10th edition wishlisting/"How do we fix this mess?" thread

[Dont-Be-Haten]

5 hours ago, Black Blow Fly said:

Reactions are the same as burning a stratagem -> Auspex Scan comes to mind.

Very true, and I believe reactions are what stratagems should have been from the jump. They don't give a praetor the means of killing a primarch, are limited in choice but all around good. Legion specific ones are a single ability which are also good. I, for one, hope reactions stay this way. No HH army needs more than 1-2 specific reactions.

 

Edited August 19, 2022 by Dont-Be-Haten

[Lemondish]

On 8/19/2022 at 6:02 AM, Dont-Be-Haten said:

Very true, and I believe reactions are what stratagems should have been from the jump. They don't give a praetor the means of killing a primarch, are limited in choice but all around good. Legion specific ones are a single ability which are also good. I, for one, hope reactions stay this way. No HH army needs more than 1-2 specific reactions.

 

So, admittedly, I have very little experience with the new Horus Heresy. However, I've been watching some of the Battle reports for it, and reading a tad more from reviewers and the key part about reactions that I am really enticed by is that a vast majority of them are Core. Everybody can do them.

Which definitely does quite a lot to reduce the feels bad gotcha of 9th edition 40k stratagems. When you know your options are mostly the same as the options your opponent has, you're in a better place to plan ahead and know what you can expect.

HH obviously has the benefit of a vast majority of its expected games and balance will be Marine vs Marine, but certain things seem to be working very well in that system in a way that they don't in 9th edition. I'm starting to understand what folks mean when they say the rules are getting incrementally more complex the more they add abilities and concepts that trump previously established elements, like the fights first and fights last rules and how they interact. Initiative as a stat now feels so much more capable in these cases. It has been a slow expansion in complexity that doesn't actually strike me as excessive until I consider where we started and where we are now. I regret not being able to see that before.

Edited August 21, 2022 by Lemondish
I accidentally a word

[BLACK BLΠFLY]

Initiative had winners and losers… Orks Necrons didn’t like a Rune Priest hopping out of a drop pod coating living linghtning.

[Brother_Angelus]

1 hour ago, Black Blow Fly said:

Initiative had winners and losers… Orks Necrons didn’t like a Rune Priest hopping out of a drop pod coating living linghtning.

A few specific interactions isn't a good reason to not include an otherwise useful stat.

[BLACK BLΠFLY]

It’s much more fair now. There’s no good reason why Orks or Necrons should have low initiative. Me, I’m glad my Marines can swing first versus Incubi now .

Edited August 21, 2022 by Black Blow Fly

[jimbo1701]

I’ve been trying to break down what I feel the problem is with the game for me (and why I’ve less interest in playing it) and I can put it down to 1 main issue.

Too many rules  - there’s just far too much for someone who plays every once in a blue moon to possibly be able to learn each and every rule for their own army / subfaction, much less know all there is to know for all the other armies out there.

All that being said, I think they’ve done a fantastic job with expanding the subfactions over the past 2 editions. 

No point complaint about it without suggesting a solution. I would do the following:

- make it very clear that the game has 3 ways to play (forgetting about points / power levels, as people should be able to use whichever they choose). This should be basic, advanced and campaign. 
 

basic - using the core rules and basic rules for the army, which would for say space marines be the datasheets and their chapter tactics. 
 

advanced - this is where the stratagems / relics etc come into play. 
 

campaign - as crusade is now. 
 

the core rule would contain more common stratagems, which again would be reserved for advanced play. This would remove say a page of strats from each codex. 
 

the purpose of the ‘basic’ game would be that you can turn up and play against an opponent knowing that the armies only have say a page of special rules you need to know about rather than a whole host of situational rules for gotcha moments. This should literally be confined to a page as well so you can show this to your opponent at the beginning of the game. 
 

This system would make casual gaming and game entry a lot easier than it currently is. 

