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So the latest Chaos Codex is getting roasted for many reasons, one of which is it can't decide from unit to unit how detailed rules should be. Which is an across the board issue in 40k and worth discussing.

For me, I like to model, I like to convert, I like to give all my Adeptus Arbites (count as IG) shock mauls rather than swords. I think it axes/swords/maces should just be an aesthetic choice.

But these days there are different rules for power swords/axes/mauls and IG can't take Mauls, only swords. Not a big deal but over an army these fudges add up. And when it's actually time to play... a game where several guys in a unit may have different weapons with slightly different rules is just an annoyance.

8th edition did away with templates and scatter die, and I think that was an improvement overall but then added dozens of weapons with different profiles.

I liked how 3rd edition did it. A power weapon is a power weapon, whether it's an axe, sword, mace, glave, nunchucks, or a board with a power nail through it. Except when it was a fist... Or lightning claws... Or a thunder hammer... OK nobody's perfect.

So... If it was up to me....

Divide melee weapons into 3 bands - normal (no special rules), power (-3 to save), and heavy (2xStrength, -3 to save, always goes last). For some armies maybe change the bands, maybe have Dark Eldar with poison (wound on 4+), sharp (-3 to save), agonizing (-3 to save, wound infantry on 2+, tanks and monsters on 4+).

Similarly divide most weapon types into a pistol (12" range, +1 attack in melee), rifle (24" range), heavy (48" range, -2 to hit if you move). Dispense with variants, a plasma gun is a plasma gun for all factions. Try and bring Adeptus Mech weapons into line with the rest of the Imperium, with no more than 1 or 2 unique weapon types.

Eliminate the Primaris/Firstborn split. It's just a new armor mark.

No more subfactions. Use warlord traits and choice of units to differentiate sub factions. or make a new codex. The color you paint your models should not affect their rules.

One area where I wish there was more granularity is vehicles/monsters/giant robots. Maybe not go back to 4 facings but just offer +1 strength and/or -1 save if shot from behind. Otherwise there's no need to maneuver.

Specifics aside, that's the level I would like to see. With most differences being just cosmetic rather than rules based.

I think that that is too much consolidation-but I do think current 40k is too granular for it’s own good.

Removing everything related to stratagems and Command Points would be a great start. This is an important, clean the Vaseline from the lens to clarify what we are looking at step.

 Kid_Kyoto wrote:
So the latest Chaos Codex is getting roasted for many reasons, one of which is it can't decide from unit to unit how detailed rules should be. Which is an across the board issue in 40k and worth discussing.

For me, I like to model, I like to convert, I like to give all my Adeptus Arbites (count as IG) shock mauls rather than swords. I think it axes/swords/maces should just be an aesthetic choice.

But these days there are different rules for power swords/axes/mauls and IG can't take Mauls, only swords. Not a big deal but over an army these fudges add up. And when it's actually time to play... a game where several guys in a unit may have different weapons with slightly different rules is just an annoyance.

8th edition did away with templates and scatter die, and I think that was an improvement overall but then added dozens of weapons with different profiles.

I liked how 3rd edition did it. A power weapon is a power weapon, whether it's an axe, sword, mace, glave, nunchucks, or a board with a power nail through it. Except when it was a fist... Or lightning claws... Or a thunder hammer... OK nobody's perfect.

So... If it was up to me....

Divide melee weapons into 3 bands - normal (no special rules), power (-3 to save), and heavy (2xStrength, -3 to save, always goes last). For some armies maybe change the bands, maybe have Dark Eldar with poison (wound on 4+), sharp (-3 to save), agonizing (-3 to save, wound infantry on 2+, tanks and monsters on 4+).

Similarly divide most weapon types into a pistol (12" range, +1 attack in melee), rifle (24" range), heavy (48" range, -2 to hit if you move). Dispense with variants, a plasma gun is a plasma gun for all factions. Try and bring Adeptus Mech weapons into line with the rest of the Imperium, with no more than 1 or 2 unique weapon types.

Eliminate the Primaris/Firstborn split. It's just a new armor mark.

No more subfactions. Use warlord traits and choice of units to differentiate sub factions. or make a new codex. The color you paint your models should not affect their rules.

