8th Edition

Count Adhemar wrote:

By balance I mean that a battle should be won by the choice of units to form an army and how that army is played...

I don't agree with that. List-making is fun and all, but a game in which you turn up with the 'wrong' army and you can't win regardless of how you play it on the table is a game that isn't much fun at all. If it's really balanced the choice of units will help, but not so much that it decides the outcome before the game even starts!

Barking Agatha wrote:

Count Adhemar wrote:

By balance I mean that a battle should be won by the choice of units to form an army and how that army is played...

I don't agree with that. List-making is fun and all, but a game in which you turn up with the 'wrong' army and you can't win regardless of how you play it on the table is a game that isn't much fun at all. If it's really balanced the choice of units will help, but not so much that it decides the outcome before the game even starts!

I think, perhaps, that Count was more referring to selecting units that are appropriate to a particular strategy and theme, rather than suggesting that only some units in an army should be worth taking.

Any game purporting to be a tactical/strategy wargame should have inbuilt into it the need to build a cohesive force that is designed to work together to achieve its outcome, otherwise you might just as well play an army of scatterbikes, oh.

The_Burning_Eye wrote:

Barking Agatha wrote:

Count Adhemar wrote:

By balance I mean that a battle should be won by the choice of units to form an army and how that army is played...

I don't agree with that. List-making is fun and all, but a game in which you turn up with the 'wrong' army and you can't win regardless of how you play it on the table is a game that isn't much fun at all. If it's really balanced the choice of units will help, but not so much that it decides the outcome before the game even starts!

I think, perhaps, that Count was more referring to selecting units that are appropriate to a particular strategy and theme, rather than suggesting that only some units in an army should be worth taking.

Give that man a cee-gar! Exactly my point. What I was saying was that a player should be able to write a list from his/her chosen codex according to their desired strategy and know that they stand a reasonable chance of winning against any other codex. As opposed to picking the best possible list from a weaker codex and still getting face-rolled by a weak list from a stronger codex.

Count Adhemar wrote:

What I was saying was that a player should be able to write a list from his/her chosen codex according to their desired strategy and know that they stand a reasonable chance of winning against any other codex. As opposed to picking the best possible list from a weaker codex and still getting face-rolled by a weak list from a stronger codex.

The problem as I see it is that they've made this a reality in 2-3 codices (space marines+, craftworld, tau).  I think as long as they keep those books robust and competitive to one another they don't care about much else.  In that respect I guess it's a problem of attitude and possibly resources.

But ya, it's a strategy that leaves the rest of us out here as basically "unsupported product" that really only works in one specific way or another.

I really don't see a way to fix it unless they're willing to devote a lot more resources to the rule set, or simply homogenize it all down to "Eldar get this, space marines get that" in the grand alliance type system people have been bouncing around. I do remember reading the AOS warscrolls when they first came out, and at the bottom there were little notes of what your units that don't exist anymore could stand in as.  I remember thinking that was probably the ultimate fate of the dark eldar.

stilgar27 wrote:

I really don't see a way to fix it unless they're willing to devote a lot more resources to the rule set, or simply homogenize it all down to "Eldar get this, space marines get that" in the grand alliance type system people have been bouncing around.

Whilst I don't think the 40K rules need 'Sigmaring', to a great extent the codexes do. GW needs to go back to the drawing board and write a very short summary of each army. What is it good at, what is it poor at etc. Three or four lines at most for each army that really give a feel for what the essence of the army is. They then need to start from scratch with each army and really work on a set of rules that reflect that summary.

Sadly I can't see this happening.

Count Adhemar wrote:

stilgar27 wrote:

I really don't see a way to fix it unless they're willing to devote a lot more resources to the rule set, or simply homogenize it all down to "Eldar get this, space marines get that" in the grand alliance type system people have been bouncing around.

Whilst I don't think the 40K rules need 'Sigmaring', to a great extent the codexes do. GW needs to go back to the drawing board and write a very short summary of each army. What is it good at, what is it poor at etc. Three or four lines at most for each army that really give a feel for what the essence of the army is. They then need to start from scratch with each army and really work on a set of rules that reflect that summary.

Sadly I can't see this happening.

Not only that, but if they're doing that, then they also need to figure out how that summary translates into rules. For DE being fast is all well and good, but that needs to translate into winning strategies, not just getting close enough to the enemy to get rapid fired to death quicker. Equally the glass cannon idea sounds good, but even when done well tends to result in extreme game results, with things pretty much over by the start of turn three because your alpha strike has wiped out any resistance, or it failed and your whole army is shattered.

For us, the "speed" should amount to extra defense. Currently, the game does not have any mechanic that shows off the hyper mobility of our army, and other fast armies that are supposed to live off of speed. No Jink does not cut it.

Quote :

For us, the "speed" should amount to extra defense. Currently, the game does not have any mechanic that shows off the hyper mobility of our army, and other fast armies that are supposed to live off of speed. No Jink does not cut it.

This could be incorporated pretty easily: Just make a rule or two that say "If a unit with this special rule has moved more than [enter inches here] in the movement phase it gets [enter bonus here]".

