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 cuda1179 wrote:
Does anyone remember what was changed from the beginning of 3rd edition, to the "3.5 edition" where they tweaked a ton of core rules through White Dwarf? I know most of it was for the assault phase.

The assault rules were trial rules. The big Chapter Approved change was to transports, adding fire and access points and some extra special rules.

 Haighus wrote:
Whilst it is undeniable that 3rd markedly reduced the flexibility of gun vehicles with the shooting penalties incurred by moving or firing ordnance, I don't think that alone made it a bad edition for treadheads.

This is the era of Imperial Guard armoured companies and mechinised companies, mechanised Tau, Eldar skimmer tanks, and 3.5th Iron Warriors.

3.5 Iron Warriors were no slouch in HTH. When your basic Chaos Marine could have Bolter, Bolt Pistol and Chainsword, you end up with very fighty base infantry. Defilers, whilst fairly poorly armoured, had a Battlecannon and Dreadnought CCW. Even Obliterators wielded paired Powerfists, at S10, in HTH.

Which is a big part of why Iron Warriors were so beardy. They just had no real downside.

 Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote:

 Haighus wrote:
Whilst it is undeniable that 3rd markedly reduced the flexibility of gun vehicles with the shooting penalties incurred by moving or firing ordnance, I don't think that alone made it a bad edition for treadheads.

This is the era of Imperial Guard armoured companies and mechinised companies, mechanised Tau, Eldar skimmer tanks, and 3.5th Iron Warriors.

3.5 Iron Warriors were no slouch in HTH. When your basic Chaos Marine could have Bolter, Bolt Pistol and Chainsword, you end up with very fighty base infantry. Defilers, whilst fairly poorly armoured, had a Battlecannon and Dreadnought CCW. Even Obliterators wielded paired Powerfists, at S10, in HTH.

Which is a big part of why Iron Warriors were so beardy. They just had no real downside.

Wait, I thought it was the codex AFTER the 3.5 that had the "armed both ways" thing.



I really hope I'm wrong as I'd feel dirty for the rest of my life defending any aspect of the 3.5 codex...

 Just Tony wrote:

 Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote:

 Haighus wrote:
Whilst it is undeniable that 3rd markedly reduced the flexibility of gun vehicles with the shooting penalties incurred by moving or firing ordnance, I don't think that alone made it a bad edition for treadheads.

This is the era of Imperial Guard armoured companies and mechinised companies, mechanised Tau, Eldar skimmer tanks, and 3.5th Iron Warriors.

3.5 Iron Warriors were no slouch in HTH. When your basic Chaos Marine could have Bolter, Bolt Pistol and Chainsword, you end up with very fighty base infantry. Defilers, whilst fairly poorly armoured, had a Battlecannon and Dreadnought CCW. Even Obliterators wielded paired Powerfists, at S10, in HTH.

Which is a big part of why Iron Warriors were so beardy. They just had no real downside.

Wait, I thought it was the codex AFTER the 3.5 that had the "armed both ways" thing.



I really hope I'm wrong as I'd feel dirty for the rest of my life defending any aspect of the 3.5 codex...

You are correct. 3rd edition had a pretty strict rule of two weapons per (humanoid) model that I only recall being broken in one unit (the Last Chancers character unit) and I suppose servo arms. The second Chaos Codex of 3rd was no exception. Plus, getting both bolter and CCW/boltpistol was an upgrade that cost points in later editions.

 Just Tony wrote:
Wait, I thought it was the codex AFTER the 3.5 that had the "armed both ways" thing.

4e.

Though 3.5 death guard had true grit which allowed them to treat boltguns as extra cc weapons.

A.T. wrote:

 Just Tony wrote:
Wait, I thought it was the codex AFTER the 3.5 that had the "armed both ways" thing.

4e.

Though 3.5 death guard had true grit which allowed them to treat boltguns as extra cc weapons.

True grit didn't stack with charge bonuses though, so was more restrained.

This was also the start of basic CSM having two special weapons so you could have a melee squad with two plasma guns. Iron Warriors had a little opportunity cost in that they restricted the marks you could take and didn't let you have daemons but that pretty much amounted to not being able to take Bloodletters.


IIRC it was Iron Warriors, the Siren minor psyker power and daemon bomb armies that were complained about. In about that order.

I could’ve sworn you could take Bolter, Pistol and Chainsword.

Anyone got a quick pick of the relevant 3.5 codex entry?

 Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote:
I could’ve sworn you could take Bolter, Pistol and Chainsword.

Anyone got a quick pick of the relevant 3.5 codex entry?

Yup: CSMs

"Weapons: Each model may have a Close Combat Weapon and either a Bolter or Bolt Pistol."

It was the late 4th codex where they could have both, which to be fair, I preferred. Terribly disappointing codex compared to the great 3.5, but that detail was one that I would keep.

Both 3rd ed CSM codexes had the option of bolter or pistol/CCW and then future codexes expanded it to always be both so it's easy to see why some confusion might arise. It was 20 years ago, after all.

 Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote:
I could’ve sworn you could take Bolter, Pistol and Chainsword.

Anyone got a quick pick of the relevant 3.5 codex entry?

Since you asked

Commissar von Toussaint wrote:

 Insectum7 wrote:
"Your opposition players just weren't good enough." is a very easy accusation to make. I could simply say the same thing about your experience in 3rd edition. Your opposition wasn't good enough and your boards didn't have enough terrain to make your battles interesting. See how easy that is?

I noticed you didn't answer any of my questions. Were the players experienced? Did they have missions? If your troops have Dawn Raid as a mission and you're afraid of tripping Overwatch, that's a player issue.

If you're on overwatch, all your units will hit less effectively. Your opponent can then exploit this, by selecting what you can see and pushing relatively invulnerable units (like tanks) out front. If you fire on them, he should have reserve assets that then torch your revealed positions. You don't fire, the opponent can push forward until your units are detected, and plaster them with blast weapons.

Or use blind grenades, which you know all about. Did they?

This is not a complex tactical puzzle, so I'm struggling to find a charitable explanation as to why your opponents didn't come up with something. Again, I assume they were simply unused to the game.

Two of the battles that come to mind are from tournaments, so I have no idea how experienced the players were since I'd never met them before. But they did show up with nicely painted armies, so I imagine some.

The thing is, a Dreadnought started out at a 0+ to-hit (BS 6 + targeter), so lumping up enough modifiers to make it miss was hard. I remember a fast moving Exarch with a holo-field getting a -5 to-hit, but that still meant a Dreadnought hit on a 5+, and with two weapon systems (Assault Cannon and Missile Launcher) that's still better than a 50% chance to hit with something. (I rolled a 5 with the Assault Cannon, btw. Dead Exarch.) I recall the use of screens, but Plasma Missiles into screening units blocked opposition LOS, as well as well as potentially expanded to disrupt things further. I recall firing into gretchin, and a plasma ball expanded enough to knock Orks in Mega armor out of unit coherency, forcing them to move back (and thus forfeiting their own counterfire) enough to see a forfeit because of that plus the other damage already done (probably bike related shenanigans) was just too hard of a hill to climb. Another ingredient was using my own Blind grenades to choose non-screening targets by way of adjusting LOS on high powered weapons that could move and fire, the Terminator Cyclone launcher comes to mind. And of course there was the first turn pressure units like Chaplain on a Bike and Attack Bike with Heavy Flamer, which could get in and do lots of damage quickly without costing too many points. Of the battles I'm thinking of, one was an Eldar Army, one Chaos-Slaanesh, and one Ork.

Commissar von Toussaint wrote:

In every edition of 40k it is incumbent on the players themselves to come together and tune their experience. For 3rd and 4th particularly, since I was the host I built terrain that made tables look nice while also functioning well to adequately break up LOS, give cover and provide options for each player to leverage. The fact that you say "terrain was pointless in 3rd" is very telling, imo.

But it was. Marines didn't need it, assault armies didn't like it, shooting armies got punished by it.

The heart of 3rd was melee combat. One space marine captain could throw more attacks - and deadlier ones - than multiple turns of squad shooting. Third ed. was specifically designed to make assault combat easier to achieve, and it did.

Ok so terrain was "pointless" except when it mattered? I don't see how it was irrelevant to Marines when there's a focus on high AP weapons (which incidentally was a great asset to the Guard, high AP Ordinance). And if your narrative is that armies were getting blasted off the board turn 1 with high AP weapons, but terrain somehow didn't matter "because shooting armies got punished by it". . . I would argue that you've stopped making sense.

Commissar von Toussaint wrote:

As for "mentally demanding", it could also be called "cumbersome".

