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I AM going to be altering saving throws away from "3+" and more toward "Roll for damage reduction" - I'm also going to be altering damage values to be more 'realistic' (Most things will do be able to kill a human if they hit). But yes, MCs and Vehicles should have dwindling durability - it feels cool and can be easily worked in, I think.

I have used the following for detailed damage on 'large targets'(Vehicles M/cs.) in my rules in development.

Large targets, (tanks bunkers, monsters, etc.) rely on heavy armour to survive .As they are large, (easily targeted) and usualy much less nimble than the lightly armoured infantry.

All large tagets have higher armour values to make up for thier lack of stealth /nimbleness, and so can ONLY be effected by specialised anti tank type wepons .(Weapon with an armour penetration bonus.)

When a large target is hit by a weapon the degree of sucess, (how much the save is failed by,) determines the degree of damage.
{Weapon damage (total) - armour value= score required to roll over to save.)

If the large target rolls over its target score NO damage takes place.
If the large target rolls equal to its target score , it becomes supressed.
If the large target fails its target score by 1 it looses 1 Wound/structure point
If the large target fails its target score by 2 or 3 it looses 2 Wounds/structurepoints.
If the large target fails its target score by 4 or more it is destroyed!

Eg am IG LMR is hit in the front AR 14 by a Las cannon , Dam 12+D6 armour pen bonus.
(The attacker rolls a 5! 12+5=17.)
14-17 =3 the LMR has to roll over 3 (4+ save ).
If it rolls 4 5 or 6 it takes NO damage.
if it rolls 3 it is supressed,
If it rolls 2 it looses 1 structue point
If it rolls 1 it looses 2 structure points.

If the Las cannon hit the front of a Rhino AR11.
And still had a total pen value of 17.
11 -17 =6.
If it rolls a 6 it is supressed,
If it rolls a 5 it looses one structure point .
If it rolls a 3 or a 4 it looses 2 structure points
If it rolls 2 or less it is destroyed.

Large target divide thier wounds/structure points up into armaments /attacks mobility.
Eg land raider 3 armament/2 mobility.

Each armament hit stops a weapon from funtioning (and looses a close combat attack if a MC.).
When all armament is destryed , it looses mobility .When a large targets has no mobility left is it destroyed.

EG Large target with mobility of 2 Movement of 6.
Will have its movment reducd to 3" after loosing one mobility wound/structure point.

This just uses one resolution method for ALL large targets that require detailed damage..

One problem might be that I'd like for durability to be expressed roughly in 'humans'. A human is 5, a space marine is 8 with 2 wounds, a guardian is 4 with better armour, something like a carnifex would be 15-20 with multiple wounds.

Another problem comes when you have larger vehicles, combined with poor rolls - this allows for many more things to 'accidentally' damage vehicles.

I like the wounds splitting between weapons and armour - perhaps vehicle armylist entries can be split up like Units -

Leman Russ - 150p

Treads D15 W2, Sv10+1D6
Main Battle Cannon D20 W2 Sv12+1D6
Lascannon Sponsons x2 D10 W1 Sv8+1D6
Front Hull D30 W3 Sv16+1D6
Side Hull D26 W2 Sv14+1D6
Rear Hull D20 W1Sv12+1D6

Numbers like this allow many armies to choose between scrapping the tank, or rendering it useless.

This also allows the Save Value, rather than the Durability, to determine which weapons can and cannot affect it. Weapons like the Lasgun, with only 5 damage, can't particularly hurt anything on such a vehicle as a Leman Russ. Bolters, which fire large-calibre RPGs, have a much greater chance - at 12 Damage, they can affect most things if the rolls go their way - enough bolter rounds should be able to ablate even the mighty armour of a Leman Russ!

I was proposing ONLY vehiles and Mcs have this type of detailed damage resolution.

All other unit ypes simply have an AR value and a number of wounds/structure points per unit.When the unit looses the wounds/Structure points the unit looses the apropriate amount of models.(Same as now but mechanical units like Necrons have 'structure points' because they are not oranic.)

As we dont remove models to show damage on vehicle and MCs.We can use this reduction of Wounds/Structure point to show errosion of ability over time.

I was using
AR... 14/12/11.

SP... M2 A 4

This vehicle has 14 armour in front facing, 12 armour on side facing, and 11 armour on rear facing.

It has 3 main weapon systems, and it has mobilty that can take 2 hit before being immobilised.

It is basicaly a slight change to the current AV system to allow more detail and margins of sucess.
I dont think we need to list detalis for each seperate location on a vehicle do we?(2nd ed hit locations were fine for skirmish, but too complicated for the battle game.IMO,)

IF only AT weapons have the armour penertation bonus(+d6 to armour pen.)Then large vehicles/MCs become more survivable.
If you get your meltagun within 6" of a Land raiader you deserve to detroy it!(IMO.)

This is more realistic , I can fire an SA 80/H&K MP5 at the side of a Challenger II all day and not make any impact.

I prefer to think of weapon groups as,
Close combat weapons , used for fightoing in assault .(Knives swords glaives axes etc.)
Small arms , the main weapons of non vehicle units.(Pistols and rifles etc.)
Support weapons , the specialised Anti tank or anti personell weapons units have.(FLamers, plasma guns melts guns etc.)
Fire support weapons , the sepcialised weapons that can not move and fire.

Just throwing out ideas...

One main problem of 40K as it is already is that a lot of armies can't affect vehicles without dedicating far too many resources towards antitank - while I could spend considerable time and effort balancing each army's armylist options, this still invalidates many WYSIWYG modelers and players.

While I get the point about modern weaponry having very rigid purposes, that's not what 40K is about. 40K is watching the fat acolyte run along the barrel of a leman russ in order to stab a bloodthirster in the eye with a knife. 40K is fumbles the psyker. 40K is space pirates and space elfs in an 80s metal space opera - and I think it needs to retain that feeling of 'awesome but not really serious'. There's always going to be the chunk that wants the epic stories, and the chunk that wants the realism, and the chunk that will hate anything (the author/producer they dont like) puts out, but in the end, it's the fact that EVERYTHING IS FREAKING AWESOME BY NECESSITY, BECAUSE EVERYTHING THAT WASNT AWESOME GOT KILLED, TERRIBLY that draws it all together into a big bundle of F***YEAH

My goal here is not to alienate longtime players - I want to bring back a lot of the things that made playing games fun back in the day - Tactical decisions, awesome benefits for awesome models, special characters being >special<, and most importantly, the feel you get when your mans kill the other guys' mans.

When the basic weapon is a laserbeam that can rip a man apart from 300 metres, and it only goes upward from there, AND I'm trying to improve game-speed and reduce rules AND prevent rock-paper-scissors, having something a little bit simpler - and not to mention, something that uses a system that's already in place and makes sense for everything else - seems... more elegant here.

Having vehicles be 'units' that the firing player can allocate damage toward makes sense from a practical standpoint - it's not an abstract group of infantry looking out for one another and their squad leader. It's a gorram tank. You target the crap out of the parts you want to get rid of

I also want to, for the most part, make shooting more mobile as a whole. Rapidfire weapons will be able to shoot at full range on the move, but not assault. Heavy weapons units will be able to move around the heavy weapon model to act as spotters, as long as the model itself doesnt move. Disembarking from a vehicle that hasn't moved wont count as moving for shooting purposes. Shooting from a vehicle will simply impose a -BS penalty for every X" moved. There's no point in adding an AV system when the damage reduction system works well enough to keep away 'weak' weapons.

Definitely appreciate the ideas, lots of stuff happening because of them - keep em coming!

Hi again.
I can see you have a firm idea of the asthetic of the end game play you want!
This is cool.

I am trying to work out the practical game mechanics and resolution methods that allow you to get there by the most apropriate route...

SO we are sort of starting at opposite ends of the development.Hopefully we can meet in the middle!

At the start I said modern warfare is about a BALANCE of mobility fire power and assault.

IF we use firepower MAINLY to control enemy mobility , (damaging vehicle M/Cs and supressing infantry.)
Then ASSAULTS be come the way to take objectives and destroy hard targets....
And this IS where the heroics come in isnt it?

Name ANY land battle in WWII that had its objective achived without infantry assault, becuase I can NOT think of one.
(Even the battle of Kursk , the biggest tank battle ever used 100, 000s of infantry to close assault the tanks the AT guns couldnt kill!)

PROPER heroes do insane acts of heroism in the real world, that makes 40k heroics look pathetic by comparison.
EG
Pegasus Bridge (1944), A Major took on THREE German Tanks armed with a just a PIAT> After his loader was killed and he was blown up TWICEHe still took out ALL THREE tanks!
Deafened and blinded in one eye, carrying 147 pieces of shrapnel and bandaged from head to foot, he got up , pushed the medic out of his way, grabbed a 2" mortar and fired it from the hip to beat back a german infantry assault before loosing conciusoness! .

