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Been thinking about storm troopers lately and how they could be improved a little. To that effect I've thought of a few things that could be done.

First of all, I recommend that all storm troopers come with melta bombs, seriously, infantry sergeants can take them but they can't?

Weapon Customization- Storm troopers are given access to the best gear in the imperium and are able to customize their weapons as they see fit. They may take one of the following upgrades.

Targeters- The storm trooper's weapons count as twin linked. Also, they may check the range to the target before they fire.

Grenade launchers- Two hot-shot lasguns in the squad are equipped with auxiliary grenade launchers. They may fire these in addition to their lasgun. The auxiliary grenade launchers use the same profile as the normal grenade launchers.

Variable energy setting- the storm troopers can change the energy setting on their guns for lower velocity shots that do more damage to unprotected tissue or to penetrate the toughest armour but do little damage.

The storm troopers may chose to fire their normal guns or a low or high intensity shot each shooting phase

Low intensity shot
Range Str AP Type
18" 4 5 Rapid fire

High intensity shot
Range Str AP Type
18" 4 2 Rapid fire, get's hot

Thoughts?

It seems fine, although how many points would they cost? Also, with the high- intensity shot, wouldn't it be stonger than str 2? It should be at least str 3, maybe even 4.

CommissarCandlestick wrote:It seems fine, although how many points would they cost? Also, with the high- intensity shot, wouldn't it be stonger than str 2? It should be at least str 3, maybe even 4.

The idea with the shot is that it can penetrate any armour but over penetrates normal tissue, thus causing little damage

Why not make it a s4 gets hot weapon? Though with the targeter that might be an issue since you can only roll two 1's 3% of the time.

M.

Infantryman wrote:Why not make it a s4 gets hot weapon? Though with the targeter that might be an issue since you can only roll two 1's 3% of the time.

M.

You can only take one weapon upgrade


Automatically Appended Next Post:
Edited high intensity shot for S4 get's hot

Probably Stormies should be Vet squads with better stock armor, scout, deep strike, and the mission rules. With the same amount of options as the vets, they can be tooled up to do different missions a bit better.

M.

Personally I the storm trooper are a cool model and I would love to see them as a more viable unit. I like some of your ideas. I have been working on some home rules for my own gaming group to make storm troopers more viable. Here’s my take on what you got here:

Melta bombs:

Two thumbs upon this! Think melta bombs at the standard cost would be a great addition!

Weapon Customization:

Yes and no, I like the idea but I think needs to be tweeked a little, here’s my take on your recommendations:

Targeters: twin liked on a BS 4 seems a over powered when you combine it with some of your other new ideas and from a fluff perspective, even with fancy scopes I do not think that storm troopers should be better shots than Space Marines. This is what I would recommend:

All storm troopers have targeters and they have this effect:
After storm troopers fire on a target they are able to relay precise targeting information to other units. After a storm trooper unit fires on an enemy unit one friendly unit within 12” of the storm troopers that fires that turn only has to roll 1 D6 to scatter.


Grenade launchers: I like your idea of grenade launchers and it is a fun rule but I think it struggles to help storm troopers more viable. They are already decent at short range shooting, I think they could use something to boost them in close combat. What do you think of this:

Underslung grenade launchers: All storm troopers Las guns have underslung grenade launcher that can fire short range fragmentation rounds. These launchers can be effectively fired on the move and storm troopers are adept using them when assaulting fix positions or break up on coming attacks.
Effect: Storm Troopers have defensive grenades and furious assault.

Variable energy setting:

I like idea of the variable settings on the guns, but I would make them a little more “variable.” Instead of a “safe” and “unsafe” choice I would make it so one setting was good for weak hoards and the other would be good for low count but strong units. But that is just my opinion I think you have a solid idea.

This would be my take on it. Bring back Hellguns with new stats and allow them to fire a Hot Shot Round (for no other reason than Hot Shot Las Gun is a silly name to me)

New stats:
Normal rounds: S 3 AP 5 Assault 2 range 18”
Hot Shot rounds: S 4 AP 2 Assault 1 range 18” Gets Hot!

Anyway these are just from my perspective, what do you think? Do you have any other ideas about storm troopers? Like I said I am working on some house rules and your post gave me some good ideas.

Nifty idea Zookie. Also check out this thread for my own version unique to a specific world: http://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/list/323692.page

M.

Zookie wrote:
This would be my take on it. Bring back Hellguns with new stats and allow them to fire a Hot Shot Round (for no other reason than Hot Shot Las Gun is a silly name to me)

New stats:
Normal rounds: S 3 AP 5 Assault 2 range 18”
Hot Shot rounds: S 4 AP 2 Assault 1 range 18” Gets Hot!

Anyway these are just from my perspective, what do you think? Do you have any other ideas about storm troopers? Like I said I am working on some house rules and your post gave me some good ideas.

Yea, no.... I would rather have a S3 AP3 Rapid Fire weapon w/o Gets Hot! rather than that...
Hotshot lasguns do not get hot simply from firing a single high strength shot, they get hot after multiple consecutive shots with no time between each shot for cooling down. If you truly wanted to include the Gets Hot! rule, it would only be fair to the fluff to include at least three shots, four being closer to reality. But then again that greatly increases the chances of FAILING the Gets Hot! rule, so IMHO I say avoid the rule entirely.

DakkaDakka wrote:

Hmmm you have a point with only a +4 save get hot is a little to dangerous what about this?

Normal rounds: S 3 AP 5 Assault 2 range 18”
Hot Shot rounds: S 4 AP 3 Assault 1 range 18”

I don't know, I think that stormies are already powerful and complicated enough. Really, they just need their points cost shaved down a little.