New player Looking at the rules

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Dawink ( 20 )
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New player Looking at the rules

Post by Dawink »

So i just played my first game last night with a group who runs off the new rules (8th) but for a cheap way to learn i had picked up the 6th to learn some things from.

Is it just me or does it seem that the new rules fail in comparsion to the older ones, i actually like not being able to measure before you declare charge and the big thing is that it seems artllery is way to easy that every crew is a sharpshooter. 6th you had to guess the range this one just say im hitting in the middle. Also with the second rank attack doesnt make to much sense, personally like the spears can only attack from second.

Is there any rules from old edition that others prefer to use if so what are they id like to see what people have made up from across the rules into one home made rule set.
knightofthelance ( 78 )
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Re: New player Looking at the rules

Post by knightofthelance »

The only thing that is truly awful in the new rules are the line of sight rules. I also prefer the old movement rules as they relate to terrain, but that's not as big of a problem.
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Re: New player Looking at the rules

Post by eman1_2 »

I think they are more streamlined. With premeasurement (which took a while to sell to me), the number of arguments goes way down. And the new charging rules prevents the clipping - which some players would use to cheat their way into a combat. Maximizing makes things quicker, and more fair to everyone, IMO.

The second rank attacking speeds up combat quite a bit, actually. Previously, you were fighting with 5 models on each side, so only a few dice were thrown. Now, you are fighting with 5 + 5 support, so hard core combat units can actually use their abilities. Makes combat more decisive.

And, the new rules are the new rules. If you show up at the store for a pick up game, that is what they are playing.
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Re: New player Looking at the rules

Post by Doctari »

I've played every edition from second to now and while I don't think these rules are the best (4th edition, imo, was the best) I do like the new speed of the game.

Random charge distance cleans up a lot of the trouble with pre-measuring. And horde rules actually make it worthwhile to have more then a 5-7 front. Magic (casting) is pretty weak and not nearly as game breaking as it has been in the past and stuff like fast cav are.. well fast.

All in all I like the flow of the game if not the lack of.. flavor.
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kturock ( 590 )
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Re: New player Looking at the rules

Post by kturock »

I've played since RT.. and haven't liekd anything since 2nd ed. 3,4 & 5 are the same squad based rules. vs mini/individual based rules. Now, you can mostly shoot exactly who you see. You can shoot and stop the enemy from contacting you in a charge. The old rules, by removing the 'rear rank' as casualties, gave the attackers free inches of movement.
I still don't like everyone moves the same speed and most leadership rules are worthless as compared to even fantasy.
6th ed is better, but there are still a lot of other and better rule systems out. and they even support their customers and answer questions about rules.
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Re: New player Looking at the rules

Post by knightofthelance »

I still don't like everyone moves the same speed and most leadership rules are worthless as compared to even fantasy.
Um, he is talking about fantasy.

I'm in near 100% agrement with Doctari. As a ruleset it's probably as good as it's ever been for a well paced clean game. 4th is probably the 2nd best for that. But overall I think I prefered 4th. It just seemed to have a more interesting background.
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kturock ( 590 )
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Re: New player Looking at the rules

Post by kturock »

knightofthelance wrote:
I still don't like everyone moves the same speed and most leadership rules are worthless as compared to even fantasy.
Um, he is talking about fantasy.

I'm in near 100% agrement with Doctari. As a ruleset it's probably as good as it's ever been for a well paced clean game. 4th is probably the 2nd best for that. But overall I think I prefered 4th. It just seemed to have a more interesting background.

DOH. :oops:

as far as a minis game, it's the simplest. It used to play like alot of other 'minis wargames'. but to pull in the , 'i can't keep track of that' 40k players, they've eliminated all of the movement and maneuvre rules. I guess if you want to play more realistic movement rules, play old editions, or any of GW's 'ancinet armies rules' [which used to be the same as fantasy, sans magic and fantasical creatures & races] or play any other system.

Players from other systems, for ACW or Napolionics for example; laugh at the simplisity of these rules.

but, GW knew 40k has been the bread & butter system and they're changing fantasy to it.

[i've heard 40k players for the last 10 years say that fantasy movement & formation rules were difficult or they'd play as many skirmishers as possible.]
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Re: New player Looking at the rules

Post by reegsk »

I've been playing WHFB for a little over ten years now, and I have to say that 8th edition is the best in that timeframe by far. Sixth and seventh were essentially the same edition, with a few minor changes. Yes, sixth/seventh required a bit more skill or blind luck when it came to guesswork. There was no pre-measuring, so you had to guess for charges, artillery, etc. As a Dwarf player, I was VERY good at guess ranges. I was rarely off by more than an inch or two. But back then, artillery was almost useless. Larger monsters and large regiments of monstrous infantry were incredibly rare, so cannons would often not earn their points back. Stone throwers had hits and partial hits, and would also not do a ton of damage. Magic was laughable, at least the BRB lores. You'd dump hundreds of points into a wizard lord, only to have him kill maybe twenty or so models by the end of the game. Unless you played Tzeentch or Vampire Counts. Then you'd have piles and piles of power dice, and your magic phase was beyond annoying. That's neither here nor there.

