8th Edition: Controversial Rules and Mechanics,

[Schlitzaf]

Characters with a wound statistic of less than 10 and who do not have the vehicle keyword, who end the movement phase in coherency with a friendly unit that does not contain the character keyword and has a minimum unit size of more than 1, joins that unit (multiple units in coherency, player chooses which unit is joined). While joined to a unit the character loses the Character keyword, any Detachment bonuses they might have and cannot be individually targeted for shooting attacks unless by units with the sniper keyword. Any wounds suffered by the combined unit are taken on the original unit first and not the Character. Any joined Characters do not suffer the effects of any Moral tests the unit might take. If that unit moves in the psychic or charge phase the joined character moves with them. If any psychic powers are used on the unit any joined characters are also effected. If the character ends any phase out of coherency, or the unit that has been joined is destroyed, they automatically leave the unit and regain the character keyword and any Deatchment bonuses they might have.

 

——————

Gentle as others have said we need a why. Part of what I was hoping to demonstrate to you is how complex your solution of ‘joining’ vs independent is. And their are couple things about your rule here which further showcases the issue at hand.

 

Per RAW, if High Marshall Helbrect joins a Crusader Squad, Helbrect loses his Chapter Tactics. While is tactics indicate units not models, their are some abilities or tactics which do go off models instead of units.

 

Graia Tactic suddenly has a Graia character who joined a squad killed by Snipers not being able to use their tactics. Furthermore Graia Units if all there Characters have joined a squad are not legally obligated to run away.

 

Secondly sense you don’t lose keywords, I can throw a JetCaptain into a unit like Devestators or Centurions and suddenly they can do old Hit and Run. Finally do the rules here override the rules regarding you must removed wounded models first?

 

Also because the character does not lose his Keywords you game that with certain abilities. For example my Cenobytes have 12” Moral Immunity to Black Templars. Throw my Marshall into a Conscript Squad suddenly the whole unit is Moral immune (and deny powers, gets rerolls 1, among other things).

 

Then thrown on top, if you throw a character like Gulliman into a squad of Jump Pack PA Unit per your RAW Gulliman can then use the descent of Angels ability. Also how does that ability work with something like canticles Or Daemon God abilities? Which are detachment based abilities, does the character lose them too?

 

Imagining having to sit and explain to new players these interactions and ‘gotcha’ moments. Also if I deep strike a unit like a Tyranid Prime that at end of deep strikes lands them next to a squad on board, unit or both are from Hive Fleet Hydra. Does the Deep Striker cause the unit to lose its Shroud? The same can be applied to Dark Angels and Grim Resolve.

 

So let’s tackle your issues using the above rule you have set out.

1) Untargetable Lone Characters. This is in many ways a feature. Take Assassin Units like Vindicires, this rule change makes that Assassin papermache. Lone characters will often be these style of units. Otherwise it’s a buffer and you just blasted the squad it was buffing. In which case....you have a 4-6 wound character running around with 4-5 attacks. (5 hits > 2.5 wounds. Or 2 Dead Marines if the situation comes up and it charges you). Creed is a character with several orders, unlike Straken he is not a CC monster so he’ll stand back barking orders. Instead of being with the men. Your rule change will force Creed into a Squad instead of having him act like well a Commander.

 

Also why this issue at hand is sometimes a ‘huh’ moment. Removing it makes a lot of characters more fragile who rely on this rule to make them worthwhile (Assassins being the most notable example)

 

2) Your argument “why can’t I shoot that Dreadnought” could be applied to “why can’t I shoot Gulliman?” Or Daemon Princes, any host of sub-10 wound monster level characters. If you remove the “vehicle” clause or add monsters to that. You’ll make monster level characters like Princes become incredibly fragile. See how much better Chaos Daemon Princes became when they became 8 wounds like Chaos Marine Princes.

