Forum adverts like this one are shown to any user who is not logged in. Join us by filling out a tiny 3 field form and you will get your own, free, dakka user account which gives a good range of benefits to you: No adverts like this in the forums anymore. Times and dates in your local timezone. Full tracking of what you have read so you can skip to your first unread post, easily see what has changed since you last logged in, and easily see what is new at a glance. Email notifications for threads you want to watch closely. Being a part of the oldest wargaming community on the net. If you are already a member then feel free to login now.

Nob bikers are so passé now. I do remember when they were the red hot snizzle. Funny how quickly things can change.

G

Because people have learnt how to deal with them

With the abundance of cover saves it's impossible to stop an assault from occurring against a savy player. I played a 1000 point game of daemons versus Tau... My army had no shooting whatsoever, my dice were horrid but somehow I still managed to win. That game was pure shooting versus pure assault and the Tau were optimiSed to lay down as much dakka as possible. When it comes to assault you have to remember that daemons deep strike beside you then the next turn they charge. The multi charges crush shooty armies.

G

If 5th edition favored shooting more than assault, I dont think that the Tau would be so behind the 8-ball like they are now.

They were a significant and serious tournement threat back in 4e, now they're a joke.

As far as guard...they havent even entered a proving ground yet. Noone knows what they can do outside of their own limited pool of local gamers.

HtH is dominating tournements right now...with a few exceptions. Just like its been for years now, 5e or not.

The rules changed a bit, thats all that happened. Really this entire discussion is irrelevant.

Casper wrote:I would say assults are benifited more by the 5th edition rules. I base my opinion off of multi-assults, and the way assults effect moral. Shooting took a big hit from not only the 4+ cover but the fact that you no longer add negative modifiers to a units LD when they take 25% or more shooting casulties. Its much easier to break a unit in assult than via shooting for now. I'm sure there will be a balancing act when more traditionally shooty armies besides guard (tau, eldar, de, some nid lists) are revamped for 5th edition rules.

Agreed. Multiple assaults are incredibly game-changing; shooting has nothing comparable. The big problems with shooting in 5th Ed. is that it is very difficult to use it to finish off enemy units. There are several reasons for this.

1) No leadership modifiers outside of the assault phase.
2) Free Veteran Sergeants in many 5th Ed. Codicies.
3) Plentiful cover.
4) Go to ground!

Add all of these these together, and it's very east for the last few models in a squad to either deny you their Kill Point or else to continue to contest an objective. I think the game could really benefit from even something as modest as a -1 Leadership modifier if a unit takes 50% casualties in a single shooting phase. But then, I'm a biased IG player.

As a new player, and a tau one at that, i don't really know how Assault and Shooting has changed from past editions, but i will say i like the way shooting is now. I've nver played against Orks personally, but pretty much every time a unit tries to assault my fire warriors they end up in rapid fire range before they assault, and they get SHREDDED. Add in the Crisis suit and Devilfish i ususally have beside them and they only get assaulted if i want them to.

Plus I love seeing my kroot eat a team of IG for lunch :-P

I don't know about guard, but if you don't take steps to counter Eldar shooting and I mean quickly, they will slaughter all before them. However, once you get those wave serpents and war walkers and wraithguard committed to a brawl, they seem a lot less threatening. You just have to accept that half of your rhinos are going to get taken out by the second turn.

Gwar! wrote:

malfred wrote:

Cannerus_The_Unbearable wrote:Wow, I guess I was wrong.

You probably misapplied the Strength vs. Toughness table to the Weaponskill Table.

Yes, but that's a pretty big mistake to make... especially since the rolls to wound have used the EXACT SAME CHART since, oh, 1987.

Lay off me, dude. I'm serious. It's getting really old and I will begin calling you out on it EVERY time you do it from this point on. I remembered why! My very first HQ (for my first 10 or so games, which were in 4th) was a Berzerker proxied as Kharn in a squad of Berzerkers under the previous CSM codex (World Eaters). Due to his WS, my first opponent, who ran various units with WS3, had a 5+ to hit me back most of the time. I used to screw up all the time once I quit running Kharn with Berzerkers because I just had it stuck in my head that they were Kharn. Anyway, I was thinking 4th and it all came back. I promise I'm not an idiot with the rules, it was just a really stupid mistake.