One area where I wish there was more granularity is vehicles/monsters/giant robots. Maybe not go back to 4 facings but just offer +1 strength and/or -1 save if shot from behind. Otherwise there's no need to maneuver.

Specifics aside, that's the level I would like to see. With most differences being just cosmetic rather than rules based.

For the record, the color you paint your models DOESN'T effect their rules. With armies no longer being allowed to mix subfactions, there's no gameplay reason to have anything be a specific color.

There was never any reason to maneuver. Every vehicle's side armor is visible from half the board at any given time and rear armor is only ever an option for deepstrikers unless the guy with the tank is an idiot. There were a lot of reasons armor facings never mattered but 'rear armor was basically impossible to get to unless you deepstrike or your opponent was a total numpty' is one that gets forgotten. (Oh, but what if they get close to the middle of the board? Oh yeah, that thing that's worthless in melee is really itching to mix it up with dreadnought CQC and Primarchs in the midboard. Do these people even play these games?)

The more granularity, the better imo, but not the cluttered unfocused mess we have now. In a vast setting like 40k you need differentiation between factions and you need differentiation between units within those factions...current 40k is not that good at achieving this in my opinion and GW tries to compeneate/hide it by tacking on a gazillion special rules to achieve said differentiation.

In comparison the new heresy edition has done a decent job in that department in my opinion.

Bring back initiative, weapon skill comparison, make relics and warlord traits cost points. This would provide more levers to balance and differentiate units. This way you could also dial back the overabundance of stratagems and it could help in reducing the problem of extreme lethality in some aspects.

So yeah, I remain that the "streamlining" they did from 7th to 8th didn't really streamline anything in the long run and it didn't make the game more accessible either because nobody can seriously tell me that it is easier to learn the rules in 9th than is was in 7th all things considered.

Nothing should be free and everything should cost points. I don't understand why(even as a PL person) GW has a perfectly balancing equation that they then feth up with ways around it.

 Tokhuah wrote:
Removing everything related to stratagems and Command Points would be a great start. This is an important, clean the Vaseline from the lens to clarify what we are looking at step.

This. It's a terrible mechanic which never should have been added, get rid of it and then we can see what else needs to be simplified.

I'd want a morale system that is actually a morale system, not a simplified "Lose More" mechanic where the player is punished for losing models by rolling to see if they lose more models.

 Kid_Kyoto wrote:
No more subfactions. Use warlord traits and choice of units to differentiate sub factions. or make a new codex. The color you paint your models should not affect their rules.

No. Never in a million years. Factions should matter. Factions should play differently. Factions sure as hell should not just be a warlord trait and some unit variance. Might as well go back to 5th Ed Codices (IIRC) and make it so Ultramarines armies are always led by Sicarius, and White Scar armies are always led by the Khan, otherwise they're just vanilla.

My Chapters/Legions are not just paint jobs, and never should be treated as such.

ERJAK wrote:

There was never any reason to maneuver. Every vehicle's side armor is visible from half the board at any given time and rear armor is only ever an option for deepstrikers unless the guy with the tank is an idiot. There were a lot of reasons armor facings never mattered but 'rear armor was basically impossible to get to unless you deepstrike or your opponent was a total numpty' is one that gets forgotten. (Oh, but what if they get close to the middle of the board? Oh yeah, that thing that's worthless in melee is really itching to mix it up with dreadnought CQC and Primarchs in the midboard. Do these people even play these games?)

^Everything about the above post is wrong. Meaningful LoS blocking terrain does wonders for the value of maneuvering and positioning vehicles with armor facing. Above post also seems to forget the existence of transport vehicles, or other armored units that are used with more aggressive positioning.

I think the first question that matters is what size of a game you want in order to determine the level of detail for the rules. As more and more models get put on the table, I want less and less detailed rules. For example, at what point does it matter exactly what heavy weapons a squad has with individual attacks for each weapon versus just being a heavy weapons squad firing as one profile regardless of the weapons they're modeled with? Where do we transition from skirmish-level, to battle-level, to mass-battle/apocalypse?

