Pre-Measuring: Better or Worse?
Hi all,
Gartenzing here, the writer on Gaming All Areas- it’s a relatively new Blog, but one which I
hope provokes a little thought for the people reading it. For HoP, I’d like to touch on a topic
which has been discussed over the last few months- Pre-measuring.
This has become a bit of a hot topic due to the 40K 6th Ed rumours. Whether it’s coming to
40K or not (at time of writing, the rules haven’t been released), Games Workshop has been
slowly making the movement to pre-measuring for a little while- Lord of the Rings uses it, as
does Fantasy as of 8th Ed. I firmly believe this is a good thing.
First of all, why use guess-range mechanics? Well, it adds a Fog of War element to games,
and it adds a little suspense to decision making. It means that you can’t be certain of a move
until the tape-measure comes out, and may affect the decision making. It’s also comfortable-
guessing range has been around for so long now that it feels almost dirty to get rid of it.
This is fine for those of us veterans with a few of years gaming under their belt, and even
better for those of us who work in Imperial Measure on a daily basis. For anyone outside
of those two specific groups, it is a significant obstacle. Worse, it is abstract- players
not comfortable with the concept are constantly removed from the game, and the rules
essentially punish them through no fault of their own.
So, what does pre-measuring bring to the table? Well, it means that the rules have to create
the decision making and suspense somewhere else- take a look at Warhammer Fantasy for
examples, where they removed guessing charges and essentially changed the game (for the
better? Yes!) Most importantly, it goes some way to levelling the playing field.
This is the big reason I’m in favour of Pre-measuring in most games. It is closer to a
level playing field. Anyone can suffer failure at the hands of the dice, and veterans and
newcomers alike are governed by the same concepts. In other words, there is no unfair
advantage to be gained from playing more games (possibly losing them in the process) than
your opponent.
So in conclusion- It’s simpler. That’s why it’s good. It means that more people can play the
same game, and that they can have more fun doing it. The only people it hurts, in fact, are
hoary old vet’s, whom I suspect are doing most of the commenting. Embrace it! If it does
come to 40K, it will likely be for the better- and yes, it will mean random charge distances
(like you have to do through terrain already.)
I’d love to talk more about this, but I’m limited on word count! So hopefully that’s all fairly
clear and succinct. Comments are welcome.
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