 

Units are instrinctically ‘fragile’ if they can be hard targeted and if you have armies like most in 8th based on using buff circles. The buffers need protection. While your join squad will protect buffers it will also cause weird knock back effects and further clarification

 

I’ll respond more in a bit breakfast time for me. Also to answer your question last night Character should lose tactics.

[Gentlemanloser]

Character targetting and to a much lesser extent HI.

 

But the actual discussion stememed from the idea that character joining rules would be pages long full of messy rules and exceptions.

 

I disagreed with that and hopefully have shown that character joining rules wouldn't be pages long or full of messy exceptions.

 

I totally agree that others personal preferences might stay with the current rules, and some might like aspects of both.

 

No problem with that at all!

 

Heck i don't really care if these rules would be implemented or binned. I've used the character targetting rules and HI to my advantage on purpose many times! ;)

 

It was more an exercise to see if character joining could work. Which i think it can.

[Leif Bearclaw]

Here's a question for those taking the 'immersion isn't a good reason'. What do you think immersion really means, to dismiss it so out of hand?

 

I'd argue that immersion is crucial for a game like 40k. Is it the best, slickest tabletop wargame around? Not really, and I rarely, if ever, see that argued. So why do so many of us play this game? Very often, it's the background, fluff and setting. If we're not immersed, what's the point? Every game, matched, open or narrative has the potential to create those brilliant narrative moments that just stick with you. From my Wolf Lord trying to pick a fight with an Imperial Knight, suicide charging a handful of Blood Claws into a Greater Daemon and pulling it off, or when Khârn lost a fight to Fire Warriors, for better or worse, BL level epic deeds or ignominious failure, those are the truly memorable bits of 40k. I won/lost because Gulliman couldn't be shot thanks to a technically closer unit behind the enemy gunline, that doesn't lead to those moments. Especially if you lose the thought when you go home is likely to be 'the character targeting rules are messed up' rather than 'damn, that moment was epic' or 'ah, I see where I went wrong'. That's why I maintain that such counter intuitive rules make the game poorer for their inclusion.

 

Now granted, what breaks immersion/is immersive will vary on a person by person basis. Which is why game design is a tricky, often cyclical process.

 

As for characters joining units. The main problem it would fix are the bizarre character targeting rules. The way a Chaplain Dreadnought can hide but a Venerable can't, when the only 'in universe' difference is the background of the body in the sarcophagus. Units out of line of sight stopping you shooting a character, but the 2nd squad just behind him are fair game. Nobody saw the new beta rules and declared that characters no longer being able to shield other characters broke immersion or was a terrible idea. Why would closing the other BS, counter intuitive exploits 8th introduced be a bad thing? Are there other ways they could achieve a similar effect? Almost certainly. Is going back to joining units for protection an obvious, relatively simple fix? I would say yes, and hence would be my preferred solution to the issues around characters.

[Gentlemanloser]

Re Hellbrect. If that's an issue then chargers only lose detachments bonuses when they join units with different detachment bonuses.

 

Re jetcaptain. Yup. Have fun with the extra synergy and build possibilities.

Instead of taking characters for buff auras to multiple squads now you might like to take different characters to keyword buff single units.

 

For the cenobyte example perhaps the answer is not just the character rule but joined characters lose any keywords they don't share with the joined unit.

 

I didn't propose that originally because i liked the idea of adding jump pack characters to non jump units.

 

But let's go conservative, and the low power route. Celestine loses fly. Bikers can't hit and run. And that ability remains a deathwatch unqiueness.

 

Lief proposed in the news thread to only allow characters to join units they share keywords with. I think that's a little too restrictive, but could also be made to work.

