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One thing we tried was increasing movement by 50% when playing on normal 4" x 6" type gaming tables It was super usefull when playing in a mega battle format and helped to make that 6 turn game become a reality.

Im not looking for a debate of rules but just things youve tried and have had fun results with

Seeing that we play on 2 x 4 boards we don't have any problems with movements.

Some houserules we use are:
models within a single unit can be on different levels on terrain. This means you can part of a unit on and part of the unit of a container. The entire unit will move at half movement when some of the models are getting on or of a terrain piece.

Another one we use is that you can not choose a weapon location that is already destroyed. It makes AFVs to weak if you allow this to be done. A weapon that does multiple points of damage can still choose a weapon that has already taken damage to let the extra damage go to the frame.

And another is that cards in the activation chain have to correspond to a specific unit and if you have two units that are the same you can not choose what one to activate when one of their cards in turned over, it has to be the one corresponding to the card (indicated for example by coloured stickers)

Again just as Saint Anuman already stated not intended to start an argument but just to get examples out there.

We do your weapons example as well, Ive always been curious as to the "how & why" of the 2x4 playing field you guys seem to favour Id be interested in hearing anything you'd like to share.

At-43 breaks down over 2x4 because it leaves Red Blok with a critical disadvantage. 2x4 also ruins the game as it also voids alomst any practical difference in medium and high accuracy weapons as any accuracy above 6 is essentially the same. So if you have a unit costed for accuracy 10 it might as well be accuracy 6 or 7.

I played Army box Red Blok vs Cogs by vanilla rules on a 4x4 and got slaughtered I gave up after losing the majority of my army for the loss of only one or two Cog models, one of which was a * vehicle which regrew.
other games were equally unplayable as the vanilla blast rules remove nearly all tactics from the game.

Home brew rules now used.


1.
Mechanic:
You get cover saves against blast, but never flamers.
The origin of the attack is considered to be stemming from the center of the blast template.
Reasons:
Its realistic. Ducking against artillery does actually work, as does hiding in or behind cover. This is why soldiers dig foxholes.
Its tactical. As artillery in vanilla AT-43 is a no brainer. The Defender Cobra fires its mortar and there is nothing you can do about it, just remove the models. This is not good gaming. You should pay if you expose your troops, you should be rewarded for being cautious with them.
Note that if you are behind a low wall and the shot impacts behind the wall you get no cover (but may still get take cover), you take the firers position as the center of the blast, not the firer.

2.
Mechanic:
Accumulating blast weaponry gives +1 radius per extra blast, not +blast. Weapons with a blast of 6 or more yield +2 blast when stacked.
So three grenade launchers with blast radius of 3 yields a single blast 5 not blast 9. Blast weapons on * and ** infantry units must stack.
Reasons:
Geometry. Doubling the radius does not double the volume. radius 4 is about double radius 3. This mechanic is correct and fair.
Its tactical. Its no longer a no brainer to stack your templates, for lighter infantry it becomes mandatory to speed up the game.

3.
Mechanic:
Red Blok weapons with a blast radius can fire smoke. Combine the units blast firepower into a single smoke shell.
You must be able to yield 5cm radius (accumulatively see above) for the unit in order to get smoke.
Use GW large blast markers for smoke.
Smoke grants cover to units within or behind and laser designators cannot penetrate smoke.
Reasons:
Its balanced. This rule is needed to give Red Blok a fair chance on larger board systems.
It also counters out the blast weapon nerf which is needed for the game but especially punitive against Red Blok.
For logistical reasons only the Red Blok carry smoke. It goes against the doctrines of most others who prefer an open field of fire.
Its tactical. Smoke goes both ways, laying down smoke gives your opponent cover against you. At the ranges you fire smoke from this is not usually a problem.

4.
Mechanic:
Laser designators must be focused on one unit only per unit firing. You need to split fire to fire your designators at a target you are not shooting at.
Reasons:
We consider this a point of clarity rather than a home brew rule. You shouldn't be able to laser designate everything, after all you already have two targets to shoot at let alone designate. Even so this allows TacArms to focus on three targets a turn.

Orlanth,Thanks for a great reply!
The smoke rules have me really thinking ( Love it)being a long time FOW fan Im wondering if FOW had any inspiration in your rule set?
Im also thinking how cool the FOW double size template would be to use in a friendly game of AT-43

Saint Anuman wrote:Orlanth,Thanks for a great reply!
The smoke rules have me really thinking ( Love it)being a long time FOW fan Im wondering if FOW had any inspiration in your rule set?
Im also thinking how cool the FOW double size template would be to use in a friendly game of AT-43

No need for any inspriation beyond the style of the communist war machine. smoke ias a low tech solution in keeping with Red Blok character.

Its also utterly necessary in order to make Red blok workable.

one thing missing is that I omitted the smoke expiry rules. Art the end of each turn roll a d6 for each smoke marker on a 4+ it expires. Smoke may linger or it might disperse quickly. You can stack smoke templates directly, in which case you need only roll for the first. Generally double stacking smoke is a good idea in the point of advance.
Also for convenience smoke doesnt scatter, the smoke is a large area blanket represented with the template, its actually rather hard to 'miss' with smoke, even if you are accuracy 2 Krasny Soldaty. This rule was brought in because a lingering template that scatters on to models or terrain features is a royal pain, we find it reasonable to place a smoke template where it will lie naturally, if you want to nudge it a little so it lies flat thats ok.

Orlanth wrote:At-43 breaks down over 2x4 because it leaves Red Blok with a critical disadvantage. 2x4 also ruins the game as it also voids alomst any practical difference in medium and high accuracy weapons as any accuracy above 6 is essentially the same. So if you have a unit costed for accuracy 10 it might as well be accuracy 6 or 7.

