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Hey all,

Decided to get going on a Nec gang, just so I can start having small games that, with the addition of micro management, adds something that 40k can't to my gaming group.

I'm probably going to use Wyrd's Through The Breach male multi kit to assemble the gang, though before I do, I wanted to get your thoughts on my starter gang, to see if it's any good, as is prefer to model WYSIWIG if possible.

So, we have...

Leader with lasgun, Chainsword and frag nades
2 heavy's, both with heavy stubbers
5 gangers, all with laaguns
1 juve with laspistol

As for territory, I've rolled for a chem Pit, Slag, old ruins, vents and tunnels.

Question re skills, as I can't see anything jumping out at me in the rule book. Do experienced fighters start with randomly allocated skills according to their experience level, or are skills only gained from game-won experience points?

Cheers!

No your gang members don't start with any skills. The assumption is the xp they've gained up to this point is what gave them the superior profile over a juve.

Keep in mind though, wyrd's models are more like 30-35mm truscale vs the gw 28mm heroic scale. Also if you're planning to play necromunda with a group I'm pretty sure you're supposed to make all rolls publicly. Or at least in front of your opponent.

Which rulebook are you using? Because I see you haven't picked a house. If using house weapons & skill tables that's very necessary before the campaign starts.

I can't decide on house tbh, atm it's Orlock, though before that it was Cawdor, and before that it was Delaque lol.

Thanks for the advice re the miniature scale

Personally, I'd take a mix of weapons - a couple of lasguns, a couple of shotguns, an autogun, that sort of thing. Makes it feel more like a gang than an Imperial Guard squad. I'd also consider giving one of those Heavies a special weapon rather than a heavy weapon, for some added mobility.

Also, it means as your gang advances, you've got some flexibility. Inevitably, one of your Heavies will get a WS, A or S increase, and combined with all the Muscle skills they can get, they actually make not bad melee fighters. you can give the special weapon to the Leader (or a Ganger lucky enough to get Specialist) and give your unaccountably skilled Heavy a chainsword or something.

Where do you start with the alternatives though? I like the lasguns for their 2+ ammo roll, not sure what the rest were off the top of my head though is there such a thing as a "best weapon" scale, ie most effective / points efficient at the top to least effective at the bottom?

Lasguns are good because of the 2+ ammo rolls. You will be needing 6s to hit (due to terrain and range moifiers) a lot in this game, which means you will trigger ammo rolls more than you might like. Having a 2+ save on those rolls helps a lot. Heavy stubbers are good for heavy weapons; you don't want your guys to run out of ammo for those big guns.

If you get a workshop as a territory, you will auto-pass your first ammo roll in a game. I wouldn't waste money on a boltgun until you have a workshop, because needing 6s to pass an ammo roll means your boltguns will run out of ammo unless there is a workshop giving you that free success.

Auotpistols tend to be a smidge better than laspistols on juves. Rifles are wasted on juves, so just give them pistols (until they get enough xp to be full gangers). Autopistols have a 4+ ammo roll, but they do NOT have a -1 to hit at long range (like a laspistol). With a BS of 2, juves have a hard enough time hitting at range, a -1 to hit isn't helping them.

Hand flamers and regular flamers are iffy... you can't miss (templates ftw) and they are S4 when most of your opponents are T3, but you have to make an ammo roll after every shot. It doesn't hurt to give the odd hand flamer to a juve, and maybe a full flamer to a ganger that gets the ability to use a special weapon, but a starting gang has better options for close-in combat...

...Like the shotgun. S4, or S3 with ignores cover. Never overlook the ability to ignore cover. Good at close range, with a chance to knock models back (pushing a guy off a high walkway and onto the ground three levels below him is super fun). Their range is short, so don't equip your whole gang with them, but having one isn't a bad idea (its a cheap S4 gun with a 4+ ammo roll).

For melee, in all the campaigns I played in, I never saw a weapon get used other than a flail, and some flavor of sword. Swords can parry attacks (your opponent's highest die roll, really) which can give you an edge in a fight. Flails can't be parried at all and have a +2 S, but only in the first round of combat. That means that whoever has the flail needs to drop their opponent in one round of combat, because getting stuck in a multi-turn melee is a death sentence. If you have a high WS ganger with 2 or more attacks, a flail will wreck face. Otherwise, stick with swords.