That bonus could be something like an invuln save, preferred enemy, a bonus to jinking or some other goodness.

Especially when dark angels jink better than we could ever hope to while having the resilience of marines and all the love that comes with it.

Speed doesn't have to get equated to higher defense, but I agree with the sentiment and would welcome it. It could mean that it's just speed as opposed to the concept of speed they gave us currently. But let us get there and be a threat. Hit super hard, or accurately by changing the dynamic of BS/WS so the paradigm gets shifted allowing us to have 6's or something. Or preferred enemy as a standard. Or twin link standard. High initiative, high and reliable attack potential, would be fun to play. Let my own pieces die to a breeze if I can control the combat, bring some real fear to the table.

We get too fixated on survivability, probably because that's what drives us crazy on the other side of the table or because we're used to 30 years of the game giving us only one equation. For 8th edition, I'm in the "blow it up and start over [more or less]" camp.

At the minimum, the rules for melee need a complete overhaul.

nerdelemental wrote:

For 8th edition, I'm in the "blow it up and start over [more or less]" camp.

At the minimum, the rules for melee need a complete overhaul.

Hear hear! The current rules are inherently unbalancing. Melee is always either going to be too good or too lame, and some armies are always going to be super-good and leave others struggling. 7th edition is just 3rd edition through 4 rounds of tweaks, and it's always had that trouble. Let's just say that it did its job and move on. Isn't it time for a new design after 20 years?

Barking Agatha wrote:

Count Adhemar wrote:

By balance I mean that a battle should be won by the choice of units to form an army and how that army is played...

I don't agree with that. List-making is fun and all, but a game in which you turn up with the 'wrong' army and you can't win regardless of how you play it on the table is a game that isn't much fun at all. If it's really balanced the choice of units will help, but not so much that it decides the outcome before the game even starts!

Will never happen.
Listbuilding (same as deckbuilding in MtG) will always be a part of your performance.
You cant expect to win with an all Wych army against an all vehicle army.
And while these are extremes where do you draw the line? How much is "enough" anti tank? And should that be equally effective against hordes?

Not to derail the thread, but are the dark eldar even really fast any more?

My meta includes among other things - a couple dark angels/ravenwing players, corsairs, a few craftworlders, and white scars.  All of these can choose to be at least as mobile as the current dark eldar depending on what they field.  Admittedly though, outside of vanilla marines they do lack open-top/assault vehicles.

I think the last game I actually played as dark eldar was 750 points and my opponent was playing dark angels in the form of 8-9 single land speeders including sableclaw in a strike force.  Needless to say I didn't feel like I had any speed advantage.

From my personal view, no we are no longer fast we are those other guys who have some units that can move at a good speed but with low AV, 5+ save, and no power of the machine spirits. We can barely reposition our Ravagers without losing the ability to fire our three non twin-linked lances, 6" move to fire one weapon at full ballistic skill, look at how fast my AV 11 firing platform is, zoom zoom. I miss Aerial Assault. Okay all our vehicles are skimmers and jetbikes so we can fly over obstacles, that does provide us with more mobility then say a ravenwing but still I don't consider us that fast. I'm also bias because I really loved the 5th edition flavor of turboboosting bladevanes and drag chains. Allowed me to be fast and still do some damage to those I passed over.

As for what I would like to see for 8th, how about some fluffy rules that actually portray us instead of this joke of a codex we currently have. 3rd edition had a scenario rules that dealt with us taking captives, 5th edition added in rules that allowed us to move fast and still do some hurt. 6th, released in the age of 7th edition BRB, basically took away the vast majority of what made us who were are and then made sure that the space marines could do everything we are supposed to do better. Hell the new Deathwatch are going to be doing poison better then us at 2+. Okay I turned this into a bit of a rant, I'll just show myself to the door.

CurstAlchemist wrote:

Okay all our vehicles are skimmers and jetbikes so we can fly over obstacles, that does provide us with more mobility then say a ravenwing but still I don't consider us that fast.

True most of the time, but dark angels land speeders are ravenwing and every bit as mobile our skimmers (potentially more so).  Black knights get skilled rider so ignore passable terrain, while all bikes get scout/outflank which can be a pretty big deal.

CurstAlchemist wrote:

I'm also bias because I really loved the 5th edition flavor of turboboosting bladevanes and drag chains. Allowed me to be fast and still do some damage to those I passed over.

Was one of my favorite tactics 5th edition and... a dark angels vehicle/character still has a form of it.  Has to move over his target in the movement phase so it's a lot more limiting, but he gets d3+1 AP2 auto-hits.

CurstAlchemist wrote:

As for what I would like to see for 8th, how about some fluffy rules that actually portray us instead of this joke of a codex we currently have. 3rd edition had a scenario rules that dealt with us taking captives, 5th edition added in rules that allowed us to move fast and still do some hurt.

Special tactical objectives/traits to make games winnable on our own terms could go a long way to leveling the field.  I'd also like to see us get some form of battle focus like the craftworlders/corsairs get, probably involving melee to compliment the assault boats, but as others have noted melee in general could use some major boosts in the new edition.

