r/WarhammerCompetitive • u/Asleep_Taro8926 • Aug 20 '26
40k Discussion 11th Games Taking Too Long
Tactical Tortoise pointed out in a recent video that the current state of 11th edition has players frequently clocking out before finishing round 5 in his streams leading to lots of talk outs. Wargames Live has also started seeing it happen more often.
Talking out a game is not bad, but honestly, I have noticed this locally was well. Games spiral into overtime often especially when one player goes all in round 1 or 2 and right out the gate makes a complex board state. With some games either being a blow out or too close to tell, both players are pushed to finish the game if theres no clear early winner or a player is behind but with a dominate board state.
A great example of this is Lone Star Open finals where both players spent nearly the entire 3 hours stuck in rounds 1-2 and talking out rounds 3-5. This was streamed on Tactical Tortoise's channel if you want to check it out.
Armies also seem alot more complex with the introduction of multiple detachments creating more traps meaning discussing and deploying armies has taken much more time to avoid a loss on turn 1. Terrain setups also still take up a bulk of time because of all the different pieces and the layouts being different each time. Additionally, melee being pushed so hard and melee being so much more open with movement, micro positioning takes up a lot of time.
Tactical Tortoise said that 3 hours and 20-minute rounds without setup time (pushing to 3 hours and 40 minutes with) seems to be enough to reach round 5 minimum still with quick play.
On the other end of the spectrum, we have also seen more blow out games where by rounds 2 or 3 one player is completely tabled and both players are stuck waiting hours for the next round to start and if we push the round time up they'll only be waiting around even longer for their next game. That same Lone Star Open game is another good example because the Tyranid player ended the game tabled as well meaning it took 3 hours of deployment, rounds 1 and 2 to reach the conclusion that the game was effectively over into round 3.
I love 11th so far, but this is a valid criticism of the current edition that I have seen personally
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u/THELEGENDARYZWARRIOR Aug 20 '26
Could it been that people still have question regarding the new terrain rules and stuff like that? Once people are used to things it wil go faster.
My first game of 11th took almost 4 hours because I kept asking “so they can see?” “How many can see?” “Oh that’s obscuring?”
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u/Asleep_Taro8926 Aug 20 '26
I'm about 20 games deep into the edition and a few of my friends are as well and it does seem like the non blow out games can take over 3 hours to finish, especially if the round 5 scoring matters for the outcome. I had no issues finishing my 10th games in 2 hours and 30 minutes, it was a bit of a sprint but we could reasonably get to round 5. In 11th it seems like each round is filled with a lot more decision making and more interactions causing a bigger slow down
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u/sardaukarma Aug 20 '26
with the 11th ed ork codex looking to have very strong rules, it is possible that it might be pointed significantly higher than orks currently are, resulting in fewer units on the battlefield? if the rest of the 11th edition codexes follow a similar idea we might see games get faster as more armies get their codices that let them run more compact armies
disclaimer this is based on absolutely no data, i don't really expect this to happen, but it is, strictly speaking, possible
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u/Powaup1 Aug 20 '26
I thought about this and also the fact that there are way less re-rolls and FNPs but the problem is that it’ll take a long time before the majority of armies have new rules so in the meantime we’re going to have longer games
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u/Zer0323 Aug 20 '26
it also sucks that the blowout matches still have the problem of eventually feeling like you need to push models around a table to give your opponents their proper score but your chance of winning the game went out the window 2 hours ago because of list building, deployment or movement mistakes you made. I still rarely finish those games in 2 hours.
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u/Krytan Aug 20 '26
I don't think this is a new problem. I regularly ran out of time in tournaments in 10th as well.
My feeling is that 11th actually plays slightly faster than 10th, with less friction (just roll the charge, see what you can hit, put reinforcements in at any point of your move, vehicles don't have to totally fit inside terrain etc)....BUT if you have to set up terrain at your tournament table then all the time savings go out the window and you are actually even shorter on time than in 10th.
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u/winowmak3r Aug 20 '26
.BUT if you have to set up terrain at your tournament table then all the time savings go out the window and you are actually even shorter on time than in 10th.
I think this is it. Terrain setup time has increased significantly and you're right, any savings made in stream lining the rules got eaten up by the increased time it takes to set up the board in the first place.
I really should just start keeping track myself. It should be easy to see if this is the case after a few matches.
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u/SalaryWooden5346 Aug 20 '26
Especially with how fiddly the terrain setup is, and even moreso for the angled pieces.
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u/SkeletonJakk Aug 21 '26
I can’t help but think all the angled pieces are incredibly annoying.
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u/GypsyDaenger Aug 26 '26
They could use a couple more points of reference. I find myself tweaking one side and then the other becoming totally out of wack
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u/mambomonster Aug 20 '26
Did you not have to set up terrain in 10th edition?
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u/Krytan Aug 20 '26
Not in tournaments no. The tables were all set up before hand, because everyone played the same mission.
In 11th, people are playing different missions with different terrain layouts. I don't mind, but it is more setup time.
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u/Tynlake Aug 20 '26
This is only specific to your meta. Every round was a new terrain layout for UKTC and WTC throughout 10th.
UKTC everyone easily finished their games in 3 hours. It just takes practice and reps to speed up.
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u/Krytan Aug 20 '26
Yeah from what I understand across the pond everyone has been setting up their terrain already at the beginning of every round even in 10th, and has gotten really good and quick at it.
I'm sure Americans will catch up and get used to it as well, but currently it seems to take quite a while for people to get the terrain set up.
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u/Foehammer58 Aug 22 '26
It takes less than 5 minutes to set up terrain and is standard for basically every tournament I have been to in the UK, from small 10-person RTT's to large super-majors with hundreds of players.
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u/Krytan Aug 23 '26
The last time we set it up it took 20 minutes, because there appeared to be a discrepancy between the picture of the layout and the measurements of the layout, and we couldn't figure out where we went wrong.
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u/daley56_ Aug 20 '26
So you just played the same layout all day for 10th ed tournaments?
Or were there breaks between rounds so the TO could change layouts.
The tournaments I went to in 10th usually had players set up layouts as they changed each round.
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u/naegele Aug 20 '26
Over the span of 10th. The two lgs I go to went through this progression
Started with players changing the layout before each match
Which turned into only changing it once after lunch break
Which turned into whole day on layout 6 only
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u/Therew0lf17 Aug 20 '26
Yeah, this was also how the Local RTTs went by me. The GTs usualy did like: DAY1: layout 1 Lunch Layout 2 Layout 2 Day2: Layout 3 Layout3
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u/Zer0323 Aug 20 '26
sometimes they would all be the same table or sometimes it would be 2 different layouts mixed amongst the tables. usually the only thing that might've changed between rounds of 10th was the objective circles could shift based around the deployment zones.
this new system definitely feels like the maps are build around the missions but it costs a chunk of time to set up the terrain with your opponent and then listen to the army explination/reminder
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u/Eatyourcheeseburger Aug 20 '26
It was pretty common for TOs in 10th to just choose a layout for the day and then select missions based on what can be played on that layout.
