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Speaking as an Eldar player: we didn't get nerfed nearly enough to dethrone us as the top faction. Especially considering the nerfs our primary competition took that hit them a lot more severely than ours did us.

We took some reasonable cost increases and our most abusive units suffered a well deserved kick in the nuts. In isolation, these are entirely appropriate and well considered nerfs. It's just that our nerfs don't exist in isolation.

Genestealer Cults probably aren't competitive anymore at all, and Custodes were taken out behind the shed and shot. Unless some other faction got some massive buffs I'm not seeing, I'd expect Eldar to remain at the top of most tournaments. Maybe Necron silver tide could give us trouble?

Speaking as a non-competitive Eldar Player, I don't give a flying fart about the changes.

I kind of like the change to devastating wounds. It's functionally mortal wounds that just don't spill over the way they ignore saves, but now they CAN be affected by rules that are -1 damage and such, making certain tough things remain tough.

Overall, glad we're getting some fixes relatively quickly. Some will call this a problem, I see this as a win.

Remember, the last 10 years people have been screeching at GW to embrace digital, balance their game, and respond to the community.

Now they're doing that and some of y'all mad about it. Incredible.

drbored wrote:
Speaking as a non-competitive Eldar Player, I don't give a flying fart about the changes.

I kind of like the change to devastating wounds. It's functionally mortal wounds that just don't spill over the way they ignore saves, but now they CAN be affected by rules that are -1 damage and such, making certain tough things remain tough.

Overall, glad we're getting some fixes relatively quickly. Some will call this a problem, I see this as a win.

Remember, the last 10 years people have been screeching at GW to embrace digital, balance their game, and respond to the community.

Now they're doing that and some of y'all mad about it. Incredible.

Agreed. People used to complain that gw didn't watch tournaments for broken combos and overpowered armies. Whining that GW didn't update/faq rules enough. I agreed with those complaints, but now they're complaining that things get updated too quickly or frequently.

I think these changes will mostly be good. I'm glad GW is taking an active role. The change to devastating wounds is how it should have been from the beginning. Glad they fixed it now, rather than later.

drbored wrote:
Speaking as a non-competitive Eldar Player, I don't give a flying fart about the changes.

I kind of like the change to devastating wounds. It's functionally mortal wounds that just don't spill over the way they ignore saves, but now they CAN be affected by rules that are -1 damage and such, making certain tough things remain tough.

Overall, glad we're getting some fixes relatively quickly. Some will call this a problem, I see this as a win.

Remember, the last 10 years people have been screeching at GW to embrace digital, balance their game, and respond to the community.

Now they're doing that and some of y'all mad about it. Incredible.

Devastating wounds always been affected by -1 dam/halve damage etc.

No changes there.

tneva82 wrote:

drbored wrote:
Speaking as a non-competitive Eldar Player, I don't give a flying fart about the changes.

I kind of like the change to devastating wounds. It's functionally mortal wounds that just don't spill over the way they ignore saves, but now they CAN be affected by rules that are -1 damage and such, making certain tough things remain tough.

Overall, glad we're getting some fixes relatively quickly. Some will call this a problem, I see this as a win.

Remember, the last 10 years people have been screeching at GW to embrace digital, balance their game, and respond to the community.

Now they're doing that and some of y'all mad about it. Incredible.

Devastating wounds always been affected by -1 dam/halve damage etc.

No changes there.

Nope, mortal wounds are handled as a pool of individual wounds, so can't be reduced was my understanding.

punisher357 wrote:

Agreed. People used to complain that gw didn't watch tournaments for broken combos and overpowered armies. Whining that GW didn't update/faq rules enough. I agreed with those complaints, but now they're complaining that things get updated too quickly or frequently.

lets put it that way:
9th Edi core was broken beyond fixing that only after 3 years a full reboot with new core rules was needed

Than 10th core was broken that it needed a re-write after 3 months

And this has a long tail as it means any of the Codices written with 10th, is from this day on outdated and broken as the rules they are written for does not exist any more

Everything that already went to the printer cannot be fixed before release and everything else is delayed, if GW even care to fix them before release

So 10th already starts at the worst point of 9th

Dudeface wrote:

tneva82 wrote:

drbored wrote:
Speaking as a non-competitive Eldar Player, I don't give a flying fart about the changes.

I kind of like the change to devastating wounds. It's functionally mortal wounds that just don't spill over the way they ignore saves, but now they CAN be affected by rules that are -1 damage and such, making certain tough things remain tough.

