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I think everyone agrees that as it stands, the Malcador and Macharius families are hideously overcosted. Even against other superheavy tanks, but especially when you compare them to Leman Russes, Land Raiders and the amount of Terminator squads it takes to take them out of commission. Structure points dont actually help much, since especially with CC units, it's easy to "over-kill" a tank as it is, rolling 4 or more penetrating hits in a turn.

I think in almost all cases the answer is recosting them as opposed to beefing them up. The Valdor is probably the exception, its main gun just isn't cutting the mustard.

Malcador: I think the whole family of tanks could stand going down 100 points. The stock Malcador is undergunned in its current 300 point range and liable to be assaulted because of poor armor. The Annihilator is very much the same, though the superheavy tank rules help it more in the sense that it can use its turret (twin-linked lasc) and hull (demolisher cannon) weapons at different targets, and both of those weapons are powerful enough to threaten a unit they target at.

The Defender should stay as the most expensive of the three, but even it should be reduced to roughly the Land Raider level in points (a 60-80 point break). What it's good at is throwing lots of heavy bolter rounds all around, and the smallish range of the demolisher means it's needed to drive pretty damn close to an enemy to get the maximum use. Also, thanks to the arrangement of the heavy bolter casement, often the best way to get the most rounds into any one squad is to fire it broadside with three guns, which in turn presents a tempting AV12 target.

Gorgon: the Gorgon's big problem is that it's a transport that moves 6" turn. I'm not sure if there is any points cost you can give it to make it tempting in comparison to the Stormlord, which does everything a Gorgon does and more, with the addition of a better main weapon and the ability to fire out.

Macharius: Again, a 100 point discount sounds about fair. The Macharius also has the problem, somewhat absent in the two more expensive Malcador variants, that it's a one-trick pony. Ca. 400 points is a lot to pay for one gun, and to be fair, not a very exciting gun, at that.

Valdor: Very much the red-headed stepchild of the Malcador family, as anyone who's seen the WIP rules can attest to. A tank hunter that's not price-efficient to take against most tanks. If we compare it with what's in other IA books, we're left with the Destroyer Tank Hunter being the superior choice. I think both the cost needs to go down, and the main weapon needs to go up in effectiveness. A small-blast weapon with BS3 is easy to miss its mark with, though at least the Shock Pulse rule means you get a consolation prize for those half-Strength scatters off the target non-superheavy tank (and really, firing the Valdor at anything that's not a tank is a colossal waste).

The Macharius is worth less than two Russes. If two Russes are 300+/-, the Macharius is 250 at most. As you said, structure points are not that much of a help, and HTH combat is just death to super-heavies (worse now with 5th Ed actually as lots more can kill them reliably).

The Macharius could even be part of the standard Guard list as a single HS slot. A single Macharius for 250, or a pair of Russes in a single HS slot as a Squadron for 300+/-. One is slightly tougher individually and can fire all its guns at different targets (not something to be underestimated), but the other has more firepower, and if one of the Russes dies it can still keep shooting with the other one.

Both units die horribly in HTH, the former because two Chainfists wil end any Super-Heavy's day, and the latter due to the Squadron rules.

This applies to the larger ones as well. The Baneblade's original cost from FW at 634 points was 25 points shy of what you got if you made the Baneblade using the VDR rules. Now the VDR rules always gave you a vehicle that cost more than it was worth (make a Rhino in the VDR and it's 80 points - 37.5% more expensive than it should be). Knocking 37% off the cost of the Baneblade gives us 396.25. Let's round that to 400, and you get what the Baneblade is actually worth.

In Apoc they made it 500, which is still too much, but they did give it the 10" blast, and a better Co-Axial rule, so I think that a price jump of about 50 is good for all that. So 450 is a good starting point. No other Baneblade Variant is close to the Baneblade in terms of sheer effectivness, and most suffer from 'One Big Gun' syndrome where if they're stunned they're no better than a HW squad, so I'd say keep them around the 400 mark.

I know I'd much rather face a Macharius than two Russes.

To be fair to the Gorgon, it's at least effective at guarding its cargo from incoming fire, what with the 14 front and side, plus the 4+ to ignore hits thanks to the armored prow. You could probably drop 80-120 points off the top with it too, and end with something semi-useful.

Forgot about that one. Yes, dropping points wouldn't hurt there because it just a transport and unlike the new Banerblade transport variants, has no real offensive power (certainly nothing comparable to the Stormlord!).

FW stuff is overcosted because FW stuff is about looking cool, not pure effectiveness.

That said, I think you go too far on discounting points. Maybe 50 pts adjustment would be fair.

