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I think it's clear that something needs to be done with the Las gun to improve its damage output without breaking the game or changing its cost. 

I think that perhaps something of a combined fire effect might be an interesting concept where for every 10 hits a unit or squad receives that unit suffers an automatic wound. The unit would still be able to save against these auto wounds but it would be an interesting way to see a small bump in their effectiveness. 

Ive always pictured the wounds delivered from Las guns are not just a lucky shot getting through more of an unrelenting stream of shots that slowly cripple or heat enemy units into oblivion. ‎

Why is that clear, now?

Isn't that why the guys they come with are pretty dirt cheap anyway? our weapons may be bad, but there's enough of us that someone is gonna hurt you.

I feel it would be a good way to make the gun slightly more effective while not making them op or really bogging the game down.

They're already effective. Quantity has a quality all its own.

More than that, you can get them as cheap as on a 3 point model. It's not an issue.

Now, that being said, guard is in bad place, and could use buffs. But I don't think buffing the lasgun is the way to go.

The basic trooper with them probably needs to be either cheaper or slightly better.

The real issue is that a human is WS3 BS3 S3 T3 I3 LD7 and a super genhanced psycho-indoctrinated extra heart, lungs, spleen, organ mutant post human death monk space marine in MK7 mobile nuclear reactor powered armor is... 1 point better in all of them. Which is rubbish.

Fluff wise Marines should be around WS5 BS5 S5 T5 I5 LD9 with 2 wounds vs Humans 3s across the board, but the game should make 4 an above-average for things like eldar or veteran humans. Unfortunately you'd only need a fluff amount of space marines (IE 10-20) and GW wouldn't be able to sell you bajillions, also would cause problems unless the BS and WS charts etc were changed.

Basically the game needs to go to D10s like gates of antares!

 Soteks Prophet wrote:
The basic trooper with them probably needs to be either cheaper or slightly better.

The real issue is that a human is WS3 BS3 S3 T3 I3 LD7 and a super genhanced psycho-indoctrinated extra heart, lungs, spleen, organ mutant post human death monk space marine in MK7 mobile nuclear reactor powered armor is... 1 point better in all of them. Which is rubbish.

Fluff wise Marines should be around WS5 BS5 S5 T5 I5 LD9 with 2 wounds vs Humans 3s across the board, but the game should make 4 an above-average for things like eldar or veteran humans. Unfortunately you'd only need a fluff amount of space marines (IE 10-20) and GW wouldn't be able to sell you bajillions, also would cause problems unless the BS and WS charts etc were changed.

Basically the game needs to go to D10s like gates of antares!

That's... only partially correct. ws 3 bs3 represents a very highly trained military force of non-enhanced, not very enhanced humans/other species. Tau are all bs 3 base for troops as well, even super veterans who aren't the commanders, or in high precision tanks. Conscripts, which are barely trained are bs2, like orks shooting, and would be the "normal" human/being. So space marines being 33% better than a well trained military troop is not the worst.

The best of the best of the best humans are actually bs 4, but still t3 (barring named characters) in scions or veterans, and are given the chance to take weapons to better utilize their experience and hardened nature.

All said, a d10 allows for more nuance and ability to balance, but imagine rolling 60 d10s at the same time, and those don't pack well

 raverrn wrote:
Why is that clear, now?

I would say that it's clear, but for slightly different reasons than the OP suggests. Rolling all the dice for First Rank Second Rank Fire! is tedious. If I had the option to trade multiple hits for fewer, higher strength, lower AP hits I might do it to speed up the game.

bogalubov wrote:

 raverrn wrote:
Why is that clear, now?

I would say that it's clear, but for slightly different reasons than the OP suggests. Rolling all the dice for First Rank Second Rank Fire! is tedious. If I had the option to trade multiple hits for fewer, higher strength, lower AP hits I might do it to speed up the game.

That sounds like a great rules idea. The OP's idea, however, is 'FRFSRF but with more dice.'

I like the Triplex lasgun variant from the background.
Either as an upgrade (for like 1pt/model) or as basic equipment.
That would have 3 fire modes,
Something like this:
Standard shot: (as it is now)
Low power: Range 18" St 2 Ap - Assault 3
High power: Range 30" Str 4 Ap 4 Heavy 1

Not a super-productive comment from me, but I think there should probably be more focus on toning down the power levels of the rest of the game as opposed to buffing the weaker elements (rest assured though, I am a guard player, I know the pain!)

