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Working on rules for Corsairs in Kill Team, since they're a perfect fit thematically (although the same could be said for Kroot, and they got worked over pretty bad) and the models/rules still technically exist. The list is basically just Reavers and Rangers, but I wanted some thoughts on translating the more general rules for the kill team, and I know Corsairs are relatively popular here.

Dancing on the Blade's Edge translates really well to kill team, because it has the Nerve Test/Broken Test split for "Selfish" and "Group" Leadership. This translated to slapping -2Ld on every Corsair model (i.e. Ld5 base) and giving them this ability:

Dancing on the Blade's Edge
You can subtract 4 from Nerve tests taken for this model, unless its kill team is broken.

This means even the basic Corsair Reaver is effectively rocking Ld9... until half of its buddies are wounded, dead, or shaken, at which point that kill team has to test for becoming broken. And with Ld6 from a lone Felarch (Ld5 if they're dead), it's almost certainly going to break. And once it's broken, they're all down to Ld5 and eating broken penalties. So when things are going well? They're going really well. And when the scales tip even a little, the Corsairs suddenly lose any taste for a straight-up fight.

In concept, I love this, but is it too extreme? Should it just be -1 base Ld and +3 (or even just +2) for non-broken Nerve tests, to narrow the gap?

Reckless Abandon is (was, rather) a really characterful rule that encourages you to get up in your opponent's face and then dance back from him, just at the edge of a charge. I've come up with two versions, and I'm not sure which I like better.

Reckless Abandon
If this model shoots at an enemy model that is within 9", it can move up to 3" after resolving all of its attacks. It cannot do so again in this battle round.

This has the benefit of simplicity: if you're willing (or forced) to get right in someone's face to shoot them, you get to move away from them (but still within charge range). I'm a bit dubious about the 9" range, though; it seems like it could be very frustrating for combat armies, even if it's basically a "free" Retreat that doesn't require a charge or stop you from shooting. An earlier draft had 6", but it didn't feel like it was nearly enough. An earlier draft also had the "must move further away" restriction, but I didn't see much need for it, to be honest; Corsairs aren't awesome assault units even with chainswords, so why not allow the flexibility? It certainly fit the fluff of the rule.

Reckless Abandon
This model can use its Reaction to fire Overwatch (with any weapon type) even if it Advanced, Fell Back, or Retreated earlier in that battle round. In addition, when an enemy model within 12" of this model targets it with an attack in the Shooting phase, this model can React as if it was the target of a charge by that enemy model. Resolve the enemy model's attacks after this model's Reaction.

This second version is more complicated and meddles with more mechanics, but also feels like it could be hilarious to play with. It comes in two parts: first, you ignore the Movement restrictions on firing Overwatch. It doesn't matter if you Retreated already this round, if you Advanced and you don't have an Assault weapon, if you Fell Back and can't FLY; you can always fire Overwatch, no matter what you did in this Movement phase. This also means you can be a bit more free with Retreating, since you're not locking yourself off from future Overwatch.

Secondly, when you get shot at by someone within 12", you get to React as though you were charged. That means you can fire Overwatch back at them first, or you can run away. Even into cover, or into long range, or out of line-of-sight, or out of range entirely! And because of the previous rule, you can fire Overwatch once every time you get shot or charged by someone at close range, even if you already ran away a little bit by Retreating. You're nasty at close-range firefights.

Brace of Pistols has been removed as a discrete weapon, since it was ass to balance and really quite fiddly. Instead I just gave each Reaver four Shuriken Pistols and the Brace of Pistols ability:

Brace of Pistols
Each time this model fires a shuriken pistol, you can choose to instead use the characteristics of a splinter pistol.

If I run with the second version of Reckless Abandon, I might need to consider doing something like lowering them to 3 pistols, but 6s to hit generate extra hits. That would emphasize the weird Overwatch dynamic even further, because it goes from 4 shots (2.6 hits, or 2 hits at long range, or 0.6 hits on Overwatch) to 3 shots (2.5 hits, or 1.5 hits at long range, or 1.3 hits on Overwatch).

