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Hey everyone, looking for some input on some house rules I've tested at home. Of course it messes up my competitive readiness even more, but I just love me some cinematic effects in battle!

Better formatting on the link
http://wargamingrebel.blogspot.com/2022/07/house-rules-improving-warhammer-battles.html

1 - House rules to help players have fun with their armies

This section mainly outlines some rules to help "balance" the game a bit so that each player can exploit the full range of their armies and minimize entirely negative feedback moments where the player is punished without real agency. See the designer commentary at the end of the article for some additional notes.

Vengeful Surge
All armies have access to the Vengeful Surge Stratagem
Vengeful Surge (* CP) - When a model or unit is completely destroyed, before removing it from the battlefield, you can either cast its psychic powers as if it was your psychic phase, shoot with it as if it was your shooting phase or fight with it as if it was your fight phase. The target unit gets a -2 penalty to cast and is considered to have a BS and WS +1 higher than on their datasheet (to a maximum of 6+), models with variable attributes are considered to be at maximum wounds for this sequence. After finishing that sequence, remove the model as you normally would. This Stratagem costs variable CP: 0CP on the first battle round, 1CP on the second battle round, 2CP on the third battle round and it cannot be used on the 4th and 5th battle rounds.

Better Charges
Surge Movement: When failing a charge, the player controlling the unit must move the charging unit for the amount rolled for the charge so that all models of the charging unit are closer to their charging targets. The first model moved in this manner must be placed as close as possible to it's original charge target.
Coordinated Charge: When selecting a unit to charge, a player may declare up to 2 characters within 3'' of a unit to make a coordinated charge. Those characters are considered to charge the same targets and have the same charge result as the declared unit. The models in the unit can be moved alongside the characters at the same time, as if they belonged to the same unit, until the charge movement is completed for the unit and the selected characters, but any effects triggered as a response to that charge (such as overwatch) are resolved against the original unit, not the characters involved.


2 - House rules to make cinematic, narrative battles at the expense of a bit of complexity

This section aims to revive and put in writing some of the rules we have always carried over from older editions of the game. They add complexity that has no place in a 2.5 hour long tournament game, but can be extremely engaging on a more socially-driven narrative match. See the designer commentary at the end of the article for some additional notes.

Explosions, craters, wrecks and carcasses
Explosive overkill: Any unit that has a rule to explode gains a +1 to that roll for the damage dealt on its last wound, meaning a tank that is destroyed by a damage 3 weapon gets a +3 to explode.
If a model explodes in this fashion, place a small crater (Area Terrain with Light Cover, Difficult Ground) in its place after removing the model from the table.
Wrecks and Carcasses: Any Vehicle or Monster that has 10 wounds or more and does not explode is left on the table as a Wreck/Carcass.
Wrecks/Carcasses are considered Obstacles with the following traits: Breachable, Difficult Ground, Dense Cover, Unstable Position, Obscuring, Light Cover.
Wrecks/Carcasses have the Inspiring keyword, but are considered to have the faction keywords of the opponent's army, meaning your wrecks/carcasses boos your enemies morale!
You can mark Wrecks/Carcasses by removing any magnetized/removable parts and weapons, putting skimmers and flyers on the ground instead of on their flying bases, using smoke markers on vehicle wrecks and covering monster carcasses with red lichen for added visual effects!
Facing for vehicles and monsters
Vehicles and Monsters of 10 wounds or more are affected by facing.
Firing Arcs: Units affected by facing must declare all of their attacks in a single 180 degrees arc in front of the unit.
Side-mounted weapons: Some crewed vehicles have independent side-mounted weapons, players must agree on these weapons before the game and they can be shot at a 180 degree to the side they are facing instead of the frontal arc.
Vulnerable rear arc: Any ranged attacks made against the rear arc of a unit affected by facing receives either a +4 to its strength value or +2 AP value, chosen by the player who controls the unit firing the weapon.
All-rounded plating: Some vehicles that have a 2+ save (Land Raiders and Necron Monoliths, as examples) are historically durable and players must agree that these units suffer half the vulnerable rear arc effects (+2 str or +1 AP for the firing unit).

