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Oh my, I apologize TopC. I misinterpreted what you meant earlier by "high S low AP". I thought you meant "low ability to Armor Penetrate." I reverse-interpret "low AP" all the time, and I think a lot other people do as well.

I do agree, though, that it will mean weapons with a High S value and a low AP value will be more valuable, but I think in general they are a little over valued by most players already. Wounding on a 2+ still means that ~17% will always fail to be wounded, even against something S10 upon a T1 model. And lets face it, a T1 model would probably be priced ridiculously low for common application, while S10 weapons would be priced for knocking out T8 units on the same chance to Wound.

Skinnattittar wrote:Oh my, I apologize TopC. I misinterpreted what you meant earlier by "high S low AP". I thought you meant "low ability to Armor Penetrate." I reverse-interpret "low AP" all the time, and I think a lot other people do as well.

I do agree, though, that it will mean weapons with a High S value and a low AP value will be more valuable, but I think in general they are a little over valued by most players already. Wounding on a 2+ still means that ~17% will always fail to be wounded, even against something S10 upon a T1 model. And lets face it, a T1 model would probably be priced ridiculously low for common application, while S10 weapons would be priced for knocking out T8 units on the same chance to Wound.

Ah were good now then i take it? lol

Essentially its making a table for reroll wounds similar to BS skill rerolls.. BS 6 rolls a 1, then rerolls said 1 if it comes up a 6 its a hit. so on and so on..

But if this is the case for wounds on these weapons then it would be reduced from 1/6th not getting wounded....which is especially bad if its AP3/2 weapon

*edit* unless i'm just reading the idea wrong?

I thought you meant a weapon such as S10 AP- vs S10 AP1, and there being an issue there. I know of only a few weapons with high-ish Strength and "low" AP such as 6 or -.

My proposal is that weapons 2T < S (so a Strength greater than twice the toughness, ex: S9 and T4 but not S8 and T4) would be rerolled and wound on a 4+ (but would not count as a reroll). But these said "recovered wounds" would not count (now) as being twice the model's Toughness.

Skinnattittar wrote:I thought you meant a weapon such as S10 AP- vs S10 AP1, and there being an issue there. I know of only a few weapons with high-ish Strength and "low" AP such as 6 or -.

My proposal is that weapons 2T < S (so a Strength greater than twice the toughness, ex: S9 and T4 but not S8 and T4) would be rerolled and wound on a 4+ (but would not count as a reroll). But these said "recovered wounds" would not count (now) as being twice the model's Toughness.

I see, at least it rules out instant death the second time around... Although I do think it leaves some races without a blast weapon that falls into this category for balancing issues.. and i play tau so i wouldnt like it unless the submuni was boosted lol str8ap3 would be manageable

So are you saying you would be upset with not being able to use this rule? Or can you explain more thoroughly why you think it would be imbalanced?

Skinnattittar wrote:So are you saying you would be upset with not being able to use this rule? Or can you explain more thoroughly why you think it would be imbalanced?

I'm just saying that the races that already have High str good AP weapons already use them to very good success... this would make them even better, leaving the races without access to said weaponry feeling.... left out?

Well, the impact is relatively minimal, with a 50% increase in the wounds (from ~17% to ~8%), but they would not inflict additional damage from being greater than twice their Toughness, so special Characters would be relatively safe if they have Wound left.

As for other races being left out: Too bad. Just in the case of Tau, no-one else gets Markerlights, or something very similar. Many races don't have AV14 vehicles, others don't have any really cheap troops, others still don't have Ordinance weapons. There are a lot of things many other races don't get, they'll just have to deal. Sorry.

lol thats not the point.

Point is they are already good, they already get taken with high frequency. What need is there to improve them? If your going to improve something that doesnt need improving because it fits your fluff better, what are you going to give other races to balance this small improvement? that is the intended point im trying to make. This is a game, balance is required for it to be competitive, challenging, fun. Otherwise it just turns into another rock paper scissors game, which lets be frank, there are way to f many of those out there... if it turns into that all it would do is hurt the game.. no i'm not saying 1 change will make that big of a change, but whats to stop another? and another? and another? to where eventually just perpetuates to that stage.. i'd leave, many others would too. That point im making is the maintaining of balance. When balance is driven out of a game it hurts the community.

If you can't at least acknowledge this point as valid, thats fine. I'm just glad your not a game developer.

I think if you are doing it S9/S10 weapons, especially blast weapons need a points increase. Otherwise it is just another rule.

@ TopC : I'm just trying to make heads up of what you're saying, so please don't take any of this the wrong way.

