AoS 3 New Rules Discussion

[novembermike]

Just now, GutrotSpume said:

Wow they didn’t add 40K style rules for fighting in combat! So any unit that is minimum 10 models on bigger than a 25mm base that only has a 1 inch reach is pretty rubbish now! What planet are GW on that they thought this was a good idea? 

This actually seems reasonable to me? Making things good or bad is perfectly reasonable.

[SilverJelly]

8 minutes ago, GutrotSpume said:

Wow they didn’t add 40K style rules for fighting in combat! So any unit that is minimum 10 models on bigger than a 25mm base that only has a 1 inch reach is pretty rubbish now! What planet are GW on that they thought this was a good idea? 

Why is choosing who gets first turn still there? 

Why is battleshock unchanged when it never had much of an impact anyway?

I’m hoping there’s more to grand strategies and battle tactics in the GHB but these seem half baked and easy to score.

A big tweak seen in this battlepack is the fact that whoever finishes deploying first HAS to take the first turn! You no longer decide! With the changes to command points this is something you may want to consider when building your army. 

Another new addition is that each player has to pick one of 3 Grand Strategies at the start of the game:
Sever the Head – you complete this if your opponent has no heroes on the battlefield at the end of the game
Vendetta – you complete this if you slay the opposing general but yours survives
Hold the Line – you complete this if you have any battleline units on the battlefield at the end of the game
Each of these are worth 3 bonus victory points at the end of the game.

In addition to this you also have to pick a battle tactic at the start of each hero phase – these are worth 2 victory points if you achieve them however you can only pick each battle tactic once meaning you will need a well rounded army able to score all of these:
Break their Spirit – Destroy a unit in enemy territory
Broken Ranks – Destroy a unit from the enemy’s starting army
Conquer – Control a specific Objective Marker that your opponent controlled at the start of the turn(You choose at the start of the hero phase)
Repel – Destroy a unit in your territory
Seize the Centre – Have more models than our opponent within 6″ of the centre of the board
Slay the Warlord – Slay the opponent’s general

[BrotherTalarian]

8 minutes ago, Vaporlocke said:

As opposed to being super chipper while dismissing legitimate concerns of people? 

Lol, what? Not sure if trolling, or…
 

I don’t know if you’re making a general statement or targeting that at me? If it’s the latter I question if you’ve actually read what I’ve written? I’m not dismissing anyone’s concerns, rather asking what they find concerning so I can understand? Meanwhile I myself am looking forward to the new edition, so I guess I’m chipper, sure?

[JackStreicher]

This is just a Realisation so don‘t take it as hate okay:

At first glance it seems like LRL are the biggest winners. They have good shooting which got better. They are rewarded for staying in formation while having a good range (2“-3“ melee range). And Teclis completely bypasses the miscasts, which all other gods will suffer from. All the Hurakan movement shenanigans are amplified by the redeploy special rule.

I‘ll have a look at the rules to form my first solid opinion though.

Edited June 14, 2021 by JackStreicher
Autocorrect

[Grimrock]

32 minutes ago, SilverJelly said:

A big tweak seen in this battlepack is the fact that whoever finishes deploying first HAS to take the first turn! You no longer decide! With the changes to command points this is something you may want to consider when building your army. 

Unfortunately not true. As per 'Stealing the Initiative' in the Contest of Generals battlepack if you finished deploying first you automatically gain priority. Reference section 4.1 'The Priority Roll'. Having priority in a round means you get to pick who goes first just like before. 

Also, this is something I really do like with the rules. Not this rule in particular, but referencing, clarity, and consistent wording in general are fantastic.

Edited June 14, 2021 by Grimrock

[yukishiro1]

Yeah I can't believe they'd make the person who finishes deploying first have to go first, that would make people actively want high drops most of the time, not low drops. 

The secondary objective system seems super undercooked and not very well balanced at first glance. 

No terrain rules (ok, well no serious terrain rules) is a massive missed opportunity and is an x off one of the possible ways they could have made shooting less oppressive, so that's a big bummer. 

Nothing to make the super restrictive coherency rules work feels like a truly bizarre choice. They took the 40k rule, made it literally twice as restrictive, and then didn't include all the things that make the 1/2 as restrictive rule less restrictive in 40k. It's a double whammy. 