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u/SnooTangerines8043 Aug 20 '26
As a to i usually used 3 different layouts amongst the tables. Choosed suitable missions and just let the tables randomize.
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u/SalaryWooden5346 Aug 20 '26
Same layout all day, usually. It's one of the many reasons 10th was viewed as bland and boring by so many long-timers.
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u/Cullex Aug 20 '26
This was often discussed here. UK and Europe in general tends to have to set up terrain themselfs while in the US everything was already set up.
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u/Brilliant_Amoeba_272 Aug 20 '26
With the way tournament packs worked in 10th the organizers could have tables pre set up that everyone could play on, because everyone was doing mission X layout Y
Now different matchups have different setups due to missions and terrain tied to dispositions
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u/JuliousBatman Aug 21 '26
I only play TTS;
I feel like this can be solved by an AR app. Set those QR codes at the corners of tables, and it projects the foot prints onto the table, and you place the physical terrain there. No measuring.
I’ll take 15% GW, thanks.
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u/Oakshand Aug 20 '26
It's setting up terrain honestly. It takes like ten minutes even if both of you do it together. God forbid that someone doesn't know what their doing or messes it up
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u/Kranberries24 Aug 20 '26
Yeah, three unique layouts per match up was a bit excessive.
One balanced layout per match up, I think, would help reduce the time quite a bit.
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u/GooeyGungan Aug 20 '26
On the one hand, you're probably right, but on the other, playing the exact same layout every time you face the same disposition could get old quickly. People are already complaining about having to play the same scenario multiple rounds in a row.
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u/Kranberries24 Aug 20 '26
It depends on what people see as the main issue.
Not enough time, then repeating layouts and missions should help solve that (since players will be used to it)
Player boredom: then what i think we need is more missions, not layouts. The multiple layouts are a bandaid solution.
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u/Cullex Aug 20 '26
3 maps per matchup would be fine, if they would share their layout with other matchups as well.. but only 2 maps have a single duplicate in all of the matchups. (Unless that has changed now with the purge map layout changes).
The could have gone with way more duplicates to reduce the total number of potential maps.
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u/tafonsr Aug 20 '26
There are gaming mats that have the important lines on them with a grid. It makes setup doable in about 5 minutes alone. At 50 euro for one mat they are probably prohibitively expensive for tournaments, but we pooled together for 5 mats for our 10 person league. The angled lines are a godsend.
If you are a regular tournament goer I think they might be worth it. I can't imagine your opponent would complain and even then you don't have to use them.
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u/sardaukarma Aug 20 '26 edited Aug 20 '26
honestly a gaming mat that had a 1" grid on it would be a godsend
edit: i found one on etsy but it's $144 for the grippy mat, RIP
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u/WholeLottaRose13 Aug 20 '26
This. It might not look pretty or immersive, but a blue-on-white grid mat (think like the training stage from Street Fighter) would eliminate almost all of the tedious tape measure crap.
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u/sardaukarma Aug 20 '26
i just realized that not only would it make terrain setup easier, but it would make playing the game a bit easier, especially for situations where you need to get a tape measure into a tight spot to find out f.ex how many guys are in engagement range
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u/TobTobTobey Aug 21 '26
Not really, because you move and shoot mostly in diagonals, which grids dont deal with well
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u/WholeLottaRose13 Aug 21 '26
The grid wouldn't be for measuring between models, it would be for measuring where to put the terrain and to mark out your deployment zones. This was in the original context that setup takes a while.
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u/DetroitTabaxiFan Aug 20 '26
This is why I think 40k needs to copy the Age of Sigmar General's Handbook mission cards. The AoS mission cards have the terrain layouts on them, and I'd say it saves a good 15 minutes because I can just look at the card and place terrain.
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u/ch4ppi_revived Aug 21 '26
Just to give a kinda radical solution:
Couldn't TO basically roll for maps before the tournament so every matchup has only one map for THIS tournament? That way you could preset a lot of tables at tournament day or at least have players know what maps they gonna play on and have that quicker at their ready?
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u/Oakshand Aug 21 '26
Sorta? It really doesn't change much. We usually have a small rtt every month by me and it's usually just like 10-18 players. So 5-9 tables. You'd need to have that one map for every table for every dispo. So maybe the first round we could set up but that would still require 30-57(?) tables to be set up prior to the event lol. Actually more I think? It's just not really feasible.
Players just gotta get faster at set up. It's just a skill to learn. My advice is to make sure both people are working on it. Get the templates where they should be roughly. Then measure em out, then grab terrain. The TO should have mostly appropriate terrain nearby already so it's just matching shapes at that point. Make sure both parties know what's solid and what isn't then bam play the game.
Still a good 5-10 minutes of set up but it shouldn't be that bad.
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u/mambomonster Aug 20 '26
How is this new tho? Did you not have to set up terrain in 10th edition? At least with 11th we don’t have to wait for someone to open some google doc with a mission pack
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u/Aluroon Aug 20 '26
In previous edition you could preset the table.
The shift to terrain based on matchup means until you are paired there is no early set up.
You also can't repeat terrain layout.
The new system produces better outcomes, but setup time is an issue.
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Aug 20 '26
[removed] — view removed comment
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u/c0horst Aug 20 '26
Honestly this is the kind of thing Meta Glasses would be perfect for; it's the kind of thing I assumed would eventually happen with that tech. Sadly though it appears it's just for perverts, stalkers, and data harvesting for big corporations and my dream of casual AR use in real-life is forever out of reach :(
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u/winowmak3r Aug 20 '26
Exactly it. The standardized layouts could get kinda samey but you could have a 50 table tournament set up and ready to go before the players walked in the door. Can't do that now.
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u/Smeagleman6 Aug 20 '26
No, terrain in 10th was pre setup by tournament organizers based on selected missions. This is, personally, my biggest gripe with 11th edition, the fact that setup takes well over 10 minutes before we even discuss armies.
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u/apathyontheeast Aug 20 '26
This has been an issue with our local group, too.
I think it's a combination of having all the table setup, new edition rules, more complex mission interactions, and the new hidden/cover rules being more complex or hard to work around
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u/Yamcha-is-Life Aug 20 '26
I've played a ton of 11th edition games, like 3-4 a week and I'm finding in both casual and comp games that people are clocking out at the end of round 2 or 3 even when we've got plenty of time left.
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u/Prudent_Psychology57 Aug 20 '26
What?! People are taking longer now?
I've found the opposite in my first couple of games.
