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Made in gb
Space Marine Scout with Sniper Rifle




UK

Remove all model Ld values. All factions start with a Leadership value. (Could be anything but for this example, this value will be: 4).
When building a list, you add units that will increase this value by 'x' (could be +1, +2 or +3). These would be units that are considered inspirational, like captains/commanders/bannermen/commisars etc etc.
You need to increase this Leadership value because if, during a battle, your leadership value is at 4 or less, your army would start taking a "morale" penalty.
This penalty would be: for every casualty you take, you take another (runs away).
This means everyones goal is to keep their Leadership units alive throughout a battle, to keep morale high, and to take out the opposing enemies Leadership units.

The default value can be tailored to factions so that some are more/less resilient to the effects of morale, or even ignored if applicable.
Essentially, dont go under a leadership value threshold, or suffer the consequences.

There would of course be ways to raise your own morale temporarily/permanently using abilities or powers, whatever. Also, to lower the enemies morale.

Just an idea, one that probably wouldnt make it in current 9th rules.

This message was edited 4 times. Last update was at 2022/05/16 19:56:34


 
   
Made in us
Humming Great Unclean One of Nurgle





In My Lab

I’d rather morale was morale, than just damage.

Clocks for the clockmaker! Cogs for the cog throne! 
   
Made in gb
Space Marine Scout with Sniper Rifle




UK

 JNAProductions wrote:
I’d rather morale was morale, than just damage.


Isn't morale just that now really? (you may have been getting at that tbh)

What, in your opinion, would be a suitable penalty?

This message was edited 1 time. Last update was at 2022/05/16 19:54:48


 
   
Made in us
Humming Great Unclean One of Nurgle





In My Lab

 RaptorInMotion wrote:
 JNAProductions wrote:
I’d rather morale was morale, than just damage.


Isn't morale just that now really? (you may have been getting at that tbh)

What, in your opinion, would be a suitable penalty?
Something like this.

Clocks for the clockmaker! Cogs for the cog throne! 
   
Made in us
Fixture of Dakka





My own morale pitch is similar to JNA's: https://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/list/780496.page

Basically, failing morale causes a unit to lose buffs whose sources are fluffed as being command-related in nature.

I also worry that your pitch, RaptorInMotion, potentially adds some new problems that would have to be solved. You have the issue of melee beatsticks like captains or chaos lords being naturally more prone to being killed than things like company commanders or farseers who want to hang out near the back. Plus, it's a bit odd that my drukhari beast units would have the same leadership as my actual space elves. Plus, a lot of armies don't seem like they do the "inspiration" thing; necron warriors are probably literally incapable of being inspired, and might not be all that impressed by the presence of their literal overlords anyway. And then there's the matter of some armies simply not having the same cheap access to inspiring units that others do. Marines have characters in their elite slots whereas craftworlders kind of don't. (Warlocks, I guess.) And even if we count the warlocks, I don't necessarily want to be penalized for not fielding the same handful of inspiring units over and over in every list to avoid being punished.

And as JNA points out, randomly taking damage as a punishment for taking damage isn't very interesting or fun.


ATTENTION
. Psychic tests are unfluffy. Your longing for AV is understandable but misguided. Your chapter doesn't need a separate codex. Doctrines should go away. Being a "troop" means nothing. This has been a cranky service announcement. You may now resume your regularly scheduled arguing.
 
   
Made in dk
Loyal Necron Lychguard






I think the idea in the OP would be hell to balance, especially for different game sizes. The only reason why I don't love the idea of suppression wholeheartedly is because I don't want my Necrons to be suppressed, I am okay with pulling off a few more casualties once in a while but I don't want to go to ground behind cover, run away or instantly lose the whole unit because there are faster and stronger enemies nearby.

What I've done to represent the morale benefits a Lizardmen Battle Standard Bearer has and the morale penalty for the enemy stealing it in my Lizardmen fandex is to regenerate CP and award CP to the enemy.