Edited June 14, 2021 by yukishiro1

[Bosskelot]

The scope of changes while also not really addressing the biggest issues with the core rules is.... very bizarre.

Of course there could be lots of unforeseen and subtle changes in how the game plays because of innocuous things, but yeah their direction for the game is kind of confusing honestly? Shooting is actively better, terrain is unchanged, battleshock is unchanged and some of the changes made to certain unit types probably won't amount to anything because of the previously mentioned things. Monsters/Behemoth's problems weren't that they lacked damage, it's that they died really quickly. And they will still die really quickly.

It really feels like GW is actively ignorant of how people played the game or just doesn't care about their concerns. 9th ed 40k core rules aren't perfect, but every single change made was made in an attempt to fix a perceived issue with 8th edition and from that perspective it's been wildly successful. With AOS 3.0, the game will certainly play differently in some areas, but it doesn't look like a lot of the core problems with the system have been solved or changed at all.

In fact when we got the leaked and full rules for 40K a lot of the worrying and gnashing of teeth died down... but with AOS 3.0 there's still a load of worrying and negativity.

[Tali182]

in regards to coherency, I would like to point out anything with 1" range on a 40mm or less base is not worse off you can do 1 inch space between bases and tuck the second row into the gaps and they are still less then an inch away, I see a lot of people saying 32m up lose attacks but they do not. 50mm and above is where you need 2" range to have to not be in the front row.   

I am sure there will be some odd cases depending on terrain or having 30 models in your unit, or he way the enemy unit is setup etc where it will be harder but generally I can not see it making a significant difference.

The biggest issue with the new rules is the extra time it will take having to be so precise.

The pic below the circles are 40mm, the lines 1 inch, you actually have a little spare range.

 

 

[Baron Klatz]

4 hours ago, Sleboda said:

Miscast, eh? OK as long a single miscast doesn't stop a 900 point Nagash, who surely pays a premium for all his plusses to cast and ability to cast eight works spells, from casting more spells. What's that you say? 

Oh.

Well, hmm, maybe it's ok as long as there is also Total Power to make it fair. What's that you say?

Oh.

Ah well, I guess they figure that they sold as many Nagash models as they thought that could, so if he is neutered, all those who bought him will need to fill those points with new stuff.

Step 1: lower his demand to move other units.

Step 2: Faq in much later he's the only way for Ossiarchs to use Command Points.

Step 3: Profit.

 

I do wonder though if he and Lord Kroak are safe since they both get extra casting values for their rolls so neither can actually roll a 2. It'd explain why the playtester was gungho on spell spams if it's something the god-tier casters can avoid. Could wind up another Faq if it's too much a deterrent for them.

At least they took away his Priest keyword so hordes of Jehovah witnesses can't mass Dovahkin him back to the Realm of Death.

[Icarion]

4 minutes ago, Baron Klatz said:

Step 1: lower his demand to move other units.

Step 2: Faq in much later he's the only way for Ossiarchs to use Command Points.

Step 3: Profit.

 

I do wonder though if he and Lord Kroak are safe since they both get extra casting values for their rolls so neither can actually roll a 2. It'd explain why the playtester was gungho on spell spams if it's something the god-tier casters can avoid. Could wind up another Faq if it's too much a deterrent for them.

At least they took away his Priest keyword so hordes of Jehovah witnesses can't mass Dovahkin him back to the Realm of Death.

They do specify that an unmodified casting roll of 2 is a miscast, and spell fails to cast. So modifiers don't matter there.

Edited June 14, 2021 by Athrawes

[zamerion]

Perhaps there are more rules that solve all these problems that you comment on in the general book.

[Beliman]

20 minutes ago, BrotherTalarian said:

Lol, what? Not sure if trolling, or…

He just took the hit. Every edition starts with new rules that nerf (or change) how some armies played before, and only FAQs (as a baindaid) and Battletomes (that can open Pandora's Boz with more Power-creep) can fix them (not 100% true, but you get the point).
If you are the one that was downgraded, it's going to hurt. Believe me, I was there before!

