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Realistically, I think we probably will see a 1-per-detachment limit on Tank Commanders. I also expect them to lose the ability to issue orders to themselves/their crew. They will also have a rework or outright removal of the current Grinding Advance rule.

My final prediction is that if these are the only changes to Leman Russes/TC's, IG players will take a number of TC's equal to a number of detachments they take, and a number of Russes equal to 0.

Salt aside, I hope we do see some changes to the basic Russ stats to make them more than just paperweights. I am strongly against the idea of giving them an invulnerable save, as that does not at all fit the fluff. However, an increase to toughness would make sense (although hard to justify compared to things like the Land Raider's current toughness 8), or an increase in wounds (much more likely) to around 14 each.

Finally, I think something will have to be done in regards to their damage output. Right now, a standard Leman Russ w/ Battle Cannon effectively needs 12 shots (the absolute max) to kill a single Plague Marine in cover. That is... abysmal, for lack of a better word. Now with the change we see to the Death Guard Defiler's Battle Cannon going to 3 flat damage, maybe that's something we can expect as well. Of course in that case, we'll need a rework of nearly every other Russ weapon as well to keep them viable so it's not just full on Battle Cannon spam.

It's fine, just that whenever these threads pop up it always feels like people are nerfing stuff and not knowing how the army works ad holding things that were by far not the strongest in the meta of the time but held like a gun behind the back to regular guard players and not soup players.

Limitations to Guard in what they can bring will only prove to be a further nerf to an army that doesn't need nerfs and

Totally get it! Guard needs a lot of help in a lot of places. I think the OP misunderstands the issue. It's like I said earlier - the issue with TC's is not that they are too good. It's that Russes are terrible ...

BlackoCatto wrote:Why, any change that isn't a point change will feth up both tanks and make them both worse in the end.

OP made it clear that we're imagining a hypothetical future in which Leman Russes get the points reduction they need... which will still leave Tank Commanders and regular Russes in the same functional role, with one being better than the other depending on their relative points, just as it was for all of 8th. Hence the other suggestions along with points changes, to differentiate their roles.

Yes, this would be a mild nerf to the order-giving ability of Tank Commanders. That's why we're also talking about points changes, which could more than offset it- as an extreme example, if Tank Commanders had their price cut in half while also getting these limitations on their Orders, they'd become the best unit in the codex in spite of the 'nerf'. Please exercise just the little bit of abstract thinking necessary to contemplate a points reduction and other things being changed too.

That goes for the rest of the posters myopically hyper-focused on the Russ's current state of under-performance and telling OP they don't understand the army or that Russes don't need a nerf. Assume the units are recosted appropriately. How do you make TCs and Russes different such that they're both worth taking?

If your problem was guard players bringing tank commanders instead of vanilla russes your easiest immediate fix is to give the commanders two orders intrinsically and reiterate that no tank can be under the influence of more than one order per turn. A 'look out, sir!' mechanic allowing russes to protect their commander buddies would also bring up their value, but balancing that would be very tricky.

At the moment though, that's not the problem, even tank commanders aren't quite worth their points, and just in general the russ has the same problem that the crisis suit does: it's a pillar of the army's identity but is presently so bad that only it's more expensive 'hero' variant might possibly be worth the investment.

I'm not as resistant to the idea of an invul save as everyone else seems to be: a sufficiently expensive optional upgrade for baneblades and russes would up their survivability greatly, and in so doing would make its existing offensive output that much more effective when it can consistently put it out for more turns. It would greatly change the character of the tank though - and if guard aren't afraid of high-AP weaponry then who is?

As long as the price difference ratio stays the same - youll always include a commander over a standard russ.

Plus the tank orders just really put the commander over the top. Drop the standard russ 20 points. See what happens. There is a point where they are in balance.

How about they just make Leman Russ variants not degrade BS until bottom bracket? Or not degrade BS at all?

Starting on a 4+ and going up with no invuln feels pretty bad.

Quasistellar wrote:
How about they just make Leman Russ variants not degrade BS until bottom bracket? Or not degrade BS at all?

Starting on a 4+ and going up with no invuln feels pretty bad.

Hmm, I wonder if a change to Guard vehicle degradation is coming in the codex. It would explain the Death Korps' currently worthless subfaction trait, where their vehicles can fire one shot at the lowest bracket before being removed from play.

On the subject of durability, I do think they ought to have a 2+ save. They're supposed to be tough against small arms, but vulnerable to anti-tank weapons as they lack an invuln- classic WW1/WW2 armor through and through.

 catbarf wrote:

Quasistellar wrote:
How about they just make Leman Russ variants not degrade BS until bottom bracket? Or not degrade BS at all?

