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The problem of course is that many assault lists can't afford one turn of Eldar shooting.

Okay, that old-fashioned Overwatch actually sounds a lot better, more effective AND a fairly interesting strategic choice instead of just "Eat inaccurate lead, melee armies!" whenever you're hit.

 vipoid wrote:
So why change the rules to let them assault from deep strike?

Why not instead change the rules to give those units an actual useful role in an army?

Because for many units that IS their useful role in the army! All their fluff, rules and design are built around this crunch impossibility...
That's something that a lot of these detractors seem to be missing, if it needs to be rebalanced and limited in some ways (which still seems to mainly be based on an exaggeration mostly but alright) then rebalance and limit it as needed but no Assault from Deep Strike just gimps certain units into complete pointlessness with no hope...
The important bits would seem to be:
• Still no Assaulting out of a Transport that just arrived from Reserves (whether it be a freshly dropped Drop Pod or a Land Raider you somehow managed to Deep Strike it doesn't matter, anything would count, you have to drop on your own if you want this!)
• CHOOSE between Shooting and Assault when you arrive, NOT both (except maybe as a special rule for certain units like some Terminators, but DEFINITELY not in general).
• If you pick Assault, you declare the unit you charge on arrival which either gets a bonus on Overwatch against you (still not sure about full BS, but can consider it, Blasts definitely should be allowed though, maybe Templates should be treated as having rolled a 3 on their D3s?) and maybe things that don't normally Overwatch would be allowed or alternatively it's treated as having Interceptor against you even if it doesn't normally have that rule. Should be the big one to help, if it doesn't then it's probably because the unit's too weak (and getting stomped is just the natural result of a much stronger unit bullying a much weaker one, it's a lot of points to do a very trivial task so it'd be kinda depressing if it DIDN'T work all that well.) or because their target is a melee-focused unit (which speaks for itself! ).

Other additional things to consider:
• You have to choose which action you want BEFORE rolling Reserves and such, the Assault option makes it harder to arrive, mishaps easier to get and/or worse and so on.
• If you pick Assault you don't get to move other than charging, you just have to charge from wherever you happen to land. Better stock up on those Locator Beacons!
• It's a disordered charge even though you only get to attack one unit.

Possibly more too, but that's what I could come up with. Maybe some other ideas could be added?

I suggest you try those rules with GKs or such against Tau or IG and see what happens.

 DoomShakaLaka wrote:
Assaulting from deepstrile is a bad idea. Maybe assaulting from infiltrate and scout if you went second could work, but having turn one charges with no chance of retaliation is not fair or interactive so no.

Shooting units completely off the board on turn 1 with no chance of retaliation because Eldar is also not fair or interactive, yet it happens all the time. At least the assaulted units will have a chance to fight back. I am all for it to be honest. It will tone down gunlines quite a lot and force diversity in the lists.

 vipoid wrote:
I suggest you try those rules with GKs or such against Tau or IG and see what happens.

I suggest you actually state issues instead of vaguely insinuating them for no reason.

 CrashGordon94 wrote:

I suggest you actually state issues instead of vaguely insinuating them for no reason.

The issues have been stated by myself and others multiple times, you just refuse to see/accept them.

Hence, I'm suggesting that you try the rules against the armies they'll hurt the most, so that you can actually experience the issues.

 vipoid wrote:

 CrashGordon94 wrote:

I suggest you actually state issues instead of vaguely insinuating them for no reason.

The issues have been stated by myself and others multiple times, you just refuse to see/accept them.

Hence, I'm suggesting that you try the rules against the armies they'll hurt the most, so that you can actually experience the issues.

Being able to charge the scatterbikes from deep striking would go a long way towards toning down the madness and getting into the nose of obnoxious cheesers. Plus, gunlines right now are way too free to just min-max on shooting, while assault lists have to deploy assault units, utility/protection, possible transports/teleport beacons/ special characters to offer outflank or infiltrate etc plus cannon fodder and some shooting to counter threats from range. Shooting armies just have it too easy at the moment. If tau just get wrecked from assaulting from deepstrike (they won't because of interceptor riptides and supporting overwatch), they should make their list diverse enough to add kroots and other blitzkrieg stuff to pillar around their suits/tanks. Same goes for IG, those conscripts are just ridiculously cheap, buy them and circle your tanks and command units.

