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.

Barrel in the Face: Any model equipped with a ranged weapon, and not carrying a specified melee weapon, may use said ranged weapon's damage profile in place of its own(The model will still use its Weapon Skill to determine if it hits. It will use its own Attacks value to determine how many hits it gets, unless the ranged weapon could not make that many attacks in a single round otherwise). Doing so allows the opposing unit to gain one additional attack per unit using Barrel in the Face(to be distributed evenly among all models), or per model in the opposing unit, whichever is higher.
This rule may not be used with Heavy weapons, Template Weapons, or Blast/Large Blast weapons.
EDIT: Additional attacks made because of this rule are done at the model's standard initiative; the use of this rule must be declared at the start of combat.

Example: A unit of five Space Marines assaults a squad of ten Tau Fire Warriors. The fire warriors may choose to either attack with one S (3), AP (-) attack each, or they may give each Space Marine two additional attacks (the number of models using BF (10) divided by the number of opposing models (5)) to instead make one S (5), AP (5) attack each.
________

Thoughts, suggestions?

Maybe if it hit on 6s and automatically counted as unweildy. Imagine a squad of IG veterans loaded up with plasma.

Buttons wrote:
Maybe if it hit on 6s and automatically counted as unweildy. Imagine a squad of IG veterans loaded up with plasma.

I could see unwieldy, but I think taking the extra attacks at that point would make up for it enough that they wouldn't have to have a reduced chance to hit.

Necroes wrote:

Buttons wrote:
Maybe if it hit on 6s and automatically counted as unweildy. Imagine a squad of IG veterans loaded up with plasma.

I could see unwieldy, but I think taking the extra attacks at that point would make up for it enough that they wouldn't have to have a reduced chance to hit.

Honestly, it is just a bad idea. Might seem cool, but it gives shooty units even more power in a meta where CC is already suffering. Now you don't only have to worry about overwatch, but when you finally do assault them a random plasma gunner can butcher your guys in close combat. If you really like the idea, perhaps have something like.
1. The unit cannot fire overwatch (they would be low on or out of ammo by the time they get into stabbing range) and cannot fire the shooting phase before.
2. It is all or nothing, either everyone is shooting in CC or no one is (this is more for simplicity sake, so you don't have to keep track of what guys are using bolters, and which ones are using power swords).
3. The weapons count as unweildy (trying to shove a guy off you and shoot him with a 6 foot long pulse rifle is easier said than done)
4. Cannot fire blast weapons or templates, the guys get no close combat attacks, although he can shoot with other weapons (can't fire off a missile in close combat and risk blowing yourself and half your squad up)
5. Cannot fire heavy weapons in a close combat unless the unit is relentless (lugging around a heavy bolter is hard enough)

So yeah, it might still have its uses, but at least that will prevent the worst abuses like blowing up a cluster of Orks by charging them with a bunch of guys with grenade launchers once everyone rushes into close combat, or having a unit of devastators rip an enemy unit apart with heavy bolters or lascannons in close combat. Honestly though, I simply find this clunky and unnecessary. 40K is a fairly large scale skirmish game, and so the rules are abstracted. Sure some marine might draw his bolt pistol in a melee and shoot someone, but that is abstracted as regular CC attacks.

Necroes wrote:
Barrel in the Face: Any model equipped with a ranged weapon, and not carrying a specified melee weapon, may use said ranged weapon's damage profile in place of its own(The model will still use its Weapon Skill to determine if it hits. It will use its own Attacks value to determine how many hits it gets, unless the ranged weapon could not make that many attacks in a single round otherwise). Doing so allows the opposing unit to gain one additional attack per unit using Barrel in the Face(to be distributed evenly among all models), or per model in the opposing unit, whichever is higher.
This rule may not be used with Heavy weapons, Template Weapons, or Blast/Large Blast weapons.
EDIT: Additional attacks made because of this rule are done at the model's standard initiative; the use of this rule must be declared at the start of combat.

Example: A unit of five Space Marines assaults a squad of ten Tau Fire Warriors. The fire warriors may choose to either attack with one S (3), AP (-) attack each, or they may give each Space Marine two additional attacks (the number of models using BF (10) divided by the number of opposing models (5)) to instead make one S (5), AP (5) attack each.
________

Thoughts, suggestions?

I would say this is pretty dangerous.
without unwieldy, this has the potential to make uber CC units out of lightweights.
Firedragons normally hit at init5 with str3 ap-. Wouldnt they love to be str8 ap2, SURE! But they could easily wipe a small unit of anything init 4 or less.