Unpredictable Deepstriking
Any rules that allow units to be set-up anywhere on the battlefield after deployment are subject to the following rules:
Uncertain landing: After setting up the deepstriking unit, Roll a D6 and consult the effects below:
1 - Perilous approach vector: Roll 1D3 + an extra D3 per every 10 models on the unit, dealing that many mortal wounds to the unit that was just set-up, then roll again.
2, 3 - Inaccurate Landing: The opposing player moves the deepstriking unit 3'' as much as possible so that every set-up model is as far away from enemy models as possible.
4 - Precise landing: Nothing happens.
5, 6 - Perfect arrival: The player who controls the unit choses to either move all models of the unit 3'' in any direction, not entering engagement range of the enemy or to gain +1 to hit with ranged attacks for the deepstriking unit until the end of the current turn.


3 - Reactions for 40k games - introducing more counter-play

We are still experimenting with these reactions since the new 30k set was announced, but they add so much dynamism and counterplay, engaging players in equal amounts at all turns, that it feels like a missed opportunity not to at least give them a try in 40k.
Each player can perform 1 reaction per phase on their opponent's turn.

Movement Phase reactions
You can react by declaring a reaction and selecting a target unit within 12'' of the unit the opponent has just finished moving.
Advance: Move up to 3'' towards the enemy unit that was just moved. Every model moved must end their movement closer to the enemy unit activated. Cannot be issued to models within engagement range of enemy models.
Withdraw: Move up to 3'' away from the enemy unit that was just moved. Every model moved must end their movement farther away from the enemy unit activated. Cannot be issued to models within engagement range of enemy models.
Shooting Phase reactions
You can react by declaring a reaction after an opponent has declared all of the targets of their ranged attacks for a single unit.
Return Fire: Before the enemy can resolve their attacks, choose one model on your army to shoot at the model you are reacting to. If the enemy models are destroyed by this, they do not finish their declared attacks.
Evade: All hits of natural 6 from the firing unit are considered misses.
Charge Phase reactions
You can react by declaring a reaction after an opponent has declared the targets of a charging unit.
Snap shots: All targets of the charge may shoot at full ballistic skill against the charging unit. They can only use pistols, assault or rapid-fire weapons and a single member of any unit can use a grenade. They cannot then be selected to use the Overwatch stratagem for this phase.
Hold the line: The charging unit won't count as charging for determining the order of fight and will fight as if it was an ongoing combat.
Designer's Commentary
Vengeful Surge: This is really meant to help bring more balance to the IGOUGO base system of 40k. While the new mission packs do bring a lot of balance to the game, they do not prevent you bringing your newly painted giant unit to play and it being obliterated turn 1 before you can even use their weapons. This is why the Vengeful Surge stratagem lets you use stuff as it gets destroyed. It also has the benefit of creating more carnage early on, clearing the battlefield and speeding up the game, as you always get a chance to swing back with powerful character units and fragile glasscannons. While some may argue that it lowers the consequence of bad placement, it is a part of the meta that can be exploited and opens up new ways to target prioritize and list build.
Better Charges: this is a way to help melee armies on a shooting game. This allows them to cover the field faster and get some benefit out of failed charges, simply as put. The coordinated charge rule is to prevent some instances when character/unit synergy is essential (i.e. charging Lychguards and a Cryptek) and failing one while the first succeeded end sup as a detriment for the player.
Explosions, craters, wrecks and carcasses: Yes, it's a lot of work, but playing on a shifting landscape is really fun.
Facing for vehicles and monsters: Facing was the one thing I wish they'd have simplified but not removed from the game. It adds so much tactical depth, especially when paired up with deepstriking and fast-moving units like land speeders and drop-pod scouts getting those rear-facing melta shots. I want that back.
Unpredictable Deepstriking: The scatter dices were too much punishing sometimes, especially if dropping in the middle of a crowded warzone, but the current deepstriking rules are just too regimented and predictable. I love the push your luck feeling when a drop pod gets you right into charge range as much as figuring out what to do if you end up way off-target. I tried to keep it as simple and streamlined as the current 40k rules system dictates, using simple D6s and placement rules to do the job.
30k Reactions for 40k: The reaction system is one of the best innovations of 30k and I just want to give genestelaer cults, drukhari and all the fantastic depth of 40k some of that added counter-play feeling.