Cannerus_The_Unbearable wrote:

Gwar! wrote:

malfred wrote:

Cannerus_The_Unbearable wrote:Wow, I guess I was wrong.

You probably misapplied the Strength vs. Toughness table to the Weaponskill Table.

Yes, but that's a pretty big mistake to make... especially since the rolls to wound have used the EXACT SAME CHART since, oh, 1987.

Lay off me, dude. I'm serious. It's getting really old and I will begin calling you out on it EVERY time you do it from this point on.

I appreciate it. Only by pointing out ones mistakes and flaws can one learn from them. I thank you for endeavouring to help me help myself by allowing me to learn from mistakes that I may miss. -Shakes hand-

Gwar, lay off Can. He admitted he made a mistake, so please stop being a necrophiliac sadist whose into bestiality (i.e. stop beating a dead horse).

As a Guard player, I have to say that 5th edition benefits assault more through a combination of run (less time to shoot them), abundant cover saves (rendering AP-breaking weapons far less effective), and the fact that close combat is horribly lethal.

Consider: How much firepower do you need to dump on a unit to wipe it out?

Answer: A lot.

Consider: What do you need to do to wipe out a unit in close combat?

Answer: Win combat (even 1 wound will do), and have the enemy fail a morale test.

A vivid (and entirely reasonable) hypothetical would have a Chaplain (or a chappie and someone else) assaulting a squad of fifty screaming conscripts. The conscripts, being WS2 and S3 against a T4 3+ model will most likely not inflict any wounds, whereas the Chappie will certainly kill some Conscripts. The Chaplain, thus, will win the close combat, and if the Conscripts fail the morale test, the Chaplain, by his lonesome, murders about 45 conscripts.

Ogiwan wrote:
A vivid (and entirely reasonable) hypothetical would have a Chaplain (or a chappie and someone else) assaulting a squad of fifty screaming conscripts. The conscripts, being WS2 and S3 against a T4 3+ model will most likely not inflict any wounds, whereas the Chappie will certainly kill some Conscripts. The Chaplain, thus, will win the close combat, and if the Conscripts fail the morale test, the Chaplain, by his lonesome, murders about 45 conscripts.

I see that angle of it, but don't forget true LOS makes things shootable a lot more of the time too. In that same example, the chaplain gets shot to hell the next turn by the 200+ other guardsmen waiting there, whereas in 4th he might have had a chance to rinse and repeat the next turn. I can say that 5th benefits Assault osmewhat, but I think it does it a lot less than the general consensus. It just seems like the "uber" close combat units aren't near so consistently uber at killing squads as a big, uber gun is consistently uber at shooting and killing stuff. I suppose it takes being on the other side of the barrel to disagree

Cannerus_The_Unbearable wrote:

Ogiwan wrote:
A vivid (and entirely reasonable) hypothetical would have a Chaplain (or a chappie and someone else) assaulting a squad of fifty screaming conscripts. The conscripts, being WS2 and S3 against a T4 3+ model will most likely not inflict any wounds, whereas the Chappie will certainly kill some Conscripts. The Chaplain, thus, will win the close combat, and if the Conscripts fail the morale test, the Chaplain, by his lonesome, murders about 45 conscripts.

I see that angle of it, but don't forget true LOS makes things shootable a lot more of the time too. In that same example, the chaplain gets shot to hell the next turn by the 200+ other guardsmen waiting there, whereas in 4th he might have had a chance to rinse and repeat the next turn. I can say that 5th benefits Assault osmewhat, but I think it does it a lot less than the general consensus. It just seems like the "uber" close combat units aren't near so consistently uber at killing squads as a big, uber gun is consistently uber at shooting and killing stuff. I suppose it takes being on the other side of the barrel to disagree

Actually, by the math, the conscripts inflict 1.66 wounds on the chaplain, so basically they have a 2/3 chance of killing him and winning combat.