I think the way lasguns currently stand is excellent and accurate to the fluff, I also believe that massed lasgun fire is effective (I've certainly accomplished a lot with it.)

There are certainly other elements of the guard codex that need to be adjusted though... (Strength D for the Deathstrike, Ogryns being far less expensive, etc...)

Jbz` wrote:
I like the Triplex lasgun variant from the background.
Either as an upgrade (for like 1pt/model) or as basic equipment.
That would have 3 fire modes,
Something like this:
Standard shot: (as it is now)
Low power: Range 18" St 2 Ap - Assault 3
High power: Range 30" Str 4 Ap 4 Heavy 1

A lasgun should be under no circumstances superior to a boltgun.
The current statline we have is necessary under the limitations an simplicity of the gun. It would be cool and realistic *shivers at the thought* if a lot of things had multiple fire modes, from battletanks to lightning claws, but that would slow things down and over complicate stuff.

 kirotheavenger wrote:

Jbz` wrote:
I like the Triplex lasgun variant from the background.
Either as an upgrade (for like 1pt/model) or as basic equipment.
That would have 3 fire modes,
Something like this:
Standard shot: (as it is now)
Low power: Range 18" St 2 Ap - Assault 3
High power: Range 30" Str 4 Ap 4 Heavy 1

A lasgun should be under no circumstances superior to a boltgun.
The current statline we have is necessary under the limitations an simplicity of the gun. It would be cool and realistic *shivers at the thought* if a lot of things had multiple fire modes, from battle tanks to lightning claws, but that would slow things down and over complicate stuff.

The Ap bit of the high power stat I am still unsure of I wasn't sure if it should just be Ap6 as that wouldn't really do much.
And their are circumstances where a lasgun is equal to a boltgun now (Vs any T6 model with 4+ or better save) and arguably better as you'd likely have 2/3 times as many lasgun models as boltgun ones....

Jbz` wrote:

 kirotheavenger wrote:

Jbz` wrote:
I like the Triplex lasgun variant from the background.
Either as an upgrade (for like 1pt/model) or as basic equipment.
That would have 3 fire modes,
Something like this:
Standard shot: (as it is now)
Low power: Range 18" St 2 Ap - Assault 3
High power: Range 30" Str 4 Ap 4 Heavy 1

A lasgun should be under no circumstances superior to a boltgun.
The current statline we have is necessary under the limitations an simplicity of the gun. It would be cool and realistic *shivers at the thought* if a lot of things had multiple fire modes, from battle tanks to lightning claws, but that would slow things down and over complicate stuff.

The Ap bit of the high power stat I am still unsure of I wasn't sure if it should just be Ap6 as that wouldn't really do much.
And their are circumstances where a lasgun is equal to a boltgun now (Vs any T6 model with 4+ or better save) and arguably better as you'd likely have 2/3 times as many lasgun models as boltgun ones....

Well there's not a lot you can do about the wounding system, but my point being it should never occupy a superior statline. You could make it AP6 but then you've still got 6'' longer range, and equivalent stopping power. Hotshot lasguns don't even have that kind of stopping power.
For the purposes of the game I've just assumed that the differences in the power settings even out to the same statline. More weaker shots vs fewer stronger shots averages out to what we have now.

Tristanleo wrote:
Isn't that why the guys they come with are pretty dirt cheap anyway? our weapons may be bad, but there's enough of us that someone is gonna hurt you.

Because the power of certain units has gotten to the point that even a full combined platoon of lasguns can't kill a far cheaper enemy infantry squad before it kills the guardsmen.

Personally I'd like to tone down those things rather than buff the lasgun, myself, but yeah that's hte problem.

Lasguns are already far more efficient against T6 than boltguns. They are 66% as effective as boltguns vs meqs. They take advantage of misfortune much better than boltguns.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 kirotheavenger wrote:

Jbz` wrote:
I like the Triplex lasgun variant from the background.
Either as an upgrade (for like 1pt/model) or as basic equipment.
That would have 3 fire modes,
Something like this:
Standard shot: (as it is now)
Low power: Range 18" St 2 Ap - Assault 3
High power: Range 30" Str 4 Ap 4 Heavy 1

A lasgun should be under no circumstances superior to a boltgun.
The current statline we have is necessary under the limitations an simplicity of the gun. It would be cool and realistic *shivers at the thought* if a lot of things had multiple fire modes, from battletanks to lightning claws, but that would slow things down and over complicate stuff.