Just post them here instead of linking. I'm not clicking a link.

I like the idea that excess damage acts as a modifier for vehicles exploding.

Jarms48 wrote:
I like the idea that excess damage acts as a modifier for vehicles exploding.

Thanks! Yeah I just felt like it made sense, and explosions is one of those things that is extremely swingy and significant, but relegated to a 6+ so you mostly just ignore it all the time.

Lots of fun ideas in here. Please know that although I'm about to nitpick a bunch of stuff, I still like a lot of what you've pitched.

 arhurt wrote:

Vengeful Surge
All armies have access to the Vengeful Surge Stratagem
Vengeful Surge (* CP) - When a model or unit is completely destroyed, before removing it from the battlefield, you can either cast its psychic powers as if it was your psychic phase, shoot with it as if it was your shooting phase or fight with it as if it was your fight phase. The target unit gets a -2 penalty to cast and is considered to have a BS and WS +1 higher than on their datasheet (to a maximum of 6+), models with variable attributes are considered to be at maximum wounds for this sequence. After finishing that sequence, remove the model as you normally would. This Stratagem costs variable CP: 0CP on the first battle round, 1CP on the second battle round, 2CP on the third battle round and it cannot be used on the 4th and 5th battle rounds.

Can you clarify whether this makes the attacking model better/worse? The +1BS/WS to a max of 6+ seems to imply that the dying model takes penalties to the attack, but the part about vehicles/monsters counting as having max wounds implies the opposite. I like that this might take some of the edge off of alpha strikes. The wording is slightly odd to me because it references units in the first sentence. To clarify, only one model is ever getting to attack via this strat, right?

Slightly worried that this might be too nasty on something like a knight, but I think I like it on the whole.

Better Charges
Surge Movement: When failing a charge, the player controlling the unit must move the charging unit for the amount rolled for the charge so that all models of the charging unit are closer to their charging targets. The first model moved in this manner must be placed as close as possible to it's original charge target.
Coordinated Charge: When selecting a unit to charge, a player may declare up to 2 characters within 3'' of a unit to make a coordinated charge. Those characters are considered to charge the same targets and have the same charge result as the declared unit. The models in the unit can be moved alongside the characters at the same time, as if they belonged to the same unit, until the charge movement is completed for the unit and the selected characters, but any effects triggered as a response to that charge (such as overwatch) are resolved against the original unit, not the characters involved.

I like that this addresses characters getting left behind because they flub a charge that their friends just made. As worded, it feels like there's probably an exploit out there somewhere? Like using a deepstriking unit to launch footslogging characters forward. You can imagine using this on some storm boyz or ork bikez to give Ghazkull bonus movement, for instance. Or using a "roll 3d6 when you charge) stratagem to basically get three beatstick units into melee instead of one. Also note that a character moving the same distance as a charging unit won't necessarily end up within engagement range. Not sure if that's intentional. It's still nice to keep your cryptek next to the squad he's buffing.

Explosions, craters, wrecks and carcasses
Explosive overkill: Any unit that has a rule to explode gains a +1 to that roll for the damage dealt on its last wound, meaning a tank that is destroyed by a damage 3 weapon gets a +3 to explode.