A rule change such as the proposed one would shape up the meta so wildly that nobody knows what would happen eventually. Yes, it might become way to terrifying to get 3 trygons reliably deepstrike and charge the enemy, but so far said Trygon is one of the biggest jokes of the game, along with all the other overcosted for no reason whatsoever assault units (terminators, warp talons etc etc).

I would be okay with assaulting from reserves or Outflank/Infiltrate, but not Deep Strike. It would be going too far, as it would give a massive advantage to the assaulting player that the defending player could do nothing about.

People have brought up the justification of shooting units being able to delete units via deep-strike, so assault units should be able to charge. This ignores one important factor: the defending player can still shoot the deep-striking unit dead in the next shooting phase. If the assault goes as the charging player wants, the assaulting unit will still be locked in combat during the opponent's turn, rendering shooting ineffective. The lack of cover saves in assault and the ability to unit to be instakilled via sweeping advances makes assault potentially even more powerful than shooting.

Assaulting from Deep-Strike is a bad idea that, while benefiting many underused units, would make the game's balance as a whole suffer greatly. We already have a great example in the form of skyhammer. You wouldn't think that two squads of Assault Marines could do much damage on the charge, but with the support of the Relentless Devastators they are supremely overpowered. Now imagine if any army could do that. Only the Tau and some Dark Angels would survive due to their ability to boost their overwatch beyond normal levels.

topaxygouroun i wrote:

 vipoid wrote:

 CrashGordon94 wrote:

I suggest you actually state issues instead of vaguely insinuating them for no reason.

The issues have been stated by myself and others multiple times, you just refuse to see/accept them.

Hence, I'm suggesting that you try the rules against the armies they'll hurt the most, so that you can actually experience the issues.

Being able to charge the scatterbikes from deep striking would go a long way towards toning down the madness and getting into the nose of obnoxious cheesers.

Scatter bikes being a staple of Tau and IG lists.

topaxygouroun i wrote:
Being able to charge the scatterbikes from deep striking would go a long way towards toning down the madness and getting into the nose of obnoxious cheesers. Plus, gunlines right now are way too free to just min-max on shooting, while assault lists have to deploy assault units, utility/protection, possible transports/teleport beacons/ special characters to offer outflank or infiltrate etc plus cannon fodder and some shooting to counter threats from range. Shooting armies just have it too easy at the moment. If tau just get wrecked from assaulting from deepstrike (they won't because of interceptor riptides and supporting overwatch), they should make their list diverse enough to add kroots and other blitzkrieg stuff to pillar around their suits/tanks. Same goes for IG, those conscripts are just ridiculously cheap, buy them and circle your tanks and command units.

A rule change such as the proposed one would shape up the meta so wildly that nobody knows what would happen eventually. Yes, it might become way to terrifying to get 3 trygons reliably deepstrike and charge the enemy, but so far said Trygon is one of the biggest jokes of the game, along with all the other overcosted for no reason whatsoever assault units (terminators, warp talons etc etc).

Gunlines are not "free"; they require support form the rest of the army, just in a different form than assault units. Tau may be able to boost their overwatch, but they can only overwatch once. Meanwhile, assault units can shoot and then potentially assault multiple units, especially if there are multiple assaulting units. IG conscript bubble can be easily shot through to get to the mean of the army. It wouldn't just be Tau getting wrecked, it would be every army that deploys units in the backfield to hold objectives. It would also put even more power in the hands of melee deathstars, which are obnoxious enough as is. Trygons, Warp Talons, and Assault Terminators may not be overpowered now, but I can guarantee that they would be if you could assault from Deep-Strike. If you want to improve melee, get rid of random charge ranges and allow people to charge from stationary or combat speed vehicles.

Once upon a time, it was possible to assault directly out of reservers. I built a couple lists that maximized that potential. I never lost a game. The end.