It already is on a per cost basis in many situations. Boltguns are pretty much gak.

Martel732 wrote:
Lasguns are already far more efficient against T6 than boltguns.

Against T6, neither one is efficient.

Your hate-on for the boltgun and inability to use it doesn't make the lasgun great.

One interesting idea would be:
After rolling to hit, you MAY divide the hits by 2 (round down) to add 1 to the strength.

In most circumstances it is significantly weaker to do so, but it does allow them to wound T7 and glance some AV10.

Thoughts?

 Cothonian wrote:
Not a super-productive comment from me, but I think there should probably be more focus on toning down the power levels of the rest of the game as opposed to buffing the weaker elements (rest assured though, I am a guard player, I know the pain!)

I think the way lasguns currently stand is excellent and accurate to the fluff, I also believe that massed lasgun fire is effective (I've certainly accomplished a lot with it.)

There are certainly other elements of the guard codex that need to be adjusted though... (Strength D for the Deathstrike, Ogryns being far less expensive, etc...)

100% this.

Everyone talks about power creep, then tries to fix problems by giving buffs. Irony anyone?

We know the trouble-makers: grav, scat bikes etc. Fix the OP stuff, not the weaker stuff.

I'm of the opinion that the power curve is too high, but the bottom of the power curve is also too low. Buff the weak guys, nerf the strong guys, find a happy medium somewhere slightly above the current average.

 Whittlesey40k wrote:

 Cothonian wrote:
Not a super-productive comment from me, but I think there should probably be more focus on toning down the power levels of the rest of the game as opposed to buffing the weaker elements (rest assured though, I am a guard player, I know the pain!)

I think the way lasguns currently stand is excellent and accurate to the fluff, I also believe that massed lasgun fire is effective (I've certainly accomplished a lot with it.)

There are certainly other elements of the guard codex that need to be adjusted though... (Strength D for the Deathstrike, Ogryns being far less expensive, etc...)

100% this.

Everyone talks about power creep, then tries to fix problems by giving buffs. Irony anyone?

We know the trouble-makers: grav, scat bikes etc. Fix the OP stuff, not the weaker stuff.

Agreed. I see this kind of thing everywhere, it's nerf doesn't even occur to people.

 kirotheavenger wrote:

 Whittlesey40k wrote:

 Cothonian wrote:
Not a super-productive comment from me, but I think there should probably be more focus on toning down the power levels of the rest of the game as opposed to buffing the weaker elements (rest assured though, I am a guard player, I know the pain!)

I think the way lasguns currently stand is excellent and accurate to the fluff, I also believe that massed lasgun fire is effective (I've certainly accomplished a lot with it.)

There are certainly other elements of the guard codex that need to be adjusted though... (Strength D for the Deathstrike, Ogryns being far less expensive, etc...)

100% this.

Everyone talks about power creep, then tries to fix problems by giving buffs. Irony anyone?

We know the trouble-makers: grav, scat bikes etc. Fix the OP stuff, not the weaker stuff.

Agreed. I see this kind of thing everywhere, it's nerf doesn't even occur to people.

It occurs, and then gets dismissed. While yes, a couple things could use a minor nerf, there's a big problem with that: Having your favorite units get nerfed can be really, really frustrating for players, especially if they had whole armies built around those things.
To use a good example, I'm an Ork player. I had a unit of Biker Nobz that I used in 5th and 6th edition. Power levels aside, I loved those guys, even as they got gradually worse and worse as time slipped by - They went from amazing, to great, to good, to mediocre-but-still-decent. By the end of 6th most of the Ork codex was non-competitive, but they were still pretty good and a lot of fun to play.

Roll in the 7th edition codex, and now Biker Nobz are more expensive, more fragile, and adding in a painboy chews up an HQ slot. Yes, it made them more in balance with the rest of the codex and no longer blatantly stronger than regular bikes, but it also means that they're going to be shelved for most games because they're no longer very good.

Nerfs aren't fun. Buffs are.

