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AFAIK in my game, I've been playing it that pen goes straight through toughness bonus as well as armour. Possibly my players (who to be perfectly frank know the rules much better than I do) have been playing it properly, it would account for some of the disparity that happens in fights. However it seems to fit to me that the Pen should tear through flesh and armour equally.

As to the Horde rules, I was doing this anyway. The stat blocks for individuals in DH/RT/BC suffer the "3.5" problem of being basically the same as a player character, meaning I as a GM have to remember a lot more stuff and have to think carefully about everything. That's fine if I have prepped it properly, but the nature of my campaign as a totally open sandbox means I can only really prep once the guys have gotten their teeth into an endeavour- there is usually some stuff at the start of any endeavour where they do something unexpected and I have to ad lib. Which is perfectly fine and I enjoy it, but it means running complex enemies out of the book with little prep time. I feel this makes them much less dangerous and effective. For that reason I focus on the big bads and villains and abstract the various minions and so on. They have wounds and damage soaks but it's all pretty abstracted and I also abstract their stats and damage to a degree. I know my players read this forum, so I'll also say that I do not abstract important villains or major threats in this way . And I am consistent with how many wounds or soaks I give the other guys. The horde rules seem like FFG's nod towards this sort of thing that I am sure plenty of GM's do anyhow, and just giving us a quick and easy way to do it.

H.B.M.C. wrote:Yes, I had a Slaaneshi Apostate Priestess who had two minions - a tiny little weedy creature who was excellent at driving and stealth (my chauffeur), and a big bruiser Servitor thing with a big chainblade and a flamer. She was the character I used during play-testing, and she was heaps of fun. Looking forward to getting back to that game.

Hah, the chauffeur is a nice idea. And good to know that yours was an Apostate and not a Psyker, now I feel a little less like copying you.

As for the Horde rules, maybe I just have to gather more experience about how they "feel" in the midst of a game. We only had a single session where we made use of them yet, so my scepticism is mostly the result of how odd the rules read straight out of the book. It's just that I look at them and suddenly imagine what kind of situations they could conjure with a neutral outside perspective.
I like heroic, but at the same time I dislike when said heroics go beyond what feels appropriate for the setting.

But eh, that's really just minor nitpicking. My main gripes remain with escalating toughness and the huge gap between character types.

DaBoss: I vaguely recall a few fan attempts at different mass combat rules somewhere in-between Hordes and normal combat. Stuff like this - maybe that would help, too?

The Horde rules have really worked when the hordes are secondary to the main threats.

Ages ago we had a particular mission where there was a Hive Tyrant, two Tyrant Guard, a bunch of Genestealers and two Endless Hordes of Hormagaunts. The Hormagants felt natural, and the horde rules worked, because they weren't the focus. They were dangerous enough so that you could not ignore them, but there were also bigger threats around.

Just fighting hordes and nothing else doesn't always work.

Mhm, I think I see what you mean. Thanks for the insight.