We are making steady progress on the road to Warhammer 40k 11th edition. The drip feed is as torturous as ever, but there are certainly some interesting changes appearing. Especially what we are going to look at today, terrain and objectives.
Terrain
Ah terrain. We love and hate you in equal measure. Having terrain really makes a battlefield what it is. If you just put the models down on a table they are just models on a table, but with the right terrain…you are transported into the grim darkness of the far future, and surprise surprise, there is only war. As much as terrain is tedious to paint etc, that’s not the issue. The issue is that Games Workshop have never managed to nail down a set of terrain rules everyone likes. Honestly 90% of my games we just house rule the terrain and agree on what sees what and what gets cover as we go along.
So have they finally solved the unsolvable puzzle? Well I don’t know about that but they are certainly giving it a go. Now you have two terms. Terrain Feature and Terrain Area. A Terrain Feature is the physical ruin or building etc that you see. A Terrain Area is a footprint, of several standard sizes, that your terrain sits on. Doing it this way you are ‘in terrain’ if you are wholly within the Terrain Area, getting rid of at least the arguments over what is or isn’t in a terrain piece.
If you are within a Terrain Area you gain the benefit of cover, which is now a -1 to the hit roll of whoever is shooting you. I have to praise them for this as it made zero thematic sense that cover would change your armour saving roll. It’s already hit you, why does the cover have any further effect? Anyway, rant over. Terrain is obscuring, which they have put one of their usual diagrams out to explain, but essentially if there are 2 units, both aren’t in the Terrain Area, but the Terrain Area is in between them, you can’t shoot them at each other.
The special new rule however is the Hidden rule. Infantry, Beast, and Swarm units inside Terrain Areas can be hidden if they didn’t shoot in the current or preceding player turn. If you are hidden you cannot be shot outside of 15”, which is insanely useful for protecting yourself against 1st turn bombardments that wipe out half your army before you get a chance to even take a turn. I have a good feeling about this one.
Objectives
Goodbye circle objective markers and apologies to the many MANY third parties out there that sold their own fancy versions of these. Objectives in the new edition are Terrain Areas (you can see they are pushing thematic changes around terrain and I’m here for it 100%).
So circles to rectangles/squares/triangles right? Well yes, but consider this, now you are always getting the benefit of cover when on an objective. Handy. Or choose not to shoot at all so you are hidden and avoid getting shot altogether. Even handier. Vehicles can also help claim objectives, but don’t get the instant benefit of cover from the area, instead it seems like they’d have to be behind at least some of the actual Terrain Feature (reminder, the physical building etc not the shape).
And that’s that. Definitely going to be interesting playing so heavily around terrain in the new edition, and I hope it really adds something to the game.
What’s Next?
Honestly, not sure. There are some changes to fighting and charging they’ll be talking about, but beyond and more model previews…not sure. Still waiting on that mystery deck!
