Insectum7 wrote: A Titan could be pretty easily downed by Lasguns if it only had a wound or two remaining.
I would assume a titan with only two wounds remaining has parts of its interior exposed. On a similar note, a LRBT that was hit by two multi-meltas probably has some weak points in its front armor.
Which brings me to my original point - how immersive either system is mainly depends on whether you want to immerse yourself.
Insectum7 wrote: A Titan could be pretty easily downed by Lasguns if it only had a wound or two remaining.
I would assume a titan with only two wounds remaining has parts of its interior exposed. On a similar note, a LRBT that was hit by two multi-meltas probably has some weak points in its front armor.
Which brings me to my original point - how immersive either system is mainly depends on whether you want to immerse yourself.
Ehh. . . When my S4 anti-infantry Devilgaunts are mathematically incentivised to shoot at vehicles over infantry, as such happens if I'm fighting Custodes, it's a bad look.
Lasguns cannot kill a titan, period. To even line up the minimum 50 lasgun shots while the titan is moving and killing stuff is already a nigh impossible task, and even then the chance is so low it might as well be zero.
It's more likely for the princeps to randomly die of a stroke than for lasguns to kill the titan.
The fact that it can even HURT a titan or any other heavy vehicle with an anti-infantry gun is the problem, not how many ridiculous number of shots on average are needed to kill it.
See how that works when you aren't providing any arguments?
Does he need to? Is it required to write a 2 paragraph disertation that eating glass is not good idea. A lascgun should never be able to hurt a vehicle like a knight, Land raider or a titan.
No, there are things you do not have to prove. You don't need to make arguments why breathing is okey for you.
And lasguns should not be able to hurt tanks or termintors lore wise. If they could then marins would not be running around with bolters and the scatter laser would be the anti tank weapon of choice for all armies in the setting.
Now GW decided that such a thing as being totaly unable to wound something should not exist. But this is a GW game mechanic choice. They can make it, because they own the game.
But what ever it is good or bad, is a separate idea.
It is like a knight being unable to shot stuff behind cover, but being fully valid as a target to the stuff that hides behind it.
That is not only wrong, but even then you would have to prove this. I can assure you that in some circumstance breathing is not okay for you.
Unless you provide a source showing that a lasgun can't ever damage a titan (which is a tripple-moved goalpoast already) in any way under no circumstances, you are just expressing an unfounded opinion which I am free to call worthless and irrelevant to the question what is immersive and what is not.
Automatically Appended Next Post: To add something of actual value, a quote from Forge of Mars:
Despise infantry if you must. Crush them underfoot, by all means. But do not ignore them. Battlefields are littered with the wreckage of Titans whose crews ignored infantry.
Karol wrote: No, there are things you do not have to prove. You don't need to make arguments why breathing is okey for you.
And lasguns should not be able to hurt tanks or termintors lore wise.
heheheheehehehehehehe I see what you did there lol.
"Lasguns should not be able to hurt tanks....also incidentally my ENTIRE fething ARMY should just happen to be immune to the baseline guns and melee of multiple factions im making such a good common sense argument look at me."
Jidmah wrote: That is not only wrong, but even then you would have to prove this. I can assure you that in some circumstance breathing is not okay for you.
Unless you provide a source showing that a lasgun can't ever damage a titan (which is a tripple-moved goalpoast already) in any way under no circumstances, you are just expressing an unfounded opinion which I am free to call worthless and irrelevant to the question what is immersive and what is not.
Automatically Appended Next Post: To add something of actual value, a quote from Forge of Mars:
Despise infantry if you must. Crush them underfoot, by all means. But do not ignore them. Battlefields are littered with the wreckage of Titans whose crews ignored infantry.
Also interesting to note, due to the mechanics of how Void Shields worked in the first Epic game, shooting small arms at Titans with their shields up was actually a valid tactic. Not so much once you were trying to do damage to the structure though. In 2nd edition Terminators had a 3+ save on 2D6 so lasguns and bolters were pretty much useless against them but the game slowed down even more spectacularly than normal if you opened up with a full Tactical squad at a unit of Terminators.
All the arguments about lasguns hurting Titans/superheavies conveniently leave out the number of shots required to do even one wound to something with dozens of wounds on its profile. There's a certain amount of abstraction in any system but I really don't think requiring hundreds of small arms shots to kill a tank is a bad price to pay to ditch the old facing system that caused endless arguments.
And also, let's not forget the joy of playing against an all-knights army in 7th ed. Oh, half the stuff I have on the table is literally pointless, has no reason to be there at all, can't do anything? The knights move over them, they fall back and shoot from them, they can't damage them at all, and they're just there as victory point tokens for when you decide to kill them? Sweet. This is a good tabletop wargame we're playing.
Modern 40k is more dune-like RTS than company of heroes. Everything can always hurt anything and with enough buffs then can even kill it. That doesnt mean it is optimal.
It is more inmersive the old system? Maybe. In the old system the choices were made for you. Right now, players are more free to tackle what they have in front of them.
In reality both systems are badly designed because GW sucks but is not like one is superior to the other. They are just completely different design phylosopies to how the game works.
I'm not talking about the FW flyer rules. I'm talking about the rules for 5th, for Valkyries, in the core game.
Stop moving the goalposts.
I am not, i made it pretty clear our group uses the flyer rules in 5th problem solved
Cool, but there were groups who used the *core* rules, without the FW rules (which were entirely optional).
So, no, in the actual core rules of the game, Ripper Swarms could charge flying Valkyries. Such immersion.
Yeah - why *didn't* vehicles have weapon skill or close combat ability is the point being made here, especially when they're just as cumbersome and lumbering as a carnifex.
They do, they are called walkers- a hybrid of vehicle and infantry- tracked or wheeled etc.. vehicles had their own version of close combat-running stuff over or ramming it. it is something we can identify with mentally because it is something that happens for real.
They *did* have their own version, but it was stupid, because as we've discussed, there was no risk unless you chose to stand in the way.
And in as far as "we can identify with that mentally because it's something that happens for real" - I'm sure I'd be able to identify with soldiers scrambling out of the way of the biological tank just as much as I would a mechanical one.
Why the disparity? You can say "but they had a different ruleset", but you're missing the point that this is the problem we're talking about. Vehicles and Monstrous Creatures were treated differently, and this led to "un-immersive" situations (where being run over by a tank posed no risk to you, for example).
Sure, but muh immersion tells me that I should be able to shoot the easily exposed crew that are on the model.
You can't have your "muh immersion" cake and eat it too. You're using gameplay to excuse flaws in "muh immersion" - yet if I tried to do the same with things like 8th' lack of facings, you'd scream about it.
Stop dodging the point, and accept that other editions had stupid logic too.
No they didn't, if you want to be able to shoot the crew, those rules did exist in second edition. they were removed because they were to cumbersome unless you want 2 pages of rules for the damage flow chart against a leman russ ( i have the book, it doesn't really work when you move beyond a skirmish scale game)
You really don't get what the point is, do you?
Yes, we know it wasn't part of the rules. That's the problem. It not being in the rules is breaking "muh immersion" in the same way that a lack of facing break your immersion. Let's phrase this another way:
"If you want to be able to shoot at the weaker rear armour, those rules did exist in 7th edition. they were removed because they were too cumbersome unless you want to argue for two hours about if you were really on rear armour (i have the book, it really doesn't work when you move beyond a skirmish scale game)"
See what I mean? I'm not disputing that the rule existed, but I am saying that, according to "muh immersion", I should be able to shoot at the crew - represented by lasguns being able to damage a tank on a lucky roll.
Do you understand now?
But, in all honesty, how often have you seen a Titan killed by lasguns?
The fact that it is even possible is the problem.
Explain. Why is it a problem that lasguns can kill a damaged Titan with extreme amounts of luck, but have no such issue killing a Terminator who probably has less weak points.
And hey, if a lasgun can hurt a Riptide or Stormsurge
Well honestly many of us feel those should have been vehicles with an AV like a dreadnought
Maybe, but they didn't. Finally, you're beginning to understand that previous editions weren't all perfect "muh immersion" simulators.
Again, it's amusing that you whip out the "well the rules didn't support it but maybe they SHOULD", which is exactly what my arguments about being able to shoot Trukk crews are.
Karol wrote:
No, it's not. That's not at all what "realism" means. We're talking about the concept of verisimilitude, you're talking about representation. Representation doesn't mean realism, in the same way that tanks being able to shoot all weapons from one facing is representative, but not realistic.*
I don't know, if someone told me their WWII soviet army from summer 1944 should not have any tanks in it or artilery support, then it would be rather unrealistic to me, same way if someone said that because of a luck factor there should be an option for infantry to hurt a tank from 30" away. I get point blank shoting through vision slits, but not regular grunts doing stuff like that.
40k isn't a historical game - comparisons to real world game systems don't work. Army compositions aren't part of 40k's verisimilitude.
And why shouldn't grunts be able to shoot through vision slits?
Insectum7 wrote:The template from the weapon was explicitly permitted to touch/cover the model firing it, otherwise Immolators and such could not fire their flame weapons.
Which in itself is kinda non-immersive from that standpoint, as, if the gun is literally sticking into the side of the tank, it really shouldn't be able to fire through it's own hull.
Also it's sorta moot because:
These are Redeemer sponsons double-hitting a model on a 25mm base, the smallest available, and still not passing over the tank.
Ah, I must be mistaken. Possibly because my Redeemer has the cannons placed further back.
Insectum7 wrote: A Titan could be pretty easily downed by Lasguns if it only had a wound or two remaining.
I would assume a titan with only two wounds remaining has parts of its interior exposed. On a similar note, a LRBT that was hit by two multi-meltas probably has some weak points in its front armor.
Which brings me to my original point - how immersive either system is mainly depends on whether you want to immerse yourself.
Ehh. . . When my S4 anti-infantry Devilgaunts are mathematically incentivised to shoot at vehicles over infantry, as such happens if I'm fighting Custodes, it's a bad look.
In much the same way as it was mechanically de-incentivised for heroes to get into combat with a lowly squad sergeant who could Instant Death them? Or spamming mid-strength high-ROF weapons to take out tanks better than actual anti-tank weapons? Neither of which I'd call immersive.
aphyon wrote:
Lasguns cannot kill a titan, period. To even line up the minimum 50 lasgun shots while the titan is moving and killing stuff is already a nigh impossible task, and even then the chance is so low it might as well be zero.
It's more likely for the princeps to randomly die of a stroke than for lasguns to kill the titan.
The fact that it can even HURT a titan or any other heavy vehicle with an anti-infantry gun is the problem, not how many ridiculous number of shots on average are needed to kill it.
But why? And let's go back to Trukks - there's a nice exposed driver there, a much more promising target than a Terminator. So why can't I kill that exposed pilot?
Karol wrote:And lasguns should not be able to hurt tanks or termintors lore wise. If they could then marins would not be running around with bolters and the scatter laser would be the anti tank weapon of choice for all armies in the setting.
Ironic, considering that the scatter laser was considered a premier anti-tank weapon in 6th/7th, because of non-immersive rules.
And sure, maybe Terminators *shouldn't* be killable by lasguns (awfully convenient for you, it may be) - but the point stands that they can be. So, either aphyon needs to accept that Terminators shouldn't be killable by lasguns, or that vehicles can be killable by lasguns.
(As for my personal take, Terminators should be killable by lasguns, but it should be difficult - in the same way that it should be difficult for a lasgun to damage a tank.)
Basically, there just seems to be a lot of dishonest stances coming from people who claim that previous editions were "immersive", considering the amount of bizarre interactions that could be had.
Across all of these edition comparisons/debates, I generally come down to preferring older rulesets for being a bit more fluffy and nuanced - even through there are a bit sloppier in their writing. And conversely, I fully recognize that the newer editions have a tighter and cleaner ruleset.
I wonder to what extent the WAAC attitudes and ever increasing emphasis on competitive play and formats is driving this. Loose rules in older editions work fine in casual and friendly play - but fall apart quickly when people are looking for exploits or adhere too literally to the "rules as written" and the specific verbiage in order leverage an advantage, instead of sticking to the spirit/intent of the rules.
What we may have gained by ease of facilitating competitive play and reducing arguments we lost, IMHO, in terms of narrative and fidelity in the ruleset. The "problems" in older editions were rarely actual problems unless playing with people with a WAAC or highly competitive mindset.
Mezmorki wrote: I wonder to what extent the WAAC attitudes and ever increasing emphasis on competitive play and formats is driving this. Loose rules in older editions work fine in casual and friendly play - but fall apart quickly when people are looking for exploits or adhere too literally to the "rules as written" and the specific verbiage in order leverage an advantage, instead of sticking to the spirit/intent of the rules.
I think I've got to agree with that! I'm much more fond of "simplified" rulesets, with plenty of scope for narrative, even if not necessarily "realistic", but I think you're definitely right on how most issues arise from a conflict between what the rules are trying to achieve, versus what the players are trying to get from them.
For me, I find the cleaner and simpler rules work just fine, but pushing those rules to their breaking point is an issue, like it would be in any ruleset.
I have no specific problem with small arms theoretically being able to damage vehicles.
The problem is that mid-power weapons are too good vs vehicles at the moment.
Although, that was rather the case in older editions. Plasmaguns used to be fairly effective anti-tank guns.
I think the system in this regard that GW has gone with can work just fine. Indeed other games (such as Legion) use a similar system.
9th's problems lie else-where.
Unless you provide a source showing that a lasgun can't ever damage a titan (which is a tripple-moved goalpoast already) in any way under no circumstances, you are just expressing an unfounded opinion which I am free to call worthless and irrelevant to the question what is immersive and what is not.
1st through 7th edition. Lol.
Also RL, where spray and pray against MBTs is a waste of ammunition.
To add something of actual value, a quote from Forge of Mars:
Despise infantry if you must. Crush them underfoot, by all means. But do not ignore them. Battlefields are littered with the wreckage of Titans whose crews ignored infantry.
Prove that they're talking about Lasguns.
Infantry can be a big threat to heavy vehicles, sure. With weapons other than their battle rifles.
Insectum7 wrote:The template from the weapon was explicitly permitted to touch/cover the model firing it, otherwise Immolators and such could not fire their flame weapons.
Which in itself is kinda non-immersive from that standpoint, as, if the gun is literally sticking into the side of the tank, it really shouldn't be able to fire through it's own hull.
It's not firing through it's own hull if it has LOS, which I said was required.
Insectum7 wrote: A Titan could be pretty easily downed by Lasguns if it only had a wound or two remaining.
I would assume a titan with only two wounds remaining has parts of its interior exposed. On a similar note, a LRBT that was hit by two multi-meltas probably has some weak points in its front armor.
Which brings me to my original point - how immersive either system is mainly depends on whether you want to immerse yourself.
Ehh. . . When my S4 anti-infantry Devilgaunts are mathematically incentivised to shoot at vehicles over infantry, as such happens if I'm fighting Custodes, it's a bad look.
In much the same way as it was mechanically de-incentivised for heroes to get into combat with a lowly squad sergeant who could Instant Death them? Or spamming mid-strength high-ROF weapons to take out tanks better than actual anti-tank weapons? Neither of which I'd call immersive.
Friendly reminder that reinstating SOME rules from an earlier edition does not necessitate reinstating ALL rules from a prior edition.
Also the mid-strength, high ROF weapons being an issue is arguably a larger problem in this edition, since weapons like the Heavy Bolter couldn't scratch AV 12.
Insectum7 wrote:The template from the weapon was explicitly permitted to touch/cover the model firing it, otherwise Immolators and such could not fire their flame weapons.
Actually they were not allowed to cover a friendly model. A model is always friendly to itself. The Template is used from the base of the model as mentioned before by others.
Insectum7 wrote:Also it's sorta moot because:
These are Redeemer sponsons double-hitting a model on a 25mm base, the smallest available, and still not passing over the tank.
Now move that small base closer. It's at the edge of the Template, and barely hits, so it could move at least 3/4 of the distance between them with no problem and not be able to be shot by both without the unit spreading out, as was referenced. And the LR's own hull blocks LoS to at least one of them
See how that works when you aren't providing any arguments?
Does he need to? Is it required to write a 2 paragraph disertation that eating glass is not good idea. A lascgun should never be able to hurt a vehicle like a knight, Land raider or a titan.
Considering how much is unarmored, that is a little extravagant to say. Each exposed piece would have to be sufficiently invulnerable to the attack that it could not be warped when hit. A lot of helicopters were downed because their exposed sensitive mechanics were hit by small arms fire.
