3.0: failed or not?

[Shard of Magnus]

6 hours ago, MARK0SIAN said:

Partly, but I don’t think I’ve ever had as many situations where, even though I’ve got the right anti-armour weapons, it’s felt pointless shooting them at some vehicles because you just won’t cause enough damage to make a difference. Very often you’re better off shooting things like lascannons at terminators or something similar rather than tanks. 

 

Lascannons seem to be in a very odd space with their weapon profile. Only being D1 (or D2 if not moving) means they aren’t suited for AV unless you can get a high volume of shots. Very unlike 2.0. The arrays and destroyer versions don’t have this issue. Meltas have done far better in the games I’ve played than I thought they would after losing the extra armor pen dice because they still have a high D value. (Ironically, the one guy who takes a melta Kratos has rolled an insane number of 1s for shooting and wounding with it so it hasn’t been the killing machine it should be.)
 

Overall, I like the weapon profile changes for the most part. Then there are cases like the lascannons where it feels misaligned.

[Xenith]

Well, SN saying a core pat of the gaem is broken, they dont like it, and promoting their own, alternative ruleset is a pretty big indicator that they aren't just shilling for GW. All the creators I have seen thsat enjoy the game have played 20+ games, and that enjoyment is probably more from having played it more, and gotten used to it.

 

I played my second 3000pt game of 3.0 last week, and can say the game is pretty much the same if you don't go heavy on the statuses, with the key difference being objectives win games now, so tactical marines are a key part of your army, no longer just a tax. 

 

The weapons were still poorly implemented in a random way, with the big winners of the edition seemingly being the things that didnt get nerfed, e.g. dread plasma stayed at 5" blast while lots of other stuff got smaller, and actually got a D2 version, which would be an effective S8 last edition, so actually a massive buff. 

 

Vehicles got stronger against weak weapons, but weaker against strong weapons - I took a typhon last game and it was an anti tank monster - at S12, with the new blast weapon rules, you effectively auto hit tanks, then all you have e to do is not roll a 1 on the armour pen tests and that tank take 6 damage - enough to one-shot predators or vindicators.

 

Last edition you needed ~8 lascannons to get 5 hits, then 3 glance/pens to strip 3 hull points from a tank/kill a predator. Now you 5 HP = 10 hits = 15 shots. or about 9 if you stand still. I didnt think that would be the case when I started writing this, but it's reassuring to see - lascannons can no longer one shot tanks, but a lascannon standing still is about as effective as a stationary lascanon last edition, while a moving lascannon in 3.0 is lots better than amoving one in 2.0.

[Brofist]

Please. They called it the best edition of heresy and shilled it hard going into the release. Which is exactly when GW needed it from a business standpoint. They pivoted to exclusively creating heresy content and events back in 2.0, so I get the pressure they are under. Still, its a poor showing, even if you understand the why. Now that its been half a year they've quietly put out alternative rules. No doubt they are good people, but there's absolutely a conflict of interest when your business depends on a game system you created 20+ videos for.

[TheTrans]

5 hours ago, Brofist said:

Please. They called it the best edition of heresy and shilled it hard going into the release. Which is exactly when GW needed it from a business standpoint. They pivoted to exclusively creating heresy content and events back in 2.0, so I get the pressure they are under. Still, its a poor showing, even if you understand the why. Now that its been half a year they've quietly put out alternative rules. No doubt they are good people, but there's absolutely a conflict of interest when your business depends on a game system you created 20+ videos for.

I don't love their blatant spamming either. 30k is pretty dead (compared to the halcyon days of 2015-2022) in Australia, so a great many of the localised facebook groups don't have many posts really being posted at the moment.. except for SN posts... everyone is just full to the brim with spammed SN battle report posts into those groups, without any other actual interaction with the community which just sits badly with me, then factor in all the 3.0 crap, did Pardo dob to GW? Pardo's pretty :cuss:ty replies to any non-stirling feedback etc etc etc.. yeah nah, they can feck off. 

Edited Sunday at 10:29 PM by TheTrans

[Irate Khornate]

To get back on topic a little,

I think at this point if the game hasn't failed yet, it will in the future unless drastic changes are taken.

 

We're already starting to see 8th+ edition 40k seeping it's way into Hours Heresy if not from a rules standpoint (I'd argue it most certainly is) then a sales standpoint. Weird squad sizes, odd numbers on model counts in boxes so you have to buy more, and the list goes on

 

30k soared in popularity during 2nd edition because of a perceived stability in ruleset, active advertising for dual ruleset models, much better pricing on contents of boxes, the ability to make your army *your dudes*, and the movement of models from resin to plastic.