Anyhow, I prefer using a real world reference to develop a game from.As it keep things intutive and straight forward....
As everyone knows how it works, even if it is just from watching war films...

The current 40k game focuses on the closse assault by ABSTRACTING everything else.I propose achiving similar results by better DEFINITION of other elements.

I definitely agree for the most part, which is why I'm basing most statistics off of humans - Everything will be more-or-less 'to scale' with humans, using a gun that kills humans and armour that blocks that gun sometimes.

I think the main thing with overhauling is going to be the fact that we've got to do it Top-Down - We have accepted, applicable lore, with lots of accepted - and frankly, awesome - weapons and vehicles. The overhaul is going to be bringing them MORE in line with how fluff works - weapons that are supposed to brutally rend foes into pieces will be more brutal and piece-rending, weapons that rely on mass of firepower will have more mass of firepower, and weapons that do weird, gimmicky fluffthings will have better supporting rules to do so rather than "make a characteristics test."

The big thing is going to be expanding the range of numbers at which models can operate, while keeping things down to as few dice rolls as possible in order to facilitate this. Breaking damage into Hit Damage Reduce is one of the easiest, as it gives you 3 modifiers and 3 rolls, for a huge range of possibilities. Im working on more ways to consolidate ranged and melee hit roll resolution, but we might have to settle for simply using the same damage resolution instead - they're simply too different in the lore, involving completely different aspects of fighting.

This isn't to say that it's going to be more powerful, but that it will be different - it will hopefully feel more like the two sides are fighting each other rather than just hitting at different times.

Yea, the 4 BS then a modifier sounds a lot easier way to keep track of things. As for the rest, most of it sounds decent and that is a long list.

It all down to how you want the game to work realy.

The current rule set for 40k , scripts all interaction very tightly , which reduces the amount of tactical freedom, and ups the strategic loading.Every unit is designed specificaly for a particular task.(To sell more minatures.)

The alternative is ' loose scripting' which alllows far more player input, and allows players to experiment and find actual tactical options from multiple sutiuation involving multiple units.

If you only have experiance with 40k rules ,you may not be aware of how restrictive the rules are.

And assuming you have to write rules with a similar level of restriction to control how the game plays is a serious error IMO.

I am not suggesting for one minuite we LOOSE anything from the 40k universe.
BUT if the rules are more intuitive , they need far less explanation , which allows more room for more rules and therfore more gameplay.

Have you looked at any other rule sets out there ?

I agree a 3 stage damage resolution is about the sweet spot.

However, we have the chioce of covering everything intuitivley , by using real world interaction as a basais.

1)Roll to spot the target,(simple Fog Of war.)Based on the TARGETS skill.

(Use the balistic skill of the unit to improves its effective range.)

2)Resolve PRIMARY damage by comparing the units armour value to the attackers weapon damage value.
(This is remove casualties from 'infantry/beast' units, and determine the magnitude of damage vs vehicles M/C targets.)

3) Resolve DETAILED damage by rolloing for 'strutural damage' on vehicles M/C, and supression roll for 'infantry/ beasts.' units.

Are you happy with the basic weapon profile.
Name/Eff Range/ Damage/Effect/ Notes.

We could use notes for special abilities like Parry, Chain edged, etc.

I still think there's no reason to separate vehicle armour from other armours - the only difference between dreadnoughts and terminators is size and construction, they use mostly the same materials - it's counterintuitive to use separate damage systems, and I think you're complicating things by adding it in as a step.

For Fog of War, it's generally assumed that things granting FoW-like abilities will fall under rules similar to night fighting - although I do want to remove night-fighting, I also want to keep EW and psyker/hyperadvanced 'communications' disturbances in the game. For most other things, I'd rather just use TLoS and assume that there's enough communications and satellite support to deal with basic sight/targeting issues - That is, there should be no need to 'spot' a target unless it has explicitely more advanced disruption wargear/rules than 'average'.

I like the idea of having EV boosted above or below certain ranges. I don't like the idea of having weapons fire outside of a set range - it seems it would be abused too casually. I don't know how to effectively reconcile the two without giving weapons overall a range increase, and giving them a basic" 'effective' range, for which every 4" outside of is +1Target EV - For example, a Bolter would have an Effective range of 0-12", with 13-30" continuing to get 2 shots, but at increasing penalties.

Primary damage is pretty much just that. Add up your damage, roll the variables you've been given, and then compare to reduction also with their variables. For humans, It's 5+D6 reduction for every 10 damage taken, and the Lasgun penetrates 1 Armour, dealing 5+D6 damage - working out to about 2/3 of the damage going through against humans.

For example, within effective range, 20 shots are fired.

Assume 12 hit, 60+12D6, 102 damage. Owning player allocates the damage along save groups (in this case, against guardsmen, all will have the same armour)

10 tics of damage reduction trigger, with 2 left over, for 50 reduction - 10 is pierced, for 40, +10D6, 75 reduction total for 27 damage.

damage is applied to the save group 1 model at a time, at owners' discretion. Guardsmen have 5 durability, so 5 models are removed.


Something like "going to ground" or hitting the dirt, for an evasion buff, would be done with an opposed initiative test - I feel it doesn't make sense to have a unit being shot at be able to react in time, every time. I also want to include initiative in a lot more areas, so yeah.

Yeah - a universal (CC, Ranged, Support) item system is probably best.

Name
Range (Inches, Close Combat, N/A)
Damage
Effects and notes can be one section, I feel.

I probably didnt explain why I showed the slight difference between infantry units, and vehicle units in the detailed resolution .

As infantry /beast units,(All units except MCs and vehicles.) Are made up of multiple models , we simply remove models to show how much damage the unit has taken.
Eg 5 terminators , with 2 wounds per model fail to save 4 wounds, we remove 2 model to show this damage .

Then we roll to see if the volume of fire recived is enough to supress the terminators.

Larger heavily armoured units , like Vehicles and Monsters are represented by single models that have to record damage seperatley.
These units are assumed to be totaly confident untill they are hit with a weapon damage high enough damage fail thier save.(target nuber supressed,(shaken) lower than target number take damage and neutralised.(Stunned.)
.
So all units have an armour value .
All units add a dice roll to thier armour value to see if they can save damage from a weapon hit.(If armour +dice is greater than weapon hit damage.)

Infantrry/beast units simply remove models to show physical damage , then roll for morale damage ,(Supression /Neutralisation.)

Vehicles /MC record damage on a record card.

I think having 'Effect', as a distinct characteristic to show number of shots-hits/area of effect/ or template is worth keeping seperate as it is a core definition of weapon effect.IMO

'Notes' to show 'weapon group', (assault, small arms , support and fire support.)And Special Effects, like ignore cover, armour penetration bonus, parry , chain edge, 2 handed, master crafted, etc.

I was going to define supression and neutralisation like this...
Supressed units ,
May ONLY return fire.(Shoot at unit that shot at it.)
OR move to interveening cover at half speed,
OR retire to cover at full speed.
Supressed units will NEVER volentarily move out of cover.(But may be pushed back in assault as normal)
Vehicles and MC s may turn to face incoming fire ,(presenting highest armour facing.) Instead of moving to cover.

Neutralised units will ONLY fight if assaulted.Otherwise they take NO actions untill rallied.

Routed units MUST move as fast as they are able away from ALL identified enemy units .(If surrounded the unit remains stationary and takes no actions.)

IF we use rolling to aquire targets, it makes targeting a simple tactical decision.(And negates the need to depend heavily on LOS blocking terrain.)
(Generaly used in modern wargames.)

Rather than heavy handed and abstracted, you can see eveything anywhere on the table ,but you have to shoot at the closest target unless you pass a LD test...
(Only used in 40k, AFAIK.)


Resolving a simple ranged combat.

IG unit with Sgnt 1 las pistol+ Chain sword. 7 las guns a Heavy bolter and a flamer.
Fire on a mob of 20 Orks 21" away.
Only the 7 lasguns (damage 5) and the Heavy Bolter(damage 7) are in range..

The ork boys have a AV2. they have to roll 7 dice to save the Las gun hits, and need to roll 4 or more.(4+2=6 which beats the las gun damage of 5)
The ork boys save 3 hits.4 boys are removed as casualties.

The heavy bolters has Effect value of 3.(3 shots.)And a supression bonus of D6.
The ork boys roll 3 dice to save from the heavy bolter , they need to roll 6s to save.(6+2=8 which is higher than 7)
And they fail to make any saves!And remove another 3 casualties.

The Ork Boys mob has a supression rating of 15.(13 boys left with an AV of 2)
The IG squad have supression value of 10 shots + D6 supression bonus(from the heavy bolter.)
If the IG player roll a 6 for the supression bonus the ork mob are supressed. (10+6=16 which is higher than 15).

