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I was wondering if usp that would allow you to shoot your own units while they are in assault eg. if a grot is fighting a unit of sm and there is unit of 30 shoota boyz next to them wouldn't it be fluff wise correct that the orks would just blast their kin (I don't think they care much about the grot) in order to get some sm killed?

rule would work like this:

First you roll to hit and they you extra dice for each hit determination who where shot on +4. Templates would hit anyone under the template.

I don't think every army should get this rule but atleast ork and maybe csm.

makes sense, but that would unfair to all other players who would'nt be allowed.

Sounds good - I tried the following a couple of times with previous edition and it seemed fun but that was just two tries and means very little!

Firing into Close Combat
A unit may fire into a close combat melee – however if it is not the closest target they must still may a Leadership test as normal. Hits are inflicted equally on each side unless one side outnumbers the other more than 2-1 (or more) or is/includes a monstrous creature / vehicle. In this case the outnumbering side/vehicle takes two hits for each one of the other – with a minimum of one each. If both sides contain monstrous creatures and/or vehicles, inflict wounds as normal.

The firer should roll a d6 to see which side takes the first hit – 1-3 friendly, 4-6 enemy.

For barrage weapons – calculate the number of models under the template normally and then randomise the hits as above – the swirl of melee makes it likely that targets will move in and out of the target area rapidly.

Leadership – normal morale checks should be made except that Pinning tests are not made – the target is too busy fighting for his life to try and get to cover! Checks should be made for 25% casualties (on both sides as required).

If a failed test results in one side falling back treat as if they have just lost the combat – enabling the enemy to pursue them as normal with a Sweeping Advance (see p43)

In addition if a unit in close combat is fired on by its own side – it must make a Leadership test due to the demoralising effects of this – with failure causing the same result as above.

I don't think so because you might kill your unit instead of the enemy's woodbok.

I think thats kind of the point

Some armies will take the risk - especially if well armoured - marines. Others realy don't care - Nids, Thinks its funny - Orks, Or better them than me.....

Even Tau and Eldar will do it if they really have to...

It was probably better when we had the finish one assault charge into another unit thing going on...........

Why not base it on BS? Better shooters should be better at hitting the right guy.

Hits hit enemy, misses hit your guys, both sides get a 4+ cover save (to represent the attempt not to hit friends).

For blasts and templates double the hits and apply them equally to both sides to reflect their indiscriminate nature

Jack

I think Jack has it about right.

Jackmojo wrote:Why not base it on BS? Better shots should be better at hitting the right guy.

Hits hit enemy, misses hit your guys, both sides get a 4+ cover save (to represent the attempt not to hit friends).

For blasts and templates double the hits and apply them equally to both sides to reflect their indiscriminate nature

Jack

Simple rule, no more hiding in close combat = better game.

this is sort of what i do with my army, i play demonhunters i draw my enemy's hand to hand units into the middle of the board. get them to charge my stormtroopers who are just about worthless, and then drop orbital bombardment on them.

Jackmojo wrote:Why not base it on BS? Better shooters should be better at hitting the right guy.

Hits hit enemy, misses hit your guys, both sides get a 4+ cover save (to represent the attempt not to hit friends).

For blasts and templates double the hits and apply them equally to both sides to reflect their indiscriminate nature

Jack

I like the idea but it isn't realistic enough because you might miss the combat even if you are exellent marksman so I like keep getting hit -part and them determinate the guys whom actually got hit but instead of rolling 4+ it could be based on bs. Though this removes the swirling melee effect.

illuknisaa wrote:

Jackmojo wrote:Why not base it on BS? Better shooters should be better at hitting the right guy.

Hits hit enemy, misses hit your guys, both sides get a 4+ cover save (to represent the attempt not to hit friends).

For blasts and templates double the hits and apply them equally to both sides to reflect their indiscriminate nature

Jack

I like the idea but it isn't realistic enough because you might miss the combat even if you are exellent marksman so I like keep getting hit -part and them determinate the guys whom actually got hit but instead of rolling 4+ it could be based on bs. Though this removes the swirling melee effect.

The cover could fix that up I guess. Maybe do it like this, roll to hit and wound as normal and they get a 4+ cover save, if they make the save then one of your guys has been wounded and you roll for your own saves. If there's cover then on 1-3 one of your guys is hit 4-6 the terrain is hit.

I find the cover save adequately reduces the number of hits incoming myself, but it might be worth play testing it with the cover save at different values to get an impact that's not brutally unfair to lightly armored close combat troops.

