Poll: Double turn

[Sarouan]

39 minutes ago, Neil Arthur Hotep said:

It would definitely be better for double turn enjoyers to be more enthusiastic about it.

People rarely get enthusiastic about a game mechanism, because they're not the real focus of the game. When you play it, do you say to yourself : "damn that charge phase in my game of The Old World is really an awesome mechanic !" or rather "damn, that charge of your imperial fire line by my horde of goblins was really epic !" ? Which is more likely to stick to your mind ?

In the end, that depends what is your objective in game, but I find players that are -really- into the game internal rules to the point of being excited about them are more the exception than the rule (and usually those who tend to love designing entire game systems themselves ).

 

I think though that Double Turn mechanism is also a problem for a specific category of players : namely those who already know a certain number of game systems (usually with a favorite). True new players, meaning those who never played a miniature wargame before, tend to accept rules as they are presented. When Double Turn (priority roll, to be indeed more precise) is presented to them, they see it as simply rolling a dice each turn to see which takes the first round - and that's it, it's not a question of "bad" or "good", it's just the rules of the game. Such a person doesn't see the problem because to them, there is none.

[Flippy]

1 hour ago, Neil Arthur Hotep said:

I think this is a good point. It would definitely be better for double turn enjoyers to be more enthusiastic about it. I think people are too defensive when talking about the mechanic: For me, it's not just "you get used to it", I actually think it's interesting and fun. I think the game is better for having the priority mechanics it has.

But of course, taking two turns in a row is super strong. And, accordingly, you should have to pay a price to do it. This is already the case right now, by having to take Battle Regiment and being forced to give away the first turn.

I think the new rule where you also can't score a battle tactic is a good addition, too, because I think the double turn has a problem that is mainly psychological: If you are on the receiving end of a double, you feel like you have probably just lost the game. In my experience, that's not actually true most of the time and if you play the game all the way until turn 5, there is always a chance to still win. I hope the fact that the player taking the double needs to give up points to get it will make people feel like they have more of a chance to still win when it happens. Because I think that's how it is in reality.

Your approach seems to be mainly on the game as a mechanism, i.e. the internal gears, how they work and how the result (scoring) is determined. Nothing wrong with this per se, but this approach can easily lead to a disconnection between what's happening on the table and how you should act to win the game (or how the winner is determined). Wrapping the game around the priority roll (as you said, it must be considered in the listbuilding stage already) and then using abstract points to balance everything out makes the experience.... weird, I guess? Like, my army got slaughtered but I still won on points. Hooray? 

I don't know how to explain this properly, but when we play AoS and the kids come to check who's winning they examine the table, not a scoring sheet - a very intuitive approach in a wargame but not very accurate for AoS.   

[Neil Arthur Hotep]

21 minutes ago, Flippy said:

Your approach seems to be mainly on the game as a mechanism, i.e. the internal gears, how they work and how the result (scoring) is determined. Nothing wrong with this per se, but this approach can easily lead to a disconnection between what's happening on the table and how you should act to win the game (or how the winner is determined). Wrapping the game around the priority roll (as you said, it must be considered in the listbuilding stage already) and then using abstract points to balance everything out makes the experience.... weird, I guess? Like, my army got slaughtered but I still won on points. Hooray? 

I don't know how to explain this properly, but when we play AoS and the kids come to check who's winning they examine the table, not a scoring sheet - a very intuitive approach in a wargame but not very accurate for AoS.   

I think what you are saying is right, I just don't see it as a problem. To me, the ability to win on points while losing on models is an upside. It simulates the ability to achieve your mission objective in a Pyrrhic victory. "I won. But at what cost?", you know? But to be fair, the AoS could do more to make that fiction easier to grasp. I think battle tactics and objective control feeling a bit disconnected from the fiction is a very fair criticism.

I get the appeal of a game where the rules are less abstracted. Maybe the fact that I prefer more abstract games is due to my own history with gaming, where for a long time I played really detailed systems with rules for every eventuality. And then I found that, in practice, those rules either never come up, or are not as fun as you imagine. And then I played more abstracted games and just found that I was not missing the extra level of detail at all.

But this is not really about the double turn/priority anymore.

[wayfarer]

It has it's good and bad points.

In general I like it however it can make for a truly bad game, at least for a couple of turns.

I recently went to a tournament in Lenton. Being doubled turned turn 1 to 2 by Kroak and gang and having my army picked apart with almost no interaction was bad. My opponent was a good guy. This and getting past the double turn made the game good towards the end and so ok overall

[NauticalSoup]

Ultimately the poll is a good indicator of how controversial the mechanic remains. It's such an extreme filter, in my experience it bounces more players than anything else. A lot of people who don't like it simple aren't playing anymore, they hate it that much.

