3.0: failed or not?

[SvenIronhand]

I'm having decent fun with it thus far. Probably get more games of it than I do 40k.

[Irate Khornate]

On 5/28/2026 at 4:14 AM, Stitch5000 said:

I have an Instagram account for hobby. I have never once posted my face or my opinion on anything other than miniatures. I judiciously prune anyone I follow that veers into non-hobby subjects, no matter how hard IG tries to feed me non-hobby content. It is my sanctuary. 

 

I can respect that. I've had to prune a lot of my escapism these past several years to avoid being dragged into the political muck that seems to be everywhere. 

[Gorgoff]

I played my second game on sunday. 

Not sold on 3rd tbh.

The terrain rules are horrible.

Even more horrible than I thought because I got them wrong.

What I thought was, that you csnt look through Medium terrain and if someone is stabding inside you can see them inside 3' of the edges. I really disliked that but made my peace with it for being simple.

But alas it isn't like that!

Ibstead you have to measure for each model which wanna sjoots through medium terrain if their line of fire is 3+ inches!

Terrible annoying while gaming.

 

I still love how valuable techmarines (and similar units) are now though  

[TheTrans]

11 hours ago, Gorgoff said:

I played my second game on sunday. 

Not sold on 3rd tbh.

The terrain rules are horrible.

Even more horrible than I thought because I got them wrong.

What I thought was, that you csnt look through Medium terrain and if someone is stabding inside you can see them inside 3' of the edges. I really disliked that but made my peace with it for being simple.

But alas it isn't like that!

Ibstead you have to measure for each model which wanna sjoots through medium terrain if their line of fire is 3+ inches!

Terrible annoying while gaming.

 

I still love how valuable techmarines (and similar units) are now though  

This seems to be a solid rendition of whenever anyone talks about 3.0, weather it be pro of negative.

I have a mate who is 3.0 made, I ask him the good points and it will be one or two things, with then a lot of caveats about a whole bunch of stuff.

I ask a mate who is pro 1st, but has played a few games of 3.0 has a whole bunch of thoughts about how stuff is crap.. with a 'oh this one or two things are interesting' haha. 

Makes me feel its just a bet of a wet-fart of an edition haha. 

Down in Victoria we have the first 3.0 event occurring late august.. and well.. like 30% into the cycle, one event is rough, and I think I'm still very hesitant about putting any effort in is like we are only 2 years away from another edition. Will it be a huge shake up (eg 2.0 to 3.0), or will it be a slight massaging... 

:cuss:... 'waiting out' the edition is nothing I ever thought I'd think I'd need to look into for Horus Heresy haha. 

[Antarius]

15 hours ago, TheTrans said:

:cuss:... 'waiting out' the edition is nothing I ever thought I'd think I'd need to look into for Horus Heresy haha. 

Well, on the plus side, the editions are over relatively quickly now that they're in the "grist for the mill"-cycle 

 

But yeah, I've just accepted that I'm not gonna be playing HH this edition (I don't really have anyone to play with, as they'd rather play other games and it seems like noone's going to arrange any events), so it's not like my opinion on the edition matters all that much but still... I'd rather just collect some things and fluff around with my army just for the fun of it - and then maybe one day, if a better edition rolls around and people want to play it, I might give it a go.

[Xenith]

On 6/17/2026 at 12:32 PM, Gorgoff said:

Ibstead you have to measure for each model which wanna sjoots through medium terrain if their line of fire is 3+ inches!

 

I've played about 9 games now, 5 in a demi competitive environment, and it hasn't come up that much. I find it countered by the fact that you now do not have to measure model by model between shooting units - e.g. "I have 20 tacs 20" away from your 20 tacs. The back half of my unit is only within 24" of the front half of your unit, and therefore shots from those models cannot kill your rearmost models",  or "half my models can only draw LOS to half of your models, we have to roll these separately". 

[Gorgoff]

1 hour ago, Xenith said:

 

I've played about 9 games now, 5 in a demi competitive environment, and it hasn't come up that much.

 

You probably play with few terrain pieces which happen to be thiner than 3 inches.

I had the same discussion with my opponent and both things applied and then it raley comes into play but tbh I think the game get way more interesting if played with more terrain. 

 

1 hour ago, Xenith said:

I find it countered by the fact that you now do not have to measure model by model between shooting units - e.g. "I have 20 tacs 20" away from your 20 tacs. The back half of my unit is only within 24" of the front half of your unit, and therefore shots from those models cannot kill your rearmost models",  or "half my models can only draw LOS to half of your models, we have to roll these separately". 

Crazy edge cases which rarely happened in my experience. Doesn't make up for now being able to shoot whole squads because you can see half of a pinky from one model. 