EDIT: For one example of what I think is a 'Good' buff/nerf, look what they did to Centurions. Going from 5th to 6th, Grav-cannons got significantly more expensive, but Centurions themselves got much cheaper, so the cost of a Grav-centurion was only 5 points higher.
The final result? Other centurions still aren't nearly as good as Grav, but they're not at least viable, without making Grav any stronger.

 Melissia wrote:

Martel732 wrote:
Lasguns are already far more efficient against T6 than boltguns.

Against T6, neither one is efficient.

Your hate-on for the boltgun and inability to use it doesn't make the lasgun great.

Lasguns cost far less per gun than boltguns and have the exact same effect on T6. How is that far more efficient? Lasguns are actually shockingly effective vs standard MCs, especially with FRFSF in effect.

You think I've played 20 years and don't know how to use boltguns? There's just no reason to treat them as anything other than an afterthought.

for 250 points an the cost of a psyker - 40 points? You can drop 150 rending shots per turn - you will obliterate things with that kind of firepower.

It's something most people aren't willing to do. However if you see the power of a 50 man ferensian wolf unit taking advantage of unit buffs. You can easily make use of it with lasguns.

Waaaghpower wrote:

 kirotheavenger wrote:

 Whittlesey40k wrote:

 Cothonian wrote:
Not a super-productive comment from me, but I think there should probably be more focus on toning down the power levels of the rest of the game as opposed to buffing the weaker elements (rest assured though, I am a guard player, I know the pain!)

I think the way lasguns currently stand is excellent and accurate to the fluff, I also believe that massed lasgun fire is effective (I've certainly accomplished a lot with it.)

There are certainly other elements of the guard codex that need to be adjusted though... (Strength D for the Deathstrike, Ogryns being far less expensive, etc...)

100% this.

Everyone talks about power creep, then tries to fix problems by giving buffs. Irony anyone?

We know the trouble-makers: grav, scat bikes etc. Fix the OP stuff, not the weaker stuff.

Agreed. I see this kind of thing everywhere, it's nerf doesn't even occur to people.

It occurs, and then gets dismissed. While yes, a couple things could use a minor nerf, there's a big problem with that: Having your favorite units get nerfed can be really, really frustrating for players, especially if they had whole armies built around those things.
To use a good example, I'm an Ork player. I had a unit of Biker Nobz that I used in 5th and 6th edition. Power levels aside, I loved those guys, even as they got gradually worse and worse as time slipped by - They went from amazing, to great, to good, to mediocre-but-still-decent. By the end of 6th most of the Ork codex was non-competitive, but they were still pretty good and a lot of fun to play.

Roll in the 7th edition codex, and now Biker Nobz are more expensive, more fragile, and adding in a painboy chews up an HQ slot. Yes, it made them more in balance with the rest of the codex and no longer blatantly stronger than regular bikes, but it also means that they're going to be shelved for most games because they're no longer very good.

Nerfs aren't fun. Buffs are.

EDIT: For one example of what I think is a 'Good' buff/nerf, look what they did to Centurions. Going from 5th to 6th, Grav-cannons got significantly more expensive, but Centurions themselves got much cheaper, so the cost of a Grav-centurion was only 5 points higher.
The final result? Other centurions still aren't nearly as good as Grav, but they're not at least viable, without making Grav any stronger.

That's an illogical point of view.
Buffing one unit is the same as nerfing everything else.
You think your boys got worse? No. Everything else got better.
If you decide boys need to be buffed to Wraithknight level now Blood Angels are complaining that their Terminators are totally worthless.
Buff those Terminators up and something else now really sucks. This is how power creep occurs.

Buff the bad units to a mid point, and nerf the good units to the same mid point and ta da now both are viable and good. If the previous good unit players start bitching that they're no longer OP, well they get a tiny, tiny violin.

 kirotheavenger wrote:

Waaaghpower wrote:

 kirotheavenger wrote:

 Whittlesey40k wrote:

 Cothonian wrote:
Not a super-productive comment from me, but I think there should probably be more focus on toning down the power levels of the rest of the game as opposed to buffing the weaker elements (rest assured though, I am a guard player, I know the pain!)

I think the way lasguns currently stand is excellent and accurate to the fluff, I also believe that massed lasgun fire is effective (I've certainly accomplished a lot with it.)