Well yes, thinking tactically can be cumbersome. It sure is easy when your troops have only three options - move, shoot, assault. You are spared the difficulty of weighing whether they might also run, hide or go on overwatch.

Similarly, "big picture" gaming is a lot easier when units moving in plain view of the enemy don't have to worry about reaction fire.

So we both agree that 3rd was easier to play.

My eyes cannot roll enough. Deciding what my units would do in 2nd was easier than in 3rd. What was cumbersome was that I felt like I was winning though wargear/list-building quirks, overwatch abuse, extensive rolling for grenade results, and a Psychic Phase minigame. In 3rd there were harder limitations on what an individual units shooting could do, and effective ranges were reduced, meaning that I had to play a more interesting positioning game if I was going to effectively grapple with opposing forces. In 2nd I would have just cropped my lines of fire with Blind grenades and picked my targets, or annihilated any assaulting unit on Overwatch again. And because Marines didn't get a cover bonus against small arms in 3rd+, I felt more free to move them about once I'd dealt with any high AP targets.

Commissar von Toussaint wrote:

And despite the details of 2nd, "Spam Assault Cannons with high BS and use Blind Grenades to control my firing arcs and therefore target selection." wasn't exactly rocket science. Same as any 40k, you find your bread and butter tricks and units, and rely on them 90 percent of the time while keeping a few tricks in your back pocket for when you have to tackle oddball stuff.

No one has ever said that it was not possible to optimize armies in 2nd.

What I have said is that thesimpler, AP-focused armies of 3rd lent themselves to more uniform list types and that these were capable of sweeping an opponent out of contention by the end of the first turn. But somehow terrain didn't matter. . . That simply did not happen in 2nd unless one of the players was a novice or did not understand the rules, and the examples you gave support that.

You yourself have pointed out the many and varied ways the many and varied lists in 2nd all have seriously deadly and effective options. That was not the case in 3rd. IIRC, GW had to redo some of the 3rd ed books because the lists were so feeble. IG treadheads really took it on the chin as well, and I don't notice anyone disagreeing with me so I will count that point as settled.

Cyan insert mine

I found 3rd to be quite good for Leman Russ tanks in particular. The Battle Cannon was a weapon that kept it's range and increased its potency against Marines. Given that Marines had improved their save against many weapons on the menu, and many other weapons had lost potency (Assault Cannon), a unit with a high strength Ordinance weapon had a threat potential many other units couldn't match. Tanks may have gotten slower, but their importance might have increased. Maybe . . . just maybe, CvT, maybe you didn't like that you had to think more to use your Leman Russ, since you could no longer move and fire it. . . "tactically thinking can be cumbersome and all" right?

The long story short is:
A: I can't understand how you can say terrain doesn't matter and then say you saw armies get blasted off the table in the first turn with high AP weapons.
and B: I felt that in 3rd I had to win with more overall positioning play using my basic units, rather than the fiddly super-character, exotic wargear, and psychic power combos I did in 2nd. In 3rd I found I could finally use Tactical Squads, for example. That was a nice break from 2nd where they sat on the shelf because they were underpowered compared to Terminators, Dreadnoughts and Devastators I could buy for similar amounts of points, or pumped up Characters that did all the exotic work. I didn't feel like I was winning with "tactics" in 2nd, I felt I was winning with dirty tricks.

 Insectum7 wrote:

Commissar von Toussaint wrote:

 Insectum7 wrote:
"Your opposition players just weren't good enough." is a very easy accusation to make. I could simply say the same thing about your experience in 3rd edition. Your opposition wasn't good enough and your boards didn't have enough terrain to make your battles interesting. See how easy that is?

I noticed you didn't answer any of my questions. Were the players experienced? Did they have missions? If your troops have Dawn Raid as a mission and you're afraid of tripping Overwatch, that's a player issue.

If you're on overwatch, all your units will hit less effectively. Your opponent can then exploit this, by selecting what you can see and pushing relatively invulnerable units (like tanks) out front. If you fire on them, he should have reserve assets that then torch your revealed positions. You don't fire, the opponent can push forward until your units are detected, and plaster them with blast weapons.

Or use blind grenades, which you know all about. Did they?

This is not a complex tactical puzzle, so I'm struggling to find a charitable explanation as to why your opponents didn't come up with something. Again, I assume they were simply unused to the game.

Two of the battles that come to mind are from tournaments, so I have no idea how experienced the players were since I'd never met them before. But they did show up with nicely painted armies, so I imagine some.