TTFN

Oh no, I understand why vehicles and mcs need to have bits go missing - I just think that for units of 1 model, different parts of their profile can be explained as different parts to hit - a model made up of different units, where the claws (Weapons), legs and tail (treads), body (front/side hull), and head (rear hull) are all different targetable parts, instead of creating an entirely new system of resolution, just for them.

I'd like to stay away from additional supplements, such as memory-aide cards - simply because this would be meant to played with existing models and 'codex updates', also to be included in the overhaul - standalone, as it were. I can do up templates for unit cards and include them no problem, but I've always felt that games requiring cards to remember unit interactions were not elegant enough in their rules, and it's something I'd like to stay away from that option for as long as possible.

With how I've got it now, if your opponent is twice as good as you in close combat, you hit them half as much, and they hit you twice as much. I'd like to keep THIS level of intuit as the norm across.

For your firing example, you've removed toughness/durability from the equation - a hit that beats av is an unsaved wound - how is that going to feel against marines? As well, weapons now cannot affect anything with an AV equal or higher to their damage, ever - very binary, very limiting.

The current firing system I have in place is balanced, but not very elegant...

20 Orks, with an EV of 4, get shot by the same IG unit

Since their EV is only 1 less, the IG still only hits on 3's. If it was 4 less, the IG would've hit on 2's.

Although I'm overhauling the 'assault, rapidfire, heavy' system, for now, 7 Lasguns and the Heavy Bolter fire.

5 lasguns hit. 2 of the 3 HB shots hit (using average rolls, once again). Allocated at 1 hit per model along the unit, 7 boys take hits - they're all of the same save group.

The Orks have an Armour Save of 3+1D6 Per 10. Lasguns deal 5 damage and penetrate 1 armour. HBs deal 12 damage and penetrate 3 Armour.

So against the (average) 60 damage from Lasguns, 33 is saved. Against the (average) 30 from HB, 11 is saved - 56 damage against Orks, with a majourity Toughness of 7, is 8 Wounds, to be allocated against the save groups that contributed armour - in this case, simply boyz.

With this, we allow for different armours to take different saves. We allow the owning player to keep his 'special' units for as long as he can. We have hits allocated around the unit, so that hit allocation matters. We have wound allocation based on armour save, meaning that if the saves taken by a majority D5 Sv5 unit has 2 D8 Sv8 models, and they contributed their saves, they still have to be allocated wounds.


When I get around to math hammering out a bunch more weapons against HEQ, FEQ, and MEQ, I'll start on the suppression systems - I don't think it's fair to have a suppression system be arbitrary without looking at the units and weapons that are going to be using it the most. I also need to math out the Morale system a lot better before we can start creating morale effects - right now it's just simple modifiers of a base value of 12 on 3D6.

I was suggesting units cards,
But obviously vehicles and MCs could have Boxes on them where you mark damage as it is taken.
Or you can simply mark the damage on the model with smoke /bllod drops or whatever.
Its not big deal realy... just use which ever method you prefer.

When combat is using low velovity primative weapons , (like swords and clubs in WHFB,) and the armour is giving basic protection, and the weapons are not guarenteed to cause significant trama.
Eg a sword may just pierce the leather armour and scratch you.

BUT in the far future where the arms race has escalated as it does, and the weapons are high powered to defeat the seriuosly advanced armour of the day...then significant trauma is guarenteed if the armour doesnt do its job.... .

The toughness of the target is only a TINY fraction of its total resistance to damage in this sci fi setting isnt it?(Seperate T values make sense in WHFB but not in 40k.)
.Would you concider this resolution method if the Armour value was representing the targets overall resistance to damage?
Eg armour save toughness, FNP, invunerable saves etc all rolled into one value.

If you are HIT, and you do not save you become a casualty.(Simple logical and intuitive.)

High armour brings natural invunerability to low damage weapons.
BUT ALL units are suseptable to supresion.

So Terminators may be invunerable to physical damage from laser rifles .
But if they recieve enough VOLUME of fire they can still be supreesed by them.

This is how you get the balance of firepower assault and mobility.
SHOOTING mainly controls enemy movement..(Supressing units and disabling vehicles.)

I was simply trying to cover all the basic elements in a straight forward way.

Although I understand your method it is a tad over complicated for my tastes.

If I'm invulnerable to a persons' weapon I am definitely not going to stop my charge toward them. Does a tank stop moving toward a group of lightly-armed fodder? Especially when its pilot knows that that fodders' allies won't shoot the rocket launcher at it once he's close-combat engaged them?

While the arms race might have escalated, very little of it is being used. The Eldar are some of the very few capable of utilizing most or all of their race's technology - they rarely lose an even-numbered fight. Space Marines are using maintenance armour and inefficiently created 20,000 year old weapon patterns. Imperial Guard are using tractors and colonial power generators for their plasma weapons. Orks are using make believe and sicks and stones. Add to this the necessary 'scale' abstraction, where a guardsman model must represent at least 10 actual guardsmen if I want to shunt Space Marines to a closer representation of their fluff, and having Damage vs Durability begins to make a lot more sense - as was stated in another thread

Videogames, by necessity, have to be balanced a lot better than the table top - you purchase the game in its whole and have access to all factions. No one is going to play half your game if the factions it represents are underpowered or not fun to play. With the tabletop, when you purchase an army that's underpowered, you've created an investment - you'll still have that army when new rules are released. If you want a new videogame, you have to go out and buy it again.

I want to start with the idea that, if I can make the tabletop game as easy to balance and tweak as a videogame, it will be more fun for each player, and less waiting between updates will be needed. This means that giving units and models health values is a great start - it lets the game be altered on a fundamental level for balance, without needing to tweak other parts - combined with Points Cost, it can be very simple to balance a unit by just tweaking both values.

In regards to suppression being a secondary 'casualty' condition' - as was stated before, having terminators face down guardsmen with lasguns and become suppressed by their fire ignores every chunk of fluff in the game. In 40K, to even earn terminator armour you have to do things that make Pegasus Bridge look like a cakewalk, survive in working condition, and prove yourself to be uncorrupted by chaos afterward. Usually by yourself.

We have people who like Terminators so much, in fluff and mechanically, that they field entire armies of them - for we must remember, we're trying to pitch this overhaul to people already familiar with the game, already in possession of the models that they like, and who will only bother reading it if it both suitably fits with their mental image of such models, and suitably fixes parts of the games these people find lacking - For such an army to be suppressed by a few hundred points of guardsmen is sort of missing the point, especially if they're invincible to their weapons - not to mention, weapons would have to scale very poorly - otherwise, weapons like the Autocannon and Assault Cannon would become ridiculously overpowered in comparison, whereas things like the lascannon would be fairly useless because if its maximum of 1 shot. With a damage system, you can have weapons like lascannons tear through units as they scythe across the battlefield, autocannons can represent the huge explosive shells they use, and boltguns too. Assault Cannons can represent their hail of shots in many ways other than just straight damage - as removing tonnes of models a turn (Twinlinked, BS4, high damage) would be silly. When you have a binary damage system, you remove a lot of the dynamic play that historically goes along with 40K.

Also, having suppression be independent of damage really creates a MSU environment, which has ALWAYS been easily abused in the 40k game - especially since I intend to move AWAY from the FOC selection regime and into a %points style.

I understand the direction you want to steer this in - it just doesnt represent 40K very well, and would be better suited towards a 'modern' combat TT, instead of a space opera one.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
DAMAGE SEQUENCE
1) - Check which models can attack or shoot.

2) - Roll to hit. Roll a D6 for each attack or shot to determine if it has hit or not.

3) – Calculate Damage. Add the damage from all of your weapons that hit, and Roll for additional damage as specified.

4) – Calculate Reduction. This step is explained in much greater detail soon.

5) – Apply Damage. Any damage that was not reduced is applied to models, one by one.

6) - Remove Casualties. The Owner of the Target Unit removes any models reduced to 0 Wounds or less.

CHECK ATTACKING MODELS & ROLL TO HIT
The first step is to check which models can shoot or attack. To determine the number of shots fired or attacks made, consult the Tactical and Assault Phase’s sections, respectively. Afterwards, you Roll To-Hit for each attack or shot. The procedure is the same, but the characteristics and charts used depend on whether it is a shooting or close combat attack. Other forms of damage may skip this step altogether, and hit or damage automatically. The bonuses from having more MS or BS are cumulative.

Close combat
For Attacks in Close Combat, compare the MS of the attacking model with the majority MS of the defenders. The Attacker normally hits on a Roll of 3+.

If its MS is lower, it hits on a Roll of 4+.
If its MS is at most half of the defenders MS, it hits on a Roll of 5+.
If its MS is both at most half and at most 6 less than the defenders MS, it hits on a Roll of 6+.
If its MS is at least double the defenders, it hits on a Roll of 2+.
If its MS is at least double, and at least 6 more than the defenders, it hits automatically.

Shooting
For Shooting Attacks, compare the BS of the Firing Model with the majourity EV of the target Unit.
The Firer normally hits on a Roll of 3+.