No, assaulting from deepstrike/reserve is a *terrible* idea, one which should not be in the game unless it comes at a severe penalty (automatically a disorderly charge made at Initiative 1, units may only charge a single enemy unit/may not multicharge) or is limited to very specific special character models.

 vipoid wrote:

topaxygouroun i wrote:

 vipoid wrote:

 CrashGordon94 wrote:

I suggest you actually state issues instead of vaguely insinuating them for no reason.

The issues have been stated by myself and others multiple times, you just refuse to see/accept them.

Hence, I'm suggesting that you try the rules against the armies they'll hurt the most, so that you can actually experience the issues.

Being able to charge the scatterbikes from deep striking would go a long way towards toning down the madness and getting into the nose of obnoxious cheesers.

Scatter bikes being a staple of Tau and IG lists.

I never said anything about Tau or IG, this was all you. The fact is that assaulting from DS would nerf scatbikes. As usually in the world, context matters, you stripped all of my comment except for the part that would make it seem irrelevant. So as I wrote clearly in my post yet you cheerfully elected to ignore, Tau would laugh off any deep striking armies with their interceptor riptides and missilesides. Ig should also be able to deploy so many bodies that deepstrike would become largely insignificant.

The armies that would really really hurt from such a change would be glass cannon armies like Eldar, which rely on their mobility and ridiculous shooting to come on top of the opposition. And that's perfectly fine by me, Eldar need the limited field.

Something along the lines of units assulting from deep strike count as a disordered charge and enemies may fire overwatch with BS2 versus units assaulting from deep strike would give it a good balance - that, coupled with having to come in from reserves, scatter, and the normal hazards of DSing I think it would be fairly balanced.

chaos0xomega wrote:
Once upon a time, it was possible to assault directly out of reservers. I built a couple lists that maximized that potential. I never lost a game. The end.

No, assaulting from deepstrike/reserve is a *terrible* idea, one which should not be in the game unless it comes at a severe penalty (automatically a disorderly charge made at Initiative 1, units may only charge a single enemy unit/may not multicharge) or is limited to very specific special character models.

Once upon a time units were not what they are now, shooting was definitely NOT what it is now and the biggest, toughest and meanest unit on any table was a carnifex or something of the like. Things have moved tremendously from that point, with LoW everywhere and D weapons chilling around for fun. You can't make a viable assumption based only on what used to happen once upon a time. You need to take today's evidence into account. And today's evidence is that close combat sucks terribly and the assault armies are reduced to even less than fluffy status.

topaxygouroun i wrote:

I never said anything about Tau or IG, this was all you.

I know, so why the hell did you quote me to talk about Eldar?

chaos0xomega wrote:
Once upon a time, it was possible to assault directly out of reservers. I built a couple lists that maximized that potential. I never lost a game. The end.

No, assaulting from deepstrike/reserve is a *terrible* idea, one which should not be in the game unless it comes at a severe penalty (automatically a disorderly charge made at Initiative 1, units may only charge a single enemy unit/may not multicharge) or is limited to very specific special character models.

Even then, there were counters to that approach.

 vipoid wrote:

 CrashGordon94 wrote:

I suggest you actually state issues instead of vaguely insinuating them for no reason.

The issues have been stated by myself and others multiple times, you just refuse to see/accept them.

Hence, I'm suggesting that you try the rules against the armies they'll hurt the most, so that you can actually experience the issues.

100% factually wrong, I made no less than 6 SPECIFIC SUGGESTIONS in order to address that, many of which would actually seem to be pretty damn overkill, you seem to be under the impression that those SPECIFIC SUGGESTIONS that I mentioned and that were not acknowledged elsewhere aren't good enough for some reason and you haven't said why for no good reason at all.
No, you have to say it. If you have a problem with them, lay it out there. If you're going to say or suggest something, you MUST back it up, that's not optional.

As a Black Templar player with 20 Assault Marines and 20 Assault Terminators gathering dust, I'd love the ability to assault out of deepstrike. However, I think it would be too strong.

Overwatch would not phase me. I've lost more models to gosh darn booby-trapped random objectives than overwatch, and I always bring assault units.

Interceptor? Again, I bring drop pods all of the time, even against tau, and I'm not scared of dangling my bits in your face. I'd get to assault? Say goodby to all of your marker light units on turn 1 or 2.