The thing is, a Dreadnought started out at a 0+ to-hit (BS 6 + targeter), so lumping up enough modifiers to make it miss was hard. I remember a fast moving Exarch with a holo-field getting a -5 to-hit, but that still meant a Dreadnought hit on a 5+, and with two weapon systems (Assault Cannon and Missile Launcher) that's still better than a 50% chance to hit with something. (I rolled a 5 with the Assault Cannon, btw. Dead Exarch.) I recall the use of screens, but Plasma Missiles into screening units blocked opposition LOS, as well as well as potentially expanded to disrupt things further. I recall firing into gretchin, and a plasma ball expanded enough to knock Orks in Mega armor out of unit coherency, forcing them to move back (and thus forfeiting their own counterfire) enough to see a forfeit because of that plus the other damage already done (probably bike related shenanigans) was just too hard of a hill to climb. Another ingredient was using my own Blind grenades to choose non-screening targets by way of adjusting LOS on high powered weapons that could move and fire, the Terminator Cyclone launcher comes to mind. And of course there was the first turn pressure units like Chaplain on a Bike and Attack Bike with Heavy Flamer, which could get in and do lots of damage quickly without costing too many points. Of the battles I'm thinking of, one was an Eldar Army, one Chaos-Slaanesh, and one Ork.

Commissar von Toussaint wrote:

In every edition of 40k it is incumbent on the players themselves to come together and tune their experience. For 3rd and 4th particularly, since I was the host I built terrain that made tables look nice while also functioning well to adequately break up LOS, give cover and provide options for each player to leverage. The fact that you say "terrain was pointless in 3rd" is very telling, imo.

But it was. Marines didn't need it, assault armies didn't like it, shooting armies got punished by it.

The heart of 3rd was melee combat. One space marine captain could throw more attacks - and deadlier ones - than multiple turns of squad shooting. Third ed. was specifically designed to make assault combat easier to achieve, and it did.

Ok so terrain was "pointless" except when it mattered? I don't see how it was irrelevant to Marines when there's a focus on high AP weapons (which incidentally was a great asset to the Guard, high AP Ordinance). And if your narrative is that armies were getting blasted off the board turn 1 with high AP weapons, but terrain somehow didn't matter "because shooting armies got punished by it". . . I would argue that you've stopped making sense.

Commissar von Toussaint wrote:

As for "mentally demanding", it could also be called "cumbersome".

Well yes, thinking tactically can be cumbersome. It sure is easy when your troops have only three options - move, shoot, assault. You are spared the difficulty of weighing whether they might also run, hide or go on overwatch.

Similarly, "big picture" gaming is a lot easier when units moving in plain view of the enemy don't have to worry about reaction fire.

So we both agree that 3rd was easier to play.

My eyes cannot roll enough. Deciding what my units would do in 2nd was easier than in 3rd. What was cumbersome was that I felt like I was winning though wargear/list-building quirks, overwatch abuse, extensive rolling for grenade results, and a Psychic Phase minigame. In 3rd there were harder limitations on what an individual units shooting could do, and effective ranges were reduced, meaning that I had to play a more interesting positioning game if I was going to effectively grapple with opposing forces. In 2nd I would have just cropped my lines of fire with Blind grenades and picked my targets, or annihilated any assaulting unit on Overwatch again. And because Marines didn't get a cover bonus against small arms in 3rd+, I felt more free to move them about once I'd dealt with any high AP targets.

Commissar von Toussaint wrote:

And despite the details of 2nd, "Spam Assault Cannons with high BS and use Blind Grenades to control my firing arcs and therefore target selection." wasn't exactly rocket science. Same as any 40k, you find your bread and butter tricks and units, and rely on them 90 percent of the time while keeping a few tricks in your back pocket for when you have to tackle oddball stuff.

No one has ever said that it was not possible to optimize armies in 2nd.

What I have said is that thesimpler, AP-focused armies of 3rd lent themselves to more uniform list types and that these were capable of sweeping an opponent out of contention by the end of the first turn. But somehow terrain didn't matter. . . That simply did not happen in 2nd unless one of the players was a novice or did not understand the rules, and the examples you gave support that.

You yourself have pointed out the many and varied ways the many and varied lists in 2nd all have seriously deadly and effective options. That was not the case in 3rd. IIRC, GW had to redo some of the 3rd ed books because the lists were so feeble. IG treadheads really took it on the chin as well, and I don't notice anyone disagreeing with me so I will count that point as settled.