If the Target Unit's EV is at least 2 better, the Firing Model hits on a 4+.
If it's at least 4 better, the Firing Model hits on a 5+.
If it's at least 6 better, the Firing Model hits on a 6+.
If it's at least 8 better, the Firing Model must Re-Roll damage, picking the worse of the two sets.
If it's at least 10 better, the Firing Model cannot hit the Target Unit.

If the Firing Unit's BS is at least 4 better, it hits on a 2+.
If it's at least 6 better, it may Roll twice for damage from Shooting, picking the better of the two sets.
If it's at least 8 better, it Hits automatically.
If it's at least 10 better, it may Fire twice against the Target Unit.




Table: Attacker's To-Hit Roll for Close Combat
Attacker's Martial Skill
Required Roll To Hit
Equal or Better
3+
Less
4+
At Most Half
5+
At Most Half, At Most 10 Less
6+
At Least Double
2+
At Least Double, At Least 10 More
Automatic

Table: Attacker's To-Hit Roll for Shooting
Firing Model's Ballistics Skill
To-Hit
Firing Model's Ballistics Skill
To-Hit
At Least 2 Worse
4+
At Least 4 Better
2+
At Least 4 Worse
5+
At Least 6 Better
Roll Twice for Damage (May Pick Best Set)
At Least 6 Worse
6+
At Least 8 Better
Automatic
At Least 8 Worse
6+, Re-Roll Damage (Must Pick Worse Set)
At Least 10 Better
Automatic, may Fire Twice.
At Least 10 Worse
Cannot Hit
--
--

Hi again.
If you are invunerable to 'severe enough physical harm to render you a casualty', this does NOT mean the volume of fire can not render you 'temporarily distracted/disoriented.
(Eg supressed.)
Eg firing a paint ball gun at some one,(Properly protected,) will not cause severe trauma.
How ever if 20 people fire paint ball guns at you rapidly the stinging and paint splash would be uncomfortable/disorenting enought to make you seek cover.

Armoured vehilces are porly protected vs a determined infantry assault.And ANY small arms fire , make vehicles 'button up'.(Close hatches, and rely on vision slits etc.And this restricted behaviuor is classed as supressed in some games.)

Having physical and MORALE damage from shooting IS present in ALL good modern battle games.(E.A., Dirstside, FoW,FaD, etc.)

My point was we need to establish a solid framework to work from.A well defined reference to use as a basis.
Rather than the subjective artistic licence thet has changed contunualy over the last quater of a decade.

If we know how combats ACTUALY works in real life , we can then make them work in game. And if we know the scale of interactions we can map them onto in game interactions to arrive at better ballance.

The reason 40k is so unballanced is becuase it is developed subjectily , NOT objectivley.

Anyhow...

Can we summrise steps 3 to 5?
Why do we have to calculate damage of weapons?Why not just put it down as a weapon characteristic?
Why calculate reduction, why not put it down as the units Armour/Damage resistance value?
Any hits on targates models that dont pass thier saves, cause wounds.

This gives us..
1)Check models have Los and in range etc.

2) Roll to see-hit

3)Target roll D6 and adds it to thier AR value, if it beats the damage value of the weapon hit the hit is saved.

4) Apply unsaved damage to unit.(Remove apropriate number of models/ mark damage on model?record sheet.).

6)(Check for supression.)

How do you fancy using the same mechanic for determining roll to hit in ranged and Assault combat?
Assuming models have Los and are in weapons range.

Eg.
Attacker value is at least 4 greater than target value hit on 2+
Attacker value is at least 2 greater than targets value , hit on 3+
Attacker value the same as targets value , hit on 4+
Attacker value at least 2 less than targets value , hit on 5+
Attacker value at least 4 less than targat value , hit on 6+

Can we simply assume targets out of view/out of range are impossible to hit.
And have a small set of modifiers?

I understand you like the WHFB in space vibe.But why are you trying to attract gamer that like the current 40k?They will just stick to the 'official rules' .
Gamers wanting a more tactical rich game , (with alternating unit activations etc.)Will be looking for well defined intuitive rules IMO.

I agree we should have morale damage from shooting. I disagree that it should happen from shooting that doesn't or CAN'T affect a unit, and I also disagree with the the idea that weapons and damage should be binary. They may work for games like FoW where each model represents a single tank or a small squad of men, but in 40K it's assumed that there's at least a dozen, if not a hundred guardsmen for each infantry model. It's assumed that the swarms of the tyranids are endless, and that the hordes of chaos are boiling up from the warp around you. The only true-to-scale armies are supposed to be the marines - marines in armour designed to put together space ships and withstand orbital insertion. Marines who wield the mighty bolter like a watergun. Marines who can cleave through foot-thick poles of solid steel with their chainswords.

The reason that CQC is so prevalent in 40K is because of all the EW - most humans have to rely on psykers and their own eyes just to see a couple hundred yards in front of them. Marines get by on the grace of their geneseed. Eldar see the future, and Tyranids have the hive mind - and everyone is blocking each other to the largest extent that they can. Combats come down to the last thousand yards out of necessity, not just because it's freakin' awesome, and the tactics and combat weapons have evolved to suit that. The arms race of weapons and armour ended when eldar reached their 'perfection' and when the imperium blocked itself in with Heresy - the only race still 'advancing' is the Tau, and despite my taulove, they do not have the numbers. Orks fit to match their opponents. Tyranids fit to beat their opponents, but are stuck at roughly lightspeed. Dark Eldar are busy with their decadence. Chaos is stuck with what they can steal. The Necrons will or can advance no further - their understanding of the materium is so complete that they simply do not care about its other inhabitants.

So we have a gigantic stalemate - exactly how a game based on eternal war is supposed to be.


If 20 people are firing paintball guns at me and I'm in armour or on drugs that make it so I can't feel anything, nope. I ignore them. Especially if I have a REAL gun and they know that the moment I see them, I'll shoot.

In 40K, armoured vehicles are controlled by artificial intelligences, or piloted by people in powered armour, or by servitors who just don't give a rats. They are bricks of metal with treads and guns and a hatch or 3 to let their cargo out. I do intend to have transports be a lot more vicious when they get wrecked or explode while carrying cargo, but a good idea might be to give most pilots a morale rating of Robotic - Fearless, Stubborn. That way, we can have effects that target pilots, and pilots (like gretchin) who are cowardly.

I think that's a core difference - You're looking at real life combat, and I'm looking at 40K combat. There's a lot of books out there to pull fluff from - we're creating a war simulator based on this universe of grim darkness and brutal war, where our convention doesn't quite work.

The reason that 40K is so unbalanced is because GW is in it to sell models and has pisspoor playtesting and development teams, and for no other reason. If they actually took time to review, revisit, and revise their projects and products, (see- riot games) then their game would be a lot better, and sell more. Their business model is outdated and they focus too much on the hobby of miniatures and painting, and too little on the game itself.

The damage of a weapon is part of its characteristic - In the lasgun's case, 5+D6, with an Armour Pen of (to be determined when I find a suitable balance point for a variety of weapons and armours). Armour Penetration is important, because it allows models with high durability and lots of wounds to do better against weapons designed to penetrate armour, like sniper rounds or tank busters, while allowing high-armour targets ignore low-ap weapons, but still be affected by low-ap high-damage weapons that would just punch through armour (i.e. battle cannon rounds will still damage terminators, even though their armour will negate a huge chunk of it, simply because terminators aren't meant to be hit by weapons of that magnitude).

Calculating Damage is simply "add up all the damage from all the hits" -- it wasn't some big shebang.

Likewise, calculating Reduction is simply consulting the models' reduction. I want reduction to be 'per 10 damage' or 'per 20 damage' - the idea is that the unit has been damaged, and makes saves (based on save groups) against the damage as a whole. This not only streamlines the rolling, allocation, and removal process, but removes a lot of abusability over the current system.

I say this, because I've ran into problems with both "Massed Fire" and "Large Gun" spam while dealing with other systems of direct damage reduction (such as dice pools, allocated hits, and binary damage). When you make the reduction and damage allocated against the save groups as wholes, you remove the ability for damage from a large weapon to be shunted onto only one model (as you allocate wounds based on majority durability evenly across the unit), while still allowing for lots of hits from many weapons to be evenly distributed evenly instead of clumping up and killing multiwound models (of which there will be more of, and wounds will not feel as important).

The intent? When you shoot and then charge a small number of remaining chaos marines with your horde of laspistol vets, it feels more like you are chipping away at them. It feels more dynamic. It feels like humans desperately throwing their weight against these armoured, beastial foes, jamming knives into creases and desperately blowing themselves up with their own grenades. It feels more like a gang of loyal guardsmen go down with each mighty swing of a chainsword, with each mighty pummel of a fist. It feels better as both players watch the damage accumulate - instead of simply having 'null' combats, where nothing might happen for rounds at a time in tarpit scenarios, it gives us more of a view of something actually happening.