I like this conceptually. However, consider that the damage on a bright/dark lance is d3+3. Meaning that 1/3rd of the time, you'll be adding +4 to the Explodes roll, and 2/3rds of the time, you'll be adding +5 or +6. A +4 means that every time a lance kills a vehicle, it will explode on a 2+. On a +5 or +6, the vehicle just auto-explodes. I worry that this will make vehicles too much of a liability in certain matchups. Hellhounds are/were considered kind of a liability because deploying them in your own deployment zone gave them a good chance of dying turn 1 and doing mortal wounds to a big chunk of your army. This rule basically gives any vehicle facing aeldari the same problem. Instead of a bonus to the roll equal to the damage of the last attack (which would also make you have to slow roll damage dice, btw), maybe just give the Explodes roll a flat +2 modifier if the finishing blow came from a weapon with a sufficiently high S or D stat? Gets rid of the hellhound problem, gets rid of the need for slow rolling, and is probably just easier to remember and balance in general.

If a model explodes in this fashion, place a small crater (Area Terrain with Light Cover, Difficult Ground) in its place after removing the model from the table.
Wrecks and Carcasses: Any Vehicle or Monster that has 10 wounds or more and does not explode is left on the table as a Wreck/Carcass.
Wrecks/Carcasses are considered Obstacles with the following traits: Breachable, Difficult Ground, Dense Cover, Unstable Position, Obscuring, Light Cover.
Wrecks/Carcasses have the Inspiring keyword, but are considered to have the faction keywords of the opponent's army, meaning your wrecks/carcasses boos your enemies morale!
You can mark Wrecks/Carcasses by removing any magnetized/removable parts and weapons, putting skimmers and flyers on the ground instead of on their flying bases, using smoke markers on vehicle wrecks and covering monster carcasses with red lichen for added visual effects!

I like this. Obviously you'll want to make sure your opponent is okay with having you stand your models on his if you're using actual game models for wrecks.

Facing for vehicles and monsters
Vehicles and Monsters of 10 wounds or more are affected by facing.
Firing Arcs: Units affected by facing must declare all of their attacks in a single 180 degrees arc in front of the unit.
Side-mounted weapons: Some crewed vehicles have independent side-mounted weapons, players must agree on these weapons before the game and they can be shot at a 180 degree to the side they are facing instead of the frontal arc.
Vulnerable rear arc: Any ranged attacks made against the rear arc of a unit affected by facing receives either a +4 to its strength value or +2 AP value, chosen by the player who controls the unit firing the weapon.
All-rounded plating: Some vehicles that have a 2+ save (Land Raiders and Necron Monoliths, as examples) are historically durable and players must agree that these units suffer half the vulnerable rear arc effects (+2 str or +1 AP for the firing unit).

I have issues with vehicle facings, but you're obviously very excited about them, so I'll set my biases aside. How much fun do you get out of the side-mounted weapon rules? If you were to drop those rules, you could have everything in front of the butt of the vehicle count as the "front arc" and everything behind the vehicle be the "rear arc". This would mean you don't have to figure out where the center of the top of your vehicle is and might save you some minor disagreements. But if you're using these rules with like-minded friends, this might be a non-issue.

Unpredictable Deepstriking
Any rules that allow units to be set-up anywhere on the battlefield after deployment are subject to the following rules:
Uncertain landing: After setting up the deepstriking unit, Roll a D6 and consult the effects below:
1 - Perilous approach vector: Roll 1D3 + an extra D3 per every 10 models on the unit, dealing that many mortal wounds to the unit that was just set-up, then roll again.
2, 3 - Inaccurate Landing: The opposing player moves the deepstriking unit 3'' as much as possible so that every set-up model is as far away from enemy models as possible.
4 - Precise landing: Nothing happens.
5, 6 - Perfect arrival: The player who controls the unit choses to either move all models of the unit 3'' in any direction, not entering engagement range of the enemy or to gain +1 to hit with ranged attacks for the deepstriking unit until the end of the current turn.

I like the general thrust of this rule. The 2 result is a bit weirdly worded. If you must end up farther away from enemy models, then why does your opponent have to be the one to move them? And why not give your opponent the option to move them closer instead? Maybe your opponent wants to make it harder for your crisis suits to reposition after shooting or something. Also, this feels like it could end up really time consuming without the old "flower petal" deepstriking formation rules. Maybe just increase the distance away from the enemy the unit has to be by 3" so that you don't have to deploy the entire unit and then muck around with extra measurement and movement? Or have the deepstriker pick a point, then their opponent gets to move that point 2d6", and all models in the unit must be deployed as close to that point as possible.