Cyan insert mine

I found 3rd to be quite good for Leman Russ tanks in particular. The Battle Cannon was a weapon that kept it's range and increased its potency against Marines. Given that Marines had improved their save against many weapons on the menu, and many other weapons had lost potency (Assault Cannon), a unit with a high strength Ordinance weapon had a threat potential many other units couldn't match. Tanks may have gotten slower, but their importance might have increased. Maybe . . . just maybe, CvT, maybe you didn't like that you had to think more to use your Leman Russ, since you could no longer move and fire it. . . "tactically thinking can be cumbersome and all" right?

The long story short is:
A: I can't understand how you can say terrain doesn't matter and then say you saw armies get blasted off the table in the first turn with high AP weapons.
and B: I felt that in 3rd I had to win with more overall positioning play using my basic units, rather than the fiddly super-character, exotic wargear, and psychic power combos I did in 2nd. In 3rd I found I could finally use Tactical Squads, for example. That was a nice break from 2nd where they sat on the shelf because they were underpowered compared to Terminators, Dreadnoughts and Devastators I could buy for similar amounts of points, or pumped up Characters that did all the exotic work. I didn't feel like I was winning with "tactics" in 2nd, I felt I was winning with dirty tricks.

I'd also like to point out as someone who has actually BEEN in combat involving tanks that having that sized ordinance be stationary is quite logical and necessary to engage targets.

 Haighus wrote:

 Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote:
I could’ve sworn you could take Bolter, Pistol and Chainsword.

Anyone got a quick pick of the relevant 3.5 codex entry?

Since you asked

And not even particularly nicely

Thank you for the clarification

 Insectum7 wrote:
I found 3rd to be quite good for Leman Russ tanks in particular. The Battle Cannon was a weapon that kept it's range and increased its potency against Marines. Given that Marines had improved their save against many weapons on the menu, and many other weapons had lost potency (Assault Cannon), a unit with a high strength Ordinance weapon had a threat potential many other units couldn't match. Tanks may have gotten slower, but their importance might have increased. Maybe . . . just maybe, CvT, maybe you didn't like that you had to think more to use your Leman Russ, since you could no longer move and fire it. . . "tactically thinking can be cumbersome and all" right?

No, I hated the vehicle rules because they were stupid. They made no sense in-universe. There was also the obvious cash-grab element of it ("Well, your standard Leman Russ is now a point sink, but hey, we've got new variants right here!").

I liked the extra detail the fighting platforms had in 2nd, the variations in speed, armor locations and thickness, and 3rd threw all that away. No hit locations, no cool turrets flying off, no flank speed dashes across the battlefield - all of that was gone. I loved vehicles popping actual smoke. That was great. Third killed all of it.

The long story short is: A: I can't understand how you can say terrain doesn't matter and then say you saw armies get blasted off the table in the first turn with high AP weapons.

That's not what I said. I said that it was possible for the game to be effectively decided on turn 1. This was a combination of firepower and the ability of units to crash into melee with horrific results that often decided the game before it really got going. Are you saying that didn't happen?

Terrain was no longer as important because models in melee don't need it - you magically can't shoot them once they made contact, so all they have to do is get there. The fighting then provides a portable force shield to screen other units behind them. In 2nd, that wasn't an issue. If the scrum's going sideways, kill it, and then the bad guys behind it. This has a very 40k feel.

I felt that in 3rd I had to win with more overall positioning play using my basic units, rather than the fiddly super-character, exotic wargear, and psychic power combos I did in 2nd. In 3rd I found I could finally use Tactical Squads, for example. That was a nice break from 2nd where they sat on the shelf because they were underpowered compared to Terminators, Dreadnoughts and Devastators I could buy for similar amounts of points, or pumped up Characters that did all the exotic work. I didn't feel like I was winning with "tactics" in 2nd, I felt I was winning with dirty tricks.

It sounds like you were, but that's on you and the people you were playing. I also played a few games of 2nd that were all-out and they were okay, but I found collaborative games more interesting. I'm sure playing against you in 3rd would have been just as unpleasant.

One of the strengths of 2nd is that is very amenable to a collaborative play, and by that I mean you could say: "Okay, I'm going to do Marines, I know you play Eldar, let's come up with a scenario and than plan for that," as opposed to just having a maxi-cheddar beardy army that is packed with rules exploits.

