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In firefights, one of the biggest factors in the outcome is the level of supression one squad can inflict on the other. Supression is the act of filling a given area with a hail of gunfire, which discourages your enemy from exposing himself, advancing, or returning fire. In Warhammer 40k, I want to introduce a Supression rule that would allow weapons that spew out lots of shots to have an advantage. My rule actually favors large, weak squads firing on small, tough squads. In this case, damage is irrelevant, its shots that count here.


What Causes Supression?
Generally weapons that fire rapid shots cause supression. Some weapons are more effective at supression than others; it generally depends on how many shots/gun. Minor supression generates 1 counter per 2 hits, moderate supression generates 1 counter per hit, and heavy supression generates 2 counters per hit. Here's a few examples:

Infantry supressive fire, Rapid fire weapons using rapid fire, storm bolters, autocannons etc: Minor supression
Assault cannons, Heavy Bolters, Psyker shooting attacks: Moderate supression
Punisher gatling cannons, physical weapons that hit D6 shots, etc: Heavy supression

How do I cause a unit to be supressed?
By firing on it with supressive weapons, or executing supressive fire (described below). Supressive weapons create a 'supression counter' on the targeted squad. At the end of your shooting phase, add up all the supression counters. Then subtract this number by the Leadership value of the target squad+number of remaining squadmembers. Example: A squad of 5 space marines has 15 supression counters. They add their Leadership (8) plus their squad size (5) equalling 13. 15-13 is 2, so they have 2 supression counters to use.

what do I do with the supression counters?
Every one counter may be used to reduce the number of shots they may fire from one of their guns next turn by 1 (pick which gun)
Every two counters may be used to reduce the number of physical attacks they may inflict in the assault phase, to a minimum of 1
Every two counters may be used to reduce the Initiative value of one enemy squadmember by 1 (to a minimum of 1) for a full turn.
Every 5 counters may reduce the distance the squad may assault by 1"

My unit is supressed! What can I do?
At the beginning of your movement phase, any supressed squads may attempt to rally. Roll 2D6. If your roll beats the number of supression counters on the squad, you may move/shoot/assault as normal on your turn. This means that if a squad has 12 supression counters or more, it cannot break supression this way. You may also opt to go to ground which automatically clears the supression counters on the squad. Note that supression counters are cumulative, any leftover counters from one turn count toward the total on further turns!


supressive fire: Even if you do not possess supressive weapons, you may still execute supressive fire with an infantry squad. Announce this before you fire with the squad you wish to perform supressive fire with. The squad counts as having BS2 (spraying its shots indiscriminately) and its ranged weapons no longer have an AP value this turn. All plain old normal shots/weapons (standard 24" bolter shots, rokkits, etc) count as having light supression and every 2 hits on the target squad add a supression counter.

Monstrous creatures, creatures with Rage, Cavalry, Beasts, Vehicles and Walkers are not affected by supression. Units with stubborn reduce the number of remaining supression counters on them by half. Fearless creatures ARE affected, and are always assumed to be Ld 10. Vehicles themselves are normally not affected, but by firing at a transport that has firing hatches you may count the hits on the vehicle toward the squad inside. Passengers of Open-topped vehicles are particularly vulnerable and the supression counters are doubled in this case.

When firing at an enemy squad, all weapons that hit that cause supression add supression counters. (rounding down for light supression). During your shooting phase the suppression counters are cumulative; you may focus-fire on a small squad to give them a lot of supression counters for example. You do not need to wound the target to supress them, only hit with ranged supressive attacks. The effects persist until the end of the opponent's assault phase on his turn.

Example of how this would play out:
A 10 man squad of Imperial Guard receives a FRFSRF order form a commander, and fires on a 5 man Space Marine Scout squad. With 9 lasguns rapid firing with the bonus shots, they fire 27 shots. At BS3, 14 hit. The scouts take their Ld and add it to their numbers, and stand with 1 remaining supression counter. The guard player opts to reduce the number of shots one of the bolters fire by 1.

I'm all for adding suppression to the game. Doing it with hits is not a good idea. Having it affect fearless units is also not a good idea. It not only goes entirely against everything fluffy, but it ignores the fact that shots and hits are superbly abstracted in 40k.

You must remember that we are dealing with futuristic combat, not modern combat. The rules are very different. The feel is very different. By necessity, you must approach it from a cinematic point of view - a dramatic and dynamic system is necessary, and a lot of units will have to be reworked or renumbered in order to fully integrate it.

Your example of the space marines - Space marines advance unfaltering on entire guardsmen platoons, entire regiments. There is no retreat. There is no hesitation. There is no thought that they might die or that they might lose.

Guardsmen are more afraid of their commissars than of enemy fire - in every situation. It's pavlovian. It's basic. It's part of their very being. You can't override this - not without the aid of heresy and dark sorceries, not without something going horribly wrong in the training process. There's simply too much instinct riding behind it. It's baser than fear.

Likewise, Orks will compete to see who can take the biggest hole from a gun and survive.


I want to add varying suppression abilities, I do - but a flat, blanket system that is not part of the core rules, that doesn't have units built around it, and that ignores the entire feel of the game is not the way to go.

I'll let you know when I think of something :I

Would make the game far too long. I'm not against the idea, but it has to be streamlined to work well.

I'd make it exclusive to weapons that are firing more than one shot. An unsaved wound forces a leadership test, fearless units or units with no leadership are immune. If the test is failed the units attacks, shots, and initiative are reduce by half rounded up until the end of the units next turn. Multiple tests can be taken but the unit can only fail once per turn. The unit's controller chooses which models make the shots/attacks.

So its pretty much pinning with a different effect.

This is basically pinning