I like to play melee Kharadrons, and I'm happy that my 6 man Endrinriggers changed a bit (I need to use 2 special weapons to be 100% effective) or use Skywardens for the first time, that means that my roster won a unit!
I don't have a problem if some units can't hit with all their models, that means less dmg overall and I'm fine with it. But my main issue is that Shooting armies (and yes, I play Kharadrons) can do the same dmg as before.
I was hoping for some terrain rules or CA Reactions (or anything inbetween) to play around, even with all this +1 saves (that will really hurt my KOs).

Btw, I need to play some games to see how all this comes around.

 

 

[Envyus]

2 hours ago, GutrotSpume said:

Why is choosing who gets first turn still there? 

 

It's not. Whoever has the least number of drops goes first they don't get to pick. 

[Mcthew]

2 hours ago, JackStreicher said:

This is just a Realisation so don‘t take it as hate okay:

At first glance it seems like LRL are the biggest winners. They have good shooting which got better. They are rewarded for staying in formation while having a good range (2“-3“ melee range). And Teclis completely bypasses the miscasts, which all other gods will suffer from. All the Hurakan movement shenanigans are amplified by the redeploy special rule.

I‘ll have a look at the rules to form my first solid opinion though.

I'm sure some nerfing will be in the offering at some point (like points increases - Teclis should be 800 points or thereabouts now, if the increases to Nagash are anything to go by?)

I suppose that's the test for AoS - if LRL aren't hit by big points increases to match their improved play it pretty much confirms what a few community members have thought about AoS 3.0 and the direction for AoS. 

Me... I'm expecting those hefty points increases for the faction. Won't make them any less potent on the tabletop but will ensure less shooting or Teclis spam when you've got more than a third of your army taken up by one model.

Personally, I would've liked to see an increase in minimum battleline units to 4 for a 2k game. Very few factions have shooting units as battleline (and those that do should have their battleline function removed, i.e. judicators). Increasing battleline (and the types of battleline melee units per faction too) would've shifted the focus from 'Shooty Sigmar 40K' to plain old 'Age of Sigmar' that we love. Alas, it was not to be.

Quick question: how many players are now holding off buying AoS 3.0 until the General's Handbook Points are released/leaked? Who is hoping for the best/expecting the worst?

Edited June 14, 2021 by Mcthew

[ageofpaddsmar]

2 hours ago, Grimrock said:

Unfortunately not true. As per 'Stealing the Initiative' in the Contest of Generals battlepack if you finished deploying first you automatically gain priority. Reference section 4.1 'The Priority Roll'. Having priority in a round means you get to pick who goes first just like before. 

Also, this is something I really do like with the rules. Not this rule in particular, but referencing, clarity, and consistent wording in general are fantastic.

So if you finish drop first you get to choose? Everywhere is say you go first

Edited June 14, 2021 by ageofpaddsmar

[Kadeton]

Man, it feels weird to be (judging from the general tone of responses here) the only melee-heavy player who thinks their army is getting a huge boost from the 3rd Ed changes. Beastclaw Raiders have always been a bit of a special case, but wow.

We get heaps more command points. We have multiple ways to get +1 to hit. We can smash a Bonetithe Nexus to rubble, or stomp a Gnawhole closed. We can do even more mortal wounds on the charge. We can shut down enemy command abilities. We can move onto objectives during the opponent's turn. We can even try to dispel magic! And at the same time, other armies are taking smaller units, worrying about coherency, miscasting spells, losing buff-stacking efficiency, and apparently focusing on spamming archers so we can fight in the shade while we feast on their pathetic, squishy bodies. Hilarious!

I'm sure the other shoe will drop when it turns out Frostlords now cost 600 points or something.

Edited June 14, 2021 by Kadeton

[Fellman]

4 minutes ago, ageofpaddsmar said:

So if you finish drop first you get to choose? Everywhere is say you go first

as i read it if you finished deploying first you win on a draw on the priority roll 

and chose how gos first/second

[JackStreicher]

So whoever drops everything first will have an ever bigger advantages as he/she goes second XD. It made the low drops and going second even more valuable.

[Neil Arthur Hotep]

6 hours ago, Ganigumo said:

Save buffs max out at +1, but stacking it higher should help vs rend. So a +2 would still be a +1 against rend 1.

Do we know how rend interacts with the save bonus/modification cap? Did they just make it so that you can only get +1 to saves at max, but with no cap on negative modifiers?