 

The first two of those reasons are gone now, the 3rd and 4th are on their way out the door, so all that leaves is resin going to plastic and if these bits get anymore fiddly and parts count keeps increasing then outside of having to prep resin it's getting to be just as bad if not worse. 

[Brofist]

Our three day ZM event wrapped. For a lot of attendees it was their first serious games of the new edition. General feedback seems that, once you play a few games, its still fun. Just not inspired enough to justify all the rules changes. We had to make pretty sweeping modifications to the ZM missions and terrain rules in order to make them appropriate for event use. Had to do that in 2.0 too, but it was more work this time around. People generally disliked the new force organization system. There's a big push now to waive it, or introduce an alternative, for next year's event. Will be interesting to see what the post event survey drags in. 

[TheTrans]

Look, I love the old force org chat and trying to juggle the confines of it. Especially at 3k things could get a bit tight back in the day.

 

HQs/Elites/Heavy Support feel less exciting when they are near infinite!

[Stitch5000]

On 2/21/2026 at 10:40 AM, Gorgoff said:

I must say that how vehicles get damage now feels "wrong" to me.

We had hullpoints for decades but that still felt different. Now a Kratos gets 12 damage and just vanishes. Felt very anticlimatic to me in my first game. 

 

First shot fired killed my Kratos I painted for that game by the way, so some things obviously never change. 

WHo shot what at a Kratos and one-bombed it?

[Stitch5000]

On 1/31/2026 at 4:07 PM, Pacific81 said:

One thing we have discovered is that its a good idea to suspend the detachment restrictions when playing an escalation league, perhaps up to around 1500pts or so.

Otherwise what I would class as a 'fun little warhammer army,' of a selection of unit types & vehicles that give you a varied game, is not possible without the onerous character tax (which is too punitive at small points values).

You do realise it is functionally the same as it ever has been? You used to HAVE to take an HQ because it was compulsory. Now you take one Centurion and you have access to two more detachments. 

[Pacific81]

7 hours ago, Stitch5000 said:

You do realise it is functionally the same as it ever has been? You used to HAVE to take an HQ because it was compulsory. Now you take one Centurion and you have access to two more detachments. 

I will be honest I didn't play the previous editions so have nothing to compare it to either way. But the current one stops us from playing with all of our war dollies while we are building our armies at lower pts values, which is a cardinal sin according to our group (so we ignore the rule).

Edited Tuesday at 05:09 PM by Pacific81

[SvenIronhand]

10 hours ago, TheTrans said:

HQs/Elites/Heavy Support feel less exciting when they are near infinite!

Except they aren't? They still cost points, and you have to spend points to unlock slots, which you in turn have to juggle.

[Irate Khornate]

10 hours ago, Stitch5000 said:

You do realise it is functionally the same as it ever has been? You used to HAVE to take an HQ because it was compulsory. Now you take one Centurion and you have access to two more detachments. 

Except it's not. 

 

It used to be one HQ unlocks one single detachment template available to everyone with factions getting modifications to said template depending upon their rules.

 

Now, it is dependent upon the HQ as to which partial templates are unlocked, if multiple partial templates are unlocked, and you have to choose from said available partial templates. And if you cannot fit your army in The limited availability of partial templates then you have to take more HQs to unlock more partials. 

 

Therefore the functionality has strongly changed. It hilariously almost reminds me of DLC purchasing. 

[MARK0SIAN]

12 hours ago, Stitch5000 said:

You do realise it is functionally the same as it ever has been? You used to HAVE to take an HQ because it was compulsory. Now you take one Centurion and you have access to two more detachments. 

It’s not the same at all because previously that single HQ unlocked elite, troop, fast attack and heavy support slots all in one go. Plus many of those units could take dedicated transports so didn’t need entire detachments just to take a land raider or something similar. 
 

The new system divides a lot of stuff that could previously have been found in one category into multiple ones. Previously you could’ve taken a HQ, command squad, a squad of legion terminators (generally including legion specific ones), veteran squad, rapier battery and a dread as well as given those infantry units dedicated transports and your wouldn’t have had to step outside your HQ and Elite slots. 
 

Now you’d need:

Crusade Primary detachment

Retinue Detachment

Heavy Support detachment

shock Assault detachment

Armoured fist detachment

Army Vanguard detachment

Tactical Support detachment

And what’s more, there’s no pay off for this extra complexity and HQ tax unless you count the headache of trying to organise it all into a list. 