Space Marines have a secondary objective all about not taking casualties from morale, you could do similar things for other factions, is a Craftworlder brave or cowardly in the same way that an Ork is cowardly or brave? I think you could tell some interesting things about psychology by incorporating faction-specific examples of cowardice and bravery into the game design of the faction and once again, I wouldn't have to deal with my Necrons cowering in fear or fleeing in terror.
   
Made in us
Fixture of Dakka





 vict0988 wrote:
I think the idea in the OP would be hell to balance, especially for different game sizes. The only reason why I don't love the idea of suppression wholeheartedly is because I don't want my Necrons to be suppressed, I am okay with pulling off a few more casualties once in a while but I don't want to go to ground behind cover, run away or instantly lose the whole unit because there are faster and stronger enemies nearby.

I get that. I think the "no benefitting from command abilities" approach could do an alright job of fitting necrons. They don't get scared or what have you, but a sudden unexpected loss of functional bodies might cause their logic systems to spin for a moment as they reassess the situation and determine which protocols to follow. Or alternatively...

Part of me kind of likes the idea of bringing back Phase Out in some way shape or form. I know, I know. Probably a terrible idea. But I could see necrons having a special morale system where they're immune to suppression, BUT you have to make a Phase Out Test at the end of the morale phase. A Phase Out Test being something like a 2d6 roll taken against the highest Leadership in your army with modifiers like...
* +1 for each necron unit that failed a morale test this turn.
* +1 if your warlord is dead.
* +1 if your army has less than half its starting units remaining.
* -1 if the enemy warlord is dead.
* -1 if at least half your starting units are still alive.

...Etc. Once you fail a Phase Out test, you roll a d6 for each unit in your army at the end of each Morale phase for the rest of the game. On a roll of 1, that unit is immediately removed from the game (but doesn't count as being destroyed for VP purposes). So morale debuffs would still matter because they make it easier for individual necron units to fail morale thus making phase out more likely to happen, but necrons get to be fearless robots until the will of your leader is no longer sufficient to ignore the emergency phase out protocols.

Seems fluffy, though probably terribly imbalanced.

What I've done to represent the morale benefits a Lizardmen Battle Standard Bearer has and the morale penalty for the enemy stealing it in my Lizardmen fandex is to regenerate CP and award CP to the enemy.
I like that quite a bit. It definitely leans into making "command" points feel less about leadership and more about individual units performing impressive stunts (you lost your nerve so now I can spend CP to drop haywire grenades on you), but that's more an issue with how stratagems are presented than a gameplay problem.

Space Marines have a secondary objective all about not taking casualties from morale, you could do similar things for other factions, is a Craftworlder brave or cowardly in the same way that an Ork is cowardly or brave? I think you could tell some interesting things about psychology by incorporating faction-specific examples of cowardice and bravery into the game design of the faction and once again, I wouldn't have to deal with my Necrons cowering in fear or fleeing in terror.

See, I'm reluctant to frame it as cowardice/bravery for most factions. Marines are more or less incapable of being afraid (and thus are arguably incapable of being genuinely brave). Necrons generally shouldn't be affected by or even capable of fear. Ditto tyranids outside of a basic self-preservation instinct. A quiet walk through Commorragh is already more nightmarish than most battlefields. Skitarii are lobotomized. Etc. Fear only really makes sense as a guard, tau, sister, and maybe ork/eldar thing. Which isn't that short a list, but maybe it's still kind of on the short side for something that gets an entire phase worth of mechanical support.

That's why I prefer to think of it as disruption/suppression. Space mariness shall know no fear, but they can still be thrown off their game when a plasma cannon evaporates half their squad in an instant and leaves their flank undefended from charging hormagaunts.


ATTENTION
. Psychic tests are unfluffy. Your longing for AV is understandable but misguided. Your chapter doesn't need a separate codex. Doctrines should go away. Being a "troop" means nothing. This has been a cranky service announcement. You may now resume your regularly scheduled arguing.
 
