Does AP need changing in 10th

[Reskin]

Too many great points to quote all of you. 

[Kythnos]

2 hours ago, MoshJason said:

Let's not make 40k go back to the "spend more time looking up rules than playing" of 7th edition. 

I have that issue a lot more now than in 7th,  to be honest. 

[Valkyrion]

11 minutes ago, Kythnos said:

I have that issue a lot more now than in 7th,  to be honest. 

 

Quite so, as far as I'm concerned too. 

Before we decided to knock 40k on the head when HH2.0 came out, my regular gaming buddy had to write down what his Tyranids were doing - I forget all the particulars, but there was something like a Synaptic Imperative as a turn based rule depending on a leader beast of some sort, the Hive Tyrant had an ability to give a unit something, as did a Tyranid Prime, a Neurothrope to boost someones psychic powers and then there was the psychic powers themselves and so on and before you know it half a dozen units have half a dozen new things to remember on top of their own datasheet abilities on top of their subfaction abilities on top of their faction abilities...then I look through my faction abilities, then subfaction abilities, then unit abilities, then stratagems to see if anything else gets involved.

 

Too much going on. It's almost computer game level in its processing, at least it is to me.  Oh I'm a Warrior in Molten Core where's my Fire Resistance potion and my fire proof buff from my paladin and my stamina buff I don't need intellect but I'll take it where's the food table and my hunters mark and you better cast call of the wild too every little helps now LEEEERRROOOYYYY!

Not that it mattered due to an overwhelming victory, but my Tyranid opponent never once said 'my Carnifexes have a -1 damage ability too' and that is basic on their datasheet, but it was his army and even he had forgotten they had that because there was so much else going on.

 

Very rarely had to annotate army lists in 7th or before, aside from counting wounds, although I do accept that 7th did muddy the waters somewhat with formations. 

[Gryphonicus Walks]

Every edition I can remember follows this trend. I’m sure some will disagree but the system goes. Marine codex released, codex creep initiated, marines underpowered, 2nd marine codex released. In general every army seems geared to kill marines which makes the whole convo pointless because they have the best saves. 
 

the whole system is a mess and every system eventually collapses under a pile of bloat. 
 

i agree with the sentiment of more models, higher lethality means happy GW. 
 

every edition will suffer from the same nonsense mark my words. Different problems but ultimately one cure; the rules team. They have demonstrated that they can create a good game. 40k will NEVER be that game, it will follow the same pattern. 
 

I genuinely feel bad for the 40k community and newer players. I mean to sound condescending but you guys get a rough ride. 

[chapter master 454]

Comes down to needing to develop what I would call a "Rules Bible" for development. To us, things like Plasma being Strength 7 is a standard, we generally consider a guardsman a standard of "human" stats in 40k, Orks have poor ballistic skill, Ultramarines are the best....wait...MATT GET OUT OF HERE.

 

However on a partially funny partly serious note: can we change it to just being that all AP deducts from saving throws as standard without the need for the minus symbol next to it so we don't need to clarify "improving AP" means "AP-1 becomes AP-2" sort of nonsense. That way we can say increase, improve, enhance, strengthen, gain, lifts, hauls, accelerates or any other descriptor that implies upping of some form without needless drivel. Just asking...and I likely wouldn't care if 10th had AP5 lasguns  if they made that change :D

[WrathOfTheLion]

1 hour ago, chapter master 454 said:

Comes down to needing to develop what I would call a "Rules Bible" for development. To us, things like Plasma being Strength 7 is a standard, we generally consider a guardsman a standard of "human" stats in 40k, Orks have poor ballistic skill, Ultramarines are the best....wait...MATT GET OUT OF HERE.