Red Blok have short range so how exactly does a smaller table give them a disadvantage? If anything they are the army that benefit the most from the 2x4 boards (this is really true in those missions where the game is played as a 4x2).

If your tables are set up in such a way that you can actually draw line of sight at range 10 then that is the problem and not the size of the table.
On a 2x4 board you can still have range 10 so saying that anything over accuracy 6 might as well be maxed at range 6 is nonsense.
What you are saying about units costed at accuracy 10 would also be a problem on a 10x10 board with containers stacked 4 high and maximum line of sight being range 2, so it has nothing to do with the size of the board.

We use 2x4 boards (in both directions) because it keeps the game time short and this is good for getting 3 or 4 games into a day (and 2 into an evening session).

I wonder if the problem is that the games played are not objective based.
If you play it as a last man standing game then the long range army will always win, yet play with missions where objectives have to be captured and tasks completed then your accuracy 10 sniper might take 6 models out during the game but the remainder of the target unit still claims the victory points and your opponent wins the game.

I wonder if the problem is that the games played are not objective based.
If you play it as a last man standing game then the long range army will always win, yet play with missions where objectives have to be captured and tasks completed then your accuracy 10 sniper might take 6 models out during the game but the remainder of the target unit still claims the victory points and your opponent wins the game.

To Echo: Play the missions. The balance breaks down if you go higher than 4x4, seek and destroy, and/or little terrain. Armies like Red Blok and Karmans are absolutely low tier in those situations and Cogs are unstoppable.

On topic: Ideas I wanna try are removing the ability to split salvoes by default and tying that into the Split Fire drill, remove the limitation on Delay Activation, and have units take morale if they're engaged, out of cohesion, and the combined number of eliminated and grounded fighters reduces and infantry unit below the threshold. If I had a complaint I'd find that the conservation of LP is less relevant as the game goes on and it always comes down to both players bidding 6 on the Authority test. Maybe giving players more impetus to save that LP for use in other functions would make that aspect less a forgone conclusion.

The only home brewed rules I have ever used are the mission system I worked on with St. Maniac up there.

I think House Rules might be an interesting topic, as well. Personally, I am about ready to return to the Therian Creation rule as written, and allow all Cypher Overseers to Create striders on themselves. Especially now that the Cogs are out and have A.I. Beacon, which is exactly the same rule with the single exception of needing to control an Objective.

OK Im thinking it be fun to have a one page optional rules sheet hung up at a gaming store or Man Cave.
I posted the smoke option at our groups forum for discussion. The Format that Orlanth used is great for this type of thing Mechanic followed by Reason follows one of my fav house rules KISS (Keep It Simple Stupid)LOL
sorta a old school slogan but its even more funny if your a fan of the band KISS...LOL
I hope to hear more form you and others all on this .
Im wondering now if there might be one good game fix for each army something fair and not over powering like the Red bloc smoke option above?
I have one Id like to offer for Karmans not sure about the details but mechanics and medics might be a good area to focus on.
Any troop that has them can chose to replace their medic or mechanic with the same. Thoughts?

AT-43.CO.UK wrote:

Orlanth wrote:At-43 breaks down over 2x4 because it leaves Red Blok with a critical disadvantage. 2x4 also ruins the game as it also voids alomst any practical difference in medium and high accuracy weapons as any accuracy above 6 is essentially the same. So if you have a unit costed for accuracy 10 it might as well be accuracy 6 or 7.

Red Blok have short range so how exactly does a smaller table give them a disadvantage? If anything they are the army that benefit the most from the 2x4 boards (this is really true in those missions where the game is played as a 4x2).

Reread what I posted, you have the compete opposite to what is written.

AT-43.CO.UK wrote:
If your tables are set up in such a way that you can actually draw line of sight at range 10 then that is the problem and not the size of the table.

Every good table should have a mixture of blocked view movement blocks cover and long and short open fire lanes depending on perspective and postioning. This maximises the tactical considerations of the game.

AT-43.CO.UK wrote:
On a 2x4 board you can still have range 10 so saying that anything over accuracy 6 might as well be maxed at range 6 is nonsense.

Blah, in 40K you can use the full 96" range on a tank if you play across the table, but you have to set up in corners for this to be an issue. However the balance of main weaponry vs boardsize gives a lot of range wenvoklpe blind spots. 4x2 boards simply dont allow that, weapon ranges between the games are fairly similar, you dont play 40K on a 4x2 except for intro games on the smaller GW stores.

You should know this being an organiser of tournaments on 4x2 tables: Anything set up in the middle of the short end will have a maximum of range 2 to both edges. Anything srt up in the middle will have a maximum of range 5 to both edges, more in both cases on corners.
So unless both players hug the board edges range doesnt come into it much unless you are Red Blok.

AT-43.CO.UK wrote:
What you are saying about units costed at accuracy 10 would also be a problem on a 10x10 board with containers stacked 4 high and maximum line of sight being range 2, so it has nothing to do with the size of the board.

Terrain cover and board size are two different issues. Cairni and I have made lots of comments about terrain cover in other threads and getting it right is an issue. One thing is certain the standard At-43 games wer are seeing do not seem to offer containers stacked 4 high with maximum range 23 everywhere. You will be lucky to see four containers on the tabletop.

AT-43.CO.UK wrote:
We use 2x4 boards (in both directions) because it keeps the game time short and this is good for getting 3 or 4 games into a day (and 2 into an evening session).

Its a dumb down solution for tournament games. Its fair in that everyone gets the same handicap, but it reduces tactics to a dice rolling session. On a 4x2 you cant outflank except by reservesd, you cant respond to an outflank if reserves are used, you cant evade range envelopes, Red Blok excepted. Frankly its a mess.

