How long would a standard 1500p game of 40k take, if you were one of the models?
Skip the turn-based move and shoot, skip all the thinking, skip the dice, skip the checking up rules.
Just run, shoot and fight.
Two small forces (rarely more than 100 models each), starting 50-60m apart, and: GO!
I think most battles would be over in about 60 seconds, even if they take 2-3 hours to play.
Does that imply that the rules are too complicated, or at least too time consuming?
W-D-L: 0-3-28846 (someone must lose to bring balance to all the awesome winner signatures)
I don't think it's fair to assume that any battle or skirmish between two trained forces is going to end in just one minute.
Also, Warhammer is a game, comparing it to real life in any sort of fashion doesn't hold up because it's not supposed to be "realistic" in terms of rules and time. It's just comparing apples and apple flavored candy.
Last edited by Vandelan; 11-05-2012 at 21:29. Reason: Decided on a better fruit comparison.
I've never played any other wargames than warhammer, but the way 40k functions today, it's very hard to move infantry smarter and outmanouvre your oppponent if they are not in transports. Apocalypse starts of even closer to the enemy.
Units arriving from reserve sometimes don't get to do anything at all.
My point is that in a real cityfight, there would be a lot of running and hiding and sneaking from buildning to building, in 6 rounds of 40k most units just gets to visit 2 buildings before they are dead, or the battle is over.
I just feel that in a game that takes 2-3 hours to play, the models should have the time to do more actions than they do.
W-D-L: 0-3-28846 (someone must lose to bring balance to all the awesome winner signatures)
I think each turn is 5-15 minutes.
No way. In fantasy, maybe, although this still might be exaggeration.Originally Posted by carlisimo
But in 40k, that's far too slow. Tops of 1-3 minute, surely - otherwise we're imagining battle tanks that take over 3 minutes to reload and aim their next shot! I'd personally be in favour of towards the lower end of that scale, but infantry might take 3mins to cover ground...
If you assume the one battle cannon template per turn is literally one battle cannon shell per turn, you also are going to have to say that assault cannons fire only four shots in the same time. Assault cannons are known to fire a thousand rounds per second (or something like that, can't check IA4 at the moment). This would mean that the battle cannon would be firing 250 times per second. Space Marines would be moving up to twelve times their body length (marine height is about one inch; twelve inches total move in one turn) in one 250th of a second, the time it takes for an assault cannon to fire four times. So would ordinary humans.
You can't take things that literally in a game as abstract as 3rd+ 40k is. Heck, in any edition of either of the warhammer games. I think I recall an interview with Rick Priestly where he said that WHFB was sort of a 1:25 scale wargame, meaning that one figure was 25 men, and yet it had command figures like heroes who were 1:1, took up as much space as 25 men, and fought not just as well but better. This system is then carried into 40k and made to serve as more or less a 1:1 system. It cannot directly represent what's happening. You can assume that your Space Marines are 1:1 and the enemy tyranids are 1:5, if you want, with the exception of the monsters which are just huge. You can assume that everything is 1:1, and then Space Marines don't anywhere near live up to the standards that the current novels demand of them. You can go around like this, devising an elaborate system in which every kind of model exactly represents a specific number of warriors in the game, or you can go with the flow and imagine it in whatever way works.
A reasonable assumption is that the one blast represents firing as often as possible, that the enemy figures are dispersed much more widely and make better use of cover than they appear to be, and that the turn takes place over however long it needs to in order for the events of the turn to make a degree of sense. For the sake of a more visceral experience, however, we get to bring out this blast template, place it, and blow away all those guys at once.
Last edited by Grimbad; 12-05-2012 at 02:30.
I think one poster here on warseer had a theory that 40k was on a logarithmic scale. So, the farther away two models are, the "turns" take up a much greater amount of time, while the closer you get, the time elapsed gets smaller and smaller.
My painting log, Alaitoc Eldar and Dark Angels:
http://www.warseer.com/forums/showth...89#post5897489
I think it was less of a theory and more of something Andy Chambers or Jervis commented on once.
...............................This is a link to the Forum Rules.,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,A Tale of Guilders plog
I've seen some CounterStrike games go for some time while people maneuvered against each other. A lot of the issues lie in the Fog of War. On the tabletop, there generally isn't one (unless you plan to play a blind game with another person being the referee), while from the First Person Point Of View, there is a huge amount.
One part of the game that a FPPOV does not provide is the fact that you know where all of your units and your opponents are, and so does he (Reserved units being an exception).
On a FPPOV, you can hide, you can more intelligently use cover to get more than a 1/2 chance of not being hit. You can be sneaky, and outmaneuver your opponent and shoot him in the back.
It all depends on the experience of the individuals involved. For my own case, I'd probably survive about 5 seconds after the rounds start firing, my reflexes are a bit soft.
Are you a Wolf, a Sheep, or a Hound?
A 40k battle, in "realistic time" would take hours to days, depending on the intensity of the conflict. The game probably represents a period of time equal to 12+ hours. In addition, the period of time a turn covers is going to vary vastly from minutes to hours. It would make more sense that early terms, before forces have come face to face, probably cover most of the battle, while the last hour or two represents the final turns of the game.