 

However on a partially funny partly serious note: can we change it to just being that all AP deducts from saving throws as standard without the need for the minus symbol next to it so we don't need to clarify "improving AP" means "AP-1 becomes AP-2" sort of nonsense. That way we can say increase, improve, enhance, strengthen, gain, lifts, hauls, accelerates or any other descriptor that implies upping of some form without needless drivel. Just asking...and I likely wouldn't care if 10th had AP5 lasguns  if they made that change :D

I wonder if they could do something like 2E Horus Heresy's (X) USRs, where the X replace the number. Then they could say AP is AP -(X), and it would get caught in any rules on incrementing (X) rules.

 

That's a nice to have vs a necessity, though.

[Kassill]

On 1/14/2023 at 2:18 AM, The Unseen said:

 

 

But the old way 40k did it where cover granted invulnerable saves had the opposite problem, guardsmen in cover were just as tough as marines in cover, they both got a 5++ vs everything if it went through their armor; so for the marine, the difference between cover and not only mattered if they had ranged AP capable of blowing through the armor, AND was still reducing his effective save by a ton, going from a 3+ to a 5+ on an expensive model feels really bad. 

 

 

 

You just brought back a nostalgia trip of how much that angered me as young player. I couldn't understand how the same two models only benefited from the wall between them and the incoming round with no factor as to what THEY were wearing/wielding. 

 

On 1/14/2023 at 3:20 AM, Special Officer Doofy said:

 

 

The core rules for 9th are amazing and the best I've ever played in 25+ years. The codex creep and arms race though is what ruined the edition. That's why I'm so curious to what 10th will bring. Without indexes to nerf most wargear at once, how will they do it? They can't just roll codexes out every 4-6 weeks that just nerf the faction and expect people to get excited and buy it. I don't think the AP system needs to change, I think wargear ap values need to change (be lowered again). 

 

 

 

^^^^ This right here. The core rules are very much the best they've been and I would hate to see a break away from that. The slider style AP --- Armor Save system we have is how it should be (IMO). The lethality that almost any line soldier, regardless of codex, can bring tips the scale hard into feeling like your "elite" soldiers are wet paper bags with legs. 

[Schlitzaf]

The core issue as I see it is giving everyone dudebro joes extra AP baseline. Tau Pulse/Burst Weaponry, Shurikan Weaponry, Galvanic, Gauss Rifles and just Doctrines in general.

 

AoC was good becauss it countered plethora of AP creep on “core” troop units. And I stand by that opanion. What folks often forget as Unseen stated, is thay past editions the “I ignore Guard Armor” rarely mattered. Because how easy cover was. If I was GW:

 

All Strength 6 or Lower Weapon (and 1 Damage or less plausibly) hitting let us [Power Armour] reduce AP by 1. This means stuff like HvyBolter or THammers aren’t memed. But it hits “basic dudebro” weaponry. 

 

My 2 cents.

[Inquisitor_Lensoven]

40 minutes ago, Schlitzaf said:

The core issue as I see it is giving everyone dudebro joes extra AP baseline. Tau Pulse/Burst Weaponry, Shurikan Weaponry, Galvanic, Gauss Rifles and just Doctrines in general.

 

AoC was good becauss it countered plethora of AP creep on “core” troop units. And I stand by that opanion. What folks often forget as Unseen stated, is thay past editions the “I ignore Guard Armor” rarely mattered. Because how easy cover was. If I was GW:

 

All Strength 6 or Lower Weapon (and 1 Damage or less plausibly) hitting let us [Power Armour] reduce AP by 1. This means stuff like HvyBolter or THammers aren’t memed. But it hits “basic dudebro” weaponry. 

 

My 2 cents.

Naw they just need to release an errata with all the weapons in each codex with new profiles.

besides I don’t think anyone would argue there’s a S6 weapon out there that doesn’t count as an anti-material weapon at the very least, so it would still make sense that an assault cannon or a multilaser would have some ability against heavy armor like power armor.

