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So the reintroduction of 2nd edition Safe/Unsafe plasma modes has skewed the game into plasmaspam central.

I think the problem is giving both the +1S and +1D on overheat. That's in the majority of cases giving +1 to wound (brings you to 3+ to wound vs T7 vehicles and 2+ to wound vs T4 MEQs) and double damage, which is a hell of a bonus when even if you kill yourself you're making your points back regardless.

What if overcharging let you pick between +1S or +1S instead of both +1S and +1D? But also make overcharging AP-4. Make plasma more versatile while still toning it down.

I think the main problem with plasma is the possibility of re-roll 1s. Having access to re-rolls makes plasma overcharge extremely safe while I'd be ok with +1S and +1D if with a 1 the model dies no matter what.

Just avoid that re-roll on plasma weapons or anything that could kill the firing model if rolls a 1.

Easy access to deep strike is the real huge issue and makes plasma even better.

If models that use plasma weapons couldn't deep strike for free and re-roll failed hit of 1s, plasma weapons would be good but fair.

True, out of the three classical special weapons, Plasma, Melta and Flamer, only Plasma is even usable after a deep strike. Melta doesn't get it's laughably crap bonus and flamers can't reach at all.

If plasma killed the dude if they roll a 1, even if you allow them to re-roll and possibly hit (so you hit with the shot but still overheat and are slain), would that work?

Change the rule to "On a hit roll of 1, even if re-rolled, the bearer is slain after all of this weapon’s shots have been resolved."

What about if you dropped the Strength of both modes by 1? That seems pretty reasonable to me.

I say make it remove a model for every 1.

This way rerolls don't prevent the damage but you'll still get to do damage with the stuff you paid for.

It would actually make them more of a one shot wonder cause rapid firing the whole squad with rerolls would be very deadly to boths sides.


Dark angels are going to be far too strong if they can just reroll away their overheats.

 Eihnlazer wrote:
I say make it remove a model for every 1.

This way rerolls don't prevent the damage but you'll still get to do damage with the stuff you paid for.

It would actually make them more of a one shot wonder cause rapid firing the whole squad with rerolls would be very deadly to boths sides.


Dark angels are going to be far too strong if they can just reroll away their overheats.

AM's already too strong with reroll order and cheaper plasmas.

Make natural 1's overheat with armor saves allowed at its Ap -3. In most cases this would mean you need 3+ save for a chance of save on 6. It also doesnt make sense that plasma overheat better against -hit modifiers.

One could also got the way of the first Land Raider Terminus Ultra. If you roll a 1 on your first roll, the model may still reroll to see if it hits and does something, but after resolving the attack, the model suffers the mortal wound.
Other than that... I don't know. Not the biggesst fan of the two-profile plasma weapons. I don't think they really needed the better-yet-more-dangerous profile, but eh, whatever. I really like the idea of a more dangerous overheating, though.

You can argue there's more issues with the other weapons.
1. Flamers are garbage. There's already a lot of threads on that.
2. Melta Guns are absurdly expensive at 17 points.
3. Grav Guns are somehow more expensive for no more benefit.

I would say:

Normal use - 1s cause a wound, saves allowed.

Overcharged - mortal wound.

That being said, with all the reroll 1s available to marines, everyone just overcharges plasma all the time with little to no fear.

I think that's the big problem - overcharged plasma is too strong, too cheap, with too little risk with very common buffs. Toss in risk-free deep striking rapid firing plasma guns and it gets a tad ridiculous.

A minigame I play is to shame (I call it sissy safe plasma when not overcharged) imperial players into overcharging their plasma so they can kill their own units, even with rerolling 1s. Managed to do it twice (almost killed azarael) in an apoc game.

 Lum wrote:
Not the biggesst fan of the two-profile plasma weapons.

Same. That was like the *essence* of Plasma - tangible risk for potentially great reward.

M.

 BaconCatBug wrote:
True, out of the three classical special weapons, Plasma, Melta and Flamer, only Plasma is even usable after a deep strike. Melta doesn't get it's laughably crap bonus and flamers can't reach at all.

If plasma killed the dude if they roll a 1, even if you allow them to re-roll and possibly hit (so you hit with the shot but still overheat and are slain), would that work?

Change the rule to "On a hit roll of 1, even if re-rolled, the bearer is slain after all of this weapon’s shots have been resolved."

Thats just punish more elite armies and allows for cheap plasma suicide units to remain nearly the same. I'm a little salty that the Tau "safe" version of Plasma is now just a worse version of the Imperial plasma.

Plasmas need to overheat on a rolled 1 before modifiers and rerolls. And then I think it ought to have either a range of 18" or an Assault 1 profile with a range of 24".

Apart from that, I think meltas ought to go down in price. And flamers should be Assault 6, R8", S3, AP0, D1. That would give them a nice buff against hordes.

no flamers don't need to go down in strength. They just need +1 hit per 8 models or something.


Galas is true that removing models hurts elite more, but if you change it to mortal wounds, hellblaster squads are too strong.



Mabey do this:
Overheat: On an attack roll or 1 with this weapon (after modifiers) the unit suffers 1 mortal wound. You can choose to overheat this weapon and gain +1str and damage. If you do, every 1 on the dice deals 2 mortal wounds to the unit.


Bit more complex, but it certainly makes it more fair over the different armies that can use it.

 Eihnlazer wrote:
no flamers don't need to go down in strength. They just need +1 hit per 8 models or something.

