Hey everyone, please take a look at this and let us know how this sounds to you for a potential tournament format for 6th ed.
No one wants to jump the gun on cutting things out of the rule set, or adding things in so early, but the reality of the situation is that we here at Frontline are contractually bound to run some big events coming up in September, and we need to show people what they’re getting if we expect to sell any tickets for these events. We’d love to get more play testing under our belts, but we can’t wait any longer. So, we need to post up some guidelines for 6th edition events, which means we need to make some tough decisions.
We’ve been playing 6th ed like crazy and feel that we know the game as well as can be expected this early in. This is our first draft of a tournament structure for 6th ed and we wanted feedback from all you tournament goers and TOs.
We will be building on the system we had used last year which itself was the result of several years of tournament player feedback and fine tuning and had excellent reviews at every event we ran. We’re looking to use those core concepts (simplicity, and fairness) combined with 6th ed changes to hopefully provide a fun, level playing field.
Lastly, that said, we’re not married to any of our ideas, and we definitely operate under the principals of meritocracy so if you have a good idea please share it. This will be an evolving structure that builds over time and with experience, but we need a starting point so here we go!
=Basics
We won’t be using mysterious terrain. Some of these are just too unbalancing for some armies.
We won’t be using mysterious objectives unless they are predetermined, which will be explained below.
We will be using Fortifications, but not Fortresses of Redemption or Skyshield Landing Pads as they are just flat out too big, particularly if both players bring one.
Warlord Traits: Frankie had the idea of rolling once and then choosing that number power on any of the three traits. This means the system is still random, but it gives you the ability to avoid rolling a worthless trait. Feedback on this one would be appreciated.
Allies are in. They bring more balance to the game as IMO, the core mechanics of the game are what now create imbalance. When everyone’s power level is cranked to 10, it helps to level the playing field.
Terrain will be pre-arranged. Having players arrange terrain just isn’t practical for a tournament from a time perspective.
Book Night Fighting will be in as will Random Game Length and Stealing of the Initiative.
= We will be using a “BAO” (Bay Area Open) style mission similar to what we did last year.
What this means is that we will essentially have a single, multi-layered mission with different deployments. What we have found is that the mission is sufficiently complex enough that when combined with differing terrain, deployment and opponents, provides for a unique play experience every game that also allows for multiple paths to victory. Playing the same mission also means that you are never left trying to figure out what to do in a given mission. You already know it and get better at it each round. It allows you to focus on playing your best instead of trying to figure out how to play.
The first victory condition will be 2 Capture and Control objectives on 40mm bases that can be placed anywhere in your deployment zone at least 6″ from a table edge or 12″ from another objective. The player controlling the most of these (as per the BRB) wins this victory condition.
There will also be 3 Seize Ground Objectives on 25mm bases which must be placed outside of either player’s deployment zone, 6″ from a table edge and 12″ from another objective following the rules in the BRB. The player controlling the most of these (as per the BRB) wins this victory condition. We are 90% sure we will allow at least one of these to always give Skyfire to a unit within 3″ of it so long as you control that objective (ANY one unit within 3″, not just the scoring unit controlling it) to mitigate the threat Flyers pose to armies without a lot of counters. What are your alls feelings on this? We think it is fair as it allows armies to fight back against Flyers but it isn’t a gimme. You have to get into position to use it and the other player can prevent you from doing this. We think it is a good compromise but would love some feedback.
The third victory condition will be Victory Points as in the old system. We wanted to keep KPs but due to the amount of Deathstar style units we anticipate will become prevalent in the game, the KP system becomes silly. KPs are meant to balance out MSU, which is still really powerful in 6th (if not BETTER) but now that the Draigowing style units are going to become the norm, saying destroying one of those is the equivalent of taking out a unit of Grots is not fair. So, Victory Points, while more mentally taxing at the end of a long game, seems to be the best bet. Half points if the unit is immobilized or below half strength at games end, full points if it is destroyed or broken at game’s end. Whoever has more VP’s wins this victory condition. An alternative to this we are considering is to say a unit is worth 1KP for every 25 or 50 points it costs. You then put this number on your army list to make the math at the end of the game easy. The downside here though, is that it creates situations where having multiple units just over the break point can mean your army will give up a great deal more points proportionally than an opponent who has a lot of units just under the break point.