For a treaded tank that does seem more difficult as most small arms wouldn't affect the track (unless bullets landed just right to disrupt the teeth), but would be best used against operators. Harder to say on some of the Skimmers because we flat out have no idea on how they work, but I have noticed vents in Tau Skimmers, and small arms could affect what is inside them. Monoliths and Obelisks on the other hand seem to be pretty well covered with little exposure.
Jidmah wrote: Why? As far as I can tell only two FW anti-grav vehicles don't have 2+ armor, T8 or both.
Yeah, and those are the ones that I shoot at. The units to deal with in the army are occupying a weird mathematical space where they jump from being half-as-easy-to-damage, to equal-to-damage, to twice-as-easy-to-damage all around T 7-8 and save 3+to2+. The current wound system creates very goofy relationships and strange bracketing. The easiest thing to do would to just go back to the old wounding chart. You'd kill the damage "loopholes" and prevent small arms from hurting the tough stuff.
Insectum7 wrote:The template from the weapon was explicitly permitted to touch/cover the model firing it, otherwise Immolators and such could not fire their flame weapons.
Actually they were not allowed to cover a friendly model. A model is always friendly to itself. The Template is used from the base of the model as mentioned before by others.
Insectum7 wrote:The template from the weapon was explicitly permitted to touch/cover the model firing it, otherwise Immolators and such could not fire their flame weapons.
Actually they were not allowed to cover a friendly model. A model is always friendly to itself. The Template is used from the base of the model as mentioned before by others.
Find the relevant passage for vehicles.
I did for 6th and 7th, and already mentioned I no longer have my 5th. As stated, LoS is from the Barrel, and the Template is used from the base of the model. No special permission is allowed to place the Template on the Vehicle in 6th or 7th. In fact, Template rules and Vehicle Shooting rules make no mention of each other.
Considering how much is unarmored, that is a little extravagant to say. Each exposed piece would have to be sufficiently invulnerable to the attack that it could not be warped when hit. A lot of helicopters were downed because their exposed sensitive mechanics were hit by small arms fire.
A Land Raider or a termintor does not have un armoured parts. Comparing them to helicopter is like comparing a bucket to a 6x6x6 steel block.
Mezmorki wrote: Across all of these edition comparisons/debates, I generally come down to preferring older rulesets for being a bit more fluffy and nuanced - even through there are a bit sloppier in their writing. And conversely, I fully recognize that the newer editions have a tighter and cleaner ruleset.
I wonder to what extent the WAAC attitudes and ever increasing emphasis on competitive play and formats is driving this. Loose rules in older editions work fine in casual and friendly play - but fall apart quickly when people are looking for exploits or adhere too literally to the "rules as written" and the specific verbiage in order leverage an advantage, instead of sticking to the spirit/intent of the rules.
What we may have gained by ease of facilitating competitive play and reducing arguments we lost, IMHO, in terms of narrative and fidelity in the ruleset. The "problems" in older editions were rarely actual problems unless playing with people with a WAAC or highly competitive mindset.
As someone who was a good deal younger and less experienced with wargames when I played fifth edition, the game system didn't feel to me like it had a ton of narrative fidelity. There were so many arbitrary breakpoints in the old system that would MASSIVELY change the performance of your unit. Your character who could single-handedly fight whole squads of enemy warriors would get absolutely dumpstered on by a single krak missile, but an autocannon with just one point less strength and AP, he could tank 30 shots from before he started to get worried. One game, your vehicle would wade through enemy fire, getting shaken but then coming back, losing a weapon but continuing to fire, eventually becoming immobilized and turning into a stationary gun turret, and the next you'd put it on the table and the first shot that came its way would instantly kill it.
Adding that to units not really acting in any kind of way that made sense given the setting - ravening insane warriors swinging chainsaw-bladed axes would pour out of their transport and....nope, they couldn't charge, they just kind of stand there yelling threateningly so their opponents would get a shot for fairness' sake. Brutal commissars of the most tyrannical regime in human history would refuse to allow the artillery to fire on alien horrors because they might kill one single conscript. The missions were so utterly pointless that generally they'd just get brought up as sort of a tie-breaker at the end of the game and both players would chuckle and crack open the rulebook and try to figure out which mission we were supposedly playing towards.
I started out playing super goofball games with 2 friends, always trying and failing to figure out how to play 3-player games in a way that was satisfying and good, and then I spent years and years just playing the same super kitbashed goofy orks throughout all of 5th and 6th at a fairly casual club with only 1-2 people who cared about the game competitively. It wasn't a WAAC attitude by any means, it was just that the system ultimately has always felt kind of silly and arbitrary and what edition you play just determines what kind of silly arbitrary crap you don't mind and what kind sticks in your craw.
Considering how much is unarmored, that is a little extravagant to say. Each exposed piece would have to be sufficiently invulnerable to the attack that it could not be warped when hit. A lot of helicopters were downed because their exposed sensitive mechanics were hit by small arms fire.
A Land Raider or a termintor does not have un armoured parts. Comparing them to helicopter is like comparing a bucket to a 6x6x6 steel block.
I mean. Unless you're talking about the track design, or the fact that there's hatches all over it, or the fact that the weapon tubing and wiring is completely exposed, or that it uses a sponson design that's NEVER been practical, and is modeled off of WW1 tanks that went out of date in a decade for a reason...
Insectum7 wrote:The template from the weapon was explicitly permitted to touch/cover the model firing it, otherwise Immolators and such could not fire their flame weapons.
Actually they were not allowed to cover a friendly model. A model is always friendly to itself. The Template is used from the base of the model as mentioned before by others.
Find the relevant passage for vehicles.
I did for 6th and 7th, and already mentioned I no longer have my 5th. As stated, LoS is from the Barrel, and the Template is used from the base of the model. No special permission is allowed to place the Template on the Vehicle in 6th or 7th. In fact, Template rules and Vehicle Shooting rules make no mention of each other.
Vehicles don't have bases, and LOS for vehicles is drawn from the weapon. The relevant passage is "a model never hits itself" under the template weapon rules. Otherwise an Immolator would not be able to fire without potentially damaging itself.
Considering how much is unarmored, that is a little extravagant to say. Each exposed piece would have to be sufficiently invulnerable to the attack that it could not be warped when hit. A lot of helicopters were downed because their exposed sensitive mechanics were hit by small arms fire.
A Land Raider or a termintor does not have un armoured parts. Comparing them to helicopter is like comparing a bucket to a 6x6x6 steel block.
Read the paragraph after what you quoted for context.
Insectum7 wrote:The template from the weapon was explicitly permitted to touch/cover the model firing it, otherwise Immolators and such could not fire their flame weapons.
Actually they were not allowed to cover a friendly model. A model is always friendly to itself. The Template is used from the base of the model as mentioned before by others.
Find the relevant passage for vehicles.
I did for 6th and 7th, and already mentioned I no longer have my 5th. As stated, LoS is from the Barrel, and the Template is used from the base of the model. No special permission is allowed to place the Template on the Vehicle in 6th or 7th. In fact, Template rules and Vehicle Shooting rules make no mention of each other.
Vehicles don't have bases, and LOS for vehicles is drawn from the weapon. The relevant passage is "a model never hits itself" under the template weapon rules. Otherwise an Immolator would not be able to fire without potentially damaging itself.
Some Vehicles do have bases, actually. And where they don't have bases, you use the hull.
However, the Line of Sight issue still applies, and it would require literally shooting through the hull in order to hit with both, which means it is out of Line of Sight, unlike the Baal Predator which would be shooting DOWN the hull to hit.
Considering how much is unarmored, that is a little extravagant to say. Each exposed piece would have to be sufficiently invulnerable to the attack that it could not be warped when hit. A lot of helicopters were downed because their exposed sensitive mechanics were hit by small arms fire.
A Land Raider or a termintor does not have un armoured parts. Comparing them to helicopter is like comparing a bucket to a 6x6x6 steel block.
Read the paragraph after what you quoted for context.
Insectum7 wrote:The template from the weapon was explicitly permitted to touch/cover the model firing it, otherwise Immolators and such could not fire their flame weapons.
Actually they were not allowed to cover a friendly model. A model is always friendly to itself. The Template is used from the base of the model as mentioned before by others.
Find the relevant passage for vehicles.
I did for 6th and 7th, and already mentioned I no longer have my 5th. As stated, LoS is from the Barrel, and the Template is used from the base of the model. No special permission is allowed to place the Template on the Vehicle in 6th or 7th. In fact, Template rules and Vehicle Shooting rules make no mention of each other.
Vehicles don't have bases, and LOS for vehicles is drawn from the weapon. The relevant passage is "a model never hits itself" under the template weapon rules. Otherwise an Immolator would not be able to fire without potentially damaging itself.
Some Vehicles do have bases, actually. And where they don't have bases, you use the hull.
Are you saying that I drawtge template from the hull of the LR rather than the weapon? Gonna need a source.
However, the Line of Sight issue still applies, and it would require literally shooting through the hull in order to hit with both, which means it is out of Line of Sight, unlike the Baal Predator which would be shooting DOWN the hull to hit.
I've been saying since the beginning that LOS is required. Your point doesn't change any of my assertions.
Karol wrote: No, there are things you do not have to prove. You don't need to make arguments why breathing is okey for you.
And lasguns should not be able to hurt tanks or termintors lore wise.
heheheheehehehehehehe I see what you did there lol.
"Lasguns should not be able to hurt tanks....also incidentally my ENTIRE fething ARMY should just happen to be immune to the baseline guns and melee of multiple factions im making such a good common sense argument look at me."
yeah thats a classic Karol move.
"My army sucks because its not litterally invincible, Oh and Eldar are OP and should stay unupdated and bad"
Unless you provide a source showing that a lasgun can't ever damage a titan (which is a tripple-moved goalpoast already) in any way under no circumstances, you are just expressing an unfounded opinion which I am free to call worthless and irrelevant to the question what is immersive and what is not.
1st through 7th edition. Lol.
That has just as much weight as saying that there's sources that a lasgun *can* damage a titan - being 8th and 9th.
Seeing as this discussion is about how neither system of game mechanics are exactly "accurate" to "immersion", should they not be discounted from "evidence"?
Also RL, where spray and pray against MBTs is a waste of ammunition.
I'd say that fishing for 6s on lasguns to kill a Titan is also a waste of ammunition.
Insectum7 wrote:The template from the weapon was explicitly permitted to touch/cover the model firing it, otherwise Immolators and such could not fire their flame weapons.
Which in itself is kinda non-immersive from that standpoint, as, if the gun is literally sticking into the side of the tank, it really shouldn't be able to fire through it's own hull.
It's not firing through it's own hull if it has LOS, which I said was required.
Insectum7 wrote:Ehh. . . When my S4 anti-infantry Devilgaunts are mathematically incentivised to shoot at vehicles over infantry, as such happens if I'm fighting Custodes, it's a bad look.
In much the same way as it was mechanically de-incentivised for heroes to get into combat with a lowly squad sergeant who could Instant Death them? Or spamming mid-strength high-ROF weapons to take out tanks better than actual anti-tank weapons? Neither of which I'd call immersive.
Friendly reminder that reinstating SOME rules from an earlier edition does not necessitate reinstating ALL rules from a prior edition.
Friendly reminder that this is a discussion talking about how those old rules had very severe "immersion" issues, for all their positives, and that the sin of being "immersion-breaking" is carried by practically every edition.
Also the mid-strength, high ROF weapons being an issue is arguably a larger problem in this edition, since weapons like the Heavy Bolter couldn't scratch AV 12.
Arguably, sure - the problem definitely hasn't left, irrespective of if things are better or worse.
the_scotsman wrote:There were so many arbitrary breakpoints in the old system that would MASSIVELY change the performance of your unit. Your character who could single-handedly fight whole squads of enemy warriors would get absolutely dumpstered on by a single krak missile, but an autocannon with just one point less strength and AP, he could tank 30 shots from before he started to get worried. One game, your vehicle would wade through enemy fire, getting shaken but then coming back, losing a weapon but continuing to fire, eventually becoming immobilized and turning into a stationary gun turret, and the next you'd put it on the table and the first shot that came its way would instantly kill it.
Adding that to units not really acting in any kind of way that made sense given the setting - ravening insane warriors swinging chainsaw-bladed axes would pour out of their transport and....nope, they couldn't charge, they just kind of stand there yelling threateningly so their opponents would get a shot for fairness' sake. Brutal commissars of the most tyrannical regime in human history would refuse to allow the artillery to fire on alien horrors because they might kill one single conscript.
All excellent examples. Don't get me wrong, I enjoyed 5th very much. But holding it as this paragon of "immersive rules" just ain't right.
Unless you provide a source showing that a lasgun can't ever damage a titan (which is a tripple-moved goalpoast already) in any way under no circumstances, you are just expressing an unfounded opinion which I am free to call worthless and irrelevant to the question what is immersive and what is not.
1st through 7th edition. Lol.
That has just as much weight as saying that there's sources that a lasgun *can* damage a titan - being 8th and 9th.
Seeing as this discussion is about how neither system of game mechanics are exactly "accurate" to "immersion", should they not be discounted from "evidence"?
It was mostly a joke. But if we're going to commit to taking it seriously then I'd say that precedent has a place in consideration. The precedent in this case has set expectations about how the fictional universe operates.
Also RL, where spray and pray against MBTs is a waste of ammunition.
I'd say that fishing for 6s on lasguns to kill a Titan is also a waste of ammunition.
At the moment we have the situation where a squad of GEQ firing Lasguns at a Leman Russ achieves the same average output that firing a dedicated AT weapon Krak Missile does.
10 Lasguns, RFing: 20 x .5 x .17 x .333 = .5661
1 Krak Missile: .5 x .5 x .666 x 3.5 = .58
So rather than "wasting ammunition" you're actually getting the same result. This encourages behavior that is the opposite of how units actually deal with armored threats in RL. If you can find examples in RL of trained infantry blazing away at heavy armor with their rifles with the expectation of damage, I'm all ears/eyes.
See how that works when you aren't providing any arguments?
Does he need to? Is it required to write a 2 paragraph disertation that eating glass is not good idea. A lascgun should never be able to hurt a vehicle like a knight, Land raider or a titan.
Karol wrote: No, there are things you do not have to prove. You don't need to make arguments why breathing is okey for you.
And lasguns should not be able to hurt tanks or termintors lore wise.
heheheheehehehehehehe I see what you did there lol.
"Lasguns should not be able to hurt tanks....also incidentally my ENTIRE fething ARMY should just happen to be immune to the baseline guns and melee of multiple factions im making such a good common sense argument look at me."
How many M16s does it take to kill an M1 Abrams tank? More than 50? More than 50 for how long? I got common sense all day long... I bet it takes your rifles longer than that.
Jidmah wrote: That is not only wrong, but even then you would have to prove this. I can assure you that in some circumstance breathing is not okay for you.
Unless you provide a source showing that a lasgun can't ever damage a titan (which is a tripple-moved goalpoast already) in any way under no circumstances, you are just expressing an unfounded opinion which I am free to call worthless and irrelevant to the question what is immersive and what is not.
Automatically Appended Next Post: To add something of actual value, a quote from Forge of Mars:
Despise infantry if you must. Crush them underfoot, by all means. But do not ignore them. Battlefields are littered with the wreckage of Titans whose crews ignored infantry.
Also interesting to note, due to the mechanics of how Void Shields worked in the first Epic game, shooting small arms at Titans with their shields up was actually a valid tactic. Not so much once you were trying to do damage to the structure though. In 2nd edition Terminators had a 3+ save on 2D6 so lasguns and bolters were pretty much useless against them but the game slowed down even more spectacularly than normal if you opened up with a full Tactical squad at a unit of Terminators.
All the arguments about lasguns hurting Titans/superheavies conveniently leave out the number of shots required to do even one wound to something with dozens of wounds on its profile. There's a certain amount of abstraction in any system but I really don't think requiring hundreds of small arms shots to kill a tank is a bad price to pay to ditch the old facing system that caused endless arguments.
I got a clue for you, it wasn’t the facing system that caused those arguments...
All the arguments about lasguns hurting Titans/superheavies conveniently leave out the number of shots required to do even one wound to something with dozens of wounds on its profile. There's a certain amount of abstraction in any system but I really don't think requiring hundreds of small arms shots to kill a tank is a bad price to pay to ditch the old facing system that caused endless arguments.