5 hours ago, Gauche said:

Which I didn't get because almost every time they FAQ something it goes the intent way and not the RAW way. But I guess intent is way more nebulous so they hedge their bets by saying that.

Makes sense, too: There is no need to FAQ stuff that already works as intended the way it's written.

4 hours ago, BrotherTalarian said:

Can people who have gripes with the new rules elaborate as to why they don’t like them, or what makes them awful?

I am generally pretty positive on the new rules, but dislike the new coherency rule.

Not because it's overly restrictive or anything, but because it just does not seem to do what GW wants it to do (make infantry blocks the standard shape and make it so that there are fewer strung out lines on the board). You can still make lines with 25mm bases, and even with 32mm and up you can basically still do it with a few modifications. It's probably just going to be annyoing and fiddly and result in weird formations in competitive play.

3 hours ago, Grimrock said:

In the end I'm just not seeing anything that makes me go 'Wow, what a great change!'.

There are some changes that I absolutely think are great in the new edition. Above all, I love all the way that you get to interact with the game when it is not your turn now. I also like the stronger emphasis on ressource management with all the added uses for command points. I like it when I need to make decisions during the game, and I think the new rules give you more opportunities to make more impactful decisions.

 

2 hours ago, SilverJelly said:

A big tweak seen in this battlepack is the fact that whoever finishes deploying first HAS to take the first turn! You no longer decide! With the changes to command points this is something you may want to consider when building your army.

If we can still partially deploy that one-drop battalion I think this is allright. Otherwise, people will probably build for high drops.

 

1 hour ago, Tali182 said:

The biggest issue with the new rules is the extra time it will take having to be so precise.

The pic below the circles are 40mm, the lines 1 inch, you actually have a little spare range.

 

 

You can just plop a 25mm base into the gap and make all the 40mm bases touch it. Should be precise enough for home games. I hope we see purpose built movement trays for competitive games reasonably soon.

[mojojojo101]

4 minutes ago, JackStreicher said:

So whoever drops everything first will have an ever bigger advantages as he/she goes second XD. It made the low drops and going second even more valuable.

I guess more people have access to one drop lists now which feels like it should be better but maybe isn't.

The big, powerful one drops will still probably be able to get to very low drops and there may be a bunch of other armies that can now have much more reliable ways to get down to low drops and ensure alpha's (especially with smaller board sizes), in particular I think 1 drop lists for IDK and FEC might be popular.

[Neil Arthur Hotep]

40 minutes ago, Mcthew said:

Me... I'm expecting those hefty points increases for the faction. Won't make them any less potent on the tabletop but will ensure less shooting or Teclis spam when you've got more than a third of your army taken up by one model.

If LRL move into a point range where they are like OBR, in that they are basically always missing at least one thing they would really like to have in every list, I think they will be all right.

21 minutes ago, Kadeton said:

Man, it feels weird to be (judging from the general tone of responses here) the only melee-heavy player who thinks their army is getting a huge boost from the 3rd Ed changes.

I was going to say the same for Gravelords. Of course, I think we can now confidently say that they were written to be a 3.0 book, not a 2.0 book, but they benefit from or are at least not negatively affected by nearly all the rule changes. And they are a horde army with basically zero shooting, too.

Edited June 14, 2021 by Neil Arthur Hotep

[Mcthew]

1 minute ago, Kadeton said:

Man, it feels weird to be (judging from the general tone of responses here) the only melee-heavy player who thinks their army is getting a huge boost from the 3rd Ed changes. Beastclaw Raiders have always been a bit of a special case, but wow.

We get heaps more command points. We have multiple ways to get +1 to hit. We can smash a Bonetithe Nexus to rubble, or stomp a Gnawhole closed. We can do even more mortal wounds on the charge. We can shut down enemy command abilities. We can even try to dispel magic! And at the same time, other armies are taking smaller units, worrying about coherency, miscasting spells, losing buff-stacking efficiency, and apparently focusing on spamming archers so we can fight in the shade while we feast on their pathetic, squishy bodies. Hilarious!

I'm sure the other shoe will drop when it turns out Frostlords now cost 600 points or something.