6 S3 attacks is better than D6 S4 attacks against anything not Toughness 6 or better. I think it would be the way to go for flamers.

6 auto-hits is too strong, and if you have to roll to hit its too weak.

keep it strength 4 like its always been and just increase hits againgst more models like flamer type weapons should.

 Eihnlazer wrote:
6 auto-hits is too strong, and if you have to roll to hit its too weak.

keep it strength 4 like its always been and just increase hits againgst more models like flamer type weapons should.

6 S3 autohits is only mildly stronger than D6 S4 autohits. It is a good rule. If you want to buff a weapon against hordes, then you decrease S and increase number of shots.

Your proposal will slow the game down every time multiple flamers is in play, as the defending player will insist on removing models from each single weapons attacks, in order to minimize the accumulated damage.

I also like the 6 S3 autohits. Flamers used to be templates with a chance of hitting 8-10 guys if they were really close to each other. D6 or D6 + 1 is too low for 9 points and there's no reason to roll a dice to determine the number of hits on a weapon that used templates in the previous editions but never scattered.

Blast and large blast changed into D3 or D6 hits makes sense, a template into a D6 or D3 (hello burnas) roll absolutely not.

pismakron wrote:
Plasmas need to overheat on a rolled 1 before modifiers and rerolls. And then I think it ought to have either a range of 18" or an Assault 1 profile with a range of 24".

As a Death Guard player, I'd be fine with this as I get to keep my 18" double tap

Also for any flamer changes, I think it's important to consider changes to other flamer-type weapons to keep them consistent. The plague spitters on bloat-drones for example.

I would try making the overcharged profile "Heavy 1" instead of "Rapid Fire 1"
That would cut down on deep strike spam (no double tap) and make plasmas more situational.

It seriously might just be easier to fix the other weapons that have issues.

Overcharged plasma could have its ranged lowered by maybe 4" or so.

Slayer-Fan123 wrote:
It seriously might just be easier to fix the other weapons that have issues.

All of the other weapons are only bad because plasma is so good in the 9" Deep Strike meta.

 BaconCatBug wrote:

Slayer-Fan123 wrote:
It seriously might just be easier to fix the other weapons that have issues.

All of the other weapons are only bad because plasma is so good in the 9" Deep Strike meta.

Agreed.

Make flamers 10" so they're able to be used against the 9.X" charges and people might take them. Or just say leave the range as is but say that "due to the indiscriminate nature of a Flamer's fire jet it may always be used in Overwatch, regardless of range - simply make D6 attacks with this weapon against the charging unit without checking range."

Make Melta cost less than Rapid-Firing, longer-ranged Plasma and people might take them. My Melta Vets are bored in their box.

Grenade Launchers have always been the red-headed stepchild so no amount of fixing will help them!

A couple of tweaks and more variety might be seen on the table.

 JohnnyHell wrote:
Make flamers 10" so they're able to be used against the 9.X" charges and people might take them. Or just say leave the range as is but say that "due to the indiscriminate nature of a Flamer's fire jet it may always be used in Overwatch, regardless of range - simply make D6 attacks with this weapon against the charging unit without checking range."

This isn't necessarily a problem specific to flamers, GW really just needs to errata Overwatch to not exclude weapons; i.e- all weapons can fire, but use either the current range to the charging unit, or their maximum range, whichever is nearer.

Personally, I don't like the fact that they are still S7/8. It was fine in previous editions when Imperial and Chaos plasma was stronger than Tau, Eldar and Dark Eldar plasma as it came with the drawback of killing the model on 1's but now you can use it without that drawback and it's still stronger than all Xenos plasma. I'd much rather it was brought down to S6, S7 when overcharged.

 BaconCatBug wrote:

Slayer-Fan123 wrote:
It seriously might just be easier to fix the other weapons that have issues.

All of the other weapons are only bad because plasma is so good in the 9" Deep Strike meta.

That's not the only reason though.

Flamers are 7 points, which is 3.5 Storm Bolters. That obviously needs to go down.
Grav Guns have no real benefit. Make them Assault 2, and now they compete with the more dangerous Plasma.
Melta Guns just need a super big price cut. 12 sounds correct.
Grenade Launchers...make them 3 points I guess?

Is that all of them?

What exactly are the things spamming plasma that are so good as to require a nerf to a weapon accross all armies?

With eldar being so strong and wave serpants basically turning plasma into worthless piles of crap - I don't actually see an issue here.

What I do see(agreeing many many posting in this thread) is a lot of other weapons being useless Grav/Melta/flamers - buff those weapons - don't nerf plasma.

Plasmas are not overpowered at all. The easy combination plasma plus re-rolls of 1s and/or free deep strike is broken.

Let's just kill the model on the result of a 1 if he overcharded and limit deep strike to a few units. In fact the access of free deep strike to tons of units is one of the major problems of 8th edition.

Slightly different tangent - would it be better if Plasma overheat dealt mortal wounds instead of instakill?

1D3 Mortal wounds for a Plasma pistol?
1D6 Mortal wounds for a Plasma gun?
2D6 Mortal wounds for a Plasma cannon?

 Eihnlazer wrote:
no flamers don't need to go down in strength. They just need +1 hit per 8 models or something.

Remove random hits from flamers
Add flamer rule: "When this weapon is fired at a unit, it scores 1 auto-hit for each model in that unit in range."

Bam.