1's and 6's

[Inquisitor Stingray]

Warhammer is a dice heavy game and a bit too much for my liking. When I got into the game I used to think how it seemed very 'considerate' and 'fair' that there existed no such thing as an automatic Hit, Wound or Save Roll, most things had a shot at doing damage against the opponent, despite poor odds. Lately, however, I've found myself getting increasingly frustrated by the amount of dice rolling involved in the game and in particular the effect that 1's and 6's can have on a game. The fact that Lasguns can hurt huge Monsters, Fliers can get hit by the odd Bolter, bloodthirsty Psycho-Marines can get butchered by a few Guardsmen and so on... It just doesn't sit too well with me. Maybe I have just been having bad luck lately, though these observations are based not so much on the outcome of the games, as on how enjoyable the experience was for both players altogether.

Like I said, there was a time when I thought the random nature of the game helped forging a narrative ("wow, those Guardsmen stood their ground against a horde of killy monsters!") but lately I've been wondering what impact the introduction of automatic actions would have on the game. I won't deny that I'm biased, by playing Tyranids my T6 is a lot more vulnerable than enemy armor (in some respects, anyway). A game featuring automatic Hits, Wound or Saves would be atrocious if written by the current developer team, indeed it occurs to me that the lucky/unlucky 1's and 6's primarly serve to ensure that some horrible unit actually has a slim chance of damaging a way stronger one. That said, in this day and age with rerollable 2+ Saves, it may all be the same.

To clarify, this is not me ranting or whining about the nature of the game. A lot of you play in a much more competitive environment and really have to go big or go home in terms of surviving the meta. I play soft lists and I usually win, but for all that I feel that some of the randomness has been turning me off lately. If not due to myself having bad luck, then seeing my opponent get crushed due to poor dice is equally unsatisfying. Sure, I have a lot of moments where I roll Perils, snake-eyes or something terrible and crack up about it, but that's not always the case.

TL;DR; Do you think having less randomness, not just tables and and movement (as most people hate) but also in actions/tests would benefit the game? As an on-the-spot example, make it so that if your Weapons Strenght value is more than double the enemy's Toughness, you automatically Wound? Eg, a Plasma Cannon automatically pulverizing a Guardsman. Let me hear your thoughts!

To further clarify, I didn't just wake up and think "boy this game I've been playing for some five years sure uses a lot dice!" I know it's fundamental to the game, you need some amount of randomness to judge the outcome of an action. It's just that... yeah.

[Deleted]

I don't like the idea of auto-hit/wound but I do think one solution to what you're having a problem with would be to include a more side-heavy dice into the game's rotation since you could improve/decrese statistical odds to something other than being 6th based.

EX. D20 would be much easier to break into 20% statistical chunks. Or 25%. Or any multiple thereof. But no one wants to carry around a bunch of D20's nor would I want to buy a whole bunch. And the game would then obviously require some huge overhauls.

[Morollan]

One aspect of this that annoys me is the melee To Hit table. WS ranging from 0-10 and only 3 possible results on a D6 that can apply? Really?! I think I wrote this on another thread but:

WS >2 lower than opponent - 6+ to hit
WS 1-2 lower than opponent - 5+ to hit
WS = opponent - 4+ to hit
WS 1-2 higher than opponent - 3+ to hit
WS >2 higher than opponentlower than opponent - 2+ to hit

[Inquisitor Stingray]

Hehe, it would be interesting to see nerd rocks make their way into this game. I agree that the WS could use an overhaul. It's definitely the one Characteristic whose range the developers utilize the most, lots of stuff out there with WS5, 6, 7 and so on.

Probably a terrible idea, but I just came upon the idea of giving players a fixed number that they could add to any die/dice roll throughout the game. For example, in a game of 1000 points, you get 5 or 10 Grimpoints (trademark pending) that you can add to any roll. So the next time you need a 5 to Wound, but roll a 3 you could spend 2 points to increase (or decrease in LD tests) to change that one result.