Ah, thank you. Would you mind running the numbers for how many Conscripts the Chaplain kills, and the chance of the Conscripts breaking?

willydstyle wrote:

Cannerus_The_Unbearable wrote:

Ogiwan wrote:
A vivid (and entirely reasonable) hypothetical would have a Chaplain (or a chappie and someone else) assaulting a squad of fifty screaming conscripts. The conscripts, being WS2 and S3 against a T4 3+ model will most likely not inflict any wounds, whereas the Chappie will certainly kill some Conscripts. The Chaplain, thus, will win the close combat, and if the Conscripts fail the morale test, the Chaplain, by his lonesome, murders about 45 conscripts.

I see that angle of it, but don't forget true LOS makes things shootable a lot more of the time too. In that same example, the chaplain gets shot to hell the next turn by the 200+ other guardsmen waiting there, whereas in 4th he might have had a chance to rinse and repeat the next turn. I can say that 5th benefits Assault osmewhat, but I think it does it a lot less than the general consensus. It just seems like the "uber" close combat units aren't near so consistently uber at killing squads as a big, uber gun is consistently uber at shooting and killing stuff. I suppose it takes being on the other side of the barrel to disagree

Actually, by the math, the conscripts inflict 1.66 wounds on the chaplain, so basically they have a 2/3 chance of killing him and winning combat.

Did you remember to factor in the fact not all 45 Conscripts can hit the Chaplain? By My Calculations a maximum of 18 Will be able to get into BTB or 2" of a model in BTB. And thats in a Super Packed circle. So, 18 Conscripts Attacking the Chaplain actually cause 0.665 Wounds on Average.

The Point is still valid though.

Gwar! wrote:

willydstyle wrote:

Cannerus_The_Unbearable wrote:

Ogiwan wrote:
A vivid (and entirely reasonable) hypothetical would have a Chaplain (or a chappie and someone else) assaulting a squad of fifty screaming conscripts. The conscripts, being WS2 and S3 against a T4 3+ model will most likely not inflict any wounds, whereas the Chappie will certainly kill some Conscripts. The Chaplain, thus, will win the close combat, and if the Conscripts fail the morale test, the Chaplain, by his lonesome, murders about 45 conscripts.

I see that angle of it, but don't forget true LOS makes things shootable a lot more of the time too. In that same example, the chaplain gets shot to hell the next turn by the 200+ other guardsmen waiting there, whereas in 4th he might have had a chance to rinse and repeat the next turn. I can say that 5th benefits Assault osmewhat, but I think it does it a lot less than the general consensus. It just seems like the "uber" close combat units aren't near so consistently uber at killing squads as a big, uber gun is consistently uber at shooting and killing stuff. I suppose it takes being on the other side of the barrel to disagree

Actually, by the math, the conscripts inflict 1.66 wounds on the chaplain, so basically they have a 2/3 chance of killing him and winning combat.

Did you remember to factor in the fact not all 45 Conscripts can hit the Chaplain? By My Calculations a maximum of 18 Will be able to get into BTB or 2" of a model in BTB. And thats in a Super Packed circle. So, 18 Conscripts Attacking the Chaplain actually cause 0.665 Wounds on Average.

The Point is still valid though.

Good point. I also think that conscripts should only be run with a Commissar keeping them in line, so their likelyhood of breaking would not be great (I think around 1/6 on LD9).

willydstyle wrote:Good point. I also think that conscripts should only be run with a Commissar keeping them in line, so their likelyhood of breaking would not be great (I think around 1/6 on LD9).

The sad part is, Conscripts cannot be given commissars Lord Commissars can join them/babysit them to keep them within 6" sure, but that is just a Major Waste.