There are certainly other elements of the guard codex that need to be adjusted though... (Strength D for the Deathstrike, Ogryns being far less expensive, etc...)

100% this.

Everyone talks about power creep, then tries to fix problems by giving buffs. Irony anyone?

We know the trouble-makers: grav, scat bikes etc. Fix the OP stuff, not the weaker stuff.

Agreed. I see this kind of thing everywhere, it's nerf doesn't even occur to people.

It occurs, and then gets dismissed. While yes, a couple things could use a minor nerf, there's a big problem with that: Having your favorite units get nerfed can be really, really frustrating for players, especially if they had whole armies built around those things.
To use a good example, I'm an Ork player. I had a unit of Biker Nobz that I used in 5th and 6th edition. Power levels aside, I loved those guys, even as they got gradually worse and worse as time slipped by - They went from amazing, to great, to good, to mediocre-but-still-decent. By the end of 6th most of the Ork codex was non-competitive, but they were still pretty good and a lot of fun to play.

Roll in the 7th edition codex, and now Biker Nobz are more expensive, more fragile, and adding in a painboy chews up an HQ slot. Yes, it made them more in balance with the rest of the codex and no longer blatantly stronger than regular bikes, but it also means that they're going to be shelved for most games because they're no longer very good.

Nerfs aren't fun. Buffs are.

EDIT: For one example of what I think is a 'Good' buff/nerf, look what they did to Centurions. Going from 5th to 6th, Grav-cannons got significantly more expensive, but Centurions themselves got much cheaper, so the cost of a Grav-centurion was only 5 points higher.
The final result? Other centurions still aren't nearly as good as Grav, but they're not at least viable, without making Grav any stronger.

That's an illogical point of view.
Buffing one unit is the same as nerfing everything else.
You think your boys got worse? No. Everything else got better.
If you decide boys need to be buffed to Wraithknight level now Blood Angels are complaining that their Terminators are totally worthless.
Buff those Terminators up and something else now really sucks. This is how power creep occurs.

Buff the bad units to a mid point, and nerf the good units to the same mid point and ta da now both are viable and good. If the previous good unit players start bitching that they're no longer OP, well they get a tiny, tiny violin.

Buffing one unit doesn't nerf everyone else. Buffing one unit makes that one unit stronger, and changes the overall meta, but it doesn't magically change the power level of other units.

Boys didn't get worse, obviously. (Well, actually, they did - Furious Charge got weakened in 6th, and their rules got changes in the new codex so that they're no longer Fearless in large mobs, and instead take casualties for failing tests.) And I'm am obviously not arguing that every unit gets buffed to be stronger than everything else that currently exists - That's ludicrous, and I don't think you could reasonably get that meaning from my post unless you're trying to exaggerate to make a point.

I'm arguing that it's better to buff bad units to a reasonable point, rather than nerf everyone else to down to the level of the bad units. You say that other things should be nerfed down to the level of the Lasgun, but the problem with that is you're assuming that the lasgun is some kind of balanced midpoint when it clearly isn't - The Lasgun has always been crappy. They gave it First Rank Fire, Second Rank Fire in 6th edition because it was crappy in 5th, and even with that edition it still wasn't good - There are just too many ways to completely ignore the shots being put out. People don't bring Guardsmen to do damage, they bring them as ablative blobs to sit on objectives or screen units. (That's fine, by the way, because screening or tarpitting are valid tactics, I'm just mentioning it to demonstrate that the Lasgun has never been used as an actual effective gun.)


Also, please read my example again - Nob Bikers were not OP. Even in their hayday, they were of an above-average strength, but they were by no means the most overpowered thing in the game by a country mile, and they still got nerfed because they were stronger than the other Ork options.



Now that I've written all this out, this brings up a point - The Lasgun was never actually designed to be an effective, deadly weapon, because Guardsmen were never meant to be a powerhouse - They're supposed to be terrible, that's why they're cheap. The problem is that the models cost so little that changing them by 1 point in either direction becomes a pretty massive difference, so minor tweaks is really, really difficult to do. If you want to make the Lasgun better, you don't need to make it stronger, you need to find a way to make Guardsmen less terrible without making them undercosted.

Small arms are almost all meh.
The exceptions being Eldar's pseudo rending, and Tau's high strength.

