Forum adverts like this one are shown to any user who is not logged in. Join us by filling out a tiny 3 field form and you will get your own, free, dakka user account which gives a good range of benefits to you: No adverts like this in the forums anymore. Times and dates in your local timezone. Full tracking of what you have read so you can skip to your first unread post, easily see what has changed since you last logged in, and easily see what is new at a glance. Email notifications for threads you want to watch closely. Being a part of the oldest wargaming community on the net. If you are already a member then feel free to login now.

Hello everyone!

Like many, I've been feeling increasingly dissatisfied with the state of Warhammer 40K over the years, and found myself writing my own rules for the game so that I could have fun with my models again.

So I'd like to present Wasteland tactics, and humbly request feedback.

https://github.com/Pointedstick/wasteland-tactics/releases/latest/download/Rules.pdf

The rules originated in a skirmish-scale wargame I designed for a small dev team a few years ago whose product never got off the ground. They gave me permission to use the rules for whatever I want, and I found myself adapting them to be able to play 40k. My goal was to preserve the essence of what I love about 40K, but in a game that feels like a classical military wargame, and avoids excessive detail and complexity. Among its features are:

* Simple basic rules that combine in complex ways
* Meaningful choices rather than just endless sterile die rolling
* Alternating unit activation
* Reactions
* Suppression-based morale system
* Leadership and Orders
* Missions with complex, real world style objectives
* Tanks that feel like tanks
* No units that are inappropriate for the scale (aircraft, super-heavy tanks, etc)

Inspirations in no particular order are: 4th edition 40K, GrimDark Future, Dust Warfare, Beyond the Gates of Antares, and Bolt Action.

So far I've written army rules for the Planetary Defense Force (IG/AM) and Orc Raiders (Orks) factions and am working on Gothic Legion (Space Marine) rules.

Development happens at https://github.com/Pointedstick/wasteland-tactics. The project is open-source, licensed using the GPLv3 license. All documents are laid out using the LaTeX typesetting system. Contributions are welcome!

It is definitely an early Alpha, lacking rules for most factions, and with no meaningful art in the rule pamphlet. Those are planned.

Any and all feedback is appreciated! Even harsh, brutal feedback.

Nate

Thanks so much for the feedback!


You're absolutely right about the "running out of units to activate" thing. I try to make the rules super explicit and I missed that. Right now it's implicit that the larger battle group just keeps activating units until it runs out, but I'll make it explicit, pending any changes to the way that works, of course.

I'm open to suggestions regarding how to improve unit coherency. I agree that the current rule is rather crude.

Regarding weapon ranges, I don't disagree. One thing I really want to do with these rules is give players meaningful choices that come with real consequences. So for example if I said that you can exceed your weapons' range by 50% with a -4 Shoot penalty, I'd want for there to be some additional disadvantage to doing so, or else players would just always do it. Maybe something like if you want to exceed your weapons' ranges (with Shoot penalty), you need to make a Will roll, and if you fail, the Shoot action fails entirely due to the unit's disorganization and confusion.

I'm glad you liked the mission positioning. That was definitely deliberate, for exactly the reason you said.

I re-did the formatting in the Shoot action slightly to re-categorize existing options to split fire or shoot at distant targets under the umbrella of a new "Advanced Shooting Task" category. Each one you want to perform requires a separate Will roll, and each failed Will roll imposes an additional -1 Shoot penalty for the rest of the action. So doing fancy shooting is now riskier.

With this as a base framework, in https://github.com/Pointedstick/wasteland-tactics/commit/64fe1ae2c109de8bec8dc7a8ac7d95e8fd5bae91 I added a new Advanced Shooting Task to allow a unit to extend their weapons' ranges by 5" at the cost of a -3 Shoot Penalty. It fit in quite nicely.

That's an interesting idea.

However I don't want to overwhelm the player with bookkeeping by asking them to apply bonuses or penalties based on the distances between models. The best way to do it without bookkeeping would be to apply a bonus when all models are in base contact with another model in the unit.

This would work out great in a system with blast and flamer templates, where there's a natural penalty for bunching up that complements any advantage it might provide. IIRC the 4th edition 40K IG codex did this, allowing you to take a "Close order drill" WS bonus when all models were in base contact, or something like that. You could mimic it in a system with abstract area effect weapons by making those weapons get extra hits when all models are in base contact.

However a bonus for having all models in base contact is separate from how you prevent models from being 5" away from other models in the unit, which is what the unit coherently guidelines are trying to prevent.

But I see your point that the current approach of forcing coherency is not very player friendly.