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Don't they get a 5+ save? Since AP4 and 4+ armor means -1 to the save, not negate entirely.

But okay-I get it now.

Minor notes today, going through USRs:

(any time I type a word in ALL CAPS i mean bold)

Assault Vehicle: Appears to have been written for a build of the game where units could not normally assault out of moving vehicles. Reword to indicate assault vehicle grants full attacks when charging after the vehicle moved.

Crusader: Does prohammer feature "Sweeping advance rolls"? Perhaps add D3 to Pursuit moves?

Fleet: This seems like a significant change from what i recall its usual incarnation being (reroll advance rolls). Does the fact that Fleet is handed out like candy in certain codexes cause this to be a problem ever?

Hit&Run: Does this move count as the unit Falling Back? Does the unit they left get to make a pursuit roll? A consolidation move?

Also change to "at THE end of THE assault phase" and corrrect type "OUTLANK" to "OUTFLANK"

Infiltrate: Specify "outside of the normal deployment zone" and "during deployment" to clarify this rule.

Jink: Should this be reworded from "Models" to "Units"? Can I jink with half my biker squad, leaving the other half to shoot normally?

Move through Cover: Add "Difficult terrain TESTS"

Outflank: May I choose instead to move on from my own board edge? I recall that being a feature of outflank in several editions to avoid outflank occasionally having a 50% chance of being a detrimental rule.

PoTMS: Is "Smoke" a technical rule term elsewhere in the document? Should it be worded 'smoke launchers'?

For Rage (5th) vs Rage (7th) should I look at what edition of codex im using?

Scouts: Reword last sentence to "Gains OUTFLANK" for consistency.

Slow and Purposeful: Reword to "Unit always moves as if it is in difficult terrain. Gains RELENTLESS." to make it similarly worded to other rules e.g. infiltrate.

Turbo-boosters: Referred to elsewhere in the document as Turbo-Boost. Rename.

Also, suggest reword: "Instead of making a normal move, units with this rule may make a special Turbo Boost move of up to 24". Units may not shoot in the shooting phase or charge in the assault phase if they made a Turbo Boost move in the movement phase. Units that also have the JINK rule gain a 4+ cover save if they used a Turbo Boost move in their last movement phase."

Brotherhood of Psykers: "uses highest leadership value in unit" rather than "unit leader" language which is not used in the rest of the document.

Counter Attack: Reword "If this unit is not engaged to any enemy models and an enemy unit successfully completes a charge move into contact with it, it may take a Leadership test. If passed, this unit gains a bonus of +1 attack during the Assault phase."

Daemon: Reword "Unit gains a 5+ invulnerable save and FEAR"

Eternal Warrior: is the intention that any MASSIVE WOUND only causes 1 wound? or just massive wounds from the Instant Death rule?

Fear: Does an enemy unit in base contact with a unit that causes Fear but which is not making attacks against that unit still have to test?

Fearless: EDIT: suggested change to FEARLESS to reflect the way its typically portrayed (as units being "mindless" or "bezerk") "Unit automatically passes all Morale and Pinning tests, but may not Go to Ground, be given Overwatch tokens or perform Reaction Fire, and automatically fails Restraint tests."

Furious Charge: "unit gains +1 strength if it made a charge move on its last turn."

Hammer of wrath: Change to "when this unit charges, each model in the unit may". Currently RAW hammer of wrath only works when you charge me!

Hatred: Change Missed to Failed?

it will not die: change 'it's' to 'its'

Preferred Enemy: same as hatred should specify that if prefered enemy lists a faction, the ability only functions vs models with that faction.

Shrouded: "Add +2 to the value of cover saves claimed by this unit. If in the open, this unit has a 5+ cover save."

Stealth: Same wording as above.

Stubborn: And pinning tests?

Tank Hunters: What does "immune to tank shock" practically mean? I automatically pass the leadership test? I can get run over and just not care?

Zealot: Reword to "Gains FEARLESS and HATRED"

Blind: reword to 'by a weapon with BLIND"

Gets Hot: remove apostrophe. Also as written this seems to say that you wound your target automatically? Should it not say that the firing model takes the wound? And if youre going by prohammers wound resolution table to get the desired effect of gets hot id reword to

"If a model shooting a weapon with this rule rolls a 1 to hit, it must take an armor save. If the armor save is failed, the firing model suffers a massive wound. Vehicles are not affected by the GETS HOT rule."

Graviton: Add "never roll on the vehicle damage table for attacks from GRAVITON weapons." (if the intention is that graviton can immobilize vehicles but nothing else)

Interceptor: a weapon with this rule may be fired at an enemy unit immediately after that enemy unit enters from reserves and ends the movement phase within line of sight and range of the weapon. If used in this way, the firing model may not shoot in the shooting phase of its following turn.

Master Crafted: Correct typo "re-roll"

Melta: reword "to penetrate vheicles" to "on armor penetration rolls"

Pinning: this rule appears to be written with my suggestion to make Going to Ground identical to Pinning in effect. if you wish to keep the two distinct, youll need to reword this rule.

Poison: you should note that poison weapons have no effect versus vehicles.

Rending: "If an armor penetration roll with a RENDING weapon is a 6, add an additional D3 to the result of the penetration roll."

Split Fire: dont all units have this? If so, should this allow automatic passing of split fire tests?

Sniper: reword to "Gains RENDING and PINNING"

Strikedown: Is this also called Concussive in some editions?

Twin linked: Reword to "Reroll failed to-hit rolls."

Unwieldy: Should models with Relentless ignore unwieldy? Just a thought. IDK.

Smoke Launchers: I always felt like because you had to not fire at all these were kind of silly. Maybe "instead of firing one Main Weapon" or "instead of firing all Defensive Weapons"?

^^^^ Thanks for the edits!

Will get to incorporating those when I can. Cheers!

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Automatically Appended Next Post:
I'm through making edits, and have incorporated most of the earlier suggestions. Wanted to call out a few items below:

Shooting Phase Step 4 Casualty Test

If this occurs at the end of the turn why put it here?

It's a check to mark units (we use tokens) so you don't forget in the event a bunch of other stuff transpires.

Targetable Area

Changed these bullet points (and the one other reference) to "Target Visibility" (making it more of a process item) and just directly referencing the body/hull of the model elsewhere, since that's already a clearly defined term.

NO HITTABLE MODELS: If the target unit has no hittable models, then no shooting attacks are resolved.

While resolving a shooting attack, the defender may choose to allocate wounds to models that are not hittable if desired. However, if at any point during the resolution of the shooting attack the condition of NO HITTABLE MODELS above occurs, the shooting attack ends immediately - no additional save rolls need to be rolled."

This edit doesn't need to be made here, because it's already covered further down in the process when it comes to allocating UNSAVED wounds. So Rhino sniping already isn't something that can be forced very easily.

"HITTABLE" as a term

I've been mulling this over and I'm going to leave it as HITTABLE for now. It IS tied to the initial "to-hit" process in that the hittable models have to be in line of sight and in range.

Fleet: This seems like a significant change from what i recall its usual incarnation being (reroll advance rolls). Does the fact that Fleet is handed out like candy in certain codexes cause this to be a problem ever?

I don't think so. In later editions where fleet was used more (and where it allowed re-rolling advance and charges), those were also editions where the charge distance was 2D6", with fleet giving you a chance for a higher distance (up to 12"). That's fairly comparable to older fleet rules where you advance d6" (during movement) and then still charge (a flat 6"). So you're effective charge was 7"-12", which is in the ballpark of 2D6" with a re-roll. A little more consistent in ProHammer, but that's fine given I'm trying to tip the scales back more towards melee a bit overall.

Fearless: EDIT: suggested change to FEARLESS to reflect the way its typically portrayed (as units being "mindless" or "bezerk") "Unit automatically passes all Morale and Pinning tests, but may not Go to Ground, be given Overwatch tokens or perform Reaction Fire, and automatically fails Restraint tests."

