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Motivation:

Now a day the aircraft does not feel truly like aircraft but some sort of hover tank. Due to bonuses restrictions, the -1 to hit barely makes a difference. Also, the aircraft can shoot without restriction in any direction. It gives the feeling that a humble infantryman and a Crimson Hunter are at the same ground level. Also, weapons that should be good for taking down aircraft (e.g. missiles, lascannons, autocannons, etc...) does not provide any bonuses.

Besides off point efficiency for killing and the capacity to move a lot of distance to snipe some target, there is little motivation to field any. Aircraft do not provide almost any interaction for game scoring (no at all for primary scoring, and also for most of the secondaries).

Proposal:

1. Remove the Hard to Hit rule and apply the following Aribone rule:

A unit without the Airbone rule cannot target a unit with the Airbone rule if its weapon range is less than 24". (no more shooting aeroplanes with flamers / super flamers or pistols)

A unit without the Airbone rule cannot target a unit with the Airbone rule if its weapon does not require a line of sight. (no shooting aeroplanes with mortars and ground to ground weapons)

If a unit without the Airbone rule shoots a unit that has the Airbone rule and this weapon has a range of 36" or less, apply a -2 to hit. A hit roll of 6 will always succeed. (-1 to hit is not crippling, -2 it is. long-range weapons are issued nowadays and they are the ones that look more likely efficient shooting down aeroplanes)

During the shooting phase, a unit with the Airbone rule can only target a unit without the Airbone rule and only can choose one weapon system to shoot this unit. (Also it should be difficult for an aeroplane to shoot down a ground target)

2. Keep the current rules for Aircraft in the cure rules. Especially the one that it says that a unit with the Aircraft keyword cannot control or contest an objective marker. Keep also the current flyer restriction from the data slate.

3. Do an effective point increase (either by increasing the points or reducing the others points) of Flyers that has the Hover rule, has the capacity to do bomb runs or has some way to bypass the supersonic rule (e.g. make multiple turns in the same movement phase)

4. Any army can use the following stratagem:
Call for air support (1CP): Use this stratagem if a unit with the Aircraft keyword under your control is within the range of an objective marker. When determining who controls the objective, half the number of model rounding up of your opponents that would contest this objective marker.

This will force that when trying to use this stratagem you will need to combine ground and air assault. To send an isolated Aircraft to the other side of the board to an objective marker totally under the opponent control will be pointless. At the same time, it will provide a way for the aircraft to play the objectives. Fluff wise it also makes sense. The troops in the ground cannot move as freely under strafe runs from the aircraft.

What about SMs with flamers that go all the way to 14?

I do think you shouldn't be able to damage airborne with pistols though. I like that idea. But it's all ready too much rules bloat. Now we need special rules for special rules. What about pistols that get an extra 4" of range like Custodes Swords?

Yeah, no, this is a slippery slope of MOAR FAQs.

Just make it so Airbourne are essentially off the table when in airborne mode, can't be targeted, unless they are in hover. They cannot attack or disembark units unless they are in hover. Done.

Also, when did Airborne units become such a problem? I mean, I've seen triple Ares Gunship lists before, but still.

IMO a large part of what makes Airborne units not feel like actual air support is:

1 - the primary problem with air support is it UNRELIABILITY, not its actual killing power, which is generally quite high

2 - one good, solid hit is enough to threaten to totally disable or destroy a plane, but they have the same exact stats as tanks.

My usual proposition is to have them basically HAVE to come on from reserve, and have them be a random roll that can be modified by having characters/units try to call for air support. then, I 100% agree with your assessment that certain weapons should not be able to target the aircraft at all, but I would probably lean towards the standard profile for an aircraft being something like T6 W5 or W6.

 the_scotsman wrote:
IMO a large part of what makes Airborne units not feel like actual air support is:

1 - the primary problem with air support is it UNRELIABILITY, not its actual killing power, which is generally quite high

2 - one good, solid hit is enough to threaten to totally disable or destroy a plane, but they have the same exact stats as tanks.

My usual proposition is to have them basically HAVE to come on from reserve, and have them be a random roll that can be modified by having characters/units try to call for air support. then, I 100% agree with your assessment that certain weapons should not be able to target the aircraft at all, but I would probably lean towards the standard profile for an aircraft being something like T6 W5 or W6.

So a Custodes Jetbike Captain is now the same as a Stormraven Gunship? Just kidding, but that is funny.

