New Warhammer 40,000 Edition announced!

[Lord Marshal]

Ork Faction Focus. 

 

Surprised it wasn't Marines first but maybe that's what James was counting on. They're tomorrow anyway.

 

Quote

All the detachments in your current codex will be usable at launch, as will the recent suite of detachments from expansions like the Eye of Terror: Reign of Iron and The Maelstrom: Lair of the Tyrant.

 

There will also be 70 new and updated detachments launching with the new edition. These will mostly be brand new sets of rules, with a few returning favourites from places like the Grotmas series.

 

Quote

Orks, of course, have been quite well served with new detachments recently, with two in the Armageddon: The Return of Yarrick expansion. Two of the three 11th edition detachments we’re looking at today are updates to the popular Taktikal Brigade and DAKKA! DAKKA! DAKKA! rules, alongside the all-new Rollin’ Deff that boosts your Battlewagons."

 

Edited Monday at 03:23 PM by Lord Marshal

[Kyari]

The changes to overwatch (no rerolling hits) is an interesting one. 

[redmapa]

Im not sure how good or bad these are but I like that they seem to be in line with the latest detachments so it's good to see that they are not as rigid or bare bones as I was expecting, hope they keep playing with the rules more. 

 

I hope they redo Stormlance, Outriders as battleline would turn that detachment into at least being fun!

[HeadlessCross]

32 minutes ago, redmapa said:

Im not sure how good or bad these are but I like that they seem to be in line with the latest detachments so it's good to see that they are not as rigid or bare bones as I was expecting, hope they keep playing with the rules more. 

 

I hope they redo Stormlance, Outriders as battleline would turn that detachment into at least being fun!

Outriders have several issues that making them Battleline doesn't fix them. You also forget that Stormlance has already BEEN a popular detachment. 

[Orange Knight]

Rules all seem decent enough, but GW are doubling down on making them so tedious to read. We're now literally in the "X = A" phase of rules writing.

 

 

[Karhedron]

1 hour ago, HeadlessCross said:

You also forget that Stormlance has already BEEN a popular detachment. 

 

Mostly for Space Wolves but I guess the point is valid. 

[Tastyfish]

It's worth watching the video, they talk about a couple of things not in the article - including what I think is probably the biggest bit of news.

I'd speculated that we weren't going to end up going back to the old days of 18 or so strats, and they confirmed that the "Rolling Death" detachment only has three.

 

I suspect that means it's a 2 pointer.

Edited Monday at 08:09 PM by Tastyfish

[Captain Idaho]

3 hours ago, Orange Knight said:

Rules all seem decent enough, but GW are doubling down on making them so tedious to read. We're now literally in the "X = A" phase of rules writing.

 

 

 

Yeah it feels like GW are moving to a position where they use a lot of words to say something that could be said a lot more concise.

 

Example:

 

 

The first bullet point doesn't need to exist. Merely say:

 

Battlewagon/Hunter Rig/Kill Rig units reroll charge rolls and can choose to advance 6.

 

Done.

 

And this next one... I'm not even sure what they're trying to say as I keep zoning out mid read:

 

 

X is the value of an attack's attacks?

 

Wait, are just trying to say a unit doubles it's shots? Why not say that then?

 

Is it me, or is GW using Chatgpt to write their rules?

 

The whole thing is exhausting. We don't need a when, a target or effect section... Just tell us: "a single battlewagon gets to double it's shooting phase ranged attacks within half range."

 

Just seems... naff.

[Tastyfish]

There's perhaps a charitable read that the more specific legal language and formatting is easier to translate. But don't know to be honest.

Though also in that case, there's the guns that already have rapid fire and different ranges to take into account. Plus the firing deck.

Edited Monday at 08:44 PM by Tastyfish

[Mazer Rackham]

17 minutes ago, Captain Idaho said:

X is the value of an attack's attacks?

 

Wait, are just trying to say a unit doubles it's shots? Why not say that then?