The reason that there's 2 different tables for MS and BS is that MS is about reading your opponent, about comparing your martial prowess and defeating them by simply not being hit. In the confusion of close combat, a marine's deceptive grace and speed is what sets him apart from the average guardsman more than anything - It's not that he cares about being hit by the weapon of his enemy, but that he doesn't need to get hit at all - he can dodge, parry, and outmaneuver the desperate trooper through years of experience and natural genetic advantage - something that doesn't aid him a quarter mile away down the sights of a las sniper. The only defense he has here is his armour, his surroundings, and a natural intuition of when to duck. One value is a comparison, a fight, an opposition. The other is a test, a chance, a set value of skill against challenge. Luck is where preparation meets planning, and in the heat of a personal fight, luck is much more important, much harder to come by, than the dedicated, lined-up shot of a master marksman targeting a rookie squad of fish.

I'd honestly love to have the same modifiers, but it's not right to balance. There's a difference between a vindicare shooting a guardsman and lelith fighting a guardsman that can't be encapsulated by the same modifiers. There needs to be automatic hits. There needs to be times when you'll never be able to hit something. This also allows values like 30 and 40 to come into play without feeling useless - the prowess of great duelists and marksmen can be represented on a wholly inhuman scale, without 'breaking' the game.

You'd be surprised at the number of people who 'play' 40k that don't anymore - the recent edition, codecies, and erratas have really, really turned a lot of players away from the game. I'd like to bring back the feel of "Unless you're trying to bring a suboptimal army, your models can be used effectively." Combined with a ruleset that makes the game more dynamic, tactical, and cinematic, this should hopefully convert a lot of players to use it in fun games. Who knows - it simply spin-off into its own thing, usable with any models; even lego!

I take your point about 40k supression being thought of as different to real world supression.

BUT having a fixed real world reference to base the interaction on is necissary to achive a better internal logic and balance in the rules.(IMO.)

However, would it be more acceptable to make the realy hevily armoured units ,Mega Nobs , Terminators, and maybe power armuor to be treated as personal vehicles, eg small dreadnoughts?
And in these small heavily armoured units , need to be hit by high damage weaponry to supress them?

If it is more intuitive for all the lighter armoured units behave like modern infantry, and the only exception is the heavy infantry.then treating heavy infantry as vehicle makes more sense than changing a sytem to suit the minority of units.

My method of dealing with superession it to make all units 'react instantly to high threat situations.' But the better trained /higher morale unit recover instantly (2+ fearless morale check), the more cowardly may take longer to recover.(5+ conscript morale check.)

I agree that GW plc have simply concentrated of selling toy soldiers to children , and game play of 40k has suffered as a result.

Basing game play on personal opinion about subjectively written background is a shaky foundation for the game play (IMO).
As there are ALWAYS some subjective arguments about what is wrong.And as these arguments are subjective they go on forever without conclusion.
(Look how Space Marines have changed since RT days, Imperiums best ORDINARY humans in powerd armour ,(T3 S4 Sve 4+) to the movie marine stats that follow the 'Ward fluff' more closely, .)

Why not give weapons a set armour penetration value, (compare to targets AR + d6).And have a seperate value for the amount of damage the weapon does to the soft target behind the armour?(Similar to the old damage value use in 2nd ed)
Eg small arms do 1 damage.

Specialised weapons could do D3 ,D3 +1, D6, D6 +1 or 2X D3 damage .

Eg melta Gun Er 12"/ AP 10/ Ef 1/ D6 AP Bonus , D3+1.damage.

This way we can differentiate between amount of hits , armour penetration and damage caused in a straight forward way?

"If it is more intuitive for all the lighter armoured units behave like modern infantry, and the only exception is the heavy infantry.then treating heavy infantry as vehicle makes more sense than changing a sytem to suit the minority of units."

This is where you're breaking down. The psychology, the base instincts of modern soldiers, and guardsmen, guardians, space marines, orks, kabalites, tyranids, whatever - is so completely different, that you can't apply this sort of thinking to it.

Using suppression rules in the way you want to (classifying between light and heavy infantry) completely breaks down at every examination of what the units actually are - you're making suppression binary in a way that requires special rules for each faction, and in many cases, every different unit in each faction. It goes beyond simply leadership and morale typing - which plays the biggest part in such matters - into army and unit psychology, which cannot by definition be based on modern warfare.

The idea of morale effects are that they're something basic - something that affects each faction the same way. In 40K right now, this is represented by a baseline - when you take too many casualties, your morale is tested. If you fail, you run away. The problem is, more and more units are moving toward 'fearlessness' as a baseline - Something I encourage, as it increases the game's pace, but also something that removes a large chunk of dynamism.

One thing that could be done - Have not only the morale grades and modifiers, but a priorities set. Guardsmen without a commissar and other similar 'modern warfare' type units would have the "Normal" priorities set - their morale goes down as they take casualties, they fall back and regroup on morale tests, and they're suppressed by large volumes of fire. We could have a Heroic set, a Predatory set, a Tactical set, a Martyr set, and a Mindless set - which covers everything I can think of, so feel free to add more - but with a priorities set, we can have units like Orks and Genestealers in the Predatory set, High-strategy units like HQs and recon in the Tactical set, many imperial units in the heroic or martyr set, tyranids outside of synapse and drug-induced/raging units in the mindless category, etc.

Modifying how a unit reacts to various situations would THEN allow us to easily set down rules FOR THOSE REACTIONS, - letting our different units react differently to the same scenarios.


Basing the game on the fluff of 40k is the only way for a game like 40k to really live, unfortunately. It's larger-than-life and needs larger-than-life rules to encompass its scope. While I can't hope to be right on every, or even many, of the fluff issues, I CAN easily convert and expand upon much of what's already there. Really, the hardest part is going to be figuring out what CANT be done once the engine is overhauled - with a system that much more encompasses being able to DO things rather than restricting what's available to 10s and D6's.

This damage system is one of the things I've tried. It not only hugely limits the values available to AP and Armour, it also really hurts necessarily small units - like carnifexes - when their armour is able to be pierced by things like bolters, which are easily massed in many armies. Static damage systems severely punish players who don't decide they're going to abuse the game mechanics. I want to avoid promoting listbuilding as a mechanical thing, and more as a "make your army thing, it will be able to do something. It might not be competitive, it might not have everything you need, but it won't flop if you give it your best shot."

Yes, I want allgrot armies to be viable, if that's what you're into.

I am right in saying that you are happy with the basic idea of supression, but want different reations to supression to be avaialble?

I am happy to expand the reaction to supression to set behaviour for different 'mind sets.'

However I dont think there need to be are too many options, as there are only a few reactions to supressive fire!
Defencive manouve...
Turn to face put highest armour towards the incomming fire,take cover/move to cover.

Offencive reaction
Rampage/assault /move towards the firing unit, return fire.

But if you want to script reactions for particualr unit types , as scripting actions in current 40k is common.Then fair enough.

A unit neutralised (stunned) does nothing,a routed unit must run away.

Limiting morale to the effects of physical damage from ranged attacks is why 40k has problems balancing fire power and assult IMO.
Including physical damage AND phsycological damage is important IMO.

As it allows ALL units have the chance to influence the actions of opposing units ,(even if its just distraction -redirection,) even if they have little chance of causing physical damage.

Where as current 40k seems to want to make every unit able to damage every other unit even if it counter fluff and expectations.

It is important to find a rule set that CAN cover everything with its core game mechanics and resolution methods.

I personaly belive that expanding on a modern warfare base for the game, is infinatley easier than trying to make WHFB work in space...

It doesnt need larger than life rules, it just needs larger than life interpritation of elegant and intuitive rules,(as in Epic Armageddon.)

Weapons should be catagorised by function , and general weapon only be effective vs general targats.AndSpecialised support weapons required to be more effective vs specific targets.
Eg
Assault weapons and small arms can take out light /meduim targets one at a time.
Anti infantry weapons can take out lots of light targets several at a time.
Ant tank weapons can take out ONE heavy target one at a time.

As Stalin said '...quantity has a quality all of its own....'(But in Russian obviuosly )
And if the enemy can not shoot ALL your troops before they engage you have the numerical advantage, which is just as valid as having units the enemy can not destroy by shooting.

How about an expanded damage resolution system...
Defender rolls a D6 and adds it to its Armour value , if the result is higher than the attackers AP value it makes its save throw.
IF the defender fails its armour save.
Attacker rolls a D6 and adds it to the weapon damage value, if this beats the defenders damage threshold, is causes a wound/structure point loss bt how much it beat the damage threshold.

This is the same as armour save and to wound roll, but is NOT using the dice in a deterministic way.But in an intuitve and TABLE free way!

Allowing charactersistic to be a numerical value that can be compared.And using the D6 to being the random modifier means far more can be covered with striaght forward
game mechanics.