That didn't work in 3rd because it was so binary. This ties back into the terrain discussion as well, because it every aspect of the game was either minimum or maximum. For example, in playing against troops in power armor, what was the "fair" number of AP 3 weapons?

Similarly, I agree that in some aspects positioning was more important in 3rd because the system was so unrealistic. Melee bubbles were a problem and so was sweeping advance which IIRC required you to keep a certain distance between the melee and other units for it to even kick in.

And of course the whole model positioning thing was huge. If your captain makes base to base contact, that's 5 attacks, but if he doesn't he gets just one.

We now know that 3rd ed. was not what the designers wanted. It was pushed on them by management. It took IGO-UGO to an illogical extreme and I think that it is telling that when Alessio Cavatore and Rick Priestly were finally able to make their own rules without restraint, the result is far closer to 2nd than 3rd.

2nd edition was better because it was played by like-minded folk is not an argument that the system is better. It’s an argument that the people you knew around the time were better for you.

3rd was the death of having to allow for random happenstance. Those shots which could have unforeseen consequences.

In 2nd Ed? I’ve had a poorly positioned Dreadnought staggered back into a friendly squad, only to explode at the start of my turn.

I’ve sent turrets flying off to land on and squish enemy characters.

I’ve had a Librarian desperately running away from a Vortex template, Rincewind style. I’ve also used shotguns to knock enemy characters into their own Vortex template. I’ve had my pride and joy patched up and kitbashed Landraider shunted around by a Traktor Cannon, then lifted up and dropped on a squad by a Smasha Gun. I’ve had a crashed Ravenwing Landspeeder gun down Abaddon, because despite being downed, the weapons were still functional and the Big Goon just stood there, laughing. Until he copped a face full of Assault Cannon.

Lots of things you couldn’t entirely predict, and absolutely could impact the game. Not necessarily winning it outright, but tipping the scales to a more winnable situation for either player. Things you were best off being at least mindful of as a possibility.

Including really daft stuff. Like a last ditch, desperation bolt pistol shot from a lone surviving Blood Claw, taking out the pilot of a War Walker, which then went out of control, staggering into its densely packed mates causing quite the domino effect.

Very cool, very cinematic, sometimes very frustrating moments.

3rd Ed by comparison felt like pure number crunching. Which in itself? Is fine, if that’s your jam. But it’s not what 40K was about for many folks. And it’s just not as spectacular or cinematic.

There are no bold tales of derring do and Stupid Deaths of 3rd Ed in my mind, because the game system was by comparison dull as dish water. Bragging rights felt more “well I spammed and cheesed and broke the FOC with this supplement, which combined oddly with this WD rule, aren’t I a tactical genius”

It’s like…..2nd Ed was the tall tales of a swashbuckling hero, regaling us with possible, but improbable happenings, where it looked like Curtains until in a flash of inspiration, the ruins of a tank came crashing down atop the villain in the middle of his monologue.

3rd Ed? That was your pain in the neck weirdo neighbour subjecting to a slideshow of his favourite bus stops, with the promise of a second slideshow of his and Marjorie’s annual holiday to Filey.

Both are telling a tale. But only one of them was interesting.

 Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote:
3rd Ed by comparison felt like pure number crunching. Which in itself? Is fine, if that’s your jam. But it’s not what 40K was about for many folks. And it’s just not as spectacular or cinematic.

Yes. Some folks may have thought I was bragging about my 3rd ed. Space Marine win/loss record. I wasn't. I was lamenting it.

I'm an old-school boardgamer, and I know how to crunch numbers. In 2nd, it was always something of a crapshoot because of all the aforementioned hilarity.

Like the time my friend and I were taking on Tyranids with a Space Marine force and got utterly crushed. Our opponent decided to go for the full sweep and wipe us out entirely, and to that end he surrounded the last model we had left - a terminator - with genestealers. And just to be safe, he fired the Hive Tyrant's venom cannon into the melee for good measure.

The result? A miss, which scattered onto a genestealer and then the Thudd Gun template traced a perfect doughnut around the terminator, leaving him completely untouched. Glorious.

In 3rd, you didn't have stories like that. All my games were math-hammer, grinding out percentages and my marine army won not because I was a tactical genius but because I'd created a working system that was almost flawless. It was also crushingly boring.

And the thing was, 3rd was so binary that you didn't dare not use it. You would go from winning every game to losing all of them.