 

Is it me, or is GW using Chatgpt to write their rules?

 

The whole thing is exhausting. We don't need a when, a target or effect section... Just tell us: "a single battlewagon gets to double it's shooting phase ranged attacks within half range."

 

Just seems... naff.

 

As a bit of a Convoluted Ruleset enjoyer myself, (FFG RPG's) it's perhaps being done long-winded to neutralise exploits. Plus I'd dare to say the rule of [RAPID FIRE X] means they can change the profile of something, or have it modified by another multiplicative effect without having to do too much chapter and verse.

[jaxom]

46 minutes ago, Tastyfish said:

It's worth watching the video, they talk about a couple of things not in the article - including what I think is probably the biggest bit of news.

I'd speculated that we weren't going to end up going back to the old days of 18 or so strats, and they confirmed that the "Rolling Death" detachment only has three.

 

I suspect that means it's a 2 pointer.

 

I do wonder what it means for the total number of stratagems for an army. Three detachment points, so if a 2 pointer is 3 strats... the math doesn't work to maintain six strats total. It's possible there's an old strat moved from a different detachment into Rolling Death; Eddie did say "three new stratagems."

 

19 minutes ago, Captain Idaho said:

 

Yeah it feels like GW are moving to a position where they use a lot of words to say something that could be said a lot more concise.

 

Example:

 

 

The first bullet point doesn't need to exist. Merely say:

 

Battlewagon/Hunter Rig/Kill Rig units reroll charge rolls and can choose to advance 6.

 

The first part is probably part of consolidating types like in math. [A=/=B=/=C] = X and then use X for the rest of the equation. I don't know if it's the best idea here, but it can be a way to consolidate is one is going have to otherwise write out [A=/=B=/=C] a bunch.

 

I expect there's going to be a lot of "can change [roll] to a 6" replacing "do not make a roll for it, instead [add 6" or what have you]" because it lets the rule interact with other things impacting the roll. For example, +1 to Advance roll does not currently interact with various rules that replace the Advance roll with a flat Move characteristic bonus.

 

19 minutes ago, Captain Idaho said:

Done.

 

And this next one... I'm not even sure what they're trying to say as I keep zoning out mid read:

 

 

X is the value of an attack's attacks?

 

X is the value of the attacking weapons Attack characteristic. I do wish someone writing the rules would consult a thesaurus when it comes to actions and characteristics whose names overlap too much.

 

19 minutes ago, Captain Idaho said:

Wait, are just trying to say a unit doubles it's shots? Why not say that then?

 

I think it is meant to future proof and make clear the strat's bonus does not apply to any additional source of attacks. I don't know Orks too well; if there's currently a Mek thing that let's the Mek point at a Battlewagon and let it make one additional attack when it fires, then that isn't part of the weapon's Attack characteristic.

 

19 minutes ago, Captain Idaho said:

Is it me, or is GW using Chatgpt to write their rules?

 

I think they're just copying off of AoS's homework ... or they've got someone who took a formal logic course at uni (just saying it reminds me of how those textbooks are written).

 

19 minutes ago, Captain Idaho said:

The whole thing is exhausting. We don't need a when, a target or effect section... Just tell us: "a single battlewagon gets to double it's shooting phase ranged attacks within half range."

 

I expect it's one of the  80/20 rule's variants at work. 80% of the time a simple explanation will suffice, 20% of the times the complicated version is needed; it's more efficient to write the complicated version and let the simple version live in peoples's heads.

 

19 minutes ago, Captain Idaho said:

Just seems... naff.

 

I agree it is naff. I also think every time they've tried to write a simple, straightforward ruleset that it needed major updates/fixes within 3 months of release.

23 minutes ago, Mazer Rackham said:

Convoluted Ruleset enjoyer myself, (FFG RPG's) it's perhaps being done long-winded to neutralise exploits

That's partly my bad if we're talking early 2010s... my playtest group broke the heck out of some of the original language.