Overall, glad we're getting some fixes relatively quickly. Some will call this a problem, I see this as a win.

Remember, the last 10 years people have been screeching at GW to embrace digital, balance their game, and respond to the community.

Now they're doing that and some of y'all mad about it. Incredible.

Devastating wounds always been affected by -1 dam/halve damage etc.

No changes there.

Nope, mortal wounds are handled as a pool of individual wounds, so can't be reduced was my understanding.

For mw abilities yes. But as per rules commentary those were applied _before_ devastating wound changed to mortal.

It was specifically for devastating wounds. Doombolt etc d6mw were different.

Rules commentary had specific note about that. You disagree with gw ruling?-'


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 kodos wrote:

punisher357 wrote:

Agreed. People used to complain that gw didn't watch tournaments for broken combos and overpowered armies. Whining that GW didn't update/faq rules enough. I agreed with those complaints, but now they're complaining that things get updated too quickly or frequently.

lets put it that way:
9th Edi core was broken beyond fixing that only after 3 years a full reboot with new core rules was needed

Than 10th core was broken that it needed a re-write after 3 months

And this has a long tail as it means any of the Codices written with 10th, is from this day on outdated and broken as the rules they are written for does not exist any more

Everything that already went to the printer cannot be fixed before release and everything else is delayed, if GW even care to fix them before release

So 10th already starts at the worst point of 9th

Ah yes what a wonderful example of selective memory forgetting all the errata's 9th had from the start.

You aren't even trying ty pretend for honest arqument. Open bad faith trolling.

Dudeface wrote:


Nope, mortal wounds are handled as a pool of individual wounds, so can't be reduced was my understanding.

The issue is that the original core rules meant that damage reduction didn't work on dev wounds. Then they released a designers commentary that said actually it did, in spite of RAW. At least yesterday's change resolves that confusion.

tneva82 wrote:
Ah yes what a wonderful example of selective memory forgetting all the errata's 9th had from the start.

You aren't even trying ty pretend for honest arqument. Open bad faith trolling.

Indeed. Both 8th and 9th had issues with core rules causing balance problems, but rather than correcting the rules they just nerfed the relevant units into disuse.

It's nice to see GW are now willing to make better targeted changes.

tneva82 wrote:

Dudeface wrote:

tneva82 wrote:

drbored wrote:
Speaking as a non-competitive Eldar Player, I don't give a flying fart about the changes.

I kind of like the change to devastating wounds. It's functionally mortal wounds that just don't spill over the way they ignore saves, but now they CAN be affected by rules that are -1 damage and such, making certain tough things remain tough.

Overall, glad we're getting some fixes relatively quickly. Some will call this a problem, I see this as a win.

Remember, the last 10 years people have been screeching at GW to embrace digital, balance their game, and respond to the community.

Now they're doing that and some of y'all mad about it. Incredible.

Devastating wounds always been affected by -1 dam/halve damage etc.

No changes there.

Nope, mortal wounds are handled as a pool of individual wounds, so can't be reduced was my understanding.

For mw abilities yes. But as per rules commentary those were applied _before_ devastating wound changed to mortal.

It was specifically for devastating wounds. Doombolt etc d6mw were different.

Rules commentary had specific note about that. You disagree with gw ruling?-'

Valid, I'd missed that and I'm sure some others have as well, but the fact it runs against what feels like common sense to the point it needs a rule not in the rulebook itself is concerning.

Edit to highlight the point, here's the rules showing it to be counter-logical:



Automatically Appended Next Post:

 xttz wrote:

Dudeface wrote:


Nope, mortal wounds are handled as a pool of individual wounds, so can't be reduced was my understanding.

The issue is that the original core rules meant that damage reduction didn't work on dev wounds. Then they released a designers commentary that said actually it did, in spite of RAW. At least yesterday's change resolves that confusion.

Yeah that sums it up, I didn't go looking for it in a rules commentary because it seemed obvious, which gives the wrong outcome apparently.

Yeah, these changes are normal in the current GW support of their games. They analyze data from the competive scene / feedback from players and after a while compiling them, they do that. Since they were "accused" of not caring before because they made changes "not soon enough", now they let less time pass before acting.