Starting on a 4+ and going up with no invuln feels pretty bad.

Hmm, I wonder if a change to Guard vehicle degradation is coming in the codex. It would explain the Death Korps' currently worthless subfaction trait, where their vehicles can fire one shot at the lowest bracket before being removed from play.

On the subject of durability, I do think they ought to have a 2+ save. They're supposed to be tough against small arms, but vulnerable to anti-tank weapons as they lack an invuln- classic WW1/WW2 armor through and through.

I could see Leman Russes getting a 2+. If the formerly AV 13/12/12 Sicaran can have a 2+ then the formerly AV 14/13/12 Leman Russ should have one too (and Baneblades as well).

 Xenomancers wrote:
As long as the price difference ratio stays the same - youll always include a commander over a standard russ.

Plus the tank orders just really put the commander over the top. Drop the standard russ 20 points. See what happens. There is a point where they are in balance.

Pretty much this ! But let me put a perspective of Tank commander / regular LRBT costs (battle cannon + 3 HB for a stable reference) throughout recent times.

end of 6th edition codex (2014) : 200 / 170 --> 30 points difference
8th edition Index (2017) : 213 / 178 --> 35 points difference
8th edition codex (2017) : 213 / 168 --> 45 points difference
Chapter Approved (2018) : 188 / 168 --> 20 points difference
Chapter Approved (2019) : 188 / 153 --> 35 points difference
Chapter Approved (2020) : 220 / 195 --> 25 points difference
Munitorum field manual (2021) : 225 / 190 --> 35 points difference.

So it goes back and forth, and there is some change at each iteration meaning the matter is taken into consideration, at least.
But GW 's rules development team probably does not know how to handle the matter correctly, maybe they change their minds as the AM top builds varies.

I in no way was saying to nerf guard at all, I was just talking mostly about the fluff of seeing only tank commanders and no regular russes, ie too many chiefs not enough indians, personally I feel maybe russes need a better stratagem, like maybe a dig in one, where they get save or to hit modifiers, also more wounds, definitely cheaper russes and I also feel maybe their sponson/hull weapons should all go down by 5, to encourage more people take sponsons

I really love the look of russes with sponsons, they look more futuristic, but I have also read of people complaining that many boards in 9th are flooded with terrain and the sponsons can actually get in the way of them being able to maneuver across the board

Imo, the problem with leman russes is that they lack in firepower for their cost more than durability, particularly in their main guns which all have highly unworthy stats compared to infantry hunter teams. [Like seriously, the battle cannon, even firing twice, will struggle to kill marines when it just outright deleted them by the squad before, and statistically compares unfavorably to ~120 point tanks that have similar toughness and wound counts and better BS]. The only leman ryss with good firepower is the LR demolished, which only does so because of the demolished cannon buff a while ago applies double to it and goes to show that the whole grinding advance concept is a crappy rule and no substitute for just giving the guns appropriate stats to begin with.

As for unit alterations, I would make TC's have infinite orders range to tanks, [seriously, they have radios]. Then, and more importantly, the tank squadrons should not split up and should recieve the order as a unit. Finally, the TC is a tank company commander, so like a company commander, they should issue 2 orders.

This would encourage the TC to be fielded in a support role. Right now, they run solo because they self buff and regular leman russes are hilariously bad. Their orders are obviously more efficient on themselves than another tank. So having it apply to the squadron would make it more efficient to use it on a squadron and having him have 2 means you would always want a squadron of other tanks to get the most out of him.

I don't agree with some of the arguments here.

Tau Players were not "taking commanders instead of Crisis suits". The issue was players "taking Tau Commanders instead of everything in the Tau List*. Because Commanders with BS2+ were clearly superior in this world of turn 1 deep strike, so why not bring along 8+ of them?

Realising what had happened GW wanted to kill it off - and would do so in the Tau Codex released in March 2018 limiting them to 1 per detachment. Realising that actually spamming anything was a problem, they would shortly after release the Rule of 3 in the April 2018 big FAQ (along with various other sensible rules changes). This would sadly prevent me running 12~ Ravagers when the DE codex was released around the same time but was probably for the best.

In any case, as we saw, restricting commanders did not increase the number of crisis suits in lists and so I suspect it would be here.

I mean you could restrict Guard to one commander for every regular Russ they bring (up to 3 obviously) - but its not going to make Guard any better as a faction. But maybe with a codex change you can make that work anyway.