Definitely don't want this. You'd end up with all kinds of fearless units (thousand suns for example) not being able to do overwatch or reaction tests. I've never felt fearless meant "berserk"

I want to provide an update on where things stand with ProHammer

(1) I went through the recent suggestions and edits on the thread here and have incorporated most of those, as noted above. Edits that affect gameplay in some manner have a comment in the rule doc calling it out.

Some big picture things to call out. These mostly relate to trying condense the terminologies and different situations into methods that are more uniform.

(2) Defined LIMITED FIRE upfront alongside snap fire. -1 to hit, half the number of shots (rounded up), targets within 24”. Clarifies that if you use limited fire as part of a reaction, you must also use limited fire on your next shooting turn.

(3) I incorporated a major rework to the langage and process around “reactions.” “Reactive Fire” as a term has been removed, and replaced with a “Return Fire!” reaction option when a unit is shot and the analogous “Stand & Shoot!” reaction when a unit is charged. These basically work the same, and both direct the unit to resolve their fire using the new Limited Fire rules. Seems to be much cleaner handling it all this way. Units performing these reactions also suffer a penalty in assault (lose advantage of cover and strike at initiative 1 with just their base attacks).

(4) I revised the assault phase process a little, after realizing we were actually playing our games differently from how the rules were written. Basically, the assault phase has parity with the shooting phase steps, in that you first declare ALL charges and withdrawal moves, and then you go around and resolve the charges/withdrawals and charged units can take the Stand & Shoot reaction if desired.

The above works well (and is how we’ve been playing it). It lets you setup situations where you might try to charge a unit with two different units, drawing out stand & shoot fire against the first unit that charges in, etc..

(5) “Going to ground” is removed as a specific term. Instead, units taking fire and perform a “Take Cover!” reaction, granting the unusual cover bonus but then PINNING the unit as if it was normally pinned.

(6) Clarified the rules around units being pinned a little bit. Clarified that broken units that are pinned (or that are broken and become pinned) continue to fall back as normal but suffer the other ill effects of being pinned (shooting with snap fire, etc.)

(7) Screening - revised this to make it a little more impactful and eliminate some of the die rolls. If the screen is in intact, then all units automatically hit the screening unit instead. Makes unit positioning a bit more interesting this way.

==============================================

QUESTIONS & NEXT STEPS / UNRESOLVED ITEMS

There are a number of loose ends and areas of the rules that I’m still working through right now. Some feedback on the below would be welcome! Curious to know people’s thoughts:

(8) Throwing Grenades - I admit we mostly forget this is even an option. In the interest of simplicity, I’m inclined to just remove the ability to throw grenades. Just seems to bog things down to resolve one-off shooting attacks of limited impact.

(9) Suppression - I’d like to revamp the suppression rules and make it a legit part of the gameplay that ties into more facets of the game. Here’s my tentative proposal:

——————————————
* Each time a unit suffers one or more unsaved wounds from a volley of shooting attacks it gains a suppression point (use a D6 next to the unit)[*]Crossfire: (see note further below)
* Each suppression point incurs a -1 modifier to leadership tests the unit makes (morale tests, split fire tests, psychic tests, etc.)
* When a unit would gain 3 or more suppression tokens it must take a PINNING test. If the pinning test fails, the unit becomes Pinned and loses all but one suppression point. If passed, the unit continues on as normal.
* Units automatically lose one suppression point at the start of each of their turns.
* Units lose all but one suppression points if they become engaged in melee
* Units that are fearless or immune to pinning STILL gain suppression points and will have their leadership value affected for other leadership tests they may be required to take.
——————————————

I think the above will add an interesting pace to the game. Units hit by a group of attacks that actually do damage and inflict casualties seems to be a good 40K-appropriate approach, representing the ability of some units being able to shrug off small arms fire, and only taken casualties when hit by a sufficient volume of it.

Since one suppression point is removed at the start of a unit’s turn, in order to force a unit to take a pinning test, you’d need to focus multiple units shooting at the same target over a battle round or two.

If the above seems reasonable - I’m going to draft it up properly in the rules as a “trial” rule for testing a bit more and see how it goes.

CROSSFIRE - As part of the suppression system, I was thinking about a clean and simple crossfire rule. Units hit by crossfire would gain an additional suppression point.

Determining crossfire: The first unit that shoot at an enemy unit determines the facing of the target unit. Draw a line between the shooting model and target model that are closest to each other. Next, superimpose a line on this closest target model perpendicular to the first line. Subsequent units shooting at the target unit that are WHOLLY behind this perpendicular line are said to be shooting at the rear/flank of the unit and inflict an additional point of suppression for crossfire.

(10) Vehicle Structure Points - This idea is aimed at reducing the chances of a vehicle being 1-shotted early in the game. We’ve found that in many matchups, certain vehicles, especially high cost high armor vehicles, struggle to justify themselves because an unlikely hit can knock them out very prematurely.

Here’s the working proposal:

——————————————
* Vehicles gain structure points (SPs) based on totaling up the three armor values for a vehicle (front, rear, and one side).
* AV 30 = 0 SPs (eg 10/10/10 vehicles)
* AV 31-34 = 1 SP (e.g. rhino, chimera, necron lighter vehicles)
* AV 35-39 = 2 SPs (e.g. dreads, heavy flyers)
* AV 40+ = 3 SPs (e.g. leman Russ, heavier vehicles)
* When a vehicle suffers a hit that would cause it to be IMMOBILIZED, WRECKED, or EXPLODES result on a vehicle damage table, the vehicle instead loses structure points, each applying a -1 to the damage table result, sufficient to drop below all immobilized, wrecked, or explodes results, or as far down as the damage result as remaining structure points allow.
* Vehicles suffering damage result due to losing structure points count as being damaged as if that damage result occurred initially.
——————————————

Essentially this gives vehicles a save, sometimes more than one, against critical damage results. No one likes getting their prize toy knocked out in one freakish shot, and this help minimize this. Again, considering drafting this into the rules as a “trial” rule for further testing.

THREAD SEEMS TO BE BROKEN - NEW POSTS ARE NOT GETTING ADDED

You've made tanks useless by saying a glancing hit makes a vehicle snap fire only. Tanks are supposed to shrug of effects like this.
Rules i use
Roll to hit with Blast weapon. If the shot misses it always deviates, never use ''on spot'' or use BS skill of firer
You have to reduce all hull points before exploding a vehicle.
Example. A vehicle has 1 hull point left on it. A leman russ Wrecks it with its auto cannon but it can over kill with its las cannon and 2 multi meltas. If any of the last three Penetrate it they can roll to see if they get an Explode result.

As someone who likely won't ever actually get to play the fruits of your wonderful efforts and is just here out of interest - I think you're really starting to get away from the core "it's a tweaked 3/4/5/6th edition" with a lot of the complexity you're suggesting.

Testing....


Automatically Appended Next Post:

licclerich wrote:
You've made tanks useless by saying a glancing hit makes a vehicle snap fire only. Tanks are supposed to shrug of effects like this.
Rules i use
Roll to hit with Blast weapon. If the shot misses it always deviates, never use ''on spot'' or use BS skill of firer
You have to reduce all hull points before exploding a vehicle.
Example. A vehicle has 1 hull point left on it. A leman russ Wrecks it with its auto cannon but it can over kill with its las cannon and 2 multi meltas. If any of the last three Penetrate it they can roll to see if they get an Explode result.

Tanks shrugging off hits is represented by armor penetration rolls failing to achieve a glancing or penetrating hit. If glancing hit results didn't minimally incur snap fire, then what would even be the point of acknowledging glancing hit?

The trail rules I'm testing out sorta return hull points, in the form of "structure points" that get depleted when a vehicle would take a hit that results in it being destroyed.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 RustyNumber wrote:
As someone who likely won't ever actually get to play the fruits of your wonderful efforts and is just here out of interest - I think you're really starting to get away from the core "it's a tweaked 3/4/5/6th edition" with a lot of the complexity you're suggesting.

