I get some people value their opponents squad being visible at a glance, but there’s nothing elegant about having dozens of cards and tokens onto the edge of the table, especially for larger games. Squad builder printouts are my preferred option. You can even cross out things as needed, or make notes about critical effects etc, and you can print a copy for your opponent so he can have it in his hot little hand, and not be trying to read the text on upside down upgrade cards from three feet away!

Yes, there are definitely two camps on this topic. I understand your point of view, but I disagree with it. Lists show the starting point of the squad, but they don’t maintain the current state of it without lots of bookkeeping. Plus, and this certainly may not be important to you, I like the imagery of the cards, they help keep the Star Wars context in the game. That’s what originally got me into the game, and what keeps me buying more ships than I need. And as long as FFG is on my side, I’m going to enforce they’re rules for playing the game. There’s nothing keeping you from playing your way with like minded players, do enjoy the game as you see fit and can find opponents for.

in response to the OP:

ive been gaming and on gaming message boards for a while.

When change is in the air for a gamer’s favorite system, they usually devolve into a morass of rage and anger, with different sides digging trenches and refusing to believe someone could possibly have a divergent view.

So for me, the boards being this toxic is another day that ends in Y when a change is coming down.

dont take it personally.

14 minutes ago, RookiePilot said:

Yes, there are definitely two camps on this topic. I understand your point of view, but I disagree with it. Lists show the starting point of the squad, but they don’t maintain the current state of it without lots of bookkeeping. Plus, and this certainly may not be important to you, I like the imagery of the cards, they help keep the Star Wars context in the game. That’s what originally got me into the game, and what keeps me buying more ships than I need. And as long as FFG is on my side, I’m going to enforce they’re rules for playing the game. There’s nothing keeping you from playing your way with like minded players, do enjoy the game as you see fit and can find opponents for.

Absolutely. Although I would maintain that marking damage and state changes with a pen and pencil is much easier and more elegant than using cards or tokens.

in all the itterations of 40k, every new edition has spawned some kind of split. i think 2nd to 3rd was the worst split i saw. maybe 5th to 6th. GW did learn something though, they learned that instead of cold changing the edition. make the new edition so it would allow you to use the old material. for example from 3rd to 4th ed or even 4th to 5th, you could use the same codex from the previous edition untill a new codex was printed. and the army rules reflected the possiblity of a new edition. so you could play your army reguardless. untill your new codex came out and it wiped your army off the map. then the anger sets in.

dont get me wrong, i am in favor of the rule changes. i think from what i saw most of the changes to the rules look very cool and streamlined. BUT. maybe instead of completely changing EVERYTHING, maybe they should have just changed the rulesets without changing the cardboard. i would have had no issues needing to buy just a core set for rule changes. changing the cardboard to boot is excessive and expensive.