Exile Posted July 5, 2015 Report Share Posted July 5, 2015 Gentlemen, With all this talk of AoS, and the prematurity of the demise of 8th edition, I would like to take, in effect, a survey. I truly enjoyed 8th edition, far more than my experience with previous editions, but, alas, it was never perfect. No system ever is, for that matter. On that note, I am curious as to what each of you feel is were some of the drawbacks, rules shortcomings, specific balance issues, etc, present in 8th edition WFB. In conversation, some friends and I have already come up with a couple points of contention: 6-dice-monkey magic Cannon sniping Steadfast Unstable Give me your top 3! 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JMGraham Posted July 5, 2015 Report Share Posted July 5, 2015 I think steadfast could work out, provided it were negated if a unit is engaged in the rear or flank. I'd also like to see charging give a bonus to initiative. Other than that, the all-elf ASF is a bit much. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
rudra34 Posted July 5, 2015 Report Share Posted July 5, 2015 3 - Wood Elves 2 - Dark Elves 1 - High Elves But worst of all, were the people who played those armies! 5 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Don't Panic Posted July 5, 2015 Report Share Posted July 5, 2015 Evan beat me to it.... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Burk Posted July 5, 2015 Report Share Posted July 5, 2015 pre-measuring and removal of guess range...that is what got me out of WFB.....took the tactics out (IN MY OPINION) 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
McNathanson Posted July 5, 2015 Report Share Posted July 5, 2015 Oh Burk, I love you and your guess-range shenanigans, I surely do :) But pre-measuring was a huge, huge boon... no more arguments about whether the charge was short by 1/16th of an inch, no more "oops I bumped my unit guess you lose". And no more waiting around for a player to hem and haw about whether he had his unit properly placed at 8.0005" away from you. And personally I think steadfast turned out to be one of the bigger improvements from prior editions. Do you really miss the days of massed infantry being totally pants? Of a unit of 50 Halberdiers losing 8 men, to a charge of 5 cavalry models, breaking, fleeing and being run down? Steadfast is really cool, especially with the improved elite units that can still grind through even a big horde of chaff relatively quickly. 6 Power Dice at the "big spell" sucks mainly (IMO) because the miscast doesn't hurt badly enough. Anyway here's my "really needs fixing in 9th (lol)" list: - Challenges, base-to-base CC rules, and general shenanigans that can swing a combat hugely based off who can attack, whom they can allocate against, etc. - Charging, alignment, and weirdness around closing the door and maximizing models (charges that look like they should be possible but aren't, basically due to funky rules about what kinds of alignments can happen) - Overly-effective single-model diverters (it's not cinematic when a single goblin hero on wolf can block/flee/rally/block/flee/rally and effectively paralyze a unit of 25 chaos warriors) Otherwise if those things were fixed I think I would happily play 8th edition until the sun goes down on my hobby career, as long as a steady stream of new models, occasional book refreshes, and Swedish comp, kept it fresh. 4 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Kremmet Posted July 5, 2015 Report Share Posted July 5, 2015 I always thought that most of the combat issues with 8th started when someone decided that there should be more damage on both sides. For example Supporting Attacks work just fine to offset the massive advantage that attacking first in a combat gives you, but then you combine it with Step Up and suddenly elves (and other high initiative models excluding some Chaos outliers) need even more damage potential to keep up with slower models. Steadfast is a nightmare because they wanted to deemphasize the importance of charging units, but it again made it so you needed massive damage outputs to compete as a melee-only unit. The percentile composition and Steadfast together lead to a need for something that made Death Stars risky hence the ridiculously powerful 6D6 spells. And so on and so forth with the point being that GW just didn't know when to quit fixing things. Really 8th's biggest issue was the design staff coming up with loads of different solutions to problems and just putting them all in instead of weeding out which ones actually helped. it's a problem GW has in general: they don't know how to cut solutions which just add more problems. At some point you have to ask, "is this rule necessary or did we just add it to have another rule?" 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
orkdork Posted July 6, 2015 Report Share Posted July 6, 2015 8th is quite broken, imo. Regardless of AoS, I find myself longing to use a different system anyhow. The alignment/combat-reform/who-can-attack complexity gets so out of whack so fast that it makes me crazy. At least half of our flank charges happen in some unsatisfying way for BOTH players. And many combats involve some form of annoying tricks centered around poorly done combat reform rules. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Burk Posted July 6, 2015 Report Share Posted July 6, 2015 Oh Burk, I love you and your guess-range shenanigans, I surely do :) But pre-measuring was a huge, huge boon... no more arguments about whether the charge was short by 1/16th of an inch, no more "oops I bumped my unit guess you lose". And no more waiting around for a player to hem and haw about whether he had his unit properly placed at 8.0005" away from you. Easily fixed....agreed on the distance before you roll the dice for charge range...no more argument. And honestly Yes, I miss that. that was the game. positioning, angles and thinking tactically. Honestly the game I saw in 8th was "move forward, over terrain that doesnt matter and get into your opp on 2nd turn, then start rolling dice till someone breaks". no thanks. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
