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I've been reading a few threads on here and one of them was reminiscing about oldhammer and how the game used to feel. One of the posters put up a picture of their game and made a comment about how the marines were all walking around in their own units rather than bunching up for auras.

Now Auras have become something of a staple of 40k, and generally they promote circular blobs of dudes shuffling around the board in perfect formation (if inded they move at all) to remain in aura distance at all times. which is something of a rubbish mechanic, to my eyes. Especially for marines, who should have enough training by now to know to aim at the enemy when they shoot!

So, I guess the opening question (as per the poll) is whether you would get rid of Aura abilities at all! Just give your general case answer, you may have some exceptions to talk about in your post! EG "I'd get rid of everything except the kustom force field" then say yes and add "but not the KFF" in your post!

The next question is how would you replace them?

Personally, having regularly faced the auras of doom in the space marine list, I would prefer to change Auras to a single-unit effect. Usually they are given off by Characters, and so it would work for the character to bestow the ability to a single unit within 3".

Alternatively, the aura ability can be a stratagem which exists as long as the character is alive, and has no range or LOS requirements, and can be used multiple times per phase.
EG: the chapter master reroll to hit aura could instead be "if there is a friendly chapter master on the board, you may select any number of friendly units at the start of the shooting phase. pay 1CP for each unit - if a unit is a Vehicle with over 10 wounds, instead pay 2CP. These units may re-roll their "to hit" rolls until the start of your next turn."

Thus it's not entirely free, but is significantly more flexible. You can deepstrike dudes in a drop pod and still use the chapter masters ability.

what are you lot's thoughts on this?

I like the auras concept, I hate re-rolling auras though. These ones should go, not the entire concept. They don't even need to be replaced at all, there's already too much dice rolling.

Charcaters that only have re-rolling auras can get a different buff.

I agree with the guy above; the re-roll auras are what make them rather OP. I think the issue lies with some particular units rather than auras as a whole.

Personally I'd make it something like this:
- re-roll auras are redefined to affect only one unit at a time, chosen at the end of the Movement Phase.
- the more powerful characters such as Guilliman, Abaddon, Mortarion, etc retain their 6" bubble.

I'd probably remove auras and replace them with a targeted buff. Some of the new Necron rules are moving that way. So instead of a 6" reroll bubble, a SM Captain would select a unit within X" to apply his buff to.

I'd also agree with the opinion reroll auras should probably be removed anyway. It seems like GW has become less and less inventive with its special rules as almost everything is now a variation of reroll auras. We already roll so many dice, having to reroll between 1/6 and 1/2 of them for multiple units is just a time sink.

I think any time some unit gets a million buffs stacked on them, people complain. And for good reason. That said, I don't know off the top of my head how to resolve that; providing limits ultimately only causes new problems. Like "well then people only ever use the Chapter Master benefit" or "then bugs never benefit from Synapse because other things would be better" or any other potential issue with forced limits.

Auras were always a thing, but they only effected the unit that the character was joined too.

Since characters can no longer be joined to a unit, they made the aura's project to everything.


So to get rid of auras, you would just need to go back to the single unit buff's of old.

This would mean that during the command phase, a character could buff one (or possibly 2) units with their buff instead of having a 6" circle.

Astra militarum does it right currently, and im assuming they just didnt want to copy that ability to every other faction to keep their uniqueness. However, it really just means AM gets a weaker buff capability than other factions just to follow their own theme.

Nerf the other factions back in line with Orders from AM and let them take relics/WL traits that let them buff more units or put more than one buff on a single unit and now people have to make decisions.

It would be a significant departure, but I would like to see auras removed entirely as a means of character buffing.

There are a lot of other ways characters can contribute to the game:
-Provide a targeted buff to a single unit.
-Unlock options for the entire army.
-Unlock stratagems.
-Generate command points.
-Special abilities (eg prevent deep strike within a radius).
-Directly contribute with their combat ability and equipment.

In Horus Heresy, character buffs usually come from abilities an independent character confers to their attached unit. The equivalent function in 40K would be for a character to provide a buff to a single unit within a very short distance.

I also strongly agree with the idea of moving away from re-rolls. They're tediously slow and detract from the game experience by making it too deterministic. A simple +1 is more impactful yet makes combat resolution no slower.

Edit: Eihnlazer beat me to it. I'd add that the unique things about Guard orders, even in prior editions, were that they could be applied from a distance, and the exact nature of the buff could change from turn to turn. Giving characters targeted buffs to units they are physically close to wouldn't step on the Guard's toes.

Bring back blast templates, especially since 9th also has "anti-conga" coherency rules.

I’d get rid of auras as they are now. There might be a case for one or two, KFF might be a good example of this like the OP suggests.

Firstly I’d remove all or most re-roll buffs, whether by aura or otherwise. Maybe a +1 instead, but would have to be looked at case by case.

Targeted buffs is something I’d like better than auras, the range could be a bit bigger than the standard 6” for auras to further reduce bunching up since it can only influence one target unit at time. I’d also look at units only being able to benefit from a single buff at a time.

Another way to go is closer to the old style of characters joining units- a buff that effects the closest eligible friendly unit in range, still only improves one unit at a time, but which unit is improved is determined by movement.

Reducing the range of some character buffs to 3” would be worth considering too, to marry up with the look out sir rules, the character essentially provided a buffs to the unit that is shielding it.

In general, I dislike auras for the most part, but I don’t think there is necessarily a one size fits all solution, a combination of the above and other solutions would be good.

The above could also interact with the new “core” unit mechanic.

Much better to have them as "Target a unit. That unit..." than an aura, by and large. The one thing I'd keep as auras would be a general "Leadership" rule, where any friendly model within 6" of a character can use that character's Leadership instead of their own. Basicly, any character can inspire those around them.

For everything else, and I mean *everything* else? Target a unit which gets "benefit" until "time". Usually "Until your next Command Phase" to make things easy.

Good enough for Guard, good enough for everyone.

Lots of good suggestions in this thread. I generally agree with reducing the number of to-hit/wound reroll auras floating around. I like the idea of replacing most auras with either targeted MWBD/Orders style buffs OR turning some stratagems with an emphasis on mobility and special actions into orders that replace auras.

So an autarch might not give craftworld units a raw power boost by making them more accurate, but he might be let a unit use the Feigned Retreat (fall back and shoot/charge) or Fire and Fade (move-shoot-move) strats for free. Or maybe he can use an order to let a unit treat the turn as 1 higher for purposes of strategic reserves or let deepstrikers arrive 1" closer. Stuff like that.

I've been kicking around similar ideas to replace the Phoenix Lord auras. I might make a thread about it soon if it doesn't overlap too much with this one.