"The best means of defense is attack , an' the best means of attack is a really really Big One, right, with lots of Boys an' dead big shooty things an' what have ya."-Legendary Smartboy Zog
A 40k battle, in "realistic time" would take hours to days, depending on the intensity of the conflict. The game probably represents a period of time equal to 12+ hours. In addition, the period of time a turn covers is going to vary vastly from minutes to hours. It would make more sense that early terms, before forces have come face to face, probably cover most of the battle, while the last hour or two represents the final turns of the game.
"The best means of defense is attack , an' the best means of attack is a really really Big One, right, with lots of Boys an' dead big shooty things an' what have ya."-Legendary Smartboy Zog
This sounds like the best and most likely way to put it.
I've always sort of imagined that the individual turn is as long as it needs to be to contain what is happening, and are not all necessarily the same. An early turn where units are creeping forward through cover and there are some long range sniping shots could take place over a couple of hours, the climax of turn 4-5 with units embroiled in close range assaults and firefights could all be over in a couple of minutes, and then the last couple of turns with the victors consolidating the battlefield and mopping up survivors could again be an hour of two. As far as number of shots goes, I don't think anything is literal - an assault cannon has a ridiculously high ROF, enough to gun down 4 models in a single turn. However, it's not firing four bullets: each of those casualties could be riddled with dozens of rounds.
Though my guards may sleep and ships may lie at anchor, our foes know full well that big guns never tire.
If you really want to see a god of murder, keep going with the off topic
I get your point, but seeing the enemy doesn't make it impossible for him to outmaneuver you. Chess might be the best exaple of this.
There was an increase of movement that changed it and made things go faster.
10 years ago a space marine or guardsman moved 4 inch, and couldn't run in the shooting phase.
Eldar where fast, they moved 5 inch, and they had "fleet", so they could run instead of shooting.
In 5th ed, everything moves 6 inch, everything can run, and there is a lot of transports.
The fast units are now crazy fast, like units in open topped transports, beasts with fleet, superfast flyers and so on.
BUT - we are still playing on the same size of board, and start the same distance from eachother.
2nd turn assaults are common, even 1st turn assaults happens!
W-D-L: 0-3-28846 (someone must lose to bring balance to all the awesome winner signatures)
I think it would also depend on the type of armies which are fighting: a Guard vs. Guard match could represent a 6-hour long slug-fest; whereas an army vs. Dark Eldar could be a very quick fight - their whole force is geared up for lightning fast assaults.
Who needs a life when there are video games? (And Warhammer)
Orks: 2000 points
All armies in 2e can run twice their move in the movement phase instead of shooting. You have to stop if your run takes you within 8" of an enemy, though, unless you declared it as a charge (which you have to do at the start of the turn).
Eldar with a 10" run and Tyranids with the 12" run (eek! and hormagaunts get a 6" leap too!) can go so fast that they incur to-hit penalties on enemies shooting at them.
2e certainly was a less abstract game, with the individual fire arcs, overwatch, splitting fire, and detailed tank damage tables. None of this grenades that don't explode business. Grenades are for exploding*. In a game of 2e, I can imagine that the 4" standard move takes more or less how long it takes you to advance four times your body length while keeping an eye out for enemies.
*Exceptions: Vortex, virus, antiplant, photon flash, tanglefoot, choke, smoke, blind, and hallucinogen
Last edited by Grimbad; 12-05-2012 at 19:57.
40k has no set scale, everything is abstract. Weapon ranges/distances and model/terrain height are on different scales, unless you think in the grim darkness of the far future space marines could get a longer range out of their weapons by throwing them and all battles are fought in an area the size of a football pitch. It is nonsense to try and work out time scales from movement distances. If battles really did last 60s and resulted in casualties typical in your average 40k game then no human would be able to maintain their sanity, let alone make rational decisions in the heat of battle!
40k is about narrative - the game is telling a story. And precisely what that story is is up to you. The game could represent a small skirmish where 1 model is 1 troop, a part of a larger series of actions where the result of the game indicates the general state of an offensive (i.e. a win indicates the entire offensive succeeds) or it could represent a much larger battle with 1 model representing many models. The battle could last minutes, hours or days.
Personally I generally see the game as representing troops on a 1 to 1 scale, although the result of the game scales up to indicate how a campaign is going as a whole and that most battles take about 1-6 hours (although the series of actions they scale up to represent may take place over several days).
I agree the whole 40k game is abstracted to the point NO real world reference is valid.
Thats why the rules are so bloated with poor definition and over complication.
(Because everything has to be explained in detail because it has no common real world frame of reference.)
Complexity is an illusion caused by lack of clear thinking.
I agree that there is no real sense of time with this game. Its up to you and your opponents to decide how long each turn is, and what each model's scale really means.
In my gaming group, we decided that each turn lasted roughly 10-30 seconds of 'real time' for moving 30' or so, snapping off a couple shots, and then running another 30' into CC and getting a couple hits in. But, then again, we're all paintball players, so run and gun is what we do for fun.
A girl once told me that the fastest way to a man's heart is through his stomach. I kindly replied that I had always thought it was through the ribcage...
It was discussed here about a month ago, I think. Just for reference. The old thread is dead though. I wouldn't bring it back to life unless you really really want to.
40k in 60 seconds...well almost...
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-MeVxKZBOfM
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