Thanks for the corrections, haven't been playing much and was associating things like the Ravenwing with the Marine bikers for some reason.

Most of the ravenwing units you'll see on the table certainly are going to be bikes, but everything else in the fast attack section (besides assault marines and transports) also falls into the ravenwing.  So anything in the dark angels book that can jink can re-roll it - with the exception of characters who's bikes are purchased as an upgrade.

There is detachment like the real space raiders one of up to 12 ravenwing units that get some special bonuses with virtually no tax that's pretty popular in my meta, even without obj secured.

In a lot of ways the ravenwing are what I would have liked the dark eldar to be, which is one of the reasons I ended up playing them pretty much all summer.  It doesn't hurt that I found an old metal sammael in my gaming closet and it's one of my favorite models of all time, or that I had a ton of models (dark vengence bikes, tacticals, terminators and 3rd edition speeders) laying around from many years of collecting 40k stuff.

CurstAlchemist wrote:

From my personal view, no we are no longer fast we are those other guys who have some units that can move at a good speed but with low AV, 5+ save, and no power of the machine spirits. We can barely reposition our Ravagers without losing the ability to fire our three non twin-linked lances, 6" move to fire one weapon at full ballistic skill, look at how fast my AV 11 firing platform is, zoom zoom. I miss Aerial Assault. Okay all our vehicles are skimmers and jetbikes so we can fly over obstacles, that does provide us with more mobility then say a ravenwing but still I don't consider us that fast. I'm also bias because I really loved the 5th edition flavor of turboboosting bladevanes and drag chains. Allowed me to be fast and still do some damage to those I passed over.

If you move 6" you can fire all weapons at Full BS and if you go 12 you can fire 2 at full BS. Doesn't make the Ravager great but if you're playing like that no wonder your having trouble.

And yes, Aerial Assault should not have been removed.

I stand corrected, I haven't been playing much lately and forgot about the Shooting with Fast Vehicles section of the rules. Teach me to not double check rules before I post. I've been getting pretty bad about collecting without assembling and painting so haven't been playing as much as I could.

Soooooo.....

Sorry to derail things, but I'm no longer convinced that the current campaigns represent the End Times for 40k.


So I just got Death Masque, and read through the narrative. Decently laid out for what is basically a small skirmish (with big implications - the missions I mean, not the entire background battle).
And this is where it left me thinking - this isn't the kick off for an End Times I expected. If anything, I think its the teaser trailer.
The events of Death Masque strike me as that thing that happen late in say, season 5 of a show, but not right at the end. And then it turns out to be a teaser for the main plot of season 6. Or seasons 7 and 8 for 40k.
My thinking having read Death Masque, is that 8th Edition in its entirety will represent the End Times. If what we're hearing of new Daemon primarchs is to be believed, I can see their introdution coinciding with 8th, and making that the big change in the narrative. If correct, I no longer think that the end of 7th will be an End Times, and that 8th will be a total reboot or reset or seismic shift in the game to the level that it obliterates entire armies/races.

The use of speed as a multiplier can be fairly easily implemented. Firstly Aerial Assault needs to return. No reason why Ravagers shouldn't be able to move 12" and fire everything. Jinking can be improved simply by giving any vehicle with nightshields a jink save without forcing snap-fire. There's a rule from an old Apoc formation that gives Raiders with advanced aethersails the ability to fire and turbo-boost afterwards. Adding the later two would make those upgrades very much worth taking - the ability to hop out of cover, fire and hop back in would give the DE unprecedented manoeuvrability and defence without breaking the game. Ignore cover would still rek Raiders but at least you'd have a chance vs everything else.

Simply allowing Wyches to assault out of 12" moving vehicles would go a long way to improving both the Wych unit and buffing the DE speed specialisation. Throw in some love for Scourges to be able to deepstrike accurately (allow Sybarites to buy Webway Portals) and have relentless (or at least relentless for purposes of firing) to enable them to fire all their weapon options properly.

Right there you have transformed the DE from a lame duck into a highly mobile surgical strike faction. It isn't hard to figure out what's wrong with each faction and to correct it within the confines of the game as it is now. GW just needs to show some willingness to do that and put some effort into it.

Something that popped into my head again, as I was looking over my Skitarii:

Should there be a form of general FOC (like the Combined Arms/Allied Detachment in the rulebook right now), I would like it to be accessible to EVERY army. "Oh, you want to ally in some Harlequins or Skitarii? Too bad! They don't have an HQ, so you can't use the allied detachment!".

You all realize that we may get just some of this wishlisting in a new Dex only to have 8th Edition drop a month later and totally mess us right.

It can't be right? Probably just some chaos thing, or maybe nids?

Alien-looking with sharp lines and curves, but different to his (probably Craftworld) Eldar stuff?

Now that sounds promising...

Tau don't have sharp lines, Necrons do but they're pretty iconic, I wouldn't necessarily call Chaos 'alien' as they usually use modified Imperial stuff, 'nids I wouldn't compare with Eldar in the first place...