I like the game as-is, with the exception of super heavies and fliers. Assault from deepstrike should be rare IMHO.

topaxygouroun i wrote:

chaos0xomega wrote:
Once upon a time, it was possible to assault directly out of reservers. I built a couple lists that maximized that potential. I never lost a game. The end.

No, assaulting from deepstrike/reserve is a *terrible* idea, one which should not be in the game unless it comes at a severe penalty (automatically a disorderly charge made at Initiative 1, units may only charge a single enemy unit/may not multicharge) or is limited to very specific special character models.

Once upon a time units were not what they are now, shooting was definitely NOT what it is now and the biggest, toughest and meanest unit on any table was a carnifex or something of the like. Things have moved tremendously from that point, with LoW everywhere and D weapons chilling around for fun. You can't make a viable assumption based only on what used to happen once upon a time. You need to take today's evidence into account. And today's evidence is that close combat sucks terribly and the assault armies are reduced to even less than fluffy status.

Late 5th/Early 6th wasnt *that* long ago, and even then we (as in the various gaming groups I frequented) had a lot of issues at the apocalypse scale (when Lords of War and D strength weapons were arguably more brutal than they are now) where units coming out of reserve would just neutralize large swathes of the opposing army, titans/superheavies included, without the opposing side had any answer. The game very quickly stopped being about who had more skill/better units, and who was able to take more advantage of the reserves rules.

If assault armies are struggling, Id say it has more to do with the nature of the assault rules than it does with the ability to assault from reserve. Being able to assault from reserve doesn't fix the assault rules, it just breaks the game further.

@Kronk: Then apply restrictions as needed, don't just make many many units useless because they're balanced around a tactic that doesn't exist.
Much better to come up with ideas to balance it than to just doom whole units to be useless forever.

As requested:

 CrashGordon94 wrote:

• Still no Assaulting out of a Transport that just arrived from Reserves (whether it be a freshly dropped Drop Pod or a Land Raider you somehow managed to Deep Strike it doesn't matter, anything would count, you have to drop on your own if you want this!) Fair enough.
• CHOOSE between Shooting and Assault when you arrive, NOT both (except maybe as a special rule for certain units like some Terminators, but DEFINITELY not in general). Well, it's not a good sign that you're already proposing exceptions. But, even then, what is this solving? The entire problem with having units assault after deep striking is that they can immediately lock down shooty units, and this is doing nothing whatsoever to address that.
• If you pick Assault, you declare the unit you charge on arrival which either gets a bonus on Overwatch against you (still not sure about full BS, but can consider it, Blasts definitely should be allowed though, maybe Templates should be treated as having rolled a 3 on their D3s?) and maybe things that don't normally Overwatch would be allowed or alternatively it's treated as having Interceptor against you even if it doesn't normally have that rule. Should be the big one to help, if it doesn't then it's probably because the unit's too weak (and getting stomped is just the natural result of a much stronger unit bullying a much weaker one, it's a lot of points to do a very trivial task so it'd be kinda depressing if it DIDN'T work all that well.) or because their target is a melee-focused unit (which speaks for itself! ).
This *might* help a little, but even overwatching at full BS it's still just one chance to stop the assaulting unit, after which the shooting unit is almost certainly dead. Moreover, what about multi-charges? And what about units like vehicles, which can't overwatch at all?
Other additional things to consider:
• You have to choose which action you want BEFORE rolling Reserves and such, the Assault option makes it harder to arrive, mishaps easier to get and/or worse and so on. It's hard to address this point because it's so vague. Although, I'm more interested in what the fluff behind it would be. "Ok, lads, we're going to try and assault them - so everyone put on the teleporters we bought off thar Ork scrap dealer."
• If you pick Assault you don't get to move other than charging, you just have to charge from wherever you happen to land. Better stock up on those Locator Beacons! But... if we're already ruling out charging from a vehicle, and run prevents charging, what other movement could they possibly get?
• It's a disordered charge even though you only get to attack one unit. Where did the 'only get to attack one unit' come from? In any case, I'm not sure that a disordered charge would even be a negative - as it just increases the chances that you'll still be in assault (read: can't be shot) in the enemy turn.