I'm not a fan of the 5 and 6 results because the game is already plenty lethal, and some units already have access to "kill better when you deepstrike" strats. I'd make 4, 5, and 6 all use the same rules as the current 4 result. Or possibly make it 1-2 = perilous, 3-4 = inaccurate, 5-6 = precise.

Withdraw: Move up to 3'' away from the enemy unit that was just moved. Every model moved must end their movement farther away from the enemy unit activated. Cannot be issued to models within engagement range of enemy models.

Feels like this one could hard counter a lot of deepstriking tactics. Ex: I deepstrike a melee unit or a shooting unit with 12" guns. You withdraw the unit so that the charge is almost impossible or only a single gun is still within range. Then again, I guess this happens before deepstrikers show up? Might want to clarify if that's the case. If you can't react to deepstrikers showing up, then that fixes this issue.

Return Fire: Before the enemy can resolve their attacks, choose one model on your army to shoot at the model you are reacting to. If the enemy models are destroyed by this, they do not finish their declared attacks.

Hmm. I don't know. If you use this on something like a riptide or an imperial knight, then this might be too good. I could see melee armies just straight up not shooting their shooting units to avoid giving enemy gunline units an extra shooting phase. Which feels gamey and uncinematic. Maybe this would be fine if you restricted it to a single infantry model? Although an extra round of shooting from a kellermorph or Maugan Ra or whomever might still be nasty.

Evade: All hits of natural 6 from the firing unit are considered misses.

Feels a little weird. This could potentially make units like ork boyz (assuming the target has a baked in -1 to hit) literally incapable of hitting their target at all. Why not just make this a -1 to hit?

Snap shots: All targets of the charge may shoot at full ballistic skill against the charging unit. They can only use pistols, assault or rapid-fire weapons and a single member of any unit can use a grenade. They cannot then be selected to use the Overwatch stratagem for this phase.

Feels weird for both this and the overwatch strat to exist. Seems like one makes the other redundant. Also seems weird that you can't shoot with heavy weapons given that some heavy weapons (anything resembling a machine gun, heavy flamers, etc.) seem like they should be great in this scenario. Keep in mind that what is and isn't "heavy" can be pretty arbitrary when it comes to vehicle mounted weapons. But also, full BS overwatch is probably just a bad idea. Ask people how much they enjoyed charging tau gunlines when FtGG was a thing. This is especially annoying for short ranged or melee armies who might cross the table under fire just to get wiped out by a free round of shooting from the riptide (or whatever) that they're finally trying to charge.

I suggest changing this reaction to just allowing the unit to overwatch and then maybe ditching the OW strat or changing it to let the shooter hit on 5+ or something.

Hold the line: The charging unit won't count as charging for determining the order of fight and will fight as if it was an ongoing combat.

I have mixed feelings on this. As a mostly-aeldari player, it still stings a little bit that my harlequins can get charged and die without being allowed to swing back against their much slower enemies. Let my opponent basically guarantee he'll swing before one of my clown squads every fight phase would make that sting even more. Maybe only allow this reaction for units that set to defend in defensible terrain? That way, it becomes a benefit of the terrain feature, and you're not necessarily hard countering glass hammer melee units.

Wyldhunt wrote:
Lots of fun ideas in here. Please know that although I'm about to nitpick a bunch of stuff, I still like a lot of what you've pitched.

Thanks! Don't worry about honest feedback, there's no better way to hammer out all details.
Overall I agree with all that you said and will incorporate feedback as detailed below. Thanks for taking the time to write.

Wyldhunt wrote:

 arhurt wrote:

Vengeful Surge

Can you clarify whether this makes the attacking model better/worse? [...]
Slightly worried that this might be too nasty on something like a knight, but I think I like it on the whole.