[Mileposter]

As for characters joining units. The main problem it would fix are the bizarre character targeting rules. The way a Chaplain Dreadnought can hide but a Venerable can't, when the only 'in universe' difference is the background of the body in the sarcophagus. Units out of line of sight stopping you shooting a character, but the 2nd squad just behind him are fair game. Nobody saw the new beta rules and declared that characters no longer being able to shield other characters broke immersion or was a terrible idea. Why would closing the other BS, counter intuitive exploits 8th introduced be a bad thing? Are there other ways they could achieve a similar effect? Almost certainly. Is going back to joining units for protection an obvious, relatively simple fix? I would say yes, and hence would be my preferred solution to the issues around characters.

Here we go! This is starting to get somewhere.

"To address the targeting inconsistencies involving Characters". This is a concrete point to start with.

 

But now I'm confused - this cites shooting shenanigans... Why is a charging rule being used to address this? Did I miss a note earlier in the thread?

 

Would it not be simpler rules change to add a 3" clause to the Character rule? "Infantry Characters with a Wound Characteristic of less than 10 cannot be targeted unless they are the closest model while they are within 3'' of an Infantry unit." or some such? Or stating that a Character cannot be targeted only if there are intervening models?

[Schlitzaf]

But what about Units like Assassins? Which are in part finally useful, espacially back field ones like Techmarine with Beamers (or the Artillery Gunner on a Thunderfire who mechanically uses this rule to avoid death) or Vindicares. With your proposed change those units become incredibly fragile and you prevent Gulliman and Daemon Princes from being hidable suddenly you’ll see those models vanish from the tabletop.

 

Immersion is nice here. I can understand being upset during a game when you got a gotcha. But think of the reverse, you got the triumvirate and included Gulliman alongside your boys in blue. Turn 1 every single Lascannon hits Gulliman and murders (it takes 15!Lascannons to kill Gulliman for those curious + how much your BS is). Which 15 Lascannon are not the most likely, once you throw in small arms fire (takes 9 bolters or 1.5 tact marine squad pre-hitting to done wound. So 3 standard MSU Squads with Lascannons are just under a fourth of the numbers required to kill Gulliman).

 

Characters need this level of protection. Even one that seem tough like Gulliman

[Beams]

Honestly, I don't want characters to join units for two major reasons:

 

The first and most important: fluff. Of my Cannoness has to join a squad, she's now a glorified squad leader, and isn't leading my army like she's supposed to be doing.

 

And the second, less important reason:

Right now, with the exception of Guilliman, characters are more limited than in 7th for the buffs they provide to handle scaling. If they join units, their are a ton of rule interactions that can lead to game-y situations (My Centurions gain fly? What is my unit considered for keyword purposes, etc)

[Torbenos]

My only real complaint about the character rules so far is that I can only shoot at it if it is the closest visible unit, I would prefer to have that be the closest targetable unit. It has happened to me a few times now that I have the enemy character standing like 6 inches infront of me, but I have a enemy group 4 inches away who are attacking my tank or something in melee. But they are closer and thus I can't fire at the unengaged enemy character right infront of me while also being unable to shoot the closer units.

 

Not wholly related but I found it very counter intuitive.

Edited December 18, 2017 by Torbenos

[Brother Casman]

Here's a question for those taking the 'immersion isn't a good reason'. What do you think immersion really means, to dismiss it so out of hand?

 

I'd argue that immersion is crucial for a game like 40k. Is it the best, slickest tabletop wargame around? Not really, and I rarely, if ever, see that argued. So why do so many of us play this game? Very often, it's the background, fluff and setting. If we're not immersed, what's the point? Every game, matched, open or narrative has the potential to create those brilliant narrative moments that just stick with you. From my Wolf Lord trying to pick a fight with an Imperial Knight, suicide charging a handful of Blood Claws into a Greater Daemon and pulling it off, or when Khârn lost a fight to Fire Warriors, for better or worse, BL level epic deeds or ignominious failure, those are the truly memorable bits of 40k. I won/lost because Gulliman couldn't be shot thanks to a technically closer unit behind the enemy gunline, that doesn't lead to those moments. Especially if you lose the thought when you go home is likely to be 'the character targeting rules are messed up' rather than 'damn, that moment was epic' or 'ah, I see where I went wrong'. That's why I maintain that such counter intuitive rules make the game poorer for their inclusion.

