The power creep of 9th edition has brought in extra complexity without even knowing it, as 40k has too many rules for its own good now.
After 12+ years of playing Warhammer, I’m starting to feel old. I used to enjoy the complex and layered rules of the 5th, 6th, and 7th editions. Then GW went and blew my mind. The simpler, streamlined 40k of 8th edition made life soooo much easier and fun. I didn’t have a million rules interactions to deal with. But if GW has taught us anything, it’s that they don’t know game balance or moderation.
The Artificial Creep
The new thing GeeDubs seems to be doing now is adding wounds and toughness to units. Boyz are T5 now, Transhuman Physiology is powerful and widespread, and Marines have more wounds. At first glance, you’d think that will make units more durable and live longer. Then you realize that the damage output is also being cranked up. Many weapons like the Heavy Bolter are getting extra damage, while there are multiple ways to easily get extra AP to your weapons via stratagems and Doctrines. So if they are making everything more deadly, and at the same time more durable, it could be argued that they are keeping things the same.
It seems like all of these changes have a net change of 0 when you look at the big picture. So the reason for this is one of two things in my view: they don’t understand the balance of their own game, or all of this is to increase buzz, interest, and sales artificially.
“Oh snap! T5 Boyz! I’ll start an Ork army now!”
“Heavy Bolters are Damage 2?! I gotta buy some boxes to get several Heavy Bolters!”
“Man! Everything is changing and so exciting!”
Meh.
Rules Interactions Out The Booty
“My Space Marines attacks you, and I’m in the Kung Fu Doctrine so I get an extra 17 attacks per Marine.”
“No, they don’t, I have this stratagem where you don’t get extra attacks versus my unit and on a 5+ I get my CP back.”
“Unfortunately not. My Warlord has an ability that doesn’t allow units within 12” to have their attacks reduced, and on a 5+ I get a CP when you spend one.”
“Haha. Nope. My HQ took an artifact that ignores the aura abilities of enemies.”
“Wrong again, my whole faction has an ability where our auras always work no matter what.”
“I understand that you think that, but when my unit is within 6” of another unit from my army, my stratagems take precedence.”
“That was FAQ’d dude. You gotta keep up with this stuff.”
“No, they took that back in an Errata. Came out this morning.”
“Oh wait! What day is it? Thursday? On Thursdays, my army gets 25 extra attacks in the Kung Fu Doctrine.”
“Dude, it’s 1:00 AM, we started this game on Wednesday, so I don’t think that counts. Does the rule say the game had to start on Thursday or just if it is currently Thursday?”
“I better check the FAQ.”
“Well, it doesn’t matter anyway, because once per game this unit can deal 74 Mortal Wounds to a unit. So I’m doing that.”
“Dude, you can only do that on Turn 3 or later.”
“I thought that was Turn 4?”
“We just started. We are on Turn 2.”
“Okay, well this Chapter Tactic allows for Turn 2 to be treated as Turn 6. But only on Thursdays, luckily it is Thursday now.”
“Man, I can’t wait to get my full rulebook in the mail. This starter set beginner rule pamphlet is fun, but I just don’t feel like there’s enough crunch.”
“Man, I know.”
Complexity Can Be Bad
We had a huge boost in new players in 8th edition, and one of the things I always told new players is that it was a great time to jump on. Sure, not all of the rules made complete sense, but all in all, it was simple, fast, and fun. If rules are easy to learn, you can grow your player base.
In the past, Age of Sigmar has always been the starter game for new players. The streamlined rules made it easy to jump in, and when you were ready for more complexity, you might jump over to 40k. Now with the 3.0 rules coming out for AoS, it seems like they are making it unnecessarily complex for no reason. NOBODY asked for any of the changes to list building, etc.
As with anything, some of these changes to rules seem like they might be good for the game, but they add complexity for no reason. Once 9th edition dropped, I started playing AoS more and more often to the point where I almost play it every week. Now I’m not thrilled to hear that GW is cranking up the intensity of their interactions as well. Boo.
What do you think about the complexity levels for GW’s two main games now? Which edition do you prefer of either?
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