We will use 3 Tie Breaker Points for bracketing purposes per the BAO style. As the old BAO Tie Breaker points were really similar to the new ones in the book, we’ll largely keep these apart from First Blood which we find is just too easy for the player going first to get.
Slay the Warlord
Linebreaker
Preserve Your Focres=You get this is half or more of your scoring units, rounding up, are not destroyed or broken at game’s end.
We will use the following deployments:
Dawn of War (6th ed version, was called pitched battle in 5th)
Vanguard Strike (triangle deployment)
Spearhead from 5th
We are considering Hammer and Anvil but in a tournament setting where tables are butt to butt, it can get really, really inconvenient. What do you guys think? I just don’t think think it’s practical and Spearhead is pretty close to it.
This mission then stays very true to the book missions as we like to do, but also (hopefully) balances out some of the inequities those missions have. For example the mission in the book “The Relic” is just so unfair for shooty armies or if you have a scoring Deathstar such as Nob Bikers who can just drive forward, grab it, and then drive away. They are tough enough to just shrug off any damage.
=Psykers
If you roll a power you can’t use, either because of Force Charge or the inability to use it such as a Broodlord rolling a shooting power, you can reroll till you get one you can use.
Points Level
This is the one where we’re really scratching our heads. We want to go with 1500 as the game really slows down and counter-intuitively, the better you are the slower it goes. Why? Every little micro-movement becomes really important. It bogs the game down a ton. We just don’t see games finishing in the same time limit we had previously with 1750pt limits. Experience will be the best teacher here and it may turn out that we are wrong, but we have to post a points limit before we have any experience, hahaha! So, we’re leaning towards 1500 at this point. What do you all think?
We also find that at this points level you can’t pack in all the goodies, which is good and bad. For one, most Deathstars fit in at 1500pts, and as such they can really dominate the game. On the flip side, it also means that you can’t bring a deathstar AND crazy support units. We’re finding it can be a bit more rock, paper, scissors at 1500pts.
We’re open to non-traditional points levels too, such as 1600, or 1650. Now is a good time to throw off old traditions if they no longer fit the dynamic of the game.
Forge World
Most of you know we at Frontline love Forge World and have pushed to have it in tournaments previously but were met with a lot of community opposition.
The biggest objection previously was that FW upset the balance of the game. Well, hahaha, no worries about that now! Game balance went out the window with 6th in a big way and the power combos that the game provides don’t need FW. The worst offenders that people complained about were Vehicles (Achilles, Lucious Drop Pod, Caestes Assault Ram) and those have all been hit with the NERF bat due to Hull Points, so I don’t see it being as big of an issue.
The second biggest objection was that most players didn’t know the FW rules. Well, now everyone is relearning the rules and this is a perfect time to open the doors and broaden our horizons. I think particularly the inclusion of the FW AA units will go a long way to helping to even out some of the crazier lists. Mostly though, FW units just add a lot of character to armies and the vast majority of them are under powered if anything.
We propose to allow any units with the 40K approved stamp to be allowed in the game.
Ultimately I think FW increases the fun of the game and the diversity of toys we get to play with. What do you all think?
=Counts As Armies and WYSIWYG
I anticipate this is going to get crazy. Can anyone say, “counts as allies?” 
Yeah, that is going to get bananas.
So, we’d love to hear some ideas on where to draw the line? Particularly with FW models, this gets crazy. So, what do you do when you have someone who has built an awesome AdMech army using all kinds of beautiful conversion but is using two different codices andFW models? Even worse, the guy with a bunch of half painted models or models from his and 4 friends’ collections that all have different paint jobs and represent an allied army. That could very easily get confusing.
We don’t want to limit people’s creativity, so what are some ideas to make this easy? My thoughts were to include a hand-out for players who are doing this to give to their opponent that includes at the very least a unit to unit breakdown, ie. this unit in my army=this unit from this codex, and etc. Preferably with a brief stat breakdown.
=What are we missing?
Are you guys seeing any obvious holes in this? The better prepared we are, the quicker we can get into the flow of running more fun, well organized events in 6th as we did in 5th!
Thanks, everyone!
