex could additionally have low barricades or other obstacles depicted, it could make note of elevations, etc. When units engage in melee, they would be moving into a hex occupied by an enemy unit. There might be some stacking limits that need to be accounted for as well - and larger units with dozens of models could presumably occupy more than one hex.

My thought, however, was that the core codex rules and all that goes with it would be kept more or less as is. So you could use all the models and rules as they currently are, but the level of detail on the tabletop would be far more streamlined and standardized. Without having to move individual units and measure everything, check LoS constantly, deal with wobbly models, etc. a lot of the basic activity in the game could be dramatically sped up.

I imaged a system too where unit roster cards would be used, and you could of course have your full compliment of models on the edge of the table, and remove those models as the unit suffers wounds and what not. Or, you could skip the extra models and just have a way to track wounds and which models are removed. Presumably, this also means you could play a full size game without needing to have the full compliment of models.

Foolofakook wrote:
[...]
The new Apocalypse had a lot of people saying it was the new best way they enjoyed 40k, but with the marketing of BIG EPIC APOCALYPSE and no support post drop, it stood a very small chance of becoming a larger scene on its own and was DOA.
[...]

It also received no support because it wasn't so well received. The ones who say that it's the "new best way" are the ones that talk about it, the vast majority of those I know tried it once, didn't like it and forgot it even existed.
My FLGS still has a couple of Apoc rule boxes on the shelf since then and doesn't seem able to move them at all, despite ordering massive amounts of GW stuff week in, week out.

 kodos wrote:
the current version of 40k is the "casual" one

Yeah, this. I wouldn't mind ditching some of the slow complications brought on by layers of strats, relics, traits, and general special rules bloat, but 40k is already watered-down to the point that there isn't much more you can take out.

Foolofakook wrote:To old heads as a sort of 40k Classic?

Yeah, no. You'd have to add rules sections to get to '40k Classic': more comprehensive cover, modifiers, recreating unit psychology, acceleration/deceleration, random wargear tables, wargear that's more than just weapons and armor (utility, buffs, etc) beyond a half-dozen per codex.

'3 ways to play,' as other people have mentioned, don't involve kill team or apocalypse.
But honestly narrative and open seem MORE complex and less casual than matched play, especially with the addition of the crusade rules. With matched, everyone involved can throw a list together and know exactly what to expect. The others take even more work (including negotiation on what exactly you can/can't do with units in the PL system, since matched strictly regulates that, and the other versions sort of just assume no one will be a jerk, without any clear definition, which is a adjustable line for a lot of people).
And as I said, Crusade is now even more rules layers, which hit army construction, in game and post battle accounting.

So yeah I got the Three ways to play thing wrong. I think I was thinking in my head about this article:
https://www.warhammer-community.com/2019/07/07/warhammer-40000-one-universe-three-gamesgw-homepage-post-1fw-homepage-post-2/

I absolutely get the point about 40k actually being the casual version of the game. Maybe I phrased the question wrong. Anything can be causal if both parties agree on how they are going to craft their narrative.

My idea is that if I sat a normal person who plays some board games down (like my wife) and tried to teach them 40k, I would get about a half hour in before they threw their hands up and said, "this game is way to complicated!"
I'm thinking about a simplification of the rules and data sheets. Some thing that would not require a whole new codex for each unit but akin to kill team and Apoc all fit one book or have some pdf download data sheets.

Judging from most of the replies I must be in a very small minority lol

Yeah, I must say I don't really know what the OP is after, 40K today is already a much more straightforward, casual system than the prior editions up to 8th were. 40K today is a system I can imagine teaching people outside the hobby for a fun event, 3rd to 7th edition? Hell no, even with guys that played on a regular basis half the game consisted of looking up rules. Now that only happens when a new codex is released

Edit since I now saw the second reply:
I guess you can make that with today's 40K. Just play 500points, few squads per side, 1 HQ, no stratagems. 40K like that isn't more complicated than an elaborate board game.

Sgt. Cortez wrote:


Edit since I now saw the second reply:
I guess you can make that with today's 40K. Just play 500points, few squads per side, 1 HQ, no stratagems. 40K like that isn't more complicated than an elaborate board game.

Yeah this. I think maybe I was looking to hard for something that's really already there. A smaller game without stratagems as probably already 75% of the way there.

What I'm probably on about is my own local meta. I think I'm trying to solve a problem that's not the games fault. But the community of players that I find have the most fun in a very competitive environment.

The game doesn't really need to change for me. But rather the environment in which I play it

Take this for what it's worth...

I've been playing 40K since 2nd edition. The new game, largely due to the codexes, gives me a headache trying to sort through a game.