JohnHwangDD wrote:FW stuff is overcosted because FW stuff is about looking cool, not pure effectiveness. can't write appropriate rules.

Fixed that for you...

Seriously, it's not about looking cool. There are plenty of FW models that are significantly undercosted as well as those that are overpriced.

Take, for example, the thudd guns and heavy mortars. Consider Meotic spore mines. Look at the assault cannon drop pod. All of these are undercosted for what they bring to the table. They also look cool, but their overly effective.

FW doesn't write crap rules out of any design philosophy espousing non-efficiency, they write crap rules because they're crap at writing rules.

JohnHwangDD wrote:FW stuff is overcosted because FW stuff is about looking cool, not pure effectiveness.

Thanks WRONGBADFUN. We can always count on you to post such thrilling and thought-provoking additions to proposed rules threads, even though you've yet to figure out what the 'proposed rule' forum is actually for.

@ DD : Please... please, please stop posting. What you just posted made utterly no sense and made NO benefit to the conversation! You pretty much just said "u pae fir lirks hur!" Which has no basis in gameplay or the discussion.

I'm going to have to agree with H.B.M.C.'s suggestion. Sounds reasonable.

In general, I think what super-heavies and vehicles in general need is their rules to be rewritten. Even the venerable Russ doesn't last long on the battlefield. My Demolisher with its cannon, Lascannon, and Plasma Cannons is my most expensive single unit, yet a 30pts of opposing models is able to take it out quite reasonably.

The game designers at FW have had a tendency to either make stuff way undercosted or overpriced (usually overpriced). Most of the flyers in the game are harassment at best.

Yes, we know, hence the thread. It's only WRONGBADFUN who seems to think that this is:

A). Fine.
B). Somehow intentional based on aesthetics.
C). A valid conversation to have in a proposed rules forum.

I'm getting the feeling he just likes the attention or perceived attention (ignoring someone is a form of attention towards them). At any rate, the validity of any of DD's comments is not the subject of this thread either, in my opinion. Though as a democratic type culture that we are, perhaps someone should start a thread discussing people such as DD and what best ways to embarrass them on that internet. It would probably do better to simply distract them from the actual conversations.

I propose that attacking a vehicle with close combat should only give you as many attacks as you have weapons (twin powerfists would give you two power fist attacks, one powerfist and one CCW, one powerfist attack and one CCW). Reasonably speaking, you would need to really wind up your body to try and hurt an armored vehicle. Exceptions would be against walkers. Which I also believe you should be able to disengage from without penalty (seriously, Guardsmen can't hurt the buggers so they just sorta sit there and get mangled, even a fearless individual would run or just sorta jog away, forward, back, or to a side).

I've got a set of proposed rules for DD if you wanna see them. No joke. I wrote them a while back.

Skinnattittar wrote:At any rate, the validity of any of DD's comments is not the subject of this thread either, in my opinion.

perhaps someone should start a thread discussing people such as DD and what best ways to embarrass them on that internet.

Oh, because I said that 100 pts was to much and 50 might be better? Yeah, at least I was on topic.

If that's what you need to do to feel better about yourself, go for it. However, I suspect that this isn't something you can legitimately do on Dakka, Rule 1 and all... The Internet is a big place, and blogs are free.

Don't get gakky at us because you don't like the Guard Codex DD. And don't fall back on your 'Rule 1' bull-gak either.

You came into a forum about proposed rules and essentially told us we were wrong for proposing rules. This is why we call you WRONGBADFUN, because you have this inane need to tell people how things should be played.

Now get out of the thread unless you're actually going to propose rules, as is the subject of this sub-forum - something you clearly still don't fething understand.

Someone quote me.

H.B.M.C. wrote:Don't get gakky at us because you don't like the Guard Codex DD. And don't fall back on your 'Rule 1' bull-gak either.

You came into a forum about proposed rules and essentially told us we were wrong for proposing rules. This is why we call you WRONGBADFUN, because you have this inane need to tell people how things should be played.

Now get out of the thread unless you're actually going to propose rules, as is the subject of this sub-forum - something you clearly still don't fething understand.

Someone quote me.

Quoted out of respect of the quoted rather than the quote itself.

@ DD : You'll also notice WRONGBADFUN, aka JohnHwangDD (I think I like that nick-name though), that my posts ALSO contain a comment directly related to the topic of the thread, and if I want to waste bandwidth, I would PM my additional comments to the other person, rather than fill up a thread with banter. In the past I haven't been so good about that, probably won't be in the future, but at least I'm not posting an off topic comment complaining about other people's off topic comments (which are also at least 50% on topic, unlike the complainers comment).