Perhaps. I'm not afraid to add some complexity into the system so long as it's at the appropriate "scope." What I mean is that I don't want complexity that comes down to having to resolve small detail oriented things that only affect a model or two (for example the "challenges" system in 6th/7th edition). But if the complexity is something that affects a whole unit, and more importantly its broad capabilities at any given point, I'm okay with that, because it's adding some new levers to the overall tactical decision making.

Prohammer Batrep!

A friend of mine and I tried out prohammer (previous version, not with all these new suggested changes) using the 3E space marine codex vs the 3e Eldar codex, plus some Harlequin allies. Prohammer doesnt have specific ally rules that I could find, so we just agreed "less than 1/3 of the points as allies" and incorporated the 'quins into the standard force org chart.

I brought:

-A farseer (guide, fortune)
3 Warlocks (1 to each guardian squad, each with 1 different power)
-the Avatar of Khaine
-a Shadowseer

--10 harlequins, with various stuff
-3x8 storm guardians with 2x melta guns
-7x dire avengers with a diresword exarch

-10x banshees with an executioner exarch
-5x fire dragons with a pike exarch with fast shot
-a death jester with a shrieker cannon

-5x dark reapers with a shuricannon exarch
-a war walker with double bright lances
-a D-cannon

-3x shining spears
-a vyper with scatter laser and shuriken cannon
-a squad of swooping hawks

He brought:

-a captain with a combi-melta and power fist
-another captain in terminator armor

-3x tactical squads with various equipment, all 5-man
-a unit of scouts

-2x predators (one of which was The Vaunted Deodorant Tank!) one with autocannon, one with full lascannons
-2x dreadnoughts, one with lascannons, one with multi-melta
-3x assault squads, with various stuff
-lascannon devastator squad

we played a pretty simple mission, relic movable objective in the middle worth 2pts per turn if you hold it, home objective worth 3pts per turn but ONLY to your opponent - no points for the player who owns it.

My opponent had his 3x assault squads and terminator captain in reserves, fairly balanced board setup with 2 tacticals and a captain in the middle, and a dread and a predator on either side, with the last tactical squad set up on his home objective.I put a big ball of melee hate in the middle, and set up my dire avengers/shining spears/vyper and other assorted fast stuff off to the flank on the side with my opponent's home objective. I placed my home objective basically in line with the relic, so I didnt have to defend it. My opponent went first and basically sacrificed the scouts to score turn 1 points on the relics, moved up the tacticals so theyd be able to pop out and rapid fire at my stuff, moved the dreads up aggressively, and shot at stuff with lascannons - though he had limited targets so that was basically 'my fire dragons' and 'my dark reapers'

My first turn, I used the scouts as a charge move springboard for all my stuff, obliterating them, but taking some mostly unipactful reaction fire with a squad of storm guardians. Biggest thing that happened was my 3 remaining fire dragons rolled up on the dreadnought, and my fire dragon exarch popped him right open with fast shot. My dark reapers, D-cannon, storm guardians, vyper and dire avengers all went on overwatch, awaiting the reserve rolls.

my opponent rolled reserves and 2 assault squads came in, unfortunately not the one with the captain. both squads were carefully positioned to avoid the Reapers' overwatch, but one (threatening my D-cannon) I completely obliterated with my overwatch units, cuttting them down to the sergeant, who broke and ran.

Most of the lascannons and multi-meltas prioritized taking out my War Walker and my Vyper, and one of my storm guardian squads with Conceal up that was holding the objective slowly got beaten down to just the warlock with tactical bolter fire. My fire dragon exarch incredibly stood firm, the sole survivor, ready to take on the dreaded deodorant predator.

On my turn, the harlequins and banshees finally moved in for the kill, charging up the middle while the guardians claimed the relic and locked it down. My opponent unfortunately at this point had a laser cannon in a clown fight, as all the bolter weapons in his list got scythed down, managing to drop only a couple of harlequins with their react fire. My shining spears daringly leapt over the wall between them and my opponent's home objective, and I suddenly remembered a few things: one, that shining spears' offense used to be crap, and two, that shining spears' defense also used to be crap. 150pts of shining spears then promptly went down like total chumps to the Overwatch token from 5 dudes with boltguns...because they were just T4 W1. Sadly the exarch rolled poorly this turn leaving the predator tank only temporarily inconvenienced. The avatar of Khaine charged in and butchered the second dreadnought, and my opponent had 7 lascannons up against a whole mess of nasty melee infantry right in their faces.

On my opponent's turn, the final assault squad finally arrived, with its captain in tow, and launched a final suicide charge into the storm guardians' objective. with the -1A from charging and the storm guardians striking first taking down 3 assault marines, the charge would be a doomed one, and my opponent conceded, with most things ready to be mopped up turn 4.

Overall Impressions:

-any time you add active, full power overwatch to an IGOUGO system, you inherently tilt the game pretty significantly towards defensive, static play, and that REALLY showed in this game, with basically anything but the bluntest most overpoweringly strong offensive pushes being easily rebuffed by defensive play.

I was able to basically put a huge chunk of my backfield on lock with a single squad of dark reapers, and even though he purposefully avoided them, my opponent lost 1/2 of his assault squads to the overwatch tokens i'd thrown down on just..random crap units I had no need to move. On my opponent's side, a minimal tac squad with boltguns and I think maybe one upgraded gun of some kind offered up a really powerful defense to my mobile units just by hiding behind some of those shipping containers.

I think it might be worth examining whether the interlocking systems of active overwatch, AND react fire, AND suppression are tipping the scales just a little bit towards static play. Run a few tests with an opponent purposefully creating a reactive, long range gunline using a tau codex, and see how it feels.

-random reserve rolls starting on a 4+ on turn 2 feels pretty punishing, and made me remember why Deep Strike felt like absolute crap throughout all the editions I played until 8e. Removing the hard barrier between deep strike and melee is a step in the right direction, but my opponent and I both agreed we'd have both been 100% better off just..not deep striking any of our stuff and instead hiding them behind some cover and just using their fast movement to get them where they needed to go.

on the plus side, though

-we both really liked where Vehicles were landing in prohammer. Lacking the React fire, they were less defensive than everything else, and the VDT seemed like it was in a good sweet spot for stuff going down when it needed to, but also requiring dedicated AT weapons to punch through armor. attacking vehicles felt tense but also things went down when lets be honest they should have died. I do not think vehicles need a change from where they are at at present.

-generally react fire as a system we both liked. We played using the "roll to hit, divide by half and round down" system, and I gotta say....it was a tad too punishing, I think just changing it to round up and it'd be about where it needs to be.

I'm going to go out on a limb and say as much as I like the CONCEPT of active overwatch...a more useful version of React Fire with take half/round up Snap Fire and then no shooting on your following turn would probably give you the good scenarios for active overwatch without the negative experiences of "spawn camping" that we ran into with active overwatch.

Images to follow!

Images

Cool bunkers, are they MDF?

Thanks for the bat report! Great to see you giving it another go and round of feedback!

Couple of scattered thoughts and reactions:

Re: Overwatch
We haven't found it to be too strong in our games, but that could be due to any combination of mission objectives, respective forces, and board setup. There's an opportunity cost of overwatch in that you can't move the unit, so you can't use that unit to pressure objectives. The tradeoff we've found is often "do I shoot at a less ideal target and move (maybe towards objectives), or go onto overwatch and wait for a better target to present itself?" Dedicated fire support units (i.e. dark reapers, devastators) benefit relatively more from overwatch.

Remember too that if a unit shoots on overwatch it can't also shoot with reactive fire. Also remember that overwatch is limited to 24" range. So for example, another counter-play option is use your own fire support units that remain stationary to utilize their "first fire" advantage to shoot at a high threat overwatch unit first, to soften it up, before it can make its attack.

On a different note, the "trial" suppression rules I have drafted established a process for crossfire and determining the forward facing for a unit (in order to determine when a unit is hit from "behind" for crossfire). I'm thinking of other applications for this method, and potentially overwatch could be one. For example it could work like this: You pick a model and use the overwatch token to determine the facing of the unit. When resolving ovewatch fire, you can only shoot on a target in the forward 180-degree arc of the unit.