I like the damage proposal you've got there, as it fits with the current resolution method I'm going for, but it's still much too binary - Too much rides on the flat comparison of AP vs Armour - A large metal slug might not have a good ap value, but if it hits a terminator in the arm with enough force to wrench it around and destroy the servos through sheer impact damage, it's still going to count it toward a 'casualty', or at least a wound - a terminator unable to move is a terminator unfit for battle. It also still doesn't let the defender roll last - an important psychological aspect of damage resolution.

I think the main difference in what we're trying to accomplish is that you'd like things to be resolved BY D6's, whereas I'd like D6's to tell us HOW things are resolved. Like I've said, I'm moving away from binary resolutions into dynamic ones, that give the player more and more choice, instead of taking it away.

One thing I'm looking at is taking away the roll to damage, and simply increasing damage output. Roll to hit, add up all the hits, roll reduction, remove models. I know you suggested it before, but the more I look at it the more I realize how clunky rolling for damage is in a system that has a set reduction interval.

The problems with classifying weapons in 40K like that is 1) Antitank weapons will always be massed and used against infantry wherever possible. This is just how our minds work, we love it.
2) Anti Infantry weapons like flamers will always be taken in redundant quantities, once we've filled up our antitank weaponry. This is simply because watching little men explode is awesome.
3) Assault weaponry is pretty much how every weapon in 40K.is portrayed as working, barring some ridiculous over the top weaponry, and IG heavy weapons teams.

When most of your technology comes from lost sources, and you just use whatever's easiest to produce and whatever has the best effect, well, those three categories sort of break down a lot - especially when many of the more attractive options, like plasma and meltaguns, are more likely to incinerate themselves and their operators than a lot of the more 'safe' weaponry.

I think you're focusing a lot on suppressive fire, and its limiting your view on morale effects - we need to include a range of morale effects, coming from all manners of places - not just weapons fire.

There's also more than just Defensive and Offensive - there's nonreactive and complete flight, as well as units that take actions other than taking cover or firing back. Tyranids, who do only what the hive mind wills them to, might simply continue toward an objective.

I still feel the easiest way to go about morale is going to be having a set of conditions that trigger a morale event, like "When this unit takes more hits than it has models, Test for Leadership or inflict a suppression token." - and then arranging those triggers into Sets.

The Normal Set would be

"When this unit takes more hits than it has models, Test for Leadership or inflict a suppression token."

"When this unit fails a morale test, it begins falling back."

"When this unit fails a Pinning Test, it becomes Pinned."

"Suppressive Effects affect this Unit normally"

And then we can define suppressive effects and pinning effects and falling back.

Whereas Tyranids would be

"While in Synapse range, Tyranids have Robotic, Fearless Morale, and the Predatory Morale Set. Outside of Synapse, refer to the unit entry (usually Poor, Enraged or Cowardly, and Normal Morale Set)."

Predatory could be,
"If this unit would become suppressed by gunfire, instead it must pass a Leadership Test, or it moves toward the Firing Unit D3 inches, and the unit takes its majourity durability in damage per inch." (something more elegant that arises will be replacing this, but i want it to scale so that neither large units of small things, or small units of large things are unnecessarily punished or immune to this damage.)

"When this unit fails a morale test, it gains the Rage USR for 1 game turn."

"When this unit fails a Pinning Test, it gains a suppression token instead of becoming pinned."

"Suppressive Effects affect this Unit normally"

The difference between 40k and the damage system I'm proposing is that unsaved wounds are a very totalitarian way of determining morale, whereas now, damage is a direct result of hits - and thus, a decent indicator or go between. We can have rules for suppression based on the damage before reduction, and the damage after. We can have rules for suppression stemming from damage/hits. We can have rules for suppression based on actual damage that doesn't fully reduce a wound. The rules set is HUGELY open, and there's a lot that can come out of it in this way.

Hello again.
I may not have explained myself too well.
I try to use a few srtaightforward resolution methods to cover complex in game interactions.
I was trying to cover your damage resolution idea in a more straight forward way.

Physical damage.
Per MODEL.
Armour saving roll.
Roll to wound.

In the example method units/models have a wide range of values that are compared, and the Dice is simply used as the random modifier.
Eg direct comparisons of values 1 to 10 vs 1 to 10 gives up 19 results.Add in the D6 dice roll and we get a range of 29 results.

If we use dice in a deterministic way , we limit the maximum resolution available A D6 only gives us a maximum of 6 results.
This is why the current 40k is SO over complicated it is tied to a minascule range of results, that have to be applied in multiple step resolutions , and each resolution is poorly defined too!

If a weapon has an AP (armour penetrating value) a DR(damage rating )and an Effect value.
ALL of its interaction on the target is covered with 3 values.

How much arnour the weapon can defeat, how much damage the weapon does to the soft target behind the armour, and how many targets/hits/area are effected.

We can limit what targets can be selected by Notes if needed.
EG unrealistic sniping with rail guns-we simply restrict to 'Only able to target large targets .'

This covers all physical damage resolution , in a straight forward way.

Pychological damage ,IS effected by physical damage , and also by comparative threat level.
Resrticting supression to purley physical damage , enforces abstracted weapon interaction IMO.

If we simply use remaining wounds/SP +highest AR as the units confidence.
Eg 5 terminators 2W each AR 7 has a confidence of 17.

30 ork boys 1 W each AR 2 has a confidence of 32.

The ternmies are realy hard to take out with their high armour value , but could be slowed with high volumes of heavy fire.(EG 3 heavy bolters.)
The ork boys are easily killed with thier low armour value , but are hard to supress untill they have taken heavy casualties simply due thier being a lot of them!


If a game achives its game play using well defined simple resolution methods , the players have a wide chioce of tactical decisions avaiable to them each and every game.

I was simply using weapon interaction to show the basic confidence vs threat mechanic.

We can simply expand this mechanic to cover fear , panic and terror values of threat if you want?
As my sugested command values cover thisparticular aspect of the resolution.

Having to, list EVERY possible threat situation that could trigger a morale rection is rather labour intensive and reastrictive isnt it?

Compare WHFB rules to KoW for a illustration ....

To run through your 'scripts' and show how the basic system could cover them.

When In Synapse range the nids get to add 3 to their morale dice rolls.
The nids that have 'Synapse' special ability have Command of 3/24" AND may add Comand value to ANY morale check of units in command range.

Kommisar , MAY execute a member of the unit he is attached to ignore any supressive effect.(You MAY survive running through a hail of bulets , but the Kommisar NEVER misses!)

Here is a few Unit morale Notes ...
A unit with Rampage.
When this unit takes supressive damage.(Threat exeed confidence.)It MUST move towards the unit that caused supression by the number of inches the threat exceeded thier confidence.

A unit with Beserker MAY ONLY move towards nearest enemy unit as a reaction to supression.And MUST continue to move at maximum speed towards nearest enemy unit untill supression marker is removed.

A unit with Sharp Shooter MAY ONLY return fire.

A unit with Cowardly MUST retire to nearest cover.(Or go to ground.)

A unit with Cautious MUST turn to face its attacker,)go to ground) OR move to interveening cover.

Normal units have the chioce of , return fire or move to cover/turn to face.

This gives the same diferentiation you appear to want, but is still arrived at using a simple to understand and use method.(IMO.)

I don't think you're understanding your math hammer quite properly - it doesn't matter what range of ap and armour you have. If you're limiting ALL damage a weapon's hit does to a single D6 comparison between AP and Armour, you have limited ALL damage to a single D6. This is very binary. It damages or it doesn't. If it does, it deals full damage. If it doesn't it deals none. An AP of 5 can only affect up to an Armour of 4, because an Armour of 5 automatically gets higher than 5 on a D6 roll of 1. So you are still limited to a 'range' of 5, regardless of how unlimited ap and armour values go. This promotes simply taking the highest AP and Armour values your codex has, because that way only your opponents most AP weapons will even affect you. i.e. the Landraider problem, but more, as you're increasing ARMOUR instead of increasing STRENGTH.

With an interval system, damage is dealt and then reduced out of 20 multiple times. AP and Armour are direct comparisons that dynamically affect each tick, with a minimum reduction of 1 and a maximum reduction of 20 per tick. This means that yes, some units will be immune, entirely, to small arms fire, simply by having a Sv of 19 or more - and that will be alright, because the moment they receive fire from a weapon whose AP reduces them to 18 or lower, they begin taking damage. Likewise, even the lowliest conscript will receive at least D6 reduction out of 20 against every blow. The Score system is a very effective D20 replacement for games where consistency and 5% intervals are required.

And again, roll to save always has to be the last roll, and has to make sense.
Roll to hit,
static damage,
roll to reduce damage,
Models are removed,
morale effects applied.


I don't understand why adding armour is integral to confidence. Morale is a much better indicator for 40K overall - Look at commissars, in their cardboard cloaks, unflinching as feth. And in this case, Durability would be better than wounds as an indicator as well - Wounds is more of an actual "how much meat is on this unit", whereas durability is "how much it takes to make this unit lose some meat".