 H.B.M.C. wrote:
My Chapters/Legions are not just paint jobs, and never should be treated as such.

Why not? Why do the tiny differences between two tactical squads from different chapters need to be represented in an army-scale game where a titan can kill either of them in one shot? Why does what planet a regiment is from matter, but whether a unit is part of a Cadian armored regiment or Cadian infantry regiment is irrelevant? The game worked just fine when sub-factions didn't exist and we need to go back to that.

Every attempt at streamlining 40k has been followed be the re-crunch-ification of the game. 40k player are fluff fans and most of them want the models fluff accurately portrayed via rules , stats and special rules Even if it results in unwieldy gameplay.

Changes will be made, but I don't believe 40k can ever be truly streamlined for long.

For myself, the finer details that set my units apart are in the painting, modeling, and in the stories in my head. On the Tabletop, I'm fine with a level of abstraction that sacrifices RPG'ish level of detail in exchange for ease and speed of play and I won't find that in 40k.

Tannhauser42 wrote:I think the first question that matters is what size of a game you want in order to determine the level of detail for the rules. As more and more models get put on the table, I want less and less detailed rules. For example, at what point does it matter exactly what heavy weapons a squad has with individual attacks for each weapon versus just being a heavy weapons squad firing as one profile regardless of the weapons they're modeled with? Where do we transition from skirmish-level, to battle-level, to mass-battle/apocalypse?

Pretty much this. The smaller the game, the more detail/customization I want. If I'm playing Combat Patrol, give me things like Challenges/Duels, purchasable special rules for each squad and squad leader, etc. If we're playing 2k points, we might be better off just playing Apoc so we don't have a thousand little rules to resolve each turn. I feel like 40k's current rules work pretty well for games of ~1000 - ~1500 provided no one brings a knight or a skew list.

CadianSgtBob wrote:

 H.B.M.C. wrote:
My Chapters/Legions are not just paint jobs, and never should be treated as such.

Why not? Why do the tiny differences between two tactical squads from different chapters need to be represented in an army-scale game where a titan can kill either of them in one shot? Why does what planet a regiment is from matter, but whether a unit is part of a Cadian armored regiment or Cadian infantry regiment is irrelevant? The game worked just fine when sub-factions didn't exist and we need to go back to that.

The key here, I think, is that chapter tactic style rules should have been "army theme" rules rather than being married to subfaction. It's just that GW tied them to chapters when marines stole the concept from corsairs, and then every other codex followed suit. So maybe White Scar and Salamander tactical squads shouldn't necessarily be different, but maybe tactical marines in a Mounted Assault list could have a special rule that lets them disembark after a transport moves while tactical marines in a Stalwart Defense army might get bolter discipline and tactical marines in a Shadow Strike list get to deploy as GSC-style blips or whatever.

Or bringing it back to your example, it probably shouldn't matter whether you're cadian or vostroyan. But it maybe should matter that you're infantry in an armored company vs infantry in a meatgrinder wave of dudes company vs infantry in a sneaky jungle fighter company.

CadianSgtBob wrote:
Why not? Why do the tiny differences between two tactical squads from different chapters need to be represented in an army-scale game where a titan can kill either of them in one shot? Why does what planet a regiment is from matter, but whether a unit is part of a Cadian armored regiment or Cadian infantry regiment is irrelevant? The game worked just fine when sub-factions didn't exist and we need to go back to that.

Wyldhunt pretty much nailed it, but more than that something Unit (IIRC) said in a different thread in reference specifically to Guard and how factions used to work with that army.

You had a Doctrine system* that let you build custom types of regiments. The various types of Guard that we know - Cadians, Catachans, Steel Legion, etc. - had Doctrines assigned to them, but they weren't mandatory. So if you wanted to play Cadians you didn't pick "Cadians", you picked the Doctrines that were recommended for that type of Guard, but were well within your rights to throw that out the window and do what you want.

GW has tried to replicate that somewhat in modern Codices, but they still tie too much to individual factions (be they Legions, Craftworlds, and so on). If they made it a bit more free form, and made the custom systems more robust, rather than as an adjunct to the current faction listings, then it would be better.