I would say this is pretty dangerous.
without unwieldy, this has the potential to make uber CC units out of lightweights.
Firedragons normally hit at init5 with str3 ap-. Wouldnt they love to be str8 ap2, SURE! But they could easily wipe a small unit of anything init 4 or less

I've thought of a few potential changes to it, actually;

1.) Every model that can use it must, if any of them do.
2.) It gives them unwieldy.
3.) It makes them attack with WS 1
4.) It can only be used with assault weapons (possibly only pistols), and only those that are non-blast and non-template.

I agree with this, except it should be even more effective. Units should continue to shoot at their normal BS, while heavy weapons may snap fire. And the penalty for using it should just be making the shooting unit WS 1 on defense, the extra attacks thing would be kind of annoying to calculate every round. This would make close combat a lot more realistic: you might be great with a chainsaw sword, but that doesn't mean your opponent is going to suddenly forget that they have a gun.

 Peregrine wrote:
I agree with this, except it should be even more effective. Units should continue to shoot at their normal BS, while heavy weapons may snap fire. And the penalty for using it should just be making the shooting unit WS 1 on defense, the extra attacks thing would be kind of annoying to calculate every round. This would make close combat a lot more realistic: you might be great with a chainsaw sword, but that doesn't mean your opponent is going to suddenly forget that they have a gun.

Um... not to be rude or anything, but I honestly can't tell if you're being serious or satirical.

Unwieldy is a definite, unless the weapon is a pistol.
For sure use WS instead of BS, no need to further penalize it.
Heavy and Salvo weapons are Snap Fire only (giving HW units a defensive WS of 1 as well)
All weapons fire only once, regardless of the number of shots or attacks.
You can use blast markers, but they are centered over the model you are in base contact with, so it's guaranteed to hit the firing model as well. You can fire a template, but the opposing player may rotate the marker up to 90 degrees, which would represent an opposing model wrestling for the barrel.
Don't give extra attacks to the opposing squad, the combination of unwieldy and 1 attack are probably enough of a deterrent, and if you're attacking like this, it's definitely a disordered charge, if you're defending like this, you're obviously losing the benefit of counter attack or any other cc related abilities.

Necroes wrote:
Um... not to be rude or anything, but I honestly can't tell if you're being serious or satirical.

Entirely serious. Having entire units of idiots running around with chainswords is terrible for realism, my ideal version of 40k would have them removed and make assault an occasional thing you do to drive the last few survivors out of cover once you've shot them, not a major strategy you plan your army around. A change like this would be great, it would make assaulting dedicated shooting units suicide (like it should be) until you've crippled them with your own shooting. And it makes sense fluff-wise, the fact that you have a chainsaw sword doesn't mean that I'm going to drop my gun and fight you with my knife. And even if you get in too close my friend with a gun will be happy to shoot you.

The alternative, of course, is to make overwatch happen at full BS and give every unit hit and run (automatically passing the initiative test), with the assault phase representing only the brief exchange of blows before the other side can step back and resume shooting.

Necroes wrote:

 Peregrine wrote:
I agree with this, except it should be even more effective. Units should continue to shoot at their normal BS, while heavy weapons may snap fire. And the penalty for using it should just be making the shooting unit WS 1 on defense, the extra attacks thing would be kind of annoying to calculate every round. This would make close combat a lot more realistic: you might be great with a chainsaw sword, but that doesn't mean your opponent is going to suddenly forget that they have a gun.

Um... not to be rude or anything, but I honestly can't tell if you're being serious or satirical.

Peregrine <3 anything that makes shooty better and/or assault worse, so he's probably being dead serious. Edit: Ha, thought so

For all the realism you usually expouse Perry, full BS shooting in melee is an enormous crock. Its right up there with giving assault a ranged attack with their melee stats by throwing their weapons or some rubbish. And like I and others have said, this is not realistic science fiction, this is Warhammer - they have a game for what you want, it's called Infinity and its a lot of fun.

it gives shooty units even more power in a meta where CC is already suffering.

This. I like the concept of the idea, but shooting units do not need or deserve any bonus that will make them even better than they already are in comparison to assault.