I'm cynical on these limitations though that seem designed to stop people doing something that wasn't obviously happening anyway. (I.E. Death Guard players can no longer run a detachment of 3 Lords of Corruption. Clearly the terror of tables across the world...)

I don't see a big problem with preventing models that issue Orders from being able to give themselves an Order, at least - not sure if you should prevent another model with the same ability from targeting them as well, but shouting at yourself should go in general.

I mean, of the four generic choices that can do so, I can't think of a time when I'd want to Order one of the other three (CC, PC, STO), aside from maybe an emergency Move! Move! Move! - it's only the TC where the preferred use case is to order themselves instead of others.

As it stands, for 35 points you get +1 to hit and the ability to issue one of three Orders to yourself or one Russ within 6". If the self-targeting of Orders was removed, how much of a cost would you say is about right for +1 to hit and the Order?

Using the Vox system to order other tanks at a distance would be a nice feature, but presumably would mean a larger cost for the order - as would having a second one to issue, if that were the case.

Unrelated point - I do wish the MFM21 entry for the Russ and the TC was clearer as to what is included in the initial points cost. It looks like it should be the Eradicator or Executioner, but I can't tell if the 175/140 includes the default hull HB or not. Probably not, but then that's an awfully high cost for each hull/sponson weapon.

The hull bolters are not included in price. But the vanquisher, or executioner, or eradicator, are basically "free" options now, other variants are calculated above this basis.

What if it required 1 regular leman russ for each commander? Basically you have to take a tank to command in order to have the command tank. I'd also like to see a hulldown tank order that adds 1 to the tanks save.

For fluff reasons I really want to see the voice of command ability only work on units who dont have the voice of command ability, let them keep their BS skill because they naturally get the best crew available

 Ravajaxe wrote:

 Xenomancers wrote:
As long as the price difference ratio stays the same - youll always include a commander over a standard russ.

Plus the tank orders just really put the commander over the top. Drop the standard russ 20 points. See what happens. There is a point where they are in balance.

Pretty much this ! But let me put a perspective of Tank commander / regular LRBT costs (battle cannon + 3 HB for a stable reference) throughout recent times.

end of 6th edition codex (2014) : 200 / 170 --> 30 points difference
8th edition Index (2017) : 213 / 178 --> 35 points difference
8th edition codex (2017) : 213 / 168 --> 45 points difference
Chapter Approved (2018) : 188 / 168 --> 20 points difference
Chapter Approved (2019) : 188 / 153 --> 35 points difference
Chapter Approved (2020) : 220 / 195 --> 25 points difference
Munitorum field manual (2021) : 225 / 190 --> 35 points difference.

So it goes back and forth, and there is some change at each iteration meaning the matter is taken into consideration, at least.
But GW 's rules development team probably does not know how to handle the matter correctly, maybe they change their minds as the AM top builds varies.

Really they tried with the tank commander when it dropped to 188 with 3 HB. They were strong at that point which is good - russ should be strong. They drop standard russ to 153...It probably was good enough to use at that point. The Commander was still prefered though. Another 10 points and I think the standard russ woulda be prefered.so190 for a standard russ right now is such a huge joke though...I mean...I redemptor dread costs less than that. All around has better quality firepower - more wounds - -amazing melee power too. It needs to come down another 20 and the commander needs to come down 10.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 evil_kiwi_60 wrote:
What if it required 1 regular leman russ for each commander? Basically you have to take a tank to command in order to have the command tank. I'd also like to see a hulldown tank order that adds 1 to the tanks save.

That would be cool and fluffy but it still doesn't solve the fact that commanders are just better russ for not much more choice. While at the same time the standard russ is kinda lacking.

If you couldn't order yourself but can order another officer, you'd just take Tank Commanders in groups to all issue each other in a mini circle-jerk.
Not allowing orders to target officers would make sense and resolve that issue.

I think there is a lot of truth in the idea that the two will struggle to be balanced only by points. Any fix will definitely have to come into the ways the rules work, otherwise one will be auto-take over the other (or alternatively, both will be trash and not worth taking).

 CommunistNapkin wrote:
I think there is a lot of truth in the idea that the two will struggle to be balanced only by points. Any fix will definitely have to come into the ways the rules work, otherwise one will be auto-take over the other (or alternatively, both will be trash and not worth taking).