That is one of the things I hate about third edition. It's basically part of the terrible terrain and line of sight rules of that game. 

 

[TheArtilleryman]

2 hours ago, Gorgoff said:

Crazy edge cases which rarely happened in my experience. Doesn't make up for now being able to shoot whole squads because you can see half of a pinky from one model. 

That is one of the things I hate about third edition. It's basically part of the terrible terrain and line of sight rules of that game. 

This is how it’s been in 40K for a while now, and I’ve always hated that rule. It’s a complete lack of common sense and almost renders using cover completely pointless. You should only be able to kill models you can see, period.

[Brother Sutek]

2 hours ago, Gorgoff said:

 

You probably play with few terrain pieces which happen to be thiner than 3 inches.

I had the same discussion with my opponent and both things applied and then it raley comes into play but tbh I think the game get way more interesting if played with more terrain. 

 

Crazy edge cases which rarely happened in my experience. Doesn't make up for now being able to shoot whole squads because you can see half of a pinky from one model. 

That is one of the things I hate about third edition. It's basically part of the terrible terrain and line of sight rules of that game. 

 

I haven't been able to play 3rd so I'm not commenting on actual experience with the rules, that aside wargames are better in my mind with more terrain. A long time ago when they first released Cityfight it was a dream come true for me. More terrain! More clutter and forcing decisions rather than just shoot and charge. 

[SvenIronhand]

Planet Bowling Ball is the graveyard of many a proud army. 

[Xenith]

On 6/18/2026 at 10:07 PM, Gorgoff said:

You probably play with few terrain pieces which happen to be thiner than 3 inches.

No. Our club standard terrain ruins have 10 buildings, 6 of which have bases over 3". You can see them in my numerous battle reports - pic attached.

 

Generally we declare intent by saying "these guys are over 3" into the terrain", meaning we don't measure unless we can move and get a weird angle, but in that instance, we measure the thickness of the terrain, not on a model by model basis - there's a very narrow gap where you can shoot through the big ruins in the middle for example.

 

 

[Brother Kraskor]

I think I must have played just shy of 20 games of 3.0 now - much fewer than many I'm sure, but I will say, in every game, I've just had a short chat with my opponent re: terrain at the start, and we've always come to an equitable agreement. It takes two minutes and makes sure everyone's on the same page.

 

Outside of that, we've always been happy to let 3.0 run as is - and I've yet to have a game that wasn't a blast, or meet an opponent that didn't agree they were enjoying this edition. 

Edited Saturday at 08:05 PM by Brother Kraskor

[Xenith]

I will say there's been one feesbad moment for me where we agreed to class everything as medium, however I didn't think this included the 40k fortress pseudo hill things, and my opponent claimed no LOS even though the guys were full visible and not behind a single stone or brick, but in the open. We did say everything was medium though, so it was legit, but I would class that as light or a hill in future.

[Gorgoff]

On 6/20/2026 at 1:55 AM, Xenith said:

No. Our club standard terrain ruins have 10 buildings, 6 of which have bases over 3". You can see them in my numerous battle reports - pic attached.

 

 

That terrain on the attached picture is terrible though. 40k slob as it's worst tbh including those big round mouspad markers which of course are place on ground level and near anything which makes narrative sense to count as objectives.

Completely broken down to pure functionality without any vibe or style.

But I know from previous battle reports of yours that you have better terrain than this and I only put it so plainly how I feel about it to emphasise that GW wants us to play on that kind of crap since 8th edition 40k and they try to force down our throats that playstyle with this edition as well. 4th edition will be even more in line with the tournament mindset of 40k I am absolutely sure.

Eying that terrain most of it isn't 3 inch thick either so for RAW rules it isn't even line of sight blocking at all (Except for the wall things without windows) BUT...

On 6/20/2026 at 1:55 AM, Xenith said:

Generally we declare intent by saying "these guys are over 3" into the terrain", meaning we don't measure unless we can move and get a weird angle,

 

 

18 hours ago, Brother Kraskor said:

I think I must have played just shy of 20 games of 3.0 now - much fewer than many I'm sure, but I will say, in every game, I've just had a short chat with my opponent re: terrain at the start, and we've always come to an equitable agreement. It takes two minutes and makes sure everyone's on the same page.

y'all are right on the money here.

 

In this edition it is extremely important to talk about terrain before the game and just pretent it isn't less than 3 inches and handwave a lot of stuff instead of really going RAW and measure all the time.

 

We did this as well once we (=me) realised how terrible the RAW rules are and how annoying it is to use them by the book.

 

So yeah I absolutely agree that it is an easy fix but it doesn't change the simple fact that 3ed has the worst rules for terrain in all editions of 40k and 30k I played in 30 years.

