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Why does everyone assume grav weapons need a Strength value? It could just be "target's armour save = what you need to roll to wound".

I agree. it could feasibly be strength x, wound vs armour save. Only invulnerable saves allowed, as heavy armour is no defence vs this weapon.

oh great, more stuff to slaughter heavy armour.

can they just start modeling marines in tshirts and shorts PA is so worthless.

It'll probably be something like S3, roll against armour save instead of toughness rapid fire. Heavy versions have multiple shots and S4+, which causes Instant Death against people in Terminator armour.

 lord_blackfang wrote:
Why does everyone assume grav weapons need a Strength value? It could just be "target's armour save = what you need to roll to wound".

What if the grav gun gets used against AS-less targets?

 sing your life wrote:

 lord_blackfang wrote:
Why does everyone assume grav weapons need a Strength value? It could just be "target's armour save = what you need to roll to wound".

What if the grav gun gets used against AS-less targets?

Then the commander screwed up...

 sing your life wrote:
What if the grav gun gets used against AS-less targets?

"Targets without an armour save are always wounded on a 6+"

 Daba wrote:
It'll probably be something like S3, roll against armour save instead of toughness rapid fire. Heavy versions have multiple shots and S4+, which causes Instant Death against people in Terminator armour.

That is quite bad:
-Plasma would be more effective most of the time.
-How would you write the rule for that ID-thing?
-ID'ing multiple-wound characters and MC's for only a couple of points is not something I would want to see.

 lord_blackfang wrote:
Why does everyone assume grav weapons need a Strength value? It could just be "target's armour save = what you need to roll to wound".

Can you type out the full ruling for that ability?
Because making them S4 and "To Wound rolls from weapons with the Grav-rule are made against the target's Armour Save, rather than Toughness." has the same result but is less wordy and more intuitive.

Maybe not rapid fire (it would be pretty weak), but 24" blast?

Wounds marines on 4+, no saves, terminators on a 3+ invulnerable only. Doesn't sound too shabby for AP2 weaponry?

The heavy version have a bit more strength and range/shots perhaps?

Probably shouldn't ID things, but it would be funny to blow up a riptide in one shot.

The battlereport said that those Centurions slaughtered Marines.
It's quite bad when you need a 4+ to wound them.
Wounding terminators on a 3+ is quite 'meeh' too.
In both cases I would prefer a Plasma cannon or gun

Even though I would love to one-shot Riptides, I wouldn't like what it does to the powerlevel of this game.
Because the next codices (probably Orks and Tyranids) would get even stronger MC's to counter that.
And my BA would feel F'd.

With S4, AP2 it would be the same power as plasma against T7,4+ or T6, 3+ and T5,2+
Then if the T is lower, you're better off with plasma and if the save gets better you could use Grav.
In my opinion that would make it quite a balanced weapon.

Reverse scaling weapons are such a crappy idea. Flavourful perhaps, but utterly impossible to cost correctly. I don't know why they're trying to make them work.

Kangodo wrote:

 lord_blackfang wrote:
Why does everyone assume grav weapons need a Strength value? It could just be "target's armour save = what you need to roll to wound".

Can you type out the full ruling for that ability?
Because making them S4 and "To Wound rolls from weapons with the Grav-rule are made against the target's Armour Save, rather than Toughness." has the same result but is less wordy and more intuitive.

I don't think there's anything particularly intuitive by trying to shoehorn armour saves into the Strength vs Toughness table. Saves and Toughness values don't even follow the same format.

Grav: This weapon has no strength value. The score required to wound a target is equal to the target's armour save.

Then some addendum about AS - and vehicles, which would be required either way.

I'm expecting Grav weapons to merely wound against a models' armour save and that is all while being AP2, and no actual Strength value. Maybe they will have the Haywire rule, but I guess we must wait and see.

I think the Centurions are ok, personally. I will wait to see them built and painted (well) in my LGS before I comment on them further. The Hunter and Stalker are great, as are the re-done infantry kits. The characters are pretty cool. The return of proper Chapter Traits without the need of a special character is awesome, particularly if what we have heard so far is true - i.e. Iron Hands having Feel No Pain 6+, as well as It Will Not Die for their characters and vehicles. I expect Ultramarines to keep Chapter Tactics in its current form and maybe get some other benefit. like Stubborn rules to represent Tyrranic War Veterans.

I'm expecting Pedro will still unlock Sternguard as either Troops or scoring units, regardless of whether or not Crimson Fists have Chapter Traits. I wonder if we will see an expansion on the "Space Marine Captain with a bike unlocks Bikers as Troops" concept and have it applied to Assault Squads and Terminator Squads. It would certainly be an interesting way of expanding the potential army lists, and not too dissimilar from Legion Praetors in the Horus Heresy series. Probably just wish-listing though.