[Dont-Be-Haten]

8 hours ago, Black Blow Fly said:

Initiative had winners and losers… Orks Necrons didn’t like a Rune Priest hopping out of a drop pod coating living linghtning.

Initiative is only one aspect of the simulation style of play. Necrons and Orks were at the advantage of reanimation protocols and large quantities of bodies. If you never had to face over 300 models of a green tide then I3 vs I4 wasn't the problem. Loyalist Space marines not being swept or auto passing leadership/morale test due to ATSKNF is what tipped the balance to unfair in older editions. 

Things like Initiative and weapon skill should matter. An Avatar of Kaine, the living embodiment of an Eldar God of War, shouldn't be able to be hit on a 2+ or 3+ in close combat simply because a generic character can swing on a 2+/3+ in close combat.

Those streamlined rules are why I don't like the direction Warhammer has taken with its game systems. But this is my own bias that I recognize.

If I had to breakdown game mechanics to fix what I think is wrong with the current system...I summarize it like this;

1. Streamline stratagems to a core set of 6 - 8 (they are never going away). Make them only usable in certain phases of each player turn.

2. Each faction has 2-3 core stratagems

3. Overhaul weapon profiles/ revert AP profiles damage etc.

4. Bring Weapon Skill and Initiative back

5. Make Leadership matter

6. Return rules back to units

7. Remove Toughness  profiles on tanks, i.e. return to Amor Values, 

8. Keep current army customizations

9. Keep current formation profiles

10. Keep the 3 styles of play but apply a 4th, Open War, Matched Play, Narrative, & introduce tournament play through the update books. (This is a personal opinion I feel should be differentiated from matched play)

[BLACK BLΠFLY]

Like I said using initiative is unfair. I’m glad it no longer exists.

[Dont-Be-Haten]

28 minutes ago, Black Blow Fly said:

Like I said using initiative is unfair. I’m glad it no longer exists.

Dexterity is prevalent in every game in some form or fashion. Taking it away and giving us what we have now is not more fair.

However. This goes off the simulation side of how I feel the game should be played.

An Eldar cohort should not be slower than an Ogryn in combat.

Edited August 21, 2022 by Dont-Be-Haten

[Jorin Helm-splitter]

14 hours ago, Black Blow Fly said:

Initiative had winners and losers… Orks Necrons didn’t like a Rune Priest hopping out of a drop pod coating living linghtning.

You're thinking of Jaws of the World Wolf, which in 5th was absolutely bonkers (for those that don't know you used your tape measure to make a line from the rune priest and models underneath it had to pass an Initiative or die... makes mortal wounds seem kinda tame lol.) I don't know if that is a fair argument against Initiative though because that power was broken it was probably the best psychic power in the game until grey knights showed up. 

I don't think that Initiative should come back, but I do think the M values probably need to reflect the differences a bit more than they do. Granted I also feel that T needs to go up for a lot of units.  

 

As far as Reactions are concerned, I do think they are a good ideal. That said balancing reactions is going to be pretty tough compared to the other systems GW has that use them. HH has a ton of common units that ensure a relatively equal power level for the universal ones. Warcry on the other hand has a cost for the reaction (the model loses an action in order to use one) that opportunity cost is bigger for your important fighters which makes them tactical decisions (really recommend Warcry btw it's a great system). 40k has a lot bigger unit variety which will make for some difficult scaling, and I doubt that IGU is going anywhere so I don't know if a cost makes sense. GW would need to make a new system for it, still I think having limited number reactions would stop the "combo" feel that stratagems have to lead too.

 

[Evil Eye]

Initiative was an absolutely good thing and its removal from 8th and onwards was a major error. As said, an Ogryn should not be able to strike at the same speed as a Wych. The problem with earlier editions wasn't Initiative, it was the way it was used for things like JOTWW. In which case don't remove Initiative. Remove JOTWW.