So, to re-evaluate, a Chaplain going charging Conscripts will Dish out, on average, 1.779 Wounds, and taking 0.665 in return. So the Conscripts lose by one, and have a 1/6 chance of passing their LD (30% chance if they have a reroll), and then the Chaplain with the Higher I has a good chance of Sweeping them. So, 1 Model Killing 50

tl;dr
Assault is More powerful than shooting!

Gwar! wrote:

willydstyle wrote:Good point. I also think that conscripts should only be run with a Commissar keeping them in line, so their likelyhood of breaking would not be great (I think around 1/6 on LD9).

The sad part is, Conscripts cannot be given commissars Lord Commissars can join them/babysit them to keep them within 6" sure, but that is just a Major Waste.

So, to re-evaluate, a Chaplain going charging Conscripts will Dish out, on average, 1.779 Wounds, and taking 0.665 in return. So the Conscripts lose by one, and have a 1/6 chance of passing their LD (30% chance if they have a reroll), and then the Chaplain with the Higher I has a good chance of Sweeping them. So, 1 Model Killing 50

tl;dr
Assault is More powerful than shooting!

Tell that to the guard player, you see.

After you swept his conscripts, you're standing out in the middle of a killing feild. You see, the non hth fighting conscripts were simply a ploy to get you out there.

1 Lascannon shot and one failed rosarius save and your chaplain is now a red mist hovering over a burn mark on the ground.

Assault isnt more powerful.....


(btw, this is NOT an attempt at proving shooting's superiority over assault)

Damn... well the conscript squad is Troops, and is actually more expensive than the chaplain... so IMO it's probably not a bad trade-off for the Marines.

....but that was turn 6 and the only thing left in the marine army was the chaplain. Everything else was blown off the table in the previous 5 turns.

Guard shooting=Win

......................................

by the way, in 4e the chaplain could've just consolidated into a fresh guard unit keeping the Guard lascannons from firing at him.

Basically this is an example of how 5e benefits shooting to a certain extent. 5e doesnt benefit either shooting or Assault more...the rules just slightly changed for both.

Gwar is a troll

40k has been bizarrely hth focused for a while. 5th slightly more so than 4th.

Deadshane1 wrote:....but that was turn 6 and the only thing left in the marine army was the chaplain. Everything else was blown off the table in the previous 5 turns.

Guard shooting=Win

......................................

by the way, in 4e the chaplain could've just consolidated into a fresh guard unit keeping the Guard lascannons from firing at him.

Basically this is an example of how 5e benefits shooting to a certain extent. 5e doesnt benefit either shooting or Assault more...the rules just slightly changed for both.

I agree with this. If you can get a HtH unit into CC then you'll probably wipe the opponent out, or break them to the point that they won't be part of the game any more (it's hard to do this to loyalist marines though...), but you'll often be put into a situation where you're trading units with your opponent 1 for 1, which is often not a very good position to be in.

Deadshane1 wrote:....but that was turn 6 and the only thing left in the marine army was the chaplain. Everything else was blown off the table in the previous 5 turns.

Guard shooting=Win

Two questions. First, how often does a 40k game go without hand-to-hand combat by turn 2, 3 at the latest? Second, how frequently have you seen Guard shooting, or any shooting for that matter, render an army useless in two turns?

5th edition made both assault & shooting more lethal.

However, assault was made much better due to the ability to get into assault range earlier (run, outflank) and the way that assault resolution is done (Multi charge, leadership modifiers for loser, armor saves for fearless).

All that being said, Guard have some really hard combos to deal with.

Medusas & tri lascannon Vultures can kill tanks at range with ease. Choirs can make any unit that isn't fearless start running with some Russ help. Masters of the fleet can put a real damper on the outflanking & drop poding armies.

Guard have become THE shooting army in 5th edition.

Blasphemy! There there, railgun, don't cry. You still pwn. I still love you...

I can't agree that shooting became any more lethal. The AP characteristic hasn't shifted dramatically, and the changes in defensive weapons took away firepower from several armies.

Melee is more conceptually exciting, so making it stronger only made sense. The proliferation of cover saves made it even more likely to get into HTH. Gwar's demonstration of how simple a single model can get disproportionate returns in HTH should be sufficient.