The most common compensation I'm seeing is "WS 1" - but WS 1 means bugger all when the worst to-hit is 5+ and best is 3+

I do think its feasible though, and this is how I would do it;

>Any model with a ranged weapon may be able to fire it in close combat.
>Such CC shooting cannot be made in a turn in which the unit fired overwatch, as this is already accounting for all the shooting they get that round. It also may not be made in any close combat in which there are other friendly units involved. Only the units in close combat can shoot in this fashion - units outside the combat still cannot fire into it as the risk of hitting friendlies is too high
>If a unit opts to shoot in melee, they must either all do so or none of them - however, characters (independent and otherwise) may choose to do so on an individual basis
>CC shooting is resolved exactly as a round of overwatch fire in all regards, aside from a) standard restrictions of shooting into melee (which have been removed) and b) the defending player may choose which models are removed (instead of from the fronnt_
>Only guns that can fire overwatch can fire in close combat, and do so in the usual fashion - ie templates get 1d3 hits and so forth
Edit:>The Close Combat shooting replaces all standard melee attacks. Just in case that wasn't obvious

Things I'm unsure of are;
-Characters can opt to attack normally or not
-When to resolve the overwatch? Either simultaneous with all melee (so shoot first, but remove casualties after all melee), or last - definitely not first
-A risk of hitting ones own team? To-hit rolls of 1 are resolved against the firing unit

 Peregrine wrote:

Necroes wrote:
Um... not to be rude or anything, but I honestly can't tell if you're being serious or satirical.

Entirely serious. Having entire units of idiots running around with chainswords is terrible for realism, my ideal version of 40k would have them removed and make assault an occasional thing you do to drive the last few survivors out of cover once you've shot them, not a major strategy you plan your army around. A change like this would be great, it would make assaulting dedicated shooting units suicide (like it should be) until you've crippled them with your own shooting. And it makes sense fluff-wise, the fact that you have a chainsaw sword doesn't mean that I'm going to drop my gun and fight you with my knife. And even if you get in too close my friend with a gun will be happy to shoot you.

The alternative, of course, is to make overwatch happen at full BS and give every unit hit and run (automatically passing the initiative test), with the assault phase representing only the brief exchange of blows before the other side can step back and resume shooting.

*Realism*

*40K*

*Space Fantasy*

Realism and 40k simply don't mix.

As for this idea...No, just no. It would entirely unbalance assaults. I could *maybe* agree with pistols only.

 Dakkamite wrote:
For all the realism you usually expouse Perry, full BS shooting in melee is an enormous crock. Its right up there with giving assault a ranged attack with their melee stats by throwing their weapons or some rubbish.

True, the stat should remain BS since it's still a shooting attack and that's the relevant skill, but I guess it might be appropriate to have a -1 penalty to represent the difficulty of making the shot.

And no, it's not comparable to giving a ranged attack for throwing a weapon, since the limiting factor there isn't skill. A thrown weapon attack would still use WS, it would just be STR 1 AP - with 3" range and probably re-roll all successful wounds unless the throwing model is STR 5+.

And like I and others have said, this is not realistic science fiction, this is Warhammer - they have a game for what you want, it's called Infinity and its a lot of fun.

And the day Infinity adds tanks and aircraft is the day I play my last game of 40k.

On the idea, I'm largely against it. Whilst it is certainly an interesting idea (kinda reminds me of DoW), there is a reason why many guardsman have bayonets. Anyways, I'd rather this not be a thing primarily because it further complicated the game and gives a further boon to shooty which was already better anyways. None more so would benefit from this than Tau. Unwieldy you say? Doesn't matter we were slow anyways! The notion of the entire unit firing wouldn't make sense either. On a model by model basis, realistically, I could see a guy shooting point blank swiveling his gun to smack a foe or hit them with the butt. But the entire unit? Along with that, the WS1 doesn't really seem like that much of a drawback. The ones using this were likely going to hit on a 3+ anyways. Anyways back to Tau. Using them as an example, it would become unappealing to even fight in CC against them. All Tau players would elect to do this because they already have crummy WS and I meaning they get an extra turn to shoot further decreasing one of the weaknesses of a shooty army.

Also please don't argue realism into 40k

You know, this would make assaulting loota boyz with a MAB in them absolute suicide.

If you mystically get past the shooting and the overwatch, your ragged remnant of a unit is garaunteed to be obliterated by the follow up dakka.

The same applies to Tankbustaz.

 Peregrine wrote:

 Dakkamite wrote:
For all the realism you usually expouse Perry, full BS shooting in melee is an enormous crock. Its right up there with giving assault a ranged attack with their melee stats by throwing their weapons or some rubbish.

True, the stat should remain BS since it's still a shooting attack and that's the relevant skill, but I guess it might be appropriate to have a -1 penalty to represent the difficulty of making the shot.

And no, it's not comparable to giving a ranged attack for throwing a weapon, since the limiting factor there isn't skill. A thrown weapon attack would still use WS, it would just be STR 1 AP - with 3" range and probably re-roll all successful wounds unless the throwing model is STR 5+.

Its comparable in that both are terribad ideas. Also we have a precedents for both that you have not considered in your suggestion above - overwatch shows us how GW has decreed the accuracy of this kind of shooting should be, and Grenades give us a precedent for thrown weapon range that far exceeds (by 266% in fact) your suggestion. You might want to consider that and re-work your ideas a little.

