Munkie

I have the opposite conclusion. I've seen people try to do janky things with positioning before but it's very rare. What's extremely common is people haphazardly placing models without too much concern because coherency is easy to eyeball. Now we're going to have to be diligent all the time and calling people out for accidental placement mistakes since coherency is changing meaningfully for the first time in 20+ years. Very much a throwing the baby out with the bathwater solution. We solved a rare problem by introducing a solution that will come up way more than the "problem" ever did.

GW really, REALLY does not want people using squads of more than 5 in this edition.

You also can't deploy in a line anymore, even when not being cheesy. I understand what they were trying to do, but this seems like a weird solution to me. 5 models in a line is okay, 6 models would never stand side by side!

As the number of footnotes grew in that article, it began to feel as if GW was calling me mean names.

Drukhari Faction Focus is up. The big thing is taking 3 patrols will take up net 0 CPs. So we can mix the different sub-factions without getting punished by the new detachment system. It essentially mimics a single battalion list in terms of mandatory slots and CP pool but with one additional HQ required. In exchange, we get the flexibility of mixing kabals/cults/covens as well as doubling the maximum FA, HS, and Flyer slots. I'm looking forward to these builds being worth taking again. In 8th, the triple patrol Raiding Force uses all 3 available detachments and only creates a pool of 7 CP. Now it'll be whatever the starting pool is. Also confirms that, while units with fly can't shoot after falling back, aircraft don't have to fall back, they just leave combat so they can still shoot. I better finish putting LEDs in my new voidraven bombers...

In the grim darkness of the extremely near future there is only... ...peace?

Yeah that's essentially the issue. "For the greater good" encourages you to clump your army. Spreading out actively weakens one of their most potent core mechanics. On top of that, the ability of drones to mitigate damage is amplified by having drone squads within 6" of as many units as possible. Preferably multiple drone squads in range of multiple units for maximum damage mitigation. People might need to move in 9th to win a game, but the design of the army itself is to encourage you not to move. I think a competitive list in 9th will look identical to 8th and play almost exactly the same. Spend 2 turns shooting with relative impunity because your opponent has to kill drones before they can even try to shoot at riptides. Then grab objectives in the late game when the opponent doesn't have enough bodies to control the board. I'd love to see devilish and Crisis suits (anyone remember those) come back, but I just don't think they will unless GW rethinks what they want the army to do.

That's too bad about Tau. I used to love my Tau back in 4th and 5th when they were a mobile faction. This confirms that the Tau way of war will continue to be: sit in the corner as far away as possible and never move unless you absolutely have to. They used to have a lot of tactical depth with moving devilish, drone screens, and jump shoot jump mechanics. In all of 8th edition, I've played a Tau army that had a movement phase exactly one time (at the ofcc). Otherwise it's more of a parking lot than guard have ever been.

10 man?! I can't see a compelling reason to include more than 5. Based on what we've seen so far, I doubt very much that I'd include more than 6 squads of 5 troops in any list.

I wish it was "subtract 1 from combat tests if the unit began the turn below half strength." Having a unit shot up on turn 1, and then a large chunk of it running away immediately after seems especially brutal on horde armies. With this slight modification, a large blob should at least get one turn of action before things go belly up.

The problem is splashing that stuff around is bad for game balance if there isn't a worthwhile reward in having the fly ability. AA stuff should be better at killing things that fly, but if you add too much of that into the game (as they have currently because Fly is so good in 8th), then it just makes Fly bad to take. That's the problem with hard counters. They're best used as checks on a powerful ability, but they may just end up stifling versatility. The game doesn't need a slew of hard counters for a good-not-great ability just because it makes narrative sense. Just like it made narrative sense for flames to burn squads embarked inside open topped transports in 6th and 7th, but it was objectively bad for the game. It was hell on earth for 2 armies (Orks, DE) and nobody else cared. It made sense, but it served no mechanical purpose other than to create imbalance where there was none.