In the 1998 rules, no infantry model can have three weapons. They have a max of two weapons, and only one of those can be two-handed.

Chaos Marines carrying three weapons in the 2007 codex is informally called "ultragrit," since it is a much simpler alternative to the previous true grit special rule. The general categories of one- or two- handed rules don't exist from the 04 edition onwards, and are only replicated in very specific examples like the relic blade.

My life in terms of early GW:

Warhammer Fantasy: Liked

40K 3rd: Wanted to like but didn't (Compared to now it was real simple to play, but there didn't seem to be much of a sense of strategy other than army building and even that was limited)

Gorkamorka: Still like

Mordheim: Liked

BFG: Still like


Now in 2024, I have a new Generation of Gamers with my kids and the number one GW game is...

Brewhouse Bash

Commissar von Toussaint wrote:
Yes. Some folks may have thought I was bragging about my 3rd ed. Space Marine win/loss record. I wasn't. I was lamenting it.

I'm an old-school boardgamer, and I know how to crunch numbers. In 2nd, it was always something of a crapshoot because of all the aforementioned hilarity

Two different types of games. And 3e onwards it wasn't just crunching the list for optimal units - a better player would win with a worse list through decision making.


You could certainly make a custom 3e ruleset - have D20 table for vehicle damage results, swap out the psychic powers with the warhammer fantasy set that let you reposition whole board tiles, use the original apocalypse assets and formations and then score the whole thing based on randomly drawn and entirely arbitrary mission objectives like 'score points only for units that run off the board' and 'score 10 points if you are wiped out'.

pelicaniforce wrote:
In the 1998 rules, no infantry model can have three weapons. They have a max of two weapons, and only one of those can be two-handed.

Chaos Marines carrying three weapons in the 2007 codex is informally called "ultragrit," since it is a much simpler alternative to the previous true grit special rule. The general categories of one- or two- handed rules don't exist from the 04 edition onwards, and are only replicated in very specific examples like the relic blade.

Well, not EXACTLY there are models that have more than three weapons. The restriction was in the armories, that stated that models upgraded from the armories couldn't be equipped with more than 2 weapons. If they could get weapons other ways, they had a loophole. In the first 3rd edition Imperial Guard codex, for example, Rough Riders could have a pistol, CCW, hunting lance, AND a lasgun. Also of note, any Commissar attached to a Rough Rider Squad got a horse for free.

A.T. wrote:
You could certainly make a custom 3e ruleset - have D20 table for vehicle damage results, swap out the psychic powers with the warhammer fantasy set that let you reposition whole board tiles, use the original apocalypse assets and formations and then score the whole thing based on randomly drawn and entirely arbitrary mission objectives like 'score points only for units that run off the board' and 'score 10 points if you are wiped out'.

Or I could just stick with the rules that I liked - 2nd - and use some simple fixes to curb their obvious excesses.

A question for those who stuck with the hobby: was 3rd better than its successors? How do you feel it has stacked up against 4-10?

Commissar von Toussaint wrote:

A.T. wrote:
You could certainly make a custom 3e ruleset - have D20 table for vehicle damage results, swap out the psychic powers with the warhammer fantasy set that let you reposition whole board tiles, use the original apocalypse assets and formations and then score the whole thing based on randomly drawn and entirely arbitrary mission objectives like 'score points only for units that run off the board' and 'score 10 points if you are wiped out'.

Or I could just stick with the rules that I liked - 2nd - and use some simple fixes to curb their obvious excesses.

A question for those who stuck with the hobby: was 3rd better than its successors? How do you feel it has stacked up against 4-10?

When I decided I was done staying current with GW games I had the opportunity to go to ANY game system I wanted. I chose 3rd. That should tell you how I feel about it.

Commissar von Toussaint wrote:

A question for those who stuck with the hobby: was 3rd better than its successors? How do you feel it has stacked up against 4-10?

While still far from perfect, 4th was the closest 40k has ever come to being great; and that very much includes 2nd edition. It would've taken relatively little to make that a great edition in terms of core rules.

 cuda1179 wrote:

pelicaniforce wrote:
In the 1998 rules, no infantry model can have three weapons. They have a max of two weapons, and only one of those can be two-handed.

Chaos Marines carrying three weapons in the 2007 codex is informally called "ultragrit," since it is a much simpler alternative to the previous true grit special rule. The general categories of one- or two- handed rules don't exist from the 04 edition onwards, and are only replicated in very specific examples like the relic blade.