Sure you can play quick games, no problem there, but 40K tourneys manage that on 6x4 so you shouldn't have too much trouble with larger boards. Admittedly from the photos of your tournament you wouldnt be able to fit as many players in so small a space.
While on this I am not digging your efforts at making tournaments, its good you are doing this but you are nevertheless reinforcing some of what is bad about At-43.

At-43 has some very good concepts and miniatures, but play this way confirms the attitude that its a kiddie game. To turn it into a tactical wargame for grown ups you need bigger play areas, more terrain, and preferably more terrain variety, changes to the blast rules as opposed to the 'bang your dead' cover negation. This will help Rackham as it will be extension encourage larger armies. You dont waste a nice 6x4 with a 2000AP skirmish, double up and see the fun really start. You get a chance to play with more types of toys too once you break the mental cap of 2k armies.

AT-43.CO.UK wrote:
I wonder if the problem is that the games played are not objective based.

A frequent jab I hear against those who notice flaws in the game balance. Yes we play objectives, yes we know about objectives. No it odenst make a blind bit of difference.

Say you had a 4' wide section of board, this can be the entire battle on a thin board or part of a larger fight. At one end you have Cogs at the other Red Blok. This means that they start at range 12 away. Its going to be a long time before Red Blok get in range for their guns, Cogs can start shooting a lot sooner. Now of course you can use cover etc etc, but problem its outside on gamers custom boards cover is hard to come by, the tournament boards you used wrre not exactly heavily covered, you could see righ across the board both ways in most places. If you can hide against some Cogs and other set of Cogs further up the line can still draw bead on you.

Bottom line is Red Blok get taken apart by Therians UNA or Cogs, especially Cogs unless you play in a tight maze, and noone wants to do that, its too far the other way.

Now you could be tempted to think 'ah but he's not using objective properly'. Frankly - no. it doesnt matter. Take our example again, you have Red Bok one end Cogs the other. Taking the objective is not an instant win, and if it was Cogs could get their first just as much as Red Blok. No taking objectives is a process. so the Red Blok advance, we will assume they are being clever and get cover one way or another and take cover all ther time. doesnt matter Cogs are still shooting at them killing a third of those they wound, with littel or no return fire. You take the objective with your Red Blok, huzzah VP for the Collective. Then you are still getting shot except not Cogs cant miss. Sure you can now fire back on 5's or there-abouts but its too late to do the damage. Cogs let you hold the objective for two turns getting a VP lead. They can afford this because by then your army is dead and they can saunter up with one guy and take it all back.

AT-43.CO.UK wrote:
If you play it as a last man standing game then the long range army will always win, yet play with missions where objectives have to be captured and tasks completed then your accuracy 10 sniper might take 6 models out during the game but the remainder of the target unit still claims the victory points and your opponent wins the game.

Sorry mate doesn't work like that. The Red Blok player must go for the objectives, he could sit around yes, but then would be losing for no reason. Those opposing Red Blok need not take objectives, just keep their distance and fire away. Time is on their side. Once the Red Blok on the objective are destroyed its there for the taking. I have best results if I hide my Red Blok, take easy objectives near me then force a stalemate by avoiding LOS. It doesn't completely work and requires more terrain than usual, still its no advantage to Red Blok, this tactic can be used by anyone else and the only thing it guarantees to do is surrender the initiative.
Deep striking Kolossus with the extra move help a little, but they are expensive and go down real easy. a decent opponents can see this coming, or even get to the neutral deployment zone first, or set a long range trap for whatever comes out. Still it gives Red Blok a chance and so we always allow a centre board neutral deployment zone if we have Red Blok playing, which generally is not a given in many scenarios.

Some of these problems would go away if Red Blok were decently costed, they die in drives so give the krasny droves to die in, they are cheap but not cheap enough, and the vehicles are more expensive than anyone elses. for what, better armour which is not offset by the far higher strength gunners opposing armies can get.


For other armies its much of a muchness. I cant speak for ONI but all the rest have some form of massed ling range shooting. This makes 4x2 boards a mess, its a throw back to little wars, you line up your toy soldiers and then knock them down again. Despite all the orders etc tactics is really limited withint a decent board size and terrain cover, at least its not so one sided though, each side can massacre the others, though Karmans can have a difficult time.

Orlanth wrote:

AT-43.CO.UK wrote:

Orlanth wrote:At-43 breaks down over 2x4 because it leaves Red Blok with a critical disadvantage. 2x4 also ruins the game as it also voids alomst any practical difference in medium and high accuracy weapons as any accuracy above 6 is essentially the same. So if you have a unit costed for accuracy 10 it might as well be accuracy 6 or 7.

Red Blok have short range so how exactly does a smaller table give them a disadvantage? If anything they are the army that benefit the most from the 2x4 boards (this is really true in those missions where the game is played as a 4x2).

Reread what I posted, you have the compete opposite to what is written.

What I read was that you say Red Blok are at a disadvantage on a small board.
I'm saying they are not at a disadvantage on a small board and I know this from experience both playing with and against Red Blok.

The rest of your post I'll see as your view and my view not being the same and I think we both can agree that it is best to leave it at that as the internet is full enough with people having a go at each other over points of view and it never go anywhere. For us the size of the boards works and untill it doesn't we will keep using them. Every month we listen to the views of the players at the tournaments and make changes if needed (for example, we have changed some missions and others have not been used again when they ended up not working for whatever reason).

Only thing I'll say is that the location for the tournaments can have a maximum of 10 gaming tables, this means we can have tournaments for 20 players (well 21 if you give buys )
There was one tournament we had to divert to the home of one of the team and yes I agree that was crowded (it did mean we had all we could drink and free pizza )

Can we please stay on topic you guys started good another long winded thread and nobody wants to read them man you guys alway go over board lets reread the first post and play nice and on topic,
: )
Man that smoke idea is awesome hey guys?