Yeah, that's exactly the direction I hope they take it. Fly was too good as a catch all. Dedicated AA guns shooting man-sized models or vehicles hovering just off the ground doesn't make much sense.

Oof. No shooting after falling back for models with Fly. Hopefully all the +1 to hit and similar bonuses against Fly models are immediately scrapped. If the only trade off is freedom of movement for increased visibility and a bunch of hard counters, then Fly is an ability you do not want.

*double post*

There's an Ogre maneater pirate that has a gnoblar dressed as a parrot on his shoulder. That added to the Black Reach warboss with the long power claw extended out, would be perfect.

Works for me!

Well, turns out a half-broken elf can still gut a warboss like a fish. A plane crash only half-breaks elfs, dontchano.

I was trying a Supreme Command detachment with the new harlequin rules. His Flying Eadbutt hit a death jester, 2 troupe masters, a shadowseer, a raider, and a venom. 6 units and he rolled 5 3s and a 1. I didn't understand why he killed his plane that had 6 wounds left until my army took 16 mortal wounds. Then I understood too well...

It also already exists. I had an opponent do that to me just the other day. Pretty brutal.

However, the arse-end does tend to contain the truth. Even if it is smeared across a length of prayer scroll. So I think it was still technically correct 💩

Based on the wording, I would say not. You can't shoot him unless he's visible and closest. If either of those things is untrue, he cannot be targeted. Still conceptually silly, but not as easily abused. For instance, one of the games where the TO ruled that I was not allowed to have a shooting phase was one where a building deep in my opponent's table quarter contained TFCs and eliminators (no LoS required). Then they had techmarines with cannons standing on top, in plain view. Then they infiltrated a scout squad into the first floor of a building in the neutral table quarter nearest to mine. The presence of the scout squad sitting 5 feet away from his characters turned my shooting phase off entirely. Absolutely nothing I could do to counter play. I was not allowed to shoot until my opponent decided to allow me to. That's much harder to pull off now.

I'm glad they're changing the character targeting rules. That was, by far, the worst thing about 8th edition (in conjunction with ITC prevalence of LoS blocking terrain). On several occasions, my shooting phase had to be skipped entirely because the only models I could see were characters, but there were closer, unseen models that somehow therefore preventing me from shooting. It made no narrative sense, didn't seem to be supported by the rules, yet I've been told many times "that's just how it works". Thank God it no longer "works" like that.

No (limited) overwatch is good for Dark Eldar. We have a relic to cancel overwatch, but as whined about above, it's on our slow HQs which can make coordinating charges tricky. The usual method is to charge with something least likely to die to the overwatch (often an empty transport) then charge with something that matters. I don't mind overwatch happening, but I'm glad we won't have the same unit over watching multiple times if they kill the first target. Killing one unit is good enough!

To be clear, I do think the changes they've revealed will be better for the overall health of the game, and I'm not going to rush to judgement until I have the whole picture. I'm just, as I said, apprehensive.

The problem is, it usually means we have to suck it up for entire editions. DE were horrible in 4th, the first half of 5th, then horrible again in 6th and 7th. In 8th, we got the cool new Raiding Force option where if you take 3 patrols, you'd get +4 command points. Except when GW changed battalions from +3 to +5 CP, the Raiding Force was completely obsolete. So we've been in suck it up mode for most of this edition too. The fundamental design flaws with DE have never beed addressed. We're the only army I know have that has exclusively foot slogging HQs AND transports with no extra capacity to fit them. Venoms have 5, and raiders have 10. Like most armies, our ideal squad sizes are 5 or 10 (when you unlock more weapons). So we can either: 1) have an HQ (or several) in a venom, risking a potentially calamitous exlposion 2) have an HQ in a raider with a squad that must take fewer guns to accommodate them. 3) Have HQs on foot, and either slow down to use auras, or move at full speed and forego auras. It would be very easy to solve this, but GW hasn't for a decade because they really don't think about DE unless they have to, and then they think as little as possible about them. Can GW fix them after we suck it up for however long is required? Yes. Will they? Probably not.