As an aside I've never liked needing to add a randomizing roll for two reasons, first the extra step seems wasteful, and secondarily since unless the combat is between two equally sized units (of similarly sized guys) a flat 50% chance regardless of all other factors is a bit odd.

Jack

Jackmojo wrote:Why not base it on BS? Better shooters should be better at hitting the right guy.

Hits hit enemy, misses hit your guys, both sides get a 4+ cover save (to represent the attempt not to hit friends).

For blasts and templates double the hits and apply them equally to both sides to reflect their indiscriminate nature

Jack

There's one glaring flaw here: if your misses hit your own guys, and you're playing an army with an all-around low ballistic skill, you're more likely to hit your own troops than you are to hit the enemy, and it's impossible for you to miss altogether.

So, for example, 20 Ork Boyz are locked in close combat with 10 Tactical Marines, and you have 30 Shoota Boyz on the opposite side of the Marines, like so:

oooooooooo
oooooooooo
mmmmmmmmmm

sssssssssssssss
sssssssssssssss

The Shoota Boyz fire. They're basically shooting at a wall of Marines, right? So there's very little chance they're going to hit their own troops.

However, at BS2, it breaks down statistically as one hit on each Marine (1/3 of the mass) and one hit on each Boy (2/3 of the mass).

Marines make 2/3 of their armor saves, Boyz make 1/2 of their cover saves, 10 Boyz are dead, and only 2-3 Marines.

Seeing as the Boyz were just about blocked by a wall of Marines, how does this even begin to make sense?

Break it down to even smaller numbers of Orks and it gets worse, for example the same scenario but with 10 Boyz and 10 Marines in close combat, and 30 Shoota Boyz... each Ork Boy would get two hits, statistically you've got 10 dead Boyz and still 2-3 Marines, now the Boyz are all dead by your own fire and the Marines are no longer locked in close combat.

This is why your system wouldn't work.

No system for shooting into combat doesn't suffer from silly inconsistencies (as I noted about pure randomization above).

My suggestion was aimed at simple playability and taking into account the relative quality of the shooters. So you're right under my proposal, orks (being the worst shots in the game) shouldn't shoot into melee, because their bad shots, luckily they make up for that by being pretty likely to win the fights without resorting to that.

Or if you have a small number of orks you blast away not caring that they're likely to end up dead so you can open up the marines to some more dangerous firepower, without the marines getting the benefit of cover from the orks.

To sum up, Shooting into a melee fight should not always be a good idea.

I do quibble slightly with you model placement example though, melee is supposed to represent an intermixed mass of opponents, so the model placement is relatively irrelevant for our purposes here.

Jack

Though the idea is nice, it is waaaaaay to OP'd for some armies (Like SM).

Here is a scenario, a blob of orks assault a tactical squad and stay engaged, Orks and marines consolidate back into combat.

My turn I drive a LS up to the now bunched up orks and proceed to hit almost all of them with a heavy flamer. No cover, no armor saves (for the orks).

Jackmojo wrote:No system for shooting into combat doesn't suffer from silly inconsistencies (as I noted about pure randomization above).

My suggestion was aimed at simple playability and taking into account the relative quality of the shooters. So you're right under my proposal, orks (being the worst shots in the game) shouldn't shoot into melee, because their bad shots, luckily they make up for that by being pretty likely to win the fights without resorting to that.

Or if you have a small number of orks you blast away not caring that they're likely to end up dead so you can open up the marines to some more dangerous firepower, without the marines getting the benefit of cover from the orks.

To sum up, Shooting into a melee fight should not always be a good idea.

I do quibble slightly with you model placement example though, melee is supposed to represent an intermixed mass of opponents, so the model placement is relatively irrelevant for our purposes here.

Jack

So if you shoot into melee you can't miss I think thats pretty silly.

pdawg517 wrote:Though the idea is nice, it is waaaaaay to OP'd for some armies (Like SM).

Here is a scenario, a blob of orks assault a tactical squad and stay engaged, Orks and marines consolidate back into combat.

My turn I drive a LS up to the now bunched up orks and proceed to hit almost all of them with a heavy flamer. No cover, no armor saves (for the orks).

Thats why I don't want every army to get this rule as it makes them more op and fluff wise silly (sm with "shoot your dudes" , orks shoot pretty much anything that moves)

How about all misses that missed by 1 on the die. So if you need 3+ to hit, all 2's are hits on your own guys. If you need 5+ then only 4's hit your own guys. This makes it fair for all armies regardless of their BS and the better shooters still have a better chance of hitting the enemy as they should. But I do agree with the 4+ cover for all and perhaps forbid any template weapons from being able to fire into melee.

