Forum adverts like this one are shown to any user who is not logged in. Join us by filling out a tiny 3 field form and you will get your own, free, dakka user account which gives a good range of benefits to you: No adverts like this in the forums anymore. Times and dates in your local timezone. Full tracking of what you have read so you can skip to your first unread post, easily see what has changed since you last logged in, and easily see what is new at a glance. Email notifications for threads you want to watch closely. Being a part of the oldest wargaming community on the net. If you are already a member then feel free to login now.

Many people, like myself, feel that pinning weapons are ultimately rather useless. Most armies straight up have high leadership values, or some way to negate low ones. (Knock a boy on the 'ead, Vox Casters, and so on.) I have a rather simple change that might make them vastly more valuable.

Option A:

"In addition to all other effects, wounds caused by pinning weapons lower the leadership value used for the subsequent pinning test by the number of wounds inflicted. Units with Stubborn ignore this effect, and will take the pinning test at its normal leadership value. Instead of No Retreat! taking effect, Fearless units are subject to D3 additional wounds."

I don;t think the would be a vastly overpowered change. In my experience, pinning weapons are so few and far between, and usually are fairly poor at causing a large number of wounds.

Comments? Opinions? Am I crazy?

I would go with Option A.

I like option A, quite a bit...

Would your proposed rule affect Vehicle Destroyed - Explodes! results? Say - if a unit suffers 3 wounds from the destruction of its transport, would the subsequent Pinning test be made at Ld -3, or normal Ld?

I'd take option A, and make that penalty the standard for all the shooting morale tests (with fearless units taking extra saves as for 'No Retreat', too crazy or dumb to duck is just as bad as to crazy to run).

Jack

MinMax wrote:I like option A, quite a bit...

Would your proposed rule affect Vehicle Destroyed - Explodes! results? Say - if a unit suffers 3 wounds from the destruction of its transport, would the subsequent Pinning test be made at Ld -3, or normal Ld?

I hadn't considered that. I suppose it would make sense though. While the intent here was to buff weapons that cause pinning, I always thought that having your vehicle explode around you should be more of an inconvenience. I'm going to take a look at the rulebook and look at the exact wording on the difference between weapons that cause pinning, and a transport exploding.

I do think that such a penalty could be just enough of a detriment to change the vehicle heavy meta game.

Jackmojo wrote:I'd take option A, and make that penalty the standard for all the shooting morale tests (with fearless units taking extra saves as for 'No Retreat', too crazy or dumb to duck is just as bad as to crazy to run).

Jack

I see what you're saying, Jack, but if all weapons started causing modified LD leadership tests, I'd think that pinning weapons would once again become fairly useless. I do however like the "No Retreat!" wounds suggestion enough to edit a clause into the rule.

I would personally say take the FAQ and wipe your butt with it, and use Pinning as described in the main rule book. It works just fine with that. Especially with mandrakes, as they have mass pinning fire. As well as snipers and any unit dedicated to pinning.

Remember that all barrage weapons are pinning artillery (specifically Guard artillery) will get a lot better with this fix. While I do agree that something has to be done to fix pinning weapons with this fix No Retreat wounds will kill almost as many Orks out of an Ork mob as the original blasts. I feel like this fix would nerf Tyranids and Orks more than vehicles.
What about instead of No Retreat wounds, fearless units take a number of wounds equal to the difference between the number of hits caused (by pinning weapons) and the number of kills (i.e. blasts hit 15 models of a unit, killing 10 of them. If the unit was fearless they take an additional 5 wounds from shrapnel, secondary explosions, snipers etc. Otherwise they have to roll insane heroism for their morale test).

I repeat the concern of Balthydes. I like the basic idea, as I now currently just forget about my pathfinders pinning anything.

The more recent codexes seem to have taken into account that "pinning sucks" and the Mandrake doom blaster (now this is theory I've never fought them and I see a lot of weaknesses to the unit) would become overpowered. Biovores would also be a bit crazy.

Its a god point. I hadn't considered pinning weapons that were actually good, like some IG artillery. I've decided to go with a straight D3 extra wounds (with saves) on fearless units.

The disadvantage of your idea is that the one or two(?) armies without Ld10 or an easy way of getting it (Tau, are there any others?) will be penalised more badly by the reduced leadership than all the other armies.

I do feel if there is one thing the game has absolutely no need for ATM, it is a nerf for Tau.

Alternatively, a very simple rule; If the unit subjected to a pinning attack passes the Ld test, a wound is inflicted automatically (saves can be taken as normal).

This penalises high Ld armies and Stubborn/Fearless more than weak armies, but they still get their armour saves, which are usually 3+.

I suppose that's true about Tau, but I feel like taking one additional wound isn't powerful enough to fix many pinning weapons, like Sniper rifles, for example.

Also, consider what this buff might do for Tau Pulse Carbines, which are pinning weapons, and can be taken en masse.

I think two things are in play here: Pinning weapons need a fix to make them more attractive, and Tau need a new codex, which an entirely separate issue.

The main issue in 40k is Leadership .. most things are fearless, ATSKNF, ld 9 or are orks or nids. That leaves tau and some IG and some SOB out in the open really.. DE never had great LD either.. but I've not much experience of them lately.

I'm note sure what your point is, Phototoxin.

The rule deals with Fearless units, and ATSKNF doesn't ignore pinning checks...

I already commented on Tau above.

IG have Get Back in the Fight!, Aura of Discipline, and can get Stubborn all over the place.

Eldar?

Commander Endova wrote:The rule deals with Fearless units, and ATSKNF doesn't ignore pinning checks...