McNathanson Posted July 6, 2015 Report Share Posted July 6, 2015 And honestly Yes, I miss that. that was the game. positioning, angles and thinking tactically. Honestly the game I saw in 8th was "move forward, over terrain that doesnt matter and get into your opp on 2nd turn, then start rolling dice till someone breaks". no thanks. That's really not 8th... but whatevers :) Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Chappy Posted July 6, 2015 Report Share Posted July 6, 2015 3 - Wood Elves 2 - Dark Elves 1 - High Elves But worst of all, were the people who played those armies! Heh, Sylvos the Manically Upbeat!? 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ClassicFlava Posted July 6, 2015 Report Share Posted July 6, 2015 Easily fixed....agreed on the distance before you roll the dice for charge range...no more argument. And honestly Yes, I miss that. that was the game. positioning, angles and thinking tactically. Honestly the game I saw in 8th was "move forward, over terrain that doesnt matter and get into your opp on 2nd turn, then start rolling dice till someone breaks". no thanks. thats what i thought of 8th before i got back into it. I think it just took the community a while to figure out the tactcis as they were differnt than 7th. 7th is still my favorite ediditon but 8th is very good imo Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Grom20 Posted July 6, 2015 Report Share Posted July 6, 2015 I have to agree with Burk on this one! We had a very large warhammer community with 7th...8th came along and it shrunk up fast! We always had huge tournaments and could always find a pick up game on a game night...8th you are lucky to get 6 players at a tournament and I could never find anyone to play on game nights (maybe this was GW prices?!?! ). There will always be those of us who love the 8th rules and there were a few things I liked about it (cleaning up some things with 7th) but they also added other things to try and take away advantages of 7th. I am a huge 7th fan and wish that was the system that GW stuck with. I think that was the height of Warhammer (at least in our area) and if the success of the game is getting players to play they did that with 7th (for the most part flaws with every edition I understand). So what I didn't like about 8th... 1. No range guessing (I am not sure why people say this was a problem in 7th...I never saw it as an issue....if I was 1/4 inch short then I should have moved up 1/4 inch closer I failed charge this was part of the strategy I loved about 7th) 2. Steadfast...I see some points a unit of 5 horses don't charge in and break my 40+ strong unit of Goblins that does seem a bit odd and silly but easy fix is if you are out numbered on the turn you charge that unit has steadfast for first round...or even if your flanked or rear charged you lose it then I could deal with steadfast. I just kept seeing death stars and that is no fun! If I break bid nasty unit I win...if I cant I lose. No fun... 3. Wizards...hated that wizards can 6 dice and bam game winner...tried to make miscasts a bit more damaging but not enough. I felt like all I always saw lvl 4 wizards all the time In our community warhammer had its strongest community in 7th so if that is the basis for what was the best edition...I am going with 7th! 3 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
fluger Posted July 6, 2015 Report Share Posted July 6, 2015 I'll just say this, if the community goes back to 7th edition, you can count on my return to the game. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Antanas the Great Posted July 6, 2015 Report Share Posted July 6, 2015 Deathstars are the only thing that comes to mind but I suppose they were always possible just not as viable as they are with steadfast. Never have run them so 6 dice magic was never an issue in my book. My solution is to bring back unit strength (e.g. 4 demigryphs have unit strength 12) with a 10 disrupting. Also only allow make way on 2nd round of combat. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Gorgosaurusrex Posted July 6, 2015 Report Share Posted July 6, 2015 I did not like: -Steadfast -Pre-measuring -Random charge distances -Overpowered 6th spells (Purple Sun, etc) -True line of sight None of these broke the game for me, but I still prefer 7th (or even 6th) edition. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
fluger Posted July 6, 2015 Report Share Posted July 6, 2015 I liked the *idea* of steadfast, as NtK already pointed out, infantry was basically rubbish in 7th edition without some kind of gimmick. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Fixxer Posted July 6, 2015 Report Share Posted July 6, 2015 Funny, that's everything I liked about 8th. 7th was way too cagey of a game and heavy cavalry should never be that good. No stepping up, no steadfast, no extra ranks of attacks means that infantry get completely destroyed by cav, monsters, or anything "fast". I feel like any rules that make infantry better should be welcomed, infantry should be able to take a charge and have a chance to stick around without having to be stubborn. 40 orcs should be able to take a charge from 5 chaos knights and have a "chance" of holding. In 7th... fat chance. Anyone remember the annoyance of scroll caddies in 7th!? So glad that is gone. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