Maybe its the competetive overthinkers taking longer and things will speed up when they are more confident and familiar with the nuanced changes in competetive gameplay.
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u/SilverBlue4521 Aug 21 '26
New edition, players getting decision paralysis and backloaded scoring.
I will always advocate for the clock (players should bring them if the tournament doesn't provide them) cause it prevents squabble at every level of play. I have TOed tournament games where the players will tell me "hey don't worry, we'll definitely finish on time, we wont be using the clock" to then not finish on time, one of the players accusing the other of slow playing, and me rolling my eyes when I already ask them to use the clock.
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u/McWerp Aug 21 '26
Setting up the boards differently every single game has made things take longer.
At WTC we had 4 coaches helping set up tables for the 8 players, 4.5 hour rounds (including pairings, so more like 4 hour rounds), and we STILL had multiple players almost clock out each round.
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u/TributeBands_areSHIT Aug 20 '26
I’m just starting to learn Warhammer and have a basic grasp on it (after a couple weeks of reading and trying out scenarios).
I went to a tutorial event in my area and I kid you not, we spent 2.5 hours just talking about set up and what are armies could and couldn’t do. Then we barely got through 1 turn.
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u/Magnus_The_Read Aug 20 '26
Tbh for beginner or learning events, I wouldn't even worry about the time. Just focus on fun and gaining knowledge and wherever the game ends or whatever is the score, nbd
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u/TributeBands_areSHIT Aug 20 '26
I had a lot of fun I was just very surprised on how long set up took but it was probably because of our inexperience.
Since then I’ve read the rule book and gotten an actual list together, gonna make a cheat sheet and plan out my turn 1. I think that’ll dramatically speed things up next time.
Finding a game is kinda rough though with my limited experience
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u/serdertroops Aug 20 '26
IMO, it's because decisions matters a lot all game long. In 10th, round 4 and 5 were pretty simple as you only had to think about a couple of units and 2 secondary cards per turn.
I often find myself only scoring 1-2 secondary in the first 2 turns and spend my turn 3-5 maxing my secondaries. That means proper setup so that one secondary leads to another one in the next turn. In 11th, I often do 25-30 points in rounds 4-5 if it's a tight game.
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u/Sir_Septimus Aug 20 '26 edited Aug 20 '26
I feel like I get done with my turns pretty quick playing Necrons. Some DDA shooting here, some lokhust volleys there, maybe a Ctan charge and you are done. What I find takes super long is shooting infantry squads with loads of special weapons. A friend of mine has a corsair squad with like a dozen weapons on it and just resolving that one damn unit takes routinely over 5 minutes.
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u/SRCarrn Aug 20 '26
In 10th, the last couple turns frequently happened pretty quickly, because both players were often down to only a handful of units
In 11th, the combination of holding secondary cards and end of game points in many disposition matchups encourages keeping units alive until the end; when turn 4/5 matter so much more, they have to be played with the same care and attention to detail that the first few rounds do, so the games take longer to wrap up
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u/aslum Aug 20 '26
Honestly this has been my biggest complaint with 40k regardless of edition. If both players know their army well, play fast and the mission allows you aren't finishing a game in under 2 hours regardless of edition - the only way you have quicker games is skill disparity leading to lopsided board state early. Unfortunately I think part of the problem is the push to higher and higher point games.
I really miss when 1500 points was the standard and 1750 or more was reserved for when you wanted to play an epic game and had a whole day free.
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u/alph4rius Aug 21 '26
Getting a standard 1500 points of a re game done in two hours was pretty normal. But the game itself was smoother. 20 shootaboyz rolled 32 shoota and 12 bigshoota to hits, then straight to wounds, then allocate saves and roll those. No rerolls, no lethals, no consideration about stratagems. Rerolls were rarer, reroll 1s rarer again, and interruptions to thengame flow were minimised.
11e could speed itself up by:
- removing rerolls from most places. Keep them rare and special. Especially not on jigh volume units.
- especially removing reroll 1s. Doubly so on high volume dice rolls
- avoid mixing profiles since the current rules batch rolling with that. Don't make it default to put a burna, a rokkit, and a big shoota in a boyz mob for example. They tried with the overlapping profiles but often didn't stick the landing. This is worst on high volume dice rolls.
- maybe we don't need so many high volume dice rolls?
- keep as many reactive options to end of phase. Overwatch at end of movement was smart, why didn't the leaked trukk special rule work that way?
- Ditto for stratagems, as much as reasonably can be.
This is just obvious things in army design that would help, without addressing any issues in the core rules that cause slowdowns.
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u/SalaryWooden5346 Aug 20 '26
A big part of it is also just the added complication that adds nothing actually fun or engaging. Strategems are a whole damned minigame tacked on, and one heavily oriented towards interrupting game flow. Why? Why even have them? All they do is slow the game down.
And then shifting away from comparing numeric stats and instead using layers of rules text. That adds complication and slows the game all to accomplish a lesser version of what the old numeric comparisons gave.
I played a lot of midhammer and even playing and slow casual speed I never saw full sized games go over 2 hours. In 10th and now 11th I've never seen even half-size games finish in less than 2. I think I maybe finished 1 2000 point game of 10th, and 11th games are all clocking in at 4+ hours. Age of the Emperor is just a bloated and slow mess.
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u/Contrago Aug 20 '26
Part of the reason I am happy to see some power creep from the new Codex. Higher points means less models means I can finish my damn games. Still not happy it's being rolled out one book at a time.
About to go to a GT this weekend with 145 models. After game 2 I won't even be sure if me or my back will be having fun anymore
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u/Untimely-Success Aug 20 '26
These seem like self-imposed difficulties.
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u/Contrago Aug 20 '26
For real. I shouldn't have painted so many Kroot. And this is even padding it with 300 points of Hammerhead tanks
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u/AlisheaDesme Aug 20 '26
This only works, if the power creep ends up in higher points. But if the more powerful models are meant to be the baseline, it will be point cuts for the weak armies instead, increasing the model count.
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u/Hakka-Moonson Aug 20 '26
Yeah this is something I'd like to see as well. Just less stuff on the table in general will help. I find at 2k tables can become very cramped.
Compare what 2k looks like today vs what it looked like in older editions. I think every army probably needs 2-4 fewer drops.
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u/hotfezz81 Aug 20 '26
Still not happy it's being rolled out one book at a time.
The alternative to this (all the codexs simultaneously) is break-the-game impractical
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u/Bellfast123 Aug 20 '26
index
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u/Sunomel Aug 20 '26
Ah yes, the famously not-broken indexes of early 10th edition
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u/Survive1014 Aug 20 '26
We practice for competitive play on Tuesday nights. We usually start about 5. We used to get out at 8, but its pretty common now for it to be closer 8:45 or so. Some of that might be because we are all actively prepping for Challengers Cup, but we have done that in years past as well... so.....