Alternatively or in addition, I might want to consider dropping the long range penalty from Corsair pistols and/or allowing them to fire on the charge, because it's not as though Pistols were in an especially good place in mainline 40k to begin with...

I'm also considering representing the Void Harness as something like a Grav-Chute/Grapnel Launcher, representing magnetic/grav grips and shield functions designed to help cling to ships and survive the vacuum of space. Possibly:

Void Harness
A model with a void harness automatically passes Falling tests. It can also move over difficult and dangerous terrain and jump down as if it could FLY. The model must still climb vertical surfaces and leap gaps normally.

A problem I'm running into is that Corsairs – as presented by Forge World – are basically a mishmash of Dark Eldar and Eldar in terms of equipment. I get that it's meant to represent taking from both "sides" and encourage kitbashing, but it just comes across like the old WHFB 9e decision to give Wood Elves both Dark Magic and High Magic to represent being weird and in-between, ooooh. It all feels a bit... unfocused and greedy. A bit kitchen sink.

I'm wondering if I ought to just trim the gear options way back, but that means making a strict decision on what you can make these Corsairs out of – only Guardians or only Kabalites. Guardians arguably make more sense, but Kabalites are much nicer models.

Not that it matters, I guess, with the old kits dead and buried. At this point it might be worth just homebrewing their loadouts and models from the ground up.

Between wyches, storm guardians and harlequins, corsairs have a hard time finding a niche.
I like the Dancing on the blade's edge and the first Reckless Abandon version (but would change it to 6"). The second one is a bit messy, and creates way too many interruptions in my opinion.

4 shuriken pistols per reaver seems like a lot. That's a lot of firepower that's very hard to leverage (as pistols are often in the long range zone).
I would instead do something like a shuriken pistol profile (S4, AP-3 on 6s to wound), but with D3 shots and no long-range penalty.

fresus wrote:
Between wyches, storm guardians and harlequins, corsairs have a hard time finding a niche.

Yeah. Less of a problem in Kill Team because they're separate, but there have still been multiple times where I've sat back and gone "is this just a Drukhari unit with shurikens?"

fresus wrote:
I like the Dancing on the blade's edge and the first Reckless Abandon version (but would change it to 6"). The second one is a bit messy, and creates way too many interruptions in my opinion.

That's fair. I love the idea of Retreating in response to an enemy firing a Heavy Bolter, or quick-draw Overwatch shooting a Flamer-armed Gunner before he can kill you, but you're right that it'd slow the game to a crawl if the Corsair player got to React every single time he was shot at, even with the range restriction.

By "change it to 6" – do you mean change the free movement to 6", or change the range within which you can do it to 6", or both? The first option would make it basically impossible to charge you except for Harlequins, so it's out, but the second option still feels... kind of anemic. If I'm within 6" and I move 3" away, I'm at most 9" from you. That means you need to roll at most an 8 to charge me – that's harder, but it's not even unlikely, especially if you're Orks (who average 10" charges), Tyranids (who average 8-10"), Tzaangors (who average 8"), Drukhari (who average 10"), Khorne (who average 10"), or Harlequins (who average 10.5"). Or are willing to spend a CP. Or have one of the Elites faction traits that boosts charge rolls.

It's a tricky one to keep useful-but-not-busted.

fresus wrote:
4 shuriken pistols per reaver seems like a lot. That's a lot of firepower that's very hard to leverage (as pistols are often in the long range zone).
I would instead do something like a shuriken pistol profile (S4, AP-3 on 6s to wound), but with D3 shots and no long-range penalty.

I tend to steer away from random shots on small arms (except for flamers, who have reliable hits to even it out), but that's a much smaller problem in Kill Team, where you're rolling per-model rather than per-unit. Hm. Certainly worth considering. Or if I'm ditching the whole "Shuriken or Splinter" schtick, just make it:

Brace of Pistols: Range 12", Pistol 2, Strength 4, AP-0, Damage 1, Abilities: Each time you make a hit roll of 6+ for this weapon, you score an additional hit against the same target. Each time you make a wound roll of 6+ for this weapon, that hit is resolved with an Armour Penetration characteristic of -3.