 

Now granted, what breaks immersion/is immersive will vary on a person by person basis. Which is why game design is a tricky, often cyclical process.

 [snip]

Well, for myself Leif, it's not that immersion isn't important, it's more that I think that "immersion doesn't really require the rules" and "the rules don't really require immersion". I know a couple people who only play 40k in tournaments, and only for the prizes and glory - they really don't care about the narrative of the game. Perhaps it would be better to say that I think we should dig a little deeper into what's breaking your immersion, and finding what rules or interactions are at the root of your discomfort, as it were. Like the character targeting inconsistencies you mentioned! (I'm only using you as an example, here)

[Mileposter]

But what about Units like Assassins? Which are in part finally useful, espacially back field ones like Techmarine with Beamers (or the Artillery Gunner on a Thunderfire who mechanically uses this rule to avoid death) or Vindicares. With your proposed change those units become incredibly fragile and you prevent Gulliman and Daemon Princes from being hidable suddenly you’ll see those models vanish from the tabletop.

 

Immersion is nice here. I can understand being upset during a game when you got a gotcha. But think of the reverse, you got the triumvirate and included Gulliman alongside your boys in blue. Turn 1 every single Lascannon hits Gulliman and murders (it takes 15!Lascannons to kill Gulliman for those curious + how much your BS is). Which 15 Lascannon are not the most likely, once you throw in small arms fire (takes 9 bolters or 1.5 tact marine squad pre-hitting to done wound. So 3 standard MSU Squads with Lascannons are just under a fourth of the numbers required to kill Gulliman).

 

Characters need this level of protection. Even one that seem tough like Gulliman

The idea that the suggested simpler alternative to joining units I posted was that they retained the same level of protection without the gameable targeting situations. The fluff reason that GW gives is that they're obscured by the fog of war - so force people to play like they need to use the fog of war.

 

Not arguing that they need protection - attempting to address the proposed problem that there are too many gameable shenanigans with how it is currently.

 

Would it not be simpler rules change to add a 3" clause to the Character rule? "Infantry Characters with a Wound Characteristic of less than 10 cannot be targeted unless they are the closest model while they are within 3'' of an Infantry unit." or some such? Or stating that a Character cannot be targeted only if there are intervening models?

[Schlitzaf]

Penth I was responding to Erak with that post. The second option you wrote is likely the best. My main fear or worry is what happens to characters like Vindicare who act solo.

[Brother Casman]

My only real complaint about the character rules so far is that I can only shoot at it if it is the closest visible unit, I would prefer to have that be the closest targetable unit. It has happened to me a few times now that I have the enemy character standing like 6 inches infront of me, but I have a enemy group 4 inches away who are attacking my tank or something in melee. But they are closer and thus I can't fire at the unengaged enemy character right infront of me while also being unable to shoot the closer units.

 

Not wholly related but I found it very counter intuitive.

I have to say, I think this would work to smooth out some inconsistencies with character targeting - ignore "illegal" targets entirely when attempting to shoot at characters.

[Leif Bearclaw]

 

As for characters joining units. The main problem it would fix are the bizarre character targeting rules. The way a Chaplain Dreadnought can hide but a Venerable can't, when the only 'in universe' difference is the background of the body in the sarcophagus. Units out of line of sight stopping you shooting a character, but the 2nd squad just behind him are fair game. Nobody saw the new beta rules and declared that characters no longer being able to shield other characters broke immersion or was a terrible idea. Why would closing the other BS, counter intuitive exploits 8th introduced be a bad thing? Are there other ways they could achieve a similar effect? Almost certainly. Is going back to joining units for protection an obvious, relatively simple fix? I would say yes, and hence would be my preferred solution to the issues around characters.

Here we go! This is starting to get somewhere.