 

resetting AP on weapons so that basic dudebros have AP0 is all that’s necessary. I’d like that errata I mentioned, but at the same time it’s what? 6 months or so until we can expect a new edition? That rule book can reset things by having a weapon profile section like the 3rd edition book did, so we wouldn’t even have to wait for new books for every army to resolve that problem, rule book would update all weapons for all weapons with stats in the codexes.

[Schlitzaf]

MultiLaser, Assault Cannon, and Burst Cannons were what came to mind specifically yes. 

[Evil Eye]

16 minutes ago, Inquisitor_Lensoven said:

Naw they just need to release an errata with all the weapons in each codex with new profiles.

besides I don’t think anyone would argue there’s a S6 weapon out there that doesn’t count as an anti-material weapon at the very least, so it would still make sense that an assault cannon or a multilaser would have some ability against heavy armor like power armor.

 

resetting AP on weapons so that basic dudebros have AP0 is all that’s necessary. I’d like that errata I mentioned, but at the same time it’s what? 6 months or so until we can expect a new edition? That rule book can reset things by having a weapon profile section like the 3rd edition book did, so we wouldn’t even have to wait for new books for every army to resolve that problem, rule book would update all weapons for all weapons with stats in the codexes.

Oh marvelous idea, MORE patches invalidating book content! I'd really rather not if I'm honest. At this point with the amount of sticking plasters needed to make 9th playable basically leaving 3/4s of printed content outdated, we just need 10th to roll along and see if it fixes the problems with the game (it won't but we can dream). If it does, great. If not, I'll just see if I can start a local group and play 4th.

[Schlitzaf]

Agreed Eye, agreed. Also for all that is by Emperor Light, GW please consider whenever you do reprints to add in “errata” to book.

[Inquisitor_Lensoven]

1 hour ago, Evil Eye said:

Oh marvelous idea, MORE patches invalidating book content! I'd really rather not if I'm honest. At this point with the amount of sticking plasters needed to make 9th playable basically leaving 3/4s of printed content outdated, we just need 10th to roll along and see if it fixes the problems with the game (it won't but we can dream). If it does, great. If not, I'll just see if I can start a local group and play 4th.

That’s the only way to fix the problem unless you just want to wait for every new codex to do the job, so each new codex ends up being a massive nerf.

[MARK0SIAN]

An index style reset like 8th edition is the best (I might even say only) way to rein it in. Wasn’t that actually one of the rumours about 10th edition? That they were going to reset everyone with an index?

[Nephaston]

I do remember reading something about Indices for 10th. It would be the smartest move, honestly.

[Jorin Helm-splitter]

I think the current AP system is fine. I just don't think it should be modified by fraction bonuses, subfraction bonuses (with custom options), unique army bonuses, and if that wasn't enough stratagems. It's really hard to balance things when you have that many different layers of rules, and that's not even factoring things like re-rolls that are also problematic. 

 

I'd like to see them go back to a subfraction bonus with very limited ally rules (honestly if it were up to me no allies but that isn't realistic).   

 

 

 

 

[Inquisitor_Lensoven]

1 hour ago, Jorin Helm-splitter said:

I think the current AP system is fine. I just don't think it should be modified by fraction bonuses, subfraction bonuses (with custom options), unique army bonuses, and if that wasn't enough stratagems. It's really hard to balance things when you have that many different layers of rules, and that's not even factoring things like re-rolls that are also problematic. 

 

I'd like to see them go back to a subfraction bonus with very limited ally rules (honestly if it were up to me no allies but that isn't realistic).   

 

 

 

 

Naw, there’s waaay too much AP in the game right now.

guard might as well not have a save. Marines barely get a save now, and vehicles are too flimsy. Vehicles have to be pointed ridiculously low for how flimsy they are as a result.

2 hours ago, MARK0SIAN said:

An index style reset like 8th edition is the best (I might even say only) way to rein it in. Wasn’t that actually one of the rumours about 10th edition? That they were going to reset everyone with an index?