I got a clue for you, it wasn’t the facing system that caused those arguments...
With so much of GW's rule development, they end up throwing the baby out with the bathwater. Vehicle facing is a solid idea and it added depth and decisions to the game. But it was also imprecisely written and worded. It could easily be fixed - but instead of fixing it they just threw the whole notion out the window.
I really don't think they got rid of vehicle facing because Timmy and Kevin couldn't figure out the side arc of a falcon grav tank, or any other 'imprecision.'
Vehicles are probably the subsystem of 40k that's changed the most over the years (other than maybe psychic powers), and they went in another new direction with it. Its hardly unprecedented.
All the arguments about lasguns hurting Titans/superheavies conveniently leave out the number of shots required to do even one wound to something with dozens of wounds on its profile. There's a certain amount of abstraction in any system but I really don't think requiring hundreds of small arms shots to kill a tank is a bad price to pay to ditch the old facing system that caused endless arguments.
I got a clue for you, it wasn’t the facing system that caused those arguments...
With so much of GW's rule development, they end up throwing the baby out with the bathwater. Vehicle facing is a solid idea and it added depth and decisions to the game. But it was also imprecisely written and worded. It could easily be fixed - but instead of fixing it they just threw the whole notion out the window.
Totally.
I liked the old Epic system where facing just gave a modifier to save, iirc. And it could be easily integrated with the new paradigm. Just do something like -1 Toughness from the side arc, and -2 Toughness from the rear arc. Pump the default toughness of vehicles up by +1 (so a Land Raider is T9), Then change the damn wound table back to what it used to be. That's my 30 second starting bid.
Lasguns couldnt hurt stuff like stormsurges either as far i remember. They could hurt anything with toughness 7 or higher. If you ask me T6 or higher should be immune to lasguns.
When i played 8th edition i saw knights and tanks being killed by flamers and bolters. That was a big immersion killer.
terror51247 wrote: Lasguns couldnt hurt stuff like stormsurges either as far i remember. They could hurt anything with toughness 7 or higher. If you ask me T6 or higher should be immune to lasguns.
When i played 8th edition i saw knights and tanks being killed by flamers and bolters. That was a big immersion killer.
Yes, because losing a couple of wounds here and there to small arms is much more immersion breaking than the weapons everyone was bringing besides actual anti-tank weapons to glance vehicles to death instead for efficiency.
Have you even done the math for a Bolter hurting a Knight? 100 Bolt Rifle shots barely inflicts 5 wounds! Your anecdotal garbage doesn't negate this exact fact.
terror51247 wrote: Lasguns couldnt hurt stuff like stormsurges either as far i remember. They could hurt anything with toughness 7 or higher. If you ask me T6 or higher should be immune to lasguns.
When i played 8th edition i saw knights and tanks being killed by flamers and bolters. That was a big immersion killer.
Yes, because losing a couple of wounds here and there to small arms is much more immersion breaking . . . .
It's not the vehicle taking wounds, it's the decision making of the troops who are spraying their small arms at heavy vehicles that's immersion breaking. It shouldn't be a thing.
techsoldaten wrote: Might help this thread if people arguing about immunity to small arms fire would identify whether or not they ever served in the military.
I have a feeling the disconnect owes to whether or not someone has seen what an automatic weapon does to armor IRL. Which is absolutely nothing.
+1
Not that I've served, mind you, but I've done some research and I prefer data over Rambo movies.
terror51247 wrote: Lasguns couldnt hurt stuff like stormsurges either as far i remember. They could hurt anything with toughness 7 or higher. If you ask me T6 or higher should be immune to lasguns.
When i played 8th edition i saw knights and tanks being killed by flamers and bolters. That was a big immersion killer.
Yes, because losing a couple of wounds here and there to small arms is much more immersion breaking . . . .
It's not the vehicle taking wounds, it's the decision making of the troops who are spraying their small arms at heavy vehicles that's immersion breaking. It shouldn't be a thing.
Are you saying that nobody in real life fires small arms at weapons despite have a nearly 0% chance of doing anything relevant? I'm asking because this seems to happen in every movie involving tanks I've ever seen.
techsoldaten wrote: Might help this thread if people arguing about immunity to small arms fire would identify whether or not they ever served in the military.
I have a feeling the disconnect owes to whether or not someone has seen what an automatic weapon does to armor IRL. Which is absolutely nothing.
I find it entirely believable that small ballistic weaponry wouldn't do a damn thing. I haven't been in the military but I have handled guns, and we had a metal spinner target that was essentially an inch-or-so thick cast iron plate that could just take a seemingly infinite number of hits from anything less heavily propelled than... I think it was .308 bolt-action rifle rounds that finally gouged the crap out of it? I may have that wrong, but presumably 40K armor could very easily be made that would just treat any such small arm with the same degree of total blasé.
But what about small energy weapons, even, say, the lasgun? Would massed fire heat a Russ' armor enough to melt it or bake the crew or make ammo explode or something in the timescale of game of 40K? Does the energy get absorbed, or does the armor have little mirrors baked into it or something?
terror51247 wrote: Lasguns couldnt hurt stuff like stormsurges either as far i remember. They could hurt anything with toughness 7 or higher. If you ask me T6 or higher should be immune to lasguns.
When i played 8th edition i saw knights and tanks being killed by flamers and bolters. That was a big immersion killer.
Yes, because losing a couple of wounds here and there to small arms is much more immersion breaking . . . .
It's not the vehicle taking wounds, it's the decision making of the troops who are spraying their small arms at heavy vehicles that's immersion breaking. It shouldn't be a thing.
Are you saying that nobody in real life fires small arms at weapons despite have a nearly 0% chance of doing anything relevant? I'm asking because this seems to happen in every movie involving tanks I've ever seen.
Methinks that's your problem.
Also, what I've seen in the more "realistic" depictions in movies is that troops will overwatch vehicles waiting for guys to pop out of them . . . AFTER hitting them with same actual AT capable weapon.
techsoldaten wrote:I have a feeling the disconnect owes to whether or not someone has seen what an automatic weapon does to armor IRL. Which is absolutely nothing.
While I haven't served, it really depends on the automatic weapon and the armor in question. An M-16 will likely do little more than mess up the paint with lead scoring in most cases, but an M-2 is an entirely different story. However, that latter is more like a Multilaser than a lasgun
If your armor is a Trukk.... I think that the impacts alone would shake it apart.
Of course, there is one caveat. Armor is designed around expected encounters. Plate armor is pretty decent against a sword, but I wouldn't trust it to hold back a round of a model 1911, for example. In some sci-fi environs, the armor is directed against more solid energy-based attacks rather than kinetic, so kinetic attacks work well. Food for thought at any rate.
CEO Kasen wrote:But what about small energy weapons, even, say, the lasgun? Would massed fire heat a Russ' armor enough to melt it or bake the crew or make ammo explode or something in the timescale of game of 40K? Does the energy get absorbed, or does the armor have little mirrors baked into it or something?
Well, considering that a lasgun hits about as hard and likely to cause damage sufficient to cause a wound like the average assault rifle today, maybe, but I doubt it. However, part of the concept I suggest considering that you not hit the armor, which is very hard with some things.
alextroy wrote:Are you saying that nobody in real life fires small arms at weapons despite have a nearly 0% chance of doing anything relevant? I'm asking because this seems to happen in every movie involving tanks I've ever seen.
I could think of 2 scenarios where someone would do this: 1) They are panicking and can't think of something intelligent to do other than get away; or 2) They trying to draw attention away from the real threat of the nice, conveniently portable AT weapon being deployed against it.
And Hollywood often makes very stupid decisions when it comes to guiding combat.
See how that works when you aren't providing any arguments?
Does he need to? Is it required to write a 2 paragraph disertation that eating glass is not good idea. A lascgun should never be able to hurt a vehicle like a knight, Land raider or a titan.
Karol wrote: No, there are things you do not have to prove. You don't need to make arguments why breathing is okey for you.
And lasguns should not be able to hurt tanks or termintors lore wise.
heheheheehehehehehehe I see what you did there lol.
"Lasguns should not be able to hurt tanks....also incidentally my ENTIRE fething ARMY should just happen to be immune to the baseline guns and melee of multiple factions im making such a good common sense argument look at me."
How many M16s does it take to kill an M1 Abrams tank? More than 50? More than 50 for how long? I got common sense all day long... I bet it takes your rifles longer than that.
This is a game about putting your little plastic models down on a tabletop and playing a game with someone else's little plastic models. "The Lore" is bs, made up to sell little plastic models.
I'm going to explain this real slow because apparently it's a toughie
If you make a game
and the basic unit of one particular army
has NO WAY AT ALL to interact with the basic unit of another army
you've probably made yourself a bad game.
if you say "well you see, in the lore, rooks bishops and queens can clearly move at top speeds 16x of a lowly pawn, I'm sorry but it's simply immersion breaking to me that it would ever be humanly possible for one of those idiotic slow pawns to ever have a CHANCE to land a blow against an opponent that lightning-fast" then you don't need to change the game so pawns can't hurt queens, you need to change the game to explain how pawns can hurt queens.
To make a point regarding the effect of small arms on tanks, it depends on several factors, the armor of the tank in question, what the intent is. Tanks often have hatches open and crew looking around, the tank commander in particular so they have better situational awareness. Yes no amount of .556 fire will penetrate the armor of even a T-55 tank which is a rather weak tank on modern battlefields. Yet fire can and will strip off outer equipment from the tank. If a bullet impacts one of our periscopes and disables it, then yes the tank was "hurt" by a weapon completely incapable of penetrating its armor, though it will continue to function.
Now in the event the armor suffers major damage, such as the damage a Melta weapon would inflict, then yes the big gapping hole in the armor could be targeted by small arms and in all likelihood the crew would be slaughtered in the cramped confines of the tank, with bullets ricocheting inside the tank and turning them into slurry. This of course assumes the intervention of a true AT gun.
Its also why I think the true AT guns of 40k should be very much capable of 1 shoting tanks. Should one of my battlewagons get targeted by a Leman Russ Vanquisher or a Tau Railgun, I should suffer a catastrophic ammunition detonation or something to that effect from those weapons. Thats the trade off of anti infantry weapons being completely useless, if that is what you're going for, then AT guns should be absolutely devastating, as opposed to spamming plasma guns which i commonly see used over most AT weaponry.
See how that works when you aren't providing any arguments?
Does he need to? Is it required to write a 2 paragraph disertation that eating glass is not good idea. A lascgun should never be able to hurt a vehicle like a knight, Land raider or a titan.
Karol wrote: No, there are things you do not have to prove. You don't need to make arguments why breathing is okey for you.
And lasguns should not be able to hurt tanks or termintors lore wise.
heheheheehehehehehehe I see what you did there lol.
"Lasguns should not be able to hurt tanks....also incidentally my ENTIRE fething ARMY should just happen to be immune to the baseline guns and melee of multiple factions im making such a good common sense argument look at me."
How many M16s does it take to kill an M1 Abrams tank? More than 50? More than 50 for how long? I got common sense all day long... I bet it takes your rifles longer than that.
This is a game about putting your little plastic models down on a tabletop and playing a game with someone else's little plastic models. "The Lore" is bs, made up to sell little plastic models.
I'm going to explain this real slow because apparently it's a toughie
If you make a game
and the basic unit of one particular army
has NO WAY AT ALL to interact with the basic unit of another army
you've probably made yourself a bad game.
The only time that's been the case is with Knights, as the basic unit of every other army is just some infantry model and perfectly shootable with basic weapons.
In which case that's not a bad game, as the problem only exists because of one faction out of 20.
I'd just call that a poor implementation of Knights. . . Which it was.
Automatically Appended Next Post:
panzerfront14 wrote: To make a point regarding the effect of small arms on tanks, it depends on several factors, the armor of the tank in question, what the intent is. Tanks often have hatches open and crew looking around, the tank commander in particular so they have better situational awareness. Yes no amount of .556 fire will penetrate the armor of even a T-55 tank which is a rather weak tank on modern battlefields. Yet fire can and will strip off outer equipment from the tank. If a bullet impacts one of our periscopes and disables it, then yes the tank was "hurt" by a weapon completely incapable of penetrating its armor, though it will continue to function.
Now in the event the armor suffers major damage, such as the damage a Melta weapon would inflict, then yes the big gapping hole in the armor could be targeted by small arms and in all likelihood the crew would be slaughtered in the cramped confines of the tank, with bullets ricocheting inside the tank and turning them into slurry. This of course assumes the intervention of a true AT gun.
Its also why I think the true AT guns of 40k should be very much capable of 1 shoting tanks. Should one of my battlewagons get targeted by a Leman Russ Vanquisher or a Tau Railgun, I should suffer a catastrophic ammunition detonation or something to that effect from those weapons. Thats the trade off of anti infantry weapons being completely useless, if that is what you're going for, then AT guns should be absolutely devastating, as opposed to spamming plasma guns which i commonly see used over most AT weaponry.
You basically just described 1st through 4th edition, where dedicated AT weapons would regularly one-shot or cripple vehicles with a solid penetrating hit.
Tygre wrote:Also tanks are mostly fairly blind. Unless the tank commander peeks out the cupola. I don't think his face would be bullet proof.
But... How else is the Commander so supposed to hit people with his sword if doesn't peek out of the copula?
the_scotsman wrote:This is a game about putting your little plastic models down on a tabletop and playing a game with someone else's little plastic models. "The Lore" is bs, made up to sell little plastic models.
I'm going to explain this real slow because apparently it's a toughie
If you make a game
and the basic unit of one particular army
has NO WAY AT ALL to interact with the basic unit of another army
you've probably made yourself a bad game.
if you say "well you see, in the lore, rooks bishops and queens can clearly move at top speeds 16x of a lowly pawn, I'm sorry but it's simply immersion breaking to me that it would ever be humanly possible for one of those idiotic slow pawns to ever have a CHANCE to land a blow against an opponent that lightning-fast" then you don't need to change the game so pawns can't hurt queens, you need to change the game to explain how pawns can hurt queens.
Okay, but what Troop unit (basic unit of an army in 40K) cannot be hurt by Lasguns?
And why are we concerned with this when we've been talking about how well a Lasgun can harm a Heavy Support Vehicle or Lord of War?
Or were you referring to Imperial Knights as an army and using their Knights as the "basic unit"?
Or were you referring to ANY non-unique unit in the other army?
If the last, I have to disagree. There is no reason for a Troop unit to have the ability to counter every single unit in a game, even if poorly, so long as an army as a whole has other answers for it. Fortunately for most Lasgun-carrying units, there is usually an option for a Lascannon, Rokkit Launcha, or similar.
panzerfront14 wrote: To make a point regarding the effect of small arms on tanks, it depends on several factors, the armor of the tank in question, what the intent is. Tanks often have hatches open and crew looking around, the tank commander in particular so they have better situational awareness. Yes no amount of .556 fire will penetrate the armor of even a T-55 tank which is a rather weak tank on modern battlefields. Yet fire can and will strip off outer equipment from the tank. If a bullet impacts one of our periscopes and disables it, then yes the tank was "hurt" by a weapon completely incapable of penetrating its armor, though it will continue to function.
Now in the event the armor suffers major damage, such as the damage a Melta weapon would inflict, then yes the big gapping hole in the armor could be targeted by small arms and in all likelihood the crew would be slaughtered in the cramped confines of the tank, with bullets ricocheting inside the tank and turning them into slurry. This of course assumes the intervention of a true AT gun.
Its also why I think the true AT guns of 40k should be very much capable of 1 shoting tanks. Should one of my battlewagons get targeted by a Leman Russ Vanquisher or a Tau Railgun, I should suffer a catastrophic ammunition detonation or something to that effect from those weapons. Thats the trade off of anti infantry weapons being completely useless, if that is what you're going for, then AT guns should be absolutely devastating, as opposed to spamming plasma guns which i commonly see used over most AT weaponry.
You basically just described 1st through 4th edition, where dedicated AT weapons would regularly one-shot or cripple vehicles with a solid penetrating hit.
You mean the same editions where a Lascannon couldn't kill a Carnifex in one hit? You're really just picking and choosing what's immersion breaking.
Automatically Appended Next Post:
techsoldaten wrote: Might help this thread if people arguing about immunity to small arms fire would identify whether or not they ever served in the military.
I have a feeling the disconnect owes to whether or not someone has seen what an automatic weapon does to armor IRL. Which is absolutely nothing.