 His Master's Voice wrote:
Reverse scaling weapons are such a crappy idea. Flavourful perhaps, but utterly impossible to cost correctly. I don't know why they're trying to make them work.

I agree. Models with a good save pay points for that; making it a liability is just wrong. It's like MSS that makes being good at CC a bad thing.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

Caederes wrote:

I'm expecting Pedro will still unlock Sternguard as either Troops or scoring units, regardless of whether or not Crimson Fists have Chapter Traits.

Do we even know that he is still in the book? In what army can Pedro be included if there's no CF traits? I'm curious to see how the special characters and chapter traits will interact anyway; I presume characters are now limited to their own chapters.

Also if this does mean wound against armor value does that make Termies even less likely to be fielded? I thought all those smashing MC's and plas like weapons already did that.

I remember when Termies were the boss. Now there is a weapon that hits then hard and a new unit that makes them look diddly.

GK termies will feel hard done by most i guess since a lot.

Still its shaping up to be a good release and it seems from the overall feel its going to be better received than CSM & DA both model and rule wise. Power Armor may yet live!

 Crimson wrote:

Caederes wrote:

I'm expecting Pedro will still unlock Sternguard as either Troops or scoring units, regardless of whether or not Crimson Fists have Chapter Traits.

Do we even know that he is still in the book? In what army can Pedro be included if there's no CF traits? I'm curious to see how the special characters and chapter traits will interact anyway; I presume characters are now limited to their own chapters.

I am hoping that is not the case.

Probably tying my wagon to the wrong star but would love to see SCs as paragons of certain styles which you can take in whatever force, epitomised by the specific Character. While Pedro is Paragon of a Sternguard Scoring Leader, he isnt the only Chaptermaster who can do it.

An example of what I am thinking is something like:
While Lysander/Not-Lysander is the bad-ass face-smasher with a couple of cool rules (Bolter Drill and Fancy Hammer) he wouldnt get the "Chapter" rule of Stubborn or whatever unless you play him as IF.
While Vulkan/Not-Vulkan is Artificer Armoured, 3++ed, Master Crafted heavy flamer and Relic Sword dude with kick ass skills, he wouldnt get the double Melta ability unles he was a legit Sally.

Pretty much a separation of Character Special Rules and Chapter Special Rules, though I can easily see how some peeps might min-max it for the best advantage, but then again that is true in all formats regardless.

Zanderchief wrote:
Also if this does mean wound against armor value does that make Termies even less likely to be fielded? I thought all those smashing MC's and plas like weapons already did that.

I remember when Termies were the boss. Now there is a weapon that hits then hard and a new unit that makes them look diddly.

GK termies will feel hard done by most i guess since a lot.

Still its shaping up to be a good release and it seems from the overall feel its going to be better received than CSM & DA both model and rule wise. Power Armor may yet live!

There seems to be an aweful lot of assumption that these new weapons are going to be the cats's meow, but everyone said tha same thing about DA and their kit before the rules even came out and look what happened... and AP3 unwieldy sword... and chuckles and no game... its honestly better at this point to enjoy the fact that GW actually appears to be trying to introduce something fresh to the game, rather than "OK for 5 points a model all tac marines can take plasma guns." imagine a world where that happened with terminators.

Termies are still boss! there are some who who'd go so far to say that TH/SS codex termies are the stongest unit in the game simply because there isnt anything they cant smash, provided they make there save. And what then? what if the grave weapon is simply "if a model has an armor save, the models armor save becomes the to wound roll... 2+ armor save? wounds on a 2+. (3+ and so on) perhaps there wont be an AP... Perhaps it'll be AP1... still too early to take away the termy mantle...

Not all Termies can take SS.

But yes let's wait and see. I just hardly see termies now and feel a little sad (but happy new toys are coming) that Termies (fluff wise) don't appear to be the ultimate walking tank they were originally.

As someone mentioned however 40k is run a bit like an arms race by GW. Bigger, better, more dakka! I have nothing against this so long as they try to make its playable.

I love new models as much as the next guy, but SM are already supposed to be the best of the best in the universe. I hope this new codex brings more in the way of tactical advantages and such. Plus I have been waiting for salamanders so get the rules they deserve fluff wise to make them as awesome as they really are. Fire and anvil. I was really upset when the CSM codex came out and they didnt have any special rules for alpha legion. I mean you give me cultist and no special rules for alpha legion are you mad. I just hope they dont make the same mistake for this codex.

 lord_blackfang wrote:
I don't think there's anything particularly intuitive by trying to shoehorn armour saves into the Strength vs Toughness table. Saves and Toughness values don't even follow the same format.