This change would add some maneuver based counter-play as a way to work around overwatch. In your game above, assault squads could potentially deep strike behind the dark reapers and be able to engage them, or at least shoot them down a little. Could add a nice maneuver and positional dynamic, and make overwatch a bit riskier and more challenging to execute well, while giving your opponent options for counter-play.

Re: Random Reserve Rolls
I agree that there's often some head ringing about weather it's better to just deploy on the table at the onset to have more table presence, present more targets, pressure objectives, versus deep striking for the flexibility of being able to deploy anywhere. If relying on deep strike units as a part of a one-two-punch strategy or something that needs a predictable tactical execution, I think it can lead to frustration. The uncertainty of when deep strike (or any reserve) unit arrives makes it's placement more of an immediate tactical decision of where it can achieve the greatest impact as opposed to slotting into a pre-defined plan somehow. When viewed that way, the randomness isn't as problematic IMHO, but it can still be frustrating at times.

-------------------------------------------------------------

Also, I've been working on this the summary document below. View at 100% scale and should fit width-wise on a 1920 x 1080 screen in your browser (Chrome at least). Basically covers the majority of the overall procedural elements and rules that most often need to be looked up. Let me know if you see anything amiss with it (or have other feedback).

ProHammer Gameplay Summary Chart

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 Illumini wrote:
Cool bunkers, are they MDF?

Yeah, Deathray Designs, I plug them at every opportunity, hands down by a MILE the best MDF terrain I've ever gotten/worked with, and at a great price.

 Mezmorki wrote:
Thanks for the bat report! Great to see you giving it another go and round of feedback!

Couple of scattered thoughts and reactions:

Re: Overwatch
We haven't found it to be too strong in our games, but that could be due to any combination of mission objectives, respective forces, and board setup. There's an opportunity cost of overwatch in that you can't move the unit, so you can't use that unit to pressure objectives. The tradeoff we've found is often "do I shoot at a less ideal target and move (maybe towards objectives), or go onto overwatch and wait for a better target to present itself?" Dedicated fire support units (i.e. dark reapers, devastators) benefit relatively more from overwatch.

Remember too that if a unit shoots on overwatch it can't also shoot with reactive fire. Also remember that overwatch is limited to 24" range. So for example, another counter-play option is use your own fire support units that remain stationary to utilize their "first fire" advantage to shoot at a high threat overwatch unit first, to soften it up, before it can make its attack.

both me and my opponent very quickly picked up on a few ways to counteract that rule - namely, staying out of LOS which is quite easy to do given Prohammer's quite lenient LOS measuring system. I simply placed my Reapers such that there was a ruin between me and my opponent's Devastators, and he placed his tacs behind a box. Both were then ready and happy to spawn-camp for the entirety of the game, awaiting our opponent's relatively fragile mobile units!

On a different note, the "trial" suppression rules I have drafted established a process for crossfire and determining the forward facing for a unit (in order to determine when a unit is hit from "behind" for crossfire). I'm thinking of other applications for this method, and potentially overwatch could be one. For example it could work like this: You pick a model and use the overwatch token to determine the facing of the unit. When resolving ovewatch fire, you can only shoot on a target in the forward 180-degree arc of the unit.

This change would add some maneuver based counter-play as a way to work around overwatch. In your game above, assault squads could potentially deep strike behind the dark reapers and be able to engage them, or at least shoot them down a little. Could add a nice maneuver and positional dynamic, and make overwatch a bit riskier and more challenging to execute well, while giving your opponent options for counter-play.

I almost wonder whether you might utilize your design lever of React Fire to make Active Overwatch irrelevant. let's pretend that you use your Crossfire system and make unit facing a thing on all units, ala 2nd edition - a quick way to do that would be to designate a "unit leader" and agree on that unit leader's facing, and then use that to determine crossfire or whether the unit is capable of reacting - say, a unit can only React if an opposing unit performs a reactable action within that unit's Front 180 degree arc and wtihin 24". And then you have a fairly strong Snap Fire rule (I personally like the idea of "discard half the hits, rounding up" myself) and you make it so a unit that uses React Fire can't shoot in its following turn.

All in all though im still digesting this new morale/suppression system. I like it, very similar to OPR, in concept, but I still need to think about it and see if it's as lean as it could be.

I still am of the opinion that a unit becoming Pinned should get the same benefits as a unit willingly GOing to Ground, but that's just me.

Re: Random Reserve Rolls
I agree that there's often some head ringing about weather it's better to just deploy on the table at the onset to have more table presence, present more targets, pressure objectives, versus deep striking for the flexibility of being able to deploy anywhere. If relying on deep strike units as a part of a one-two-punch strategy or something that needs a predictable tactical execution, I think it can lead to frustration. The uncertainty of when deep strike (or any reserve) unit arrives makes it's placement more of an immediate tactical decision of where it can achieve the greatest impact as opposed to slotting into a pre-defined plan somehow. When viewed that way, the randomness isn't as problematic IMHO, but it can still be frustrating at times.

Yes, I agree that my opponent definitely fell into a strategy-layer trap of basically knowing the current edition, and failing to really understand how different the older edition was (i.e. - how you really need a smaller number of dedicated anti-tank weapons to really cover your bases, how anti-infantry troopers arent 'tax' that you should take a min number of but instead should be the backbone of your forces, and how deep strike is not a strategy-layer tool that you can really rely on to be part of your battle plan, but instead soething you bring MAYBE ONE cheap unit of to do in order to act as a wild-card that can appear potentially anywhere.

What I'm generally questioning is whether the rules for deep strike and how it interacts with react fire and active overwatch may have dropped it a bit below the power curve than you maybe intended. because I brought a deep strike unit the way that deep strike generally was used in oldhammer (small cheap wildcard unit) and they straight up just..never showed up, and even if they had showed up, theyd have just gotten splattered by something on React/Overwatch or failed to make any real impact as id have had to deploy them out of LOS one turn, and then actually use them the next turn.

overwatch requiring a target to be within a 180 degree arc of the designated "unit leader" may resolve that issue, as you said.

I almost wonder whether you might utilize your design lever of React Fire to make Active Overwatch irrelevant. let's pretend that you use your Crossfire system and make unit facing a thing on all units, ala 2nd edition - a quick way to do that would be to designate a "unit leader" and agree on that unit leader's facing, and then use that to determine crossfire or whether the unit is capable of reacting - say, a unit can only React if an opposing unit performs a re-actable action within that unit's Front 180 degree arc and within 24". And then you have a fairly strong Snap Fire rule (I personally like the idea of "discard half the hits, rounding up" myself) and you make it so a unit that uses React Fire can't shoot in its following turn.

Hmmmm.... tricky trying to parse through my own thoughts. I'll see what I can muster up here....

I see active overwatch and reactive fire as two distinct things that need distinct tradeoffs and tactical purposes.

Overwatch is about deferring shooting in order to fire at a priority target as it presents itself (might even warrant needing to pass a leadership test to enter overwatch?). It's range limited (so you can't use it snipe backline units from across the board), but allows the unit to bring its full shooting power to bear, just deferred a turn. With the addition of only allowing overwatch fire in the forward arc of the unit, it opens up some counterplayer opportunities for maneuvering behind units on overwatch.

Reactive fire is about breaking down the turn structure and helping to mitigate the inherent lethality and lopsided-ness of the IGOUGO system and some of the imbalance resulting from dedicated melee units attacking melee-weak units. The counter-play comes down to the order you select units to shoot and/or charge, in a bid to draw out reactive fire. Reactive fire is also weaker than normal shooting, and limits your subsequent shooting, so there's some tradeoffs to make there. Although being honest, if you're unit is likely to get wiped out from either being shot and/or assaulted, taking the "reaction" shot is usually a no brainer.

Another thought/restriction on overwatch could also be that when you put a unit on overwatch you also declare your intended target (just like having to declare other shooting attacks). It then puts the ball in your opponent's court as to whether they decide to bring the unit out or not, but would let other units move into position to charge or shoot at the over watching unit without suffering from return fire.