Saint Anuman wrote:
Man that smoke idea is awesome hey guys?

Points for effort, but I don't care for it gamewise. Too fiddly, shouldn't be army specific, cross-pollenates accessories from another game, and Red Blok have a way to generate mobile cover: It's called shield wall and it is very effective.

Saint Anuman wrote:Can we please stay on topic you guys started good another long winded thread and nobody wants to read them man you guys alway go over board lets reread the first post and play nice and on topic,

This is on topic. If you want to run a You Make The Call' on house rules you got to expect the rules to be up for critique and fully explained. I wont and need not apologise for using big words.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

SaintManiac wrote:

Saint Anuman wrote:
Man that smoke idea is awesome hey guys?

Points for effort, but I don't care for it gamewise. Too fiddly, shouldn't be army specific, cross-pollenates accessories from another game, and Red Blok have a way to generate mobile cover: It's called shield wall and it is very effective.

You mean hide behind Red Blok armoured units?

Trouble with that is your shield wall is very small and very expensive, also those may well be the units you are trying to save.

Red Blok striders are not as well armoured as you think. Sure you have more armour than everyone else, +2 points over UNA and +1 over everyone else, however your main bulk anti vehicle weaponry is S12, wheras enemy bulk anti vehicle weaponry is S14 or S15. This means you break even on comparison to UNA and are at a direct disadvantage against Cogs and Therians. Karmans being harder to place because of varied armouring and the prevelence of jammers, but are likewise superior. So the weapons/armour baslance puts Red Blok on a loser, yet they cost more, a lot more. The only advantager they have is rate of fire, which does not offset the higher price and poor accuracy.

Please please walk a line of expensive walkers in a shield wall, its a ticket to win for an opponent.

if you make your wall from Kolossi it sounds better on paper, Kolossi are genuinely far better armoured, but are expensive and easy to ground. Use then as the shield wall and you only protect infantry, and you slow your advance to a crawl when your shieldwall gets grounded, which is precisely what you dont want to do with Red Blok. Kolossi are also overpriced.

Shield walls do not work for Red Blok. A wall of Toads works for M.Ind with the autorepair, and I suppose will work for ONI too, but UNA dont have sdhort ranged infantry to advance behind so again you wont want to actually shield wall with them. Unless you work out a plan involving zmobies hiding behind ONI vehicles, which should work, I dont see much call for shield wall at all.

2'x4' does seem like an awfully small table. 3'x3' isn't bad for 2000 AP, lends itself to a quick, brutal game, but anything over that really wants 3'x4'. If you look at the published scenarios like in Frostbite or Damocles, I don't think there's a single 2'x4' playspace in there. That says something to me about how the game is designed, I guess.

A couple of mats from two Army box boxsets will get about 3x2 space each, slightly under. But the mats are to be seen as an instant standby

Besides even the mats are used in pairs, and naturally so if you play boxset vs boxset. So 4x3 sounds like 'factory' size. Thus Rackham and Cairnius seem to agree on this one.

The extra foot would make a big difference, but I would like to see 4x4, more often. This is the standard scale for Warmachine. when we played UNA vs Therians a lot last year we played 4000-5000AP games on 4x4. It worked as reasonably well as the rules allowed.

There actually is a 2x3 mission in Frostbite

Anyway, the boardsize is a preference that will differ between players and groups. At the moment we are playing trough a battle report for the upcomming new Rackham website and that is 2500ap on a 2x4 board. The game is intense and has room for tactical choices making or breaking your turn.

AT-43 is not a game of massive wars being fought on the tabletop, It is more a skirmish game. I feel the game starts to fall apart when played with armies bigger than 3000ap and on boards bigger than 4x4. (having to increase the movement of all models when playing on big boards shows this in my view).
Interestingly we are getting a fixed 5x5 board for longer lasting games. However instead of playing all out wars with massive armies we will still be using 2500ap armies and let play continue for as long as we want. Each time an objective is met by a player that player will receive new orders to go and do something somewhere on the board.

AT-43.CO.UK wrote:There actually is a 2x3 mission in Frostbite

No problem wirth that. A single mission on a undersized board adds an element to a campaign game. If I was running a 40K campaign game I would have no problems forcing players to play one round on an odd board as a challenge. Some armies would profit others would be screwed. Though undersized for 40K is 4x3 minimum, 3x2 for a game of At-43 is ok.
Its a problem if such small board sizes are standard.

AT-43.CO.UK wrote:
AT-43 is not a game of massive wars being fought on the tabletop, It is more a skirmish game. I feel the game starts to fall apart when played with armies bigger than 3000ap and on boards bigger than 4x4. (having to increase the movement of all models when playing on big boards shows this in my view).

Youir mileage may vary, however it is in Rackhams interest to upscale the game. Warhammer and 40k took off when they ceased to be skirmish games, back in the nineties armies were about 20-30 models. On a company point of view 4000AP should be encouraged, it is assinine not to.

AT-43.CO.UK wrote:
Interestingly we are getting a fixed 5x5 board for longer lasting games. However instead of playing all out wars with massive armies we will still be using 2500ap armies and let play continue for as long as we want. Each time an objective is met by a player that player will receive new orders to go and do something somewhere on the board.

5x5 is an interestijng board size as it favours no sides is larger than the 6x4 and yet more compact. you might have problems for smaller players reaching the middle of the board.

Orlanth: I'm referring to the combat drill "shield wall" which turns a vehicle into cover for infantry. It's not difficult to obscure the minimum six fighters in large RB type 1 infantry units and keep them trailing on a rush move.