The problem I have with forge world is lack of knowledge. All I know about are units like the dreadnaught assault drop pod, eldar hornets, plague drones. These things generally intimidate me because I hear horror stories. No one talks of a necron tomb stalker flopping around or ork landship that gets a 5++ for the Lols. Scary gets more air time then sane.
I understand your point, and that is a bummer as so many people knee-jerk against FW based off of a lack of knowledge and fear.
Honestly, we use them all the time and they really aren’t that bad. In fact, most of them are UNDER-POWERED in a big way. The stuff people got most upset about in the past was things like the Achilles and the now with HP, that thing is not that hard to take out at all. With allies, EVERYONE has the tools to take these things on.
I think all it will take is one push and everyone will get on board and have more fun being able to use more of their toys. If we required everyone to have the rulebook for their FW units and show them to you, would that make you more comfortable with it?
I applaud your intention to include Forge World models!
With regards requiring everyone to have the rules for their units, yes that would likely help, and this should be applied to all Codices, Chapter Approved, Imperial Armour and White Dwarf articles that describe the units in a competitors list.
The reason being is it may not just be the Forge World publication that an opponent may never have seen. It’s possible they may have missed out on that edition White Dwarf with the Ork Flyers in it for some reason as one example.
Should owners not want to risk their pristine Codex copies or desire to keep everything on a tablet or laptop for example, then allow clear personal-use copies of the publication(s) to be brought instead (copyright respecting course).
Disallow pure reliance on hand-written scribbles, spreadsheets or Army Builder style print outs. The point is to maintain transparency: Opponents can see the 40k Stamp or the White Dwarf logo and can be assured that the list of USR’s hasn’t been added to or the profile tweaked in an obvious way.
Also require opponents to walk through each others army before hand and make freely available those clear copies of the units rules for each other to view at any time.
Addendum: Expanding on the “opponent may have missed an edition of White Dwarf” – they may also not have had direct access to something like the Necron Codex either!
You make good points. Unless everyone has ever codex, the argument that people don’t have access to the rules is a bit moot. I think bringing a hand-out with all the pertinent rules for your army would be more than enough to mitigate the unfamiliarity.
I have never had over half the codex that are current, but I have seen enough to know 90% of the dex I dont own. It isn’t a matter of never had a dex so much as having never seen anything about them. I have never had to see paladins in action to know how bad they can be. I just don’t know what weirdness can be pulled from forge world because they have things that don’t function like anything in vanilla 40k ever has . (lucius drop pod) they could be bad, but the possibility of the utter unknown is a lot to deal with.
Absolutely!
There will be players who know little about Gloom Prisms, Psybolt Ammo and Mirror Swords. Let alone all the new combinations.
Discovering Wraithseers can bestow Feel No Pain on Wraithguard should be seen in the same context as learning Dakkajets can hit at BS3 and fire twice.
Plus it’ll be one of the best looking tournaments on the circuit.
Yeah, I agree. I think now is the time to bring all of this into the mainstream. It’s the best opportunity to make it all widely understood which will alleviate the fear people have of it.
Anyone who complains about forgeworld stuff does so out of ignorance. I see no reason not to include it. There’s a lot more ‘broken’ stuff in regular 40k that people put up with in every other game, so why not include the extra variety?
I agree with Frankie that Warlord Traits (and random psychic powers as well) might be easiest to roll for all at once. Every extra roll you save is a minute or two per game. If you make the players roll when they check in and turn in their armylist, the TO can hand them a score sheet and write down what they rolled in pen to prevent cheating.
I also think Nightfight should be assigned to missions. Mission 1 should be at dawn, 2 at mid day, 3 at dusk, etc. Making Nightfight more common is a good think, I think, but it’s one more set of rolls you can streamline away to save time by assigning them to particular missions.
I also agree with the 1 KP per 50pts thing. It’s simple, quick to calculate, and scales well. You can have players note how many KPs each unit is worth on their list to make things easy.
I do think that the combination of Capture and Control objectives and Linebreaker is a little redundant.
