I played lots of 5th/6th edition fantasy and some 40k a long time ago and I am considering getting back into the hobby to play AoS. I have watched a lot of battle reports on Youtube and played some TTS games. My opinion is mostly a “What needs to change to get me seriously into the game”.
This double turn rule is nonsense needs to end. If it is so good then why aren’t 40k players wanting to add it to their games? If it was a good mechanic players would turn down the double turn 60-70% of the time. In high level games it seems players take it almost 100% of the time because the best armies are the ones that take advantage of a double turn.
In a game of Warhammer both players role huge amounts of dice. While it is variable in the short term, this will even out over the course of the game. The double turn puts so much value into a single dice roll it ruins all the other dice rolls. So many games are decided on turn dice rolls that are almost 50/50 decisions. So why bother wasting your time spending hundreds of dollars and hundreds of hours on an army when the result of the game is going to come down to a 50/50 decision at some point? You can just toss a coin at the start of the game and use that to determine the winner.
Obviously, all competitive games come down to crucial and tense dice roles at some point. Let’s imagine a situation where you need to make 1 wound on a character to almost certainly win the game. You have 10 attacks and 8 hit. Then you roll badly and get only 1 wound. The opposing player needs to make a 4+ save. Here we have just reduced the outcome of the game to a single 50/50 event but it feels completely appropriate, this situation arose organically during the game. The turn roles are guaranteed at the end of each round making them the important things and all the other events a sideshow that occurs as a consequence of the turn order. The double turn takes all the good tension out of the game and replaces it with something that results in one competitor being bored, one competitor getting an excessive advantage, and also it completely fails to create a believable abstraction of fantasy warfare.
If it has to stay because the designers are too belligerent or arrogant to accept that this ruins the game then the double turn should come with restrictions to movement, charging and casting. Also all points should be scored at end of a battle round so that the player that goes second has the advantage to take them.
I have no idea why tournament organizers don’t just abandon the double turn rule.
If in my limited understanding of the game I am missing something here I would be happy for anyone to correct me.