[Antarius]

I think I'd best start with a little disclaimer: I've been used to the force org chart since 3rd ed. 40K came out, so I am obviously not coming to it from a new perspective.

 

However, while the force org isn't perfect (and all the force org shenanigans of various editions, armies and/or detachments did present problems), I find the force org has one big strength which is that it's easy to navigate. I don't know if newcomers feel the same, but it seems objectively simpler than the current model, which I find to be much messier as well as unengaging (which is subjective, of course).

While I get many of the complaints some people have about the force org, I think it did a good job of enforcing a bit of structure as well as making an army look and feel like an (imperial) army. So I think it's a no-brainer for a game like Heresy.

 

The new system just seems much more complicated and, frankly, a bit of a chore without any real benefit. But I freely admit I haven't taken the time to get used to it, which is always one of the things that make evaluating new editions and changes (at least the ones you don't immediately love) difficult.
More broadly, this seems to be an issue with the edition in general; the rules were absolutely horrendous to get through and for all the legalese, it didn't even seem like they managed to make them less ambiguous (which I assume was the point).

More than anything, 3rd was a surprise for me, because while I expected changes, I actually thought GW more or less had a strategy of letting AoS/40K go down the path of new, more streamlined core rules, while TOW/HH was there to cater to people who liked the old core rules with some tweaks. But that just goes to show how one might be wrong about even things that seem obvious, I guess.

I hope HH sticks around and that they manage to strike a better balance between crunchy and streamlined next time. I'm not against some degree of streamlining and abstraction in my rulesets, but this edition seems to have added complexity in all the wrong places and streamlined all  the wrong things, which genuinely surprised me as I really don't subscribe to the "GW suck at rules" school of thought (but in this case it just seems pointless to deny it; I don't think I've really heard anyone say anything truly positive about it, at least not anything that surpasses "it's actually pretty good, once you've played twenty games or so" and that seems like damning with faint praise).

[Stitch5000]

17 hours ago, Pacific81 said:

But the current one stops us from playing with all of our war dollies while we are building our armies at lower pts values, which is a cardinal sin according to our group (so we ignore the rule)

YI'd argue that the biggest limitation to using all your war dollies is the points limit itself... The game makes it pretty explicit that it is designed for 3,000 point games for better or worse!

 

14 hours ago, Irate Khornate said:

Now, it is dependent upon the HQ as to which partial templates are unlocked, if multiple partial templates are unlocked, and you have to choose from said available partial templates. And if you cannot fit your army in The limited availability of partial templates then you have to take more HQs to unlock more partials. 

Yes, you have to make choices. but FUNCTIONALLY when you are adding Detachments, you get multiple Detachments and the Logistical Benefit Prime Advantage to add additional single slots. 

FUNCTIONALLY, the points limit is, as it always has been, a much greater limit to the flexibility of which units you include in your army than the Force Organisation chart system is. 

I've not yet found an army list I have on file for HH1 or HH2 that I have found, at any points limit, that I cannot take in HH3, with the exception of outliers like loads of Dreadnoughts or all Tanks. 

 

11 hours ago, MARK0SIAN said:

It’s not the same at all because previously that single HQ unlocked elite, troop, fast attack and heavy support slots all in one go. Plus many of those units could take dedicated transports so didn’t need entire detachments just to take a land raider or something similar. 
 

The new system divides a lot of stuff that could previously have been found in one category into multiple ones. Previously you could’ve taken a HQ, command squad, a squad of legion terminators (generally including legion specific ones), veteran squad, rapier battery and a dread as well as given those infantry units dedicated transports and your wouldn’t have had to step outside your HQ and Elite slots. 
 

Now you’d need:

Crusade Primary detachment

Retinue Detachment

Heavy Support detachment

shock Assault detachment

Armoured fist detachment

Army Vanguard detachment

Tactical Support detachment

And what’s more, there’s no pay off for this extra complexity and HQ tax unless you count the headache of trying to organise it all into a list. 