I will always try* to convince my opponents to treat all terrain as line of sight blocking if a unit stands behind it and if inside just announce wether or not it is visible and able to shoot out. That is still immersion breaking for me but it is at least functional. 

*If I play again in the next two years of course. I am temoted to just wait for the next edition or build a community who plays the first edition and forget about it.

 

Edited Sunday at 08:00 AM by Gorgoff

[Brother Kraskor]

Oh yeah I can agree the terrain rules are bad, 100%. Hence the need for a chat every pregame. And the results of that chat have ranged from true line of sight, to no LOS blocking at all (that was a bit of a rogue one) and everything in between. Probably 50% of the time just playing RAW, but with a thorough discussion about each terrain piece first. 
 

As bad as they are though, and I think this is my point, I've not allowed them to cloud the entire edition for me. Yes, they're rubbish. But in my view they're easily overcome, and if the cost of a great game with fellow-minded hobbyists is a 2 minute chat on terrain I'll happily pay!

[Razorblade]

3 hours ago, Brother Kraskor said:

As bad as they are though, and I think this is my point, I've not allowed them to cloud the entire edition for me. Yes, they're rubbish. But in my view they're easily overcome, and if the cost of a great game with fellow-minded hobbyists is a 2 minute chat on terrain I'll happily pay!

It's not like all the rest is fine tough. The terrain rules aren't even the worst offender tough and, as opposed to most of the other issues, something that is relatively easy to fix pre-game

[Mr Farson]

Right

 

My turn again

 

For the third time since launch I tried to get into and stick with 3.0 and bounced off it again.

 

After three goes over the year and a bit and like 15 games I have my thoughts composed of my issues with it.

 

1.Too many rules sharing names with older rules which now do something different. Shred has existed as a rule since 5th or 6th ed 40k from memory, 13 years and several editions it's been re roll failed wounds in some variation. In 3.0 it's a bracketed target number to add an extra point of damage. Shred is just the first example I can think of but this type of rules writing is definitely causing issues to longer standing players.

 

2. List building is just miserable, I ran an armoured spearhead a while back vaguely similar to my 2.0 and 1.0 version of the list. 30 tacs in 3 rhinos for objectives, boss tank and the rest of the list tanks only. The same list now requires me to have multiple centurions just kinda there?

 

3.Changes for changes sake, S is now RS why? Challenges? What I really want is for the primarch Vs primarch slap fest that lasts all game is for it to still last all game but with even more book keeping woooo 

 

4. The need of the rulebook for everything because you can't trust a single element of the game to play like a past edition. Apothecarys and fnp? Nawh mate that tried and proven method of wound negation for 27 years that's a reaction now that pings off in a random phase provided you meet several pre criteria in triplicate but only on a Tuesday.

 

5. So many sub phases

It's the pretend charge sub phase, now it's the pistol sub phase, now it's the volley fire don't forget to compare it against your unit profile to see if you can pretend to make a charge requiring a whole extra paragraph to explain a basic concept 

 

 

[TheTrans]

3 hours ago, Mr Farson said:

Right

 

My turn again

 

For the third time since launch I tried to get into and stick with 3.0 and bounced off it again.

 

After three goes over the year and a bit and like 15 games I have my thoughts composed of my issues with it.

 

1.Too many rules sharing names with older rules which now do something different. Shred has existed as a rule since 5th or 6th ed 40k from memory, 13 years and several editions it's been re roll failed wounds in some variation. In 3.0 it's a bracketed target number to add an extra point of damage. Shred is just the first example I can think of but this type of rules writing is definitely causing issues to longer standing players.

 

2. List building is just miserable, I ran an armoured spearhead a while back vaguely similar to my 2.0 and 1.0 version of the list. 30 tacs in 3 rhinos for objectives, boss tank and the rest of the list tanks only. The same list now requires me to have multiple centurions just kinda there?

 

3.Changes for changes sake, S is now RS why? Challenges? What I really want is for the primarch Vs primarch slap fest that lasts all game is for it to still last all game but with even more book keeping woooo 

 

4. The need of the rulebook for everything because you can't trust a single element of the game to play like a past edition. Apothecarys and fnp? Nawh mate that tried and proven method of wound negation for 27 years that's a reaction now that pings off in a random phase provided you meet several pre criteria in triplicate but only on a Tuesday.

 

5. So many sub phases

It's the pretend charge sub phase, now it's the pistol sub phase, now it's the volley fire don't forget to compare it against your unit profile to see if you can pretend to make a charge requiring a whole extra paragraph to explain a basic concept 

 

 

Brother, you keep getting further than me.