Possibly more too, but that's what I could come up with. Maybe some other ideas could be added?

 CrashGordon94 wrote:
@Kronk: Then apply restrictions as needed, don't just make many many units useless because they're balanced around a tactic that doesn't exist.
Much better to come up with ideas to balance it than to just doom whole units to be useless forever.

Sorry, why does preventing assaulting from deep strike mean units will be useless forever? I refuse to believe that there are units that can't possibly be good unless they can assault from deep strike.

 CrashGordon94 wrote:
@Kronk: Then apply restrictions as needed, don't just make many many units useless because they're balanced around a tactic that doesn't exist.
Much better to come up with ideas to balance it than to just doom whole units to be useless forever.

I don't need to. I've told you why I don't want it at all.

You want to assault with terminators? Bring a land raider or deep strike and weather the storm.

¯\_(ツ)_/¯

I say yes, assault from deep strike. Change-up the rules, switch the strength from shooting to melee. All those armies that have increase Overwatch will do better.

Peoples armies will adapt and we will see a completely different type of game, and I'd be happy to play it.

I think yes.

It might become a bit broken on non-scattering Deep Strikers, but, if units aren't allowed to move either, then it becomes quite a risky business. Either you deep strike close to your target and risk scattering onto it and mishapping, or you go further away and risk failing your charge (and scattering away, making it even harder to make the charge).

Some people have also raised concerns about such units being able to essentially pick multiple units to take out of the game, but it would be simple enough to say these units may assault, but may not multi-assault on the turn they deep strike.

No, deepstriking assault (and even outflanking reserves) is simply too powerful (as evident by previous editions in which assault ruled the roost).

What should happen is deepstriking units should only be shot at using Snap Fire rules. This represents the fact that, "HOLY $%##!!! A gnarly assault unit just dropped right into my battle line!!!!", which would be pretty unnerving for even the most stalwart troops.

 Icculus wrote:
I say yes, assault from deep strike. Change-up the rules, switch the strength from shooting to melee. All those armies that have increase Overwatch will do better.

Peoples armies will adapt and we will see a completely different type of game, and I'd be happy to play it.

It wasn't that long ago (4th/early 5th) that the assault phase was the dominant factor in the game, and melee trumped shooting. People complained and GW apparrently listened. I would say that the game is arguably better balanced today (in terms of the shooting/melee dichotomy) than it was back then. Anyway, needless to say, a lot of people said what you are saying here when they argued in favor of shifting from melee to shooting, it didn't quite work out that way.

TL;DR: Veteran players have already lived through the 'completely different type of game', you have no idea what you're asking for.

Honestly, assaulting from deep strike is kind of fun, and a very high risk-high reward maneuver.

I used to do it when zagstruk wasn't awful, and assaulting after deep striking was a balance. You wanted to get close enough to be able to assault, but not so close that you'd mishap.

Deep striking into assault range is risky enough to be allowable, imo, on some units. Some caveats for me would be:

Nothing that can reroll or reduce scatter ranges, or auto-pass deep strike mishaps (like drop pods). If you want to pull it off, you'd better be willing to risk the unit.

Independent characters should probably not be allowed, or be severely limited.

Take some penalty for attempting it, such as dangerous terrain tests and not being able to shoot the turn you arrive.

But overall, I thought it was a fun addition, and could be now in certain units.

For cries sake it's hard enough for armies like IG to stop DS units as it is. One round of shooting and OW is often not enough to kill enough units. Especially if that blob has been already shot at for a turn or two. Add a half competent assault unit and yeah.... fun for us!

I also get the impression vehicles would suffer massively if this was allowed too, what can they possibly do in their defence?

If you want to allow assault from DS you would have to find a was to completely gimp it, which would mean most people would still not do it.

Also isn't deepstriking suppose to have inherent disadvantages anyway? Seeing you essentially get to deploy almost anywhere and that unit is unable to be damaged until it enters the table?

There we go, thank you!

vipoid wrote:Well, it's not a good sign that you're already proposing exceptions. But, even then, what is this solving? The entire problem with having units assault after deep striking is that they can immediately lock down shooty units, and this is doing nothing whatsoever to address that.