But just making all Marines one thing and one thing only? That's boring. Who wants that?



*Which had its own failings, which I can discuss at length but aren't strictly relevant in this context.

 H.B.M.C. wrote:
If they made it a bit more free form, and made the custom systems more robust, rather than as an adjunct to the current faction listings, then it would be better.

Better, yes, but I still don't see how it's necessary in a game at the scale of 40k. Your choice of units and upgrades should be enough to represent your army, if you need to layer on special sub-faction rules to represent customizing a force then it's time to go back and look at the core rules and figure out why they aren't getting the job done.

But just making all Marines one thing and one thing only? That's boring. Who wants that?

People who want marines to be just one faction among many, not 75% of the game with each color of marine getting its own special snowflake rules.

You don't believe that 40k is at the scale where different regiments or types of armies can or should be represented. Basically you want a really sterile game. There's no convincing you otherwise, so I'm not going to try.

 H.B.M.C. wrote:
You don't believe that 40k is at the scale where different regiments or types of armies can or should be represented.

Please do not build straw man arguments. Different regiments and different types of armies can absolutely be represented by taking the appropriate units. An armored regiment takes tanks, an infantry regiment takes lots of infantry, etc. The game worked just fine before 8th added explicit rules saying This Is Your Faction, it will work just fine with the rules bloat removed.

While the IG Doctrine system and the 4th edition Marine Wheel of Chapters rules were not perfect, that's the sort of thing I would like to see.

Rather than tying rules to how your IG are dressed, or which color your marines are, tie them to the player/warlord.

Should Soviet-style Valhallans be waves or expendable conscripts, or a small band of hardy Stalingrad survivors? Let the player decide!

Most marine chapters have scout companies, bike companies etc, let the player pick which company this army is.

And plant these rules in one place. Right now there warlord traits, stragams, army rules and sub faction rules. ENOUGH.

 Eilif wrote:
Every attempt at streamlining 40k has been followed be the re-crunch-ification of the game. 40k player are fluff fans and most of them want the models fluff accurately portrayed via rules , stats and special rules Even if it results in unwieldy gameplay.
.

Rather people want more free rules to find the next op combo. Resulting in armies like all bike ws armies when rules reward that despite it not being fluffy ignoring main combat units of white scars.

Chapter etc bonuses also either needs to be freely appliable unit by unit inside army or cost points unit by unit basis depending on unit in question. Blood angel hellblaster isn't worth same as say ultramarine so them costing same is bad balance. And leads to armies not representing armies in fluff.

I love granularity so I hope we get even more in the future.
But then again, I loved 7th ed where you had formations, special rules and a ton more stuff so I'm definitely not the kind of player who wants less complexity in 40k.

I'd love consolidations of profiles and wargear, not the removal of rules (subfactions, relics, stratagems, etc....).

Halve the number of weapons and halve the units' rosters. I still can't understand why orks have to have 5 datasheets for buggies, 4 for planes, 5 for battlewagons, etc... lots of units could be merged into a single datasheet. Also among infantries, there's no need of having beastnagga boyz and boyz, just make them all boyz. Or intercessors and tactical squads, make them the same basic marine dudes.

Stratagems can be reduced to a handful of options (10-15 at most) and some of them, those that are locked to specific units, can just be special rules listed in the datasheet of such units maybe with a once per game use.

CadianSgtBob wrote:

 H.B.M.C. wrote:
If they made it a bit more free form, and made the custom systems more robust, rather than as an adjunct to the current faction listings, then it would be better.

Better, yes, but I still don't see how it's necessary in a game at the scale of 40k. Your choice of units and upgrades should be enough to represent your army, if you need to layer on special sub-faction rules to represent customizing a force then it's time to go back and look at the core rules and figure out why they aren't getting the job done.

See, I think there's room for giving armies a bit more complexity than just unit/wargear selection without necessarily squeezing that complexity into the core rules.

The half-baked idea rattling around between my ears at the moment is something like:
* Ditch chapter tactics, stratagems, and doctrines.
* Make warlord traits and and relics purchasable wargear with 0-1 restrictions.
* Let armies pick from a list of themes available to their codex.