Didn't realize you used Lasguns and Bolters in the military and shot a bunch of them at a tank.
terror51247 wrote: Lasguns couldnt hurt stuff like stormsurges either as far i remember. They could hurt anything with toughness 7 or higher. If you ask me T6 or higher should be immune to lasguns.
When i played 8th edition i saw knights and tanks being killed by flamers and bolters. That was a big immersion killer.
Yes, because losing a couple of wounds here and there to small arms is much more immersion breaking . . . .
It's not the vehicle taking wounds, it's the decision making of the troops who are spraying their small arms at heavy vehicles that's immersion breaking. It shouldn't be a thing.
If there aren't infantry near the tank they're not just gonna sit there idly. If there are infantry near said tank, said anti infantry weapons are pointed at that instead of the tank. Quit picking and choosing what's immersion breaking. Either the game is immersive or it isn't.
If anything, there's more active decision making in terms of trying to plink off one more wound off a tank, which is a good thing in a game that doesn't have a lot of depth to begin with.
panzerfront14 wrote: To make a point regarding the effect of small arms on tanks, it depends on several factors, the armor of the tank in question, what the intent is. Tanks often have hatches open and crew looking around, the tank commander in particular so they have better situational awareness. Yes no amount of .556 fire will penetrate the armor of even a T-55 tank which is a rather weak tank on modern battlefields. Yet fire can and will strip off outer equipment from the tank. If a bullet impacts one of our periscopes and disables it, then yes the tank was "hurt" by a weapon completely incapable of penetrating its armor, though it will continue to function.
Now in the event the armor suffers major damage, such as the damage a Melta weapon would inflict, then yes the big gapping hole in the armor could be targeted by small arms and in all likelihood the crew would be slaughtered in the cramped confines of the tank, with bullets ricocheting inside the tank and turning them into slurry. This of course assumes the intervention of a true AT gun.
Its also why I think the true AT guns of 40k should be very much capable of 1 shoting tanks. Should one of my battlewagons get targeted by a Leman Russ Vanquisher or a Tau Railgun, I should suffer a catastrophic ammunition detonation or something to that effect from those weapons. Thats the trade off of anti infantry weapons being completely useless, if that is what you're going for, then AT guns should be absolutely devastating, as opposed to spamming plasma guns which i commonly see used over most AT weaponry.
You basically just described 1st through 4th edition, where dedicated AT weapons would regularly one-shot or cripple vehicles with a solid penetrating hit.
You mean the same editions where a Lascannon couldn't kill a Carnifex in one hit? You're really just picking and choosing what's immersion breaking.
The AV mechanic is the one that I'm focussing on atm. Here's my go-to response for your type of statement now: Reinstating certain aspects of former editions does not necessitate the reinstatement of ALL aspects of former editions.
Five min in the penalty box for you.
Also, there was a tradeoff for MCs in that era, where it was more likely for them to take damage from a Lascannon, but it would require multiple hits. And being only T6, the Fex was engageable by a far greater array of weapons than something that was AV 12+.
If there aren't infantry near the tank they're not just gonna sit there idly. If there are infantry near said tank, said anti infantry weapons are pointed at that instead of the tank. Quit picking and choosing what's immersion breaking. Either the game is immersive or it isn't.
Really Slayer? Are tgey going to empty clips of ammunition into the armor plates in the hopes of achieving something? Is that your stand on the matter?
terror51247 wrote: Lasguns couldnt hurt stuff like stormsurges either as far i remember. They could hurt anything with toughness 7 or higher. If you ask me T6 or higher should be immune to lasguns.
When i played 8th edition i saw knights and tanks being killed by flamers and bolters. That was a big immersion killer.
Yes, because losing a couple of wounds here and there to small arms is much more immersion breaking . . . .
It's not the vehicle taking wounds, it's the decision making of the troops who are spraying their small arms at heavy vehicles that's immersion breaking. It shouldn't be a thing.
Are you saying that nobody in real life fires small arms at weapons despite have a nearly 0% chance of doing anything relevant? I'm asking because this seems to happen in every movie involving tanks I've ever seen.
The end of Saving Private Ryan makes the point quite clearly.
See how that works when you aren't providing any arguments?
Does he need to? Is it required to write a 2 paragraph disertation that eating glass is not good idea. A lascgun should never be able to hurt a vehicle like a knight, Land raider or a titan.
Karol wrote: No, there are things you do not have to prove. You don't need to make arguments why breathing is okey for you.
And lasguns should not be able to hurt tanks or termintors lore wise.
heheheheehehehehehehe I see what you did there lol.
"Lasguns should not be able to hurt tanks....also incidentally my ENTIRE fething ARMY should just happen to be immune to the baseline guns and melee of multiple factions im making such a good common sense argument look at me."
How many M16s does it take to kill an M1 Abrams tank? More than 50? More than 50 for how long? I got common sense all day long... I bet it takes your rifles longer than that.
This is a game about putting your little plastic models down on a tabletop and playing a game with someone else's little plastic models. "The Lore" is bs, made up to sell little plastic models.
I'm going to explain this real slow because apparently it's a toughie
If you make a game
and the basic unit of one particular army
has NO WAY AT ALL to interact with the basic unit of another army
you've probably made yourself a bad game.
if you say "well you see, in the lore, rooks bishops and queens can clearly move at top speeds 16x of a lowly pawn, I'm sorry but it's simply immersion breaking to me that it would ever be humanly possible for one of those idiotic slow pawns to ever have a CHANCE to land a blow against an opponent that lightning-fast" then you don't need to change the game so pawns can't hurt queens, you need to change the game to explain how pawns can hurt queens.
What are you on about here, Scotsman? This is supposed to be an infantry based war game. If you took pistols to fight mechanised infantry, then you forgot about the mech part. Not a bad game. Maybe a bad game player. Very much a bad point.
panzerfront14 wrote: To make a point regarding the effect of small arms on tanks, it depends on several factors, the armor of the tank in question, what the intent is. Tanks often have hatches open and crew looking around, the tank commander in particular so they have better situational awareness. Yes no amount of .556 fire will penetrate the armor of even a T-55 tank which is a rather weak tank on modern battlefields. Yet fire can and will strip off outer equipment from the tank. If a bullet impacts one of our periscopes and disables it, then yes the tank was "hurt" by a weapon completely incapable of penetrating its armor, though it will continue to function.
Now in the event the armor suffers major damage, such as the damage a Melta weapon would inflict, then yes the big gapping hole in the armor could be targeted by small arms and in all likelihood the crew would be slaughtered in the cramped confines of the tank, with bullets ricocheting inside the tank and turning them into slurry. This of course assumes the intervention of a true AT gun.
Its also why I think the true AT guns of 40k should be very much capable of 1 shoting tanks. Should one of my battlewagons get targeted by a Leman Russ Vanquisher or a Tau Railgun, I should suffer a catastrophic ammunition detonation or something to that effect from those weapons. Thats the trade off of anti infantry weapons being completely useless, if that is what you're going for, then AT guns should be absolutely devastating, as opposed to spamming plasma guns which i commonly see used over most AT weaponry.
You basically just described 1st through 4th edition, where dedicated AT weapons would regularly one-shot or cripple vehicles with a solid penetrating hit.
You mean the same editions where a Lascannon couldn't kill a Carnifex in one hit? You're really just picking and choosing what's immersion breaking.
The AV mechanic is the one that I'm focussing on atm. Here's my go-to response for your type of statement now: Reinstating certain aspects of former editions does not necessitate the reinstatement of ALL aspects of former editions.
Five min in the penalty box for you.
Also, there was a tradeoff for MCs in that era, where it was more likely for them to take damage from a Lascannon, but it would require multiple hits. And being only T6, the Fex was engageable by a far greater array of weapons than something that was AV 12+.
If there aren't infantry near the tank they're not just gonna sit there idly. If there are infantry near said tank, said anti infantry weapons are pointed at that instead of the tank. Quit picking and choosing what's immersion breaking. Either the game is immersive or it isn't.
Really Slayer? Are tgey going to empty clips of ammunition into the armor plates in the hopes of achieving something? Is that your stand on the matter?
1. Said weapons were still unlikely to wound a Carnifex. Greater array only applies if said greater array has a chance to do anything. Quite frankly, that's already comparable to vehicles now. So good for you for making my point more valid.
Also I LOL at you trying to say there were trade offs for Monstrous Creatures not being vehicles. Seriously it's like you didn't play the game at all 3rd through 7th. Monstrous Creatures were always better.
2. If a Rocket Launcher blew off part of a vehicle why wouldn't you try to take pot shots at the innards if there's no infantry nearby? Seems logical to me, but apparently logic only works for you if it's in favor of the garbage AV system you refuse to remove your rose tinted glasses for.
Slayer-Fan123 wrote: 1. Said weapons were still unlikely to wound a Carnifex. Greater array only applies if said greater array has a chance to do anything. Quite frankly, that's already comparable to vehicles now. So good for you for making my point more valid.
Also I LOL at you trying to say there were trade offs for Monstrous Creatures not being vehicles. Seriously it's like you didn't play the game at all 3rd through 7th. Monstrous Creatures were always better.
There is a significant difference between unlikely and impossible. AV 10 could not be Glanced by a Lasgun, but T6 could be Wounded, even if easily deflected.
Slayer-Fan123 wrote: 2. If a Rocket Launcher blew off part of a vehicle why wouldn't you try to take pot shots at the innards if there's no infantry nearby? Seems logical to me, but apparently logic only works for you if it's in favor of the garbage AV system you refuse to remove your rose tinted glasses for.
There are two problems with that. Usually if a rocket blew off a part of the Vehicle, often there is nothing really left to hit in there that could be harmed by small arms. Rockets that are intended to damage armor usually do some considerable damage to whatever is behind that armor. For those rockets that aren't intended to damage armor but bypass it (like a sabot round), they only leave a very small hole behind (and still severely mess up what is behind that armor). In either case, you're shooting at something that already survived a rocket blast and you're using small arms afterward. Consider this logically and one can see that it is a bit preposterous.
At best, you disable the Vehicle sufficiently for the crew to want to get out (fear of fire or internal smoke), at which point the small arms aren't aimed at the Vehicle, but at the much softer crew.
So, small arms against an armored Vehicle are only practical to get the Vehicle's attention away from something that will harm the Vehicle, otherwise one is not using logic at all.
Slayer-Fan123 wrote: 1. Said weapons were still unlikely to wound a Carnifex. Greater array only applies if said greater array has a chance to do anything. Quite frankly, that's already comparable to vehicles now. So good for you for making my point more valid.
Also I LOL at you trying to say there were trade offs for Monstrous Creatures not being vehicles. Seriously it's like you didn't play the game at all 3rd through 7th. Monstrous Creatures were always better.
There is a significant difference between unlikely and impossible. AV 10 could not be Glanced by a Lasgun, but T6 could be Wounded, even if easily deflected....
3rd-5th that made a difference. With 6th-7th and hull points AV10 may have been immune to S3 but it took way fewer boltgun shots to drop an AV10 vehicle than it took to drop a Carnifex.
To add something of actual value, a quote from Forge of Mars:
Despise infantry if you must. Crush them underfoot, by all means. But do not ignore them. Battlefields are littered with the wreckage of Titans whose crews ignored infantry.
Prove that they're talking about Lasguns.
Infantry can be a big threat to heavy vehicles, sure. With weapons other than their battle rifles.
In fact, this is the machine spirit of a titan itself talking, referring to a time when its armor was penetrated by tyranid light infantry ambushing it in a forest, resulting in its defeat.
I'd also like to point out that the goal posts have now been moved from "anti-infantry weapons shouldn't be able to destroy tanks" to "lasguns shouldn't be able to hurt titans".
Cool, but there were groups who used the *core* rules, without the FW rules (which were entirely optional).
So, no, in the actual core rules of the game, Ripper Swarms could charge flying Valkyries. Such immersion.
Except your wrong, let me explain
Originally valkyries were FW exclusive AV10 flyers , the FW flyer rules were available to use on a permission basis as they did not exist in the core game.
GW decided to make the model in plastic for the core game upgrading it to an AV 12 GROUND VEHICLE for use in 5th edition as they did not introduce actual rules for flyers until 6th.
Now yes it was a flyer according to FW rules and it does look like an aircraft, however as it was implemented is was no different than any other skimmer transport like the tau devilfish so infantry could assault it because it was not a flyer. so that's where your immersion breaks the simple solution was to use the flyer rules as we have done as they existed at the same time as optional rules.
They *did* have their own version, but it was stupid, because as we've discussed, there was no risk unless you chose to stand in the way.
I already showed that wasn't true. even moving out of the way a deff rolla still caused wounds as did the destroyer vehicle upgrade for chaos. the rules existed even if you did not use them or did not know about them.
Why the disparity? You can say "but they had a different ruleset", but you're missing the point that this is the problem we're talking about. Vehicles and Monstrous Creatures were treated differently, and this led to "un-immersive" situations
That was not a problem the fact they were treated differently created more immersion not less if anything the current "everything is a monster" with toughness and wounds is less immersive.
if a car tries t run me over my response would be very different that being run down by a large land animal like a kodiak bear that has teeth, claws and arms not just a box with wheels.
See what I mean? I'm not disputing that the rule existed, but I am saying that, according to "muh immersion", I should be able to shoot at the crew - represented by lasguns being able to damage a tank on a lucky roll.
Do you understand now?
Yet you miss the fact your talking about CORE rules that apply to all vehicles equally in the game. you try to make the argument VS an open topped trukk with an un armored boy driving it, but the same rule would have to apply to a land raider that is completely closed up with no way to hurt the crew (who are also in power armor inside the raider). Now if your group wants to house rule in the 2nd edition hit charts you have the power to do so but it does slow the game down.
Explain. Why is it a problem that lasguns can kill a damaged Titan with extreme amounts of luck, but have no such issue killing a Terminator who probably has less weak points.
Because terminators are people in suits of armor that can be wounded, titans are armored vehicles that are not alive to be wounded. the vehicle equivalent to what your trying to represent was the old damage chart-cumulative death through progressive damage to parts and equipment. you just needed to bring something that was designed to kill armor not designed to kill infantry.-bringing the right tool for the job (and getting it into the right position) was part of the tactical play of the old editions.
Finally, you're beginning to understand that previous editions weren't all perfect "muh immersion" simulators.
I already said as much in my earlier post, the problem is that 9th is actually worse at it.
40k isn't a historical game - comparisons to real world game systems don't work. Army compositions aren't part of 40k's verisimilitude.
And why shouldn't grunts be able to shoot through vision slits?
Yet there are certain realities that are part of human nature and experience that are ingrained that we readily identify with.
And this is why-
Go ahead and shoot at the periscope view finder to your hearts content it wont do anything to the crew other than annoy them
Ironic, considering that the scatter laser was considered a premier anti-tank weapon in 6th/7th, because of non-immersive rules
Only because GW introduced the stupid hull points rules that rewarded tickling vehicles to death via high ROF weapons that could not actually kill them for real but could glance them to death while doing no actual damage. it was bad game design to have a double damage system for one unit type. it can be done correctly as they have with DUST, GW however failed at it. .
I wonder to what extent the WAAC attitudes and ever increasing emphasis on competitive play and formats is driving this
Considering GW openly went to those player groups for input on writing 9th i dare say it is the main drive and focus of the edition.
I find it entirely believable that small ballistic weaponry wouldn't do a damn thing. I haven't been in the military but I have handled guns, and we had a metal spinner target that was essentially an inch-or-so thick cast iron plate that could just take a seemingly infinite number of hits from anything less heavily propelled than... I think it was .308 bolt-action rifle rounds that finally gouged the crap out of it? I may have that wrong, but presumably 40K armor could very easily be made that would just treat any such small arm with the same degree of total blasé.
But what about small energy weapons, even, say, the lasgun? Would massed fire heat a Russ' armor enough to melt it or bake the crew or make ammo explode or something in the timescale of game of 40K? Does the energy get absorbed, or does the armor have little mirrors baked into it or something?
No they don't do a damn thing other than scratch the paint we have real world examples of that. i remember seeing one of the famous tank runs through baghdad during the closing days of the second gulf war where the iraqis fired loads of shots from AK-47s (7.62mm), the tanks paint job was pockmarked with little nicks, that's all.
As for las guns to generate the kind of heat required they would have to have a constant beam held on to a tiny area for an extended period of time like a cutting torch, not something you are going to achieve with a rapid fire las gun.