As for the topic :

I would also like to see a "No Effect" result on the Vehicle Damage Table (VDT). Crew Shaken and Stunned are almost as effective as Wrecked, which is ridiculous to say the least! Perhaps a table like :

6 - Destroyed
5 - Wrecked
4 - Weapon Destroyed (and Crew Shaken)
3 - Immobilized
2 - Crew Stunned
1 (and below) - No Effect

EDIT : Changed "Crew Stunned" to "Immobilized" and "Crew Shaken" to "Stunned."

Regarding your VDT, perhaps 3) should be immobilized and do away with crew stunned altogether?

Perhaps as a compromise, you could make "No effect" into "Minor EFfect" and then have it accumulate into something if you get 3 or more. That way, at least the effort of getting through armour doesn't feel completely wasted.

Edited post to include "Immobilized" and other changes.

Good point, Konrad. Though what about a "Weapon Stunned" result? Or removing "Weapon Destroyed" and make that another Immobilized result? (oh how I hate the idea of vehicles being reduced to weaponless, immobilized paper weights, mine and opponents).

6 - Destroyed
5 - Wrecked
4 - Immobilized
3 - Crew Stunned
2 - Weapon Stunned
1 - No Effect

Let's be honest, though. Making it through the armor is only difficult on vehicles with AV13 and AV14, AV12 and less is like paper by comparison, and that's where most people put their complaints of vehicles being "to hard to destroy, wah wah wah." Well, tough noogies to them. Land Raiders, Necron Monoliths, Leman Russes, and other AV14 vehicles are SUPPOSED to be tough as nails! They SHOULD last and act on the battle field just about as many turns as possible, you don't pay 150+ pts for a giant minor distraction! If there were far fewer anti-tank weapons in the armies I would agree, but everyone and their distant relations seems to have access to a melta type weapon or chainfist! Or something to tear through armor, so I'm not very empathetic with people who think vehicles as being tough buggers. I don't know how many battles my Leman Russ chassis have been popped in or before Turn III with only half their points made up for, even if I'm taking cover saves!

Thinking about it, I guess there's not much difference between the No Effect and accumalting Minor Effects - you'd have to be pretty unlucky with AP rolls, plus its even more housekeeping to do.

Lest we not forget, Leman Russ is quite good at surviving shooting - its next to useless if its assaulted.

And you're right; you've generally paid a lot of points for AV14; you should expect it to be resilient.

I've always found the Extra Armour option a bit rubbish. Could there not be a better option that improves AV - to no higher than 14 obviously, but that is a bit more expensive in points?

And maybe also limit extra AV to only non-Fast vehicles (otherwise you could get AV13/14 Fast transports which could be stuipdly stupid).

Perhaps options like Extra Armor could null VDT results that "fall off" the table because of modifiers? Which would only affect Glancing Hits of course. Or perhaps also increase the range of Glancing hits? But then that would make AV14(15) damn near impossible to kill, as you would need a 16 to score on the regular table. Though two results of Immobilized would still result in destroyed.

I think AV14 would have to remain the maximum.

I was thinking more about lighter tanks which are vulnerable to assault. I'm an IG player and I lose Hellhounds and Leman Russes in assault more than I do in shooting.

Would fewer, stronger tanks unbalance the game?

In my opinion: No. On a real battlefield (and I'm not talking nitty gritty warfare here) armored vehicles are monsters to encounter. Just think of the sensation of being unable to harm something that wants to rip you to shreds. Like encountering a tiger and you're bare handed (not BEAR handed). There isn't much you'll be able to do without specialized weapons (High Explosives that are not concentrated or specialized anti-armor are not very effective against armor, and anti-armor rounds aren't very effective as HiEx rounds). I would like to see tanks maneuvering around other tanks and specialized units of anti-armor, both to avoid being destroyed, and to distract your opponents armor from eating your infantry or whatever those vehicles are tasked to kill.

To some extent, I understand why GW want to make tanks important, but not immense leviathans that you could spend five turns attacking and do f-all damage to but I think the new assault rules go too far the other way.

I liked one of your previous posts about the number of HtH attacks you get against a tank.

In a similar vein, what about Tank Shock?

Does it seem right that a tank can't roll over (and damage/kill) people, yet it can ram another vehicle?

If a tank-shocked unit fails its LD, perhaps there should be a chance of damage to the ones it hits? This could also bring a bit more of a threat back (knowing if you didn't beat a tank in HtH, you may get squashed by it next turn).

JohnHwangDD wrote:

Skinnattittar wrote:At any rate, the validity of any of DD's comments is not the subject of this thread either, in my opinion.

perhaps someone should start a thread discussing people such as DD and what best ways to embarrass them on that internet.