And then those themes would give you access to a reasonably complex special mechanic and/or unique wargear options. So marines might have access to themes like...

MOUNTED ASSAULT
* Gives you a Velocity mechanic that gives bikes and vehicles bonuses to defense and hammer of wrath style damage on the charge based on how far they move, but you can only "turn" so much much when moving at high speeds.
* Lets tacticals and intercessors disembark after their transport moved (but they can't charge afterwards).

STALWART DEFENSE
* Gives units the Bolter Discipline rule (they wouldn't have it without this theme).
* Grants access to the "Ready... Aim..." action that lets a unit shoot at the end of the enemy Shooting phase. (Sort of like oldschool overwatch, but your opponent gets a chance to hide or kill your units before the Stalwart marines get their shots in.)

SHADOW STRIKE
* All units deploy as GSC blips.
* Models that hold still can use a Heavy 1 bolter profile that ignores Look Out Sir (ala the old Raptors chapter tactics.)

I wouldn't want marines to have all those mechanics in effect at the same time, but I kind of love the idea of being able to play my army in radically different ways that aren't necessarily supported by just fielding a bunch of bikes or whatever.

But just making all Marines one thing and one thing only? That's boring. Who wants that?

People who want marines to be just one faction among many, not 75% of the game with each color of marine getting its own special snowflake rules.

Something like what I pitched above doesn't have to be a marine-centric thing. The same basic idea could apply to any codex. If anything, it might be an opportunity to consolidate some of the marines together. Grey Hunters and Wolf Guard don't necessarily need to be extra special datasheets when an army theme can just unlock the option to upgrade your sergeant to wear terminator armor.

 Blackie wrote:
I'd love consolidations of profiles and wargear, not the removal of rules (subfactions, relics, stratagems, etc....).

Halve the number of weapons and halve the units' rosters. I still can't understand why orks have to have 5 datasheets for buggies, 4 for planes, 5 for battlewagons, etc... lots of units could be merged into a single datasheet. Also among infantries, there's no need of having beastnagga boyz and boyz, just make them all boyz. Or intercessors and tactical squads, make them the same basic marine dudes.

Stratagems can be reduced to a handful of options (10-15 at most) and some of them, those that are locked to specific units, can just be special rules listed in the datasheet of such units maybe with a once per game use.

How much less complex buggies would be with 1 entry with weapon options though? Apart from cutting # of buggies you can field to 1/5(rule of 3) what would it accomplish?

 Kid_Kyoto wrote:
So... If it was up to me....

Divide melee weapons into 3 bands - normal (no special rules), power (-3 to save), and heavy (2xStrength, -3 to save, always goes last). For some armies maybe change the bands, maybe have Dark Eldar with poison (wound on 4+), sharp (-3 to save), agonizing (-3 to save, wound infantry on 2+, tanks and monsters on 4+).

Well, yes and no. While I agree that there are too many weapons which are too similar to each other, cutting them down to three is probably a bit too much. At the very least you need to differentiate between TH/DCCW and PF/PK now because there is quite a big difference game-wise between them. The "normal" type also needs to do something, otherwise you might as well just delete those profiles completely. +1 attack and/or -1AP comes to mind.
Taking Death Guard as an example, there are good arguments for keeping Manreapers and Flails as separate weapons because they actually do something unique. Plague cleavers, plague reapers and maces and can be rolled into one thunderhammer-esque profile, all the swords and axes could be rolled into your "power" profile. The codex wouldn't play different at all, but the rules would be much cleaner.
In the end, special melee weapons do have a place when they actually do something different and aren't just different for the sake of being different.

Similarly divide most weapon types into a pistol (12" range, +1 attack in melee), rifle (24" range), heavy (48" range, -2 to hit if you move). Dispense with variants, a plasma gun is a plasma gun for all factions. Try and bring Adeptus Mech weapons into line with the rest of the Imperium, with no more than 1 or 2 unique weapon types.