Yeah, the rumor is a soft reset for 10th

[Evil Eye]

3 hours ago, Inquisitor_Lensoven said:

That’s the only way to fix the problem unless you just want to wait for every new codex to do the job, so each new codex ends up being a massive nerf.

9th is the problem- the whole edition is a wash at this point, and as someone who likes books and likes them to not be rendered obsolete within a few months or even weeks of release, I'd be OK if 10th is a soft reset and after errata, the codex content is final. I don't need a constant stream of updates and patches, and would rather they just spent time making the codices fun to play and not completely broken one way or the other in the first place. Wargames are an analogue medium, you should be able to play them with zero electronic devices at all, and the current "patch" model is not compatible with that, hence the mess we're in right now. Sure, some people might stop playing because the ADHD-tier update and balancing cycle going away would remove GW's pathetic facade of pretending to care about competitive balance (implying they've ever been good at that and that the game hasn't gotten progressively worse since they tried to jump on that bandwagon way back in 5th), but honestly if these people are keeping this miserable cycle going then I won't miss them.

 

Honestly, the entire "living system" thing is a joke. I'd rather have a complete, stable system that can be expanded upon at will with optional sourcebooks and Chapter Approved (the cool 3E ones) style releases than a volatile system that is constantly making incompetent efforts to correct itself and thus makes any kind of long-term planning completely impossible.

[Inquisitor_Lensoven]

4 hours ago, Evil Eye said:

9th is the problem- the whole edition is a wash at this point, and as someone who likes books and likes them to not be rendered obsolete within a few months or even weeks of release, I'd be OK if 10th is a soft reset and after errata, the codex content is final. I don't need a constant stream of updates and patches, and would rather they just spent time making the codices fun to play and not completely broken one way or the other in the first place. Wargames are an analogue medium, you should be able to play them with zero electronic devices at all, and the current "patch" model is not compatible with that, hence the mess we're in right now. Sure, some people might stop playing because the ADHD-tier update and balancing cycle going away would remove GW's pathetic facade of pretending to care about competitive balance (implying they've ever been good at that and that the game hasn't gotten progressively worse since they tried to jump on that bandwagon way back in 5th), but honestly if these people are keeping this miserable cycle going then I won't miss them.

 

Honestly, the entire "living system" thing is a joke. I'd rather have a complete, stable system that can be expanded upon at will with optional sourcebooks and Chapter Approved (the cool 3E ones) style releases than a volatile system that is constantly making incompetent efforts to correct itself and thus makes any kind of long-term planning completely impossible.

I 100% agree. 
I’m sick of wondering if I’m up to date or not. Or if my opponent is up to date.

 

but we need to have something that brings back all of the :cuss:ty AP to reasonable levels, and an index of weapons stats in the back of the BRB to bring everyone to the same level all at once.

[tychobi]

AP is fine. Blanket rules are hard to balance but better for offence to be weighed than defence. 9th has a lot of issues but armor penetration is not one of them. 

Edited January 18, 2023 by tychobi

[chapter master 454]

Certainly a very slight then sudden jump in power I would agree. Feels weird that AoC was a means to bleed out some of that AP...hmm...I wonder if that is factoring in to GWs move forward with how they handle 10th.

 

I would say that as much as it can be a clown car of updates...I would say that considering we have gone from whining about NO updates like it used to be to now have TOO MANY, I think we are getting somewhere with GW. We just need them to know how to do it properly and they are trying. Not say not to give them a good grilling when needed but grill them on bad balance decisions, not the decision to balance things so actively.

[Reskin]

21 hours ago, Evil Eye said:

Oh marvelous idea, MORE patches invalidating book content! I'd really rather not if I'm honest. At this point with the amount of sticking plasters needed to make 9th playable basically leaving 3/4s of printed content outdated, we just need 10th to roll along and see if it fixes the problems with the game (it won't but we can dream). If it does, great. If not, I'll just see if I can start a local group and play 4th.