This is 40K, not WarmaHordes .
_________
On a serious note, maybe suggested already, only certain armies would do this not all.

Guard is prob. the most famous for it,

illuknisaa wrote:
So if you shoot into melee you can't miss I think that's pretty silly.

You're taking the to-hit roll too literally, thanks to the cover save (which as I noted could be increased or even turned into an invulnerable save if flamers frighten folks) plenty of shots will have no effect, i.e. missing.

Remember the to hit die roll does not represent single shots just the relative firepower of the gun over a single shooting phase, hence why the assault rifle like Rapid Fire Weapons can hit more up close...same amount of bullets, but a closer target equals increased effective firepower.

Jack

When I'm shooting with a sniperrifle I generally don't sit next to my target. Your suggestion is just making better bs armies even more op and you really think marines (not csm) would shoot their own?

Personally I'm ok with either not being able to shoot into melee or every army being able to do it. The only choice I see as unbalanced is allowing some armies but not others.

Every army can find it self in scenarios where they would reasonably fire into close quarters risking friendly fire (and in fact every army already has the option to risk hitting friendlies with scattering blast weapons). So I am OK with allowing it as is. In the Grim Darkness of the 41st millennium your commanding officer can and will order your fellows to risk your life if needs be.

As to high BS armies being overpowered...I hadn't heard that complaint before, most of the bitching I've heard centered around assault being too good.

Jack

FIRING INTO COMBAT.

During the shooting phase, if you desire, you may fire into combat.
To represent the reluctance to fire upon your own comrades the unit attempting to fire must pass a Ld test, if you fail that unit may not shoot at all this turn.
Roll to hit with a +1 BS modifier.
Once you have determined your hits you must allocate them to each side, count all the units on one side as a single unit, to do so count the number of wound on the starting profiles on each side, on a 3+ you hit the side with the more numerous wounds, if both sides have the same wounds its a 50/50 chance to hit either side and a roll of a 4+ is needed to hit the intended side.
For blast/template weapons take the number of hits you would normally get from being under the template and allocate those hits as above to represent a swirling melee.

Examples:
1) You score 10 hits on a combat involving 2 units of orcs and a unit of your space marines. The orks have 10 models in each unit, each unit has a nob. You have 5 marines left. The starting profile wounds for the orks is 22, the marine have 5. Take your 10 hits and roll them again, any that are a 3+ hit the orks.
2) A Carnifex has charged your IG line, there are 6 IG left in the unit it charged and it is your shooting phase. You score hits on the combat. The carnifex starting wounds are 4, the 6 IG have 6. On a 3+ you will hit your own men (but they are dead anyway, and the carnifex does really have to die)

One you have discerned who you hit you must roll to wound and perform wound allocation as normal. Since each side treats all of its units as one single unit wounds can be spread across multiple units. Units in combat recieve a 4+ cover save.

Examples:
1) Two squads of 5 marines, each led by a sergeant with a special weapon in each is locked in combat with an ork warboss along with 5 ork boys, led by a nob and 2 gretchin. You, as the marine player decide to fire your nearby full tactical squad at the combat. You have a 9 bolters and 1 flamer. You fire everything.
Assume your flamer is close enough to catch 3 models in the combat and the rapid firing bolters hit 15 times (+1 BS modifer considered)
You count the wounds for each side, although the orks are less in number, they have 1 more wound that the marines, so are hit on a 3+ (the big target of the warboss being to easy to miss)
Out of your initial hits 2 flamer hits hit the orks along with 10 boltgun hits. On the marines there are 1 flamer hit and 5 boltgun hits.
Next roll to wound. The majority T of both sides is 4 in this case.
Out of your hits you score 1 flamer wound and 5 boltgun wounds on the orks. On the marines you score 3 boltgun wounds.
You allocate the 3 boltgun wound to standard marines, this may be spread across your two units.
The orks however have 6 wounds to allocate. The flamer (ignoring the cover save) and a boltgun hit are allocated to the gretchin, while the 4 remaining boltgun hits are allocated to standard orcs.
The final result is one dead space marine, 2 dead gretchin and 2 dead orcs.

As you can see from the example (theres no heavy weapon, but still) small arms fire, even BS5 boltguns, did not do much (working on rough averages)
I'm under no illusions however about how multiple blast/flamer weapons could be used to take advantage of these rules (hence why i added in randomisation of blast/template hits)