Disagree. I see no reason why unique factions should not have unique weapons. The big problem right now is that every unit has unique weapons and that needs to stop. In 4th orks had 20 different ranged weapons, and these included unique stuff like the SAG and snazz guns. Make all the marines shoot the same bolters again, give all the dreads the same plasma cannon and have the big mek and the wazzbom shoot the same tellyporta blasta.
As with melee weapons, if you don't have a good reason to stray from the stock option, don't. Unique primary gun for a tank? Sure. Unique weapon for a unique unit? Sure. Yet another bolter variant for yet another primaris unit starting with I? Feth off.
Once again, implementing these changes would probably have minor impact on how a faction plays, but would take a lot of mental load of players.

Eliminate the Primaris/Firstborn split. It's just a new armor mark.

Also do the beastsnagge/ork split while you're at it, thankyouverymuch.

No more subfactions. Use warlord traits and choice of units to differentiate sub factions. or make a new codex. The color you paint your models should not affect their rules.

I agree, but for a different reason. While everyone was crying to get chapter tactics for their armies and was happy when they got them, I think the experiment has failed.
None of the subfaction bonusses actually make the corresponding faction feel like they should, so at this point it's just free rules for the sake of free rules.
No matter whether you play eldar, orks or sisters, you always have the shooty faction, the choppy faction, somethingsomething objective secured faction and so on.
Death Guard don't actually have any sub-faction rules, you basically just pick a plague(= warlord trait) and a stratagem+relic to go along with it. And that works perfectly fine to differentiate the sorcerer faction from the "we ain't going nowhere" terminator faction and the poxwalker horde faction.

At this point, I feel like they should just drop them for everyone, because they have clearly failed at what they are supposed to do.

One area where I wish there was more granularity is vehicles/monsters/giant robots. Maybe not go back to 4 facings but just offer +1 strength and/or -1 save if shot from behind. Otherwise there's no need to maneuver.

I'm not sure whether I really want that. Those kind of rules fall apart when not dealing with traditional tanks, and 40k has plenty of those. I've never understood why a battlewagon should be more vulnerable from behind than from the sides (both engine and fuel is located in the middle) and monsters like the Haruspex seem more durable from behind than from the front.
While I have blown up plenty of vehicles by hitting their rear armor with rokkits, I think it feels better that there isn't an easy way to get rid of vehicles anymore.

Essentially the granularity I want to see in 40k is "unit" not "model". What a unit does, sees and where it moves should matter, not what single models do.
Right now there are still way too many rules bothering with single models, like picking who rolls saves, determining cover, LoS and range.
Right now, if a tire of a battlewagon can "see" the enemy model, the ork gunner looking the other direction can still shoot him. I'm fine with that, it's an abstraction - it's not like the BW will move exactly 12 yards, hit the breaks, have every gun shoot exactly three times and then hit the gas to drive another 12 yards.
However, what then defies this logic is that when a unit of lootas has the same footprint as the battlewagon unit, only that one loota which can draw LoS is allowed to shoot. In my book, all kinds of units should follow the same level of abstraction.

And while we're at it, I also want TLoS to go. Just draw a 2D line as long as your weapon's range is and anything which has its hull or base on that line can be shot. If there is any terrain on that line, you have to apply that terrain's properties to the shot. Simple, no more shooting from and to banners/wings/antennas, no more laserpointers, no more people gluing windows shut to hide knights.

tneva82 wrote:

 Blackie wrote:
I'd love consolidations of profiles and wargear, not the removal of rules (subfactions, relics, stratagems, etc....).

Halve the number of weapons and halve the units' rosters. I still can't understand why orks have to have 5 datasheets for buggies, 4 for planes, 5 for battlewagons, etc... lots of units could be merged into a single datasheet. Also among infantries, there's no need of having beastnagga boyz and boyz, just make them all boyz. Or intercessors and tactical squads, make them the same basic marine dudes.

Stratagems can be reduced to a handful of options (10-15 at most) and some of them, those that are locked to specific units, can just be special rules listed in the datasheet of such units maybe with a once per game use.

How much less complex buggies would be with 1 entry with weapon options though? Apart from cutting # of buggies you can field to 1/5(rule of 3) what would it accomplish?

They already have the almost exact same profile and only the shokkjump dragsta has a dedicated unique special rule. They can simply be merged into a single profile with 5 different sets of weapons to choose in order to represent the official models.