I've seen it in practice and it does work. Example: Set up an AFV on shield wall, rush Krasny Soldaty with mechanics behind the AFV, take cover, buy yourself a turn, and cover hop to get to an objective or drop point to set up your reinforcements and kolossi. Factor in KK5 or Urod for some shield wall goodness.

AT-43.CO.UK: I half agree with you on scalability. I find you can play high AP games with AT-43 if you use the reinforcement system well (IMO one of the best, if not the best reserve system out there). It's not strictly a skirmish game. Large boards don't cut it though. The game suffers above 4x4" from what I've seen.

Can't wait for the new website and scenario though. If it's an open board scenario then I hope it employs drop points and reinforcements. The published open table scenarios are severely lacking.

SaintManiac wrote:Orlanth: I'm referring to the combat drill "shield wall" which turns a vehicle into cover for infantry. It's not difficult to obscure the minimum six fighters in large RB type 1 infantry units and keep them trailing on a rush move.

I've seen it in practice and it does work. Example: Set up an AFV on shield wall, rush Krasny Soldaty with mechanics behind the AFV, take cover, buy yourself a turn, and cover hop to get to an objective or drop point to set up your reinforcements and kolossi. Factor in KK5 or Urod for some shield wall goodness.

I understand how shieldwall works. I am just unsure of the value.

1. The shield wall are the most important parts of the army, placed in a row ready to be shot at.

2. Even a Dotch Yaga or three Sierp cover only a narrow frontage, by spreading out your defensive line 9which an opponent should do to maximise range discrepency you will too often get flanking shots at the advancing infantry.

4. We are atalking 400-700+ points of vehicles to shield 150-300pts of infantry.

5. Even Frontline dont have enough vehicles to provide enough cover the the infantry horde Red Blok are mandated to take. In most lists you get one vehicle slot and four infantry, you cannot possibly provide adequate shield wall in such cases.

6. To use the narrow advancing cover you need to box up into a tight formation. Make a Cobra's day, all you need is a Tac Arm around the flank to spot and lump the shell right in the middle. Karmans might zoom over the top and flamer up the middle.

7. You are concentrating your forces too much having to focus your infantry and vehicles together. A wise opponent may collapse the defences right in front of you and move onto the flanks. at least one flank will be able to keep distance and pour fire in.

The best way to make use of this is if you are not really covering your infantry advance but the other way around. Take a vehicle first mentality and have the infantry alone to repair ratyher than be protected. Sounds similar but subtly different, you move your walkers as needed, exposing some infantry to die if needs be.

Orlanth, sorry for the late reply .

I don't know your playing styles/conditions. If you have reservations, fair enough. Your mileage may vary.

That said, you're interpreting a tactic as a strategy. You advance an AFV, call shield wall, and let your infantry use it as cover temporarily so they can hop to an objective or assault a position next turn. It essentially acts as a bridge, that's it.

The Dotch Yaga covers about the same frontage as a container. Three sierps > Dotch Yaga. One/Two type 1/2 AFVs are sufficient for the task. The Dotch and three Sierps are overkill.

It doesn't dictate your deployment. Unlike 40k, you can always react to what your opponent does.

Frontline puts a premium on AFVs and has little impetus for this tactic. The other three don't.

I've successfully used it as a Karman player. Every time I've played Red Blok, it's frequently used. IMO it's one of the best Karman and Red Blok buffs to come out of Frostbite.

Also, Orlanth, saying "you're using X points' worth of vehicles to cover Y points' worth of infantry" isn't really an accurate risk-to-benefit assessment because 95% or something of the published scenarios aren't about killing for VP, they're about objective-grabbing...which means infantry tends to be much more valuable than vehicles in AT-43. I think that's a fair assessment, anyway...

SaintManiac wrote:

That said, you're interpreting a tactic as a strategy. You advance an AFV, call shield wall, and let your infantry use it as cover temporarily so they can hop to an objective or assault a position next turn. It essentially acts as a bridge, that's it.

I find that is too easy to bypass. In AT-43 weapons are move and fire, sniper rules excepted, you simply relocate to unmask your guns, or better yet have a dispersed formation that allows you enfilade fire.

SaintManiac wrote:
The Dotch Yaga covers about the same frontage as a container. Three sierps > Dotch Yaga. One/Two type 1/2 AFVs are sufficient for the task. The Dotch and three Sierps are overkill.

That might be enough if the opponent lines up in front of you, but a savvy opponent has no reason to do that.

SaintManiac wrote:
It doesn't dictate your deployment. Unlike 40k, you can always react to what your opponent does.

This of course goes both ways and opponents can react to shield wall too.

SaintManiac wrote:
I've successfully used it as a Karman player. Every time I've played Red Blok, it's frequently used. IMO it's one of the best Karman and Red Blok buffs to come out of Frostbite.

Karmans are different, their infantry are very powerful but horribly vulnerable and expensive. There is a world of difference between allowing a unit of Anakongas to close range than a unit of Krasny.

Cairnius wrote:Also, Orlanth, saying "you're using X points' worth of vehicles to cover Y points' worth of infantry" isn't really an accurate risk-to-benefit assessment because 95% or something of the published scenarios aren't about killing for VP, they're about objective-grabbing...which means infantry tends to be much more valuable than vehicles in AT-43. I think that's a fair assessment, anyway...

If you want Red Blok infantry to reach objectives you are better off with a Kolossus rush, with medics, or Krasny horde rush. Swallow the casualties, and the front wave provides 'Shield Wall' for thr second wave for free. Meanwhile distract firepower from the Kolossus with a seperate rush of * striders.


The bottom line is that shield wall has four big negatives for Red Blok.


