you know the more i reed the SCE book the more i think "this is the book where we break all the rules/standards becouse we made things to restrictive for our golden boys"
To be fair, what irks me is not "is this op?" what I hardly stand is the continous messing with the core rules and with the apparent direction of the game. AoS is not a balanced game, it's impossible to have it. But we have (had?) some large sense of balanced rules... except GW screw it up. Constantly. once the special abilities on 6s were triggered on modifiable 6s. Now all of these are fixed on unmodified 6s. Good! But wait, here come the new aelves and MWs for them trigger on 5s. Conga lines are bad, let's make a core rule of coherency for units. Good! But wait, here come the new SCE that don't care about it. It's disheartening.
Don't forget that they did the same thing with Lumineth. They're doing it because they have all those shiny new Stormcast models to sell. The Stormcast have avoided the Space Marine treatment for the most part, so I really believe it has less to do with GW having a favorite faction then just wanting to push the newest hotness.
I feel like units getting special abilities or rules that let them do special things other models can’t isn’t exactly a unique or new concept, is altered coherency really that different in rule tweaking compared to being able to shoot twice or something?
In terms of being OP or even general game-impact? No, probably doesn't matter overly much, at least not for now. In terms of consistent gamedesign with a solid core? Yes. Breaking your core-rules 1) confuses players, cuz they can't count on the core-rules actually consistently being valid for everyone at all times. And 2) It brings the long-term risk of introducing weird stuff that accidently breaks the game, because you now have a random exceptions to the core to deal with.
Nah. Adhering too strictly to core rules to the detriment of certain levels of convenience is silly. They have more forgiving coherency cause the models are big and the wings make it hard to be within 1 from another. Nothing more, nothing less.
If a core-rule requires exceptions like this to not be silly or inconvenient then maybe this particular core-rule shouldn't exist to begin with..... However, in that case exceptions still aren't the solution. The solution should then be to come up with a better core-rule.
Nah. Core rules are your baseline and smartly breaking them in limited, controlled scenarios is what keeps certain things interesting/functional and its like that for every game. Think it's shortsighted to say a core rule should change because one unit needs a slight modification to it. In 99% of the scenarios it works better so why hurt the 99 because of the 1? It makes no sense when the problem is solved easily on a single warscroll without any further ramifications. Sorry, just can't see a world where the better choice is making models that don't look cool or messing with core rules that 99% of the time are fine.
yeah no.... Core rules cannot be broken by definition, that's why they're core rules. If they can be broken they're not core. And games that do break their core-rules quickly lose what made the original game work, as you're literally changing the core of the original game. The game might evolve into something new and survive, but it's no longer the original game. And if what you came for is the original game, you'll probably end up dissapointed once enough core-rules have been broken.... As for it being a rule that interferes with cool models. Well either your model is badly designed for your game (e.g. too big for a large unit in this case, which also kinda begs the question; why even allow such large units to begin with?). Or your core-rule isn't a fun rule as it conflicts with the rule of cool. As an aside, the 1" coherency rule has a bunch of other drawbacks, as people have discussed at length when it was released. This wouldn't exactly be the only reason to be in favour of removing or changing it into something more sensible.
I don't generally like the new coherency rules. But I'll hold back any real frustration until I see if more flying units are allowed this wider coherency. My hope is that certain flying units, from each army that has them, WILL be allowed a 3" coherency. If not, then I'll call out GW for more shenanigans.
I deeply disagree with all of this but I'll just leave it at that. You're definition of core rules is flawed, especially when looking at a game as diverse as age of sigmar. A model with 3" coherency instead of 1" doesn't break anything nor does the idea that units can have different coherency rules break anything. Weve drifted so far into the world of wild exaggeration and extrapolation any further discussion is meaningless. We are gonna lose what made the game work? Really? 3" coherency is where we are drawing the line? Ya'll will complain about anything Edit: and that's without mentioning all the dozens of other ways units in this game "break" the core rules that are infinitely more impactful than a coherency change.
That's is kind of the point. GW keeps establishing core rules/design principles, usually with a big fanfare about how they finally "streamlined X" or "simplified Y" and now it's "really balanced and consistent across all armies. Really you can trust us this time guys.". Only to then promptly proceed to break them for a subset of factions/units for no apparent reason in the very next release, much like @Killer Angel said earlier. Occasionally this causes a a big enough cascading effect that requires other factions to get updates to catch up. Which eventually translates into new core rules/design principles which slowly get implemented in new tomes/new GHB/a new edition, only for the whole spiel to start all over once it's finally become consistent again. And as they keep doing that the game moves further away from what it originally was. That isn't necesarly bad, it's just different. Will AoS survive those changes? Probably. Will it be better for it? That's mostly a matter of personal preference. But it definitely won't be the same, and that can be a shame if the original core-gameplay is changed too much over time. And let's be real, AoS 3.0 is very different from 1.0, or 2.0 or even the state the game was in 2.5. Different enough that you might have a preference for a particular edition and dislike the others. And with this change AoS 3.0 has already taken the first small steps on the road to AoS 4.0, which is hilarious as it's barely a few months old.
edit: it's obvious we just have different ideas around what works and game design philosophies. i'm firmly of the opinion that everything is on the table assuming its implemented in a careful, thoughtful way of how it interacts with the rest of the game. I dont think something "breaking" the core rules makes it inherently problematic, just like i dont think if something doesnt break the core rules its inherently good. Its about the execution of the idea. you can break the game even if you dont break the core rules. Appreciate the chat. I dunno if you've ever tried kings of war but it sounds like a ruleset more in line with what you're looking for.
it's... complicated, and it boils to personal preferences. IMO a unit that shoot twice is strong, but it doesn't go against the consistency of the game. We have units that if charge 10" can do a free attack, spells that can let units attack twice, abilities that increase the number of attacks... this kind of "exceptions" are pretty common. But let's go back to my previous examples: GW across the years worked with the nex battletomes, pointing toward a uniform goal: the effects on attacks are triggered on nat 6s. It gives a feeling of conformity, of balance. So why the need to introduce a unit that does MWs on 5? Don't break your own equilibrium, leave them at 6s and double the attacks... Coherency is the same: with all its flaws, it's a common ground for every army, why do you have the need to break the "balance" by giving a unique rule to SCE? make a errata for the core rules and fix coherency for flyers, so you keep a sense of consistency to the game. Is that 3" coherency a big deal? Will it change AoS forever? Gosh, no to both. But i find it stupid and annoying nonetheless.
But, why? Outside of some strange adherence to not messing with the sanctity of the core rules, why does it matter? If the end result is the same, why not streamline the process so we aren't forcing massive amounts of dice to be rolled? Same with the coherency. not all flying units needed it. Dragons did because of their size and model. Just feels like a weird thing to get bothered by. It's the whole "letter of the law vs spirit of the law" argument. Why adhere to the letter of the law for no practical reason when we can still adhere to the spirit of the law just fine?
Hm, never heard RAW vs RAI worded as "letter of the law vs spirit of the law" before. Your's sounds much more eloquent & poetic, haha!
That's why i was saying it's strictly a personal pov. I don’t like it and imo it's the wrong approach, but that's just it.
It's just that i cannot stand GW's attitude when it screws its own rules for the sake of it. But hey, we work with what we got.