[WestRider]

I think somewhere I still have a notebook full of ideas for converting 40K to a d10 system. I also worked out a more complex WS system, where pretty much every step of improvement made some difference against a reasonably common WS, but I don't know where that chart's got to.

[gigasnail]

d10 system would really help mitigate the all or nothing/big swing issues and give the codex writers some room for balancing/nuance.

[Xantige]

I can see the logic in the current set up. If for whatever reason, you only have enough models to play 1000 points, and they're not all the all star choices of the codex, you want to know that you have at least a CHANCE at taking out your opponents big tank/flier/whatever. 40k isn't cheap, it may not be balanced, but if you're locked in without choices, it's nice to know you can do SOMETHING against an opponent with a better made army list than you. On the other hand, it's a small consolation in a game bloated with useless and OP units.

There were a few games in 5th ed when I leaned on this mechanic because my friends army always had a vehicle or two, and having no anti-vehicle at the time, I had to throw loads and loads and loads of devilgaunt shots into them. It was never really worth it, but fielding just two battleforces of nids against a better made army, losing was sort of a given. It was sort of fun to see what I could do with just two battleforces, sometimes I did get a lucky shot, that was my mini-victory before I'd get tabled. I guess I'm still in that place you were when you felt it was a way of adding narrative. Although it can also be really annoying at times.

I don't know how much it'd help the game to change it though. I envision armies with so much auto-hitting that some people/armies would just get wiped off the table. But that's also because I can't help imagining this used well and not abused as GW would be wont to do. It would streamline games with less dice rolling, but things would get samey and predictable, especially if exploited.

It might help some things, but I wonder if it might just be better to try and balance the armies, or the way stats are used in today's 40k?

And to be fair, if 40k was rewritten by any good developer it would be better .

[commandersasha]

The only thing about D10s upwards is that they are MUCH harder to read, as you need digits not dots, so when you are rolling 120 attacks for your Ork boys on the charge, numerals would be unreadable!

I DO agree that the WS chart should be as complex as the Wound chart: as an untrained pacifist, I reckon I would be WS2, slightly worse than a rookie Guardsman. If I picked up a sword against Lelith Hesperax, Logan Grimnar or Jaime Lannister, there is NO WAY I would land a blow on them, or prevent them from wounding me!
It should read exactly as the Wound chart: some matches are just to different to allow for luck.

The Strength scale could afford to be revised, although that would require Errata for EVERY CODEX; doubling all the values, then nudging them a bit up and down as necessary, would double the accuracy.

The problem with Space Marines and their vulnerability to S3 soldiers comes from an unfortunate entrenched statline: 1 wound, and T4S4 does not represent the fluff at all.

To my mind, the only Army List that comes even CLOSE to representing an Astartes force, was Draigowing in 5th edition:
1) Although still T4, the second wound reflects their healing abilities and ignoring mortal wounds.
2) 2+ is what power armour would really be like against swords, knives, claws and teeth
3) Power weapons are what Chainswords should be like: even if I am wearing Kevlar, have you ever seen a chainsaw in action???it may skitter off a really tough, smooth surface, but once it finds an armpit, a waist etc, it is ripping through whatever it finds!
4) One guy wounded? Of COURSE his trained buddies will re-arrange the squad to protect him from a second wound.

I don't think 40K can handle the changes that would be necessary to make it much more reflective; if you want that level of realism, skirmish games will serve much better; Warmachine reflects loss of a limb, for example.

[Geneva]

Hey, how ya doin'?

Maybe a slight addendum to the current To Hit/To Wound system then? For example, at a certain point or against a certain Ws/T you might need to roll a 6 to hit/wound and then reroll it if successful. Likewise a model with extraordinarily high Ws/S (say double) might earn a reroll to failed rolls. It would certainly make Ws10 feel a lot less redundant if you're re-rolling to hit anything up to and including Berzerkers. If you're half over (Ws5 vs Ws3) you just reroll 1s instead. It would also expand the disparity between CC specialists and more basic units. I feel an Eldar Exarch shouldn't be having too much trouble laying through a squad of Guardsmen.