"To address the targeting inconsistencies involving Characters". This is a concrete point to start with.

 

But now I'm confused - this cites shooting shenanigans... Why is a charging rule being used to address this? Did I miss a note earlier in the thread?

 

Would it not be simpler rules change to add a 3" clause to the Character rule? "Infantry Characters with a Wound Characteristic of less than 10 cannot be targeted unless they are the closest model while they are within 3'' of an Infantry unit." or some such? Or stating that a Character cannot be targeted only if there are intervening models?

 

No, I may have been jumping around a bit, as character targeting is usually the more contentious issue, and creates most of my personal headaches with characters, as overall shooting still seems to be king in 8th.

 

As for charging, I understand the frustration of failing charges with your buff characters (or vice versa), and HI is one of the rules I struggle most with in 8th. One charge roll for the entire group, character and squad, seems a simple and elegant solution to me. The only real issue with this seems to be charge-buffing stratagems. Which could be solved by increasing the CP cost of stratagems for units with joined characters.

 

 

But what about Units like Assassins? Which are in part finally useful, espacially back field ones like Techmarine with Beamers (or the Artillery Gunner on a Thunderfire who mechanically uses this rule to avoid death) or Vindicares. With your proposed change those units become incredibly fragile and you prevent Gulliman and Daemon Princes from being hidable suddenly you’ll see those models vanish from the tabletop.

 

Immersion is nice here. I can understand being upset during a game when you got a gotcha. But think of the reverse, you got the triumvirate and included Gulliman alongside your boys in blue. Turn 1 every single Lascannon hits Gulliman and murders (it takes 15!Lascannons to kill Gulliman for those curious + how much your BS is). Which 15 Lascannon are not the most likely, once you throw in small arms fire (takes 9 bolters or 1.5 tact marine squad pre-hitting to done wound. So 3 standard MSU Squads with Lascannons are just under a fourth of the numbers required to kill Gulliman).

 

Characters need this level of protection. Even one that seem tough like Gulliman

Why do you propose that Gulliman wouldn't be able to join a unit? I certainly haven't been arguing that. While generally I think only similar units should be able to join (Infantry with Infantry etc, nobody want Swarmlord joining a unit of Gaunts), it would be very easy to add relevant exceptions to datasheets. So Gulliman gets a rule that allows you to count as Infantry for the purpose of joining, rather than Monster (imo, he shouldn't be Monster in the first place).

 

As for things like Assassins? They weren't unpopular in previous editions, where they could be freely targeted, as long as their rules were up to snuff (generally Culexus and Vindicare). Stuff like Techmarines could just hide in units, there's not even a real downside there thanks to 8th allowing free form target selection. Thunderfire Cannons? The Gunner just joins the guns as a unit, so the T6 artillery can tank for him.

 

 

Honestly, I don't want characters to join units for two major reasons:

 

The first and most important: fluff. Of my Cannoness has to join a squad, she's now a glorified squad leader, and isn't leading my army like she's supposed to be doing.

 

Interesting, and illustrative of the issues with immersion varying on a person by person basis. Why do you feel that way, especially as all her relevant buffs would still apply (don't know what auras etc a Cannoness gives)? How does having a specific squad for protection, rather than 'anything closer to the guns' make it feel less like she's 'leading' the army?

 

 

And the second, less important reason:

Right now, with the exception of Guilliman, characters are more limited than in 7th for the buffs they provide to handle scaling. If they join units, their are a ton of rule interactions that can lead to game-y situations (My Centurions gain fly? What is my unit considered for keyword purposes, etc)

Only if the rule is written with the same lack of foresight that led to some of the worst excesses of 7th. Done properly, you'd need the appropriate faction keywords to join in the first place (so no Gulliman leading a Conscript swarm) and characters wouldn't confer keyword special abilities to joined units (so your Centurions wouldn't get fly).