Also tanks are mostly fairly blind. Unless the tank commander peeks out the cupola. I don't think his face would be bullet proof.
periscopes and cameras
not a full 360' view but not blind, esepcially the modern ones.
This is a game about putting your little plastic models down on a tabletop and playing a game with someone else's little plastic models. "The Lore" is bs, made up to sell little plastic models.
I'm going to explain this real slow because apparently it's a toughie
If you make a game
and the basic unit of one particular army
has NO WAY AT ALL to interact with the basic unit of another army
Yes it is a game, but the LORE is what draws and keeps people playing the game. there are far better written games out there with great minis than 40K but they have nowhere near the market hold that GW does because of the IP.
Second point we go back to what the older editions were about-no not every unit was good at dealing with every other unit, your job as the general was to bring what was needed and get it to where ti was needed to deal with all possible threats.
The only time that's been the case is with Knights, as the basic unit of every other army is just some infantry model and perfectly shootable with basic weapons.
In which case that's not a bad game, as the problem only exists because of one faction out of 20.
I'd just call that a poor implementation of Knights. . . Which it was.
FW had this solved way back in 3rd edition-want to bring a flyer or a superheavy-be a good sportsman and give a heads up to your opponent/get permission first so they can be prepared to deal with it and not have it dropped on them. the guy at our store who has an imperial knight army will say "hey i want to play my knights" i say fine i will just swap out my flamers and heavy bolters for melta or lascannons etc.. so my infantry have a chance to deal with it.
The AV mechanic is the one that I'm focussing on atm. Here's my go-to response for your type of statement now: Reinstating certain aspects of former editions does not necessitate the reinstatement of ALL aspects of former editions.
Five min in the penalty box for you.
Also, there was a tradeoff for MCs in that era, where it was more likely for them to take damage from a Lascannon, but it would require multiple hits. And being only T6, the Fex was engageable by a far greater array of weapons than something that was AV 12+.
Bingo-MCs couldn't be one shotted but they were also vulnerable to pretty much all small arms fire, increasing the threat nature of the battlefield for them VS an effective 1 wound vehicle for roughly the same points cost.
The end of Saving Private Ryan makes the point quite clearly.
panzerfront14 wrote: To make a point regarding the effect of small arms on tanks, it depends on several factors, the armor of the tank in question, what the intent is. Tanks often have hatches open and crew looking around, the tank commander in particular so they have better situational awareness. Yes no amount of .556 fire will penetrate the armor of even a T-55 tank which is a rather weak tank on modern battlefields. Yet fire can and will strip off outer equipment from the tank. If a bullet impacts one of our periscopes and disables it, then yes the tank was "hurt" by a weapon completely incapable of penetrating its armor, though it will continue to function.
Now in the event the armor suffers major damage, such as the damage a Melta weapon would inflict, then yes the big gapping hole in the armor could be targeted by small arms and in all likelihood the crew would be slaughtered in the cramped confines of the tank, with bullets ricocheting inside the tank and turning them into slurry. This of course assumes the intervention of a true AT gun.
Its also why I think the true AT guns of 40k should be very much capable of 1 shoting tanks. Should one of my battlewagons get targeted by a Leman Russ Vanquisher or a Tau Railgun, I should suffer a catastrophic ammunition detonation or something to that effect from those weapons. Thats the trade off of anti infantry weapons being completely useless, if that is what you're going for, then AT guns should be absolutely devastating, as opposed to spamming plasma guns which i commonly see used over most AT weaponry.
You basically just described 1st through 4th edition, where dedicated AT weapons would regularly one-shot or cripple vehicles with a solid penetrating hit.
You mean the same editions where a Lascannon couldn't kill a Carnifex in one hit? You're really just picking and choosing what's immersion breaking.
The AV mechanic is the one that I'm focussing on atm. Here's my go-to response for your type of statement now: Reinstating certain aspects of former editions does not necessitate the reinstatement of ALL aspects of former editions.
Five min in the penalty box for you.
Also, there was a tradeoff for MCs in that era, where it was more likely for them to take damage from a Lascannon, but it would require multiple hits. And being only T6, the Fex was engageable by a far greater array of weapons than something that was AV 12+.
If there aren't infantry near the tank they're not just gonna sit there idly. If there are infantry near said tank, said anti infantry weapons are pointed at that instead of the tank. Quit picking and choosing what's immersion breaking. Either the game is immersive or it isn't.
Really Slayer? Are tgey going to empty clips of ammunition into the armor plates in the hopes of achieving something? Is that your stand on the matter?
1. Said weapons were still unlikely to wound a Carnifex. Greater array only applies if said greater array has a chance to do anything. Quite frankly, that's already comparable to vehicles now. So good for you for making my point more valid.
Also I LOL at you trying to say there were trade offs for Monstrous Creatures not being vehicles. Seriously it's like you didn't play the game at all 3rd through 7th. Monstrous Creatures were always better.
2. If a Rocket Launcher blew off part of a vehicle why wouldn't you try to take pot shots at the innards if there's no infantry nearby? Seems logical to me, but apparently logic only works for you if it's in favor of the garbage AV system you refuse to remove your rose tinted glasses for.
1. Greater Array is still greater array. A Carnifex with T6 could be wounded by a S3 lasgun. The same Lasgun couldn't hurt ANY vehicle in the game.
@ your attempted LOL, MCs were on a tight leash in 3rd and 4th ed. The Wraithlord was the toughest one you'd commonly see, it only had three wounds and a Lascannon wounded it on a 3+ and ignored armor. A buffed out Carnifex with T7 and a 2+ save was wounded by a Lascannon on a 2+, and didn't get an armor save. This was long before the days of Riptide MCs with 3++ etc, and the MC system worked fine.
2. Go find me a scenario in real life where whole parts of a tank were blown off and troops then engaged with rifles to shoot at internal spaces. If a tank has gotten whole chunks blown off, the tank is already out of action. Minus the scenario of opening the hatch and firing into the crew compartment (assaulting a vehicle in 40K) I'm going to suggest that your proposed scenario is not really a thing.
To add something of actual value, a quote from Forge of Mars:
Despise infantry if you must. Crush them underfoot, by all means. But do not ignore them. Battlefields are littered with the wreckage of Titans whose crews ignored infantry.
Prove that they're talking about Lasguns.
Infantry can be a big threat to heavy vehicles, sure. With weapons other than their battle rifles.
In fact, this is the machine spirit of a titan itself talking, referring to a time when its armor was penetrated by tyranid light infantry ambushing it in a forest, resulting in its defeat.
Did the Titan say how these light infantry were a danger? Were they spraying Fleshborers at it? Were they attacking it in CC? Were they in fact Genestealers, known for their armor penetrating capability? Did they have some special equipment? Do you have any details?
Because of course I'd expect well equipped infantry to be able to hurt a Titan, but I'm thinking things like anti-tank bombs, Meltaguns, Powerfists, things of that nature. I'm not denying Infantry a chance to hurt vehicles, not at all. I just don't think they should be doing it with their standard issue battle rifle.
Jidmah wrote: I'd also like to point out that the goal posts have now been moved from "anti-infantry weapons shouldn't be able to destroy tanks" to "lasguns shouldn't be able to hurt titans".
Real life doesn't matter!
This is a game about space monks in power armour shooting rocket bullets, sentient, sapient fungus beings that are a threat to the above rocket monks. There's a literal dimension of chaos that has Demons! Self repairing skeleton robots with pokeball star gods. Space Elves.
Current and historical military stuff is so out of its depth in ways we can't fathom. Lasguns may be, in relation to the other thing in the year 40,0000, a basic weapon, butas a comparison, look at the state of military stuff from 40,000yrs ago, image if those people saw our current tech, and that's just one planet of one race.
Blndmage wrote: Real life doesn't matter!
This is a game about space monks in power armour shooting rocket bullets, sentient, sapient fungus beings that are a threat to the above rocket monks. There's a literal dimension of chaos that has Demons! Self repairing skeleton robots with pokeball star gods. Space Elves.
Current and historical military stuff is so out of its depth in ways we can't fathom. Lasguns may be, in relation to the other thing in the year 40,0000, a basic weapon, butas a comparison, look at the state of military stuff from 40,000yrs ago, image if those people saw our current tech, and that's just one planet of one race.
The Lasgun has the same stats as an Autogun, and the Autogun is the equivalent of a modern assault rifle. Also, even in this imaginary setting there are anti infantry weapons and anti tank weapons. And as has been noted before, there's a legacy of prior editions that set some precedent for expectation. There's over 20 years of legacy promoting the idea that in this fictional universe lots of weapons simply can't hurt heavy vehicles.
Heck, even in Star Wars they had armor that's "too strong for blasters!".
Blndmage wrote: Real life doesn't matter!
This is a game about space monks in power armour shooting rocket bullets, sentient, sapient fungus beings that are a threat to the above rocket monks. There's a literal dimension of chaos that has Demons! Self repairing skeleton robots with pokeball star gods. Space Elves.
Current and historical military stuff is so out of its depth in ways we can't fathom. Lasguns may be, in relation to the other thing in the year 40,0000, a basic weapon, butas a comparison, look at the state of military stuff from 40,000yrs ago, image if those people saw our current tech, and that's just one planet of one race.
Oh, absolutely. These discussions and their outcomes are all fundamentally pointless, but so is, you know, playing the actual game. That doesn't mean that they can't be fun, interesting, or thought-provoking.
In the end it does boil down to people who play models that shouldn't or think they shouldn't be wounded by stuff like lasguns puting arguments against it, and does that do not run such units claim that they very much should be able to do it.
It is like the whole should armies have special rules or not. Everyone wants their to have them, and other people to not have theirs.
Insectum7 wrote: In fact, this is the machine spirit of a titan itself talking, referring to a time when its armor was penetrated by tyranid light infantry ambushing it in a forest, resulting in its defeat.
Did the Titan say how these light infantry were a danger? Were they spraying Fleshborers at it? Were they attacking it in CC? Were they in fact Genestealers, known for their armor penetrating capability? Did they have some special equipment? Do you have any details?
Does that really matter? None of the infantry infantry units could harm a warlord titan in any way, not even genestealers.
Not really, as that's just an completely unsupported claim so far. The claim is that lasguns should never be able to hurt titans under any circumstances, do not push the burden of proof for that on me.
My claim is merely that the AV system is not more immersive than the toughness/save/wounds system, and I have provided ample of proof for the shortcomings of the AV system in regards to contradicting common sense and lore.
Heck, even in Star Wars they had armor that's "too strong for blasters!".
And yet in Star Wars Legion blasters can hurt tanks, they're much better at it too than lasguns vs tanks in 40k. About equal in potency to a boltgun vs medium tank in 40k.
Although I do note that amassing high volumes of mid strength/mid AP firepower is pretty much impossible in Legion, yet standard operating procedure in 40k. Which means tanks in Legion still feel very tough to remove without dedicated AT weaponary.
AV is a staple of historical games, and it suits the units and capabilities inherent in those games well. I can easily see why the dynamic of 40k makes it unsuited to such a mechanic (it's hard to balance AT when the premier AT weapon lascannon is easily man portable in every squad).
Other games like Legion (and I believe DUST) use a mechanic more similar to 40k. And it works well there. GW, as ever, simply managed to take a sound idea and bungle it completely.
I think the problem is that people have built up expectations of what immersive anti-tank capability should look like from previous editions, rather than approaching the new edition with a fresh and open mind.
It was mentioned earlier in the thread that a squad of guardsmen does as much damage to a tank with their lasguns as they do with a krak missile. IMO that's not a problem of lasguns being too good (0.6 wounds is nothing) it's a problem of krak missiles being too weak. GW massively fluffed the statistical relationship of weapons and protection. A major cause of this is them changing the to-wound chart but keeping the same statlines (eg boltgun = strength 4, lascannon = strength 9). Returning to the old to-wound chart would go a long way to resolve some of these issues.
Jidmah wrote: In fact, this is the machine spirit of a titan itself talking, referring to a time when its armor was penetrated by tyranid light infantry ambushing it in a forest, resulting in its defeat.
Did the Titan say how these light infantry were a danger? Were they spraying Fleshborers at it? Were they attacking it in CC? Were they in fact Genestealers, known for their armor penetrating capability? Did they have some special equipment? Do you have any details?
Does that really matter? None of the infantry infantry units could harm a warlord titan in any way, not even genestealers.
Uhh. . . as it pertains to the discussion, yes it matters.
Also there was a time when Genestealers had Rending Claws which could Pen AV up to 16. (4+6+6)
Not really, as that's just an completely unsupported claim so far. The claim is that lasguns should never be able to hurt titans under any circumstances, do not push the burden of proof for that on me.
My claim is merely that the AV system is not more immersive than the toughness/save/wounds system, and I have provided ample of proof for the shortcomings of the AV system in regards to contradicting common sense and lore.
You have? Like what? The Titan reference you provide above but refuse to provide details for?
Heck, even in Star Wars they had armor that's "too strong for blasters!".
And yet in Star Wars Legion blasters can hurt tanks, they're much better at it too than lasguns vs tanks in 40k. About equal in potency to a boltgun vs medium tank in 40k.
Although I do note that amassing high volumes of mid strength/mid AP firepower is pretty much impossible in Legion, yet standard operating procedure in 40k. Which means tanks in Legion still feel very tough to remove without dedicated AT weaponary.
AV is a staple of historical games, and it suits the units and capabilities inherent in those games well. I can easily see why the dynamic of 40k makes it unsuited to such a mechanic (it's hard to balance AT when the premier AT weapon lascannon is easily man portable in every squad).
Other games like Legion (and I believe DUST) use a mechanic more similar to 40k. And it works well there. GW, as ever, simply managed to take a sound idea and bungle it completely.
I think the problem is that people have built up expectations of what immersive anti-tank capability should look like from previous editions, rather than approaching the new edition with a fresh and open mind.
It was mentioned earlier in the thread that a squad of guardsmen does as much damage to a tank with their lasguns as they do with a krak missile. IMO that's not a problem of lasguns being too good (0.6 wounds is nothing) it's a problem of krak missiles being too weak. GW massively fluffed the statistical relationship of weapons and protection. A major cause of this is them changing the to-wound chart but keeping the same statlines (eg boltgun = strength 4, lascannon = strength 9). Returning to the old to-wound chart would go a long way to resolve some of these issues.
Returning to the old wound chart has long been my proposal. T7 would be immune to Lasfire and T8 immune to bolter fire. And I'm all for pumping up the damage potential of supposedly dedicated AT weapons.
Insectum7 wrote: The Lasgun has the same stats as an Autogun, and the Autogun is the equivalent of a modern assault rifle. Also, even in this imaginary setting there are anti infantry weapons and anti tank weapons. And as has been noted before, there's a legacy of prior editions that set some precedent for expectation. There's over 20 years of legacy promoting the idea that in this fictional universe lots of weapons simply can't hurt heavy vehicles.
Legacy is often used as an euphemism for "outdated gak".
Heck, even in Star Wars they had armor that's "too strong for blasters!".
If I remember Star Wars correctly, there was this guy who blew up that heavily armored battlestation with a single shot that should never have penetrated the station's armor or shields.
Automatically Appended Next Post:
Insectum7 wrote: Also there was a time when Genestealers had Rending Claws which could Pen AV up to 16. (4+6+6)
Rending was an extra d3, for a maximum of 13 against a titans front armor of 14.
panzerfront14 wrote: To make a point regarding the effect of small arms on tanks, it depends on several factors, the armor of the tank in question, what the intent is. Tanks often have hatches open and crew looking around, the tank commander in particular so they have better situational awareness. Yes no amount of .556 fire will penetrate the armor of even a T-55 tank which is a rather weak tank on modern battlefields. Yet fire can and will strip off outer equipment from the tank. If a bullet impacts one of our periscopes and disables it, then yes the tank was "hurt" by a weapon completely incapable of penetrating its armor, though it will continue to function.
Now in the event the armor suffers major damage, such as the damage a Melta weapon would inflict, then yes the big gapping hole in the armor could be targeted by small arms and in all likelihood the crew would be slaughtered in the cramped confines of the tank, with bullets ricocheting inside the tank and turning them into slurry. This of course assumes the intervention of a true AT gun.
Its also why I think the true AT guns of 40k should be very much capable of 1 shoting tanks. Should one of my battlewagons get targeted by a Leman Russ Vanquisher or a Tau Railgun, I should suffer a catastrophic ammunition detonation or something to that effect from those weapons. Thats the trade off of anti infantry weapons being completely useless, if that is what you're going for, then AT guns should be absolutely devastating, as opposed to spamming plasma guns which i commonly see used over most AT weaponry.