Just ignore the usual people trying to make it look like it's "a fail" or "admission of a broken game" (mostly because they actually support other games / just want to prove their point / justify not playing this game). It's not. Changes aren't actually that big of a deal, it's just details that only the harrdcore competitive scene really cares about. Which is why I believe the competitive scene is a plague for all miniature wargames and only make it worse for those looking for fun, but that's another debate and it's certainly not GW at fault here trying to answer to their pleas. It's more a player mindset problem.

9th wasn't broken beyond repair, it was just bloated - the fate of all game systems trying to cater to the competitive scene after years of FAQ and erratas. After a while of that neverending cycle, you just realize it's not worth the hassle.

On the other hand, I totally understand casual players not being enchanted by changes so soon - because they don't especially play that often and that's indeed something new to learn and easy to overlook in games. That's another flaw of going competitive : you're constantly running after the new meta and it never ends. It's not a surprise some are "burnt out" and feel like it's more a chore than a game.

The change to Dev Wounds is generally bad because it creates a new way if bypassing armour/invuls when the game already has such a mechanic! Y'know, Mortal Wounds.

This is, at best, a quick fix. A leaking band-aid solution that highlights how fething terribad GW are at writing rules and that they should have figured this out before going into print.

2 years of development my ass...

 H.B.M.C. wrote:
The change to Dev Wounds is generally bad because it creates a new way if bypassing armour/invuls when the game already has such a mechanic! Y'know, Mortal Wounds.

This is, at best, a quick fix. A leaking band-aid solution that highlights how fething terribad GW are at writing rules and that they should have figured this out before going into print.

2 years of development my ass...

That is... actually correct.

 H.B.M.C. wrote:
The change to Dev Wounds is generally bad because it creates a new way if bypassing armour/invuls when the game already has such a mechanic! Y'know, Mortal Wounds.

Yeah, it's a competitive scene issue. That's why it was changed that way.

Of course for simplicity's sake, Mortal Wounds are the best way. But hardcore competitive players don't want it simple : they want it technical. Because that's their best way to play the game in their mindset.

If for you, competition, balance and technical rules leaving no room for player interpretation are the holy grail, it's no surprise you have changes like this in the rules.

But that doesn't make it "bad" in itself. Just for you.

Why wasn't it like this in the first place ? Well, precisely because of the feedback from competitive scene. And it's not GW's fault trying to take that into account.

Yup, 2 year of development. Other companies claim 7 for a boardgame in KS with changes that can be resumed on one page. I think GW is the fair one here. Otherwise, HBMC, feel free to develop your game on your own and see the exact same problems facing your player base when they tell you that your way to write rules sucks.

I think Devastating wounds should just be the "Rending" of old, which ignores armour saves on a 6.

 H.B.M.C. wrote:
The change to Dev Wounds is generally bad because it creates a new way if bypassing armour/invuls when the game already has such a mechanic! Y'know, Mortal Wounds.

This is, at best, a quick fix. A leaking band-aid solution that highlights how fething terribad GW are at writing rules and that they should have figured this out before going into print.

2 years of development my ass...

So because there's more powerfui mechanism can't create weaker one and instead have game be broken.

Got you. You enjyy broken game. Guess you pissed off your eldar got nerfed.

Sarouan wrote:
But that doesn't make it "bad" in itself. Just for you.

No, it's appalling rules design. They have literally created a redundant mechanic that is slightly different to an existing mechanic to hastily patch over rather than solve the actual problem. And all the while touting the grand return of USRs to the game.

We're not even 6 moths into this and it's already a gak show, with two nearly identical rules with similar names - Mortal and Devastating Wounds - and it's a bad look to be getting it this wrong this early.

The Indices are already riddled with unique unit special rules that do generally the same things but worded in slighly different ways (sticky objectives being one example). And now they're going to start messing with the core rules in this mannet?

Bad just for me? Buddy, this is bad for everyone.

tneva82 wrote:

Got you. You enjyy broken game. Guess you pissed off your eldar got nerfed.

And you accuse others of trolling

tneva82 wrote:
Got you. You enjyy broken game. Guess you pissed off your eldar got nerfed.

For the love of all that is holy tneva:

Please. Try. Posting. Something. Other. Than. Overly. Aggressive. Massively. Accusatory. Strawman. Attacks.

 H.B.M.C. wrote:


Bad just for me? Buddy, this is bad for [b]everyone[/i].

Not everyone. The hardcore competitive scene will be fine with it.

Like I said, it's only natural to have this way because players constantly push for a more "competitive scene friendly" game. That's what nagging on points and "perfect balance" and other things like this eventually lead to.