I was just thinking today that a viable way to work mysterious terrain types into a tournament format in a fair way would be to have terrain pieces on each table that have a number written on them. At the beginning of each round, you announce to all of the players what type of terrain each of the numbers is for that round. Gets some of the new types into the game in a way that’s mysterious, but you can still deploy around 🙂
I like your idea of bringing Forg World in while everyone is on equal footing relearning everything. I’d say if you want to get FW stuff in, with allies, play at 1750 or 1850. Many armies will be shafted for allies at lower levels. Having a few extra points gets you at least one squad on while still meeting the basics for your army 🙂
We’ve been using the Hammer and Anvil stlye deployment in tournaments in seattle at Tshft for years and once you get used to it, it’s not that bad. I have no problem with FW in 6th, but if you bring FW you need to bring the book with all the rules and let your opponent look at it before the game. I think that will help ease some fears. We are really looking forward to making the trip and going to our first BAO this year.
I agree, I actually like the new deployment. It forces you to look at more outflanking/infiltrating/deepstriking options in order to hit backfield units, and play the game in a generally different way than forming up a nice even battle line. I don’t think it’s particularly difficult to deploy while standing on the long table edges, either.
well everything looks good but arent you worried by changing the warlord trait to roll for which chart you select someone would roll a worthless chart to them? IMHO it should be kept as it is….all the other changes seem good. I wouldnt allow forgeworld since players have a hard of enough time learning all the rules for the normal books without learning the complex broken rules of half of the forgeworld arsenal….hammer and anvil is too broken for somme armies (tau)….and isnt that good so I would leave it out….but using old VP’s when there is a new name attached to BP’s might be confusing so I would leave it out or change its name…..C and C is also a leave out in my oppinion…if anything table quarters, renamed VP’s and 3 objectives should be the name of the game….i like what you did for the bonus point objectives…..as well as banning the fortress of redemption which could be silly in a tournament setting…as for wysiwig honestly why would eldar have an aegis defence line? but a cool converted eldar version would be awesome as well as some fluffy counts as allies would be cool so I wouldnt be too strict on wysiwig…im a fan of suing all the terrain rules you listed but adding a predetirmend number of mysterious woods since the 6th divination power has to do with rolling on that chart…. but keeping this down to two of these woods per table other than that preset terrain is the best set up imho…..good set of tournament rules and I would play them from my perspective and I am worried TO’s will change 6th edition too much for tournaments and this set does not…good job reece and gang
The change to generating psychic powers makes SOOO much sense. Thank you!
I think this will be the first ever event of this size to introduce Forgeworld – best of luck! Finally we can end this vicious cycle of non-inclusion due to non-inclusion elsewhere. I believe you’ll win a lot of people over if you show them the new Imperial Aeronautica book that gives most armies AA and Fliers.
That is my hope, too! We love FW and want to use the stuff more frequently. I hope it works! I think what will happen is not much at all, and most people just bring regular stuff, hahaha.
I would be very happy to see Forge World become mainstream for all the reasons you describe and more. Considering the amount of diversity and potency allies add to the game already, not allowing Forge World in too feels counter-intuitive. Variety of units is the only hard counter to itself. It’s also –as said– a good way to help armies handle flying units.
Speaking of handling flying units… I’d definitely concur about limiting Fortifications to just bastions and defense lines, but from the moment I first read the rules it immediately pissed me off you could only take one Fortification per FOC. Letting armies take 0-3 like a normal FOC selection (or even *gasp* letting fortifications be unlimited and as many as points allow since points spent on terrain are points not spent on units that can win you the game) would be a hard counter to flyers, since you’d have more anti-air, and it would allow for extraordinarily fluffy armies such as an Iron Warriors bunker defense line. Yes you might have extremes like someone coming in able to write their name in aegis defense lines, but if you’re playing at 1,250 or 1,500 I bet they wont have many points left over for any kind of credible army. Really just being able to take two or three Fortifications would be a huge boon for Anti-air and defensive measures.
I admire Frankie’s attempt to honour the spirit of the Warlord Rule, however I feel rather strongly that the Warlord traits were just a flat out dumb place to add randomness (by GW’s own stated goals for the edition) and it would be better to ignore both the letter and the spirit of this rule.
They want to talk about Associative and Disassociative gaming design? I’ll buy that Random Psychic powers are vaguely thematic with the warp and chaos, but randomly determining what your general is good at today is not easily associated with leadership, genius or tactical acumen. Simply letting the Warlord pick their power permanently during list construction seems best to me. Not only does it save everybody time and hassle, it also opens up even more variety in list building, theming and comboing. It is a tactical tool and having control over it is a small blessing considering how wild and wacky the game has gotten. Sure some traits will be picked more than others, but each has its place if you can actually choose them for armies that can take advantage of what they offer.