The biggest issue with 6/7 is that combat, well, stunk. Only the front rank fought, unless you had spears, and you "pulled from the front". To put this into perspective, my Dwarfs had a charge range of 6". I NEVER declared charges because I was never in range. My opponent would always get the charge off. Charging used to let you strike first. So let's say I get charged by a decent melee unit, Chaos Warriors, with halberds or great weapons. Chances were that they would inflict four or five wounds, meaning that my entire front rank was dead. I don't get to swing back. Combat over. Let's say I don't break. Next round, those Warriors are higher I, so they swing first again, and do the same amount of wounds. Again, no attacks back, combat over. Combat was incredibly boring and usually decided in a single round, with the charger winning the vast majority of the time. Now, Dwarfs are tough, so not everything could kill my front rank. But not charging or being unable to charge often meant you lost. My Bretonnian army was completely untouchable. With a 16" charge range, I would charge your money units with two or three units each, break them and overrun past the rest of your line. Then turn around and charge the rest of your army, game over. What can you do against that? You're not going to charge me, and you don't get to swing back in combat because all of your dudes are dead.

Perhaps the worst feature of 6/7 was Difficult and Very Difficult terrain. An average game back then would have maybe four terrain pieces, one in each quadrant, because they sucked so hard. Unless you play Wood Elves, then terrain was your best friend. The fact that you had to halve or quarter your movement and could not march was crippling. A standard infantry unit in difficult terrain would be reduced to 2" of movement until the entire unit cleared the terrain piece, which was impossible in a 6 turn game. And while you may think, "Well, just avoid terrain", it wasn't always possible. Personally, I'd stick my artillery and missile troops in there. It didn't prevent you from reaching and killing them, but once you did, you were stuck. And Wood Elves could move forests, so they could plunk them in front of your heavy cav or, worse, move it ONTO your unit, then you were trapped.

Movement overall was rough. The general movement mechanics are the same (though I do like the addition of Swift Reform), but charges are so different and so much better. I cannot tell you how many arguments I have witnessed and been a part of in tournaments from 6/7 about whether or not a charge was completed. You had to pay for wheeling, maneuver around terrain (another annoyance). . .it was a nightmare. And clipping in 6th edition. . .ugh, clipping. They fixed that particular problem in 7th, but the wheeling/terrain issue still remained. Eighth is so much easier and you really can't argue. While the rules say to roll your charge and then measure, I do it the opposite way. I measure, agree with my opponent on what I need to roll, and THEN roll. If I meet what we agreed on, success. If I don't, failure. But rolling and then measuring leaves the argument of, "Is that 10 inches, or 10 1/16th inches?" And when you rolled a total of a ten, well, begin argument (or dice off, which is my go-to). And you automatically maximize. And you don't worry about wheeling and maneuvering. If the unit can physically fit along its charge path, you make it. Combat itself is so much better. So many more attacks! And you may think that this is hypocritical, since more attacks means you can wipe out a unit just as fast as you could in 7th. But there is a difference. If your beatstick, nasty unit charges in and kills half of my unit, okay, crap happens. But when your decent unit charges in and manages to kill everything I have that can attack back, and my unit breaks and runs without getting a chance to do ANYTHING, that sucks. At least if you kill half of my unit, the other half still gets to fight. And when that's a horde unit of Longbeards with great weapons, that half is going to do some serious damage.

Now, I'm not blind to the faults in 8th edition. They went WAY overboard with magic. It went from being useless unless you were playing a specific army to OMFG ROFLSTOMP! There are very easy ways to abuse the rules, like a massive block of Ironguts with five characters, or putting so many characters in a unit that a wizard is placed in the second rank and therefore untouchable. Some special characters (*coughcough* Doucheweaver *coughcough*) went from being annoyingly powerful to army-killingly powerful. But 8th was such a departure from previous editions that they definitely were not going to get it right. Let's hope nine is a more refined, smoothed out version of eight. Will it be perfect? No, but the game already improved so much in the 7 to 8 leap that I'm looking forward to it.
eman1_2 ( 278 )
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Re: New player Looking at the rules

Post by eman1_2 »

What Reegsk said.

I have never seen it put down into words so well. I may have to steal this wording sometime (I will give credit).
Mike

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- Google something for someone, they get an answer. Teach someone how to Google their own answer, they own the Internet.
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