Are you saying that because it is slightly better (causing about 8% more wounds) and only applies to specific weapons against specific enemies (yes, only a few S7-S9 weapons for the majority of models with T3-4 respectively) that this will trigger a slippery slope of new rules that would possibly unbalance the game into some sort of "rock-paper-scissors" game? But only if we neglect to give armies that don't have these specific weapons, these specific weapons?

No, I think this is a small change for fluff's sake and fluff's sake only. Yes, certain armies will be left out without the same tactical benefit, but I don't particularly give a flying [bad word]. Guard didn't get assaulty units when they improved assault rules, Guard didn't get cheaper tanks when they nerfed tanks and made them cheaper for everyone else (well, for almost five years at least, until the recent codex). And what happened then? Well, nothing really. Guard remained Guard, even today with their new codex and all these "oh noes, 40k is being ruined" changes that people thought while they were rumors, they have had little effect on the army.

I don't want to rant, so I will keep this short. TopC, if you're afraid that a change like this, admittedly by you small, will overturn the game somehow, then my friend you are not playing the game very well, of you have succumbed to tunnel-vision. This will only change a few weapons against some enemies.

@ Tacobake & TopC : Will there be a points increase? Hopefully, but hopefully not a severe one. Remember, currently S10 weapons have the same effect on T4 models as a S6 weapon. You don't pay the price for a S10 weapon when it will do the job of a S6 weapon; you buy them for their anti AV14 and T8 abilities. So you are already paying an inflated price for the weapons with S7+, because their main role is against higher T and AV which won't be effected by this new rule, as it can't effect T5 and above (because there are not S11+ weapons). And I don't think there should be any weapons that can (except maybe Ordinance.... because I like the idea of a Hive Tyrant taking a Battle Cannon to the chest then blowing out in a rain of messy ichor, goo, and cooked meat for Guardsmen to catch in their helmets and eat. I'm sure they taste much like lobster...) in a regular game.

What evs dude, continue being having a biased opinion instead of trying to look at it from a over view (pssst alot of races got the shaft w/ assault buff) i'm done here. just glad its not a rule and most likely never will be since its all just conjecture.

TopC wrote:What evs dude, continue being having a biased opinion instead of trying to look at it from a over view (pssst alot of races got the shaft w/ assault buff) i'm done here. just glad its not a rule and most likely never will be since its all just conjecture.

Well it too bad we couldn't discuss this more, I don't know your point of view (as vague as it is). I personally feel bad that GW doesn't rely more on consumer input, but that's generally in their best interest financially. I hope at least you have taken something away from out attempted discussion.

Skinnattittar wrote:

TopC wrote:What evs dude, continue being having a biased opinion instead of trying to look at it from a over view (pssst alot of races got the shaft w/ assault buff) i'm done here. just glad its not a rule and most likely never will be since its all just conjecture.

Well it too bad we couldn't discuss this more, I don't know your point of view (as vague as it is). I personally feel bad that GW doesn't rely more on consumer input, but that's generally in their best interest financially. I hope at least you have taken something away from out attempted discussion.

One and only point.

GAME BALANCE

If you give someone something, you have to make it cost more, or take something away from them for the added benefit.

If you do none of said things, you then have to modify other armies to compensate.

Thats it.

And I said that the price should increase. I do not believe it should be a dramatic increase, then explained my reasoning. And no, you do not have to "give and take" for balance sake. Universal rules do not make specific exceptions. Granted, certain armies will be effected less, but the only army I can think of being most left out is Tau, and in all honesty, they have so many problems to be solved for their new codex, that this minor change is the least of their worries. Everyone else has enough S7+ weapons and their own coping devises that they're covered fine for the purposes of this proposed rule.


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I'll put some numbers to this.

Say an Autocannon is overall 20pts (including the Guardsmen to man it). It is S7, so the proposed rule only affects T3 units. At S7 it is really a light anti Armor and anti Heavy-Infantry weapon. So now to use this proposed rule we have to have it being used against units it is not really mean to, so not really going to be fired at most of the time (or at least whenever possible). So properly priced, we are already wasting points using it as anti light-infantry. But there is something to be said for multi-purposing.

Okay, so the increase in likelihood is about an 8% difference (5/6=~83% vs 11/12=~92%, subtract the former by the later). So the increase in price should only be, at most, 8% of the weapon's cost. For an Autocannon, well, only one out of the three uses effect, but we'll give the benefit of a doubt and increase the cost the full 8%.

What's the increase in points cost? 1.67pts. Or 2pts over the entire weapons team. Now that's not considering the two Guardsmen and their lasguns, and you're not using the Autocannons for their main intended role (which they are priced for). So the price increase would be even less!

The same problems would be encountered for larger weapons, and the increase would be just as minor. At most, I would say 10pts, but even that's a bit high. 5pts for an Earthshaker Cannon (S9), nothing for a Battlecannon (S8).