1. The units used to shield are overpriced if ** or high priority targets for the opposition * and ***. Shield Wall presents to the opponent the units they want to shoot anyway. Cant see the Krasny for the Sierps, who cares I would rather shoot the Sierps anyway.
Now you do get mileage against units with anti infantry heavy firepower, but if facing Shield Wall they should be the ones on the flank. Steel Troopers on the other hand can miss out on their laser rifles, its the AT weaponry I want to fire. It saves me a point of LP on splitfire thats all. It doesnt help that your faster * striders are slowed down when used this way which hurts their potential somewhat, a pity because the * striders are best at performing Shield Wall.

2. Shieldwall forces you to condence your battleline. This is very communist in style but real commies enjoy a bit of range, Red Blok dont. If you are forming a shiedlwall adn huddling infantry behind it you are concentrating your forces too much. Range is everyone elses advantage, your massed Blok will have a very nasty zone of death around them, it might even overshadow an objective or two. But it wont reach most of the opponents army. This even in an objective only based game is suicide. If there was an insta-win for capturing objectives Shield Wall would work as it so happens your opponent can allow you to sit on the objectives (after running a gauntlet of getting there) for a couple of turns while their army pummels the Red Blok from outside effective range.

3. Blast weapons love condensed formations.

4. Red Blok are fairly slow all told with different units having different movement speeds and are difficult to coordinate in this fashion. Generally a Shield Wall would involve holding back some strider units which should ideally be closing with the opponent.



Contrary to appearance I am not saying dont use Shield Wall. I am insteasd saying keep it situational. I find Shield Wall (only) works in conjunction with smart play over terrain.. If the infantry are advancing, are facing the rtight opponents and I have a vehicle unit nearby Shield Wall can help, but it is opportunistic at best.

I feel strongly that many on thias thread are not fully converse with anti Red Blok tactics. We keep thinking about tactics for Red Blok, as they need them to overcome their failings. less emphasis is placed on anti-Red Blok tactics which certainly do exist. Means of exploituing Red Blok's weaknesses with other armies. For me the lynchpin of this form is to dominate the flanks. Red Blok cant afford to manoeuver to contest flanking positions due to their low speed and have difficulty with providing superior firepower through overlapping range envelopes. If UNA or Therian forces disperse their formations to both flanks and seperate or conceal (for UNA) central forces there is niot a lot Red blok can do about it. Cover really helps even things, but it requires a lot of blocking terrain to give Red Blok a fair chance.

Been awhile....... getting into 40K....shhhhhhhh....don't judge me.
But the way we play AT-43 was that we assigned leadership points to certain ranks or leaders and the actions you where allowed to do was based on how many points you spent.

Actions you could buy with your points including moving twice in one go, or even using the same unit again etc. Obviously the most expensive of moves.....basically bankrupt you. But still all possible

It was a pretty sweeet system. I developed it because my gaming group hated the real rules. Essentually I changed the the game.


BTW had an apocalyse game 4000pts space marines held off 5700pts orks and 3600pts tyrinds and 2500pts necron 3 whole turns.......Game of capture the AT-AT.



Automatically Appended Next Post:
I should probably point out that we played massive games of AT-43 with those rules. No idea of point values. Waaaay over the 10,000's per side. Epic or apocalyptic. And we played the original 4 every game.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
I should probably point out that we played massive games of AT-43 with those rules. No idea of point values. Waaaay over the 10,000's per side. Epic or apocalyptic. And we played the original 4 every game.

alchemistfalling wrote:Been awhile....... getting into 40K....shhhhhhhh....don't judge me.
But the way we play AT-43 was that we assigned leadership points to certain ranks or leaders and the actions you where allowed to do was based on how many points you spent.

Actions you could buy with your points including moving twice in one go, or even using the same unit again etc. Obviously the most expensive of moves.....basically bankrupt you. But still all possible

It was a pretty sweeet system. I developed it because my gaming group hated the real rules. Essentually I changed the the game.


BTW had an apocalyse game 4000pts space marines held off 5700pts orks and 3600pts tyrinds and 2500pts necron 3 whole turns.......Game of capture the AT-AT.

Plerase can you tell us more, I would like to see the points breakdown for this.

The leadership points/command points system is something I agree with, games with one tend to end up better tactical games . However as you indicate the system should allow you to do a lot, but should risk draining your pool of leadership points by the choices made. AT-43 doesnt get the balance right, you end up with too many points and the points are spent equally on essential and non essential actions. Take Cover thus becomes a no brainer, if it was priced differently the game would become more cerebral.

I recommend, if you havent found this already, that having a second activation should have a cost appropriate to what it is. Got a *** vehicle on the tabletop and its worth giving a second go every turn if it costs AP/100 rounded up in LP it becomes a bit more tricky. So if you want to use that Fire Crawler twice that 8LP to reactivate, but only 2LP to double tap your Wing Sniper team.

Unless you are playing Red Blok your LP pool is of great concern (UNA are a close second to not needing to worry about LP) all other armies have to think what they spend their LP on. It is up to you to trick your opponent in using LP when not needed so they run out just as they need 4LP to create something or whatever.

Some players are really good at this trick and will catch out even the most experienced player, others are not and will leave their opponent with more LP than they can spend.

Another reason why AT-43 works better with armies of 3000ap maximum (I would even say 2500), bigger armies just swim in LP. in 2500ap you need to think about what you spend it on as not all units will have sergeants or relays to name just two things you need to remember during your LP spending spree.

AT-43.CO.UK wrote:Unless you are playing Red Blok your LP pool is of great concern (UNA are a close second to not needing to worry about LP) all other armies have to think what they spend their LP on. It is up to you to trick your opponent in using LP when not needed so they run out just as they need 4LP to create something or whatever.

I find any army except Karmans has enough. Saying that we have banned creation of extra Hekats in our games on a point of balance so that 4LP is not factored in unless it is to replace a unit already destroyed.
Red Blok have it easier than most due to high numbers and the LP leeching abilities they have, it doesn't remotely compensate for their disadvantages though. If find that Red Blok and UNA especially blow points on priority test need it or not simply because otherwise they wouldn't get to spend them.