As I've often repeated, the core game rules might be simpler, but there are MANY more layers to the game now - both in terms of gameplay and list building.

Compared to say 5th edition, you now have to deal with tracking the applicable moments of when to use a stratagem and managing a pool of CP resources. There are vastly more aura abilities and buff interactions between units that trigger re-rolls or other abilities that need to be considered. All of this combines with there being vastly more different units, more types of wargear, die roll modifiers to be constantly adding/subtracting. Make no mention of faction traits, relics, and piles of other codex-level rules. Then you have missions with multiple objective and scoring conditions, secondary missions, more complex force organizational charts due to the range of detachment types available, etc..

Anyone thinking that the new system is less complex is, IMHO, deluding themselves.

If the presentation and style of core rule writing that we have in 8th/9th applied backwards to 5th edition, I think people would realize it wasn't nearly as complex as it was clamed. 90% of the rules were all universal and part of the core rulebook, with just a small smattering of special army-level or unit-level special rules. A lot of the perceived confusion in the older rules was frankly due to the sloppy writing and comingling of rules with fluffy justifications for them. But the system itself wasn't very complex at all.

FWIW, I think older editions are easier to teach and the rules themselves, being less gamey, are more intuitive as well. That additional intuitiveness goes a long way to making it easier for people to internalize the core rules.

 Mezmorki wrote:


FWIW, I think older editions are easier to teach and the rules themselves, being less gamey, are more intuitive as well. That additional intuitiveness goes a long way to making it easier for people to internalize the core rules.

Yeah the Middle Earth Strategy Battle Game comes to mind. That's a big chunky rule set. But once you understand the core mechanics of the game everything has a logic that is intuitive. I could teach a non gamer friend SBG. Current 40k feels more clunky.

But like one reply said. A small game does go a long way in fixing the complications that arise with multiple buff stacking auras and feels-bad mechanics. Taking Strategems out does help to. But if you are going to do all that isnt that a sign that your game may not be so well engineered after all?


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Mezmorki wrote:
The idea of it is that the game translates all of the rules into a system built on "hexes" as opposed to a board with physical 3D terrain. Each hex would represent a 6" wide swath of land, and so all ranges would be re-scaled down to a number of hexes (e.g. a bolter could shoot 4 hexes at max range, most units would move 6" a turn, etc).

The "board" would be built by drawing and sequentially assembling a board to represent a 6x4 play area (12 x 8 hexes), with each hex being roughly 2-3" across (the whole game could fit on a 2-foot x 3-foot mat). Instead of placing all of a unit's models in a hex, you'd only need to place one representative model, and use X-sided dice to track how many wounds (and thus models) are left in the unit.

The hexes could stipulate the type of terrain and/or cover they provide, different edges or sides of the hex could additionally have low barricades or other obstacles depicted, it could make note of elevations, etc. When units engage in melee, they would be moving into a hex occupied by an enemy unit. There might be some stacking limits that need to be accounted for as well - and larger units with dozens of models could presumably occupy more than one hex.

I think this is great idea for kids too. definitely get Memoir 44 vibes, one of my favorite simple war games.

Hmm, as someone who started wargaming with Lotr and only came to 40K at the end of 5th I always thought Lotr earlier was the introduction game of GW with pretty simple ruleset, while the Warhammers had their big unwieldy rules with loads of mechanics. I'd say that has turned, Lotr never really changed, but 40K is now an even simpler ruleset than Lotr, it gets complex with Codizes of course and I personally find it has more depth than earlier editions, too, but it's more beginner friendly in my eyes, easy to learn, hard to master, like Lotr.

One-page 40K definitely points to another way to play the game, where the unit rules are stripped back allowing for quicker play.

It's not something I would see GW (or the community) embrace, as the community would simply decry it as "dumbing down" or making 40K bland.

Foolofakook wrote:
The new Apocalypse had a lot of people saying it was the new best way they enjoyed 40k, but with the marketing of BIG EPIC APOCALYPSE and no support post drop, it stood a very small chance of becoming a larger scene on its own and was DOA.

Balance was bad which doesn't help, you can also mathhammer out efficiency really easy for the system and there is no rock-paper-scissors gameplay with weapons being better or worse against different types of targets which theoretically makes it quite shallow although I never got into it.

One reason I think people were so vocal about it was that it was accidentally the game a large group in the community has been asking for for a long time. A more engaging, less complex, less beardy 40k that I could teach to my nephew on a Saturday or convince my wife to take pity on me during lockdown and have a laugh.

You can say it like that, but I think mostly it is just people that are in love with alternating activations. The only genius thing about the system was removing models after everyone has had their chance to act so that every unit has a chance to activate once before it is removed.