You basically just described 1st through 4th edition, where dedicated AT weapons would regularly one-shot or cripple vehicles with a solid penetrating hit.
You mean the same editions where a Lascannon couldn't kill a Carnifex in one hit? You're really just picking and choosing what's immersion breaking.
In 2nd ed a lascannon was S9 and 2D6 wounds vs a T8 W10 carnifex. They could definitely one shot a carnifex.
Other games like Legion (and I believe DUST) use a mechanic more similar to 40k.
Well considering that Andy chambers worked on DUST i am certain there is crossover there.
What they use is a wound system combined with vehicle/infantry armor classes instead of AV facings however facing still matter for LOS from the weapon mounts.
but unlike 40k they base damage output on armor class 1-4 for infantry and 1-7 for vehicles
The heavier the armor class the less shots you get at it to none at all as the armor class increases
take this light infantry unit
they are armor class 1
they have 2 anti tank weapons very similar in damage but different in range (12" V 16"), infantry rifles and an anti-air/infantry cluster rocket launcher
the hits/damage output is similar to 40K but as you notice there is a limit to what weapons can hurt what class of armor or how much.
Lethality is based on number of shots as it is a d6 (d3) symbol dice sytem that effectively makes almost everybody hit on 5+. as armor class goes up shots and damage potential go down.
class 1 infantry is no armor, 2 is light armor (think a guardsman), 3 is power armor and 4 is mech suits like terminator armor
for vehicle it ranges between things like trucks and open topped sentinel like walkers that are susceptible from small arms because the pilot is literally sitting on a seat in the open.
to medium to heavy vehicle that are immune to small arms
On the up side you can split fire with all your weapons at different targets so long as the mount has LOS to the target.
So the attempt to maintain some sense of immersion is still there. you cannot kill everything with everything you still need dedicated weapons to do certain jobs.
Karol wrote:In the end it does boil down to people who play models that shouldn't or think they shouldn't be wounded by stuff like lasguns puting arguments against it, and does that do not run such units claim that they very much should be able to do it.
And for those who have neither nor every had neither?
Jidmah wrote:Legacy is often used as an euphemism for "outdated gak".
Not necessarily. It could also refer to systems that work better than the current experiment. Only time will tell.
Jidmah wrote:
Heck, even in Star Wars they had armor that's "too strong for blasters!".
If I remember Star Wars correctly, there was this guy who blew up that heavily armored battlestation with a single shot that should never have penetrated the station's armor or shields.
The shielding was mentioned as to why they were required to use Proton Torpedoes. It was in a port, so it was a point were there was no armor. Rogue One explains why that single shot worked.
Jidmah wrote:
Insectum7 wrote: Also there was a time when Genestealers had Rending Claws which could Pen AV up to 16. (4+6+6)
Rending was an extra d3, for a maximum of 13 against a titans front armor of 14.
It was for 5th-7th, but for 3rd and 4th it was D6. I remember the whining when it changed, particularly from Assault Cannon and Genestealer fanatics.
Insectum7 wrote: The Lasgun has the same stats as an Autogun, and the Autogun is the equivalent of a modern assault rifle. Also, even in this imaginary setting there are anti infantry weapons and anti tank weapons. And as has been noted before, there's a legacy of prior editions that set some precedent for expectation. There's over 20 years of legacy promoting the idea that in this fictional universe lots of weapons simply can't hurt heavy vehicles.
Legacy is often used as an euphemism for "outdated gak".
Heck, even in Star Wars they had armor that's "too strong for blasters!".
If I remember Star Wars correctly, there was this guy who blew up that heavily armored battlestation with a single shot that should never have penetrated the station's armor or shields.
Using super rare space magic. Then the same guy said the quote I gave above.
To be honest with set to hit rolls they could as well give us a fixed number of hits per models firing and save everybody the tedium/waste of time of all that rolling.
Cyel wrote: To be honest with set to hit rolls they could as well give us a fixed number of hits per models firing and save everybody the tedium/waste of time of all that rolling.
This sounds like it ties into another thread, about lack of tactics, and also points back to the OP. Why did GW change weapon skill? Matt Ward
I think everyone who responded to me missed that the thing I was responding to in the first place was a claim that "Lasguns shouldn't hurt TERMINATORS"
Not TANKS
TERMINATORS
the armored infantry unit that is the main troop of one army, is weaker than the main troop of another army, and is the main building block of a common variant of another army.
which, to be fair to Karol, is a perfectly fine logical next step in the equation. If a person can make one claim that an imaginary weapon would be unable to harm an imaginary vehicle, then why not just make another?
Here, I'll do one too: warhammer has long established that orks generate a gestalt psychic field of waagh energy that causes reality to bend towards orks beliefs.
It seems, therefore, that it would be counter to the canon of warhammer 40,000 that orks can be harmed by ranged weaponry that doesn't make sufficient explosive noise, since Orks believe that explosive noise is what gives weaponry power. Shuriken weapons, las weapons, splinter weapons and other silent weaponry should be completely incapable of harming an ork. And you can't prove otherwise.
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Cyel wrote: To be honest with set to hit rolls they could as well give us a fixed number of hits per models firing and save everybody the tedium/waste of time of all that rolling.
Why has this never been a complaint with ballistic skill then? 40k has always had next to no modifiers to shooting hit rolls, compared to basically any other wargame I've played. It's still hilarious to me that we have 'realism' arguments all the time but the fact that firing a lascannon at a target 48" away and 2" away requires the exact same hit roll.
I think everyone who responded to me missed that the thing I was responding to in the first place was a claim that "Lasguns shouldn't hurt TERMINATORS"
Not TANKS
TERMINATORS
the armored infantry unit that is the main troop of one army, is weaker than the main troop of another army, and is the main building block of a common variant of another army.
which, to be fair to Karol, is a perfectly fine logical next step in the equation. If a person can make one claim that an imaginary weapon would be unable to harm an imaginary vehicle, then why not just make another?
Here, I'll do one too: warhammer has long established that orks generate a gestalt psychic field of waagh energy that causes reality to bend towards orks beliefs.
It seems, therefore, that it would be counter to the canon of warhammer 40,000 that orks can be harmed by ranged weaponry that doesn't make sufficient explosive noise, since Orks believe that explosive noise is what gives weaponry power. Shuriken weapons, las weapons, splinter weapons and other silent weaponry should be completely incapable of harming an ork. And you can't prove otherwise.
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Cyel wrote: To be honest with set to hit rolls they could as well give us a fixed number of hits per models firing and save everybody the tedium/waste of time of all that rolling.
Why has this never been a complaint with ballistic skill then? 40k has always had next to no modifiers to shooting hit rolls, compared to basically any other wargame I've played. It's still hilarious to me that we have 'realism' arguments all the time but the fact that firing a lascannon at a target 48" away and 2" away requires the exact same hit roll.
What you point to is one limit in the ork ability to believe, that causes reality to make them vulnerable to sneaky elf weapons and so on... which, counterintuitively confirms the ork power to bend reality.
techsoldaten wrote: Might help this thread if people arguing about immunity to small arms fire would identify whether or not they ever served in the military.
I have a feeling the disconnect owes to whether or not someone has seen what an automatic weapon does to armor IRL. Which is absolutely nothing.
I find it entirely believable that small ballistic weaponry wouldn't do a damn thing. I haven't been in the military but I have handled guns, and we had a metal spinner target that was essentially an inch-or-so thick cast iron plate that could just take a seemingly infinite number of hits from anything less heavily propelled than... I think it was .308 bolt-action rifle rounds that finally gouged the crap out of it? I may have that wrong, but presumably 40K armor could very easily be made that would just treat any such small arm with the same degree of total blasé.
But what about small energy weapons, even, say, the lasgun? Would massed fire heat a Russ' armor enough to melt it or bake the crew or make ammo explode or something in the timescale of game of 40K? Does the energy get absorbed, or does the armor have little mirrors baked into it or something?
Another question to ask is the materials used to make the armor. Plasteel, I assume, would have greater density and less weight than steel.
The thing about lasguns... we kind of do know how they work. I'm an SPIE member, you might want to consider attending this virtual conference.
The exhibitor hall registration is free and will allow you to interact with a number of vendors who specialize in photonics. They're going to explain the majority of their applications are for tracking / targeting, not offense, and show you some interesting applications of lasers. Some of them resemble the flashlights described in the lore.
If you want to register for the full conference (which is cheaper if you become a member) you can attend technical sessions where you will learn about advances in spintronics, optical resonance and other concepts fundamental to offensive use of lasers.
Here's where armor becomes important. Let's say you have a piece of steel, it's 1" thick, that's your piece of armor. A sophisticated weapons system today will be able to determine the density and range in about 1/100th of a second and calculate the exact wattage necessary to burn through that steel. It's rarely useful to just put a single hole in a plate of armor (if a person was behind it, the wound would instantly cauterize) so you'd really need to be cutting some kind of a shape in the steel. Under the best circumstances - highly polished lens, active polarizing filter, multiple emitters, close proximity - that takes a few seconds.
In any case, a lasgun is going to have less wattage than the average plasma cutter you can rent from the hardware store. The point is - light doesn't work the way it's depicted in Star Wars.
If you wanted to talk about meltas, submillimeter waves can be used in a manner similar to a heat ray. I'd have to look, but I saw a presentation last year of something that could probably pass for the 40k version.
How this compares with a Boltgun - with a shell, you aim, it goes boom. If the shell has enough density, the armor has a big hole in it.
Charistoph wrote:
techsoldaten wrote:I have a feeling the disconnect owes to whether or not someone has seen what an automatic weapon does to armor IRL. Which is absolutely nothing.
While I haven't served, it really depends on the automatic weapon and the armor in question. An M-16 will likely do little more than mess up the paint with lead scoring in most cases, but an M-2 is an entirely different story. However, that latter is more like a Multilaser than a lasgun
If your armor is a Trukk.... I think that the impacts alone would shake it apart.
Of course, there is one caveat. Armor is designed around expected encounters. Plate armor is pretty decent against a sword, but I wouldn't trust it to hold back a round of a model 1911, for example. In some sci-fi environs, the armor is directed against more solid energy-based attacks rather than kinetic, so kinetic attacks work well. Food for thought at any rate.
While a lot of armor is well designed, the majority of it is thick sheets of steel. It's the substrate that gets the most attention.
Personal protection - like vests and helmets - a fair amount of testing goes into that. Mostly it's related to ballistics and mobility.
Slayer-Fan123 wrote:
techsoldaten wrote: Might help this thread if people arguing about immunity to small arms fire would identify whether or not they ever served in the military.
I have a feeling the disconnect owes to whether or not someone has seen what an automatic weapon does to armor IRL. Which is absolutely nothing.
Didn't realize you used Lasguns and Bolters in the military and shot a bunch of them at a tank.
Why has this never been a complaint with ballistic skill then? 40k has always had next to no modifiers to shooting hit rolls, compared to basically any other wargame I've played. It's still hilarious to me that we have 'realism' arguments all the time but the fact that firing a lascannon at a target 48" away and 2" away requires the exact same hit roll.
1st and 2nd Edition had a lot of modifiers to hit. Modifiers for speed, size, distance and cover, iirc.
I also believe that the original design around Rapid Fire was not to represent more shots, but to represent that it was harder to hit targets further away.
techsoldaten wrote:I have a feeling the disconnect owes to whether or not someone has seen what an automatic weapon does to armor IRL. Which is absolutely nothing.
While I haven't served, it really depends on the automatic weapon and the armor in question. An M-16 will likely do little more than mess up the paint with lead scoring in most cases, but an M-2 is an entirely different story. However, that latter is more like a Multilaser than a lasgun
If your armor is a Trukk.... I think that the impacts alone would shake it apart.
Of course, there is one caveat. Armor is designed around expected encounters. Plate armor is pretty decent against a sword, but I wouldn't trust it to hold back a round of a model 1911, for example. In some sci-fi environs, the armor is directed against more solid energy-based attacks rather than kinetic, so kinetic attacks work well. Food for thought at any rate.
While a lot of armor is well designed, the majority of it is thick sheets of steel. It's the substrate that gets the most attention.
Personal protection - like vests and helmets - a fair amount of testing goes into that. Mostly it's related to ballistics and mobility.
A lot of OUR armor is well designed with the basis being thick sheets of metal (with some including plastics and ceramics now).
This game's universe is not set up with our considerations in mind, with about 28,000 more years of development behind it, then another 10,000 years of religious degradation as well. For the Imperium it is ceramite (whatever that is), for the Craftworlders it is Wraithbone, and with Orks it is ramshackle sheets of metal slapped together held together by their own belief.
Jidmah wrote: ...If I remember Star Wars correctly, there was this guy who blew up that heavily armored battlestation with a single shot that should never have penetrated the station's armor or shields. ...
Obviously because the dramatic moment happened the one time it needs to happen again in every piece of follow-on media just to make sure we completely deplete the specialness of it happening the first time.
Jidmah wrote: ...If I remember Star Wars correctly, there was this guy who blew up that heavily armored battlestation with a single shot that should never have penetrated the station's armor or shields. ...
Obviously because the dramatic moment happened the one time it needs to happen again in every piece of follow-on media just to make sure we completely deplete the specialness of it happening the first time.
Oh cool! Arright, I may have to take a peek when I get a good stretch of downtime at work. Lemme see if I understand what I'm reading in this post, though: A lasgun can pierce armor relatively easily but would need to move or slice the point of... let's call it "impact"... to do significant damage because otherwise you just put a hypodermic-sized cauterized hole in a person or thing? That would suggest that laser weapons should be better at piercing the denser armor of 40K than most ballistic weaponry.
The Hot-Shot Lasgun would be a better representation then - low strength but better chance to pierce armor. On which note I always thought Russes should have a damn 2+.
Karol wrote:In the end it does boil down to people who play models that shouldn't or think they shouldn't be wounded by stuff like lasguns puting arguments against it, and does that do not run such units claim that they very much should be able to do it.
And for those who have neither nor every had neither?
Jidmah wrote:Legacy is often used as an euphemism for "outdated gak".
Not necessarily. It could also refer to systems that work better than the current experiment. Only time will tell.
Jidmah wrote:
Heck, even in Star Wars they had armor that's "too strong for blasters!".
If I remember Star Wars correctly, there was this guy who blew up that heavily armored battlestation with a single shot that should never have penetrated the station's armor or shields.
The shielding was mentioned as to why they were required to use Proton Torpedoes. It was in a port, so it was a point were there was no armor. Rogue One explains why that single shot worked.
Jidmah wrote:
Insectum7 wrote: Also there was a time when Genestealers had Rending Claws which could Pen AV up to 16. (4+6+6)
Rending was an extra d3, for a maximum of 13 against a titans front armor of 14.
It was for 5th-7th, but for 3rd and 4th it was D6. I remember the whining when it changed, particularly from Assault Cannon and Genestealer fanatics.
But said Death Star was at full health when shot at that opening. So how is that somehow better than 30+ Infantry shooting Lasguns at a target with 1-2 wounds left? Seems logical that target with tons of openings after being weakened makes more sense than how the Death Star happened.
The game would be better served with core mechanics rather than special exceptions to attempt to represent various aspects of the game.
ie, Genestealers have a 5+ invulnerable save to represent their reflexes because there's no other mechanical way to show this.
A core mechanic System where the Initiative characteristic is the opposed value against WS and BS would open up an entire design space currently lacking in the game.
You can keep the current 'who charges strikes first' mechanic and use Initiative entirely for opposing WS.
Armies where this would be a useful addition:
Orks - double initiative when charging into melee like they used to have. Their waaagh power represented.
Grotz I3 making them a bit harder to shoot because they're sneaky
Veteran Marines, WS/BS/I5 to show their veteran status, just like in 2nd ed.
Tyranids, I4 minimum, I6+ genestealers etc, making them harder to hit at range and in melee, making the swarm a scary opponent. Lictors being very hard to hit (maybe higher I against shooting due to their chameleonic skin).
Tau - VEspid stingwings high I as they flit around. Kroot gain I in cover, making them scary stealth predators like they should be.