Very constructive ideas to fix the problem… 

 

Comment removed

Edited January 16, 2023 by WAR
Everyone play nice and not get too heated.

[Reskin]

3 hours ago, tychobi said:

AP is fine. Blanket rules are hard to balance but better for offence to be weighed than defence. 9th has a lot of issues but armor preparation is not one of them. 

AP is not fine. You must be a guard player.

AP is the problem. Been increasing for a while now.

there’s absolutely nothing wrong with models on the board turn 5 and the game finishes, and you need to recount the score twice to see who won.

I’d rather a nice close game than being tabled by the end of turn 2.

2 hours ago, chapter master 454 said:

Certainly a very slight then sudden jump in power I would agree. Feels weird that AoC was a means to bleed out some of that AP...hmm...I wonder if that is factoring in to GWs move forward with how they handle 10th.

 

I would say that as much as it can be a clown car of updates...I would say that considering we have gone from whining about NO updates like it used to be to now have TOO MANY, I think we are getting somewhere with GW. We just need them to know how to do it properly and they are trying. Not say not to give them a good grilling when needed but grill them on bad balance decisions, not the decision to balance things so actively.

I absolutely agree. At least they are trying. The frustrating thing is they don’t listen to player feedback. Or very little anyway. I much rather them try to fix my army at stages through the edition than not at all. And I have to wait 4 years until my terrible codex gets updated.

 

what a joke, no one wants to play their army with a terrible codex, and anyone who thinks otherwise is kidding themselves.

[Xenith]

Agree that AP/Lethality has gone too far.

 

I've said before that 9th ed feels like they developed the core rules and the codexes in isolation - a lot of the issues some armies had (range, speed, etc) were solved by the changes to 9th ed core game, like smaller tables, M values, etc, and then they went and updated each codex based on the perceived issues from 8th ed, thereby making each codex doubly deadly. 

 

Pistols/fleshborers are an example. 12" range is limiting on a 6x4 board where you start 24"+ from one another, so models armed with short range weapons, like shuricats, fleshborers, pistols, etc, can have a low impact on the game.

 

They solved this in the core rules by making smaller boards, and more central objectives to bring models closer to one another. They then also solved it in the codex by increasing the ranges on traditionally 12" weapons by 50% to 18" then smacking an extra AP on them (fleshborer, shuricat).

 

One or the other of these would have been fine, but both in tandem upset the balance. 

 

I think the codexes are fine, whhat I think would be good would be a Munitorum manual with updated weapon stats to bring them all in line with what they're supposed to be like. 

[Evil Eye]

8 hours ago, Reskin said:

Very constructive ideas to fix the problem… 

I mean, the topic is how to solve the problem in 10th, which I mentioned (keeping a similar system but drastically reducing the frequency of weapons with AP modifiers). Personally I'm all for abandoning 9th altogether and just waiting it out; there's not long left of this edition, and buying into more updates for a broken edition that's on its last legs anyway, quite frankly, is just daft and rewards GW's terrible model for the game.

 

I'm not saying "BOYCOTT GW" or whatever, but there is zero point in supporting the last gasps of 9th. They've done this with every edition after 6th- 7th had a whole bunch of supplements that went obsolete the moment 8th dropped (a shame as some, like Traitor Legions, had genuinely good content), 8th has Psychic Awakening, which again had some great content that was swiftly replaced, and often by inferior versions (I much preferred the custom Hive Fleet system in Blood of Baal to the actual 9th edition 'dex). And now they're doing it again with Arks of Omen. The edition is not going to be around for much longer and frankly buying more sticking plasters to make the tail end of the game playable seems like a waste of money.

 

Absolutely, it's worth discussing how to fix the problem in the next edition. It isn't worth trying to fix the game right now because with the amount of patching needed you might as well just release 2nd/3rd versions of every Codex instead.

Edited January 16, 2023 by Captain Idaho
Reference to removed content removed