Well, you just check the value of the save on the table.
Everyone knows that S4 needs a 5+ to wound T5.
And it won't take long for people to understand that S4 needs a 5+ to wound an Armour Save of 5+

Then some addendum about AS - and vehicles, which would be required either way.

AS - is correct.
But why would you need an addendum about vehicles?
You don't roll to-wound for vehicles, so you can't use the Grav rule.

I am not saying there won't be anything against vehicles, they might use Haywire or something, but you don't need an extra line for vehicles.

Caederes wrote:
I'm expecting Grav weapons to merely wound against a models' armour save and that is all while being AP2, and no actual Strength value. Maybe they will have the Haywire rule, but I guess we must wait and see.

How can you wound AGAINST the armour save if there is no Strength-value?
The word 'against' means that you compare stats (and use the to-wound table).
Normally you compare strength against toughness.
With Grav you compare strength against armour save.
Without a S-value, you cannot compare anything against the save.

Zanderchief wrote:
Also if this does mean wound against armor value does that make Termies even less likely to be fielded? I thought all those smashing MC's and plas like weapons already did that.

I don't think so. As far as we know, Grav won't do anything against Termies that Plasma isn't able to do.

Well plasma always boxed terminator. As did MCs. Terminators are line breakers, built to eat through infantry and wreck vehicles, not hunting MCs or other heavy elites. They also make excellent fire magnets against line infantry. If the Centurion has needs to fill a role, it should be as an MC hunter, which other than using weight of fire, SM doesn’t really have a counter to.
Grav weapons are an interesting concept, and should really function as more of a debuf then an actual weapon. I would see S: 4 Ap:-, wounds against Sv, if the target suffers an unsaved wound they count as being in difficult terrain/take a grounding test.

Imperial Deceit wrote:
Well plasma always boxed terminator. As did MCs. Terminators are line breakers, built to eat through infantry and wreck vehicles, not hunting MCs or other heavy elites. They also make excellent fire magnets against line infantry. If the Centurion has needs to fill a role, it should be as an MC hunter, which other than using weight of fire, SM doesn’t really have a counter to.
Grav weapons are an interesting concept, and should really function as more of a debuf then an actual weapon. I would see S: 4 Ap:-, wounds against Sv, if the target suffers an unsaved wound they count as being in difficult terrain/take a grounding test.

Not sure where you got this bud, but one of the best ways to kill MCs is with TH/SS termys... hands down... sure you could just shoot the crap out of them with high strength, AP3 or better weapons (looking at nids), but if you had to be in close combat? there is no better unit to crush an MC through reliable dice rolls... Also, termies have never had enough attacks to deal with massed infantry, so Im not sure where that comment came from. I would take a 30 boy mob vs a unit of 10 termys any day of the week...

YMMV. From my experiance Terminators are too slow to handle MCs, especially Daemons and Hive Tyrants. Losing your 2+ save makes you as vulnerable as regular marines (or guardsmen if you don't have SS) and your going to lose the WS battle everytime. They do have enough attacks, on the charge you will have 11 from a five man squad, most infantry outside of orks and nids can't even feild that many models. The return won't be nearly as bad, because for the most part you will retain your 2+ except for the odd power klaw, which you can deal with via Challanges.

ClockworkZion wrote:

 aka_mythos wrote:
Does anyone else look at the Centurions and think this is what GW will base a new Obliterator on?-I could sure see someone convert them that way.

Nope!

Obliterators are basically Terminators who have fused with their suits and have absorbed technology/weapons along the way, Centurions are Marines in Power Armor piloting a kind of exo-suit that carries guns or breaching drills. Not really the same thing when you get down to it.

Plus Centurions are a bit bigger.

in the new fluff they arent terminators or even marines. They are just men fused with daemon fused with machine that creates something with a marine like 4s across the statline board.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 lord_blackfang wrote:
Why does everyone assume grav weapons need a Strength value? It could just be "target's armour save = what you need to roll to wound".

that is how I always envisioned it. no use against things without a save

Kangodo wrote:

Caederes wrote:
I'm expecting Grav weapons to merely wound against a models' armour save and that is all while being AP2, and no actual Strength value. Maybe they will have the Haywire rule, but I guess we must wait and see.

How can you wound AGAINST the armour save if there is no Strength-value?
The word 'against' means that you compare stats (and use the to-wound table).
Normally you compare strength against toughness.
With Grav you compare strength against armour save.
Without a S-value, you cannot compare anything against the save.