There are basically two issue with pinning (and anti-personnel shooting in general as it relates to morale):

1. Fearless, as discussed above (I've already proffered my preferred solution to this).

2. Transports. Can't take pinning wounds in your vehicle so even better then fearless.

Every army is more then capable of being protected by at least one of these, sometimes both. Pinning needs to be significantly more effective/reliable (and have some useful impact on fearless units, d3 wounds is hardly enough for any ork mob to begin caring) to overcome its situational uselessness, otherwise its not worth anything and should probably just best be left out of the rules entirely so as not overly penalize armies which are not utilizing one of the two above.

No retreat style wounds are hard on the two common horde footslogging armies, but both of those can easily bring their own cover saves to help mitigate the impact as well as bringing plenty of cheap (sometimes even free for nids) bodies to soak up those wounds.

The armies which are only protected by their transports from it need to have a fair chance of it actually occurring (enough reliability that it can be planned on from the attackers side) to merit its use. The proposed penalty works fine for that for any unit which brings a decent quantity of pinning fire.

Jack

Jackmojo wrote:

Every army is more then capable of being protected by at least one of these, sometimes both. Pinning needs to be significantly more effective/reliable

Indeed. That's the whole point here. I think that taking the pinning test at a reduced leadership is going to make pinning much more reliable. Or are you saying that there should be an even more severe penalty?

(and have some useful impact on fearless units, d3 wounds is hardly enough for any ork mob to begin caring)

No retreat style wounds are hard on the two common horde footslogging armies, but both of those can easily bring their own cover saves to help mitigate the impact as well as bringing plenty of cheap (sometimes even free for nids) bodies to soak up those wounds.

I'm confused, an Ork Mob won;t care about D3 wounds, but D3 wounds are too hard on them? I was thinking about it, and I couldn't decide if D3 or D6 wounds was appropriate. I felt like d6 might be too harsh on units like Veterans or Fire Warriors, that can't blob up, but still have fairly weak armor.

The armies which are only protected by their transports from it need to have a fair chance of it actually occurring (enough reliability that it can be planned on from the attackers side) to merit its use. The proposed penalty works fine for that for any unit which brings a decent quantity of pinning fire.

Again, I'm not entirely sure what your stance is. Opening a transport with anti-vehicle weapons, and then shooting the unit with pinning weapons seems fairl reliable in conjunction with this rule.

Commander Endova wrote:
Indeed. That's the whole point here. I think that taking the pinning test at a reduced leadership is going to make pinning much more reliable. Or are you saying that there should be an even more severe penalty?

Nope, I'm just outlining my agreement with your original point

Commander Endova wrote:I'm confused, an Ork Mob won;t care about D3 wounds, but D3 wounds are too hard on them? I was thinking about it, and I couldn't decide if D3 or D6 wounds was appropriate. I felt like d6 might be too harsh on units like Veterans or Fire Warriors, that can't blob up, but still have fairly weak armor.

D3 wounds is an inadequate impact to discourage a large horde unit (orks or gaunts are what I'm thinking here), I fully favor the same impact as 'No Retreat' (i.e. one wound per point of leadership penalty, so a unit would need to take at least two unsaved wounds to need to make any extra saves). Some folks will argue that this is too harsh though, my counterpoint being that both of these armies have both sufficient bodies and plenty of options for getting cover saves to protect them (unlike in melee).

I think my last post got away from me there so I understand how I might have been confusing

Commander Endova wrote:Again, I'm not entirely sure what your stance is. Opening a transport with anti-vehicle weapons, and then shooting the unit with pinning weapons seems fairl reliable in conjunction with this rule.

Yep, that's where we agree.

Jack

How about something a little easier.

If a unit takes wounds from pinning weapons they must then roll a D6. They are pinned on a roll of a 6 if only one wound was caused, or on a roll or 5+ if more than one wound was caused. Fearless units are exempt. This way leadership doesn't matter and more wounds help.

Leadership ought to matter though. IG conscripts ought to be easier to pin then Chaos Space Marines.

And units too crazy/stupid/mindcontrolled to take cover can suffer for it.

Jack

Im not a fan of leadership being involved for pinning. The idea is that the fire is forcing people to go to ground/cover. A good leader doesn't magically make pinning fire go away. Also no matter how high your leadership you would still want to find cover. Only fearless troops should not want to go to ground because they don't fear anything. Leadership just seems like the wrong stat to use.

All those poor bastards who've charged machine gun nests in every war since the beginning of the 20th century beg to differ...whether going for glory, esprit de corps, or from fear of their officers.

The leadership stat covers personal bravery as well as unit cohesion and strength of officership (hence why all models have leadership, but you get to test against the leaders).

Jack

Phototoxin wrote:The main issue in 40k is Leadership .. most things are fearless, ATSKNF, ld 9 or are orks or nids. That leaves tau and some IG and some SOB out in the open really.. DE never had great LD either.. but I've not much experience of them lately.

QFT! The fundamental problem is fearless. There's just to many armies out there that are 100% fearless.

The best fix, IMO, is for 6th edition to drop all rules for fearless and drop every model's leadership by a point.

Except models who start on 7.

rivers64 wrote:Eldar?

What about Eldar? The only things in their army with less than 9 leadership are warlocks, rangers and guardians. And even out of these three warlocks can buddy up with farseers to use their leadership.

Kilkrazy wrote:Except models who start on 7.

Aye, but in a lot of those cases, I feel like at that point the unit is useless anyway, (Ork mobs that have taken that many casualties) or still have some way of circumventing their low leadership (Get Back in the Fight! order).