Honestly I have had a blast with Grimdark Future, but a fully supported actually licensed version of Diet 40k I think would have a market that does not necessarily compete with the competitive scene. It could make it easier for us filthy casuals to find a game at a FLGW where both parties knew the vibe they were after.

If GW were to come out with this “Relaxed Fit” 40k how would you market it? To parents with kids? To old heads as a sort of 40k Classic? Would it compete too directly with 9th edition? Is it too against GW’s ethos of “Meta Chasing=Money Making”? Is there a chance in hell for a fabled 4th way to play?

I don't see it, between the three games they have there is no room left and any players that played the new way would do so instead of or in addition to playing one of the other games. Give Apoc a small rework and rebalance and try to make it great for 2k pts I can see, but making a whole new game for a slightly simpler 1k-2k gaming experience seems silly. Doesn't 9th edition have a basic rules and advanced rules section? You can just play without the advanced rules and command points if you want to keep things simple.

Explaining all the rules of a game like 40k is really hard and if you try to play a game without them knowing any of the rules whatsoever they might feel like you are playing both armies, I have had people complain about the latter when I taught them the game a second time after not catching everything that is going on because the teacher didn't let the learner do their moves and think at their own pace. Sometimes learners will try to figure out the perfect solution, if I know what it is I will keep my mouth shut, if I don't I will tell them that even I don't know so pondering the action for any longer probably won't help. Reading the rules for 9th takes a little longer than for 8th but unless it is a small child they can get through it, I read all 120 pages of rules for 7th edition WHFB in a foreign language and I must have been around 10 back then and I had no money to buy the book so I had cycle uphill both ways to get to the hobby store and loan a book for a few hours before I had to go home.

Make the army lists, loan them the main rulebook and let them take however long they want to finish reading the rules and then have a game with them. I taught a girl or two to play Warhammer 40k and they definitely weren't the slowest learners I have had. Maybe your wife just isn't into the 40k, it can be great when played with friends but people that are reluctant or uninterested don't make great opponents. I think you might both have more fun if you find another board game to enjoy together. 40k is at its best when it is a little indigestible and hard to get into, although I think rules bloat has been a serious issue starting with 6th edition. More than anything I think the game might just need a reset, it'll likely come with 10th edition, every other edition usually rocks the boat a bit more. One can hope GW goes back to indexes and put all the Stratagems (but a limited shared amount instead of the bonanza we have now), Relics and stuff into one book and remove faction-specific objectives and standardise most ability names and effects across factions.

There are ways for the game already to be pretty relaxed. The problem is any game no matter how simple some people will take to absurd levels of over competitive. There is no avoiding them outside just playing with people you know think as you do.

Point in case if anyone remembers those burger king Xbox games that got released a number of years ago ? Well I had a friend play one and did so online, he found a way to jump a section of the race course and beat the one person he raced against. Then got a voice message accusing him of cheating and demanding a 1 v 1 rematch calling me him all manner of nasty name.

Let that sink in, someone being crazy angry over losing at a burger king centered racing game you got near for free from burger king. Yeah, I know, that screams fine balance yes ?

To all the people bringing up narrative or Crusade up as the casual way to play 40k I'm afraid it's really not.

Casual in this case refers to being easier or more straightforward to play, whereas Crusade has extra amounts of book keeping on top of the book keeping 9th already requires. The mission design and the pre- and post-game mechanics make the experience way slower and more complex than regular 9th. If you want a more casual, pick up and play experience right now, playing the GT Mission pack is honestly the better way to get it. Although the best is still probably Open play since the mission (missions?) are very simple.

I plan to play 40k only as a casual game.
Can't get angry anymore at the clusterfeth rules... just disappointed and not willing to go to tourneys.

 Bosskelot wrote:
To all the people bringing up narrative or Crusade up as the casual way to play 40k I'm afraid it's really not.

Casual in this case refers to being easier or more straightforward to play, whereas Crusade has extra amounts of book keeping on top of the book keeping 9th already requires. The mission design and the pre- and post-game mechanics make the experience way slower and more complex than regular 9th. If you want a more casual, pick up and play experience right now, playing the GT Mission pack is honestly the better way to get it. Although the best is still probably Open play since the mission (missions?) are very simple.

This is correct- Casual does not imply another layer of rules on top of core rules, army construction rules, codexes, supplements etc.

Killteam is a better casual game- there is reduced layout in minis/terrain, rules contain everything you need to play in one book. Its rules are still quite dense though.

honestly 40k is pretty fething simple. if you made it any more simple it'd literally be "sit down, each player rolls a die, highest die wins"