Necrons - wraiths, flayed ones, melee destroyer types having higher I to reflect their skill at melee
Grey knights - Higher initiative against Daemons to reflect their psychic presence making it harder for them to be struck by daemonic attacks
DArk eldar - high initiative across the board, with nude wyches being like genestealers, relying on their I to protect them against any attack
CWE - high initiative for aspects showing their skill in their chosen ways of war, crazy high I on exarchs to reflect their kung jitsu bullet time abilities
Harlequins the same
And so there you go, If you bring back I and turn WS and BS back into a comparison value, you get a real opportunity to expand the abilities of most armies in the game.
It's not just an eldar thing - but it will help reflect a core aspect of their force that hasn't been properly reflected in 20 years.
Slayer-Fan123 wrote:But said Death Star was at full health when shot at that opening. So how is that somehow better than 30+ Infantry shooting Lasguns at a target with 1-2 wounds left? Seems logical that target with tons of openings after being weakened makes more sense than how the Death Star happened.
Look up how the USS Arizona was sunk. The Death Star was not so different, except that the first Death Star was deliberately designed with this weak point where one sufficient hit would cause its own reactor to detonate, and the second had holes so big a light freighter could literally fly in to the middle.
This was one of the more realistic aspects of the 3rd-5th AV system. Even with the 6th and 7th system, I thought it worked, but they had the process backwards, in which only Penetrating Hits would guarantee Hull Point loss (the Vehicle Table would roll would only deprive a Hull Point loss on a Glancing Explodes! result).
I don't know how much redundancy that a Carnifex has, but the closest one could come to that would be removing its equivalent of a heart or primary neural cluster, which Characters did not have the same weakness. However, there was Force and other Insta-Death techniques that worked on a Carnifex, but didn't work on Vehicles.
Hellebore wrote:ie, Genestealers have a 5+ invulnerable save to represent their reflexes because there's no other mechanical way to show this.
There could be several ways to show this, but other than a reduction in dice rolls or increasing the BS number of the shooter, there really isn't any other. Also it does have precedent, as stupid as it is. If anything, certain models should be able to roll a Save against Hits before they have a chance to Wound to represent this concept. It would help be effective against Markerlights which always struck me odd about the Dodge Invul.
Slayer-Fan123 wrote:But said Death Star was at full health when shot at that opening. So how is that somehow better than 30+ Infantry shooting Lasguns at a target with 1-2 wounds left? Seems logical that target with tons of openings after being weakened makes more sense than how the Death Star happened.
Look up how the USS Arizona was sunk. The Death Star was not so different, except that the first Death Star was deliberately designed with this weak point where one sufficient hit would cause its own reactor to detonate, and the second had holes so big a light freighter could literally fly in to the middle.
This was one of the more realistic aspects of the 3rd-5th AV system. Even with the 6th and 7th system, I thought it worked, but they had the process backwards, in which only Penetrating Hits would guarantee Hull Point loss (the Vehicle Table would roll would only deprive a Hull Point loss on a Glancing Explodes! result).
I don't know how much redundancy that a Carnifex has, but the closest one could come to that would be removing its equivalent of a heart or primary neural cluster, which Characters did not have the same weakness. However, there was Force and other Insta-Death techniques that worked on a Carnifex, but didn't work on Vehicles.
Hellebore wrote:ie, Genestealers have a 5+ invulnerable save to represent their reflexes because there's no other mechanical way to show this.
There could be several ways to show this, but other than a reduction in dice rolls or increasing the BS number of the shooter, there really isn't any other. Also it does have precedent, as stupid as it is. If anything, certain models should be able to roll a Save against Hits before they have a chance to Wound to represent this concept. It would help be effective against Markerlights which always struck me odd about the Dodge Invul.
Instant Death is already a rare rule to begin with, and that's coupled with the fact that, as already mentioned, a Lascannon was able to kill/incapacitate a Rhino but only ever did a singular wound to a Carnifex.
The system sucked and people really need to stop defending it.
Slayer-Fan123 wrote:But said Death Star was at full health when shot at that opening. So how is that somehow better than 30+ Infantry shooting Lasguns at a target with 1-2 wounds left? Seems logical that target with tons of openings after being weakened makes more sense than how the Death Star happened.
Look up how the USS Arizona was sunk. The Death Star was not so different, except that the first Death Star was deliberately designed with this weak point where one sufficient hit would cause its own reactor to detonate, and the second had holes so big a light freighter could literally fly in to the middle.
This was one of the more realistic aspects of the 3rd-5th AV system. Even with the 6th and 7th system, I thought it worked, but they had the process backwards, in which only Penetrating Hits would guarantee Hull Point loss (the Vehicle Table would roll would only deprive a Hull Point loss on a Glancing Explodes! result).
I don't know how much redundancy that a Carnifex has, but the closest one could come to that would be removing its equivalent of a heart or primary neural cluster, which Characters did not have the same weakness. However, there was Force and other Insta-Death techniques that worked on a Carnifex, but didn't work on Vehicles.
Hellebore wrote:ie, Genestealers have a 5+ invulnerable save to represent their reflexes because there's no other mechanical way to show this.
There could be several ways to show this, but other than a reduction in dice rolls or increasing the BS number of the shooter, there really isn't any other. Also it does have precedent, as stupid as it is. If anything, certain models should be able to roll a Save against Hits before they have a chance to Wound to represent this concept. It would help be effective against Markerlights which always struck me odd about the Dodge Invul.
Instant Death is already a rare rule to begin with, and that's coupled with the fact that, as already mentioned, a Lascannon was able to kill/incapacitate a Rhino but only ever did a singular wound to a Carnifex.
The system sucked and people really need to stop defending it.
As I said previously, in 2nd ed a lascannon did 2D6 damage at S9 vs T8 W10 carnifex, meaning it could definitely one shot a carnifex. And because of the way wounds interacted with armour penetration (being rolled to add to strength and dice bonuses to penetrate) it meant that a lascannon could kill a vehicle and a carnifex in a single shot, despite using different profiles.
Slayer-Fan123 wrote: Instant Death is already a rare rule to begin with, and that's coupled with the fact that, as already mentioned, a Lascannon was able to kill/incapacitate a Rhino but only ever did a singular wound to a Carnifex.
The system sucked and people really need to stop defending it.
Sounds more like a problem with the Carnifex more than the AV system, unless you can provide a proper counter that would be more realistic than the AV system?
Slayer-Fan123 wrote: Instant Death is already a rare rule to begin with, and that's coupled with the fact that, as already mentioned, a Lascannon was able to kill/incapacitate a Rhino but only ever did a singular wound to a Carnifex.
The system sucked and people really need to stop defending it.
Sounds more like a problem with the Carnifex more than the AV system, unless you can provide a proper counter that would be more realistic than the AV system?
Yeah, this. MC issues didn't derive from the AV system. That should be obvious.
And MCs worked well enough in 3rd-4th. I think during 5th they started getting more wounds, invulns and outputting greater lethality, making them more frustrating. By 6th-7th they had gotten pretty stupid though. That said, all that was needed was a multi-wound damage capability from bigger guns, like RT, 2nd and 8+. Easy fix.
Yeah, monsters were fine at first. Their added durability was offset by the units being given fewer and poorer guns relative to vehicles, moving at infantry speed, and also being relatively highly priced.
Things became bad around 6th edition when GW forgot those unit design limitations were there for a reason, and started handing out inexpensive and fast 'monsters' with firepower matching vehicles. Riptides and dreadknights and such.
That's why most of the tyranid range was still garbage when everyone was complaining about monsters throughout 6th and 7th, despite having about half the monsters in the game. They were largely a product of the original design, with slow movement, gakky guns, and high prices. The few ones released later (toxicrene, maleceptor) were apparently balanced to be in line with the older nid monsters, so were also terrible.
terror51247 wrote: I am all for introducing modifiers for Shooting rolls based on range.
Me too, and others...
As for WS comparisons a la 2nd Ed, with Initiative yes, I would be all for that too.
I never understood though why a guardsman should ever be a threat to an avatar, at all, without a special weapon like a power sword for example, so pure WS might not be enough...
terror51247 wrote: I am all for introducing modifiers for Shooting rolls based on range.
Me too, and others...
As for WS comparisons a la 2nd Ed, with Initiative yes, I would be all for that too.
I never understood though why a guardsman should ever be a threat to an avatar, at all, without a special weapon like a power sword for example, so pure WS might not be enough...
This is a bit like the "lasguns can kill a titan" argument though. Back when there was a WS chart a Guardsman hit the Avatar on 5+ and wounded on 6+ and the Avatar got a save (can't remember if they had their 3+ save back then or if it was just the 5++). So a single Guardsman wasn't a threat to an Avatar. An entire squad...still wasn't. I think it worked quite well. It allowed for those one-in-a-million moments when a Guardsman killed an Avatar (likely after the Leman Russ had blasted most of its wounds off from long range) but in practical terms the Avatar was pretty much invulnerable, as it should be.
For balance purposes I think you need to be careful about making things immune to damage. Making something very, very resilient is probably the better approach. I remember the frustration of my Dark Eldar opponent in 5th edition when his squad of Wyches were stuck flailing pointlessly at a Dreadnought because they had no way to hurt it in melee and couldn't fall back voluntarily. In 40k's case, a lot of the problems stem from the scope of the game. It probably would be appropriate, for example, to have lasguns unable to hurt a Titan as is the case in Epic, but 40k is a game that tries to cram far too much into its scale. It's insane to have a game include things like Titans while also worrying about modelling the exact type of power sword a squad sergeant is carrying.
I think there is a very good reason to make things immune to damage - time.
Is it worth rolling a million dice for a 56% chance to inflict one wound? Probably not.
So cut down on the gameplay friction and just round that down to zero. The reason why I think that's better than just "well don't roll then", I'd be handicapping myself during the game by forgoing that chance. Whereas if the game were balanced around that chance being zero I wouldn't be losing anything.
40k already has a problem with players volume stupendous amounts of dice to inflict only minor damage. I want a wargame not a dice rolling simulator.
Jidmah wrote: ...If I remember Star Wars correctly, there was this guy who blew up that heavily armored battlestation with a single shot that should never have penetrated the station's armor or shields. ...
Obviously because the dramatic moment happened the one time it needs to happen again in every piece of follow-on media just to make sure we completely deplete the specialness of it happening the first time.
You just described 4 of 9 SW movies.
And the entire EU, yes. Is that...good storytelling?
kirotheavenger wrote: I think there is a very good reason to make things immune to damage - time.
That's a fair point. However, if time spent rolling dice is your major problem with things not being immune to damage I think we'd be much better off reworking the frankly absurd number of dice being rolled in your average game of 40k.
kirotheavenger wrote: I think there is a very good reason to make things immune to damage - time.
That's a fair point. However, if time spent rolling dice is your major problem with things not being immune to damage I think we'd be much better off reworking the frankly absurd number of dice being rolled in your average game of 40k.
I definitely agree.
IMO there should be only about 2-3 dice rolls in a resolution. So offence+defence, plus occasional extra rolls for FNP or rerolls or something.
I don't even think rolling more dice particularly adds much to the resolution, granularity wise. Sure you have the design space to make all sorts of minute differences, but the statistical differences become so minor it loses all significance.
And the entire EU, yes. Is that...good storytelling?
Yes. People want to hear the same stories told over and over again. They are okey for the stories to be reskinned, or inconesquential details to be changed, but the very moment you do a big real change they get very angry.
If in ep 6 Luke would kill Vader, became the hand of the Emperor, and lived happily ever after people would have destroyed the cinemas.
Most human stories can boil down to. Hero goes on a trip, things happen to him, he get bigger , he confronts the big bad and wins.
Slipspace wrote:For balance purposes I think you need to be careful about making things immune to damage. Making something very, very resilient is probably the better approach. I remember the frustration of my Dark Eldar opponent in 5th edition when his squad of Wyches were stuck flailing pointlessly at a Dreadnought because they had no way to hurt it in melee and couldn't fall back voluntarily. In 40k's case, a lot of the problems stem from the scope of the game. It probably would be appropriate, for example, to have lasguns unable to hurt a Titan as is the case in Epic, but 40k is a game that tries to cram far too much into its scale. It's insane to have a game include things like Titans while also worrying about modelling the exact type of power sword a squad sergeant is carrying.
Part of the problem with your comparison is not that Wyches could not damage the Dreadnought, but that they couldn't get away and do something else. There was another rule issue getting in the way.
Part of the problem with Lasguns and even Boltguns not doing any damage to AV was the fact that if the unit had an AT weapon or two, the Lasguns and Bolters were REQUIRED to shoot at the same target instead of focusing fire on something more practical. This is the case of a bad rule causing a frustrating feel.
This isn't a case of the problem with the scope of the game, but how bad rules make for bad interactions, and GW seems to not be able to make a rule change without figuring out how to make it bad in another direction. Now not every model in a unit needs to shoot at the same target, but even a Grot can Wound a Titan. The first point makes sense, but the last is now prompts a head tilt of mild confusion.
If in ep 6 Luke would kill Vader, became the hand of the Emperor, and lived happily ever after people would have destroyed the cinemas.
Isn't that basically the story of Revenge of the Sith? Minus the happily ever after part and changing the characters around.
Cinemas are still standing where I live, at least.
Not the best example as Revenge of the Sith is a Prequel. We already know the overall results going in as Episode 3 is not intended to be the finality of the overall story while Return of the Jedi was at the time of its filming.
Part of the problem with Lasguns and even Boltguns not doing any damage to AV was the fact that if the unit had an AT weapon or two, the Lasguns and Bolters were REQUIRED to shoot at the same target instead of focusing fire on something more practical. This is the case of a bad rule causing a frustrating feel.
.
Thats easy to solve.Allow units to split fire. I never understood why most restrictions on split fire even exist.
Part of the problem with Lasguns and even Boltguns not doing any damage to AV was the fact that if the unit had an AT weapon or two, the Lasguns and Bolters were REQUIRED to shoot at the same target instead of focusing fire on something more practical. This is the case of a bad rule causing a frustrating feel.
.
Thats easy to solve.Allow units to split fire. I never understood why most restrictions on split fire even exist.
That's probably one of the changes I'd make for the 3-7 paradigm, going back.
It did make for some critically important decision making though, especially for units like Tactical Squads. If you moved, you couldn't shoot your Heavy. If you fired your Rapid Fire guns, you couldn't charge. If you fired your Heavy at a vehicle, your bolters are wasted. You had to be on point with your priorities for the turn. I enjoyed those harsh tradeoffs, but it's understandably frustrating to many. I think being able to naturally split fire is better, and it creates areas for other decision making. It was especially harsh for new players, too. Probably not the thing you wanted for your basic troops of your flagship faction.
Part of the problem with Lasguns and even Boltguns not doing any damage to AV was the fact that if the unit had an AT weapon or two, the Lasguns and Bolters were REQUIRED to shoot at the same target instead of focusing fire on something more practical. This is the case of a bad rule causing a frustrating feel.
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Thats easy to solve.Allow units to split fire. I never understood why most restrictions on split fire even exist.
Considering the rule came out of the switch between the more skirmish crunchy rules of 2nd to more of an army battle game of 3rd the most obvious was speed of play and balance issues. like Insectum7 said, it forced you to make tactical choices.
terror51247 wrote: I am all for introducing modifiers for Shooting rolls based on range.
Me too, and others...
As for WS comparisons a la 2nd Ed, with Initiative yes, I would be all for that too.
I never understood though why a guardsman should ever be a threat to an avatar, at all, without a special weapon like a power sword for example, so pure WS might not be enough...
This is a bit like the "lasguns can kill a titan" argument though. Back when there was a WS chart a Guardsman hit the Avatar on 5+ and wounded on 6+ and the Avatar got a save (can't remember if they had their 3+ save back then or if it was just the 5++). So a single Guardsman wasn't a threat to an Avatar. An entire squad...still wasn't. I think it worked quite well. It allowed for those one-in-a-million moments when a Guardsman killed an Avatar (likely after the Leman Russ had blasted most of its wounds off from long range) but in practical terms the Avatar was pretty much invulnerable, as it should be.
For balance purposes I think you need to be careful about making things immune to damage. Making something very, very resilient is probably the better approach.
Spoiler:
I remember the frustration of my Dark Eldar opponent in 5th edition when his squad of Wyches were stuck flailing pointlessly at a Dreadnought because they had no way to hurt it in melee and couldn't fall back voluntarily. In 40k's case, a lot of the problems stem from the scope of the game. It probably would be appropriate, for example, to have lasguns unable to hurt a Titan as is the case in Epic, but 40k is a game that tries to cram far too much into its scale. It's insane to have a game include things like Titans while also worrying about modelling the exact type of power sword a squad sergeant is carrying.