Hrm, from this and your proposed rapid fire rule change, it's pretty obvious you play guard, and every rule you're proposing is designed to buff IG more than any other army. You want this rule at virtually no cost on the army that has the absolute largest array of high strength blast weapons.

Which is kind of ironic, since IG are pretty much universally regarded as the most solid army to date.

@ Kroot Loops : The vast majority of my experience with WH40k is with IG, so by nature I will see problems/changes/inspirations in the issues that concern my army the most. However I do not make these suggestions simply to "buff" my army, as you might claim.

I have always felt dis-satisfied with the wounding system, as have a lot of others, in my experience, which is why I have proposed this rule. With regards to Rapid Fire, I starter playing at the end of 2nd Edition and the beginning of 3rd (both versions were being played when I started, and 3rd Edition Rule Book was barely a few months old). I liked how Rapid Fire worked then, as opposed to 4th and the current method. I am not complaining too much about that issue, it works fine generally, but I missed the old ability, which put more differences between different kinds of weapons, as well as the flexibility.

As for "irony," I am going to have to take that word away from you, because that is not what "irony" means, which itself is a bit ironic. Remember that just about everything in the Guards codex is T3, and there are a swathe of weapons S7 and above that get used against them commonly, so my proposed rule would hurt them probably more than it would help them (remembering that there are only three common weapons above S8 in the IG armory, the Demolisher, the Earthshaker, and the Lascannon). Their S8+ weapons are expensive and generally purposed to more specific roles than knocking on Heavy-Infantry, like busting tanks or crushing monster characters.

I will not deny it will be a boost to some weapons, such as the Earthshaker, but that might simply see it being employed more often.

I'm not going to turn this into a huge argument because it's simply not worth it.

I don't think any other army can put out nearly the number of high strength shots as IG, especially when it comes to blasts

Very few things in other armies equipped solely with rapid fire weapons would have any desire to assault (Save maybe dark eldar, no idea what they have), because they suck in CC and don't have 50 man blobs or commisars to charge in. Your 12 man fire warrior squad certainly has no desire to charge into cc.

it is then ironic that you are proposing rule changes with the language of helping armies over all, while in reality helping the army you play head and shoulders above any other.

IG are hardly the only T3 army, but they are certainly the most survivable of the lot thanks to being the easiest to fully mechanize or take in huge numbers.

Done, enjoy the rest of the thread.

Please don't take jabs then run, it's rather unprofessional.

Again, you have misused ironic, I am guessing only to try and jab with a label against an argument. Irony is intending one thing, and having the exact opposite happen (typically by logic and misinterpretation of the situation, than shear chance, I mind you. Having it rain on your wedding day is not ironic).

Both modifying Rapid Fire and this thread's proposed rule change do help all armies. Does it help some more than others? Yes, it does, it is universal. But the change is relatively minor, and how this would effect the points cost of those weapons is not the subject of this thread.

Again, it is at best an ~8% change in inflicted wounds, not completely eliminating the failed wounds. You would then still get your Armor, Cover, and Invulnerable Saves as they apply (so an AP3 Wound because an AP- Wound on the "rebound"). So even if we take that into consideration, we're talking about at minimum an average 50% survival of those wounds. Bringing us down to a ~4% change in inflicted wounds.

Points increases would have to be taken from there, but consideration must be kept as to how the weapon is initially intended to be used. Demolishers and Earthshakers would probably see the majority of that 4-8% weapon price increase full, while Battle Cannons would see less, as they only inflict additional wounds to T3 and below models.

So what are we talking about? 5pts? 10pts maybe? for the more expensive weapons? Mathed out, one or two points maybe for the non-blast weapons? I can see how this would horribly slew the game in favor of the Imperial Guard... That was sarcasm, a relative of irony but not itself ironic, as it is intended.

One definition of Irony is also to pretended ignorance in a discussion. Please explain to me the benefits of charging a WS 2 S 3 T 3 A 1 I 2 Ld 7 squad with no power weapons or offensive grenades and a max size of 12 into combat rather than taking two S5 shots?

And while fluff doesn't necessarily belong in the rules section, armies/units that are typically equipped with only rapid fire weapons are those who would not be inclined to normally charge into assaults.

As for High Str blasts, they're already wounding almost everything except the toughest creatures on a 2+ (and still that at Str 10) and risking instant death for many models. a roll of a 1 on the die just means a piece of terrain (or a companion next to you) shielded you, or there was a miraculous avoidance of a wound. There are armies that can drop a staggering number of high strength large blasts on you, and increasing their chance to wound is small only because 84% of the models hit are already wounded. If you hit 8, you cause 6.72 wounds, generally killing 6-7 outright if not in cover, 3-4 if in cover, for one shot, that's pretty good, and it doesn't really need a buff. Especially since it's not something shared by every army.