[Gailon]

17 hours ago, Flippy said:

Your approach seems to be mainly on the game as a mechanism, i.e. the internal gears, how they work and how the result (scoring) is determined. Nothing wrong with this per se, but this approach can easily lead to a disconnection between what's happening on the table and how you should act to win the game (or how the winner is determined). Wrapping the game around the priority roll (as you said, it must be considered in the listbuilding stage already) and then using abstract points to balance everything out makes the experience.... weird, I guess? Like, my army got slaughtered but I still won on points. Hooray? 

I don't know how to explain this properly, but when we play AoS and the kids come to check who's winning they examine the table, not a scoring sheet - a very intuitive approach in a wargame but not very accurate for AoS.   

That’s an interesting point. I can say that this is one of the main things that attracted me to the game. And maintains enjoyment. It makes the game have a more tactical feel to it for me. Killing my opponent is not enough. And I frequently have to weigh killing and scoring. 
 

I have a distinct memory of a couple games against the friend who taught me the game. Early into learning when I was just starting. I tabled him with most of my army alive in both games. And lost both. I found that really interesting and realized this game had some strange depth in its variance. 
 

I also liked that it can sometimes gives the person who loses or is losing a fun game experience. In those games that I lost I wasn’t just getting kicked around for 3 hours. 
 

sometimes you do just get kicked around, but sometimes you ‘lose’ but still have a winning look on the table. That’s something I find interesting. 
 

but I have to admit it is ‘gamey’ and artificial. Trickier from a narrative perspective. 

[Skreech Verminking]

As the double turn currently is, I don’t like it.

personally I have heard of so many people stating that it has a some what in depth tactic, yet I haven’t seen a single person ever taking the consideration of just not taking the double turn when it happened.

this is the case for both casual and tournament level play I have seen, taken part in and witnessed.

 Currently as it stands, there is no incentive of just not taking the double turn.

the benefits of taking it are much greater then thr negatives it comes with.

[Xil]

I like the mechanic actually. But i also see that sometimes it can leave a bad impression after some games.

But last match where i played my Daughters vs Khorne is a prime example of how the double turn can change the flow of the game without ****** the outcome. In that game i deployed defensible and thus was given first turn. I moved a little and scored the 4 points (hold more is off the table in that mission turn 1). Khorne went and did the same, coming a little bit closer but screening like no tomorrow out of fear of my punch. Then i gave Khorne the double but he couldn't capitalise from it, so nothing much happend in regards to killing. Then i was able to start picking my battles instead.  The game was super interesting and close. We talked a lot and discussed what we could do as it was intented to be a training game.

i believe not giving away double wouldn't have changed the game by much. only difference would have been that i had to pick my fights some inches closer to his territory.

This shows, that if both players know the mechanic and play accordingly the games don't just fall apart. This only happens when someone neglects the risks and trys to play for the rewards only.

[Sarouan]

10 hours ago, NauticalSoup said:

Ultimately the poll is a good indicator of how controversial the mechanic remains. It's such an extreme filter, in my experience it bounces more players than anything else. A lot of people who don't like it simple aren't playing anymore, they hate it that much.

I mean, the question is litterally "u like Double Turn ? Yes / No". The only thing we can get from it is that the number of "yes" is nearly double the number of "no".

There's no controversy in that, it's just a matter of "liking it or not". We don't even know if the people answering "no" are indeed not playing AoS anymore or they didn't even bother to start playing. Same for yes, actually, we don't know if all of these people are also actually playing AoS at the moment (you may like something but not have time to engage in it for plenty of reasons).

That's why I said this poll is useless : you can always make the numbers in favor of whatever narrative you believe in, because the question is so vague and we have no idea what is the game situation of people answering.

[Flippy]

5 hours ago, Gailon said:

sometimes you do just get kicked around, but sometimes you ‘lose’ but still have a winning look on the table. That’s something I find interesting. 
 

but I have to admit it is ‘gamey’ and artificial. Trickier from a narrative perspective. 

It is interesting, but it's also "gamey". I agree. My issue with this is that (at least based on the AoS Metawatch) the designers are more on the "gamey" side and they apparently think they are doing a great "balancing" job by working with stuff like battle tactics, point values and double turn ramifications. 

[Sarouan]

2 minutes ago, Flippy said:

It is interesting, but it's also "gamey". I agree. My issue with this is that (at least based on the AoS Metawatch) the designers are more on the "gamey" side and they apparently think they are doing a great "balancing" job by working with stuff like battle tactics, point values and double turn ramifications. 

For a game to be "gamey", I'd say it's pretty much what people would normally expect from it - and actually a compliment.  

[Flippy]

8 minutes ago, Sarouan said:

For a game to be "gamey", I'd say it's pretty much what people would normally expect from it - and actually a compliment.  