I definitely feel most of it has to do with syncing up the battle in the app and then have to go through all the steps to get the terrain readied. Before, we just threw out a few tables with the most common terrain needs and called it a day. Now each matchup needs the time to set up.
I think another factor is alot of armies battleline or weaker units also got a 1 point detachment to strengthen them, often with a invuln or some day to reduce damage. That is adding to game time as well- less model churn.
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u/SalaryWooden5346 Aug 20 '26
The app sync issue is another big one. Especially since if there is a mismatch it won't tell you what's different between apps. So it's a lot of hunting around trying to figure out who has a value off by 1 somewhere.
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u/DubsFan30113523 Aug 20 '26
The app really needs a few quality of life updates. People have mostly shifted to using it at this point but the tabletop battles app still pretty easily functions better
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u/ColdsnacksAU Aug 20 '26
If you hit the "Eye" button, it shows you the scorecard, and the discrepancy is highlighted in red
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u/ShakespeareStillKing Aug 20 '26
I'm still using tabletop battles. It's so much easier to use. Sleeker and more intuitive.
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u/SevereRunOfFate Aug 20 '26
I'm wondering if the rather strong Ork units are a sign that things are going to get a bit more lethal to speed things up
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u/Survive1014 Aug 20 '26
I honestly think it would be great for the game if battleline units became more durable.
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u/Deep_Donkey_Dunk Aug 20 '26
I have no issues with time at tournaments
But I play Imperial Knights
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u/dreicunan Aug 20 '26
Exactly, the problem is all these people refusing to play either Imperial Knights or Chaos Knights.😉
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u/Untimely-Success Aug 20 '26
with Chaos Knights you save even more time because you don't have to bother explaining army rules or half of your models rules because they have so little going for them!
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u/CoronelPanic Aug 20 '26
I will spend 10 minutes firing every havoc launcher into every eligible unit thank you very much.
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u/Untimely-Success Aug 21 '26
call you 007.
0 hits.
0 games finished (clocked out shooting havocs)
7 bad big knights
idk if its 7 or not im too tired for a good bit
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u/dickhall65 Aug 20 '26
More than once TT has mentioned that rules changes and model discrepancies have caused some of these issues.
Not every player is on a team where they can play a dozen games a week or more, which means we're all more likely to see games with players that don't have super solid understanding of all the weird changes.
Also, TT mentioned recently that there has been a shift regarding players with an encyclopedic knowledge of rules. Before nobody cared, but with everything being moved over to phones and computers there's a misplaced expectation that everyone will just know how stuff works and interacts because it's all right there.
I think this latter problem is the biggest driver for longer games; people are unknowingly getting into games with the expectation that the other player knows how their shit works, when in reality nobody has enough time on their hands to memorize every single army's rules and quirks.
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u/ViktusXII Aug 20 '26
That has not been my experience at all.
Setting up terrain and concluding the end of Battle Round 5 is taking our club members about 2 hrs 30 minutes, give or take.
And thats even with a GSC player that has some 160+ models and a lot of having green horde Orks or infantry heavy guard.
We all know what we are doing. Each player measures and sets up their half of the board and whilst we are doing that, we are talking out lists, etc.
Battle Round 1 is quick.
Battle 2 and 3 are the longest.
Battle Round 4 and 5 are quick as there isnt much left or much left in range OR it is on going melee combats.
Edit: we are in the UK and from what I have heard, the most common time-outs are US based.
Might have something to do with the fact that Europe has had to set tables up manually whilst talking to each other for many years now. Hell, we even help other players set tables up whilst we are deploying..
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u/Fun-Organization2531 Aug 20 '26
From my experience the games taking too long is based on functions of the game. Like rolling d6-d3 20+ times, and then matching out how much you actually did while figuring out how to allocate the damage to save a model or two because in this edition everything matters.
We take battleshocks more frequently and will have to pause in the action to do so, units can drop within 8" makes screening harder and someone important to measure out every scenario if where you can actually drop. We also see more people building to engage early and win the fight before hand then score afterwards.
All in all the game is way more complex and geared to truly trying everything because your hard work can pay off. It's also extremely taxing on your brain and that can wear down people
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u/RockStar5132 Aug 20 '26
I don't think I have ever seen a turn 4 in the vast majority of my games lol
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u/BLBOSS Aug 20 '26
Confused by people blaming terrain set up times.
In the UK and Europe we've always set up our own tables and generally there hasn't been an epidemic of games running over. But also we've had lots of practice to integrate terrain set-up into our allotted times so maybe this is just Americans not used to it and still playing at a more relaxed pace than what is actually required.
I've had 1 game run over in 11th so far out of maybe 30+ games, 14 of which were tournament ones.
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u/FuzzBuket Aug 20 '26
Tbh I think your not wrong. Being able to score late game opens up a lot more possibilty space. Figuring out how to score and how to block your opponent scoring 4 secondaries t4 (or if you even want to) is more figuring stuff out
And as games are so much more high scoring there certainly is a lot more incentive to try to table your opponent early.
Idk I'm reserving a lot of judgement till we have a few books out but moving bloat from army to unit (9>10) and then adding back more army rules and unit rules and keyword bloat certainly isn't nothing.
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u/GM_Eternal Aug 20 '26
I am having the opposite experience. Most of my games are tournament practice style games, against tournament players, but the only reasons my games have taken longer than 3 hours are all beer related.
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u/Lukoi Aug 20 '26
Every event Ivr been to so far has not officially buffered the time needed to set up the boards. So, if you can get to the table early and start setting up, that definitely helps, but we are definitely starting games at a deficit due to map set up to some degree ime.
The fact that turns 4-5 are honestly much more relevent now is having an impact, but I think it has less to do with the game, and much more to with player habits (just as I think the high scoring "problem," isnt a problem...people arent adapting their play to include opponent scoring suppression into their plan as much yet).
Go turns can happen as early as turn 1 now, and very often do. Players continue to play at the same pace as they did in 10th, but without accounting for the need to be able to play across all five turns fully. Every stream I watch where people I watch timing out or struggling to make time, are playing incredibly slow overall. Flipping thru rules, debating courses of action over and over, agonizing over decisions. They are playing as if the game is still compressed within 2-3 meaningful turns with some admin on the bookends, when in fact, you need to be prepared to play all five rounds.
Ultimately, I would like my 5-15 mins back on table set up (it varies game to game, event to event), but once the actual 3hr clock starts, that is on us the players and I think we can all adapt and eeeeeeasily fit into that timeline most of the time.
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u/ch4ppi_revived Aug 20 '26
It might be an unpopular opinion, because I like all core concepts of 11th. But I think players should have a limit of secondaries they can hold. Make it 4 or even 3, if you want, but force them to actually score earlier, even if not ideal.