Just my $0.02 that I learned from playing Necromunda a bunch.

Go for a mix of guns because it's more fun. Go for some gangers being melee too. Mix up your two heavies with different weapons (go for a flamer or another special weapon on one).

The most important thing with Necromunda is having fun and variety with weapons will do just that!

Quick question because I could not find it in the rule books, what happens when your leader dies and multiple gangers have equal leadership? How is a new leader chosen?

Highest experience first

 the Signless wrote:
Quick question because I could not find it in the rule books, what happens when your leader dies and multiple gangers have equal leadership? How is a new leader chosen?

Thunderdome.





I kid. It's highest XP total.

But it really should be Thunderdome.

It would be awesome if it was the Thunderdome.

From a storyline perspective that is. In my gang, that would probably result in everyone killing each other as leadership is at a six way tie.

2 Heavies right from the start might be a bit top heavy. Remember that Necromunda has rules about shooting the closest targets, so having a bunch of Juves to meatshield for your Gangers and Heavies is more important than loading the gang up to be topheavy from the start.

Mmmmmm good point Nuggz... I did rewrite my list which allows for more bodies, though does still feature a dual heavy build:

Leader w shotgun, frag grenades, man stopper shells and sword
Heavy with Stubber
Heavy with auto pistol and flamer
2 lasgun gangers
2 autogun gangers
1 auto pistol and flail ganger
1 shotgun ganger with hot shot shells
2 auto pistol juves

I wasn't too sure about the flamer heavy, as surely he's gonna be outranged for most of the game? Drop him for more pistol juves then?


Automatically Appended Next Post:
In the knowledge that doing so will reduce my total income through having a higher number of bodies of course, so what's the better balance?

 the Signless wrote:
It would be awesome if it was the Thunderdome.

From a storyline perspective that is. In my gang, that would probably result in everyone killing each other as leadership is at a six way tie.

But it would be so cool. And Thunderdome fits so well for the game too

Keep the flamer, I find it a fun surprise for anyone that gets too close to me. Also give that heavy a sword or chainsword so that he can kill anything that his flamer doesn't.

Since you have Tunnels and Vents, then Heavies with Flamers are really fun! In a suitably built up board, you can infiltrate them up close and give them a good chance of unleashing the pain on some people.

It has been a long time since I played, but I recall liking to give Juves frag grenades (if you can even do that anymore/ever ) because even if they missed, the grenade had to go an explode somewhere. Plus, it scared the crap out of my opponents when I moved in a JUve via tunnels/vents and then had jump out of cover and charge forward throwing a grenade.

Super-Duper Juvie attack!

Hehe, juve-nade-o (hands off, I just copywrote it ) sounds awesome fun! May have to drop the Stubber for a flamer and go nade crazy with juves... QUICK! TO THE ROSTER WRITER!!

Like you spotted a good mix of weapons is key.

A Juve with a hand flamer can be a real ace in the hole. Allot of opponents will pay no heed to a flanking Juve and you can get real close to 3-4 bunched up gangers and boom!

This can easily send 3 OoA in one go often winning the game and rocketing the Juve's XP up to ganger level.

Move the handfuls er to another Juve and repeat.

That does sound pretty killer - I've redone my list with this incorporated, bringing me to 12 bodies. Is that too many for a start up gang do you think?

Leader
- shotgun
- frag nades
- sword

2x heavy
- flamer
- sword

1x Ganger
- shotgun

3x Gangers
- lasguns

2x Gangers
- Autoguns

2x Juves
- Stub guns
- Frag nades

1x Juve
- Hand Flamer

As for modelling these beauties, I've been thinking of doing a Foot Clan theme (Ninja Turtles ftw) gang, with Samurai like features on the more experienced members (leader and heavies) and a more ninja appearance for the gangers and juves. I've found these heads from Micro Art Studio



There's a fair few options out there for Samurai heads, though I'm struggling for torsos and arms. Weapons aren't so much of an issue. Any thoughts on sources of good martial arts theme torsos? Ideally, I'm looking for separate torsos and legs (such as we have from GW tac marine kits etc) as opposed to full mono-pose bodies.