Maybe, maybe, a way to unify this more is to define LIMITED FIRE (as has been done, and we discuss the restrictions on that compared to normal fire). You could then put units on overwatch in lieu of shooting on their turn, in order to fire with limited fire during your opponent's turn (and then fire normally on your next turn if desired). Or you could take limited fire as a reaction, but then get no shooting on your subsequent turn (since presumably the unit would've shot normally on its earlier turn already). The following situations could result over a player's two turns.

NORMAL SHOOTING SCHEME
Player A Turn 1 - shoots normally
Player B Turn 1 - no shooting
Player A Turn 2 - shoots normally
Result = 2 full powered rounds of shooting

OVERWATCH SCHEME
Player A Turn 1 - enters overwatch
Player B Turn 1 - shoots limited fire on opponent's turn at any target (overwatch fire)
Player A Turn 2 - shoots normally
Result = 1.5 rounds of shooting

REACTIVE FIRE SCHEME
Player A Turn 1 - shoots normally
Player B Turn 1 - shoots limited fire on opponent's turn at an attacking / charging enemy unit (reaction, suffers melee malus's)
Player A Turn 2 - can't shoot
Result = 1.5 rounds of shooting

With the above, overwatch vs. reactive fire could all use the same "limited fire rules" (including only in a forward 180-degree arc if desired). They both result in the same potential output in damage (a full round of shooting on one turn and a round of limited shooting), but are both less than a unit shooting normally twice. The primary difference then is just in the timing and target selection, and also taking a "reaction" causes some melee penalities, whereas overwatch fire wouldn't.

The above isn't that much different from the way it works now, except it's reducing the damage output for overwatch shooting a bit, which is probably fine and would help balance it out a bit.

both me and my opponent very quickly picked up on a few ways to counteract that rule - namely, staying out of LOS which is quite easy to do given Prohammer's quite lenient LOS measuring system. I simply placed my Reapers such that there was a ruin between me and my opponent's Devastators, and he placed his tacs behind a box. Both were then ready and happy to spawn-camp for the entirety of the game, awaiting our opponent's relatively fragile mobile units!

See... I think the situation you describe is actually interesting. Yes, it's more defensively minded than traditional 40K, but when you factor in objectives and scoring points, the calculus shifts. Is my opponent's overwatch fire covering objectives? Do I think I can move onto an objective and absorb the damage long enough to return fire? Do I move onto the objective with one unit and threaten the overwatching unit with a faster assaulting unit? Which unit will my opponent shoot at, etc. I think these are interesting choices.

Another way to handle overwatch, is that rather than having it occur during the shooting phase, it occurs during your opponent's movement phase. Each time you finish moving a unit that in LoS and range of a unit on overwatch, your opponent has to choose then and there whether they will fire at it or not. If they decline to shoot at it, they can't decide later to go back and shoot it if no other targets present themselves. This can add another line of counter-play to the mix, as the order in which you move units can have a bearing on whether the overwatch fire goes off or not. Something to consider.

I still am of the opinion that a unit becoming Pinned should get the same benefits as a unit willingly Going to Ground, but that's just me.

So this would just be adding the +1 to cover saves as one of the effects being pinned? So the "Take Cover!" reaction is simply voluntarily becoming pinned at the moment the unit starts to take hits. In the spirit of trying to reduce lethality, giving pinned units the +1 to cover save isn't a bad consolidation prize. I can make this change.

Yeah, I actually noodled it over a bit more and I do think with the addition of a "Facing" system like you're proposing with your new morale system Overwatch wouldnt be nearly as oppressive.

I do like your new morale system, as well as the idea of implementing simple, low-effort facing rules into the system, ala 2e to make Active Overwatch something that requires actual choice, and to reward positioning.

....I do think your first draft would *most likely* result in morale being very oppressive and fearless being OP, though, so I do want to re-propose the idea of the Fearless rule preventing a unit from taking Reactions normally, and only allowing Reactions from using Overwatch tokens.

Suppression Points: I like the idea of -1LD for each suppression points, but I think personally its a good way to trim down some of the various modifiers applied to various types of LD test. Suppression Points should be the PRIMARY source of LD modifiers, and I also think they should NOT affect leadership for the pinning tests you start taking for each suppression point you take past 2.

I'm thinking of these tests:

-break test for falling under 1/2 strength
-regroup test
-break test after losing melee combat
-split fire test

I think suppression points could be the sum total of the modifiers for all these tests and would be a great unifier of the morale mechanics. (Also I think you should be allowed to choose to have a broken unit become Pinned after making a fall back move to shrug off suppression tokens)

I think Overwatch is actually pretty fine as is and could be worked into a holistic reaction system - ill type up thoughts on that later.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
Crossfire: I think this is a really critical aspect of this new suppression system, because it enables a player through maneuver to give out suppression points to more elite/MSU units and allows those units to have to interact with the pinning system

I think a fairly simple way of checking for Crossfire - say, if a straight line can be drawn through the targetable area of a model in the enemy unit to the targetable area of any friendly model, then the shooting attack will inflict 1 additional suppression point - and then you're basically good to go with it.

Any time a unit would gain more than 3 suppression points, a Pinning test must be made instead, and no more than one Pinning test must be taken against any given shooting attack.

Pinned units fire with Limited fire and may not have Overwatch tokens, and if a unit is under the effect of 2 or more rules that require Limited fire, then it may not shoot at all (this means Pinned units may not use React fire).

Then in terms of active overwatch, this is really the only system where a facing system for non-vehicle units needs to be implemented. Simply place a directional indicator on overwatch tokens, and when placing a unit on Overwatch nominate a "unit leader" and place the overwatch token on their base to indicate what direction is "forward."

In addition to being able to declare React fire normally, a unit with an Overwatch token may declare React fire when an enemy unit:

-arrives from Reserves
-ends a move during the opponent's Movement Phase.

when firing React fire with a unit with an Overwatch token, the target unit must be wholly within 180 degrees of the facing indicated by the overwatch token as well as within 24", but the react fire attacks are made at full ballistic skill and the token does not count as having used react fire in its following turn.

In no particular order...

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I still need to test the current wording of how suppression points are gained. Right now, you need to (a) be shot at (but not necessarily hit by) more shots from one unit than you have models, and (b) must suffer at least one unsaved wound.

This encourages mass fire and is a nice counterpoint to split fire (e.g. if you split fire you're less likely to get enough volume of shots on a unit to apply suppression).

I don't think suppression needs to be the primary modifier, and the -1 for below 50%, out of coherency, etc. are still relevant IMHO.

I was also thinking that, balance wide, suppression might work better balance wise where you get -1 for every 2 suppression tokens (or part thereof), up to a max of 6 tokens (and -3 leadership).

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I wonder if there should be more things tied to taking "non-morale" leadership tests. Right now, it's only split fire tests, restraint tests (for not pursuing in melee), and psychic tests. Suppression affects all leadership based tests, so even fearless units testing for the above are subject to suppression tokens for split fire tests, etc.

But what about other opportunities for leadership? What if going into overwatch requires a test (resisting the urge to shoot at visible enemies), or even performing reaction fire? In this manner, all units, even fearless ones, would be subject to suppression effects.

As an alternative, suppression tokens could also do things other than modify leadership, such that all units (even fearless ones) are impacted by the nature of suppressive fire. E.g., having one or more suppression token could incur a -1 to a unit's WS and BS.

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More in a bit.....

 Mezmorki wrote:
In no particular order...

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I still need to test the current wording of how suppression points are gained. Right now, you need to (a) be shot at (but not necessarily hit by) more shots from one unit than you have models, and (b) must suffer at least one unsaved wound.

This encourages mass fire and is a nice counterpoint to split fire (e.g. if you split fire you're less likely to get enough volume of shots on a unit to apply suppression).

I don't think suppression needs to be the primary modifier, and the -1 for below 50%, out of coherency, etc. are still relevant IMHO.

I was also thinking that, balance wide, suppression might work better balance wise where you get -1 for every 2 suppression tokens (or part thereof), up to a max of 6 tokens (and -3 leadership).