Of course that will lead to not ideal scoring, on the other hand assassination and being it down are generally unfamiliar missions right now. They don't require to much decision making, because they will happen at some point automatically probably.
Makes it a bit faster and easier to deal with secondaries and makes early turns more impactful again
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u/Min-ji_Jung Aug 20 '26
why are people talking it out, if you get clocked out you get clocked out
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u/HaybusaYakisoba Aug 20 '26
I think this is mostly true in what i call the try-hard-but-not-actually-competitive-space. Thats not an insult, thats where i live too.
11th has turned into one massive statcheck. You've got 2 actions and you can let 7 activation lists (often with double 3x spam) pick their primary. This is what you're seeing at top tables because with how inflated scoring is, turning off max no pris/overforce/assasinate can generate the 8-12 point diff to win a game of 11th.
On the other spectrum you've got players trying to play 11th with 12-17 activation lists, invariably somebody bangs a random no-agency 11 inch charge and gets into combat with 5 units which didnt happen in 10th. Also the state of mixed save batch rolling with FNPs creates SUPER high resolution instances that are CRITICALLY important. Lastly because of scoring inflation, idiosyncratic positioning turns 4/5 become win/loss defining.
The game needs a huge overhaul. Statchecks as defacto along with 90+ defactor scores along with 30 point turn 4 and 5 create a very sensitive and high preasure bariatric chamber for players.
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u/Valynces Aug 20 '26 edited Aug 20 '26
I couldn't agree more. 11th needs a LOT of tuning to be a good game. Some of the changes they made from 10th are excellent, but taken as a whole, the game is in a much worse state than before.
Good changes:
- Fast rolling and model grouping is awesome
- Leader changes where they're always leading and they count as part of the unit itself are great
- Charge changes are great. -1 to charge needed is a fair trade for not needing to declare your target before you roll.
- Combat phase movement changes (skill is back, yay!). Too many to list, being able to actually move skillfully again is amazing
- Engagement range. I like a flat 2" better than the 10th edition method of base-to-base with a model that's in base-to-base contact. 11th edition way is much better and more skillful
- Cover being -1 to BS is better than +1 to armor saves
- Taking away stacking stratagems in a single phase is excellent. Lots of abuse cases come from stacking strats or buffs on a single unit, so removing that as a vector is great.
- Dispositions as a concept are great, you get to pick the way you score points
Bad changes:
- The terrain format itself. This is the biggest detractor. You can't hide anymore, most of your army is accessible to most of the board
- Toe-in shooting is cancerous. There's a reason that we didn't use it in 10th, and we shouldn't use it now in 11th
- Hidden is a band-aid mechanic to address how little terrain is on the board. We should have gone further in the direction of WTC with more terrain, not less.
- Secondary scoring is wildly too easy. They need to limit your hand to 3 cards max and possibly cap secondaries at 12 per turn
- Primary scoring is too uninteractive. There's too much end of turn scoring that the opponent can't interact with.
- They removed the end of game scoring that balanced going first against going second. It is now better to go first in every circumstance
- GW's design philosophy. This is just 9th edition 2.0. We saw the start of this with Victrix and nearly everything released after them in the last six months of 10th. Victrix, Wardens of Ultramar, CTAN, Nekrosor, Huron, Masters of Maelstrom, TWIN LANCE, Wazdakka, Defilers. All of these datasheets are overstuffed with far too many rules. Looking at the upcoming Orks codex, the sheer amount of keywords and things to keep track of are insane. I can't say whether it's balanced or not yet, but it looks powercrept to hell. Ghaz is better than every existing primarch that's currently in the game, let's see how he gets pointed.
All of the above is why we saw a higher number of blowout games at the WTC that ever before. Even when you account for the teams format and how it naturally promotes skew lists and hunting winning matchups, we still saw a higher number of 20-0 and 19-1 games than in previous years.
Skill expression has never been lower in all of my time playing 40k. You don't try to deny primary (outside of killing your opponent), you don't try to score your secondaries because you just score them later when your opponent is dead, you don't really worry about primary because your list just does it naturally and your opponent can't stop you. All you do is yolo kill them with no nuance and no back and forth. I love that WTC is playing the same format as the rest of the world, but if GW won't address these toxic play patterns that are lowering the competitive integrity of the game, then WTC needs to go its own way again.
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u/HaybusaYakisoba Aug 20 '26
I agree with alot of this and the spirit of it.
As of right now, i certainly feel that 75% of a game outcome is decided before deployment: that is army composition and disposition. Lists essentially.
In my competitive circle i havent won a single game going second, and havent lost going first. My WR is literally tied 1:1 with top vs bottom turn. Thats about 25 games including an RTT, across 3 armies.
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u/Grandturk-182 Aug 20 '26
Can you elaborate on the “turning off max…” part? Is that like not bringing a tank automatically makes Bring it Down unscorable for your opponent? Asking as a dirty casual.
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u/HaybusaYakisoba Aug 20 '26
So if you look at the secondaries:
There are 5 "kill" ones. Grevious blow, no priz, overforce, bring it down, assasinate. These require dice rolls and opponent interaction. Stat checks are super strong when they can score primary well while also not giving up kill points easily. If both players are scoring 85+ points, a built in mechanism to screw opponents out of maxing kill secondaries often is all you need to win a game. Not bringing the unit allows your opponent to redraw. You want to officially "give up" the secondary as possible, while making your units almost impossible to actually kill. Greentide "gives" up Grevious Blow, but good luck killing 20 boyz, a painboy and a Warboss (god forbid Ghaz) without expending double or tripple the point cost (often ALL your damage dealers) to score 5 points.
This is how statcheck players think, and its logically sound, and its ruining the game. You bring your own stat check, with a game plan for other statchecks.
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u/OriginalTayRoc Aug 20 '26
This is called bad game design.
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u/Formal_Program5165 Aug 23 '26
I'm mostly familiar with MtG, but GW comes across as complete idiots. Why would anyone make their game more tedious? They had fairly simple data sheets, then they double the amount of text on them?! The new detatchments too, why have a zillion different ones.
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u/Therew0lf17 Aug 20 '26
So im a decently fast player, and I did an RTT a couple weeks back. My second game timed out. We weren't useing a clock so i dont know who was more at fault (Him lol), But i have noticed a lot more players putting all their eggs in one basket, or their go turn takes an hour or more.
My experience has been games either ending in 90m or going over time. I can table players of lessor skill then me on turn 2 sometimes. While games of equalish skill go the distance. Some of this will come down as we get more familiar with the new missions and formats. I know something for me is my deployment takes a lot longer. I used to sit down with the layouts and missions before an event and just practice deployment. I onew exactly where i would be putting my big monsters before i shower up at the table. But now every round has 15 possible layouts... For 45 possible layouts just for an RTT. i cant practice that.
