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Was just playing a game of kill team and noticed that thanks to the long range rules using th breachers will be quite difficult with the ranges being 15, 10, and 5 inches.
So the closer you are the better your shots are but then the closer you are you have to use a different profile. Effectively you have to be 2.5 in away to not get a negative.

Seems like an oversight to me, very frustrating.

Yep. Typical GW stupidity. Your best bet is to try to house rule it based on the maximum range of the gun being 15", not the range of the variable damage stats.

I think it's less stupidity than an oversight since the Devs would just work off of what they intended versus our lack of understanding of their intention.

That said, it's likely based on the max range of the weapon instead of the individual profiles and makes the most sense that way, so unless GW FAQs otherwise I'd play it that way.

 Peregrine wrote:
Yep. Typical GW stupidity. Your best bet is to try to house rule it based on the maximum range of the gun being 15", not the range of the variable damage stats.

Even then, the profile of the Breachers gun is already designed to make it weaker at longer range, so I feel doubling down on that for everything over 7.5" is pretty harsh still.

Stux wrote:

 Peregrine wrote:
Yep. Typical GW stupidity. Your best bet is to try to house rule it based on the maximum range of the gun being 15", not the range of the variable damage stats.

Even then, the profile of the Breachers gun is already designed to make it weaker at longer range, so I feel doubling down on that for everything over 7.5" is pretty harsh still.

A -1 to hit is not the end of the world and is to encourage closer range fire fights and have people risk actual melee instead of gunlines. It's a mechanic we should see in 40k to help fix some of the issues we have currently honestly.

Yes, it hurts breachers a little more, but considering you're using the equiv of a laser shotgun I can see why it'd work that way.

I like the mechanic! I'm concerned for how punishing it is for Breachers specifically.

Stux wrote:
I like the mechanic! I'm concerned for how punishing it is for Breachers specifically.

It's punishing, but look at regular shotguns like on the Cultist Champion. S3 at 12" (with a -1 for long range) and S4 at 6" (where they stop having a -1). I feel like it represents shotguns even better than the old rules did, and seeing as Breachers basically are also using shotguns it fits.

That said, most of the good Kill Team lists look like a mix of units and options. A pure Breacher Kill team likely won't do so well, but a mix of Breachers, Firewarriors and Drones (and Kroot if they're an option) will likely pretty well.

I don't know, it seems like they could have just created a rule like scattergun that ignores the range penalty. If shotgun type weapons already have a short range and degrading profile, GW could have justified no long ranged penalties based on the idea that the spread of the shot at least counteracts the penalty while degrading the strength.

Skaorn wrote:
I don't know, it seems like they could have just created a rule like scattergun that ignores the range penalty. If shotgun type weapons already have a short range and degrading profile, GW could have justified no long ranged penalties based on the idea that the spread of the shot at least counteracts the penalty while degrading the strength.

I promise that if this happened somehow we'd have people crying about how broken breachers are and how OP shotgun style weapons are.

 ClockworkZion wrote:

Stux wrote:

 Peregrine wrote:
Yep. Typical GW stupidity. Your best bet is to try to house rule it based on the maximum range of the gun being 15", not the range of the variable damage stats.

Even then, the profile of the Breachers gun is already designed to make it weaker at longer range, so I feel doubling down on that for everything over 7.5" is pretty harsh still.

A -1 to hit is not the end of the world and is to encourage closer range fire fights and have people risk actual melee instead of gunlines. It's a mechanic we should see in 40k to help fix some of the issues we have currently honestly.

No, regular 40k has enough negative modifiers as it is.

 Bobthehero wrote:

 ClockworkZion wrote:

Stux wrote:

 Peregrine wrote:
Yep. Typical GW stupidity. Your best bet is to try to house rule it based on the maximum range of the gun being 15", not the range of the variable damage stats.

Even then, the profile of the Breachers gun is already designed to make it weaker at longer range, so I feel doubling down on that for everything over 7.5" is pretty harsh still.

A -1 to hit is not the end of the world and is to encourage closer range fire fights and have people risk actual melee instead of gunlines. It's a mechanic we should see in 40k to help fix some of the issues we have currently honestly.

No, regular 40k has enough negative modifiers as it is.

While we have too many set up as traits, I disagree about their being too many as a core mechanic. Pairing the modifier for obscured models for example would make positioning better and giving weapons a -1 to hit at long range would discourage long range firebase play and push armies to get closer to engage more effectively. Mix that with a natural 6 always hitting and the game balance would level out a lot more between armies.

Essentially, you want to make artillery hit on a 6 when used like artillery is used, got it, makes sense.

 Bobthehero wrote:
Essentially, you want to make artillery hit on a 6 when used like artillery is used, got it, makes sense.