McNathanson Posted July 6, 2015 Report Share Posted July 6, 2015 I feel like any rules that make infantry better should be welcomed, infantry should be able to take a charge and have a chance to stick around without having to be stubborn. Yes!!! 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
generalripphook Posted July 6, 2015 Report Share Posted July 6, 2015 Well of course infantry can take a charge to the front and be stubborn...but to the flank or rear? Thats when the formation falls apart. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Kremmet Posted July 6, 2015 Report Share Posted July 6, 2015 I feel like any rules that make infantry better should be welcomed, infantry should be able to take a charge and have a chance to stick around without having to be stubborn. 40 orcs should be able to take a charge from 5 chaos knights and have a "chance" of holding. In 7th... fat chance. Anyone remember the annoyance of scroll caddies in 7th!? So glad that is gone. Should they be afforded rules that give them a chance? Yes, but those 40 orcs shouldn't make 5 Chaos Knights completely useless. A balance between the two editions is something I'd like to see where combat is always in initiative order, supporting attacks exist, and maybe Steadfast with some heavy alterations on when it works. Besides putting infantry back in the fight 8th did not really improve on 7th and even that they took too far. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
McNathanson Posted July 6, 2015 Report Share Posted July 6, 2015 40 Orcs don't make 5 Chaos Knights completely useless! 40 Orcs is an expensive, slow, relatively cumbersome block with moderately poor statline that is good at some fights and great at none. Chaos Knights can still do so much that the Orcs can't. As opposed to 6th where the Orcs were just hands-down horrible and the only thing they could do better than the Knights was absorb shooting damage, which would never be directed against them anyway cuz they were inconsequential. I think many people are forgetting how horribly imbalanced 6th was and how deeply it was flawed! RAF? Sea Guard? Never mind funneling, or clip-charges, or anticipatory charges... oh my... :) 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
fluger Posted July 6, 2015 Report Share Posted July 6, 2015 Don't forget SAD! I played it! 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Kremmet Posted July 7, 2015 Report Share Posted July 7, 2015 40 Orcs don't make 5 Chaos Knights completely useless! 40 Orcs is an expensive, slow, relatively cumbersome block with moderately poor statline that is good at some fights and great at none. Chaos Knights can still do so much that the Orcs can't. As opposed to 6th where the Orcs were just hands-down horrible and the only thing they could do better than the Knights was absorb shooting damage, which would never be directed against them anyway cuz they were inconsequential. I think many people are forgetting how horribly imbalanced 6th was and how deeply it was flawed! RAF? Sea Guard? Never mind funneling, or clip-charges, or anticipatory charges... oh my... :) Yes, as it turns out I was replying to a hyperbolic statement with one of my own. Chaos Knights or even cav in general weren't what made Orc Boys bad in 6th nor did it have anything to do with them being infantry. What made them bad was that their rules sucked. Plenty of other infantry were popular and meta bending in their own right from Night Gobbo spam lists to checkerboard skaven to just undead in general. Hell I started the game playing all infantry OnG and played against everything you've mentioned with them. Yes my boys never hit the table, but I had several hundred boots on the ground for all those games. In 8th the design strategy to reinvigorate infantry just got out of hand which resulted in a lot of reactionary measures that didn't need to happen. Uber spells, reroll-everything elves, and the domination of monstrous cav are all a direct result of the rules glut infantry received in 8th. This isn't to say that everything they did to incentivize infantry in 8th was bad, but that they took things a little too far. A lot of 6th was unbalanced and I haven't forgotten that, but 8th created a whole slew of new problems by over correcting in favor of infantry. And even with those positive changes you still didn't see Orc Boys on the table. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
McNathanson Posted July 7, 2015 Report Share Posted July 7, 2015 Yes, as it turns out I was replying to a hyperbolic statement with one of my own. Fallacy of relevance! Two wrongs don't make a right A lot of 6th was unbalanced and I haven't forgotten that, but 8th created a whole slew of new problems by over correcting in favor of infantry. And even with those positive changes you still didn't see Orc Boys on the table. This I can mostly agree with, except that I would rather they overcorrect in favor of infantry, rather than undercorrect for a unit type that is historically just not very good. Admittedly I think it took adjustments in the meta, and new army books, before it got to about the right spot. Although I think most of the measures you mentioned (ASF elves, powerful monstrous cav) are just typical power creep measures that GW usually uses to sell models. But the end result is that infantry is playable and can do good stuff that other units can't do as well, and yet it's not overly dominating. That's a good thing. In fact, one of the things I really like about 8th (and the army books that came with them) is that *finally*, most of the units have a value or role in one build or another. Contrast that to past editions where there were so many units that were just plain worse than the other choices in the book in nearly every situation. The variety of reasonably competitive builds has never been better. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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