[Silvereyes]

Hopefully won't be much longer until they actually show an example of what these new detachments look like. I really want to know what the different between a level 1, level 2, and level 3 detachment is.

[Anon]

It’s pretty clear they have to use this convoluted language to make the new detachment systems work. They need to introduce new keywords/tags to prevent units from receiving special bonuses from multiple detachments. This trend becomes obvious when looking at the new Ork detachments in the Armageddon supplement.

 

It’s even spelled out in the preview: “This detachment has the Wagon tag and cannot be taken with another Wagon detachment.”

 

I’m fairly certain that in the “70 new and updated” detachments, certain units will receive new tags and that this will make up most of the changes.

[Marshal Rohr]

12 minutes ago, Silvereyes said:

Hopefully won't be much longer until they actually show an example of what these new detachments look like. I really want to know what the different between a level 1, level 2, and level 3 detachment is.

Box size on the shelf, so little Timmy doesn’t have to make any informed decisions when he goes to click add to cart on the web store. By 13th edition there will only be combat patrols, army boxes, and battle forces for 40K. Everything will be condensed into one of three choices, straight out of card packs and skins in video games. 

[Mazer Rackham]

38 minutes ago, jaxom said:

That's partly my bad if we're talking early 2010s... my playtest group broke the heck out of some of the original language.

 

Oh really....? 

 

I been looking for you for a looooong time, buddy.....the trouble you've caused me...! 

 

Spoiler

 

[Many apols for Off-topic..!]

 

Edited Monday at 09:57 PM by Mazer Rackham

[Tastyfish]

3 hours ago, jaxom said:

 

I do wonder what it means for the total number of stratagems for an army. Three detachment points, so if a 2 pointer is 3 strats... the math doesn't work to maintain six strats total. It's possible there's an old strat moved from a different detachment into Rolling Death; Eddie did say "three new stratagems."

 

 

I could see 3 Detachment points on a single detachment gets you 6 strats, 3-4 enhancements and 1 rule.

2 DP gets you 3 Strats, 1-2 enhancements and 1 rule.

1 DP gets you 1 Strat, 1 enhancement and 1 rule

 

Split it up, to be 2 +1 gets you 3 strats from the major faction (and one rule) plus 1 strat and 1 rule from an add on.

 

The force built around the single concept gets more room to explore that, but the two detachment rules give you more scope to explore different elements at the expense of both focusing. Or go 3 DP for three rules, but also just three strats focusing on those units.

 

Hopefully each book gets at least three of each. But the triple 1s vs 2+1 and pure 3s looks like it might make a lot of variety and give GW a wide berth in patching units, if they can also cover combinations of units (no aspect + wraith etc, that includes rerolls and/or transports).

 

More I think about it, I think the 3DP force will be the old index style for the most part, but also hopefully more of the combined arms style forces.

1x3 + 2x2 + 3x1 is more or less where we are now though (with 8 final detachments and 5 combat patrol detachments), so also quite believable. 

Edited yesterday at 12:50 AM by Tastyfish

[Antarius]

I always get a bit of "pre-new edition blues" when I read these preview articles, because they always make the new rules seem like a chore and/or a bunch of silly crap. However, I try to remind myself that (perhaps apart from HH 3rd ed.) it usually winds up being fine for people who are not chronically online.

I still kinda-sorta wish that they'd go for rules written in more natural English and then have the 80-page FAQ for people who really wanted to know whether "this unit is armed with boltguns" means that all models in the unit has an infinite number of boltguns or just one. But that ship has obviously sailed long ago - and to be fair, I guess it's not all bad.

[TheMawr]

4 hours ago, Tastyfish said:

 

I could see 3 Detachment points on a single detachment gets you 6 strats, 3-4 enhancements and 1 rule.