"Does not require LoS" could give a +1 to mitigate the obscurement thing, or they could get a bonus if another model in the army with a vox can see the target requiring more nuanced play than "spam mortars". As for the -1 at more than half range, is that even an issue on actual artillery units?

Earthshaker Cannons have a range of 240", meaning they'd ignore the penalty at 120" or less. You know, 10', or, longer than the distance seen on most tables.

Mortars have a range of 48" meaning that at 24" or less they'd ignore the penalty.

Manticores have a range of 10 feet meaning anything inside of a 5' bubble is still in short range.

Yeah, I'm not seeing a problem in most cases here and considering how inaccurate artillery can get over long distances it makes sense that they could be a little less accurate when shooting out at max range.

Do you have to use the shorter range though? It just says "choose one of the profiles", so if the target it 7" away you could use the 15" profile instead of the 10" to avois the -1 to hit.

 Fentlegen wrote:
Do you have to use the shorter range though? It just says "choose one of the profiles", so if the target it 7" away you could use the 15" profile instead of the 10" to avois the -1 to hit.

It's not explicit that you HAVE to use the shorter range profile, but it's kind of crap at long range!

The thing is that it is kind of wonky to do that. It's like saying a melta gun suffers a -1 for long range at 4-6" if you want to benefit from the boost of being at half range or a Bolter at 7-12" if you want to fire two shots.

Meltaguns only have one profile, so it's not really the same thing. Their range is always 12", so the long range rule in Kill Team only applies to more than 6".

Sticking with meltas though, a better comparison are combi-meltas. That's a multi-profile weapon, same as a pulse blaster. Saying you use "the weapon's maximum range" might mean you use the boltgun profile's 24" range to measure long range even for the 12" meltagun profile.

We sometimes say that a combi weapon is "two weapons in one" but that's not an actual distinction the rules make, it's just a multi-profile weapon where you can fire both profiles if you want.

Pulse Blasters are essentially a shotgun though. It doesn't have different fire selections, its blast just gets weaker the farther it travels.

Skaorn wrote:
Pulse Blasters are essentially a shotgun though. It doesn't have different fire selections, its blast just gets weaker the farther it travels.

It actually does have different fire selections in 8th edition. You could say the crunch doesn't match the fluff, but in 8th edition pulse blasters and pulse blastcannons are multiple profile weapons and you can choose which profile to use, just like a combi weapon or a missile launcher.

Yes but that is because it was easier to write out clearly than having one profile with a special rule about how it looses W at X range, and Y at Z range.. They could do the exact same thing with melta weapons having two attack profiles and remove the special rule, but it's not nearly as complex and most players are used to the melta rule. Neither of these weapons work like a Rail Gun or Missile Launcher in other armies that fire two different types of munitions. Both weapons fire one type of attack that just loose power at longer ranges.

Skaorn wrote:
Yes but that is because it was easier to write out clearly than having one profile with a special rule about how it looses W at X range, and Y at Z range.. They could do the exact same thing with melta weapons having two attack profiles and remove the special rule, but it's not nearly as complex and most players are used to the melta rule. Neither of these weapons work like a Rail Gun or Missile Launcher in other armies that fire two different types of munitions. Both weapons fire one type of attack that just loose power at longer ranges.

No. Pulse Blaster does work like the Missile Launcher, you choose the profile to use. The wording is identical.

They changed the rule with 8th edition, though. They simplified it sure, but they changed the rule and it no longer works the way players might think it does. In 8th and in Kill Team, it's three profiles, pick one. There is zero ambiguity in the actual rules as to how it works.

Ok, so your saying that it has three different types of attack settings, each with their own max range, and shot from its most powerful setting will not travel beyond 5"? If you set it for long range, will it be the weakest strength for 0 to 15"? Because my understanding from what I've read is that you Fire it at max strength and that shot gets weaker as it reaches 6" and again at 11". It was just given three attack profiles for ease of clarity because it is more complex than Melta or Rapid Fire.

It simply just has three profiles. The whole “shot gets stronger” thing is a holdover from 7th edition where you were told the profile to use depended on how far away you were. That rule, like many other rules in 7th edition, doesn’t exist anymore. So we’re left a weapon that has identical phrasing to a missile launcher - “choose one of the profiles.” You can fire any of the three profiles at a target 4” away.

Now, I think it does make sense to think of it as a weapon with a 15” range, and that’s how I’d rule it when I played with someone using a pulse blaster. But I think that’s basically just house ruling something that’s broken by RAW.

Your playing Tau and not running Stealth Suits then you deserve the crappy shooting

Considering how the weapon is described as working I'm going to assume that they just forgot that RAW it has three different starting points at which the Pulse Blaster is considered long range, I'm willing to bet this is an oversight. I'm sure there will be an FAQ stating that it is long range at 7+inches.