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Hi All,

Do I need to declare what troops are in my troop carriers?

I'm thinking it is more akin to "the fog of war" if it's not required.

Any thoughts on how it might add to the tension if reserves/embarked troops are not disclosed prior to the game.

I'm thinking the oppo has some folded paper for Rhino A, Rhino B etc. before the game, on which are details of what is in each Rhino, with points values, same for reserve squads, although some thought would need to be given as to how to disguise how many reserve units you have (maybe some blanks?). When you deepstrike/disembark the oppo can open the paper to confirm that you are bringing on the "hidden" forces.

The upshot being, the opposition can't deliberately target Rhino A as they "know" that some scary units are in it. Also, as you deploy reserves/disembark troops, the opposition should be able to do some mental calculation as to what if anything you have left to bring into the game.

Cheers

gkos wrote:
Do I need to declare what troops are in my troop carriers?

Yes, the rules on page 183 say you have to during deployment, and mid game you obviously need to say "I am embarking this unit into this transport" as part of the procedure for embarking.

bum.. I think they missed a trick there in order to ratchet up the tension/tactics a bit.

Mid game would never be a problem, as the knowledge would naturally be available to the opposition army.

gkos wrote:
bum.. I think they missed a trick there in order to ratchet up the tension/tactics a bit.

Mid game would never be a problem, as the knowledge would naturally be available to the opposition army.

Eh... It'd require a very high degree of honesty from the players that you can't guarantee in PUGs. Let's say you have five identical Rhinos-four contain tactical squads, and one contains Sicarus and a poop ton of honor guard. What's to stop you from saying the first Rhino that blows up contained tacticals? And the second? The third, the fourth?

as I mentioned, the oppo has what is in each vehicle on a bit of paper prior to the game, this prevents the cheating (you would need to identify the vehicles but marking are easy enough)

when you disembark (or get blown up) you decalre it and the oppo can confirm what is on the paper

Thats a very stupid rule. How does the enemy know which units are in my transports ? He doesnt. To prevent cheating units and their corresponding transports should have same colors, or same numbers, letters, or whatever.

To prevent cheating units and their corresponding transports should have same colors, or same numbers, letters, or whatever.

that would work


Automatically Appended Next Post:
However, if you have the same colour or markings, it would preclude playing the "cup and ball" tactic. e.g.

I have three rhinos as dedicated transports, I put my red hot squad in one, but keep two troops disembarked beginning of game, plus have some off table reserves.

I then run the rhinos up, the oppo has to guess which rhino holds the bad guys, if I have marked troops, they can deduce it.

If they have sealed envelopes or folded paper, they are still guessing.

p5freak wrote:
Thats a very stupid rule. How does the enemy know which units are in my transports ? He doesnt. To prevent cheating units and their corresponding transports should have same colors, or same numbers, letters, or whatever.

I'll take "What is military intelligence?" for 500 Alex.

gkos wrote:
However, if you have the same colour or markings, it would preclude playing the "cup and ball" tactic. e.g.

I have three rhinos as dedicated transports, I put my red hot squad in one, but keep two troops disembarked beginning of game, plus have some off table reserves.

I then run the rhinos up, the oppo has to guess which rhino holds the bad guys, if I have marked troops, they can deduce it.

If they have sealed envelopes or folded paper, they are still guessing.

The markings are under the rhino and under the bases, invisible to my opponent. He doesnt know if the rhinos are all empty, if one is empty, or two, or if all are occupied.

BaconCatBug wrote:

p5freak wrote:
Thats a very stupid rule. How does the enemy know which units are in my transports ? He doesnt. To prevent cheating units and their corresponding transports should have same colors, or same numbers, letters, or whatever.

I'll take "What is military intelligence?" for 500 Alex.

Stratagem scan 1CP. Pick a transport. Your opponent must reveal if that transport is occupied or not.

This conversation is moving more into the realm of proposed rules, so I'm going to move it there (as the initial question has been answered).

I've seen this topic come up in the past. Not knowing which units are in which transport is more "realistic" (in a game about space wizards fighting elf clowns and space viking werewolves), but it also has some pretty serious gameplay complications. Most transports have a "hatch" that you can open, so you could probably just toss a folded piece of paper inside or whatever to "hide" your units, but think about what that does to gameplay.

Armies with lots of transports have a huge advantage in that their opponents can no longer make intelligent decisions regarding what to shoot. Armies like tyranids and daemons have basically no transports, so they can never benefit from a rule like this. If a game is a "series of meaningful choices," as it's often defined, then this is a rule that removes a lot of the meaning from your opponent's choices. You go from making a judgement call about target priorities to just randomly picking a target and hoping it's the one you care about.

So this probably isn't a good rule for competitive play or pickup games.

That said, something like this could be fun for a narrative mission. "The VIP is inside one of the enemy transports. Stop him from escaping off the board!" You could even do a "mystery list" mission where both players bring in their lists piecemeal and don't reveal what's in their army until they arrive from reserves. "You brought THAT in this army?!"

It is 40K into the future, and most armies have some sort of life-scan technology available to them; wouldn't be too difficult for them to have basic knowledge of what's in those tin cans.

However, as mentioned above there are times when not knowing "what's in the bawx" could be part of the game. But I think that's something best left up to you and opponent. I'm certainly not against a mission where one side is trying to locate and destroy a special bit of cargo or VIP. Or perhaps one side being led to believe they are attacking the enemy's supply line, only to find the Emperor's Finest themselves laying a trap...

Some general ideas if you wanted a game of cat an mouse with transports:

2 CP: Secret Cargo: All transports contents are unknown to the enemy. Write down the (detailed) contents of each transport, but keep the information secret. If the transport is engaged in melee, scanned, destroyed or its contents disembark, you must immediately reveal the contents.

1 CP: Disguised Cargo: At the start of the game, secretly choose one friendly transport. The transport's contents are masked by a false signal generator. Prepare a fake (detailed) list of contents for the transport. If the transport is destroyed or its contents disembark, you must reveal the true contents. However, if the transport is engaged in melee or scanned you only reveal the fake contents to your opponent.

1 CP: Deep Scanners: Instead of firing, one model in a unit may scan an enemy transport model within 12". The owner of the transport must reveal the transport's contents - unless the transport is protected by Disguised Cargo.