And the day Infinity adds tanks and aircraft is the day I play my last game of 40k.

What happened to Realism, Perry? They have little need for Tanks when they have TAGs, and even less so for covert operations style urban engagements as that game represents. They also already portray things like aircraft and artillery realistically - by having them drop men and missiles onto the boards from out of sight. Seems the pinnacle of realistic sci-fi wargaming IMO

The same applies to Tankbustaz.

My god... we've done the impossible. Tankbustas... could be useful for something? Hallelujah!

Melee is fairly realistic in the 40k universe, thank's entirely to armies like

Orks and tyranid's - They rely on a horde of bodies, care little for casualties, and as such, melee is the most efficient way to disorientate their enemies, and prevent them from shooting effectively.

Eldar - Preternaturally fast, they don't need to worry so much about getting shot in combat like they do at range, because their superior reflexes allow them to dodge or repel incoming blows or shots.

Space marines (Blood angels example) : While not represented in the tabletop stat's perfectly, they are meant to me as strong, and as resilient, and as fast, as 10 men. They are a surgical strike unit, designed to take out one specific target before they can respond, and the best way to do that, isn't at range, where they can take cover or flee, but to run up, and use their superior strength and presence to their advantage, to crush the morale of nearby enemies. It's as much a psychological tactic for a marine to use melee as it is a battle tactic, because the results, would most likely cause anything less than another space marine, or a brainless ork, or a subdued tyranid, to break in fear and horror.



Now, the only thing I can think of using this rule for, is having a special rule along the lines of

"Keep firing, keep firing!"
In combat, the unit's attacks use the strength of their ranged weapon, rather than their own.


And give it to unit's like tau, who would never drop their gun even in combat. Fire warrior's still barely ever hit, and barely get any attacks, but this would at least give them a better shot. Other armies, however, would prefer to manually chop people up, such as orks.

But obviously, this is a special rule that should only be given to certain basic infantry, not devastator squad's and such.

We allow one of the regular attacks in close combat to be replaced by a single pistol attack. Anything more than that seemed too strong. In fact we considered treating models with heavy weapons as -1 WS but left them as is.

I remember hearing rumours that ones pistol weapon would influence how you fought in close combat.

If nothing else, this is a feasible concept and would certainly be fine in my books. I don't like how that rumoured effect was to occur though; "the bonus attack you get for pistol + CCW is resolved at strength of the pistol"

If you don't use the strength of the pistol, what then is the point of using it in close combat?

 Peregrine wrote:

 Dakkamite wrote:
For all the realism you usually expouse Perry, full BS shooting in melee is an enormous crock. Its right up there with giving assault a ranged attack with their melee stats by throwing their weapons or some rubbish.

True, the stat should remain BS since it's still a shooting attack and that's the relevant skill, but I guess it might be appropriate to have a -1 penalty to represent the difficulty of making the shot.

In all this craziness I think I am going to pick out this to refute

BS represents a models ability to adjust for wind, distance, and speed compared to the speed of travel of the projectile. It also includes all bonuses for targeters, vision enhancement and fire control software.
It has nothing to do with the ability to quickly draw a gun and keep the barrel pointed where you want while another person wails on you. In close situtations you dont need to adjust for wind, consider distance, your projectile can be assume to have instant speed. Your targeters, vision enhancements and fire control systems are going to be worthless.

WS on the other hand represents your dexterity with a hand held weapon, your ability to line up a shot or attack against an enemy watching him and searching for a moment of weakness where you can strike him. A skilled hand to hand fighter would be more likely to pick the right moment to draw and then shoot his gun. A skilled hand to hand fighter would also have a higher chance to bat an enemy's gun away right before he fired.




Automatically Appended Next Post:

Now for true realism, lets consider that guns are already much more effective than armor. Even if armor does save your life, you are likely down on the ground in a lot of pain and out of the fight. In 38,000 years with laser rifles, rocket propelled exploding shells, and plasma cannons we are still dealing with flakk armor. Flesh is still flesh. So:
Warriors have a BS
Rolling to hit will change based on distance, whether the enemy moved, whether the shooter moved, whether the model is in cover.
If a shot hits, it kills
No rolling to wound. If an exploding .75 caliber bolt hits you it kills you, or at least puts you on the ground
No armor saves. No flakk armor, carpace, or jack is going to save you.

Most of these weapons have high rates of fire. Change all weapons to assault 10. Rapid fire weapons would fire 20 shots.