---------------------------------------------

I wonder if there should be more things tied to taking "non-morale" leadership tests. Right now, it's only split fire tests, restraint tests (for not pursuing in melee), and psychic tests. Suppression affects all leadership based tests, so even fearless units testing for the above are subject to suppression tokens for split fire tests, etc.

But what about other opportunities for leadership? What if going into overwatch requires a test (resisting the urge to shoot at visible enemies), or even performing reaction fire? In this manner, all units, even fearless ones, would be subject to suppression effects.

As an alternative, suppression tokens could also do things other than modify leadership, such that all units (even fearless ones) are impacted by the nature of suppressive fire. E.g., having one or more suppression token could incur a -1 to a unit's WS and BS.

---------------------------------------------

More in a bit.....

Suppression the way you've described it is a system that is complex to track. Already, "Oh, that was more wounds than your unit has models" is inherently quite tricky, but something that if well integrated, does help to introduce a natural disadvantage to the "MSU" phenomenon that makes small units inherently advantageous within 40k that has really always existed. "Larger units with more models are a bit naturally braver" is I think a fairly solid basis to stand on as a core for a morale system, but then you actually have to tie it together. If suppression is just something dangling off to the side of a morale system, I think this drastically weakens its use case and lowers its value below the threshold of the quite complicated tracking system.

The real important thing to look at is I think 2 things:

1 - when do we add a suppression token.

when 1 unsaved wound is suffered AND when the number of wounds pre-saves exceed the number of models in the unit is too complicated. I'm sorry, I do love me some crunch, but it's too complicated and it's low value.

Let's start with this: let's have a unit with the BEST SAVE POSSIBLE, a 2+, take wounds in excess of the usual minimum unit size - 6. That unit has a nearly 100% chance of suffering at least 1 unsaved wound from the get-go.

So now you get into "is there value to going with 'a number of wounds exceeding the number of models in the unit." For most units, this means the number of suppression points they will ever suffer is 1 before they are wiped out. A number of wounds exceeding the number of models in the unit, even for a 5-man unit of space marines, is going to equal 2/5 casualties. The odds of ever stacking up 3 suppression points on 1 unit during a game practically seems fairly slim even if we're looking at lasgun shots with negligible AP.

I want to pitch you on "A number of hits capable of wounding exceeding the number of models in the unit" - and then possibly consider altering the to-wound chart such that T = 3 > S cannot wound. This would mean that even if you're slinging a bunch of S3 shots at a T5 target, say, a squad of guardsmen opening fire on a unit of SM Bikers, the number of shots needed to cause suppression would still at the very least have a 50-60% chance of causing a wound. And if the goal of a suppression system is to give low-S weaponry something useful to DO against high-T targets (which I think it is) this facilitates that much, MUCH better than "wounds exceeding models" does.

I think we're sayin the same thing (pretty close).

So what I have is pretty much what you are suggesting as well (re-read my post you quoted). That is, you get suppression when the the number of shots fired exceeds the number of models in the unit. With the caveat that at least one wound actually has to occur as well.

The reason for the last point is that I do want armor to actually account for something. Terminators getting hit by a dozen las rifle shots, after accounting for misses, and failures to wound, and armor saves can often (and thematically should) shrug off those hits. If the stipulation is only based on number of shots fired, you're going to get things like terminators getting pinned into uselessness.

Right now, T = 2 > S cannot wound. So you can have a S2 wound a T5, but only on a 6+ right now. Feels fine and has been working well so far.

 Mezmorki wrote:
I think we're sayin the same thing (pretty close).

So what I have is pretty much what you are suggesting as well (re-read my post you quoted). That is, you get suppression when the the number of shots fired exceeds the number of models in the unit. With the caveat that at least one wound actually has to occur as well.

The reason for the last point is that I do want armor to actually account for something. Terminators getting hit by a dozen las rifle shots, after accounting for misses, and failures to wound, and armor saves can often (and thematically should) shrug off those hits. If the stipulation is only based on number of shots fired, you're going to get things like terminators getting pinned into uselessness.

Yeah I actually think shots instead of hits is too lenient, personally. Makes cheap units like 10-man las squads a bit too potent, and I would be worried about vehicles with a couple heavy stubbers being able to basically throw out a suppression token against any squad for free. but, overall, I think it's solid, would happen often enough to be impactful, but not so often to be something you never bother with. Combined with a simple crossfire rule (see my suggestion above) and with that being the major source of leadership modifiers to unify the various tests, I like where it goes. The crossfire rule allowing for a second way to achieve suppression points without having to wound but only with good positioning adds a layer of battlefield positioning skill expression.

I'd definitely add a leadership test to going into Overwatch as well as have it affect psychic powers etc. I also like that suppression would somewhat affect fearless units and monsters, theoretically, representing them 'going berserk' or becoming less disciplined even though they still wont run or be pinned.

Either "shots fired" or "successful hits" could work, but it'll just come down to playtesting to see how it works and if it needs to swing one way or the other.

Our group spent some time last week talking through the trial suppression rules (they are written up in ProHammer rules now) and we're going to play some games with how we have it and see how it goes. It might very well be that cheap las squads and the like will be too strong with dolling out suppression based on "shots fired".

The other lever for modifying this is based on impact of suppression. As written, we have each suppression token incurring a -1 to Ld. There's some concern that that is too much, and that capping suppression tokens at 3 or making every two suppression tokens (rounding up) incur a -1 might be the way to go. Again - need to test this.

Last - for the moment we're letting fearless units ignore suppression. Mostly because if they ARE affected by suppression, but not affected by pinning, then it's not clear how they would ever clear their suppression tokens.

Older core rules said that fearless units could choose to go to ground (Take Cover!) and self-pin themselves, so maybe that's what they'd need to do. Or charge into melee, which is what most fearless units probably want to do anyway. Something to resolve still.

I'd just include in the Go to Ground rules that a fearless unit may take the penalties of Go to Ground without the cover bonus in order to clear suppression, if desired. I think that would ESSENTIALLY never come up, but it's ok to give players an option even if tactically it seems unusual that it would matter. After all, Fearless units would only be caring about suppression for the purposes of Restraint, Split Fire and Overwatch if you were to add overwatch as a LD test event (I think you should). But even to get to 3 suppression tokens, units would need to necessarily take 3x their number hits and suffer 3 separate at-least-one-wound events, odds are good that a highly suppressed unit of even fearless models is going to be so shredded that you're not overly concerned with stuff like split fire tests - I just think Suppression is a fantastic place to add a little bit of skill expression and unify the various "Nearly The Same But Slightly Different" modifier setups for various leadership tests. Put it all under one system, and make that system an active/tactical system as opposed to just circumstantial ("welp, guess the unit is at half strength so now they're -1 for the rest of the game nothing I can do about it and you didnt do anything to cause it other than kill my guys" vs "I successfully jumped a fast unit of mine behind your unit in order to quickly stack up 3 suppression tokens with a co-ordinated attack, now I have a much greater chance of that unit breaking and me successfully dealing with it in a way other than killing it to death.")

TLDR: I think this is just one of those things that in a vacuum seems problematic but in practice would really not be. Like take the example of some fearless unit, say, 10 thousand sons marines, taking 3 tokens of suppression from boltguns:

-1st token, on average causes 2 casualties.
-2nd token, on average causes 2 casualties
3d token, on average causes 1 casualty.

you now have 5 models left in the unit with a -3 penalty, which adjusts their leadership down to 7 in most codexes. As the person playing them - is it so critical that your Thousand Sons be able to split fire with a target roll of 10 instead of 7 that youd give up a full turn of shooting with them? You can't gain additional suppression tokens anymore, you're capped at -3, and you auto-pass the pinning checks you'd be required to make from more tokens, and there's only 4 models with inferno boltguns left in the unit.

Another possible spot for a LD test you might consider is to have there be a roll for choosing to target the passengers of a transport that you just destroyed mid shooting attack. Personally I love the idea of high-LD units having various tactical advantages that allow them to feel like better trained soldiers.