The single evolving BAO mission is definitely a good call. As is rerolling psychic powers until you get one you can use. Gordy is on point about assigning Night Fight to missions. Using the d3 point increments thing from Pancake Edition for Kill Points might also be worth thinking about, though victory points may still be best. Son of Dorn has an interesting idea about assigning random terrain effects to numbered terrain pieces on a static board, game by game. Combined with the one BAO mission I think that could work quite well. It’s controlled, yet mysterious. Good idea there too I think.
Ultimately, more fortifications allowed for anti-air (though only bastions and defense lines), Forge World inclusion and choosing your Warlord’s trait during list creation would do so much more to open up the game. It’s completing what the Allies Rule started and it needs to be done in my opinion. To merely open up the game somewhat –and then stop halfway– is honestly sorta unbalancing. We all need access to the COMPLETE toolkit now.
Great ideas, and thanks for the feedback.
Yeah, we are trying to alter the game as little as possible while still providing a level playing field. I think we’re honestly just going to have ti wing it at first and then fine tune it as we go.
I think choosing Warlord Traits might be a hair too much in certain situations. For example, taking the power that gives -1 to reserves and then taking an IG OoF to get another -1 would just bone reserve armies. As a TO I am always thinking about those extreme situations as those are what cause problems at a tournament. 90% of the time it;s no big deal, but every know and then you have a situation where someone auto-loses and that just sucks for someone who paid to come.
We have even considered dropping the Warlord Traits, but as I understand it, they are going to be a fairly integral part of the game. I agree though that it is weird that my general today is good at one thing, but tomorrow good at another? Haha, too much random for me.
Again, thanks for the feedback, it is appreciated and helps us get up to speed.
I LOVE the idea of bringing ForgeWorld into the mainstream. It’s long overdue.
You are the man to do this Reece. You can be the champion here. Let’s go!
Thanks! We have been trying to get this to happen for ages as I think in the end it will make the game more fun as we use FW all the time and love it. We find it makes the games more enjoyable and we definitely play competitively. The balance issues don’t bother us as we have actually tried this stuff instead of just theorizing it as a lot of the people against them have. I hope it catches on and I am getting almost all positive feedback on this one this time around, so I am hopeful!
I honestly think these altered rules are pretty much perfect. I know my local gaming group will be adopting these for sure, and I can’t wait to see how it pans out.
I’m still overall a little pessimistic about 6th edition – the reality is, a well thought out rule set shouldn’t require this many alterations just to be playable. I feel like the new rules excessively punish new players – it’d be really easy to hammer newbies with a bunch of invincible fliers, for instance.
Only other thing I could suggest – have you considered banning Fateweaver? He really is just a ridiculous buffer, and with night fighting up he’s pretty much impossible to kill. Just silly if you ask me. Or maybe FAQ him so his re-rolls only apply to invulns? Ugh…
I have concerns that top-end competitive games, even with alterations, may still be pretty one-sided…
Thanks for the feedback and the compliments, it’s appreciated.
As for Space Chicken, yeah, he is crazy, crazy good now. My hope is that the new Chaos dex coming out addresses the insanity of him giving a reroll to CSM units. So far though, we have been able to beat lists using Termies, Oblits and Fateweaver in our test games. It isn’t easy at all, but if he doesn’t come in turn 1, you cna focus fire the termies down. If he does, you have to focus your entire army on him and kill him first. Easier said than done, but not impossible.
I think a lot of it is that we play against Big Bird so much here as Will uses Daemons as his main army that we’re used to it.
Interesting stuff. I like it except the VP thing. I think you can stick with KPs. Here are two reasons why. 1. The super units are REALLY SUPER now, and VP require you to bring them below half to get anything. I just don’t see that happening with most of them. Changing from KPs to VPs will not do anything. You never got a KP off them before, and you wont get any VPs off them now. 2. The BAO style mission is already balanced against super units(Even more so under 6th since a unit can only control/contest one thing). If you sink half your points into the super unit, the opportunity cost is your ability to manage the other two win conditions. To win both the capture and control and sieze ground win conditions requires you to have at least two markers(one of which is unique) uncontested and be contesting the other three. That is potentially five units.