AT-43.CO.UK wrote:
Some players are really good at this trick and will catch out even the most experienced player, others are not and will leave their opponent with more LP than they can spend.

Yes one of the better aspects of the game.

AT-43.CO.UK wrote:
Another reason why AT-43 works better with armies of 3000ap maximum (I would even say 2500), bigger armies just swim in LP.

I disagree and consider the opposite true. Sure a 5000AP army has far more LP, but not double. for a start larger armies mean more full platoons rather than one platoon and the cherry pick of a second. This forces you to fill up the choices and all armies have expensive slots that need filling. Got a Red Blok army with a mandatory ** vehicle slot, that means you only need take one ** vehicle in your army, you can leave that bit out in the second partial platoon. Got 5000AP and you have three full platoons, this means ponying out 425-450pts three times over; a bargain if you spam Urod clones but overcosted otherwise.
I haven't any problem with this, larger armies force a wider balance.

However the real reason why AP balance is better in larger games is because while you have double the army more of less, you do not get double the general. As the Army boxes imply every 2000+AP game has a >>>> or >>>>> leader with it. Now that is swimming in LP. A Colonel/Omega/Saint carries as many LP as the rest of the army. Sure it means you are in trouble if he dies, but you should think about that from the first glance at the tabeltop onwards.
with smaller games, and yes we do play them, we limit ourselves to >>> leaders or less and no Dragomira, unless she is the sole >>> leader you take.

What about usage? When playing larger games Knee To The Ground becomes far more common, as does Split Fire. You could extrapolate there is more room for Shield Wall too with more units 'stacked' behind each other. This implies you have a larger army on a not so much larger frontage. If you are playing on a 6x4 the multiple fire lanes ensure that the point of contacts remain similar to that of a 2000AP game, just double or more scale in every way. All this means is that those things you need everyone to pay LP for are needed again. Got a wide front battle? Fine that means everyone is going to be on Take Cover, which is a good idea anyway, but there is no option if your all in the firing line.

The only point that would suggest LP is less tight is the conceedable point that double the army does not mean double the priority test. So true you get more points and that solitary decision on whether to invest on priority becomes easier. I find this a small sacrifice. Priority test boosting will let you go first (or last as Cairnius explained on the other thread) with one more unit. there are too many ways around that and unless you are playing Mexican standoff with *** vehicles (the first to shoot destroys the other) its generally not worth the 6LP investment. If I had a routine or ordeer that cost 6LP I would expect it to be powerful, more powerful than increased likelihood you choose to take the first activation or not.

This all comes back to my interest in alchemistfalling's house rules for LP activation, LP should be able to give out major benefits at a heavy price and players should be forced into a costing dilemma wirth every move.

AT-43.CO.UK wrote:
in 2500ap you need to think about what you spend it on as not all units will have sergeants or relays to name just two things you need to remember during your LP spending spree.

Relays are a no brainer because they are universal and universally cheap. Only weapons teams and medics don't get them. I buy sergeants as standard for other armies, for 10pts the LP saved on activation is worth it. Every time. Buying an Lt for a *** vehicle is more of a challenge, often the big vehicles are the only units without officers in my army. After all they are worth the 1LP to activate yes. even so a Lt is a good second option commander.




I will leave you with this sufggestion, an experiment if you will.

Take Cover is by far the most important order, it makes all the difference. Play a game with fairly normal armies with a mix of infantry and vehicles, at the game scale you are comfortable with, with one house rule for the occassion. Take Cover costs 2LP to use, everything else remains the same. Allow enough cover on the tabletop to make Take Cover tempting. Watch you and your opponent sweat over every LP you spend. i think you will find the game will blossom once LP becomes scarcer and more precious and costage reflects benefit.

Orlanth wrote:
I find that is too easy to bypass. In AT-43 weapons are move and fire, sniper rules excepted, you simply relocate to unmask your guns, or better yet have a dispersed formation that allows you enfilade fire.

On 18-30cm movement? You must have no trouble bypassing low walls, containers, and other terrain, if that's the case. All that's required is half the unit partially in the trajectory of the vehicle base. A well positioned AFV, with terrain, can cover from most angles.

That might be enough if the opponent lines up in front of you, but a savvy opponent has no reason to do that.

And a savvy RB player is not going to blindly line up his AFVs in a row, in the middle of the table either....

This of course goes both ways and opponents can react to shield wall too.

And so on, so forth... This point applies on your end too.

Karmans are different, their infantry are very powerful but horribly vulnerable and expensive. There is a world of difference between allowing a unit of Anakongas to close range than a unit of Krasny.

Karman vehicles have far worse protection than RB. And it's not for lack of attention they receive from the opponent.

If you want Red Blok infantry to reach objectives you are better off with a Kolossus rush, with medics, or Krasny horde rush. Swallow the casualties, and the front wave provides 'Shield Wall' for thr second wave for free. Meanwhile distract firepower from the Kolossus with a seperate rush of * striders.

How is this a free shield wall? They'll swallow the impacts, but won't provide cover. Assuming of course, the opponent shoots with size 2 fighters. Otherwise, you get nothing. Shield wall gets around these problems.

1. The units used to shield are overpriced if ** or high priority targets for the opposition * and ***. Shield Wall presents to the opponent the units they want to shoot anyway... [snip]...

Kinda the point isn't it? Most vehicles are priority targets. Better them than infantry that can score. Unless you play Frontline of course. And I'm not sure why you think RB ** vehicles are overpriced....

2. Shieldwall forces you to condence your battleline.

Did you see my previous post? I can have a single AFV covering a single infantry unit on one flank with the rest of the army dispersed in other parts of the table. Again, tactic, not strategy.