[Schlitzaf]

Why shouldn’t Gulliman be able to join Conscripts?

[Gentlemanloser]

My only real complaint about the character rules so far is that I can only shoot at it if it is the closest visible unit, I would prefer to have that be the closest targetable unit. It has happened to me a few times now that I have the enemy character standing like 6 inches infront of me, but I have a enemy group 4 inches away who are attacking my tank or something in melee. But they are closer and thus I can't fire at the unengaged enemy character right infront of me while also being unable to shoot the closer units.

 

Not wholly related but I found it very counter intuitive.

I made that point back when they first FAQd the targeting.

 

It should never have been closest visible but closest viable.

 

That stops units in cc tanking for a character 30" away.

[Wargamer]

Things that should make a character fair game:

1) Closest target.
2) Closest target in line of sight.
3) Closest target not engaged in combat.
4) Character is more than 6" from another enemy unit.

Rule #4 in particular would be good to have just to punish poor life choices.

[Charlo]

For me too, while yes I said it doesn't feel good, I don't think we should overlook what I said about the difference between Shooting and Assault.

 

Shooting is strong and buffing it with characters is easy, so shooting gets stronger.

 

Assault is inherently not that strong, requires more resources AND characters don't feel like they are performing how they are expected to when they fail a charge and their troops make it in. It's a parity thing for me, throwing assault a co-ordination bone to contend with shootings (pardon the pun) "fire-and-forget" approcach to character placement.

 

Even Heroic Intervension, the rule based around assault, benefits a defensive & shooty army more so than an offensive assaulty one.

[chapter master 454]

Immersion is an odd subject as immersion comes from the ability to suspend ones disbelieve. Some people find this very easy to do with little effort while others need certain things to be in place.

 

Now granted. The current rules aren't perfect and no ruleset has ever been perfect but as to illustrate a point made about the immersion: someone mentioned that if characters join units they then become glorified squad leaders instead of army leaders and this breaks THEIR immersion. To be honest, I agree with this as it always did feel odd the way that anytime you took a character it was 'who is he awesome with' and more often 'Ok...whose going to be the babysitters/meat shields for this guy'. Naturally there were instances of a character where their babysitters were equally powerful but on the whole most characters were brought along more as a tax. I would wager most of us in prior editions would cut the majority of them if they weren't needed to be legal (lets face it, most characters act more of a 'nice benefit' than a big boon. I mean most, not the select few that are actually good).

 

Now of this edition characters feel like awesome additions. It feels good to put a captain among tacticals or devastators because now even though they are melee centric they give a benefit to these units en mass and they feel like they are commanding an ARMY and not a SQUAD.

 

 

It is of note I will agree on the notion that targeting is bad. There is clearly some work needed here that GW need to work on. Right now, they have new targeting rules in the works and we will see how that turns out. Yes we can put examples of how 'but what if their leader is for some reason by themselves over there with no other unit within 30" yet I can't target them' but those are extreme examples that go into hyperbole. The issue isn't with these instances but more with how it is abused currently, including things like Tau commander Flyboy spam being a terror and how culx assassins were working as bodyguards during their down time.

 

So the question is "Why does joining units fix this problem?" As it stands with current rules, it would require reworking because as it stands it requires exceptions and further rule moving around that could just lead to more confusion. (as to point it out: due to how wound allocation works, if the character joins a squad and has taken damage, even 1 wound, they now have to take all wounds the squad takes until dead. This would require exceptions for characters but then, where do the exceptions stop and start?)

[Gentlemanloser]

Not so extreme with characters like vindicare.

 

They're designed to be 30" away on thier own. And if the majority of your army is closer (which it probably should be) the vindicare becomes immune to all shooting.

 

Plus there are dedicated bodyguard units, some don't even have bodyguard rules like Paladin.

 

What about a Swarmlord who gets the charge leaving his slower tyrant guard behind?