So if we have the Morale (Excellent for Terminators) be 10, Majourity Durability is 20, and then different modifiers such as Fearless or Stubborn could add others. Their Suppression Value is 30. Terminators are Heroic, so we look at what we need to do to suppress heroic units - We see that, for instance, it's "a test when Actual Damage reaches the suppression value," but that "Friendly units within D6" must also test against suppression if failed" to represent such a heroic unit going down. So now all we have to do is deal at least 30 actual damage to suppress them!

Compared to 30 orks, who with their Predatory Set and Mob Rule modifier (+1 per Ork), Fearless (5) and Durability of 14, have a Suppression Value of 39, and the Predatory Set states "When this unit takes its Suppression Value in total damage, it must test against a Rampage (Which instead of 1" per point exceeding, would be D6", or its movement value - just to keep things smaller. We don't want units purposely failing morales, like marines, in order to charge 30" a turn!)

I prefer to make Rail weapons into line weapons rather than limiting their targets. This is something we can go at in more detail later.



"If a game achives its game play using well defined simple resolution methods , the players have a wide chioce of tactical decisions avaiable to them each and every game. "

The suggestions you've promoted limit players wishing to play a competitive army to rocket tag - if you can make your damage numbers bigger than a D6 + the best leadership would allow, you win! All you have to do is go first and target his meanest squad with your meanest squad. He'll do the same, but all he'll have is is redundant meanest squad to do it with - then you can take out his 3rd meanest with yours, and he'll only have his 4th, etc. Eventually turn 2 starts, and he's down a squad in comparison!

I think you're missing the idea of sets by a bit - they're supposed to be broad and nonspecific, covering aspects the others don't. They say "reacts to suppression effects this way" - that way we can define a bunch of different suppression effects, as ones made by BlastMasters will be different than ones made by Biocannons or Shardwebs or what have you. Look at Magic the Gathering - lots of keywords, but then also different types of cards - creatures, enchantments, etc.

HI again.
I was simply using a straight forward model of modern combat.TO wich we could apply the veneer of 40k.

I am using the unit/Model characteristics to define its in game function.

Comparing the uits AR vs the attackers weapon armour penetration to see if the weapon penetrated the armour is the first step of damage resolution.
AN Ork AR 2 vs a SM Bolter AP 6
The ork model has to roll 5 or more for the armour to be effective vs the bolter hit.
(If the armour defeates the round no futher action required,)

If the bolter hit beats the ork armour , compare the orsk Damage Threshold vs the Damage value of the weapon
Orks DT 7 the bolter shell DV 4.
The Sm player needs to roll 4+ to wound the ork.

AR from 1 to 14, and AP from 5 to 12.
DT from 5 to 15,and DV from 1 to 12


IF you are using a more interactive game turn, letting the opposing player throw saves last is not required,They have the oportinity to be more proactive and shoot-assault back!

The dice value required is from direct comparison of unit/model stats.Weapon effect individual targets, the effect on these targets may have a knock on effect on the unit as a whole.

Unit confidence is thier measure of how they stand up to scary experiances.
How many of them, and how well protected they are determines when a unit becomes supressed.
Some units rely on large numbers to ignore supression untill casualties pile up.(Orks, Nids.)
Some units rely on heavy armour ,(Mega Nobs -terminators.)
Its MORALE VALUE determines how fast the unit will recover.
Its the simplest way to model morale in a non abstract way I can think of..

Do Activation like Dreadfleet- Activate one squad, move, fire, assault, then do another.

Lanrak wrote:Comparing the uits AR vs the attackers weapon armour penetration to see if the weapon penetrated the armour is the first step of damage resolution.
AN Ork AR 2 vs a SM Bolter AP 6
The ork model has to roll 5 or more for the armour to be effective vs the bolter hit.
(If the armour defeates the round no futher action required,)

Alright but now a bolter can never affect a target with AR6 - like terminators. The whole point of the armour save is to give a unit a chance to overcome damage - this chance should be dynamic, not binary.

The difference between dynamic and binary -

Dynamic: An interactive system or process, especially one involving competing or conflicting forces.
Binary: Something composed of two parts or things, or a system in which results fall into only one of two categories (On or off, yes or no, positive or negative).

Under your system, the bolter either damages or it doesn't. This is not beneficial to speeding the game up, and it is not beneficial to game design - especially a competitive game in which players will quickly abuse it (again, look at landraiders). The easiest way to discourage this is to give units a chance to save X damage out of an interval - Yes, eventually some armoured units will ignore all damage from certain sources with a damage reduction system, but this is what lets your antitank weapons be more effective when spammed against vehicles than when spammed against infantry - It's what can easily remove the spamming of melta weapons as all-takers weapons and what can damage plasma's power against light vehicles while retaining it against infantry. High AP values don't affect smaller units after a certain point - they will always gain the 1D6 reduction out of 20. Having a vehicle reduced in armour from 30 to 10 against a weapon that does 40 damage is MUCH more devastating than having a guardsman be reduced from 5 to 1D6. Having multiple casualties from a single weapons' fire as well actually represents the unit firing the weapon in something similar to a combat scenario - and not just a single, small pulse of the weapon - it lets us balance around more points, as our damage isn't limited to 1 model, and not limited to a simple comparison of SvT.

Lanrak wrote:If the bolter hit beats the ork armour , compare the orsk Damage Threshold vs the Damage value of the weapon
Orks DT 7 the bolter shell DV 4.
The Sm player needs to roll 4+ to wound the ork.

No need to compare wounding if you make Durability the HP, and simply add up all the damage done. Simply remove majourity Durability from Actual Damage Dealt and apply a wound - repeat until there's no damage left. Removes the need for an entire set of rolling and calculations, as well as quickening wound allocation.

Lanrak wrote:AR from 1 to 14, and AP from 5 to 12.
DT from 5 to 15,and DV from 1 to 12

Under your system you can never damage AR12-14, as 12+D6 will always be higher than AP12. I don't think you thought that through very well. It also very much limits our availability of weaponry, and creates an abstraction on its own - are you saying a lascannon is only twice as penetrating as a bolter? Or is it exponential, which still doesn't work, or logarithmic - in which case why are you introducing logarithms what. With a direct Armour - AP = damage out of 20 negated, we have an intuitive comparison system. Flak Armour is designed to provide a small save against Lasguns, so it does. Bolters are designed to take out squishy targets in light armour, so they do. Lascannons are designed to penetrate heavy armour, so they do. They ALWAYS do - all that's left is seeing how much damage is saved, and how much the damage that was dealt affects the unit; there's no abstractions of "Well, he got hit by a lascannon but his armour took it so he's k." It further focuses on the UNIT instead of MODELS.

Lanrak wrote:IF you are using a more interactive game turn, letting the opposing player throw saves last is not required,They have the oportinity to be more proactive and shoot-assault back!

Dead wrong, this has been a huge point of contention on a lot of rolling overhauls for 40k, /tg/ has a huge archived thread on it, and I'm sure I can find numerous studies on allowing a defender the chance to save (see: dungeons and dragons) to give a very satisfactory argument that Rolling to SAVE YOUR MODELS! is a very powerful psychological buffer against BEING SHOT AT, even in a game. As well, with an incredibly more important suppression aspect, the unit may very well not get to shoot back ;P

Lanrak wrote:The dice value required is from direct comparison of unit/model stats.Weapon effect individual targets, the effect on these targets may have a knock on effect on the unit as a whole.

Weapons fire almost never affects individual targets, especially targets in groups, especially from groups, especially in a game about groups. Weapons Fire from units affects Target Units as a whole, perhaps sniper rifles and similar weapons omitted.

Lanrak wrote:Unit confidence is thier measure of how they stand up to scary experiances.
How many of them, and how well protected they are determines when a unit becomes supressed.
Some units rely on large numbers to ignore supression untill casualties pile up.(Orks, Nids.)
Some units rely on heavy armour ,(Mega Nobs -terminators.)
Its MORALE VALUE determines how fast the unit will recover.
Its the simplest way to model morale in a non abstract way I can think of..

Still not seeing armour as being part of it - durability would be a much better determination of it in my opinion. I'd be more confident knowing I can absorb a hundred bullets and survive, rather than dying from 1 bullet but wearing armour that stops 99 out of 100. This is because I have a very good understanding of probability, however, so my opinion on that might be biased compared to a real person.

Nids don't care about casualties, ever. Even when out of synapse, they focus on their own thing and ignore 'normal' morale rules. We have to have a system that can encompass ideas that don't fit into this small example of armour and numbers, because it simply does not apply to the core idea of many factions. You're trying to fit a really tiny cube into a big cut-out circle - Not only is the shape wrong, but it's just not big enough to fulfill that circle's needs.