I'm sorry for what was clearly a poor choice of words. I simply mean that, going by the rumours, it will most likely be Strength 'X' so that there are no confusing questions about instant death, and it will wound on a D6 result equal to the models' armour save. If someone who has read the battle report can confirm the Grav weapons were also used to destroy tanks, it would be probable they have the Haywire special rule as well.
Err looks like I quoted incorrectly, sorry!


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Crimson wrote:
Reverse scaling weapons are such a crappy idea. Flavourful perhaps, but utterly impossible to cost correctly. I don't know why they're trying to make them work.

I agree. Models with a good save pay points for that; making it a liability is just wrong. It's like MSS that makes being good at CC a bad thing.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

Caederes wrote:

I'm expecting Pedro will still unlock Sternguard as either Troops or scoring units, regardless of whether or not Crimson Fists have Chapter Traits.

Do we even know that he is still in the book? In what army can Pedro be included if there's no CF traits? I'm curious to see how the special characters and chapter traits will interact anyway; I presume characters are now limited to their own chapters.

Hahaha, you need to make sure that the [.quote] and [./quote]'s are correctly placed. You probably have one [.quote] too many!

But things being confusing is really a player-issue.
ID clearly says that Strength needs to double the Toughness.
I just think that Strength 'X' needs much more wording than S4, and it both comes down to the same thing.

Imperial Deceit wrote:
Although what it really tickles me is all the anxiety and moaning over rules that we the community basically made up.
When September rolls around (And it will, I promise) then we can legitimately complain about how OP or overpriced or useless the rules are.

I am not moaning, I am guessing what it will do. The philosophy and math behind it is more entertaining than watching Dr Phill on tv.
And I have faith in GW's balancing, so I trust them to balance this correctly.
They shouldn't make Plasma useless.
They shouldn't make Grav useless.

If they balance it right, there will be a point where both Plasma and Grav are equally strong at killing stuff.
In my opinion that point will be T7Sv4+, T6Sv3+ and T5Sv2+ since that are commonly found statlines in codices.

Although what it really tickles me is all the anxiety and moaning over rules that we the community basically made up.

When September rolls around (And it will, I promise) then we can legitimately complain about how OP or overpriced or useless the rules are.

Imperial Deceit wrote:

When September rolls around (And it will, I promise)

LIES!
you have no proof time will continue to pass
past performance is no guarantee of future results

Just because it hasn't happened doesn't mean it won't happen.
The absence of evidence is not the evidence of absence!

Kangodo wrote:
Hahaha, you need to make sure that the [.quote] and [./quote]'s are correctly placed. You probably have one [.quote] too many!

But things being confusing is really a player-issue.
ID clearly says that Strength needs to double the Toughness.
I just think that Strength 'X' needs much more wording than S4, and it both comes down to the same thing.

Imperial Deceit wrote:
Although what it really tickles me is all the anxiety and moaning over rules that we the community basically made up.
When September rolls around (And it will, I promise) then we can legitimately complain about how OP or overpriced or useless the rules are.

I am not moaning, I am guessing what it will do. The philosophy and math behind it is more entertaining than watching Dr Phill on tv.
And I have faith in GW's balancing, so I trust them to balance this correctly.
They shouldn't make Plasma useless.
They shouldn't make Grav useless.

If they balance it right, there will be a point where both Plasma and Grav are equally strong at killing stuff.
In my opinion that point will be T7Sv4+, T6Sv3+ and T5Sv2+ since that are commonly found statlines in codices.

I tried fixing it but literally have no clue what I did wrong lol. I guess I will leave it for now.
Yeah fair enough, I just remember all the hub-bub about weapons like the Abyssal Staff and I think a few others that worked similarly to grav weaponry. I think having no potential for instant death would be a form of balancing it against plasma, as it won't instantly kill say Inquisitor Coteaz whereas the Plasma Gun would. That's just my theory though.

Heh, anyone else think about how annoying it will be to shoot grav weapons at mixed armour save units if the whole "wound against armour save" blurb is accurate? No different to current wound allocation rules, but still a bit annoying. Heh, that could actually be a funny way to protect a Chaos Lord in a unit of Chaos Spawn, or Inquisitor Coteaz in a Henchmen unit. Against Grav weapons, per the mixed save rules, put the 5+ armoured bodies or non-armoured bodies in front for a change! If Grav weapons indeed cannot hurt units without an armour save, I can only imagine the look on a poor Space Marine players' face when my Spawn and Khorne Lord shrug off the fire from his new Centurions.

 Exergy wrote:


in the new fluff they arent terminators or even marines. They are just men fused with daemon fused with machine that creates something with a marine like 4s across the statline board.

In the new fluff Mutilators are though to be Assault Terminators that have been mutated by the warp, so Obliterators being Terminators isn't too hard to imagine.