Thanks in advance

Si

IMO you're going to want to keep your Heavies with Heavy Weapons (Hvy Stubbers being the best for starting gangs). My reasoning is this: Your Gang Leader can take Special Weapons, and so can any ganger who later rolls Specialist, but those guys can never get access to Heavy Weapons.

Heavy Stubbers really lock down flanks like nothing else. You likely won't have a great deal of success using Flamers until you start picking up some of the agility perks, and I'm going to go out on a limb here and say that if you've got 2 Heavies with Flamers, they will probably be targeted by every opponent you face.

Heavy Stubbers never did jack in the games I played, but our set-ups were very terrain-centric, with lots of cover.

In a more open board set-up things would be a bit different.

Sometimes it's not about actually doing anything, but about making your opponent avoid certain areas.

I've also noticed that a lot of people put heavy weapons up high. Often a good idea, since it gives them good visibility, but depending on your layout, other buildings and walkways might obscure a lot of the tabletop; you might be better on ground level. Also, don't be afraid to spend a turn repositioning if need be.

Related to the scenery issue, I've noticed that having lots of tall buildings is a waste of time if they're not linked at or near their upper floors. There's no point climbing three storeys up if you just need to climb back down again to move forward, after all (our scenario of choice was Scavengers, since it's basically Gang Fight with free money, so gangs tended to advance across the table quite a lot).

 AndrewGPaul wrote:

Related to the scenery issue, I've noticed that having lots of tall buildings is a waste of time if they're not linked at or near their upper floors. There's no point climbing three storeys up if you just need to climb back down again to move forward, after all (our scenario of choice was Scavengers, since it's basically Gang Fight with free money, so gangs tended to advance across the table quite a lot).

Yes, totally. And that's why the original Necromunda terrain is still by far best for actually playing the game with, imo, as it's all about the walkways coming from the top floors and connecting to other building. Real shame it's OOP for newer players.

Agreed that Necromunda rules and terrain are superior but Mantic's terrain for Deadzone is a semi-decent substitute.

http://www.manticgames.com/mantic-shop/battlezones.html

Micro-Arts Studios terrain for Infinity is also exceptionally nice.
http://shop.microartstudio.com/designed-for-infinity-c-78.html

But perhaps the best match available to Necromunda's original terrain is from Litko:
http://www.litko.net/categories/Terrain-%26-Buildings/Industrial-Tower-System-/

It is also dead easy to scratchbuild with cardboard, tubes, and other found materials.

Tehnolog makes good SciFi terrain, But it's hard to get it outside of Russia this days. try ebay.

Cyber Ruins


Chemical plant


Platformer


Power plant


Ultraclicks

The terrain that mantic is doing for the last kickstarter is industrious themed industrial so it will probably be good for necromunda. Also I cannot recommend highly enough the industrial terrain by wargames tournaments. It's mdf laser cut & extremely good value for the price. Really if you buy it all you'll need is some scatter terrain.

There's also the issue of which set of rules you're going to use. It looks like most people are using the updated "4th Ed" rules. Personally, I prefer the original "2nd Ed" rules, as they were considerably less restrictive on things like weapons and skills. The revised rules included things like the house weapons list to match the pre-exising, and by that time out of production, models; rather than for anything resembling game balance. Apparently, GW didn't bother to consider conversion and kit-bashing as part of the game.

 luchog wrote:
There's also the issue of which set of rules you're going to use. It looks like most people are using the updated "4th Ed" rules. Personally, I prefer the original "2nd Ed" rules, as they were considerably less restrictive on things like weapons and skills. The revised rules included things like the house weapons list to match the pre-exising, and by that time out of production, models; rather than for anything resembling game balance. Apparently, GW didn't bother to consider conversion and kit-bashing as part of the game.

I too think the original rules are the best, I've never played with any of the amended rules but I've looked through them. Most of the changes were to remove things GW no longer made like hand-flamer templates and sustained fire dice (which are all parts of the game I love and wouldn't want removed), the rest of the changes were changes just for the sake of it.

House Weapon lists are pointless because they only apply for gang creation correct? Which means they only apply for the first game you play because after that you can get whatever you want from the trade post.