You want to take HQ, Command Squad, Legion Terminators, Veteran Squad, Rapier Battery and a Dread, plus transports, so I've just picked Blood Angels, randomly -

I would take:

 

 

 

• Crusade Primary Detachment
  • Command Prime Slot - Centurion (Officer of the Line (2) so Add detachments Combat Retinue and Army Vanguard)
    (There are 4x transport slots in here to fill if you want Rhinos, or one additional unused Logistical Benefit to take a Spartan or Land Raider)
• Combat Retinue Detachment
  • Retinue Prime Slot - Command Squad (Logistical Benefit Add Support Slot)
• Army Vanguard Detachment
  • Elites Prime Slot - Crimson Paladins (Logistical Benefit Add War-engine Slot)
  • Elites Slot -Veteran Squad
• Logistical Benefit (from Command Squad)
  • Support Slot - Rapier Battery
• Logistical Benefit (from Crimson Paladins)
  • War-engine - Contemptor

Edited yesterday at 10:12 AM by Stitch5000

[Pacific81]

Yes that is very true @Stitch5000, however if we waited until we get to 3000 points we will not be playing it until 2028! 

By which point a new edition will be along and the org chart rules will have changed ;)

 

So we have to apply a degree of pragmatism to this (I am fortunate I guess I play in a group where we change rules that are detrimental to the game experience, and don't treat them like they have come down in lightning bolts onto stone tablets on Mount Sinai) 

[Stitch5000]

7 minutes ago, Pacific81 said:

So we have to apply a degree of pragmatism to this (I am fortunate I guess I play in a group where we change rules that are detrimental to the game experience, and don't treat them like they have come down in lightning bolts onto stone tablets on Mount Sinai) 

All gaming groups should be like this! This is why we play a game with a written rulebook and not computer games! :) 

[Darmor]

I've been playing 40K since the 5th. As of now, I play 40K, Age of Sigmar, and HH. The new Detachment system for me is a bit of a mix between these three games. It may seem complicated because of the many letters in the description. Still, it provides your list with structure (as in the old FoC) while retaining the freedom to combine different units.
The AoS army-building system is a bit easier and clearer, with fewer details, so that you can use it as a quick reference. If you get it, the 3.0 Heresy system becomes much easier to understand.

[MARK0SIAN]

2 hours ago, Stitch5000 said:

YI'd argue that the biggest limitation to using all your war dollies is the points limit itself... The game makes it pretty explicit that it is designed for 3,000 point games for better or worse!

 

Yes, you have to make choices. but FUNCTIONALLY when you are adding Detachments, you get multiple Detachments and the Logistical Benefit Prime Advantage to add additional single slots. 

FUNCTIONALLY, the points limit is, as it always has been, a much greater limit to the flexibility of which units you include in your army than the Force Organisation chart system is. 

I've not yet found an army list I have on file for HH1 or HH2 that I have found, at any points limit, that I cannot take in HH3, with the exception of outliers like loads of Dreadnoughts or all Tanks. 

 

You want to take HQ, Command Squad, Legion Terminators, Veteran Squad, Rapier Battery and a Dread, plus transports, so I've just picked Blood Angels, randomly -

I would take:

 

 

 

• Crusade Primary Detachment
  • Command Prime Slot - Centurion (Officer of the Line (2) so Add detachments Combat Retinue and Army Vanguard)
    (There are 4x transport slots in here to fill if you want Rhinos, or one additional unused Logistical Benefit to take a Spartan or Land Raider)
• Combat Retinue Detachment
  • Retinue Prime Slot - Command Squad (Logistical Benefit Add Support Slot)
• Army Vanguard Detachment
  • Elites Prime Slot - Crimson Paladins (Logistical Benefit Add War-engine Slot)
  • Elites Slot -Veteran Squad
• Logistical Benefit (from Command Squad)
  • Support Slot - Rapier Battery
• Logistical Benefit (from Crimson Paladins)
  • War-engine - Contemptor

How are you using the centurion to unlock two apex detachments? My understanding is that only high command slots are allowed to select them and the prime benefit doesn’t override this? 
 

Even if there is some way to run the list you mentioned you’ve still had to jump through the hoops of using logistical benefit to add all the other forces and for what benefit? How did that make list writing, army composition or the game in general any better?

 

Compare that to the old system where that 1 HQ unlocks access to literally every other unit in the army (albeit with some additional restrictions for Lords of War) and the old way is as close to objectively simpler as it’s possible to get. It’s certainly not accurate to say the two systems are functionally the same. 

[Shard of Magnus]

You can’t unlock apex detachments with a centurion. Without high command you’d have to use logistical benefit choices for the retinue and elites, be playing a legion that has an option for one of those types as a special aux detachment, or use a legion champion to unlock veteran cadre. The legion champion won’t let you take everything without another HQ either, as you’ll fall one logistical benefit short.
 