Well, not EXACTLY there are models that have more than three weapons. The restriction was in the armories, that stated that models upgraded from the armories couldn't be equipped with more than 2 weapons. If they could get weapons other ways, they had a loophole. In the first 3rd edition Imperial Guard codex, for example, Rough Riders could have a pistol, CCW, hunting lance, AND a lasgun. Also of note, any Commissar attached to a Rough Rider Squad got a horse for free.

Did they have to take the free horse? Because I now have the image of a really crappy commissar insisting that he does not ride and forcing the cavalry to move at his pace

When they are out of sight over the nearest dune there may be a tragic hunting lance accident.

Commissar von Toussaint wrote:
A question for those who stuck with the hobby: was 3rd better than its successors? How do you feel it has stacked up against 4-10?

4e was kind of a 3.5 ruleset. Rapid fire changes encouraged moving up, transports were deathtraps, vehicles were more mobile and close combat was streamlined. Codex books started to move away from the big bags of combo-rules to more defined units.

5e brought in running for more mobility around the table, cover was very strong and vehicles were easy to neuter but hard to kill. Pile-ins made close combat brutal usually followed by the winner standing around and getting shot. Consolidated rules, more rerolls and increasing use of AP3 and invulnerables. Somewhat defined by its mission rules and codex creep after release.

6e piled a whole load of rules into the game - flyers (when not all factions had fliers or anti-air weapons), hull points, snapshots, hammer of wrath, random charges, weird psychic phases, allied madness, superheavies, and a pile of random tables. I can't remember offhand if it was 6th or 7th with the daemon summoning madness.

7e was 6e turned up another couple of notches with increasingly bonkers formations at its core - such as the admech one that just gave you all of your wargear for free, and stacked special rules, and no gets hot, and a supercharged superheavy... and there were a range of factions above them despite it all.
I recall adding up one of the marine formation costs - they could field gun for gun and transport for transport a copy of a 2000pt sisters army, except the SMs would only pay 1500 for it... and get game-long rerolls, and army wide obsec, and so on

8e and 9e I haven't played all that much, early (index) games were incredibly bare bones but worked for the most part with some houseruling over how mission card decks were created. But over time the game increasingly felt like pokemon, particularly 8e where everything seemed to move so fast and/or fall out of the sky that the main tactical element seemed to be generating points to throw out a wombo-combo to punch through a knight and then move again and punch through a landraider and so on... (I only exaggerate slightly - you had units like the blood angels 'smash captain' that could be 46" deep onto the board on the first turn, cost peanuts, and could punch out a primarch in one go).


I'd say from 6e onwards the game lost its paper-scissors-stone structure. It was now rock paper scissors lizard spock and some factions had rocks so big they could just smash anything regardless.
Once 8e got rolling a lot of the planning and positional play seemed to be gone with stuff leaping across the board, massive deepstrikes, the the power of any given unit fluctuating wildly.

I've not played 10th.

 morganfreeman wrote:

Commissar von Toussaint wrote:

A question for those who stuck with the hobby: was 3rd better than its successors? How do you feel it has stacked up against 4-10?

While still far from perfect, 4th was the closest 40k has ever come to being great; and that very much includes 2nd edition. It would've taken relatively little to make that a great edition in terms of core rules.

100% agree.
It also had the best hand to hand combat rules of any edition.

 Just Tony wrote:
When I decided I was done staying current with GW games I had the opportunity to go to ANY game system I wanted. I chose 3rd. That should tell you how I feel about it.

I wish there were more people like in you 2011! We were moving and while I would have preferred to sell the books, their market value was zero. Stores didn't want them, online they got no bids so with great sorrow I had to pitch them after my efforts toward giving them away failed.

 cuda1179 wrote:

Well, not EXACTLY there are models that have more than three weapons. The restriction was in the armories, that stated that models upgraded from the armories couldn't be equipped with more than 2 weapons. If they could get weapons other ways, they had a loophole. In the first 3rd edition Imperial Guard codex, for example, Rough Riders could have a pistol, CCW, hunting lance, AND a lasgun. Also of note, any Commissar attached to a Rough Rider Squad got a horse for free.

Are you sure about that being the first 3rd Ed IG codex? It’s been 20 years, but I read that a lot as a kid, and recall Commissars being exclusively part of the command squad (on foot).