This greatly depends on the kind of game we're talking about. Some games are inherently abstract (chess), some are mostly abstract with some fluff that is obviously pretextual (the "eurogames"). I have no problem with this when playing, let's say, Azul. But tabletop wargames are usually different and they do not draw people in with their smart internal engines - instead they use: 

- huge amount of lore / fluff;

- the models and hobby elements related to the models (painting).

This is why seasoned players usually emphasise the rule of cool - actual game rules can change many times while you invest a lot of time / money / emotions in the lore and the models. So, what you would usually expect from the game such as AoS is that the mechanic supports the recreation of epic fantasy battle, i.e. encourages the engagement, dramatic moments and actually "killing" the opposing toy soldiers with your toy soldiers.

If you take the more "gamey" approach (e.g. abstract scoring system) you might as well, at one point, ask yourself why even bother with the whole illusion of battle (painting tiny toy soldiers, crafting artificial terrain, naming your characters and units, writing a backstory). Maybe just use tokens and enjoy the smooth and balanced game engine without the whole hassle? 

[Sarouan]

27 minutes ago, Flippy said:

 But tabletop wargames are usually different and they do not draw people in with their smart internal engines -snip-

Well no, they're not necessarily. It's just the conception of "The Hobby" that is promoted by certain companies, and that is not the case of all (those who sell self sufficient boardgames : yes, there are wargames inside of them : and technically, all boardgames are tabletop ). Again it's an assumption from some players about what tabletop wargames "should be".

I guess that's why 4th emphasizes on the use of modules in the previews : so that players can more clearly see the different rule packs that fit their style. You don't like "gamey" gimmicks ? Path to Glory will get rid of these petty battle tactic nonsense, apparently. In 3rd, there always were the other ways (narrative and open) than matched play, but for some reason, some players decided matched play is the only way to play and only judge AoS on that. Granted, it wasn't always clear which use what.

[Flippy]

4 minutes ago, Sarouan said:

Well no, they're not necessarily. It's just the conception of "The Hobby" that is promoted by certain companies, and that is not the case of all (those who sell self sufficient boardgames : yes, there are wargames inside of them : and technically, all boardgames are tabletop ). Again it's an assumption from some players about what tabletop wargames "should be".

Yet here we are, discussing Games Workshop game on the AoS-only forum, with our perception shaped by Games Workshop, which is also true for the majority of tabletop wargames players around the world. And yes, the underlying problem with the double turn (and some other mechanics) is that they go against an assumption from some players about what tabletop wargames "should be". The difference between us is that I think this is actually a valid critique.

[Sarouan]

That's normal, GW has shaped the miniature market a lot since they're at the top for such a long time. But that doesn't mean it is the universal truth. Tabletop wargames are actually older than that...I still remember fondly the ones I play with cardboard tokens. They weren't any less valid than the miniature ones, and not any less "gamey". Can you play AoS with tokens instead of miniatures, with a drawing determining where the terrain are ? Of course ! Just like you can play tabletop RPG with miniatures and detailed 3D terrain. It's only a matter of taste and personnal involvment, as always.

[Flippy]

12 minutes ago, Sarouan said:

Can you play AoS with tokens instead of miniatures, with a drawing determining where the terrain are ? Of course !

Have you ever seen this in real life?

Neither have I.

Edited April 3 by Flippy

[Marcvs]

8 minutes ago, Sarouan said:

Can you play AoS with tokens instead of miniatures, with a drawing determining where the terrain are ? Of course !

"Uhm actually" moment: not really, at least not with the core rules (real line of sight is in there)

[Sarouan]

28 minutes ago, Flippy said:

Have you ever seen this in real life?

Neither have I.

No, not in recent days because nowadays, it's way easier to make an app that can do practically the same AND be more convenient than still drawing a map, cutting some cardboard and so on. But I have seen some groups in Facebook actually doing that.

However, if we're talking about software like tabletop simulator...that's practically the same concept, just on your screen. They're really great to play games with people you'd otherwise have difficulties to meet on a regular pace, or just practice the game in general.

Edited April 3 by Sarouan

[Sarouan]

30 minutes ago, Marcvs said:

"Uhm actually" moment: not really, at least not with the core rules (real line of sight is in there)

Sure you can. Real line sight apply to the "miniature" in game, so you do with the token you have. If it's flat, line of sight is drawn flat. You can  also do something like this :
 

Spoiler

It asks for more time investment, of course, but there are plenty of ways to practice the game mechanics appropriately.

[Gailon]

16 hours ago, Skreech Verminking said:

As the double turn currently is, I don’t like it.

personally I have heard of so many people stating that it has a some what in depth tactic, yet I haven’t seen a single person ever taking the consideration of just not taking the double turn when it happened.

this is the case for both casual and tournament level play I have seen, taken part in and witnessed.