I don't think the Ws or T should be the breaking point, but rather what it can do. If it can do a "bombing run" ala whatever that stupid thing the DW have is, or the Ares Gunship.
Another thing aircraft can do is their special move. "hypersonic" I think it's called? Pivot 90 degrees and fly a max of 40" or something. I think every Aircraft should be those things base. An aircraft move profile, a Hover profile, and a bombing run. I think every IG AC has those, as do the SM ones, and the Custodes one. Do the Ork ones have those? Who cares, a Lawnmower with a ork flapping his arms is an aircraft for them.

But honestly, an Aircraft shouldn't need a dedicated weapon, because then it's basically back to the AV system. As it stands right now, you can't charge one without at least "fly" keyword. Now we want to make them immune to certain weapons?

I ask again, show me a major problem with aircraft currently. Otherwise we have Orks to nerf, and Eldar to pee our collective pants about.

FezzikDaBullgryn wrote:
So a Custodes Jetbike Captain is now the same as a Stormraven Gunship? Just kidding, but that is funny.

Given that Custodes is a superhuman giant badass riding and even bigger jetbike that sounds right to me

Also, you have made a fair point on raising that there are pistols and flamers that can surpass the 12" range mark. Perhaps increase it to less than 24"? This will leave the bolt guns like weapons as a baseline and if there is a pistol or a flamer that can shoot further than 24", that will be that epic that will be justifiable under my standards. Just think about how colossal would it be a 24" inch range flamer, It would look like almost like a volcanic eruption I'll edit the post.

Another good point that you have made about the rules bloat. I could be wrong but IMAO I think that the main issue with 40K is that there are not so many universal rules and all the complexity, especially the stratagems, is been rolled to the codex. Then you don't only need to learn the universal rules + the rules of your army but you also need to learn the rules of all the other codex + supplements. I think that taking junk from the codex and bringing them as universal rules could be beneficial and adding universal rules for every army is not as bloating the rules as adding rules for a specific army. But I guess that is a topic for another discussion.

Also, I agree with you that aeroplanes shouldn't have a dedicated weapon for them. But also to be shot freely without restrictions (and a -1 to hit is barely a restriction). Because of this, I was placing global restrictions on the weapon range. Every army has access to 24" > range weapons. To be fair is the most common weapon that there is in the game. Also, every army has access to 48" > inch range weapons that are premium anti-tank / infantry weapons but that nowadays, with the reduced table size, they have reduced its value, but they are still pointed as it matters anymore (e.g. melta cannons been much cheaper than lass canons when the 24" inc range make almost no difference in modern table sizes). This might give them some a new purpose. So it wouldn't be to bring specific weapons for flyers but give an edge to weapons that are currently wide over cost.

I agree with you that then Aircraft with the Hover rule, bomb runs and rules that allow to effectively bypass the supersonic rule (e.g. do multiple turns) would have an edge and therefore will be needed to have a point adjustment. Also, aircraft that have only one weapon (e.g. Necron flyers) as well. But luckily flyers are some of the less numerous kind of units. i.e. there are far fewer flyers than infantry, characters or tanks. I'll edit the post.

The problem that I see with the flyer is that the only motivation to field them is because of point efficiency by killing ground units. That's because you don't see so many SM, Tyranids or Chaos SM flyers and you see a lot of orks, eldars and ad mech ones.

But then if the aircraft are been field because the killing power, what's about the tanks? What I see is that there is a conflicting role. the_scotsman also point out, although for different reasons, that they look like tanks.

 the_scotsman wrote:

My usual proposition is to have them basically HAVE to come on from reserve, and have them be a random roll that can be modified by having characters/units try to call for air support. then, I 100% agree with your assessment that certain weapons should not be able to target the aircraft at all, but I would probably lean towards the standard profile for an aircraft being something like T6 W5 or W6.

I understand your point of view and I wish it could be possible to arrange it with the current rules. I think that the problem of using the standard T and S profiles make it more couples with all the other weapons in the game. For instance, T6 provides no extra protection against S6 flamers, which shouldn't be able to hit a flyer, especially with the autowound mechanics.

In other threads in the general 40k discussion forum, people also were discussing that flyers should be playing a different game or they truly don't belong to 40K. Some suggested placing it in a different game and then doing something like if archived air superiority has extra points to the regular 40 k games. This proposal tries to archive a step towards this. Reducing the interaction between flyers and ground troops (reducing the firepower that they can deal with each other) but at the same time, give the flyers a way to play an important role in the game scoring and all in the same game.

Also bear in mind that currently there is a restriction to 2 flyers per army which I think we should keep. I'll edit the post with this point as well.