I think that's the general problem with the rules so far. The divide between top tier and lower tier armies has gotten just that much bigger. The only way to narrow it again is to put huge point increases into the mix. Monster-focused armies should have a big points tax now, but how will that effect SoB who already are limited to how many models they can effectively field if Megas go up another 100-200 points? Likewise BCL, I expect will be hit hard by the points difference.

Either that, or some factions will become obsolete and pointless to field. There's a few of these already, but I do wonder if there's nothing but hate for Beasts of Chaos in the AoS team? We've had laughable factions in the past, but how they've been treated by the new rules is tragic. I expect the points for BoC to go down, but it can't go down sufficiently to make them playable. Khorne will have a bad day too, I think. So will Gitz and Fyreslayers. While those top tier are getting just a bit stronger. I play KO and Tzeentch, and when I think now what they can do, it's embarrassing. Some factions, the changes will even out, such as Skaven (although coherency won't effect the clanrats too much anyway, while reinforcements might). SCE are in an odd place of gaining much but losing a fair bit due to base size.

Seriously the new coherency rule is utter nonsense. And designed by someone who doesn't play AoS 🤣. At least it cannot be claimed now that AoS is a skirmish game as you can't use skirmish formations.

But actually it is a skirmish game because the unit sizes are smaller. And there are less models you can field.

No... Wait... 😳🤔

[Neil Arthur Hotep]

3 minutes ago, Mcthew said:

I expect the points for BoC to go down, but it can't go down sufficiently to make them playable. Khorne will have a bad day too, I think. So will Gitz and Fyreslayers.

I mean, you just named all the factions that people were saying needed a new book even before the AoS 3 rules changes. Let's hope they get them soon.

[Kadeton]

3 minutes ago, Mcthew said:

I think that's the general problem with the rules so far. The divide between top tier and lower tier armies has gotten just that much bigger. The only way to narrow it again is to put huge point increases into the mix. Monster-focused armies should have a big points tax now, but how will that effect SoB who already are limited to how many models they can effectively field if Megas go up another 100-200 points? Likewise BCL, I expect will be hit hard by the points difference.

Either that, or some factions will become obsolete and pointless to field. There's a few of these already, but I do wonder if there's nothing but hate for Beasts of Chaos in the AoS team? We've had laughable factions in the past, but how they've been treated by the new rules is tragic. I expect the points for BoC to go down, but it can't go down sufficiently to make them playable. Khorne will have a bad day too, I think. So will Gitz and Fyreslayers. While those top tier are getting just a bit stronger. I play KO and Tzeentch, and when I think now what they can do, it's embarrassing. Some factions, the changes will even out, such as Skaven (although coherency won't effect the clanrats too much anyway, while reinforcements might). SCE are in an odd place of gaining much but losing a fair bit due to base size.

That's fair, but to be honest I don't think it makes much difference. People have been complaining for ages about Beasts of Chaos and Khorne being unplayable, and it seems naïve to hope that a new edition would somehow change that situation by itself. They need new battletomes to bring them up to par, since nothing in the Core Rules can fix fundamentally poor warscrolls. But going from being the two worst armies to... still the two worst armies... doesn't really strike me as anything other than what you'd expect. Here's hoping that the "Age of Beasts" means the Beasts will be getting something cool this edition!

3 minutes ago, Mcthew said:

Seriously the new coherency rule is utter nonsense. And designed by someone who doesn't play AoS 🤣. At least it cannot be claimed now that AoS is a skirmish game as you can't use skirmish formations.

But actually it is a skirmish game because the unit sizes are smaller. And there are less models you can field.

No... Wait... 😳🤔

It's definitely getting pushed towards an "elite skirmish" game, where the ideal choices are tough, heavy-hitting units of five models or less, and monster-heroes. Gosh, that sounds a lot like every BCR army ever...

[Acrozatarim]

I think that it's going to take a while of people actually playing with the new rules for a lot of the ramifications of the changes to clearly show themselves. We've already had people leaping to assumptions that are incorrect, the GHB points adjustments are likely to change things further, and there are so many adjustments across the board to various moving parts that even very canny players are unlikely to grok all the new interactions straight off.

Also, they're designing these new rules with the game they want in mind, not the meta that currently exists as of the end of 2nd ed.