   
Made in us
Confessor Of Sins





Tacoma, WA, USA

This is essentially a variation on the Bottle mechanic that is commonly used in skirmish type games including Necromunda. A some point in a battle, the entire army has taken enough casualties that self-preservation kicks in and the side retreats from the battlefield. The retreat may be in full (failed my Bottle test, game over) or on a model/unit basis (failed my Bottle test, now I need to test each unit to see if they flee the battlefield).

Either way, I don't think this fits the 40K scale game well. No one wants a game of this scale to suddenly turn on a dime over just one more casualty and a bad single botched roll.
   
Made in us
Fixture of Dakka





Fair. I guess you could set the value such that it's impossible to fail until you've lost enough of your army. It doesn't make much sense to phase out turn 1 because you lost a single unit and rolled box cars on a Phase Out Test. I guess you could grant bonuses based on the number of non-canoptek/flayed one units left alive (throwback to the old Phase Out rules) so that it's essentially impossible to fail until your numbers are low enough. Or maybe say that you don't start taking Phase Out tests until you're down to a certain number of units based on game size. Though both of those would punish vehicle-heavy lists a bit and reward MSU.

But for the sake of discussion, you could probably find a reasonable way to limit when/how easily Phase Out Tests are failed. And after that, losing 1/6th of your army per turn, though definitely a big deal, doesn't seem like it would necessarily be a death sentence either. Heck, it could even work to your advantage if your butchered squad managed to phase out to safety before your opponent could score points off of its destruction.

(But again, I acknowledge this is probably a bad idea. Fun to think about though. )


ATTENTION
. Psychic tests are unfluffy. Your longing for AV is understandable but misguided. Your chapter doesn't need a separate codex. Doctrines should go away. Being a "troop" means nothing. This has been a cranky service announcement. You may now resume your regularly scheduled arguing.
 
   
Made in au
Longtime Dakkanaut




There’s 2 ways I’d like to see morale go:
- As a forced fallback, you lose ground if you retreat.
- As a debuff, a unit that failed loses all access to rerolls and hit modifiers.
   
Made in us
Longtime Dakkanaut







The difficulty with morale rules for 40k involve issues like:
* The way to mitigate unit-based morale effects, especially if they're triggered by dice rolls, is MSU. Or just taking the inevitable units that will ignore part or all of the morale rules. *cough* This is 40k, after all. *cough*
* Pretty much any negative effects of the morale rules are just going to amplify 40k's lethality problem. That alpha strike which would just severely damage a bunch of units now gets a chance to neutralize or eliminate them using the morale system.

I mean, my memories of 3rd edition are that the result of the morale rules really just made units die faster.

To be novel or interesting, you need to come up with an interesting rallying mechanism, and don't try to have the fate of a unit reduced to 'roll 2D6, on a bad roll remove the unit'.
   
Made in us
Confessor Of Sins





Tacoma, WA, USA

I would think that having Morale be more central to gameplay rather than an add-on damage mechanic, you need to:

Reduce Lethality
Increase Ways for Morale “damage” to be inflicted
Make Recovering Morale “damage” a choice rather than a roll
Use high enough Morale “damage” to remove units/models
   
Made in us
Fixture of Dakka





 alextroy wrote:
I would think that having Morale be more central to gameplay rather than an add-on damage mechanic, you need to:

Reduce Lethality
Increase Ways for Morale “damage” to be inflicted
Make Recovering Morale “damage” a choice rather than a roll
Use high enough Morale “damage” to remove units/models


Trying not to veer too off-topic, but I'm going to touch on some other changes I'd like to see.