GW has been laying sticking plasters on top of sticking plasters which are making the infection worse and need more, heavier coverings when the pus soaks through the ones beneath when the answer is just to drain the abscess. And in the case of Initiative and JOTWW nonsense? It's like someone having a trapped hair on their leg so you chop the leg off.

[BLACK BLΠFLY]

I doubt initiative will ever come back and good riddance. We can make all kinds of examples to try justifying it but really the game is much more fair without it, especially now that melee is such a big part of the game.

[Dont-Be-Haten]

5 minutes ago, Black Blow Fly said:

I doubt iniinitiativetiative will ever come back and good riddance. We can make all kinds of examples to try justifying it but really the game is much more fair without it, especially now that melee is such a big part of the game.

Well. Maybe... t's in 30k and I can already tell you every single player that I have played against that only has experience from 8th edition or later has only seen initiative as a positive. Maybe they are all ignorant, but they all like it alongside WS.

[spessmarine]

can't say a more obtuse version of Initiative is an improvement where flowcharts for strikes firster/laster comes into play, but, to each their own I guess

[BLACK BLΠFLY]

It’s not hard once you get it sorted and geedub has an example how it works that covers all possible cases. I’m pretty sure every player of factions that had low initiatives were glad to see it go.

[Lemondish]

11 minutes ago, Black Blow Fly said:

It’s not hard once you get it sorted and geedub has an example how it works that covers all possible cases. I’m pretty sure every player of factions that had low initiatives were glad to see it go.

All possible cases that exist today. The thing about the fights first, last, or in between is that it needs forever updates as new rules and interactions are introduced. 

A stat like Initiative need only be modified to achieve the same thing with greater nuance, without new FAQs, exceptions, or wordy descriptions. It is a stronger foundation.

And if the fear is something like JotWW being reintroduced despite not existing anywhere currently, then I'd like to point out that I was exclusively speaking from the perspective of Initiative determining how units fight in combat, not anything else. Excessive use of unrelated mechanics and stats is definitely something to be wary of, but there's no way the current system 9th system is anywhere close to as nuanced.

[Dont-Be-Haten]

16 minutes ago, Black Blow Fly said:

It’s not hard once you get it sorted and geedub has an example how it works that covers all possible cases. I’m pretty sure every player of factions that had low initiatives were glad to see it go.

You are wrong to assume such things. Necrons literally didn't care about being lower initiative. They obliterated pretty much everyone in 6th edition, and 7th was just kinda their nerf edition. A lord with mid shackles forcing Mephiston to Sepuku didn't care about the lord of death, a war glaive at S7 AP1, I3 and mind shackle scarabs, was one of the deadliest characters of 6th edition. Necron warriors 20 strong were a tarpit, as were fearless orcs that just congalined and handled pretty much everything aside from maybe 3 units of space marines/grey knights/blood talon death company, furiosos in 5th edition. 7th edition was just wraith knights and fast troops with scattered lasers...had nothing to do with initiative.

But we can agree to disagree. Though, I believe you fall largely in a minority group.

 

[Noserenda]

I personally much prefer the 8th ed setup for doing melees as it makes the whole phase a lot more interesting; Charging and strike first/last always felt fairly obvious to me. It may well have spiralled out of control in 9th like everything else :D 

Similarly i dont think WS added a huge amount to the game, maybe in a duel, (Or a skirmish system where you can put in rules for multiple combatants like 2nd) but in a scrummy melee its generally pretty straightforward to land hits when someone is looking elsewhere. In the vast majority of cases it was pretty much set by your army anyway, if you want something to be harder (or easier) to hit just pop that on their profile. 

As a die hard treadhead id genuinely forgotten how :cuss:ty armour values is as a system, i mention i want to play with a bunch of tanks and everyone gets sad, heaven forbid the poor Knights player who just wants to do some stomping. People still get punished by an uphill struggle if they leave out AT weapons but at least its not a complete feel bad matchup.