Oh, because I said that 100 pts was to much and 50 might be better? Yeah, at least I was on topic.

I don't think 50 points is enough, because as it stands, the Malcador family for example is horrible. They're less armored than the Leman Russ, which just got boosted with the Lumbering Behemoth rule and AV13 sides. Structure points don't provide much extra protection, especially because a lower AV means the enemy can use worse AT weapons to better effect (a Malcador can suffer a penetrating hit to its side from an autocannon).

The stock Malcador is the worst affected of all the FW superheavies, which is why I suggested the most aggressive price drop for it, but every FW superheavy is more or less affected.

In our rules we still use two damage charts because... well... our rules are better. No arrogance there - our rules are better than the bull-gak Jervis vomits out onto us each month.

Anyway, they look like this:

Glancing Hit Chart
1 - No Effect
2 - Shaken on a 4+
3 - Stunned on a 4+
4 - Stunned
5 - 1-3 Weapon Destroyed/4-6 Immobilised
6 - Roll on the Penetrating Chart

Penetrating Hit Chart
1 - Shaken
2 - Weapon Destroyed
3 - Immobilised
4 - Destroyed
5 - Destroyed
6 - Explodes

We wanted to emphasise that glancing hits are glancing hits, not something that kills you 1/6th of the time (like in 3rd/4th) or makes you impossible to kill (like in 5th). It's a few more dice rolls, but it goes a long way to making tanks into tough vehicles rather than glass-hammers.

For Super-Heavies it is similar, just with losses to Structure Points and a modified Critical Hit chart once a vehicle has lost its structure points.

H.B.M.C. wrote:In our rules we still use two damage charts because... well... our rules are better. No arrogance there - our rules are better than the bull-gak Jervis vomits out onto us each month.

Anyway, they look like this:

Glancing Hit Chart
1 - No Effect
2 - Shaken on a 4+
3 - Stunned on a 4+
4 - Stunned
5 - 1-3 Weapon Destroyed/4-6 Immobilised
6 - Roll on the Penetrating Chart

Penetrating Hit Chart
1 - Shaken
2 - Weapon Destroyed
3 - Immobilised
4 - Destroyed
5 - Destroyed
6 - Explodes

We wanted to emphasise that glancing hits are glancing hits, not something that kills you 1/6th of the time (like in 3rd/4th) or makes you impossible to kill (like in 5th). It's a few more dice rolls, but it goes a long way to making tanks into tough vehicles rather than glass-hammers.

For Super-Heavies it is similar, just with losses to Structure Points and a modified Critical Hit chart once a vehicle has lost its structure points.

So how do these charts impact on a game. I'm guessing that it makes tanks more survivable from shooting but the inherent vulnerability to HtH remains (for non-Land Raiders).

Do modern-day tank designers deliberately leave the rear of their tanks unprotected?

Most armour is concentrated to the front quarters, with less emphasis placed on rear, top and botton armour (remember mines - so bottom armour can be important). And it's not always about protection - less armour can mean a greater speed with the engine you've gone, saving you from needing a bigger one you might not be able to mount.

As far as how our tables affect things, they make tanks capable of withstanding more firepower rather than spending most of the game shaken (but not dead). We also have a different Hull Down system that basically amounts to Hull Down/Moving Fast/Smoke = Glancing Only, unless you roll a 6 to Penetrate, in which case (assuming you can Penetrate) you ignore the Hull Down.

Eg. Lascannon (S9) fires at a Hull Down Russ (AV14). Hits, and then rolls a 6 for Penetration. Hull Down ignored. Say a Missile Launcher (S8), hits and also geta Six for Penetration - 6+8=14, so it cannot penetrate normally anyway, so it glances.

In HTH combat tanks are extremely vulnerable without the protection of Hull Down (here speed is the protection, especially for fast vehicles). So vehicles can die quite quickly if you can catch them with some good high-strength weapons or lots of smaller weapons on the rear (unless it's me doing the rolling of course - Plague Marine Champion vs Land Raider - charged it three times, couldn't even pull off a Lascannon!!!).

I don't like the idea that a generic roll of a 6, as long as it is still able to penetrate the AV should "upgrade" the shot to the penetrating hit table regardless of supporting factors like the vehicle's AV value and the weapons Strength. Though I can't suggest something else except that you roll an extra die, which really isn't preferable really.

Sorry, uhh, my mistake. It's a To Hit roll of 6, not a Penetrating roll of 6. So it is quite possible to hit with a 6, and then still only roll a Glance.