Oh, I think it needs a buff, albeit minor. Not only does it make things seem more fair (I'm sorry if you disagree, but where S3 is just as effective against T1 as S10, things are not as they should be) and fluffy. This is an issue I have heard since I started playing, why not solve it with a relatively simple rule?

As for your description of how one in six could survive, I call shenanigans and poor fluff writing. I could say that all Guardsmen should receive a 2+ cover save even in the open because they will flop down and continue to fight, it doesn't mean that it should be correct.

On the subject of irony, is that in the use as a literary device? Or actual usage? I have never heard it used with intended misdirection by the "victim." Or have you used a non-sequitur?

Socratic Irony

It's a game, and Like many games, WH uses the premise that a certain result always fails, be it the high number or the low. We see it a lot more being a d6 based game rather than a d20 or d100 (not to mention we tend to make a lot more rolls). I think it works fine the way it does now, and don't see any need to give it a buff.

And while your guardsmen couldn't flop down to claim a 2+ cover save, they could flop down to claim a 6+ cover save. Hrm, look at that, the same odds to save as to not be wounded.

Ah, "verbal" irony. I consider that "sarcasm." I prescribe to "dramatic" irony.

I think what you're basically trying to say is the d6 systems have limitations? Which I would agree with, but I think this is a pretty simple solution to a limitation. And as you said, it is a game, so we can make up and use whatever rules we want to make things more "realistic." As was my example with Guardsmen dropping to the prone for cover. It is a poor example, I will admit that much, but still has a valid point of interpretation.

Except that in a competitive game (and any game with a winner and a loser is competitive on some level) such as this, I would say 'Balance' is a greater concern than 'Realistic'. And lets face it, realism isn't a strength of 40k. I mean come on, it's the 41st millennium and people are fighting with swords and giant metal mittens?

Are you saying you can't fight with giant metal mittens?! I have been doing it so wrong for so long....

Are you implying that this will somehow incur some sort of great, horrible imbalance in 40k? Which would thus require that 40k is already in some sort of "balance" already, or was at some time.... because I would have to disagree with that, and just about every player would as well.

As I have said several time already, we're not talking about a 50%, or 30%, or 10%, or even an effective 8% change. We're talking about a 1-8% change under optimal circumstances. If 40k is in such a precarious balance, then why even have a proposed rules section? Or is it so close to toppling over? In that case, there would have to be much bigger swathes for rules modification to fix it than to worry about this.

if the change is so small, then why propose it at all?

40k is definitely not a well balanced game, but why add to the imbalance? Lets put it this way. In blast templates alone, some armies could easily lay down 3-7 high strength large blasts in a turn. Conversely, some can lay down zero. Considering that the armies that can lay down those 3-7 templates are already on the 'strong' side of the balance scales, and some of those that can not are already on the 'weak' side of the scale, the proposed rule only increases the imbalance.

Then you have to consider the effects could be greater than the statistics would have you believe, and it could cause some of the armies on the 'strong' side due to assault performance to lose ground.

Simply put, the game being unbalanced is not a good excuse to make it more unbalanced.

I think it may be a good change, but just keep it at a re-roll.

Eldar Own wrote:I think it may be a good change, but just keep it at a re-roll.

May I ask why? Do not forget, any weapons or situations that would have given a reroll on wounding can not reroll again, as you can only reroll once. Not only that, but instead of making it a one in twelve chance of survival, you have made it a one in thirty six chance of survival, which is pretty much instant death for everyone who is hit by the weapon, which isn't what I want. I am going to guess you are insinuating that you would just reroll to wound rolls and all normal actions apply (AP, Instant Death, etc...).

I was thinking of Demonolishers. A Demolishers on seven or eight Marines or even Terminators is a big difference 2+ vs 2+ re-roll.

7 * 1/6 == 1 or 2 live.

w/ re-roll everything dies. yikes!

Nothing is certain in the Grim Darkness maybe keep it at a 2+. Of course on the other hand it DID hit them.

Maybe what it could be is a rule for auto-wounding, similar to AP. Heck it would even speed up the game. Maybe put that in with modifiers to-hit.

If you want to keep it simple, and still change it, you could try making it a 2+ roll on a d10. No rerolls or complications needed. you just need to find a d10.

Though, I doubt you could convince someone you play against to complicate the game more by changing the rules. Games take long enough as it is with people delaying games for various reasons, and don't need an additional layer of rolling for something that isn't even in need of fixing, compared to clearing up bad rules.