Same with all the other stuff that I listed. The kill rig for example is a battlewagon with different weapons than the older kit, nothing more. And beastnaggas are boyz.

What would it accomplish? First there would be no more silly rules about just one unit of each buggy. The datasheets section would be much shorter and simpler to consult, rules and profiles would be easier to remember. There's no need of giving +2''M, +1W, +1S, +1 to hit for one of the big shootas, -1 to hit, etc... to only one or two of the buggies, different abilities to cause mortal wounds on the charge etc.... those are all differentiations that aren't needed and add a lot of confusion. At the moment it's extremely hard to field multiple kinds of buggies and perfectly remember all their stats, rules and wargear. Heck it's actually hard to remember correctly their profile even fielding a single kind of buggies.

 H.B.M.C. wrote:
I'd want a morale system that is actually a morale system, not a simplified "Lose More" mechanic where the player is punished for losing models by rolling to see if they lose more models.

 Kid_Kyoto wrote:
No more subfactions. Use warlord traits and choice of units to differentiate sub factions. or make a new codex. The color you paint your models should not affect their rules.

No. Never in a million years. Factions should matter. Factions should play differently. Factions sure as hell should not just be a warlord trait and some unit variance. Might as well go back to 5th Ed Codices (IIRC) and make it so Ultramarines armies are always led by Sicarius, and White Scar armies are always led by the Khan, otherwise they're just vanilla.

My Chapters/Legions are not just paint jobs, and never should be treated as such.

In an optimal world you'd not need blatant unbalanceable traits and instead would get the option in the army building phase, depending upon specialisation for which you'd pay points and unlock slots....
alas ... 30k ruleswriters seem entirely in another world than 40k ruleswriters.

I am in the camp of thinking Kid_Kyoto's suggestions go a bit too far on the standardization side but the current game could definitely be improved by heading in that direction. Certainly I always preferred when a power weapon was a power weapon, and there was more standardization of weapon stats across factions when there wasn't a pressing need to distinguish them. Let Kill Team be the place for bespoke weapon rules, where different types of power weapon have different stats and so on.

I do with Primaris had been introduced from the onset as a new set of equipment rather than that AND biological improvements, but that ship has sailed and IIMO we're too far along for going back and retconning things that much to be worth it.

 Blackie wrote:

tneva82 wrote:

 Blackie wrote:
I'd love consolidations of profiles and wargear, not the removal of rules (subfactions, relics, stratagems, etc....).

Halve the number of weapons and halve the units' rosters. I still can't understand why orks have to have 5 datasheets for buggies, 4 for planes, 5 for battlewagons, etc... lots of units could be merged into a single datasheet. Also among infantries, there's no need of having beastnagga boyz and boyz, just make them all boyz. Or intercessors and tactical squads, make them the same basic marine dudes.

Stratagems can be reduced to a handful of options (10-15 at most) and some of them, those that are locked to specific units, can just be special rules listed in the datasheet of such units maybe with a once per game use.

How much less complex buggies would be with 1 entry with weapon options though? Apart from cutting # of buggies you can field to 1/5(rule of 3) what would it accomplish?

They already have the almost exact same profile and only the shokkjump dragsta has a dedicated unique special rule. They can simply be merged into a single profile with 5 different sets of weapons to choose in order to represent the official models.

Same with all the other stuff that I listed. The kill rig for example is a battlewagon with different weapons than the older kit, nothing more. And beastnaggas are boyz.

What would it accomplish? First there would be no more silly rules about just one unit of each buggy. The datasheets section would be much shorter and simpler to consult, rules and profiles would be easier to remember. There's no need of giving +2''M, +1W, +1S, +1 to hit for one of the big shootas, -1 to hit, etc... to only one or two of the buggies, different abilities to cause mortal wounds on the charge etc.... those are all differentiations that aren't needed and add a lot of confusion. At the moment it's extremely hard to field multiple kinds of buggies and perfectly remember all their stats, rules and wargear. Heck it's actually hard to remember correctly their profile even fielding a single kind of buggies.

I don't think your suggestion would solve any problems though.