The first counter argument to the HTH strength should either be a Deathstrike, or the Manticore being able to cover a significant portion of the table. The potential is huge, but can't be consistently delivered every round -Deathstrikes fire once (eventually), and the Manticore is inconsistent.

The opportunity to wipe a unit out in HTH by comparing d6+I is infinitely more deadly than Ranged combat. No Retreat or Fearless still makes a significant impact on a second round of combat, more than fleeing from a round of fire.

Shooting became more lethal because of the addition of true line of site & the elemination of target priority.

Crisis suits can be killed when hiding behind forests, units can shoot whatever they want. Independent characters can be targeted. a 10 man squasd can be killed if only one person in it is seen.

How can you say Shooting didn't become more lethal? Sure giving cover saves to everything did make it harder to kill some things, but there is a whole lot of stuff you could NEVER kill before in shooting because you didn't have the option.

asugradinwa wrote:Shooting became more lethal because of the addition of true line of site & the elemination of target priority.

Crisis suits can be killed when hiding behind forests, units can shoot whatever they want. Independent characters can be targeted. a 10 man squasd can be killed if only one person in it is seen.

How can you say Shooting didn't become more lethal? Sure giving cover saves to everything did make it harder to kill some things, but there is a whole lot of stuff you could NEVER kill before in shooting because you didn't have the option.

I agree. I remember when you always had to shoot at the closest unit and tanks must be fired at before infantry (or so I think. Not sure haven't read a 4th edition rule book in like what? 3 years?) even if no guns can damage it.






-Orkishly

asugradinwa wrote:Shooting became more lethal because of the addition of true line of site & the elemination of target priority.

Crisis suits can be killed when hiding behind forests, units can shoot whatever they want. Independent characters can be targeted. a 10 man squasd can be killed if only one person in it is seen.

How can you say Shooting didn't become more lethal? Sure giving cover saves to everything did make it harder to kill some things, but there is a whole lot of stuff you could NEVER kill before in shooting because you didn't have the option.

Ok, so you can shoot more units. Does the fact that 4+ cover saves are now nearly a given make a difference? Yes. It makes a huge difference in making your shooting less effective. There is nothing in assault that can give your unit a free invulnerable save.

Shooting became more lethal. Absolutely. But assault passed it up in my opinion. Remember how you used to need BtB contact to get your full attacks? Not anymore.
Sweeping advance is a big loss to everything but Terminators and Tau, but squads with good I stats became much, much more effective due to their ability to easily run down slower troops. Example: Tau fire warriors can never escape from Prince Yriel. Period. So assault is much more decisive now that you can catch slow troops and destroy them ALL. The best shooting can do that is equivalent casualties-wise is force a Ld test. Against IG, good plan. Against BT, prepare to get charged.

Against vehicles, the melta is now king. So working a shooty unit that close to the enemy will leave your shooty unit vulnerable to being crushed and run down, thus eliminating the dominance of long range anti-tank (ordnance still does wonders, however)

Any way you look at it, Warhammer 40k has become a closer affair

And Shooting lost its already weak maximum morale modifier of -1 while the average HtH modifier went from a - 1 or -2 averaging on the high side to -3 and up. Used to be the best you might get was a -4. Now there are combats where you get -6 and I've even seen a -7.

When you go back to the white dwarf where they were introducing 5th the GW designers pretty much as said that they gave the book an assault slant. Something about assaults are now supposed to be brutal and fast never really lasting longer than a turn. That means a unit destroyed in a single turn by another single unit. Something that doesn't happen too often in shooting.

Here lets compare the plus side versus the minus side for the 4th to 5th edition changes for HtH and ranged combat.

HtH Negatives-Things that hurt HtH oriented armies
1)Target priority going away. Allowed more units to combine shooting.
2)No longer can consolidate/sweeping advance into another unit and lock in HtH.(Not as helpful as it seems when you realise that the units are running away to get out of assault range meaning that they aren't shooting.)
3)Powerfist/Lightening claw rules were fixed to reduce number of attacks.
4)TLoS does allow for shooting through area terrain as long as there is a true line of sight between the units.
5)Barrage weapons consider cover from the center of the blast emplate.
6)Base vehicle chart made killing vehicles a little more difficult.