Not to mention all the mismatch between things that blur the lines between unit and vehicle, like how OP Contemptors are in AoD right now for example.

Reactions are alright, i think i prefer the AoS version currently where you are working from a pool rather than a set number per phase and it requires your leaders to be doing the actual leading but i know half my play group gets annoyed tracking that so i suspect they might prefer the AoD version.

[BLACK BLΠFLY]

"All possible cases that exist today. The thing about the fights first, last, or in between is that it needs forever updates as new rules and interactions are introduced."

Whats the last new thing to be introduced? Like I said once you get it figured out it’s not a big and the example given by geedub really helps a lot.

https://www.warhammer-community.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/08/OQ1TeUZ6hxw5jp1e.pdf

[WrathOfTheLion]

Initiative becomes simpler when adding interactions to it. Once fights first/last/ignores interactions start coming into play, it's easier to just directly quantify it than to try to work that out.

[Slave to Darkness]

On 8/10/2022 at 1:39 AM, Black Blow Fly said:

There was a good podcast on Auspex Tactics and I agree with his assessment. It is very unlikely there will be a complete reset… it is really not in anyone’s best interests either. If anything they should consider slowing down the release cycle.

Agreed, but we all wanted faster releases so some players are not left out in the cold for multiple editions. At least give us indexes to kick off with then drop all codex books at once to avoid codex creep. Any later tweaks or changes could be in warzone books or some form of compendium/compilation. 

[Jorin Helm-splitter]

3 hours ago, Dont-Be-Haten said:

Well. Maybe... t's in 30k and I can already tell you every single player that I have played against that only has experience from 8th edition or later has only seen initiative as a positive. Maybe they are all ignorant, but they all like it alongside WS.

In all fairness though in 30k most units have the same initiative. Which means both units swing at the same time a lot. In 40k you will have a lot more different values to keep track of. Same for weapon skill, personally I love them both in marine vs. marine games but I think it's harder to give both abilities a fair price when your designing units. I don't really care if they come back but I do like the interaction between players, which would disappear. 

3 hours ago, Evil Eye said:

Initiative was an absolutely good thing and its removal from 8th and onwards was a major error. As said, an Ogryn should not be able to strike at the same speed as a Wych. The problem with earlier editions wasn't Initiative, it was the way it was used for things like JOTWW. In which case don't remove Initiative. Remove JOTWW.

GW has been laying sticking plasters on top of sticking plasters which are making the infection worse and need more, heavier coverings when the pus soaks through the ones beneath when the answer is just to drain the abscess. And in the case of Initiative and JOTWW nonsense? It's like someone having a trapped hair on their leg so you chop the leg off.

I think wych should be faster, but I also think an Orgyn with something like five times mass is probably gonna crush them on the charge. It just depends on how much you want to add. Personally, I think GW wants things like reactions to dictate a lot of this because they are clearly moving towards a subscription model (not super happy about it).  

[Inquisitor_Lensoven]

Can someone explain how it’s ‘unfair’ for a smaller, more well trained force like marines, taking the initiative in combat at striking first, against larger armies of less well trained army units like say…orks, who come in units of much greater numbers?

how is it fair that a unit of 30 boys gets to make their attacks against elite members or the already elite space marines like blade guard veterans?

it seems equally unfair for armies to have different leadership stats, because lower leadership means more likely to lose more of your army for absolutely no damn reason.

Is it fair that a squad of 3 custodes can reliably wipe a squad of 10 guardsmen in melee?

Edited August 22, 2022 by Inquisitor_Lensoven

[BLACK BLΠFLY]

Whose to say Marines are better trained than Orks? That’s quite an assumption. You have a faction bias.

Edited August 22, 2022 by Black Blow Fly

[Special Officer Doofy]

Initiative can stay in the dirt with AV and templates. Kind of weird to assume people who dislike initiative are the minority. There's a reason it went away.