I agree the wording could be improved, as a lot of this was me just "putting in paper" stuff we've been doing from vocal agreements for a while.

To clarify, the intent is to "let players use at least one cool model/unit even if the opponent alpha strikes them". We loved playing Apocalypse because of their wound allocation system that removed models from the table only after every single model has had a chance to at least do something.

In out games we wanted it to not just be a "freebie with no consequence" so we decided that all to hit rolls would be at a penalty. However, specifically when playing Knights/Baneblades etc we found that using the low wound profile meant that it usually was a lot of rolling dice for nothing, so we just decided to use the top bracket instead for models that have degrading profiles. I'll also address the wording to address units as we use it that way. It has certainly changed the value prop of some units, especially killy melee with somewhat decent good ranged defense like death company, because they basically get a fight-on-death start, but we found that the benefits outweigh the problems for our group.
It means I can put my Monolith or a Baneblade down knowing that it'll at least get one good round of shooting while at the same time making charging a melee dedicated glasscannon like Bloodletters very dicey if they are full strength. Funny enough it means failing a deepstrike charge not as bad as you can, sometimes, still be a threat even on your opponent's turn.

We usually do WS/BS modifiers since stacking penalties was removed, but that's just us being grog nards. I'll change it to a -1 to hit as that's simpler and clearer. We'll still do our way at home though haha

Wyldhunt wrote:

 arhurt wrote:
Better Charges
Surge Movement: When failing a charge, the player controlling the unit must move the charging unit for the amount rolled [...]
Coordinated Charge: When selecting a unit to charge, a player may declare up to 2 characters within 3'' of a unit to make a coordinated charge.[...]

I like that this addresses characters getting left behind because they flub a charge that their friends just made. As worded, it feels like there's probably an exploit out there somewhere?

You got it, what I like about this is that it ends up with less rolling of dice and less time fumbling with models to guarantee characters get in, it speeds the game up slightly. I do agree that it essentially buffs characters because, yeah, you can use 3d6 charge/rerolls/+2 to charge etc to "carry slow characters forward", but is that such a bad thing? We've found that the situations in where a cryptek stays behind and gets counter-charged by a flyer/biker unit is worse, and it just generally creates moments where players stop to consider their options/careful movement that slows the game down unnecessarily IMHO and I think the tactical considerations of having to deal with potential longer charges from Characters way more engaging/interesting than failing a charge that was supposed to be synchronous. You can argue that with Surge movement that is not a concern (since you can always declare a charge with the sole intent of just moving up) but this just expedites things.
Once more, this is more me trying to wrap something we've agreed upon and played on in words, but we generally just agreed amongst us that "up to 2 characters can charge alongside the unit, like if they were independent characters attached to the unit, like in in 7th" and once we started playing like that the game just opened up for us. Yes, the character does not need to end up in engagement range, that's ok.

Wyldhunt wrote:

 arhurt wrote:

Explosions, craters, wrecks and carcasses
Explosive overkill: Any unit that has a rule to explode gains a +1 to that roll for the damage dealt on its last wound[...]

I like this conceptually. However, consider that the damage on a bright/dark lance is d3+3.[...]

I'm glad you like the concept, and you are absolutely right. I don't play against a lot of fixed min damage weapons such as dark lances, we have been recently seeing this with my Lokhust Heavy Destroyers though and you make a perfect case for it.

I've changed it to the following, following your comments:
Explosive overkill: Any unit that has a rule to explode gains a +1 to that roll if it was wounded by a weapon with a Strength higher than its Toughness characteristic on this phase. Add an additional +2 to that roll if the damage dealt on its last wound was greater than its remaining wounds.

Wyldhunt wrote:

 arhurt wrote:
If a model explodes in this fashion, place a small crater (Area Terrain with Light Cover, Difficult Ground) in its place after removing the model from the table.

I like this. Obviously you'll want to make sure your opponent is okay with having you stand your models on his if you're using actual game models for wrecks.