That’s a very good point. If you bring the Deathstar (particularly at 1500) then you will only be able to afford cheap scoring units which the other player can focus on destroying.
Reecius, What about units in the Imperial Armour books such as Shadow Captain Korvydae. IA8 predates the 40k approved stamp so would they be allowed?
I would tentatively say yes, all the characters in the books that I know off of the top of my head are if anything, over priced. The Baddab War books especially are really well balanced for the most part. We’ll have to go back and reread them, but I think the characters would add a lot of fun to the game.
One other thought on flyers. I think a good fix until they update armies with things like flak missiles and stuff is to just make any quad gun you take invulnerable but unable to shoot at all unless manned. Treat it like terrain. You can only take one after all. It is not going to unbalance things if the 6 night scythe army cant destroy it. It would force players to try and kill the unit manning the gun instead of easily destroying the gun itself(which lets be honest, its so easy it makes it not worth taking IMO).
Well, you can take Quad Guns on Bastions, which are REALLY hard to kill. Making them invulnerable though is a bit extreme, I think. I see the point with being able to kill the squad manning it. I think the best solution is more play testing, honestly.
Any points limit is fine by me. We just need to know as far in advance as possible.
None of our group want to face Forge world due to the unfamiliarity of the models and their rules.
I think the vast majority will prefer allies to be allowed.
The Warlord idea is great about rolling first, then picking which chart to utilize.
I am fine with “counts as” as long as it is WYSIWYG.
Thanks for the feedback!
On the FW issue, if we allow it and require that players bring the rules for the unit, and keep points values low with time limits longer, it will make for an easy way to acclimate, I think. I have been to a lot of tournaments that allow FW and honestly, most people don;t even bring them. If we can get it to be normal, then people will get used to it.
I think each player’s Command Post (40mm base)should give Skyfire… and maybe only to heavy weapons like Reaper Cannons and Auto Cannons and Heavy Bolters.
You guys (as TOs) could pick 2 Warlord traits before each match (or the entire event) begins. The person who goes second gets to pick the one they want and the person that goes first gets the other.
I’d say make the VP calc for every 100 army points killed = +1 VP. Math is easier. But, the calc starts at 0, i.e. if you kill only one Space Marine the entire game you get 1 VP. If you kill 100 points of Space marines you get 2 VP, This would mean the guy who kills 1499 gets 15 VP and the guy who kills 1500 gets 16 VP.
Having the Skyfire unit in your deployment zone is a bit too easy, IMO. I think you should have to earn that point for it to not be an auto No-Flyer type situation.
I think we will go with a tiered VP system though, thanks Rich. See you tomorrow, buddy!
I really do think that you need to use KP’s. Right now, the BAO missions encourage MSU with the number of objectives, with nothing to balance that out. KP’s make a player at least consider not taking a MSU army as they will be hampered in that part of the mission. VP’s do nothing to curb MSU (in fact they even encourage it more) so with the current mission setup, there is no reason to not take MSU.
Yeah, we just discussed that exact point in the Podcast (which is incoming). I think we will end up going with a hybrid system where a unit is worth a number of KP based on its points cost. This is the best compromise between the two, IMO.
If you remember, VP’s based on the number of points was how it was done back in 2nd edition. The problem is that it is really easy to game. Make everything 199 pts (or 299 or 399 etc), and you are basically trading one flawed system for another. Yeah, it’s weird that a paladin death star is worth the same as a unit of grots, but KP’s are the best way to give a drawback to an MSU style army.
True, but we were thinking of a breakpoint much lower, like 25 or 50 pts. That way it is not nearly as easy to game and it still punishes MSU. The armies that will have lots of units at 50-100 points will have a disproportionately higher amount of KP in their lists, thus punishing MSU but not benefiting Deathstars.
Idea for warlord trait: Prior to the tourney, custom make your own table; pick a roll of a 1 on any table, same for 2, and so on. You now have a customized predetermined warlord table of 1-6. You could have all one table, a mixture of two or a concoction of all 3! It is balanced because, IMO, all tables are equally rated 1-6 with 1 being the lesser and 6 being the greater.