I sit down and start building a list..and yeah, its just miserable. It brings me not an iota of joy. List building and sort of squirming around the edges was always a fun element of hobby one could do while not 'doing hobby'.

1.0 you had truly phenomenal freedom, but with some level of caveats involved, could do things like AoDC etc. You also had large extensive legion traits that had upsides and downsides.

2.0 which was gutted by comparison, still did cool things based on what ROWs you had.

3.0... like what 'RoW's are your legion traits now... and the equivalent of a RoW is just a box that allows you to take a specific bracket of legion based units and doesn't add anything cool on them.. wow.. fun. Its just take what you want with extra steps (that step being a centurion). 

[Brofist]

Out of the three HH podcasts/youtubers I follow, one hasn't put out any new content for 3 months and the other two are starting conversations about using house rules because line spam has become 'samey' and 'the game lacks flavor'. Tee hee!

  

On 6/20/2026 at 6:10 AM, Brother Kraskor said:

Outside of that, we've always been happy to let 3.0 run as is - and I've yet to have a game that wasn't a blast, or meet an opponent that didn't agree they were enjoying this edition. 

 

Probably because those other guys stopped playing, haha

[Antarius]

8 hours ago, Mr Farson said:

3.Changes for changes sake, S is now RS why? Challenges? What I really want is for the primarch Vs primarch slap fest that lasts all game is for it to still last all game but with even more book keeping woooo 

I really think this is at the heart of most of the problems. That and the borderline-unreadable rules, but I suspect those are a product of the same thing.

I am usually the guy who sticks up for GW or at least goes "well, there are problems but there's no perfect game and the problems are quite overstated and hyperbolic" and I was a bit skeptical because of the initial rumours, but also figured that it would be the same with 3rd. But I remember just going "nah" and putting the rulebook up for sale, when I got the starter box and tried to get through the rulebook. I'm pretty sure I'd have at least tried to roll with the changes if it hadn't been written in such a convoluted and no-fun-to-read way. And I've read Kant back in the day...

[Antarius]

To be fair to whoever wrote 3rd, one thing I genuinely think was a good idea and quite fitting for the game was the different statuses. Heresy seems like exactly the right kind of game for a couple of different psychological/physiological effects that limit what units can do and a couple of different ways to apply them. That's one are where I didn't mind added complexity at all, because it would add flavour and strategic options at the same time.

 

I'm also somewhat okay with less individuality for the legions (or at least, individuality that's contained within fewer rules/pieces of gear; I just don't think HH needs the same level of flanderization as 40K), as long as things seem meaningful overall, I can live with not having a Blood-Volkite for the Blood Angels and I'm fine with saying that a Night-Scythe and a Dark-Scythe are essentially the same, because they're both powered scythes even if they're cared by dudes in dark blue and dark green armour respectively. But having said that,  if you streamline those things, it really has to have a payoff in ease of play or what's the point?

In that sense, 3rd just seems to have gone completely off the rails. You're left wondering if no one stopped to ask "what's the point?" and that's just not a good feeling.

[Razorblade]

1 hour ago, Antarius said:

To be fair to whoever wrote 3rd, one thing I genuinely think was a good idea and quite fitting for the game was the different statuses. Heresy seems like exactly the right kind of game for a couple of different psychological/physiological effects that limit what units can do and a couple of different ways to apply them. That's one are where I didn't mind added complexity at all, because it would add flavour and strategic options at the same time.

It's also a great balance-tuning tool because 1st and 2nd E pinning was brutal. Or it would have in theory if they didn't make the worst part of old pinning the easiest to access, wrote in a rule that made any kind of status crippling to melee units and then removed all the protections from all the expensive Melee units that needed them, whilst inexplicably adding a 10pts piece of equipment that practically negates a failed test to everything but the expensive units that really needed it.

[The Praetorian of Inwit]

For what it's worth it has and hasn't failed in my local area. People aren't playing it as much, noticeably so, but they still love the models and keep assembling and painting. For GW the model sales are the probably the important thing by a long shot. 

 

I've seen a lot more people become interested in Mechanicum with 3.0.

[Brofist]

Same with Solar Aux. It helps that their rules are much better in 3.0 than the hackjob they got in 2.0.

[Xenith]

On 6/23/2026 at 4:44 AM, Brofist said:

Out of the three HH podcasts/youtubers I follow, one hasn't put out any new content for 3 months and the other two are starting conversations about using house rules because line spam has become 'samey' and 'the game lacks flavor'. Tee hee!

 

 

I assume Heresy Hammer for the second, but who's stopped producing? I also see SN seems to have slowed down a bit, but I assumed from their Gibraltar event?