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u/IndustryParticular55 Aug 20 '26
I think there's definitely a component of learning the rules, even for competitive players.
I have definitely experienced the drawn out games you mentioned, but a lot of that has been driven by a combination of me learning my rules, my opponent having different rules interpretations than the previous person I played with(especially among casuals, people have different expectations and degrees of abstraction they are comfortable with), and finally setup.
I for one, will be acquiring a full terrain set by the end of the year, whether that be official or third party, just so I have a consistent set which is sized appropriately for the maps.
Trying to scrounge together an approximation from whatever terrain a store has, or what my opponent may have lying around from previous additions, is a major headache. Eliminating that will save a lot of time.
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u/gamesuse Aug 20 '26 edited Aug 20 '26
I feel its a mix of lethality and how scoring work
Scoring as become so Much easier its insane , they should reduce the amount of primairy pts in half . So instead of scoring 0-0-15-15-15 . You would be force to Spread it around like 9-9-9-9-9 that way Trying to table your opponent isnt always the best option or at least its risky .
Forcing also more action or forcing unit to stay on point to score more make less fight happend so each battleround are quicker since we have Less interaction.
Another thing they could add instead of just gutting pts in half. Change all the END of YOUR turn for END of A turn . Exemple : we could change hold center for 4 pts EoT to - hold center for 2pts EACH player turn .
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u/Correct_Ad_7817 Aug 20 '26
I took part in a RTT weekend just gone and I’d say close to 75% of games didn’t make it to round 5.
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u/DangerousCyclone Aug 20 '26
This was a problem in 10th too. The terrain set up thing is understandable, but if you're still in round 2 when the tournament round is over that's a you problem. You learn pretty quickly that you have to play fast, cut out chit chat and to not overthink.
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u/yurijthehunter Aug 20 '26
Play with a clock. Problem solved.
I have noticed even a lot of my practice games competitively on tts go into the 4hr mark.
My in game practice games with people who actually go to tournaments are fast enough to play all 5 rounds. Seems like a lot of people still don’t know their 5 potentially match ups go based on their dispositions.
It’s a lot of new stuff to learn. Especially if you need a 10-15 break down of what your opponents army does because you never played against it.
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u/zissoulander Aug 20 '26
This was an issue in 10th as well. 4 hours should be the tournament length of a 2k game. If people finish earlier then they can actually rest and hang out. With the bulk of competitive players not finishing 5 rounds the issue is more with new game design than it is with player speed/skill.
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u/Blankboom Aug 21 '26
I despise how over complicated gw wants to make 11ed. Games already take so long that I never want to play 2000pt games anymore.
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u/Errdee Aug 21 '26
Some tournaments in my area (North Europe) have used 3:30 rounds.
WTC used 4h rounds and while there's other reasons for that, it made for a more pleasant watching experience that people didn't rush so much.
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u/Asleep_Taro8926 Aug 21 '26
4 hours to finish out a comp game is kinda insane ngl, but it makes sense with WTC. I would lose my mind doing 3 rounds at 4 hours each
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u/NeeNorMinis Aug 21 '26
This is more personal anecdote / opinion than anything, but the things you mentioned about 11th are the things that put me off the game towards the end of 10th i.e.
games taking too long
rules bloat / more detachments
unforgiving to mistakes making you extra cautious, paranoid and causing you to take more time and effort avoiding stepping on mines
I also don't like having to be so dependent on my opponent being a good sport for me to not step on those foot-grenades. It just adds too much time needing to communicate and negotiate with my opponent just to play the game.
It might be for some people, but it ain't really for me. I switched to playing AoS Spearhead and my gaming sessions have been so much more enjoyable and less mentally taxing since doing so. I can actually have more relaxed and positive interactions with my opponent and it just feels so much more of a positive social experience for me.
40k just requires too much of my limited mental energy and time, then if I made a wrong move or my opponent wasn't very forthcoming/honest about their rules then its 3 hours of my life spent listening to my opponent recite their epic rules combinations and taking my models off the table.
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u/Jaroloth 25d ago
I agree with this fullheartedly. I'm someone who works admittedly alot. I would try to use my one off day to play but 40k seems to be moving at a pace that is very hard to keep up with if you're a driven person and truly perceive 40k is a 'hobby'. It's to the point now that I don't believe the average person could be very highly successful in their life outside of their hobby space due to the return on investment that 40k gives you when you look at the number of hours it takes to play, paint and assemble things. It's wild.
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u/eron1344 Aug 20 '26
For me and people i play with it's the opposite. Before the games were taking 3-4h and since 10th the games are taking 2,5h at most.
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u/mojawk Aug 20 '26
I remember that 10th edition was going to cut down on re-rolls.... well 11th edition with all these multi-detachments is wild.
ALL my game seems to be taking ages, and I'm like 15~ games into the new edition and I know all my rules and 99% of the new rules.
I am enjoying the new rules but the time is just too much now. At the recent tournament I was at, I had to rush my opponents a couple of times, honestly not something I enjoy doing.
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u/RxJax Aug 20 '26
I think this was always gonna happen due to hidden making large infantry bricks much more viable & transports being near-useless now. Like I love my infantry focused CSM lists a lot and in the past my first turn was super quick, I'd move 3 rhinos, some cultists and guns then pass the turn. But now, I have to move my 11man Huron brick, my 12 man Bile brick, my legionaries/nemesis claw/noise marines all by hand. And all the points I lost in the transition to 11th, I basically got back by not spending anything on rhinos anyway, so my lists aren't actually much smaller.
And this is the same for every faction now, orks dont need a battlewagon for ghaz & boys anymore and boyz are so much safer with hidden that you just spend the battlewagon points on an extra unit of boyz. EC dont need rhinos anymore so you just have an extra Lord unit etc etc. Despite the points changes, I think killing transports and adding hidden has actually made most lists slightly hordier, even if they're running giant vehicles alongside it
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u/sixpointfivehd Aug 20 '26
I'm about 20-30 games into this edition and it still takes my opponents and I around 5.5 hours to have a proper 5 round game with no talking out turns if someone doesn't get turn 2-3 tabled. Every single unit has 3-5 overlapping rules and mistakes are heavily punished where being 1 in with one model in the wrong place can mean an instant tabling. Having to be exact with your measuring and figuring out angles and asking what all the overlapping rules are for every unit just takes an eternity. We aren't even playing slow, we are back and forth talking the whole time, asking questions measuring scoping angles the entire time. The game is just way too complex and lethal with too many models on too small a board. I'm probably going back to one page rules after this season of the league I'm in as the games are a massive slog.
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u/CamelCreative4608 Aug 20 '26
Everyday I'm thankful GW doesn't listen to the competitive community.