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Lightning Shadows wrote:Do Activation like Dreadfleet- Activate one squad, move, fire, assault, then do another.

Move and Fire are going to be the same, but Assault - by necessity - is going to have to be its own phase;

A small example: I bring 3 big units of scarabs in my necrons army and put them at the front. I activate them first, and charge them forward into you. If they get the charge, it means they've each gotten to move, run, and assault - compared to your units not getting anything. And now your unit will only have 'assault' in its turn! Compared to having everyone's units move and shoot, and then doing the assault phase on its own where each unit only gets to assault, it's simply a lot less focused again on making gimmick armies and relying on denying your opponent the chance to make use of his action economy (i.e. it mitigates the alpha strike - there's going to be plenty of ways for assaulty armies to keep their assaultyness, don't worry!)

I like 40k's more basic version of movement. While it works for fantasy, the way 40k handles more 'fleet' (heh) units is fine.

WS should stay the same. a simple 1 - 10 scale is good. Makes it simpler to learn and remember.

I don't like EV. I'd imagine BS and the chances to hit have already taken this into consideration, since your models represent living creatures, who'd be moving, dodging, ducking, running, etc.

Toughness is fine as it is. Simple scales are prefered, which is what Toughness already does.

@Crazyterran then I guess this isn't really a thread for you. Movement, to-hit modifiers, and wounding are some of the main things that have to be changed in order to provide a more interesting, varied game.

The Fleet mechanic is simply a lazy workaround. I would prefer my fleet units be actually fleet, my assault units be actually assaulty, and my fleety assaulty units to be fleetily assaulty. Thundering Orks should have no problem rapidly outpacing Guardsmen in an all-out charge into hand to hand - and Holwing Banshees should have no problem outstrapping both of them. The more statistics we use to define a unit, the more defined that unit gets.

The 1-10 scale is useless. It's such a sad excuse for a reason to include WS, BS and Wounding tables, and could've been handled much better by many of Lanrak's suggestions. If simpler was a direction I wanted to take this, if I felt that look-see D6 roll interactions was what Warhammer 40K needed, I would definitely be finding more of his advice useful.

WS stays about the same anyways. The only practical differences you'll see is that more armies hit on 3+'s in fights, and at rare extremes there will be more variance.

Your argument for the removal of EV simmers down to this, and I don't think it was intended, but it looks silly - "Shooting takes EV into account because your models have EV, so we don't need EV."

As well, you realize that EV modifiers will be replacing cover, right? This is one of the most important changes that need to be made to the entire shooting system, so it only makes sense to have a system in place to handle it.

Toughness vs Strength adds a roll in the damage process and doesn't provide a relevant statistic for anything except toughness tests, which can be better represented by other tests, so I see no reason to really keep it. Once again, it's a lazy excuse for an almost needless table, and many of Lanrak's suggestions more elegantly replace it. Durability+Damage is a far more representative system combining the best of Dark Heresy and HoMM, in order to describe the nuances between the variety of units to be found in the 40k universe. Sorry, I don't like having 20 units with 3's across statlines. It just doesn't appeal to me.

Hi
Sorry about the typo.(5-12 should be 5 to 18.)
I was originlay allowing an armour penetration bonus to the weapon effects.(But simplified it to a fixed value)
But as the player is rolling to save (adding the save roll to the armour) , I forgot to put the revised weapon damage in.

Anyhow, I was not saying the defending player should not get a saving throw,but the order of resolution doesnt mean it has the be the LAST roll in the resolution process.
EG target rolls to save, then attacker rolls to wound, is more intuitve.
The ONLY reason the save roll is left untill last in WHFB and 40K is due to thier lack of interaction in the game turn mechanic. ('...its my go, so I do evrything first, then you roll saves at the end....')

I can understand the overall effect of shooting vs the targets defence you are proposing.But I feel the current player base MAY finds that a bit too complicated/abstracted?

And the :-
Roll to save.
Roll to wound,
Apply effects.
Resolution I propose may be more in line with thier current experiance?

Yes some units ARE invunerable to certain weapons.Thats why we need a wide variety of weapon on the battle field is it not?(If it was just humans in fabric/leather uniforms basic 'ball and blade' weapons would surfice.(Pike and Shotte rules.)


I am not saying you could simply drop current codexes into the new rule set and everything would just work.
But as we are using new game mechanics and resolution methods a complete re-write of ALL army lists and PV would be in order.

Abstraction is needed to arrive at straigntforward and fast resolution .BUT intuitive results are prefered,and most 40k players like rolling handfulls of dice.

A squad of Terminators reciveing heavy fire would not move to cover or go to ground , but turn to face the attacker, asses the tactical threat, and then take apropriate action.
It simply makes them stop briefly to asses what is happaning and take the apropriate course of action.

A Grot mob recieving heavy fire will simply run to cover.And stay there untill the Runtherd rounds them up.

BOTH units have a reaction triggered , but the behaviour type and lenght is different.
The type of behaviour can be covered by UNIT NOTES,(Resolute, Cowardly.Rampage, Beserker, etc.)
And the lenght of behaviour the morale grade.(Roll over the morale grade value to pass a rally test.)

In short I prefer multiple straight forward resolution steps, as I think its a better fit with 40k current audience.
The damage resolution you propose IS fine , BUT is more suited to historical gaming where it is used more often.(As in a Damage Resolution Table.)

Just my opinion obviuosly...

You can still have a roll to wound and a roll to save - simply make the attacker roll over the defender's armour, and the defender roll toughness. The point is not HAVING a roll to save, the point is that players get a psychological boost from "oh my god I stopped the big bad thing from killing me!", even when it doesn't happen very often, because

A) It takes the 'blame' for their models' deaths and places it on the dice, instead of the other player

and

B) Cognitive Bias - a person isn't going to notice the 50 saves he fails if he expects to fail a lot of saves. It's the saves that DO work for him that really stand out, experience wise.

The thing with 40K is that for every terminator immune to lasgun fire, there's another one not wearing a helmet. For every land raider, there's an exposed powercore. For every Carnifex, there's a guardsman with a big-ass knife and some balls of steel. There are going to be instances when extremely disparate situations come up, such as lasguns against most vehicles, or basic CC attacks in brutally unmatched fights (humans vs lelith). Therefore, it's a lot more ACCURATE and therefore creates a BETTER SIMULATOR to have the chances of failure for certain things, like a Terminator taking any damage at all from a salvo of lasguns NOT be absolutes.

It makes it so that players can focus MORE on PLAYING the armies they want to play, rather than BUILDING an army that's able to actually damage things. What happens when a weapon is unable to affect certain units is that that weapon stops being taken, or is taken as little as possible. Instead of having a balance between cost and effectiveness, we instead end up looking at cost vs having any effect, period! Units stop becoming viable on their own merit, but instead on the weapons they can purchase or the weapons they start with, and we eventually wind up back in the era of "You need power weapons and S7 Rending lots-o-shots or your army can't affect my 6 landraiders full of terminators"

BUT ALL I WANT TO DO IS FIELD A THOUSAND GUARDSMEN :I

I can understand your concern.
BUT current 40k IS very strategicaly focused, and you HAVE to pick a specific unit for a specific job.

However, if you think about the overall army , and work on composition similar to FoW where combined arms is important.
Then all units can be used in a wider tactical role.

I agree all units should be able to have an effect on all other units, but NOT necisarily be able to cause them physical damage.
This is where the current 40k game falls down, it focuses purely on physical damage , and so the game play becomes abstracted.

The point is you can argue anything from a fluff perspective.(Pick any of the numerous arguments over poor rules definition over the last dozen years of so! )

So allowing a unit to slow down a Terminator unit briefly by pouring fire at them ,can be justified by the fluff.(They are simply updating thier tactical situation and assesing the threat level before continuing with thier mission.)Calling this supression is justified.

Supression covers ANY reaction that impedes the supressed units actions,closing hatches, turning to face,other distraction techniques etc.
It doesnt necisarily mean they dive face down on the ground!

If you acept this as a valid part of the game development, it allows more freedom in unit creation and roles on the table top,

In a game of Firelfly,(6mm WWII,)Little Dave ALWAYS picked the uber units , heaviest armour , biggest gun etc.
He was crowing about his unit of Jagdtigers ,that were invunerable to enemy fire more than 500m away, and how his 88mm could kill the heaviest enemy tank up to 1500m away!

Chiefy simply scouted thier position with a cheap armoured car, dropped artillery smoke on them, from cheap mortar section.(effectivley blinding them all game.)
Outflanked them with a unit of armoured cars,and destoyed them with rear shots!

820 pts of UBER tank destroyers taken out by , 60pts of AC F,O.O, 120pts of mortars and 150pt AC section....

Its just an example how the combined arms allow multiple units to be more useful than the sum of thier parts.

I belive we both want a similar rule set, but we are stating at opposite ends of the developement .(And a bit of talking at cross purposes perhaps?)