HtH Positives-Things that have helped assault oriented armies
1)Run rule took away a turn of opponents firing by allowing the assault army to close more quickly.
2)Run rule effectively shrank the board by allowing more units to get across the board faster meaning less manuveuring room for highly mobile shooting armies.
3)Morale modifiers gained a big boost in favour of HtH.
4)Fearless additional wound rule works against shooty armies tarpit units.
5)Ubiquetous 4+ coversaves halved the effectiveness of certain limited high AP ranged weapons.
6)Tanks and transports are harder to take out now by just the base chart. This means transported assault units get across the board more often.
7)The majority of tanks are able to be destroyed more easily in HtH than ranged combat.
8)4+ coversave for tanks and transports is better than the old glancing when obscured rule.Again transported unit get across the boards more often.
9)Multiple assaults...'nough said
10)KPs seem to plague shooty armies more than assault armies.
11)Objective missions 2/3 of the time.
12)Defenders react forces non-assault types to bring all units in.
13)New assault rules got rid of the unit escaping sweeping advance if no models are left in base to base.
14)All blast weapons drift.
15)And(Drum roll please)..................TLoS. Yep, funny how quickly the assault type players forget the old flamer through the solid brick wall because it is area terrain cheese. Didn't matter how solid you built the terrain your opponent could see 6" in and shoot through solid objects because it was area terrain. You had to go through and name it as LoS blocking to avoid this and even then rules lawyers would say that area terrain written trumped called LoS bolcking terrain because called terrain was only house rules.



Ranged Negatives-
1)Run for loss of shooting turns from eney closing to fast
2)Run for effectively reducing board size for less manuveuring room
3)Run becuase where it benefits assault armies, the benefits are much less for shooty armies
4)Loss of negative morale modifiers from wounds cuased by shooting
5)Tarpit units aren't as effective for a few reasons.
A)-KPs
B)-Anything that could really stick in now takes additional wounds which works against the units longevity.
C)-No longer able to use wounds to break base to base to avoid sweeping advance.
6)4+ Cover everywhere
7)Vehicles much harder to destroy. A little from the base chart and a lot from coversaves. Covers which cant be taken in HtH.
8)Multi-assaults
9)KPs, 2 of the 3 big shooty armies have KP issues
10)Objective based mission in 2/3 of the scenarios where you are trying to sieze ground from an opponent.
11)All Blast weapons drift
12)Barrage weapons consider cover from the center of template(Yes this is a shooting attack but assault armies have access to barrage weapons)
13)TLoS because shooting armies are not able to exploit the area terrain rules anymore.

Ranged Positives-
1)Target priority gone
2)Sweeping advance no longer can lock the next unit.
3)TLoS allows for units to be targeted more often but not by much.
4)Tanks and transports are harder to destroy by assault armies shooting.
5)Powerfist/Special HtH saw a reduction of attacks unless you take two.
6)Barrage weapons consider cover from the center of the template



Now I play Tau. In 5th I still have a better than 50% win ratio. In fourth it was closer to 75-80%. I enjot my army and will continue to play it. Yes I am currently writting a fan-dex for my army but the motivation for this was more to fix horrible wording and to tackle illogical units all the while updating to a 5th edition standard.

I probably missed a few things up above but going when comparing 5th ed BRB with the 4th ed version assaulting recieved more positive tweeks,IMHO.


Edit spelling

On the point of objective missions, it's much easier to sit on an objective when a unit can shoot (sucks to have 'zerkers babysitting). Armor being harder to destroy is better for shooting because your best guns are your armor usually. KPs hurt army with assault troops and lots of transports. TLoS gives you access ot shoot units you flat out couldn't before, Cover save or not. I can say that Assault does benefit more, but not by as much as people generally think.