Basically, it comes with the package.

As for casual players...they'll get annoyed, but it's a shrug in the end because it's ultimately just a detail of one special rule. Don't make a mountain from a mouse.

Seems more like a failure on your part to understand why this is terrible rules design and why this happening this early does not bode well for this edition.

 H.B.M.C. wrote:
Seems more like a failure on your part to understand why this is terrible rules design and why this happening this early does not bode well for this edition.

No need to be hyperbolic. I totally see why you make it so crucial, but it's easy to counter with this simple fact : far from all units have this "devastating wound" special rule. If you play a game with no unit having it, there is no impact of this "terrible rule design" because it simply doesn't happen. And even in a game where a couple of units does have it, it's not like the hassle is really that much bothering when it happens (assuming they're not destroyed early in the game).

If you play a game with nearly all of the units have it, however (like, I guess...eldars? ) - I can see the impact more important there, indeed. But that's not the majority of games at all.It MAY be your majority of games played because of a specific list you play, sure...but then, that means it's not a "everyone" problem. It's a "you" problem trying to make it pass like a life-or-death issue for all players, so that you way to play is preserved.

Theories on how rules should be designed in a game or not are fun, but in reality, it's only their actual application in the game and the feedback from players that matters.

Sarouan wrote:
Yeah, these changes are normal in the current GW support of their games. They analyze data from the competive scene / feedback from players and after a while compiling them, they do that. Since they were "accused" of not caring before because they made changes "not soon enough", now they let less time pass before acting.

Just ignore the usual people trying to make it look like it's "a fail" or "admission of a broken game" (mostly because they actually support other games / just want to prove their point / justify not playing this game). It's not. Changes aren't actually that big of a deal, it's just details that only the harrdcore competitive scene really cares about. Which is why I believe the competitive scene is a plague for all miniature wargames and only make it worse for those looking for fun, but that's another debate and it's certainly not GW at fault here trying to answer to their pleas. It's more a player mindset problem.

9th wasn't broken beyond repair, it was just bloated - the fate of all game systems trying to cater to the competitive scene after years of FAQ and erratas. After a while of that neverending cycle, you just realize it's not worth the hassle.

On the other hand, I totally understand casual players not being enchanted by changes so soon - because they don't especially play that often and that's indeed something new to learn and easy to overlook in games. That's another flaw of going competitive : you're constantly running after the new meta and it never ends. It's not a surprise some are "burnt out" and feel like it's more a chore than a game.

While I get your point here, I disagree with the suggestion that only the 'hardcore' competitive players care about rule changes.

Anecdotally my first (casual) game of 10th was against an Eldar player who openly acknowledged how strong their rules were, specifically avoided taking highly competitive units like Wraithknights, and still the game was incredibly one-sided. While the quantifiable data used does come from a competitive environment changes like this do have a positive effect on more casual players too. Balance shouldn't be so far off that it's necessary for players need to agree handicaps to their lists beforehand.

These were overall positive changes for everyone, not just tournament players.

 H.B.M.C. wrote:
The change to Dev Wounds is generally bad because it creates a new way if bypassing armour/invuls when the game already has such a mechanic! Y'know, Mortal Wounds.

It actually opens up more design space. Devastating Wounds may ignore Inv like Mortal Wounds, but seems meant for single shot high damage weapons not meant to take out crowds, while Mortal Wounds can be harder to damage mitigate (if they reverse the ruling back to the original RAW) and can "splash" across multiple models. Same difference as a single attack damage 6 weapon vs a 6 shot damage 1 weapon.

Since the damage reduction applied ONLY to devastatlng wounds that is gone. No remaining mw source is affected by -1 damage.

I think the problem is less about GW writing bad rules than it is GW being unable (or unwilling) to comprehend the lengths some people will go to to abuse the rules.

This change was because cheesy players were using an anti-tank weapon to delete whole squads of infantry - which is clearly NOT what GW intended.

 xttz wrote:


While I get your point here, I disagree with the suggestion that only the 'hardcore' competitive players care about rule changes.

Anecdotally my first (casual) game of 10th was against an Eldar player who openly acknowledged how strong their rules were, specifically avoided taking highly competitive units like Wraithknights, and still the game was incredibly one-sided. While the quantifiable data used does come from a competitive environment changes like this do have a positive effect on more casual players too. Balance shouldn't be so far off that it's necessary for players need to agree handicaps to their lists beforehand.

These were overall positive changes for everyone, not just tournament players.