3. Blast weapons love condensed formations.

Why, yes they do, but see above. You do not need to condense to use shield wall.

4. Red Blok are fairly slow all told with different units having different movement speeds and are difficult to coordinate in this fashion. Generally a Shield Wall would involve holding back some strider units which should ideally be closing with the opponent.

RB infantry on rush go 20cm. RB vehicles on combat go 20 cm. I'm not sure how you're coming to this conclusion.

Contrary to appearance I am not saying dont use Shield Wall. I am insteasd saying keep it situational. I find Shield Wall (only) works in conjunction with smart play over terrain.. If the infantry are advancing, are facing the rtight opponents and I have a vehicle unit nearby Shield Wall can help, but it is opportunistic at best.

Agreed, except for the last part. Shield wall has seen frequently use in my neck of the woods. It's far from an oddity.

I feel strongly that many on thias thread are not fully converse with anti Red Blok tactics.

And I feel strongly that blind assumption is a common pratfall on internet forums.
I've been playing this game since 2007. In all kinds of playing environments. On different kinds of tables and missions. I'm well aware of what Red Blok can and cannot do. And I know how to beat and lose to them. I can say that for practically every army.

SaintManiac wrote:
Karman vehicles have far worse protection than RB. And it's not for lack of attention they receive from the opponent.

Karmans are fast enough to terrain hop.

SaintManiac wrote:
And I'm not sure why you think RB ** vehicles are overpriced....

Red Blok striders cost more, for that you get better armour, which as explained before is an illusion. Yes you get +1 armour, +2 vs UNA, but are -2 or -3 to strength of guns. All in all you break even with UNA in gun vs armour, and are at a disadvantage against Therians. Yet both of them are cheaper.

You have a ROF advantage, three shots per launcher, two for a heavy gun, one more shot than most equivalents. But that doesn't remotely compensate for the appalling accuracy and lack of rerolls. Until you get real close one light laser cannon with one attack with rerolls is worth as many Kossaks as you can care to field. Sorry Red Blok need high rolls to hit and high rolls to wound and get no special advantages such as rerolls or jammers for either.

Red Blok ** vehicles have their strongpoints and dont 'suck' but are comperable than their UNA equivalents , if indeed slightly weaker, so should be priced no higher. I would take 50AP of the price of every ** Red Blok vehicle, possibly excepting Urod. I would boost Urods accuracy by 1 or 2 instead, being piloted by heroes after all.

SaintManiac wrote:

If you want Red Blok infantry to reach objectives you are better off with a Kolossus rush, with medics, or Krasny horde rush. Swallow the casualties, and the front wave provides 'Shield Wall' for the second wave for free. Meanwhile distract firepower from the Kolossus with a seperate rush of * striders.

How is this a free shield wall? They'll swallow the impacts, but won't provide cover. Assuming of course, the opponent shoots with size 2 fighters. Otherwise, you get nothing. Shield wall gets around these problems.

Very easily more targets than you can shoot at, you need high strength weaponry to kill Kollossi, which has a realtively low ROF. There are counter to this, but not as much as with AFV screens. Infantry killers are other infantry and those infantry shots pass through Kollossi on a one to one basis, as basic squad weapons shots will do squat against armour 12 this means a number of free saves, add medics to that and very little firepower gets through.

Sore Cobra can shoot over, but you dont need to bunch behind a wall of kollossi, you need to bunch behind an AFV and still wont get any cover if you have a TacArm on the flank laser designates the squad. Other vehicle weapon can avoid the Kollossus shield wall, but with a handful of exceptions you will want those guns fired at the Kollosus themselves.

SaintManiac wrote:

2. Shieldwall forces you to condence your battleline.

Did you see my previous post? I can have a single AFV covering a single infantry unit on one flank with the rest of the army dispersed in other parts of the table. Again, tactic, not strategy.

Obviously you didnt read mine. Your opponent normally will have accuracy 6+ weaponry. you sit on the flank with a unit or two, wide on the flank and bypss your AFV. No shield wall a\nd being sufficiently far away no chance to respond for Red Blok, especially if you creep on both flanks. To approach to get one flank in gun range will expose you to free shooting from the other.

SaintManiac wrote:

4. Red Blok are fairly slow all told with different units having different movement speeds and are difficult to coordinate in this fashion. Generally a Shield Wall would involve holding back some strider units which should ideally be closing with the opponent.

RB infantry on rush go 20cm. RB vehicles on combat go 20 cm. I'm not sure how you're coming to this conclusion.

You might also notice other stats for Red Blok, notably their appalling accuracy. If you want to to use the vehicles you have paid for it helps to advance with them. 20cm combat move is ok for UNA or Therians who have some reach, for Red Blok you need to rush your vehicles on the first turn or you wont be in range to fire fast enough. If you advance 20cm you wont fire effectively, or at all for Molots first two turns, by that time nucleus cannon or laser cannon have taken their toll. Please please advance 20cm, signed UNA.

SaintManiac wrote:

I feel strongly that many on this thread are not fully converse with anti Red Blok tactics.

And I feel strongly that blind assumption is a common pratfall on internet forums.
I've been playing this game since 2007. In all kinds of playing environments. On different kinds of tables and missions. I'm well aware of what Red Blok can and cannot do. And I know how to beat and lose to them. I can say that for practically every army.

So what do you do. You have four choices: Play on postage stamps sized boards, spam Sierps, spam Dragonov, or spam Gencol heroes.
You can take out some players with Red Blok in game on a decent size tabletop, but not if they really know how to use UNA or Therians. Once you have a handle on those lists you can beat Red Blok 100% of the time without minimaxing your list, whether playing meatgrinder or objective based games.