Range. Current assault rifles have ~300m range it takes a man about a minute to run 300m while a gun can easily fire 600 rounds in a minute. To account for this all guns have 60" range except for pistols that have 30" range.

 amanita wrote:
If you don't use the strength of the pistol, what then is the point of using it in close combat?

I don't like the idea of using WS to hit at pistol strength. I just look at my Orks - Slugga boyz would get better (whooo!) but then their bonus pistol attack would be their best attribute, always equal or better than an attack made with their close combat weapon.

If this became a rule I wouldn't be too fussed though, it is a quick and easy way to resolve this.

Now for true realism, lets consider that guns are already much more effective than armor. Even if armor does save your life, you are likely down on the ground in a lot of pain and out of the fight. In 38,000 years with laser rifles, rocket propelled exploding shells, and plasma cannons we are still dealing with flakk armor. Flesh is still flesh. So:
Warriors have a BS
Rolling to hit will change based on distance, whether the enemy moved, whether the shooter moved, whether the model is in cover.
If a shot hits, it kills
No rolling to wound. If an exploding .75 caliber bolt hits you it kills you, or at least puts you on the ground
No armor saves. No flakk armor, carpace, or jack is going to save you.

Most of these weapons have high rates of fire. Change all weapons to assault 10. Rapid fire weapons would fire 20 shots.

Range. Current assault rifles have ~300m range it takes a man about a minute to run 300m while a gun can easily fire 600 rounds in a minute. To account for this all guns have 60" range except for pistols that have 30" range.

Theres plenty of stuff in the Warhammerverse that should require "to-wound" saves, and plenty of armour that should give armour saves. I think the shooting is abstracted down to 1-2 shots for most guns for the purposes of balance and not having to roll thousands of dice. Plus if we start rolling 20 dice per shot we'll have to start accounting for barrel drift and such making shots after the first one gradually less accurate...

Range is also abstracted. I'm all for abstracting it but it seems stupid that they would do this and then insist on true line of sight.

Dakkamite? I don't believe that is what he meant by that. It seems more along the lines that he was entertaining Pergrine's claims of realism, shooting, etc.

Yeah I don't know why I replied to that one

Isn't this what overwatch represents? Using a rifle in melee should never hit on better than a 6.

The only weapons that really they look like they could be fired in Melee are Pistols, but that requires basically every pistol and model with pistols be recosted. Like Inferno pisols going from 10/15 points they are now to about 40 (compare with a powerfist).

Also, if you restrict the pistol to it's shot value (usually one), it will complicate matters a bit and therefore slow down assaults quite a lot.

 Daba wrote:
Isn't this what overwatch represents? Using a rifle in melee should never hit on better than a 6.

The only weapons that really they look like they could be fired in Melee are Pistols, but that requires basically every pistol and model with pistols be recosted. Like Inferno pisols going from 10/15 points they are now to about 40 (compare with a powerfist).

Also, if you restrict the pistol to it's shot value (usually one), it will complicate matters a bit and therefore slow down assaults quite a lot.

Shh, no logic, only Peregrine's pathological dislike of Assault, Chaos, and the Tyranids now.

IMO something like this would be better than Overwatch.

Maybe all models with a non-blast or template Rapid Fire/Assault weapon could use its Strength, AP and Attacks values in lieu of their own?

At BS 1 but possibly also at Initiative 10?

 Kain wrote:

 Daba wrote:
Isn't this what overwatch represents? Using a rifle in melee should never hit on better than a 6.

The only weapons that really they look like they could be fired in Melee are Pistols, but that requires basically every pistol and model with pistols be recosted. Like Inferno pisols going from 10/15 points they are now to about 40 (compare with a powerfist).

Also, if you restrict the pistol to it's shot value (usually one), it will complicate matters a bit and therefore slow down assaults quite a lot.

Shh, no logic, only Peregrine's pathological dislike of Assault, Chaos, and the Tyranids now.

How could someone possibly hate Tyranids or Chaos? Chaos especially is a fantastically interesting faction (there are heaps of 'bug' factions in other things that bring down the Tyranids a bit though)

 I_am_a_Spoon wrote:
IMO something like this would be better than Overwatch.

Maybe all models with a non-blast or template Rapid Fire/Assault weapon could use its Strength, AP and Attacks values in lieu of their own?

At BS 1 but possibly also at Initiative 10?

Thats essentially what I suggested a few posts back. A squad can swap all melee attacks to instead fire a volley of overwatch into the other unit. I wouldn't be opposed to INT 10 if it replaced standard overwatch fire but definitely not if they get standard overwatch as well.

Absolutely not. Tau are already overpowered and have over watch. Giving them an additional over watch basically hands them the game.