 Currently as it stands, there is no incentive of just not taking the double turn.

the benefits of taking it are much greater then thr negatives it comes with.

This perspective I hear a lot and it’s just inexplicable to me. The priority adds variance that requires thought. 
 

My last game encapsulates the situation with the priority I see in almost all my games. My opponent went first and in my first turn I needed to go in a way where I was prepared from him to go next (nothing crazy, that’s just you to I go). So I went forward, had screens and was careful. 
 

I won priority and did not take the double. It would have been a bad decision. I gave away the turn. Now he has to take his turn aware that I could double. He plays carefully. We actually played the entire game ‘you go I go’ but the priority roll impacted the decisions we were making in an interesting way. 
 

The more I play the more the priority roll has more of an impact when it isn’t resulting in a double turn. 
 

priority definitely still decides outcomes of games. But when doing a post mortem on a game I can almost always point to several other rolls that had just as big a potential impact. (Like that last game I rolled a crazy armor save right out the gate that had more impact on the outcome than any of the priority rolls) 

[Skreech Verminking]

12 hours ago, Gailon said:

This perspective I hear a lot and it’s just inexplicable to me. The priority adds variance that requires thought. 
 

My last game encapsulates the situation with the priority I see in almost all my games. My opponent went first and in my first turn I needed to go in a way where I was prepared from him to go next (nothing crazy, that’s just you to I go). So I went forward, had screens and was careful. 
 

I won priority and did not take the double. It would have been a bad decision. I gave away the turn. Now he has to take his turn aware that I could double. He plays carefully. We actually played the entire game ‘you go I go’ but the priority roll impacted the decisions we were making in an interesting way. 
 

The more I play the more the priority roll has more of an impact when it isn’t resulting in a double turn. 
 

priority definitely still decides outcomes of games. But when doing a post mortem on a game I can almost always point to several other rolls that had just as big a potential impact. (Like that last game I rolled a crazy armor save right out the gate that had more impact on the outcome than any of the priority rolls) 

Well I can only talk from my own experience.

if thats is what you have so far experience, great for you.

I wish I could say the same thing but so far it hasn’t happened to me.

funnily enough there was one game where my opponent gave me turn priority.

although more for the reason that he wanted to fight me before I get to him, and I chose not to move anything for 4 turns.

i just stood there in the backlines looking goofy at his army, while he did the same thing.

that game ended in a draw

it was the fastest game I ever played at a tournament in second edition

Edited April 4 by Skreech Verminking

[Sarouan]

15 minutes ago, Skreech Verminking said:

funnily enough there was one game where my opponent gave me turn priority.

although more for the reason that he wanted to fight me before I get to him, and I chose not to move anything for 4 turns.

i just stood there in the backlines looking goofy at his army, while he did the same thing.

that game ended in a draw

it was the fastest game I ever played at a tournament in second edition

So basically, Double Turn had actually nothing to do with how this game ended.

In classic IGOUGO, you could also have decided not to move anything for 4 turns and your opponent still waiting for you to come at him. And it would have ended the same.

It was your own decisions that made the game ended that way, not the game mechanisms themselves.

[Skreech Verminking]

48 minutes ago, Sarouan said:

So basically, Double Turn had actually nothing to do with how this game ended.

In classic IGOUGO, you could also have decided not to move anything for 4 turns and your opponent still waiting for you to come at him. And it would have ended the same.

It was your own decisions that made the game ended that way, not the game mechanisms themselves.

Yep exactly like I said, I’ve never seen the things you have described.

that example is probably the closest to what I had with my opponent not taking the double, out of fear I might double him later.

and as you have said it if the double didn’t exist, well the outcome for at least that one game would have been the same.

although maybe the thoughts would have been different.

But possibilities if we would have ignored the double turn function in a long ago past time, seems to be not that easy, especially not when it has been a few years and the thoughts that we could have had if we removed a factor or added something else to the game isn’t easy to figure out without trying

Edited April 4 by Skreech Verminking

[Sarouan]

Just now, Skreech Verminking said:

Yep exactly like I said, I’ve never seen the things you have described.

that example is probably the closest to what I had with my opponent not taking the double, out of fear I might double him later.

Well, because most players tend to decide not to do that. Because it's basically refusing to play in the middle of the game.

But Double Turn really has nothing to do with that. Your decisions from both alone are to be blamed.

 

[Skreech Verminking]

2 minutes ago, Sarouan said:

Well, because most players tend to decide not to do that. Because it's basically refusing to play in the middle of the game.

But Double Turn really has nothing to do with that. Your decisions from both alone are to be blamed.

 

That may be so, but I never said I blame the double turn, just that I currently don’t like it from the experience I had.

And if you want to know more see my first post on the double turn