That may be true in all the HQ/detach combinations but this is tangential to the thread and I’m not really interested in the academic exercise.

[Stitch5000]

1 hour ago, MARK0SIAN said:

How are you using the centurion to unlock two apex detachments? My understanding is that only high command slots are allowed to select them and the prime benefit doesn’t override this? 
 

Even if there is some way to run the list you mentioned you’ve still had to jump through the hoops of using logistical benefit to add all the other forces and for what benefit? How did that make list writing, army composition or the game in general any better?

 

Compare that to the old system where that 1 HQ unlocks access to literally every other unit in the army (albeit with some additional restrictions for Lords of War) and the old way is as close to objectively simpler as it’s possible to get. It’s certainly not accurate to say the two systems are functionally the same. 

You are entirely correct, my apologies... 

With that in mind I'd revise the list to:

Praetor - Unlocking an Army Vanguard Detachment

Army Vanguard Detachment
Elites (Prime) - Crimson Paladins (Logistical Benefit)
Elites - Veteran Squad
 

The with the Logistical Benefit I'd either take the Rapier or the Dreadnought

Bearing in mind previously you would have had a compulsory 2 Troops slots, I could take a Troops slot in the Primary Detachment and have another Logistical Benefit to play with,,, I have taken 1 HQ and 1 troops choice which is LESS than the compulsory minimum required in previous Force Orgs. 

I could even throw in a Legion Champion instead of the Praetor and have a whole heap of freedom with what I take. 


When you say "jump through hoops" what you are talking about is simply engaging with the game. There are an awful lot of "hoops" to jump through if you just want to resolve a combat. Why not just make it simple and roll a dice each to see who gets the highest result? Lots of people enjoy making lists and building efficiencies into them, juggling unit positions and such. In fact most people I know spend an equal amount of time making lists (if not more) to what they spend actually playing games. 

I'll cocede, the two methods are not functionally identical. With the new one, if you want an easy time of it, just take an extra Command choice... There's a bunch of really fun ones you can choose, from Heralds to Masters of Signal or Chaplains, which presumably already exist in many colections and were never actually allowed to be taken as the compulsory HQ you HAD to take... So... PRACTICALLY the same. 

 

[Antarius]

I hope this isn't a low blow, but I think it's a pretty good sign that it's become too complicated that people can't agree on how it works/make mistakes when using it. Again, I know I might think the old force org was more intuitive simply because I'm used to it (and I'm not against a shake-up, per se), but I never knew anybody to have trouble with figuring it out.

Now, pretty much all games have complex parts, especially games that run over several editions, but I think it's fair to ask what benefit this added complexity has.

[Orodhen]

9 minutes ago, Antarius said:

[...] I think it's fair to ask what benefit this added complexity has.

None. There are none.

 

List building in 3.0 is more like a punishment.

[Stitch5000]

11 minutes ago, Antarius said:

I hope this isn't a low blow, but I think it's a pretty good sign that it's become too complicated that people can't agree on how it works/make mistakes when using it. Again, I know I might think the old force org was more intuitive simply because I'm used to it (and I'm not against a shake-up, per se), but I never knew anybody to have trouble with figuring it out.

Now, pretty much all games have complex parts, especially games that run over several editions, but I think it's fair to ask what benefit this added complexity has.

I think it's a fair point but I do remember making plenty of mistakes with the old system and also witnessing others do the same, particularly when it came to things being valid to move slots etc.  and then involving the multi-layered tangle that was Rites of War made the old system just as complex.

As for benefits, as I mentioned before, I'm happy that it has added some crunch to a part of the game that a lot of people spend a lot of time with. There's something to be involved in if you want to be. In the past it was just a big scrum for Elites or Heavy Support, basically everything interesting was in those two slots. I just had a spreadsheet saved with my HQ and two troops choices fille dout to use as a default. Now, you could do that now, knowing pretty well what your Detachments are going to be and sticking with that, but there's also more to it. 

To bring this onto the thread topic, I think it is unfair to judge the game asa failure because there is a level of depth and potential complexity in a part of it, that you can largely sidestep by simply taking one Command-level model that you were most likely taking before anyway. 

Let's be real, being forced to buy one new model for your army between editions isn't a drop in the ocean... as for the previously mentioned "onerous command tax", in many cases this can just be a 50pt Optae. 

[Brofist]

I mean, is a digital game/movie/book truly good if you have to read half of it (or re-read it several times) before it gets good? 

Edited 16 hours ago by Brofist