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Seeing as rough riders are considered 2nd to 3rd teir units for what they do, i made a thread towards adjusting them, for better or worse.

Rough riders:
-45 pts to Rough Riders unit for 5 Rough Riders.
-Unit is now equiped with lasguns and a CC weapon. They may exchange the lasgun for a shotgun or laspistol.
-The Rough Riders lose the hunting lances. They may now be upgraded with Hunting lances at 1pts per model.
-Same prices for equipment and upgrades
-The sargeant may exchange his laspistol for a bolt pistol at 2pts
-Excelent shots: The entire unit may upgrade at 1pts per model to gain USR "Relentless"
-Hit and Run: The entire unit may upgrade at 2pts per model to gain USR "Hit and run"
Special rules:
Scout

Khan: 40pts. everything stays the same except he and his unit gains USR "Skilled rider"

Undecided rules:
Hunting lances: Same codex rules but is now no longer 1 shot. May be used instead of a CC weapon but does not confer +1 attack bonus.


^most recent update


Any other ideas to adjusting rough riders, whether or not they agree with my orginal post are good. Also any reasons why they should not be changed are good as long as you have a reason to back up your argument.

They, and Penal Legions, are basically the "assault troops" in an otherwise non-assault-oriented army...they seem out of place for that reason. *Because* they're assault oriented, I think losing the hunting lance option would be a bad idea...I'd almost like to see the lance be more than a 1-time-use thing (maybe still only works on the charge, but if you can manage multiple charges, all the better).

I'd also like to see Khan change them to a troops FOC choice (with, perhaps, a modest points cost increase on him for that benefit).

I've been playing this game for over a decade, and I've never even encountered a Guard player with Rough Riders. The unit needs a make-over.

I know the hunting lances are iconic, but IMO they should be an upgrade option. Lower the points cost, equip everyone with lasgun, laspistol, and cc weapon as standard, and give options for 1 special weapon per 5 models. They're essentially Mongolian horse-archers, they should be armed and used that way. With the Scout special rule, they'll be a viable unit for a flanking attack and a quick strike with special weapons, then kiting from there on out. That would be a lot more interesting and useful than a weak CC unit with a one-shot weapon.

I'm about to shamelessly plug my own thread.

http://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/list/369140.page

Basically, Rough Riders get Scouts, Relentless and Move Through Cover, Hunting Lances become optional, and they're subject to a general price decrease. Ignore the new/changed weapons if you want, they don't matter. Keep in mind that prices for said weapons in the RR entry might be a bit high though, or completely irrevelant.

Not one person has seen the flaw here? Really?

Give them Outflank ffs! They're CAVALRY! They're supposed to run out and flank! But they don't get that option.

Giving them lasguns/pistols etc isn't going to make them any more awesome 55pts you stick a vet squad in a chimera and now its mobile and packs a LOT more punch.

Rough Riders + Outflank = awesome.

Ah, sorry. i thought the "still have same rules and weapon selections" was good enough to say they kept the hunting lances. I only droped the points and gave them the option to carry shotguns and etc.

The shotguns and etc: i thought it was silly to have a total fluff retcon of RR being able to carry lasguns/ shotguns and the worst offender of them all, the abilty for them to carry a las pistol and a CC weapon while riding a horse.
Next your gonna see them having trouble chewing bubble gum and walking at the same time.

The scout rule is an excelent idea, i just thought it was a little too radical but i guess that was false. How about 5-10 pts for the scout upgrade?

@I_am_a_spoon: plug away, any help to building a better unit is appreciated. I forgot that RR sgts cant carry Bolt weapons for some reason now. I'm not sure about relentless and mve through cover being that: i think it would be hard to shoot weapons on a moving hourse with a great amount of accuracy and i believe hourses do not move through cover well enough to gain the "move through cover" rule.

Your thread has alot of good stuff though, defintly worth opening and reading through.

another radical idea: maybe instead of one shot, the hunting lance should be changed to have it be used more than once?(with a price change or stat change also of course!)

Give them scout, move through cover, hunting lances always work on the charge.

Whole squad can take meltabombs.

Can take a comissar. Mounted on a horsey. The horse wears A comissar cap too, so you know whose horse it is. It carries a bolt pistol in its teeth and shoots other horses that get spooked.

A priest can be mounted for 5 points.

Mogul kamir lets you reroll what side you come in on. His squad gets counter-attack. His hunting lance always strikes first in close combat.

king-newmic wrote:I'm not sure about relentless and mve through cover being that: i think it would be hard to shoot weapons on a moving hourse with a great amount of accuracy and i believe hourses do not move through cover well enough to gain the "move through cover" rule.

Well, horses do allow you to move at full speed whilst shooting, and for an experienced rider used to the horses's movements, I don't think aiming would be much of a problem (there have been many mounted skirmisher units throughout history).

As for Move Through Cover, I always picture cavalry jumping hurdles and obstacles, rather than stepping gingerly over or around them. If humans can get MTC, then why not horses? Although, yeah, I can definitely see how it might be wierd when it comes to terrain like forests or buildings.

king-newmic wrote:another radical idea: maybe instead of one shot, the hunting lance should be changed to have it be used more than once?(with a price change or stat change also of course!)

This would be good, especially if the Rough Riders had Hit and Run. I don't see why each cavalryman couldn't carry multiple lances.




And I definitely agree with them having Scouts.

Im back from reading the BRB and it seems that calvery already receive a bonus to moving through difficult terrain so there is no reason for "MTC"
Relentless i might consider because the RR are Skilled riders and you would think they are able to fire on the move after years of training on a war horse.

I really like scouts for them, but the melta bombs i'm against, both rulewise and fluffwise. Rule wise because the simple abuse of hourses getting scout, fleet, and a 12" assult range mixed with melta bombs is a bad idea. Fluffwise, you need to carfully latch on melta bombs to tanks, somthing i think calvery would have a problem doing.

I also think that mounting the Lord Commisar is a good idea but has to be settled in a diffrent thread. Giving the squad its own commisar i dont support.

i will update the thread with the options presented here.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
rules are now updated

Lascarbines:str3,ap-,assault2,Range18''.
Also the ability to use lighter support weapons like shotguns and heavy stubbers(which have been modified to become easily man portable). Also one use rocket launchers (similar to the M72 LAW or the ATH-4). Theycould also be able to have dual laspistols or a a laspistoland cc weapon.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
http://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/list/393116.page

Lascarbines: i think they are an interesting weapon and their is a good chance it has a great synergy with Rough Riders but until the debate over whether to add the rifle or not is done, i can't add them to the rough riders.

Shotguns: they were already added. Read the OP

Heavy Stubbers: if any heavy weapon would be carried it would be this one. The problem is that your slapping a decently sized gun on a horse. Up for debate though...

Duel laspistols: topic for a diffrent thread i believe. The las pistol/CC weapon combo is already included; read OP.