Yeah! This adds so much dynamism to games with vehicles. Again, no place for it in a competitive setting, but its just fun to do. With the new terrain features we've added the Unstable Position trait to wrecks, so you actually can't place models on top of them. Again, this is jus me putting some agreed upon rules on paper, but we usually don't place models on top of vehicles (heck how to even do that on a my Doomsday ark counts-as). When it's a Baneblade we do, however, but it's one of those instances where this is really meant as a house rule and you can just talk to your opponent, but I'll add that titanic models don't get that trait and, since they are not scalable, hopefully noone attempts to perch on a knight's shoulder (likely it's just the hips left anyway as the top was removed hahaha)

Wyldhunt wrote:

 arhurt wrote:
Facing for vehicles and monsters
Vehicles and Monsters of 10 wounds or more are affected by facing.[...]

I have issues with vehicle facings, but you're obviously very excited about them, so I'll set my biases aside.

Yeah we like them for the tactical movement, but keep in mind it's specifically vehicle weapon facing, and not LOS from weapon barrel. What I mean by this is that it was really unfair in 7th that a T'au Riptide could fire from a tiny window on a ruin that gives LOS to its left thigh but a Land Raider couldn't because the lascannons were below that window simple because one was a vehicle and the other a monster. We just basically shook hands that "vehicle facing is forward, except for sponson weapons on tanks" and that was it. I've added a bit about Turret/Pivoting in there now but yeah, this is something that there's no place on tournament matched play but we like the feeling of tanks/vehicles being these ponderous behemoths that can be outmaneuvered around. The fun we bring from that is more of the tactile feel of the pieces themselves influencing how they are used in battle, bringing the game closer (if only by a sliver) to a simulation. When playing with Land Raiders, Baneblades etc it makes them feel more like the model itself has that "weight". It makes it so that when firing a decked-out Repulsor not all weapons simply go on the main target and we get less of that "the repulsor is constantly spinning in a whirlwind of death" feeling as it does now.


Firing Arcs: Units affected by facing must declare all of their attacks in a single 180 degrees arc in front of the unit.
Side-mounted weapons: Some crewed vehicles have independent side-mounted weapons, players must agree on these weapons before the game and they can be shot at a 180 degree to the side they are facing instead of the frontal arc.
Turret/pivot-mounted weapons: Some vehicles and monsters have weapons on turrets that can rotate as well as weapons on arms/shoulders, players must agree on these weapons before the game. For the purposes of these weapons, the vehicle/monster can declare a 180 degree firing arc in any direction, and shoot all their turret/pivot weapons towards that arc.

Wyldhunt wrote:

 arhurt wrote:
Unpredictable Deepstriking
Any rules that allow units to be set-up anywhere on the battlefield after deployment are subject to the following rules:
Uncertain landing: After setting up the deepstriking unit, Roll a D6 and consult the effects below[...]

I like the general thrust of this rule.[...]

Yeah, you have a point, we just carried it over from 7th where your opponent chose where you'd drop if you rolled on the perils of the warp table. Let's simplify everything for this article and we'll give that a shot. The "buffs" on 5/6 were a recent addition anyways.

Uncertain landing: After setting up the deepstriking unit, Roll a D6 and consult the effects below:
1 - Perilous approach vector: Roll 1D3 + an extra D3 per every 10 models on the unit, dealing that many mortal wounds to the unit that was just set-up, then roll again.
2, 3 - Inaccurate Landing: The increase the minimum distance you have to set-up your models from enemy models by 3''.
4, 5, 6 - Precise landing: Place your models as intended!




As we get into Reactions, one important thing to keep in mind is that the player can only use a single reaction per phase, meaning if you evade, you don't return-fire and vice-versa.

Wyldhunt wrote:

 arhurt wrote:

Withdraw: Move up to 3'' away from the enemy unit that was just moved. [...]

Feels like this one could hard counter a lot of deepstriking tactics. [...]