GW chronically overprices poor BS/underprices good BS, which they never had to address before 8th because BS didn't matter a lot for blasts. The poor durability of the LR chassis means it's only useful for its alpha-strike potential (where the BS matters a lot more) or if you're using the Tallarn move-shoot-move (which needs to be a Tank Commander), particularly when the shrunken tables make it much easier to charge them. You can't balance the current statlines with points, no. If the Russ were tougher it'd be easier.

evil_kiwi_60 wrote:What if it required 1 regular leman russ for each commander? Basically you have to take a tank to command in order to have the command tank. I'd also like to see a hulldown tank order that adds 1 to the tanks save.

It was this way with end of 6th edition codex. The Tank commander was a +30 points upgrade for one of the Leman Russ squadron, that must have been 2-3 models (instead of 1-3).
They kept and adapted the squadron rule for heavy support, but ditched the prerequisite for tank commanders. Hence the "spam".

AnomanderRake wrote:

 CommunistNapkin wrote:
I think there is a lot of truth in the idea that the two will struggle to be balanced only by points. Any fix will definitely have to come into the ways the rules work, otherwise one will be auto-take over the other (or alternatively, both will be trash and not worth taking).

GW chronically overprices poor BS/underprices good BS, which they never had to address before 8th because BS didn't matter a lot for blasts. The poor durability of the LR chassis means it's only useful for its alpha-strike potential (where the BS matters a lot more) or if you're using the Tallarn move-shoot-move (which needs to be a Tank Commander), particularly when the shrunken tables make it much easier to charge them. You can't balance the current statlines with points, no. If the Russ were tougher it'd be easier.

I agree. If you look at the slim price difference between tank commanders ans regular LRBT , I see little reason to handicap myself by taking the weaker version. Especially considering all the -1 to hit that were so prevalent in 8th edition, and that stifled BS 4+ army lists. One thing that would significantly improve Leman Russ as a whole is a nudge up to their resilience. Leman Russes are depicted as very resilient and tough tanks. While on the table they are barely more durable than a lowly Chimera or a Rhino. They desperately need at least 14-16 HP, or 2+ save, something ! Please GW make something in this regard ! Its poor durability is limiting its role to an expensive alpha strike role, that fails half the time (or worse). Bump its durability, the problem will solve itself. People I'm so tired of my Leman Russes getting blasted off the table so quickly...

Problem with GW, is that when an unit is not up to the task, they react by making it more deadly, thinking it would solve the issue. The "grinding advance" rule comes from this flawed design policy. The whole free bonus AP-1 "doctrine" to space marines comes from this same flawed design. All shoot twice / fight twice stratagems is this flawed design again. The result is a game with absurd levels of attrition we have now.

Even if Leman Russes were fairly priced they would struggle in a situation where some of the best units are melta units or are weak to melta units. Things will get better for Leman Russes as these things change, improving the armour Sv would not help much in this regard. 9th pts are still totally messed up despite a small number of good nudges in the right direction. I love nudges, they make it so that balance doesn't swing too hard back and forth but I think GW could have found more than 2-4 entries per faction to fix.

Auras are great for encouraging people to take up to one of a unit, the more powerful the aura is relative to the rest of the model's kit the less likely people will be to spam the model because the valuable aura won't stack.

Give Leman Russes within 6" of a Tank Commander BS 3+, change tank orders into stratagems. Tanks might operate further apart but I think it is fine to view the 6" as an abstract way of saying that they are staying close enough together to work as a unit within an army and not just a bunch of separate elements within an army.

Company Commanders are silly, the Move! Move! Move! order is stupid, Guardsmen should not be so quick. Even if it was a Stratagem it would be silly and out of place for AM. I could see either the Company Commander having a Move!x3 aura that increases run distance by D6" and fix bayonets to increase attacks by 1 and Platoon Commander having FRF! SRF! to add 1 to hit rolls for shooting attacks. The rest of the infantry orders could be Stratagems.

Infantry orders being auras would make voxcasters a lot more useful I think, you could cover a huge amount of units with one of each Commander type with no need to spam or save on the vox casters and get more Commanders for redundancy against assassination.

 kirotheavenger wrote:
If you couldn't order yourself but can order another officer, you'd just take Tank Commanders in groups to all issue each other in a mini circle-jerk.
Not allowing orders to target officers would make sense and resolve that issue.

They'll likely go with CORE, with orders only affecting CORE REGIMENT ASTRAZENICA models (and Vehicle keyword in the case of Tank Commanders). Guard tanks will (largely) be CORE and characters (including tank commanders) won't be. Done.
Though if they just abandon the BS upgrade, that would help too. Marksmanship isn't a part of command ability.