However, you could change the buggies to not have unique weapons - especially since their weapons aren't that unique to begin with.
Snazzwagon essentially has a quad snazzgun
KBB has a tripple deff gun and burnas
SJD has a twin KMB
Scrapjet has a quad rokkits
Squig buggy actually is unique
Wartrike could have dakka guns instead of boomstikks, PK instead of snagga claw

Boom, 8 profiles gone that no one would miss for one second.

 H.B.M.C. wrote:
You don't believe that 40k is at the scale where different regiments or types of armies can or should be represented. Basically you want a really sterile game. There's no convincing you otherwise, so I'm not going to try.

it is more about that it should be the same for all

if marines have multiple book to represent the "true to the Codex" Marines, not having a Codex Slaanesh a Codex Emperors Children, a book for each Eldar Ship and each Guard Regiment is not good for the game

because the Marines, that are by the Background just a different paint job, get a book while factions that are actually very different are a fluff note inside the book of another faction with "just pretend that the different paint job matters"

that said, we already had that point were the different colours already were more than just a paint job for everyone, but somehow all but Marines lost it
and either Marines lose it too or everyone else get it back

 Jidmah wrote:

 Blackie wrote:

tneva82 wrote:

 Blackie wrote:
I'd love consolidations of profiles and wargear, not the removal of rules (subfactions, relics, stratagems, etc....).

Halve the number of weapons and halve the units' rosters. I still can't understand why orks have to have 5 datasheets for buggies, 4 for planes, 5 for battlewagons, etc... lots of units could be merged into a single datasheet. Also among infantries, there's no need of having beastnagga boyz and boyz, just make them all boyz. Or intercessors and tactical squads, make them the same basic marine dudes.

Stratagems can be reduced to a handful of options (10-15 at most) and some of them, those that are locked to specific units, can just be special rules listed in the datasheet of such units maybe with a once per game use.

How much less complex buggies would be with 1 entry with weapon options though? Apart from cutting # of buggies you can field to 1/5(rule of 3) what would it accomplish?

They already have the almost exact same profile and only the shokkjump dragsta has a dedicated unique special rule. They can simply be merged into a single profile with 5 different sets of weapons to choose in order to represent the official models.

Same with all the other stuff that I listed. The kill rig for example is a battlewagon with different weapons than the older kit, nothing more. And beastnaggas are boyz.

What would it accomplish? First there would be no more silly rules about just one unit of each buggy. The datasheets section would be much shorter and simpler to consult, rules and profiles would be easier to remember. There's no need of giving +2''M, +1W, +1S, +1 to hit for one of the big shootas, -1 to hit, etc... to only one or two of the buggies, different abilities to cause mortal wounds on the charge etc.... those are all differentiations that aren't needed and add a lot of confusion. At the moment it's extremely hard to field multiple kinds of buggies and perfectly remember all their stats, rules and wargear. Heck it's actually hard to remember correctly their profile even fielding a single kind of buggies.

I don't think your suggestion would solve any problems though.

However, you could change the buggies to not have unique weapons - especially since their weapons aren't that unique to begin with.
Snazzwagon essentially has a quad snazzgun
KBB has a tripple deff gun and burnas
SJD has a twin KMB
Scrapjet has a quad rokkits
Squig buggy actually is unique
Wartrike could have dakka guns instead of boomstikks, PK instead of snagga claw

Boom, 8 profiles gone that no one would miss for one second.

It would solve the issue that a couple of buggies have one more wound and/or +1S, that a couple of buggies have a different M stat, that some buggies have +1 to hit on some weapons (grot gunners), that some buggy can cause mortal wounds on the charge, etc... I'd just make a single profile with all those stats and abilities that are the same for each buggy. Only the set of weapons should be different.

I can't really play them without constantly looking at their profiles and that annoys me terribly . With a single unique profile and set of rules I'd only need to remember the weapons' profiles. My main goal would be about reducing the bloat rather than increasing balance, to try to remember everything by heart, like I used to do in older editions. I hate constantly flipping pages more than facing OP units .

I'd keep the wartrike as a separate unit of course since it's an HQ and not a FA. Then I agree with you that lots of weapons can be merged together.