If the imperial Guardsmen needs a minor buff to bring him up to mid tier, I say he should get it.
Making the lasgun superior to a boltgun in any way is not the way to do it, at least on an individual weapon basis.

All of these threads are feeding the same beast (i.e. must increase everything to match all of the over-powered gak which came out recently, etc.). It's all just a huge machine to push power-creep across the board. You bump a lasgun = "oh, well we need to bump the bolt gun...which means we need to bump the stormbolter, which means we need to bump the heavy bolter..." etc.

There's no victory here (and for the love of fething god don't add more special rules to "specialize" weapons).

However, counterpoint to my own complaint is that GW sure as hell isn't going to come out with a new edition and downgrade stuff to sane/balanced levels --- so...in short; you're screwed.

Going back to the OP's point regarding lasguns..... lasguns are not one of the issues surrounding the imperial guard at the moment. Hell first rank fire, second rank fire enables fairly cheap units to wither down much more elite and expensive units like space marines, terminators, demons etc etc.

I would say these are more important issues for guard

1) They have been left behind when it comes to the power creep, most of their heavy stuff was created around 3rd ed and just can't compete and is mostly FW
2) They lack of free units some other factions get
3) Their best formations being stuck behind Massive paywalls.
4) Vehicle rules sucking which they rely heavily on
5) They pay the same price for their heavy weapons as space marines despite reduced effectiveness or durability. Heavy weapon teams for example being incredibly fragile and expensive. Guard have no way to make up for this.

When you combine orders, psychic powers and potential infantry combo's, the basic guardsman with lasguns perform quite well.

 pumaman1 wrote:

 Soteks Prophet wrote:
The basic trooper with them probably needs to be either cheaper or slightly better.

The real issue is that a human is WS3 BS3 S3 T3 I3 LD7 and a super genhanced psycho-indoctrinated extra heart, lungs, spleen, organ mutant post human death monk space marine in MK7 mobile nuclear reactor powered armor is... 1 point better in all of them. Which is rubbish.

Fluff wise Marines should be around WS5 BS5 S5 T5 I5 LD9 with 2 wounds vs Humans 3s across the board, but the game should make 4 an above-average for things like eldar or veteran humans. Unfortunately you'd only need a fluff amount of space marines (IE 10-20) and GW wouldn't be able to sell you bajillions, also would cause problems unless the BS and WS charts etc were changed.

Basically the game needs to go to D10s like gates of antares!

That's... only partially correct. ws 3 bs3 represents a very highly trained military force of non-enhanced, not very enhanced humans/other species. Tau are all bs 3 base for troops as well, even super veterans who aren't the commanders, or in high precision tanks. Conscripts, which are barely trained are bs2, like orks shooting, and would be the "normal" human/being. So space marines being 33% better than a well trained military troop is not the worst.

The best of the best of the best humans are actually bs 4, but still t3 (barring named characters) in scions or veterans, and are given the chance to take weapons to better utilize their experience and hardened nature.

All said, a d10 allows for more nuance and ability to balance, but imagine rolling 60 d10s at the same time, and those don't pack well

Well the main crux of the matter is BS2 represents troops given a weapon with little to no training or experience. BS1 by comparison would be like giving a young child an AK and BS 4 goes from anything from vet's, people who have trained for hundreds if not thousands of years to simply genetically engineered super soldiers.

Then you have the massive 40k fluff contradictions as per the usual. Renegades all being BS2 despite many having more battlefield experience than most guardsmen, the variable quality of guardsman, scouts being as accurate as fully fledged space marines despite potentially very little experience, Cadian White Shields using conscript stats despite being better trained and equipped than the majority of guardmen in other armies.

Then you have things such a the quality variation between different regiments with the potential for them being of extremely low quality. Hell some forces like the Steel Legion often include hive gangers with very little formal training. Now I dunno about you, but Gang members conscripted into the armed forces aren't exactly known for their accuracy. Add to the fact most guardmens die before gaining any real battlefield experience.

Guardsmen in the current form with BS3 represents the fact of a human 'base' that everything else is compared to rather than any real logic, as per most of the other stats. Sure you could make space marines stats better represent them in the fluff, but depending on your source that could be 2 marines taking on a force equivalent to 1k-2k points and still winning.