I do understand your point of view. That's why I don't see that change as really "bad design", merely an annoyance to apply a newly rewritten special rule so soon after the release of the game. It's indeed answering to feedback of players.

But let me tell you this : you say your game was one-sided and that your opponent aknowledged how strong their rules were and avoided taking "highly competitive units"...but did he consider that the other units in his army in comparison to what you have AND the victory conditions of the scenario maybe weren't also balanced ?

Balance isn't just a question of points or even rules. That's why they never solve the problem of having "unbalanced games", because there are other considerations. For example, in a game where you win by controlling objectives spread on the table, when one army only has infantry and the other has mainly highly mobile vehicles / bikes...it's clear the advantage goes to the side that is mobile.

This change of rules and even points don't ultimately changed that. The main reason eldars in combat patrol are so awesome is the actual content and type of units inside, when compared to the victory conditions of combat patrol scenarios and the content of other combat patrol boxes.

If you played, said, a scenario where the actual victory condition is to kill the eldar warlord, suddenly maybe it wouldn't feel so one-sided...or at least, from the same side than before.

Points are just a tool to help players balance their lists so that the game is fair. But the most important to keep in mind is that's just a tool...not the only thing that matters. Ultimately, it's a player's choice to decide which faction he plays and which units he picks while knowing what he will meet in game...as well as the level of said player (you don't play a normal game when you do an initiation, after all).

That's why when I play with a newbie, I make sure I take lists that have mostly the same "type"...like all infantry, or just the same amount of mobile units in each. That's what makes it truly felt balanced. The way you build your army list is actually telling if a player really cares about balance of the game rather than just looking for an easy victory. And that is entirely and solely a player mindset matter.

Data from tournaments can be skewed if a list is working due to some narrow selection of units.

When you look at 8th indexes, it was a strange time. The tournament scene was one cheese after another. Soup, first turn deep strike and unit spam for example were all problems that needed to be resolved.

But many of these lists were not things the average player had or ever aspired to have. You didn't spam Dark Eldar birds. Or Malefic Lords. Or 5 Stormravens. Mass Tau Commanders or Cullexus Assassins etc. If you played two lists drawn from normalish 7th edition collections, it didn't do too badly.

Obviously players evolved and some of the cheese started to push into the regular FLGS, but I feel it took some time.

By contrast barring a deliberate effort over the last 10 weeks or so, you should have ended up with a very powerful Eldar list unless you somehow owned 100 guardians. But it wasn't just Eldar. The problem with 10th edition was that you had a 7th edition style tier list of factions. Its not like a DG or LoV player could go "oh, its not Eldar, its only Necrons or Tyranids, we'll have a good game." Barring a significant skill differential, you probably lost.

Why 8th and 9th were often described as the most balanced 40k has ever been (and I know a lot of people hard disagree - and certainly there were times with broken factions) was because the majority of factions could have a game into the majority of other factions. Especially the last 6 months or so of 9th. This was not true in 7th, and has not so far been true in 10th. Hopefully this update will move things in that direction.

 Manfred von Drakken wrote:
I think the problem is less about GW writing bad rules than it is GW being unable (or unwilling) to comprehend the lengths some people will go to to abuse the rules.

This change was because cheesy players were using an anti-tank weapon to delete whole squads of infantry - which is clearly NOT what GW intended.

They specifically made mortal wounds spill over to other models, something that wasn't previously true in 40k. And is how damage works in AoS, so this isn't some mysterious, unheard of rules interaction.
If they didn't intend mortal wounds to spill over and wipe out infantry squads, they're idiots. That's the entire effect of making that change!

I don’t get all the rejoicing over this fix, it’s like people forgot how GW run their business. The game is designed to break within 3 years, requiring a new edition. Each new codex will come with its own set of problems and the rules team will play whack-a-mole with patches to try and keep a resemblance of balance, even though we know they cannot do that competently (otherwise a reset game would be balanced at the onset).
I wouldn’t mind these updates if I knew that nothing new was coming, because they would be balancing a preset group of rules/models and eventually find a pretty good place , but with each new codex will come new minis, new rules and new broken interactions that will need fixing. The ruleset and armies will be mostly indistinguishable from what it is right now, and to be honest, that churn is getting kind of old.

I hope y'all are enjoying the 400 page hardcover that was valid for 2 months and didn't even last until the first codex

Ash has a good take based primarily on how the constant churn makes 40k inaccessible to casuals.