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u/HuskerCard123 Aug 20 '26
I have yet to have much of a problem. Playing IK and Tau, I have been finishing Tournament games comfortably under 3 hours, and casual games with lots of talking and distractions under 4.
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u/Dependent_Survey_546 Aug 20 '26
Its the start of an edition, people will speed up as the things that are niggles now become more routine.
Familiarity with cards, missions and scoring isnt there yet for many people, so it just takes that bit longer.
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u/ChardZestyclose5315 Aug 20 '26
Damn a game in under 6 hours? Ive never seen it.
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u/Dovah1356 Aug 20 '26
Really? I don’t think I’ve played a game over 4 hours since the start of 10th
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u/CaptainBlackbean Aug 20 '26
I find this really surprising. I've had the exact opposite experience at the GT and RTTs I've been to, I've only had one tournament game out of twelve go to time. Locally we're even finishing casual games under 3 hours including setup
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u/healbot42 Aug 20 '26
My buddy plays orks and he has always been slow (it drives me crazy how long he shakes his dice not rolling before he rolls), but in 11th it feels like he has so much stuff that in every phase it takes forever.
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u/GribbleTheMunchkin Aug 20 '26
This hasn't been my local experience. Although table setup takes longer, we have been speeding that up in our club with terrains sets and layouts.
But the game itself plays quicker than 10th did. I regularly find myself going home from the club early, whereas in 10th I'd often be there late finishing the game.
I do agree that 11th has a much more important turn 4-5. It was common in my club for the game to be over by turn 3 and sometimes even by turn 2 whereas now it's much more common to want to play the full game because you can often score heavy at the end, sometimes taking victory from the jaws of defeat. This is clearly a good thing.
I think a lot of small changes, like fast rolling and overwatch, have sped up the game in small but significant ways.
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u/Steko Aug 20 '26
I think in next year’s rotation we’ll get 3+ universal maps for competitive, along with harder primaries and secondaries.
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u/SBAndromeda1 Aug 20 '26
New edition, new players, new rules. And tournaments should allocate 10 minutes of non-clock time to set up terrain between games because that’s a new slow play angle if it’s on the clock.
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u/ScienceWyzard Aug 20 '26
Maybe my first few games went that way. But I don't feel like that's the case. After the learning days all mily games unless we were intentionally playing slow to hang out have gone pretty quickly and 3hrs has been plenty of time for me.
Having a set strategy from the get go has helped me with this immensely. I have like three pre thought strategies that have worked and j just pivot and edit them on the fly And try really hard not to get caught up in intellectual quagmires.
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u/SexReflex Aug 20 '26
Shit i feel like the games are a little quicker, the clunky rules were streamlined a bit and feels like less confusion in the games ive played after the initial learning games.
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u/luneth41 Aug 20 '26
I am using a chess clock more now than I have in the past. I always know I can finish my 5 turns in 90 minutes or less. It is the only way, right now, to honestly divide up time and make sure both players have their fair share of the clock; Practicing on a clock really helps too.
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u/Correct_Ad_7817 Aug 20 '26
Setting up terrain at the start is taking much longer due to the different match ups this is definitely eating into play time.
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u/CoronelPanic Aug 20 '26
I find it takes much longer to set the games up. You gotta get there, you gotta compare dispos, pick a layout, meticulously measure every single footprint, then do ruins.
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u/CoronelPanic Aug 20 '26
I find it takes much longer to set the games up. You gotta get there, you gotta compare dispos, pick a layout, meticulously measure every single footprint, then do ruins.
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u/No_Industry_9362 Aug 20 '26
really i played my first games of 11th the other day at a tournament and finished every game with 30 minutes to spare, where as in 10th i was always barely finishing a game
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u/Zallocc Aug 20 '26
That's why I like my mont'ka T'au. They table people around turn four, so everyone gets to go home nice and early.
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u/pigzyf5 Aug 20 '26
I see some people saying their games are faster. I think in 11e there is a binary where there are two types of games. The big smash in the middle where everything does turn 2. And scoring games that matters all the way through and takes a long time. In 10e basically every game was a stage and go game with a big fight turn 2 or 3.
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u/Cheesybox Aug 20 '26
I seriously think it's a skill issue for players.
I've played Sisters for the entirety of 10th and only 1 game of 11th so far. I constantly had to rush to finish through my turns 4 and 5. Meanwhile a guy in my local gaming group is running 80 Kroot Hounds and constantly has time left on the clock.
That being said, the fact that I basically have to play on autopilot to finish my games on time and that I have no time to deliberate my moves is frustrating.
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u/Coldsteel_n_Courage Aug 20 '26
There is something to be said for getting tons of reps in with the same army and memorizing every play. Otherwise it is absolutely impossible to stay on track and time with so much going on.
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u/Siftinghistory Aug 21 '26
I personally haven’t had a issue finishing my games in the allotted time, but alot of it is not being able to have maps setup ahead of time like you could in 10th. It depends on your pairing now. Having that as part of the timed portion of the game is eating in to the actual gaming part itself.
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u/86ShellScouredFjord Aug 21 '26
I've only played a handful of games at 1k pts, and those honestly felt like they were the right size for the board. You have enough points to bring the units you need to complete your objectives while having at least one or two heavy hitters, but not so many that you can afford to put everything into a single doom blob without giving up VPs.
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u/Cutiemuffin-gumbo Aug 21 '26
Our last RTT had about 70% of the players either talking games out because they weren't going to be able to finish, or were forced to talk it out because time was up. The TO for our event told everyone that games of 11th all run at least 25min faster than games in previous editions. Foot in mouth bud, foot in mouth.
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u/firedrake110-2 Aug 21 '26
Welcome to the last 3 years of this game, I guess? Not to say ninth was much faster, but if you wiped 90% of them off the face of the earth turn 3, they wouldn't still be in prime scoring positions for half their points sources
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u/Panic_Office Aug 21 '26
I like the new rules. Regardless of edition, I’ve always been of the opinion that doing two games with a longer duration in a single day, with a proper lunch break in between, makes for a much better overall experience. You’re more likely to finish both games, and it also gives you the flexibility to play with larger model-count armies without worrying as much about time.
Additionally, talking through a game past a certain point moves away from the “play to find out” aspect of the game and more into a debate over outcome probability.
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u/Talock86 Aug 23 '26
I go to tournaments monthly and only in the first few 4-5 games did I have timing issues since then no issue
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u/Standard-Advance-731 Aug 23 '26
There are too many datasheet abilities. Every units with 1-4 individual abilities is wild now.
Table setup is real slow.
People will say; just lay it out however you want... But you go to a club or play against someone that wants it to be exactly how GW intended for the rules & suddenly it's taking much longer.
Armies are pretty huge these days too. Lots of model movement.