Ignoring other issues regarding the Russ, you fix the Tank Commander by changing its rules. It needs to stop being a better LR (better BS and orders I can use on myself) and instead be a LR that makes other LR better.

It makes sense for tank commander to have better BS because their tank would have the best crew, just they shouldnt be able to receive orders, would make sense if you would need like atleast like 2 regular leman russes per every tank commander you can take, I also really like the idea of the tanks having atleast 10 inch order range, also a 2+ save would be nice vs bolters, but honestly I feel more wounds would be fluffier and also better vs all the new fusion/melta meta

I don't think so. The current rules for tank commanders inadequately depict what it should be. Currently it is more a tank ace than a commander in charge of coordinating a tank platoon or company. The crew shoots better, have access to auto-rerolls, and that is pretty much it. What we should have is issuing two orders to other tanks in the detachment. Allowing special moves, suppressing fire, improving other tanks accuracy, tricks... All of this by radio, without the current shouting range of 6", which makes zero sense, given tanks are loud machines that cover one's voice. GW really made it all wrong with this codex. It's just herohammer applied to the Guard.

In the fluff, guard tank commanders are pretty uncommon, they are one per a company of 10 Leman Russ ; or even more than 10, if other tanks are added to the basic company. So there should definitely not be given access to more of them than number of tank squadrons.

On the flip side of orders, it kind of makes little sense that the Tank Commander can give orders to the crews of other tanks, but not to their own tank crew. Really the easiest solution is to try to make them force multipliers rather than Leman Russ +1. Make the Tank Commander an upgrade to a Leman Russ squadron that can issue an order to the squadron as a whole, that and maybe create a bigger variety of Tank Orders that have more variety than "reroll 1s, move extra without shooting, and fire smoke".

That said, as others have said, the issue with the Russ and Commanders is that both are kind of not that great right now - GW deciding that T8 is for the most part maximum toughness, and that almost no vehicles get a 2+ save, combined with the ease with which certain units can throw out wounds...

I've said it before, but the easiest fix for Vehicles would be to make them beefier, then boost specialized anti tank weaponry to boot, and er away from invulnerable saves. At the moment, they have boosted some of the anti tank options but not boosted the durability of tanks.

 Ravajaxe wrote:
I don't think so. The current rules for tank commanders inadequately depict what it should be. Currently it is more a tank ace than a commander in charge of coordinating a tank platoon or company. The crew shoots better, have access to auto-rerolls, and that is pretty much it. What we should have is issuing two orders to other tanks in the detachment. Allowing special moves, suppressing fire, improving other tanks accuracy, tricks... All of this by radio, without the current shouting range of 6", which makes zero sense, given tanks are loud machines that cover one's voice. GW really made it all wrong with this codex. It's just herohammer applied to the Guard.

In the fluff, guard tank commanders are pretty uncommon, they are one per a company of 10 Leman Russ ; or even more than 10, if other tanks are added to the basic company. So there should definitely not be given access to more of them than number of tank squadrons.

Iv tried many times, and I find it most difficult to issue orders to my self

bat702 wrote:
...Iv tried many times, and I find it most difficult to issue orders to my self

Try shouting the order, then moving slightly to the side and turning the other way, and then acknowledging the order? See if that helps?

 Inquisitor Lord Katherine wrote:
Imo, the problem with leman russes is that they lack in firepower for their cost more than durability, particularly in their main guns which all have highly unworthy stats compared to infantry hunter teams. [Like seriously, the battle cannon, even firing twice, will struggle to kill marines when it just outright deleted them by the squad before, and statistically compares unfavorably to ~120 point tanks that have similar toughness and wound counts and better BS]. The only leman ryss with good firepower is the LR demolished, which only does so because of the demolished cannon buff a while ago applies double to it and goes to show that the whole grinding advance concept is a crappy rule and no substitute for just giving the guns appropriate stats to begin with.

As for unit alterations, I would make TC's have infinite orders range to tanks, [seriously, they have radios]. Then, and more importantly, the tank squadrons should not split up and should recieve the order as a unit. Finally, the TC is a tank company commander, so like a company commander, they should issue 2 orders.

This would encourage the TC to be fielded in a support role. Right now, they run solo because they self buff and regular leman russes are hilariously bad. Their orders are obviously more efficient on themselves than another tank. So having it apply to the squadron would make it more efficient to use it on a squadron and having him have 2 means you would always want a squadron of other tanks to get the most out of him.

At least someone makes sense.