You are right, but the way we've done it is only really against actual normal movement, not deepstriking/summoning/reserves. I'll address that in wording.

Wyldhunt wrote:

 arhurt wrote:

Return Fire: Before the enemy can resolve their attacks, choose one model on your army to shoot at the model you are reacting to. If the enemy models are destroyed by this, they do not finish their declared attacks.

Hmm. I don't know. If you use this on something like a riptide or an imperial knight, then this might be too good. [...]

Yeah, this one definitely changes the game and while we found it fun at the first dew games none of us have real melee threats that also shoot pistols/grenades. So I think you are absolutely right. In our few games we used it, we found that it was used to "shoot my big thing before your big thing shoots" and it has worked, but if I have an Ork list I may as well not shoot my Boys pistols, you are right.
How about we restrict return fire to heavy weapons? I think this would mitigate most of the issues, most of the time while keeping it in... most of scary weapons that can wipe enemy units are heavy (there are some knight assault weapons that are scary) but I feel the feeling we were going for is "give me a chance to shoot my big thing if you have a chance to kill my big thing" and while I think this may be redundant with Vengeful Surge listed above, we'll do more testing to see how it feels, but I'm ok with it feeling impactful as its once per phase (heck we could restrict every reaction to once per game too).

Shooting Phase reactions
You can react by declaring a reaction after an opponent has declared all of the targets of their ranged attacks for a single unit and at least one of the weapons shot is a heavy weapon.

Wyldhunt wrote:

 arhurt wrote:
Evade: All hits of natural 6 from the firing unit are considered misses.

Feels a little weird. [...] Why not just make this a -1 to hit?

Done, we just liked to get away from not stacking the -1 but I don't play against orks/nids/GSC or armies with poor shooting. A -1 will effectively do the same, thanks!
It just means this reaction is not that important on some situations where a -1 is already in effect, but it's still neat.

Wyldhunt wrote:

 arhurt wrote:

Snap shots: All targets of the charge may shoot at full ballistic skill against the charging unit. [...]

Feels weird for both this and the overwatch strat to exist. Seems like one makes the other redundant. [...]

Yeah I agree with all of your points and we have basically just house-ruled that "this is overwatch now" but I wanted to keep the rules separate/modular on paper, will be worth putting as note on this.
I'll change it to just be a "free overwatch" for now for simplicity sake, we want to take it for more spins before making any calls. We can't just "replace overwatch" as there are unit interactions/abilities with overwatch per se.

Snap shots: All targets of the charge may make an Overwatch attack for free, as if they had been targeted by the Overwatch stratagem, but cannot use blast weapons. You can still use the stratagem normally on another charge target, but the unit that used Snap shots cannot Overwatch at the same time or later that turn, as well as a unit who was the target of the stratagem cannot declare this reaction.

Wyldhunt wrote:

 arhurt wrote:
Hold the line: The charging unit won't count as charging for determining the order of fight and will fight as if it was an ongoing combat.

I have mixed feelings on this. [...]

Yeah I get you, but bear in mind the opposite is also true, and if they catch your harlequins on their turn it's you who declare hold the line to their faces... But Harlequins are not often gotten out of position hahaha.
We have found in our games that this changes the order of charge declaration (just like interruption affects fight declaration) but I am leaning on playing a few games without Charge phase reactions... we'll see.
What I don't like about tying it to set to defend is that it feels like it's then too situational, my intention with reactions right now is to have them as integral parts of the game, not some buffs/gotchas that happen once in a while, but are largely not impactful. Having said that I discussed this with my buddy an and he proposed we test the following:

Hold the line: On the following fight phase, when a model in the unit that was the target of the charge is removed as a casualty roll a D6: on a 4+, before removing that model from the battlefield, you can make it's melee attacks against the unit who destroyed it, remove the model as usual after resolving these attacks.


Thanks again for the comments and I've updated the blog article with all above discussed rules if you want a consolidated place for them: http://wargamingrebel.blogspot.com/2022/07/house-rules-improving-warhammer-battles.html