 

Leif asked above why having a character join a unit makes them feel less like a leader. I think that's an interesting question. As nothing stops said character moving about the board on thier own. Fliting from unit to unit.

 

You shouldn't feel locked into joining one and only one unit for the entire battle.

 

Unless you want to!

 

Edit. I covered wounds above. Simple one line. The unit takes wounds first. Unsaid but that also follows the normal rules so a wounded unit mini takes wound first over unwounded ones.

Edited December 18, 2017 by Gentlemanloser

[Beams]

You could move from unit to unit in seventh as well, it just didn't seem to happen very often.

 

As far as why I feel my Cannoness (who hands out reroll ones) feels better as an independent agent, it's because she's an independent agent. I'm not saying, I move this squad (which Cannoness is a part of) I'm saying I move my Leader. The squads might still be around her, but she's clearly a target and a threat in her own right.

[Schlitzaf]

Here is I think the quote that matters here, to paraphrase “it’s is often said Democracy is the worst form of government except for all the others.” Essentially that is what 8th Independents are, several variations of character joining and more have been used over the year. You only need to look at 7th to see it’s final state.

 

You had retinues, of 4th-5th then we had real independent, characters acting as faux second Units in close combat (able to be targeted) in 4th-7th. Then we got challenges. You say all that your immersion is weaker and that these are issues. How is that any different than having characters joinining in case of BA Librarians suddenly that Squad can warp faux warp time?

[Schlitzaf]

So Week 2 Discussion: Pyskers

 

Physic Focus avoids the issue of Jaws from 5th we’re certain powers were spammed and others rendered pointless. Furthermore the most recent Smite Change. I play Templars so as always my viewed is skewed. With Smite changes going from 5-6-7 means you get two and half good shots off.

 

The other change to physics, relative to last edition only one chance to attempt my biggest feel is that it makes denying meaningful. You cannot just try to deny a power then your foe just tries again.

 

So then time for week 2

[Shockmaster]

I much prefer the limitation on psychic powers as it has made me use powers that I likely would have never used if I could just have another go at my first choice, variety is much more fun IMO.

 

Your right too, it makes denying much more important which I also prefer as in my last battle my opponent denying my first choice power in the last turn swung the battle back in his favour, I would have likely have won if I could have instantly had a second go at that same power.

 

Obviously it is frustrating if certain armies are designs to spam certain powers again and again but then maybe they need to get an exemption from this rule or better yet, a more substantial change so that they are not reliant on spamming one power to have an enjoyable battle.

[chapter master 454]

Only problem I can see is that some armies have good powers and other only have 1 or 2 good ones. Looking at the marines, lets not lie but their powers are trash. Only half of the table is good and even then that's being generous. MEANWHILE: Eldar have many good powers and even their 'meh' ones are good.

 

This means that GW need to make GOOD powers and not have stupid ones that mean little. Good example is the marine buff a MODEL power. Not a unit, just a singular model.

 

Each power must have a reason to exist within the army and have a decent feeling behind them if they are to be a 'once per turn' deal. One thing that the last edition had an issue with was that psykers became less of a utility and more of additional shots and are more just an extended shooting phase. Any Psyker that didn't get those powers or invisibility were considered trash and discarded.

 

As long as the powers actually make a difference when cast then they are good and actually make the opponent think about denying it. Not just "Oh, that one? Sure, its worthless." or "hmmm...I guess I have the deny so may as well...but no real loss if I fail to".

[utilityzero]

There are only two armies that have to use masses of psykers, TS and GK. So any change in the rules either has to take their situation into account or make some sort of exception. The other armies that are spamming psykers are only doing it because it's currently a bit broken. Smite spam is just too effective for what it costs points wise.

 

But to be honest I don't have as much of a problem with psyker spam as I do with mortal wounds which I believe to be the biggest problem with 8th edition. I think removing mortal wounds would fix the psyker problem as well as removing one of the most painfully stupid imbalances from the rules altogether.