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Separate note: I looked over the terrain rules incidentally, and while i know EXACTLY what you're TRYING to write for the difficult terrain rules, I'm trying to figure out a way to reword it to be less confusing.

I feel like anyone who didnt spend multiple editions with "Eyeing The Terrain" as his absolute favorite goofy bit of GW rules writing shenanigans would read the rule and go ".....what?"

here's my stab: "ENTERING DIFFICULT TERRAIN: If a model’s move would cause one or more models in a unit to enter a terrain piece within 6”, then rather than moving as normal, roll 2D6 and take the highest result. If this result exceeds the distance to the terrain piece, then that unit may move into the terrain piece and no model in the unit may move further than the result of the 2d6 roll. If the result is less than the distance to the terrain piece, the unit moves as normal for its unit type, but may not enter the difficult terrain piece."

The intention as i understand it is "if i roll a DC test lower than the result needed to get to the cover, I shouldnt get to hop in and claim a cover bonus, but is silly if I roll a 2 and the terrain piece is 4" away that this terrain piece somehow psychically prevents me from moving over the open ground between me and it"

Other assorted thoughts & responses:

* I tweaked the suppression rule for fearless units. Fearless units gain suppression as normal, but obviously auto-pass their pinning tests. I just noted that fearless units can always choose to fail their pinning test and/or Take Cover! if they want, willfully becoming pinned but clearing most of the suppression tokens. That should take care of it.

* I forgot to mention that our group liked the idea of using the overwatch token's orientation to convey the forward 180-degree arc of the unit, and that you can only overwatch into that forward arc. I think adding a leadership test to enter overwatch isn't a bad idea either.

-------------------------------------------

My pending list of ProHammer projects:

(1) Finish up the other half of the mission design book

(2) Write up the revised campaign system rules (this is for running map based campaigns!) and unit experience system (adapted from 4th editions campaign rules).

Our group is going to run a ProHammer mini map-based campaign. Starting with 2000 points total in the army, but each detachment is limited to 750 points initially. After a certain number of campaign rounds, everyone will get reinforcement points and the detachment point limit will go up (to 1,000 or so)

 Mezmorki wrote:
Other assorted thoughts & responses:

* I tweaked the suppression rule for fearless units. Fearless units gain suppression as normal, but obviously auto-pass their pinning tests. I just noted that fearless units can always choose to fail their pinning test and/or Take Cover! if they want, willfully becoming pinned but clearing most of the suppression tokens. That should take care of it.

out of curiosity, why have GTG clear "most" suppression tokens and not "all"? If you get 1 suppression token does that mean youre just going to have 1 for the rest of the battle then?

in my eyes the most logical situation is:

-becoming Pinned (or GTG, if GTG is the state and Pinned is the action of un-willfully becoming GTG, whatever way you want to word it) clears all suppression and no suppression can be gained while already Pinned

-suppression stacks up while in any other state, including Broken, and any time you would have to take 1 or more Suppression from an attack while already at 3 Suppression, you instead take a Pinning test.

The way it's setup in the rules is that "pinned" and "broken" are both status effects. It's possible for a unit become pinned (e.g. as a result of suppression) and then still need to take a leadership test for casualties and/or if they are charged in morale. Preserving 1 suppression token means you'll take those roles with a -1 still, reflecting that the unit is still a bit shaken up by incoming fire.

In the full write-up in ProHammer, it lists how suppression tokens are "lost" - which includes:

(a) Becoming pinned (lose all but one suppression token)

(b) Becoming engaged in melee (lose all but one suppression token)

(c) At the start of your turn, lose one suppression token.

I've also clarified what happens when a unit is both pinned and broken. The two effects stack such that the unit DOES still fall back 2D6" as normal, as per being broken. But instead of a it being a "tactical retreat" where the unit can still shoot normally while it falls back, a Broken + Pinned unit is also subject to snap fire and suffers additional penalties if they do get charged. This represents a worse morale state of total panic and an uncoordinated withdrawal.

BTW, I think it's important to have the 2D6" fall back trump the limited D3" move of being pinned because breaking a unit and having it fall back is a mechanism for pushing units off of objectives. Otherwise, a unit that's holding an objective would happily stay pinned and hold onto the objective. It creates more dynamic play this way.

Ah, OK. full disclosure I have made a copy of the rules at this point, seeing as we are unlikely to meet and rather than needing to get into knock down drag out arguments over some detail I dont like I've just been changing things.

For example - while I think the concept of losing 1 suppression token at the start of your turn is fine, I think what you'd find with that is that most typically that means Suppression will never be a factor on your turn, because Suppression tokens are likely going to be stacked up on 2 occasions.

1 - incidentally, when you just happen to fire a large amount of guns at one unit. This unit will probably take 1 token, and if it survives, shed it immediately.

2 - when you purposefully position models to use Suppression, in which case the decision to GTG to shed suppression becomes a factor but then youll just shed the last suppression token on your next turn anyway.

This is why I think it makes more sense to just have the one way to shed suppression and have it shed all at once.

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Also I've put in that units Going to Ground or Broken cannot hold objectives, so 'happily staying pinned on an objective' is a non-issue. Just seemed to make sense to prevent GTG on an objective being a default tactic for chaff troops. So I have Pinned while Broken result in a unit being both - double Snap Fire rule comes into effect, so it can't shoot at all, it can only make a fall back move, but the fall back move is D3.

Otherwise the only distinction would be firing Snap.

I was wondering if perhaps you had made a "fork" of the project - since I had added things to the prime version (e.g. a full write-up on the suppression section) and your feedback/questions made me think maybe you hadn't read that yet

No issues with making a fork for your own use of course. Just bear in mind that I'm regularly trying to clean up and tidy up the document, so there may be minor fixes and adjustments you'll miss if working off of a forked version.

What I've been trying to do for version control, is at a given version number (currently v2.1) anytime a change results in a substantive gameplay change, I'll make the change and add a comment with the next version number (i.e. version 2.2 now). At a certain point, when I'm comfortable with a batch of changes, I'll save a back-up copy of the live version with all the comments, and then clear out all the comments in the live version. This way, people can go back and look at the older commented version to see what's changed, but the live link will always be the latest version.

Anyway - take a look at the original ProHammer document, as it has a whole "Suppression (Trial Rule)" section built out.

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Regarding suppression....

In response to #1:
Say a unit gets 2 or 3 suppression tokens (e.g. 1 suppression token and then another 2 from being in crossfire). Squad leader has Ld 9, so you suffer a -3 to Ld test to pin. If you PASS the test (on a 6 or less), the unit is unpinned but still has those -3 modifier. It will drop to -2 at the start of their next turn. So they'd take split fire tests or whatever at a -2 along with whatever other leadership tests they might need to make that turn.

In response to #2:
If you go to ground, you're still subject (potentially) to needing to take a casualty test from shooting attacks, in which case you'd have a -1 to that test, and if you fail suffer both broken and pinned (which is pretty rough).

If you only lose suppression by getting pinned (either GTG or being forced into pinning), bear in mind this means that if you charge and should loose the combat, you'll be slapped with whatever pile of negative suppression modifiers you still have.

I need to play some games with how I have it - theory crafting only gets so far

In response to holding objectives:
Have you perchance used or looked at the ProHammer mission book? About half of the planned mission archetypes are complete, and it's what we've been using for a while now.

There are some specific rules about what units count as "scoring models" versus other units. Generally, holding an objective requires a player to have more scoring models in proximity of the objective than their opponent has of models in total. Monstrous creatures, vehicles, swarm units, beasts, mindless, and broken + pinned models/units never count as a scoring.

The above means that most basic infantry / jump troopers / bikers / etc count for scoring, but any model's can count towards denying control of a point. So you could have a scoring unit trying to take a point or zone, but the enemy having a pinned unit would still count against them. The enemy wouldn't be able to take the point with their pinned/broken unit, but their presence could deny my ability to take the point. Hence still wanting to have a lever for forcing units to fall back by breaking them.

Also, on the topic of being broken + pinned....