I like the idea of reworking the game to incorporate more uses for things like actions (spotting for other units, raising banners, etc.), reactions (go to ground, jink, etc at the cost of being unable to perform actions on your following turn), and crossfire mechanics. So using something like the suppression systems JNA and I pitched, you could have suppressed units be unable to perform actions, benefit from crossfire, and maybe even prevent them from taking reactions. This would mean that units that fail morale would still be participating in the game (still moving, attacking, etc.), but they'd be worse at coordinating/synergizing with other units. Your suppressed guardsmen wouldn't be able to provide spotter benefits to your basilisks. Your suppressed tactical squad would be able to shoot at those enemies in cover, but they wouldn't be able to provide crossfire benefits to the interceptors targeting the same squad. Etc.

Combine this with ditching stratagems in favor of AoS-esque command abilities, and I think you'd have an interesting bit of play and counterplay. You suppressed my tactical marines? Guess I'll have to use my lieutenant's command ability to rally them instead of buffing them this turn. This also means that armies like Night Lords that specialize in debuffing morale are likely to be facing an opponent with a lot of its synergy turned off.


ATTENTION
. Psychic tests are unfluffy. Your longing for AV is understandable but misguided. Your chapter doesn't need a separate codex. Doctrines should go away. Being a "troop" means nothing. This has been a cranky service announcement. You may now resume your regularly scheduled arguing.
 
   
Made in us
Regular Dakkanaut




The problem with moral (in general) is that the Space Marine Faction historically has been close to immune to it's effects ever since the ATSKNF was implemented. Same can be said with Nids and their synaps and Necrons with their absurdly high leadership. (though less so with Necrons as they still had to take the tests)

So the question... Is the player base willing to give up historical lore to implement a moral system that they would get penalized by?

And if not... what would the cost be to a unit?

This is something that is important to me because we look at thread after thread of unit comparisons, that deal with hard numbers that are easy to quantify. But if we toss in a true moral system that works... will we, as a community, be able to look at a unit and say, "that unit can kill three times its points in a turn, but if you make a scary face at it, it runs away... that's fair"?

Ultimately though, if you are going to have a moral system in place, the unit rules have to be changed so that you can't ignore it; either through rules or through squad size. Moral CANNOT be based on losses otherwise there is no point in creating a good system... because 3/4 of the player base will just build around it.
   
Made in gb
Longtime Dakkanaut



London

My favourite morale solution currently is to have a staged system. Something like this.

Spoiler:
Fail a test and you can't shoot, charge or use psychic powers.
Fail a second and you can't move and any units in engagement range of the enemy auto die.
Fail a third test and unit removed.

Leadership a target number to roll under, so always pass on 1, fail on 6.
Mods
Taken casualties this turn -1
At or below Half Strength -1
Reached half strength this turn -1

Must test in end phase if taken casualties.
May test in end phase if wish to rally (but failure makes unit more broken as detailed above)

The main modifiers for that would be things like fearless, ATSKNF and synapse.

Fearless - Ignore casualty modifier
And They Shall Know No Fear - Re-roll
Synapse (x) - a Synapse unit can make itself or another unit on the table fearless for this test, up to X times this turn

For example, a marine unit with LD 8 on the sarge, would fail most tests on a 6, with a re-roll.

This message was edited 1 time. Last update was at 2022/05/27 15:47:34


 
   
Made in us
Pious Palatine




 JNAProductions wrote:
 RaptorInMotion wrote:
 JNAProductions wrote:
I’d rather morale was morale, than just damage.


Isn't morale just that now really? (you may have been getting at that tbh)

What, in your opinion, would be a suitable penalty?
Something like this.


That system is massively, disproportionately anti-melee. Suppression just reads "Suppressed units fail all charges" in a lot of cases.


 
   
Made in it
Waaagh! Ork Warboss




Italy

ERJAK wrote:


That system is massively, disproportionately anti-melee. Suppression just reads "Suppressed units fail all charges" in a lot of cases.


Agree. Suppressed units should not be able to fire at all then, to be fair. Or to be forced to fire, with negative modifiers, only vs the closest target.

 
   
 
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