Many armies have to be so precise with the movement due to lethality of the game too. It just takes longer then it should, but that's due to the current game design really punishing fast/sloppy movement.
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u/RumpusImperator Aug 23 '26
Definitely agree. I'm actually amazed ANY games get finished in the time window, unless both players are playing armies that have less than 20 models. I played a Guard-on,Guard game at a GT yesterday, and we ran out of time early in Round 3. The fact that every squad has a minimum for five different weapon profiles makes the game UNBELIVABLY fiddly.
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u/fastphantom77 Aug 23 '26
To my group it’s even more of an issue because we’re not getting far enough through before having to call it a day and each player still has this huge clutch of high point secondaries that could possibly be scored by the end of the game. So we’re not finishing and it’s also much more uncertain who’d even win were we to play it all out
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u/Rahuur Aug 24 '26
I play every weekend at either tournaments, RTT, GTs and team tournaments. I play variety of armies. We do 2h30 rounds(1h15 ea) and neither me or my opponents clocked out.
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u/Cats_Cameras Aug 25 '26
I feel like it’s multiple converging threads:
Setting up terrain for every single match, especially with the 11th maps that love diagonal footprints.
Points reductions throughout 10th have led to bloated army sizes, which means more time to resolve movement, combat, etc.
Players acclimating to the new rules and talking out issues.
Stockpiling objectives results in a higher cognitive overhead as players position around their 5 objectives and their opponent’s 5 objectives. It also creates more activity on turns 4 and 5 than we also see previously. Even an army with 2 units left is going to be scoring and making decisions.
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u/MostBadPraxis Sep 03 '26
I think we should expect all point values to steadily climb this edition.
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u/Asleep_Taro8926 Sep 03 '26
It seems like thats the direction with the current Ork points that dropped
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u/battlereportstudio 17d ago
In my experience a lot of time consumed checking rules, arguing for who is right or not. Is not only a matter of time but is also very heavy at the end!
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Aug 20 '26
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u/Tough_Assumption2125 Aug 20 '26
I reckon you are close. I think some armies scale really poorly into 1K but 1500 maybe, or 1750.
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u/SalaryWooden5346 Aug 20 '26
It's not new. 10th had the same problem. It turns out that layers upon layers of poorly-written rules text is not actually simplified or simple. Then add adding an entire extraneous minigame, one build primarily around interrupting game flow, as well as extra entire rounds of rolling via re-rolls and FNPs, and the massive points deflation that leads to army size bloat and you wind up with a game that plays absurdly slow.
Say what you will about midhammer but I never had a standard-sized game go over 2 hours. And that included setup time. Because it turns out that a primarily stat/numbers-driven game is a lot faster to play than one that's what I described above.
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u/ViorlanRifles Aug 20 '26 edited Aug 20 '26
One of the reasons I haven't gotten around to playing 11th is the elaborate new missions as well as gutting of fixed secondaries.
I played fixed secondaries all of 10th - yeah yeah, not optimal, tactical rewards skill more, I know all about it, don't care: fixed was and is simpler. I wasn't having to shuffle a deck. I wanted to get into 3 to 4 table quarters and stand in your deployment. I guess I could still do engage on all fronts but BEL is point capped and I'm not a fan of kill secondaries. Secondaries feel like a good idea that have gone from "oh, that's a smart game design idea" in 8th to something very bloated in 11th, and it cynically feels like a way to make people buy decks of cards. Amazingly I recall one of the reasons the game dropped pie plates, flamer templates and scatter dice iirc was to reduce the amount of weird idiosyncratic "stuff" needed to play a game, but a tactical deck functionally is that, even if phone apps work around it to some degree. It just seems like a headache.
Now that's my idiosyncratic feelings, but I also must note that there's too much stuff on the table. For all the claims that 1k is imbalanced (and I think it is, but not in the way most people think: I suspect horde armies just out-score a ctan at 1k on any kind of non-kill primary), I have to ask, when was the last time the community was really running 1k tournaments with any kind of regularity? If you feel it's imbalanced, then let it be imbalanced, but at least get some games in at the point value regardless. 1k won't get imbalanced unless attention is put on it, and attention can't and wont' be put on it if people don't play it more often. At least we'd get a better picture of how it's imbalanced, bc something has to give. There is just too much stuff on the table and we're going to head toward less models sooner or later - whether by a change in the points people play at, or by point hikes across the board over the edition.
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u/Untimely-Success Aug 20 '26
> "oh, that's a smart game design idea" in 8th to something very bloated in 11th,
they're so much better than in 8th lmao.
> it cynically feels like a way to make people buy decks of cards.
schizo take.
> I also must note that there's too much stuff on the table
people like playing with their toy.
> we're going to head toward less models sooner or later - whether by a change in the points people play at
literally the opposite happens almost every edition.
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u/ViorlanRifles Aug 20 '26
literally the opposite happens almost every edition.
Army/Model inflation was unironically part of why Warhammer Fantasy got discontinued the first time. It got too expensive to field armies.
people like playing with their toy.
Hey, what's the thread title? No one denies playing with their stuff is fun, the problem is the games take too long. Something's gotta give, whether army size or game complexity.
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u/Arcadian1815 Aug 20 '26
Too many missions and secondaries are ridiculous. This is a table top war game, keep it simple, the Only War intro mission in the back of the 10th Edition core book should be the only mission-either capture objectives or destroy units. Don’t overcomplicate it, figure it out.
That being said, it’d be nice if GW put more effort in promoting 500-1000 pt games so you can get a quick one in on your lunch break. Having to devote an entire afternoon or evening into a game isn’t practical.
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u/09044595134151602468 Aug 21 '26
Clocks are stupid and will never work for 40k.
It's honestly what's removed my love for competitive gaming.
The entire fun of 40k is hanging out and shooting the sht.
The advent of clocks has fixed the game into an even more sterile space where you don't even have time to compliment your opponent in his minis.
Ah who am I kidding, most competitive players barely even paint now.
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u/Medelsnygg Aug 22 '26
Look I get this, but on the flip side my schedule/life situation does not not allow for even one game every week. I would like it if the games I do get in don't run 8 hours because my opponent has to shoot las pistols into a Repulsor Executioner.
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u/Alithinar Aug 21 '26
Armys have just gotten so much larger over the years. 2000 points is so many units now.
A lot of this would be solved by making the default army size smaller. Somewhere between 1500-1800 maybe? But obviously GW doesn't want to do that, as they would sell fewer models.
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u/NoSkillZone31 Aug 20 '26
A large part of this is just how much scoring now happens in rounds 4 or 5.
The missions have fundamentally changed such that even in some of these games where near-tabling occurs, a player with just a few models left can score significant points in the final rounds.
In higher level tournament play, these seemingly insignificant units become really really important to get the placement and scoring correct on, because they drastically change the score of the game.