2 DP gets you 3 Strats, 1-2 enhancements and 1 rule.

1 DP gets you 1 Strat, 1 enhancement and 1 rule

 

Split it up, to be 2 +1 gets you 3 strats from the major faction (and one rule) plus 1 strat and 1 rule from an add on.

 

The force built around the single concept gets more room to explore that, but the two detachment rules give you more scope to explore different elements at the expense of both focusing. Or go 3 DP for three rules, but also just three strats focusing on those units.

 

Hopefully each book gets at least three of each. But the triple 1s vs 2+1 and pure 3s looks like it might make a lot of variety and give GW a wide berth in patching units, if they can also cover combinations of units (no aspect + wraith etc, that includes rerolls and/or transports).

 

More I think about it, I think the 3DP force will be the old index style for the most part, but also hopefully more of the combined arms style forces.

1x3 + 2x2 + 3x1 is more or less where we are now though (with 8 final detachments and 5 combat patrol detachments), so also quite believable. 

 

If the codex ones are 3 point detachments, the 70 1 and 2 detachments wont be enough to really let you play with the system. 

 

because if most armies get 3 new detachments ( and each army needs 3 new detachments that way ), you'd either have one 2 point and two 1 point detachments or one 1 point and two 2 point detachments. in both cases it means until their codex drops, the system only provides a single choice (or no choice for those armies only getting 2 detachments), and there is possible kneecapping of armies-within-armies people may have built ( kroot, harlequins, ynnari, cult specific daemons/hybrid daemon armies based on the codexes ) as a selection of three detachments likely wont cover those.

 

It becomes even worse when you consider that for a 1000 point game, not a single detachment in the codex works anymore if they are the 3 point detachments. 

Thats not even going into arbitrary numbers of stratagems and enhancements.

 

 

However, if the codex ones are 2 point detachments, they are all playable as they where.. even in smaller games, and the new detachments could be only or mostly 1 point detachments to play around with the system.

It also adds up to the enhancements and stratagems ( even if this isnt exactly a heavy argument );

 

2 point ( current detachments and most common ) = 4 enhancements & 6 stratagems
1 point ( flexibility detachments ) = 2 enhancements & 3 stratagems

3 point ( possibly rare) = 6 enhancements & 9 stratagems

 

It would mean that the new edition adds a layer ( powercreep/bloat as some would say ) on what was already there.. but that isnt exactly unprecedented for GW.

 

the codex detachments could also be costed individually and the enhancement/stratagem ratio becoming more arbitrary.. but I think thats more effort than GW would put into it. As a blanket solution, codex detachment = 2 points seems likeliest to me.

 

 

While typing this I decided to listen to the video if they say anything about it not said in the article (even if I dislike those talking videos). And they talk about adding tactical brigade detachment to the codex detachments, wich seems to confirm the above theory that the codex ones ( or at least some ) are 2 point detachments and Taktikal brigade is a 1 point detachment.

 

[Antarius]

8 hours ago, Anon said:

It’s pretty clear they have to use this convoluted language to make the new detachment systems work. They need to introduce new keywords/tags to prevent units from receiving special bonuses from multiple detachments. This trend becomes obvious when looking at the new Ork detachments in the Armageddon supplement.

 

It’s even spelled out in the preview: “This detachment has the Wagon tag and cannot be taken with another Wagon detachment.”

 

I’m fairly certain that in the “70 new and updated” detachments, certain units will receive new tags and that this will make up most of the changes.

I think you're right.

The interesting thing is how convoluted and confusing it will be in practice (which is difficult to say at this point, but I'm cautiously optimistic).

It's funny and/or worrying, because keywords are quite an elegant solution in principle, but they can really spiral out of control in practice, so they're a huge pitfall when you're deeply immersed in writing the game and dealing with playtesters who are also very deep into the game and jargon.

[Karhedron]

4 hours ago, Antarius said:

I still kinda-sorta wish that they'd go for rules written in more natural English and then have the 80-page FAQ for people who really wanted to know whether "this unit is armed with boltguns" means that all models in the unit has an infinite number of boltguns or just one. But that ship has obviously sailed long ago - and to be fair, I guess it's not all bad.