How is a guardsman gonna hurt an avatar? Laser rifle is not strong enough. Bullets melt. Knife will melt. Arm will probably melt. Psychology used to do more in the game, and this would be a good use of it. As for being* frustrated when combat knives can’t wound a dreadnought, good. You took the wrong unit. If the models and dice are wiser than the player, those dudes will run. Completely off the table.
Part of the problem with Lasguns and even Boltguns not doing any damage to AV was the fact that if the unit had an AT weapon or two, the Lasguns and Bolters were REQUIRED to shoot at the same target instead of focusing fire on something more practical. This is the case of a bad rule causing a frustrating feel.
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Thats easy to solve.Allow units to split fire. I never understood why most restrictions on split fire even exist.
That's probably one of the changes I'd make for the 3-7 paradigm, going back.
It did make for some critically important decision making though, especially for units like Tactical Squads. If you moved, you couldn't shoot your Heavy. If you fired your Rapid Fire guns, you couldn't charge. If you fired your Heavy at a vehicle, your bolters are wasted. You had to be on point with your priorities for the turn. I enjoyed those harsh tradeoffs, but it's understandably frustrating to many. I think being able to naturally split fire is better, and it creates areas for other decision making. It was especially harsh for new players, too. Probably not the thing you wanted for your basic troops of your flagship faction.
While it is a hard tradeoff forcing decision making as far back as list creation, it is an artificial one that brought no distinct advantages other than possibly speed of game play by basically taking one or more guns out of the decision making process. Unfortunately, all or nothing for no more reason than, "those are the rules," can come across as both sloppy and frustrating.
The sad fact is that there are a lot of rules in GW games that seem to be answering problems created by the rule writers themselves that only need simple answers. There is a lot of things where a rule piece from each edition is good, but then was stomped on by the next edition, or were answers due to the IGOUGO nature of the game's baseline. Then the really sad part is when people complain about one thing, they are actually whining about another thing, as the case of Wyches and Lasguns not doing anything to a Dreadnought demonstrates.
ProHammer adds split fire after making a leadership test, limited to splitting fire once. Leadership isn't an issue much of the time, but it adds a little drama and tension. Once passed, with only splitting fire once you gotta make a hard choice and commit to it. We also play with declared fire, so you need to declare all your targets first.
Mezmorki wrote: ProHammer adds split fire after making a leadership test, limited to splitting fire once. Leadership isn't an issue much of the time, but it adds a little drama and tension. Once passed, with only splitting fire once you gotta make a hard choice and commit to it. We also play with declared fire, so you need to declare all your targets first.
The sad fact is that there are a lot of rules in GW games that seem to be answering problems created by the rule writers themselves that only need simple answers. There is a lot of things where a rule piece from each edition is good, but then was stomped on by the next edition
This is entirely the point that led my group and Mezmorkis group to do what we did to improve the game play.
We generally liked the core rules of 5th best, but the vehicle defensive weapon rules and vehicle assault rules were better in 4th so we subbed them into 5th. snap fire, grenade throwing and overwatch were really good ideas that work well in 5th but they didn't implement them till 6th&7th so we retro-ed them into 5th and so on.
To add insult to injury some of the reasons given by members of the rules design team as to why they changed good rules for bad ones from one edition to the next were head scratchers. the pendulum swing always seems to be taken to extremes with GW.
Mezmorki wrote:ProHammer adds split fire after making a leadership test, limited to splitting fire once. Leadership isn't an issue much of the time, but it adds a little drama and tension. Once passed, with only splitting fire once you gotta make a hard choice and commit to it. We also play with declared fire, so you need to declare all your targets first.
What do you mean by splitting fire once? One model per unit? One unit per turn could? One unit per game could? The whole army once per game?
Honestly, what do you gain by this method over just letting them choose the targets of their weapons by the number of guns that they have? At worst, I might concede only allowing two targets per unit for this procedure for anything with a gun count smaller than a Baneblade.
To anyone in general: But when implementing any rule, the question should always be: What problem are you trying to solve with this setup and why this implementation?
If we're talking "all models in a unit with the same gun can Split Fire on Ld test", that'd be interesting. Otherwise, I just don't see a reason to justify having restrictions on Split Fire - my Guardsmen aren't going to plink at a fething Gargant with their lasguns regardless of what the Lascannon team does (comments upthread notwithstanding), and if adding in special/heavy weapons comes at the cost of being forced to waste the shooting of the special/heavy wep or the rest of the unit, well...why give us special/heavy weps as an option in base squads, then?
edit:forgot which thread the Titans vs Lasguns argument was in
Mezmorki wrote: ProHammer adds split fire after making a leadership test, limited to splitting fire once. Leadership isn't an issue much of the time, but it adds a little drama and tension. Once passed, with only splitting fire once you gotta make a hard choice and commit to it. We also play with declared fire, so you need to declare all your targets first.
Love it. Declaring targets before slitting fire and before measuring ranges would be best imho. Leadership test ok... splitting once makes sense so one unit can target 2 different units but no more.
Mezmorki wrote: ProHammer adds split fire after making a leadership test, limited to splitting fire once. Leadership isn't an issue much of the time, but it adds a little drama and tension. Once passed, with only splitting fire once you gotta make a hard choice and commit to it. We also play with declared fire, so you need to declare all your targets first.
Love it. Declaring targets before slitting fire and before measuring ranges would be best imho. Leadership test ok... splitting once makes sense so one unit can target 2 different units but no more.
ProHammer also includes optional rules for no pre-measuring, which is what we mostly use.
I'm sometimes on the fence about the leadership test - but I kind of like the slight uncertainty about whether you'll be able to bank on split firing or not. You often need to commit to a movement plan for it. I like the hard decision.
Really don't like it. I much prefer fewer dice rolls that mean more than more rolls that mean less. I don't think a 2k point game of 40k should need any more than 20 dice to play.
Mezmorki wrote: ProHammer adds split fire after making a leadership test, limited to splitting fire once. Leadership isn't an issue much of the time, but it adds a little drama and tension. Once passed, with only splitting fire once you gotta make a hard choice and commit to it. We also play with declared fire, so you need to declare all your targets first.
Love it. Declaring targets before slitting fire and before measuring ranges would be best imho. Leadership test ok... splitting once makes sense so one unit can target 2 different units but no more.
ProHammer also includes optional rules for no pre-measuring, which is what we mostly use.
I'm sometimes on the fence about the leadership test - but I kind of like the slight uncertainty about whether you'll be able to bank on split firing or not. You often need to commit to a movement plan for it. I like the hard decision.
Prohammer is the future. I like the optional rules. Indeed, this is what GW should be doing with effectively tiers of rule complexity. Don’t want the added step of leadership tests for splitting fire? Fine, don’t use them. Game is simpler. Do enjoy the added uncertainty and drama? Use the leadership tests. This home brew convert to suit play styles attitude is what this hobby is all about, or was, until IP CCG corporate capitalism sucked all the creative spirit from the activity.
Actually, Prohammer has finally pushed me over the edge. I no longer wait for GW to fix their terrible game system with 10th Ed. And I am increasingly open to 3rd party models.
The only issue is convincing your local groups to play such an extensive custom ruleset.
9th Age only worked in our local group because Age of Sigmar was such an unmitigated mess. As soon as the GHB came out, 9th Age slowly dropped off the radar.
Charistoph wrote: The only issue is convincing your local groups to play such an extensive custom ruleset.
9th Age only worked in our local group because Age of Sigmar was such an unmitigated mess. As soon as the GHB came out, 9th Age slowly dropped off the radar.
Well at least we can agree there's a problem with trying to house rule everything and why GW needs to be held to a higher standard for rules writing.
Part of the problem with Lasguns and even Boltguns not doing any damage to AV was the fact that if the unit had an AT weapon or two, the Lasguns and Bolters were REQUIRED to shoot at the same target instead of focusing fire on something more practical. This is the case of a bad rule causing a frustrating feel.
.
Thats easy to solve.Allow units to split fire. I never understood why most restrictions on split fire even exist.
That's probably one of the changes I'd make for the 3-7 paradigm, going back.
It did make for some critically important decision making though, especially for units like Tactical Squads. If you moved, you couldn't shoot your Heavy. If you fired your Rapid Fire guns, you couldn't charge. If you fired your Heavy at a vehicle, your bolters are wasted. You had to be on point with your priorities for the turn. I enjoyed those harsh tradeoffs, but it's understandably frustrating to many. I think being able to naturally split fire is better, and it creates areas for other decision making. It was especially harsh for new players, too. Probably not the thing you wanted for your basic troops of your flagship faction.
While it is a hard tradeoff forcing decision making as far back as list creation, it is an artificial one that brought no distinct advantages other than possibly speed of game play by basically taking one or more guns out of the decision making process. Unfortunately, all or nothing for no more reason than, "those are the rules," can come across as both sloppy and frustrating.
I found it very clean from a design perspective, and I think it cane from a good place, but ultimately I don't think it's right for 40K. It's not very good from an accessibility standpoint.
The sad fact is that there are a lot of rules in GW games that seem to be answering problems created by the rule writers themselves that only need simple answers. There is a lot of things where a rule piece from each edition is good, but then was stomped on by the next edition, or were answers due to the IGOUGO nature of the game's baseline.
Yes. There are many instances of "Two steps forward, one step back" as well as two and sometimes three steps back. :/
Then the really sad part is when people complain about one thing, they are actually whining about another thing, as the case of Wyches and Lasguns not doing anything to a Dreadnought demonstrates.
That's hugely common in game feedback. People treat symptoms and not causes. Happens all the time in game dev.
Grenades? You know, these things they have loads of on their belts and ammo bags?
It can even try melting one, hot high explosives on fire just produce bigger boom
waefre_1 wrote: Otherwise, I just don't see a reason to justify having restrictions on Split Fire - my Guardsmen aren't going to plink at a fething Gargant with their lasguns regardless of what the Lascannon team does (comments upthread notwithstanding), and if adding in special/heavy weapons comes at the cost of being forced to waste the shooting of the special/heavy wep or the rest of the unit, well...why give us special/heavy weps as an option in base squads, then?
Why not?
I like how people here debate computer games grade strategy, not real life ones. In RL, the whole squad would absolutely fire on the gargant, because lasguns would be doing critical job of suppressing all the defensive emplacements and gun holes it has so the lascannon can shoot unhindered. If they shoot a weak point, or explode ammo belt or something (represented by rolling 6 well enough) they absolutely should do some damage. Armored vehicles and monsters even in real life aren't monolithic blocks of steel, you can absolutely mission kill even Abrams with 'weak' machine gun if you destroy its sensors, communication equipment and machine guns on top, they all have tons of weak spots. There is a lot that can be said about badly thought out mechanics of 8th/9th, but rolling 6 to wound is not one of these things.
I also agree with some points above, IMO unlimited split fire slows down game too much if someone tries to abuse it and I wouldn't mind it being limited to two targets per unit. Army units in real life don't minmax by having every member shoot a different target, never mind in abstract game.
Yeah, there are a lot of reason's why in ProHammer we limit it just one split (two targets):
* Keeps game from getting too bogged down.
* Forces players still make some judgement calls about how to allocate their shooting attacks
* Leaves room for certain units with split fire special rules to still be special (i.e. units with spit fire rule automatically pass the leadership test and can fire at up to three different targets)).
The attack process in ProHammer is designed so that ALL models in a unit shooting at a given target ALWAYS speed roll all of their shots. The system is designed to accommodate mixed weapons (including blast) and mixed target armor/cover/invul. saves. That also really helps speed up the play - and once you get used to it it's a lot more intuitive than GW's own system, and much better than having to roll single model attacks one a time. The same general attack process works for close combat engagement too.
waefre_1 wrote: Otherwise, I just don't see a reason to justify having restrictions on Split Fire - my Guardsmen aren't going to plink at a fething Gargant with their lasguns regardless of what the Lascannon team does (comments upthread notwithstanding), and if adding in special/heavy weapons comes at the cost of being forced to waste the shooting of the special/heavy wep or the rest of the unit, well...why give us special/heavy weps as an option in base squads, then?
Why not?
I like how people here debate computer games grade strategy, not real life ones. In RL, the whole squad would absolutely fire on the gargant, because lasguns would be doing critical job of suppressing all the defensive emplacements and gun holes it has so the lascannon can shoot unhindered. If they shoot a weak point, or explode ammo belt or something (represented by rolling 6 well enough) they absolutely should do some damage. Armored vehicles and monsters even in real life aren't monolithic blocks of steel, you can absolutely mission kill even Abrams with 'weak' machine gun if you destroy its sensors, communication equipment and machine guns on top, they all have tons of weak spots. There is a lot that can be said about badly thought out mechanics of 8th/9th, but rolling 6 to wound is not one of these things.
I also agree with some points above, IMO unlimited split fire slows down game too much if someone tries to abuse it and I wouldn't mind it being limited to two targets per unit. Army units in real life don't minmax by having every member shoot a different target, never mind in abstract game.
OK, first off: We are talking about a ruleset based on 5th ed, where a lasgun was literally incapable of damaging a Gargant. No, you couldn't fish for crits, and no, you can't accumulate points of damage and count it as a Blind effect. You roll to hit, and then you do nothing because it is mathematically impossible to roll 1d6+3 and get better than a 9, and the absolute lowest you could roll and still do damage to any vehicle is 10 (and a Gargant would be muchharder to damage - AV 10 was for things like Trukks and Sentinels). I'll admit, I haven't read the ProHammer rules. Maybe Mezmorki did something to the AV rules to allow for a lasgun to do chip damage to vehicles - I'd be OK with it if they did. I'd still want to houserule the houserule so that units needed to have some Mindless USR to need the Ld test to do Split Fire, rather than needing some other USR to ignore the Ld test.
Second: Lasguns aren't doing a damn thing to "suppress defensive emplacements and gun holes" on a Gargant. Even if they did, that job would undoubtedly be given to something with a higher rate of fire and more punch, like a Heavy Bolter or a Multilaser. The lasguns, if they are suppressing anything, would be targeting the Ork infantry that are running around looking for fights. Which is precisely what 5e Split Fire prevented you from doing.
That said, I should have been clearer in my speech there - when I said "restrictions", I had the old "only Special Boys get to Split Fire" paradigm in mind, not "I should be able to individually target every single shot each of my units makes". I agree, that would be absurdly time consuming and far too prone to abuse.
Third: This is a tabletop game by Games Workshop. "Video game" strategies are more appropriate to use than RL strategies, because GW is not about milsim, it is about laser rifles and chainsaw swords and rough abstractions. If I wanted to worry about windage and range modifiers for shooting and pinning fire and ammunition logistics, I would play a different game entirely, because 40k has not been and (likely) will never be that sort of game.
Fourth: You are going to have to give me one hell of a source for me to believe that a modern army would tell their troops to waste small arms ammo on an MBT unless they had literally nothing else to do (and even then, I'd suspect the order would be "observe and report the MBT's position so that other elements can engage it" rather than "tickle the optics until the nice tanky mans get hopping mad and pop the hatch to yell at you"). If we were talking about a lighter piece of armor, I might believe you, but we are not.
One of these days I'm going to make a post with this much bolding and not miss a close tag somewhere
waefre_1 wrote: The lasguns, if they are suppressing anything, would be targeting the Ork infantry that are running around looking for fights. Which is precisely what 5e Split Fire prevented you from doing.
Technically speaking Split Fire came in to being with 6th Edition, and did not exist as a rule itself before then. There was an army or two who had a way around it, namely the Tau and their Target Locks (but those were model specific).
waefre_1 wrote: Fourth: You are going to have to give me one hell of a source for me to believe that a modern army would tell their troops to waste small arms ammo on an MBT unless they had literally nothing else to do (and even then, I'd suspect the order would be "observe and report the MBT's position so that other elements can engage it" rather than "tickle the optics until the nice tanky mans get hopping mad and pop the hatch to yell at you"). If we were talking about a lighter piece of armor, I might believe you, but we are not.
The only reason I can think of is this: Pepper the tank with small arms to get its attention directed at you so the real AT weapon can be set up and fired from another position. Shooting it with small arms just screams, "Blow my a** to kingdom come for the temerity of annoying you with our gnats."
Though, as a side note, lasguns do have some superior capabilities over ballistic or energy packet weapons in that if you hit a periscope, one's shot could hit whoever is looking in to it due to reflection. Still, not something I'd rely on to disable armor.
