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Some vehicles come with it standard...but I'm wondering how many people feel about upgrades for Armored Ceramite in general. This thread is not so complicated, just more of a question of consensus.

Armoured Ceramite is a game of iterated prisoner's dilemma. Lots of people will refuse to include melta in their lists on the logic that 'everything has Armoured Ceramite, so there's no point!', so you may find yourself taking Armoured Ceramite and never actually using it because nobody's ever taking melta.

Generally you should always be taking Armoured Ceramite on really expensive vehicles (superheavies, Spartans), but whether you take it on absolutely everything is going to depend on how much melta you actually see and on what you're trying to do with your vehicle (e.g. if you've got a Predator squadron intentionally held back as part of a firebase that isn't supposed to get anywhere near the enemy...).

And Armoured Ceramite on Flyers is just silly. There isn't enough Skyfire melta in the game to be relevant, and avoiding a 12" radius of a multi-melta Contemptor-Mortis shouldn't be difficult.

In terms of game design I feel that AC is very poorly implemented (at least in 30k.) I feel the issues with AC could be prevented by having it refuce the potency of melta without completely nullifying the effect. For instance, having AC affect every facing [b]except[/i] the rear would make melta useful but require some skill to pull off. It would also have vehicles retain most of their notable durability in 30k whilst still giving melta a niché.

Was also thinking about making AC less specialised and instead improve the vehicle's durability in a more general way, for instance giving the vehicle a 5++. Just some ideas...

On the expensive models, Lords of War, Spartans, whatever, it's an auto take. I'd rather spend the +20 points or so protecting me against that off chance that something has Melta then not. Each meta is a bit different, but a couple players in my meta use two to four Rhinos, and all have pintle Multi-meltas. Some run the occasional Support Squad with five Meltaguns. Melta isn't just for vehicles, it's also very useful against Terminators (especially those with two wounds), Machine Dudes, Primarchs, and the light vehicles. Multi-melta's on a Rhino just really, really irk me. It makes them into very cheap and reliable vehicle killers, enabling you to spam a lot of them in your army if you desire for some really cheap points.

Armored Ceramite on anything below AV 12 is a waste of points. An average Meltagun shot will still glance AV 12 without the extra die due to the Melta rule.

Side note: Remember that Meltabombs do not have the Melta rule; they instead have straight up Armorbane and Armored Ceremite only works against Melta.

 nudibranch wrote:
In terms of game design I feel that AC is very poorly implemented (at least in 30k.) I feel the issues with AC could be prevented by having it refuce the potency of melta without completely nullifying the effect. For instance, having AC affect every facing [b]except[/i] the rear would make melta useful but require some skill to pull off. It would also have vehicles retain most of their notable durability in 30k whilst still giving melta a niché.

Was also thinking about making AC less specialised and instead improve the vehicle's durability in a more general way, for instance giving the vehicle a 5++. Just some ideas...

Halve the melta range! Make melta weapons only apply their effect within 1/4 normal range (6" for multi-meltas, 3" for meltaguns, 1.5" for Inferno pistols and Pyroclast flame projectors...) instead of 1/2!

 AnomanderRake wrote:

 nudibranch wrote:
In terms of game design I feel that AC is very poorly implemented (at least in 30k.) I feel the issues with AC could be prevented by having it refuce the potency of melta without completely nullifying the effect. For instance, having AC affect every facing [b]except[/i] the rear would make melta useful but require some skill to pull off. It would also have vehicles retain most of their notable durability in 30k whilst still giving melta a niché.

Was also thinking about making AC less specialised and instead improve the vehicle's durability in a more general way, for instance giving the vehicle a 5++. Just some ideas...

Halve the melta range! Make melta weapons only apply their effect within 1/4 normal range (6" for multi-meltas, 3" for meltaguns, 1.5" for Inferno pistols and Pyroclast flame projectors...) instead of 1/2!

Great idea.

I either put it on everything or nothing depending on my opponent, we usually talk out 30k games before we play them, just for balance.

I only put it on things I'm going to try to get within threat range of Melta. My Spartan, Vindicators, Leviathan Dreadnought, Dracosan. Not really worth it on anything else.

 nudibranch wrote:
In terms of game design I feel that AC is very poorly implemented (at least in 30k.) I feel the issues with AC could be prevented by having it refuce the potency of melta without completely nullifying the effect. For instance, having AC affect every facing [b]except[/i] the rear would make melta useful but require some skill to pull off. It would also have vehicles retain most of their notable durability in 30k whilst still giving melta a niché.

Was also thinking about making AC less specialised and instead improve the vehicle's durability in a more general way, for instance giving the vehicle a 5++. Just some ideas...

Even with armored ceramite, S8 and AP1 is nothing to sneeze at when the armor value is 13 or less.

It's situational for me. If I go up against my regular opponent, who plays Tau, then yes, every tanks gets it whether they like it or not.

But in more regular games of 30k (as in, against other Horus Heresy lists) I usually check what army my opponent brings. Certain armies can only cram so many meltaguns into a list, making the inclusion of armoured ceramite a waste of points for me, so I drop it in favour of an extra tank instead.

I feel it's situational but more so situational depending on what vehicle.

If a vehicle crosses a certain points threshold around 300 I would say yes auto include. So malcador Spartans and super heavy gets it off the bat. At that point it's relatively cheap to protect the much larger investment you akready out into those units.

Next down the line are things like land raiders and sicarans. It's a maybe depending on what the land raider is carrying and normally a no on sicarans local meta dependent.

Anything smaller I would really consider as it's just to expensive on vindicator and predators to be worth it.