 

As someone who works in systems engineering, we adopt formal language for requirements because one person's "natural english" is not always the same as someone else's. If you leave ambiguity, you will get people arguing or making different assumptions. A lot of people have been clamouring for tighter wording on rules for a long time and this is what it looks like. It ain't pretty but it gets the job done! 

[Antarius]

16 minutes ago, Karhedron said:

 

As someone who works in systems engineering, we adopt formal language for requirements because one person's "natural english" is not always the same as someone else's. If you leave ambiguity, you will get people arguing or making different assumptions. A lot of people have been clamouring for tighter wording on rules for a long time and this is what it looks like. It ain't pretty but it gets the job done! 

Certainly, but I think there are degrees. Something like 2nd edition (while I did/do love it) is quite ambiguous in many places, but I think something like Warcry did very well with a combination of clear, concise, natural English and applying keywords and rules jargon where necessary.

 

My concern is that you can get to a point where the rules are unambiguous in theory, but so convoluted that they become confusing and ambiguous in practice. But we shall see, of course. I’m not overly concerned yet.

[Domhnall]

13 hours ago, Captain Idaho said:

 

 

X is the value of an attack's attacks?

 

Wait, are just trying to say a unit doubles it's shots? Why not say that then?

 

Is it me, or is GW using Chatgpt to write their rules?

 

The whole thing is exhausting. We don't need a when, a target or effect section... Just tell us: "a single battlewagon gets to double it's shooting phase ranged attacks within half range."

 

Just seems... naff.

 

I think because [RAPID FIRE X] is a standard rule, and 'X' may not necessarily be 'A'. So to keep it in line with the rest of the rule system you keep the same wording. In this case, 'X' = 'A'.
As is also specifies "excluding attackes made by weapons selected with Firing Deck", then specifying 'X' = 'A' clarifies that you ONLY double up that amount. As you can guarantee if it said "a single battlewagon gets to double it's shooting phase ranged attacks within half range." there would be players arguing this includes firing deck shots, because those were shot in the shooting phase and it doesn't specifically say that it doesn't. 

Wording for rules (in any games) has become almost it's own kind of legalese speak, because if any ambiguity is left, it WILL be exploited. So you have clunky (often confusing wording) because somebody somewhere somewhen got advantage from what should have been a simply rule.

[Mogger351]

This sort of language where everything is very clear, rigid and feels almost mathematical is far easier for me to work with that the word salad of HH 3.0 as a contrast

[Antarius]

18 minutes ago, Mogger351 said:

This sort of language where everything is very clear, rigid and feels almost mathematical is far easier for me to work with that the word salad of HH 3.0 as a contrast

HH 3.0 will hopefully stand as an eternal monument to the low point of GWs rules writing. I usually think people are pretty hyperbolic when it comes to criticising GWs rules, but HH 3 was terrible. 

[Marshal Rohr]

15 hours ago, Captain Idaho said:

 

Yeah it feels like GW are moving to a position where they use a lot of words to say something that could be said a lot more concise.

 

Example:

 

 

The first bullet point doesn't need to exist. Merely say:

 

Battlewagon/Hunter Rig/Kill Rig units reroll charge rolls and can choose to advance 6.

 

Done.

 

And this next one... I'm not even sure what they're trying to say as I keep zoning out mid read:

 

 

X is the value of an attack's attacks?

 

Wait, are just trying to say a unit doubles it's shots? Why not say that then?

 

Is it me, or is GW using Chatgpt to write their rules?

 

The whole thing is exhausting. We don't need a when, a target or effect section... Just tell us: "a single battlewagon gets to double it's shooting phase ranged attacks within half range."

 

Just seems... naff.

This is just how GW writes all their rules now. Convoluted and unclear. 

Edited yesterday at 11:53 AM by Marshal Rohr