Effects of being BROKEN:
* If unengaged, must fall back at the start of its turn.
* May shoot, but count as having moved
* May not enter overwatch
* May not perform reactions (Take Cover, Return Fire, Stand & Shoot)
* If charged, must immediately test to regroup. If failed, strikes at initiative 1.

Effects of being PINNED:
* May only crawl D3” in its next movement phase.
* Gains +1 to cover saves (or 6+ in the open)
* Shoots with snap fire on its next turn phase
* May not charge.
* If charged, loses advantages for being in cover (opponent’s strike at normal initiative value).

If a unit is broken + pinned (or is pinned and becomes broken), then you combine the effects except that you must do a standard fallback move. The unit is breaking from cover and running, screaming for the hills, scrambling through whatever cover they can find along the way.

Throwing out an idea for vechile wounding chart.

So i know what of the big issues with vehicles was GW never really found a sweet spot for them. With things either being unkillable or being glanced to death or stunned all game.

What if you had a system that uses hullpoints still, but the vehicle damage chart instead of jsut being the result of a single die roll is calculated this way.

D6+remainingHullpoints - (1 for AP2, 2 for AP1) -(1 if armor bane) -1 if pen

Then the damage result in a chart where the lower the result the worse the effect, The idea here is that a vehicle that is fresh and unwounded most likely will not be getting stunned, or popped instantly, or getting their weapons' destroyed out the gate. It also makes it so heavy vehicles like the land raider, are not getting shaken as soon as they get dinged by a single auto canon round. But as their vehicle gets more and more wounded, the likely hood of getting worse results increases.

This way the more you focus a vehicle the more chance it has to pop, and the more health it has, the less likely it is to just get one shotted/become stunn locked all game.

In my experience 30k manages to find the sweet spot for vehicles in a way 40k never has without changing the 7e vehicle damage system at all by seriously limiting your ability to spam mid-power shots and making AV12-13 much more prevalent. AV10-11 is treated as cheap, squishy light vehicles that can be easily taken down with autocannon fire, and the real armored vehicles are the ones with AV13-14 on the front and 12-13 on the sides (the Predator remains a weird 13/11/10 crossover between "light vehicle" and "tank").

That said my own experiment with revising how vehicle damage works was to reverse hull point damage and the damage table, so a glance does a damage table result and a pen does a hull point and a damage table result, so it's possible to stunlock a vehicle by firing weapons too light to kill it at it but if you want to kill it you need real AT.

FWIW, we have four games under our belt with the revised "Structure Point" system we added to ProHammer. This gives all vehicles SP's based on the sum of their armor values (AV 30 = 0 SPs, 31-33 = 1 SP, 34=36 = 2 SP, 37 or more = 3 SPs). Whenever a vehicle takes a damage result that would destroy it, you remove SPs to lower the die roll to the first non-destroyed result.

We're finding that it works pretty well. It gives light transport (rhinos, chimeras, and equiv.) a save against an early unlucky hit 1-shotting it. Likewise, the serious armor like Leman Russ' and Land Raiders will take some work to properly destroy.

We have found this really hadn't changed the "stun locked" equation too much, and often times vehicles are getting immobilized and have all their weapons blown off before ever being officially "destroyed" - but that's okay in our book. Part of the DNA of how it's worked throughout these editions. We have clarified more cases where cover lets you degrade the penetration roll result, and in general vehicles about right in terms of durability to us.

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Also, I'll mention our trial suppression rules are working pretty well and is adding an interesting element to the gameplay. It definitely discourages smaller units since it easier for them to pick up suppression tokens. The effects of suppression on unit morale is mixing things up more. I've never had so many marines fall back and need to take advantage of And They Shall Know No Fear - pretty cool actually.

I have a couple of things to add to the discussion:

1. Ld-related tests
You have Split-Fire, Restraint (close combat) and Psychic. 2nd already had Target Priority (ranged combat). The general idea (I am not quoting the exact ruling of 2nd) is like this:

Self-preservation dicates that units fire at the closest enemy targets otherwise they may bite the dust in the next seconds of a firefight. So if despite all of this a unit still DOESN´T want to fire at the closest enemy target it has to make a Ld-test in order to keep their cool and be allowed to pick calmly another target which is farther away. Obviously there are a few exceptions to this rule:

1. Units including special/heavy weapons suited for targeting large units (e.g: vehicles/tanks/monstrous infantry/monsters) are trained to not waste their ammo on units which are composed of smaller models (German idiom: Mit Kanonen auf Spatzen schiessen.). Therefore they may ignore nearer units composed of swarm/small/medium models. This exception also came up during 3rd Tyranid codex in which all other factions were trained to pick targets when fighting Tyranids according to the size of the bugs (swarm/small/medium/monstrous infantry/monster).

2. If an enemy unit is too close to the unit in question which wants to choose another target then a new target may not be chosen. Self-preservation kicks in as described earlier and it has to target the closeset enemy unit. How close the enemy unit has to be for this rule to kick in is negotiable but I feel 6 inch is a good start.

3. An exception to having to fire at an enemy unit which is 6 inch or closer to a firing unit would be if the enemy unit can´t be harmed by the ranged attacks of the chosen unit (e.g. Grots having to fire with blunderbusses at a Dreadnought). What kind of action the grots would have to take in that case is open to debate.


2. Effects of Suppression
This depends on the case if the entire unit is considered to be suppressed when the suppression condition has been fulfilled or if the rules allow for more granularity so that single models of a unit can be suppresssed. 40K has taken the route in the past to require a pinning test and on failure the entire unit was effected.

Epic Armageddon on the other hand dealt a single (maximum; regardless of multiple units firing at the same target) blast marker to units coming under fire and adding an additional blast marker to each model lost to a unit due to ranged fire. Each blast marker prevented a model in the unit from using it´s ranged attacks during it´s next activation. However blast markers didn´t prevent models from participating in close combat as it was considered that the proximity of a close threat would energize even the most fearful soul.

This leaves the question which models would be affected first in a unit by blast markers? The solution was that the more cowardly individuals of a unit would be first affected as they lurk further back measured from the unit doing the firing at the target unit. So you deal blast markers from the back to the front.

In the end you have to choose to either give an entire unit a minor debuff due to being suppressed or be really punishing by dealing out a major debuff for individually tracked models of a unit.


3. Source of Suppression in regards to Mindless/Fearless units
This adds a bit of granularity to the suppression mechanic. There can be three sources described as posing a threat to units in regard to suppression:

A. Single sniper shots
B. Hail of bullets
C. Explosives/Flamer

What follows is my understanding of how Mindless/Fearless units would operate in 40K and what kind of units would be part of these categories.
Mortal units, the majority in 40K, are all affected by the above mentioned sources of suppression. However Mindless or Fearless units should ignore source A&B as they either have no concept of being alive (e.g. Servo Skulls and Servitors) aren´t alive in the first place (e.g. Plague Zombies and Daemons) or their sense of survival is being suppressed (Tyranids). However the tremendous force of explosions will still hurl those models from their feet and thus they should be able to be suppressed by source C and being set on fire will interfere with their perception of their surroundings.

What exactly belongs in category C is up to debate. Quick and easy would be to select all template weapons so even the humble frag grenade could have an effect.


4. Bikes/Jetbikes/Cavalry and Suppression
I have always found that Bikes/Jetbikes don´t function really well in the 40K environment since 3rd onward as they have been basically treated as being cavalry. So this might not be an issue with other folks but for me it´s a pretty glaring discrepancy. Epic Armageddon doesn´t use separate rules for the above units in regards to suppression but 40K obviously addresses unit differences in more detail so I think it may be warranted. Apart from that I think Bikes/Jetbikes should behave differently in close combat as well but this would be a topic for another discussion.

Back to the meat of the matter. Vehicles can be suppressed via specific results on the damage table and infantry models have the basic suppression mechanic. This leaves Bikes/Jetbikes/Cavalry to be unaccounted for and honestly going to ground for these type of units just doesn´t work as this would usually prove fatal to the pilot/rider while being in motion. So imo these units need a separate way to deal with the suppression mechanic.