So that you can't do both at once, you have to choose one or the other.
If you're so, so worried about that in specific, what about the defending unit getting to make an Initiative Test to run away and/or gaining Hit & Run/something similar?

vipoid wrote:This *might* help a little, but even overwatching at full BS it's still just one chance to stop the assaulting unit, after which the shooting unit is almost certainly dead. Moreover, what about multi-charges? And what about units like vehicles, which can't overwatch at all?

Well, if it's multiple chances needed, could do the auto-Interceptor (without the "can't fire the same weapon afterwards") restriction AND the boosted Overwatch, perhaps also with the Initiative Test to run away and/or Hit & Run move mentioned above. Or multiple Overwatches, but that would be weird.
Part of the point of declaring the unit is to snuff out multi-charges, on arrival you pick THE unit which gets to do this stuff in defense and only charge THEM, nobody else.
Also I was specifically thinking of specially allowing Vehicles/Slow and Purposeful/etc to Overwatch with the same bonuses when I mention "units that otherwise couldn't". You charge a Vindicator from DS, it gets to give you a face full of Demolisher Cannon, possibly twice. Or you charge those Grav Cents from DS, prepare to get Grav Cannon'd! With rerolls! Maybe twice, again! I'll admit it's not much help to units too weak to do much or that don't have guns, but I already covered those situations.

vipoid wrote:It's hard to address this point because it's so vague. Although, I'm more interested in what the fluff behind it would be. "Ok, lads, we're going to try and assault them - so everyone put on the teleporters we bought off thar Ork scrap dealer."

Well the specifics I thought of were requiring a higher roll to arrive, more scatter and mishaps that were easier to get (not sure how, admittedly) along with perhaps being deadlier somehow (like maybe the unit is destroyed on any mishap?).
Surprisingly, I actually thought of fluff for it, the difference between them just plonking down and firing their guns and them immediately crashing down and rushing forward like utter maniacs, though I'll admit this might be a little flimsy for the differences caused.

vipoid wrote:But... if we're already ruling out charging from a vehicle, and run prevents charging, what other movement could they possibly get?

Movement in the movement phase and someone mentioned an Assault move. None of that, just charging. And someone else mentioned reducing charge range from DS to 1D6, how about that as well?

vipoid wrote:Where did the 'only get to attack one unit' come from? In any case, I'm not sure that a disordered charge would even be a negative - as it just increases the chances that you'll still be in assault (read: can't be shot) in the enemy turn.

Already handled earlier but just to restate, the "declare the target" thing (You're right to point this out, it was important and I should've really phrased it better). I can see the point, it wasn't too much of an important point, just a potential extra thing that I thought might've been worth suggesting.

In any case, thank you for responding, these were perfectly valid things to bring up, and I'm trying to meet those who have issues with the idea halfway with these things.

vipoid wrote:Sorry, why does preventing assaulting from deep strike mean units will be useless forever? I refuse to believe that there are units that can't possibly be good unless they can assault from deep strike.

Believe it. With Deep Strike and specific melee weapons they're literally geared up for a tactic that doesn't exist, it would be like a Crisis Suit that can't fire its guns, a Rhino with no Transport Capacity or a Platoon with only 1 Guardsman in it.

kronk wrote:I don't need to. I've told you why I don't want it at all.

You want to assault with terminators? Bring a land raider or deep strike and weather the storm.

You do, you have concerns that it might be OP? Come up with nerfs, rather than just doom whole units! Imagine what the game would be like if someone at GW said "I don't think we can make Necrons balanced, let's just not make them".

That options already exists, it doesn't work. Otherwise you wouldn't have those Assault Termies gathering dust, would you?

 CrashGordon94 wrote:
Sorry, why does preventing assaulting from deep strike mean units will be useless forever? I refuse to believe that there are units that can't possibly be good unless they can assault from deep strike.

Believe it. With Deep Strike and specific melee weapons they're literally geared up for a tactic that doesn't exist, it would be like a Crisis Suit that can't fire its guns, a Rhino with no Transport Capacity or a Platoon with only 1 Guardsman in it.