Ailaros wrote:Either transports were able to do a good job keeping their troops from getting killed, in which case their loss of scoring without getting out was a necessity
Isn't that part of their purpose?
In any case, the return to vehicles being able to be glanced to death (this only wasn't possible in a single rules edition) is balanced against a lot of gains. You can dismiss the fact that it IS harder to shut down tanks without destroying them because "they're flimsier"
Killing them shuts them down, yes that does dismiss that.
and you can dismiss the fact that transports do move more quickly because "they're flimsier"
It's not just that they're flimsier (which is a big one), their utility has plummeted. Before they could contest objectives and score with an embarked unit, units could assault out of stationary transports, and infantry could disembark and fire after moving up to 12". Also, for tracked tanks, they have to give up their one defensive mechanism (smoke) to get that enhanced movement, while skimmers are rewarded with a cover save for the same movement.
and you can dismiss the fact that they get cover saves more easily because "they're flimsier",
Yes, because average cover saves are less effective and cover ignoring weapons and abilities are significantly more common.
and you can dismiss that their shooting was improved because "they're flimsier",
Shooting's improvement is marginal at best. Hitting on 6's with secondary weapons while moving is nice, but isn't a particularly vast increase. Not being shaken/stunned on glancing hits too is nice, but, due to the decreased lifespan, doesn't mean you're getting any more utility out of the tanks because as often as not they'll be dead when previously they'll just have been temporarily disabled.
and you can dismiss the added survivability to squadrons thanks to much better rules because "they're flimsier",
The squadron rules are better, but outside of one army it applies to relatively few units that are generally already hilariously easy to kill. Also, the 5E squadron rules were amongst the most punitive they've ever been, so just about anything would be an improvement.
and you can dismiss transports firing overwatch because "they're flimsier"
Yes we can dismiss it, not just because tanks are flimsier, but the fact that such overwatch isn't available on many transports (not everything is open topped or has firing ports) and won't do much on most others unless loaded with flame units. Simple fact is, usually doesn't amount to anything (not saying it can't ever be useful, but such instances will be atypical, highly so if the unit isn't packing a number of flamers)
and you can ignore the 48 rules that made close combat worse and thus not likely to ever happen to tanks because "they're flimsier",
Except many of them don't mean squat against tanks. They don't get overwatch. They are hit super easy. They have huge bodies that make getting into contact very easy. No, the
MEQ mechanized assaults of yesteryear and wave of power armored assault troops doesn't work. Units like
SM Bikers (especially White Scars and Dark Angel Bikers), Necron Wraiths, etc with inherent natural speed and "alternative to armor" saves are highly capable, particularly at tank hunting, in 6E.
and that that vehicles can now fire more weapons on the move because "they're flimsier",
Addressed this. Yes, it's nice, but it's a minor wildcard factor, the two sponson gun's needing 6's to hit isn't going to overly worry most opponents.
or that the vehicle pen chart is more generous to vehicles because "they're flimsier"
It's more generous if it's not AP1 or AP2 (i.e. stuff that's going to more likely kill through
HP's anyway) otherwise it's the same. And yes, if you'd read the math above you'd see that it doesn't make a whole lot of difference because of how the
HP's overlap as a kill system. Can you imagine how fragile tanks would be if every pen still killed on a 5?
and that glancing hits no longer cause system damage (or shaken or stunned results) because "they're flimsier",
Yup, because, once again, where before you may have been stunned or damaged, now you're just plain dead instead instead of the singular case of two glancing hits over two different turns and no more than that.
or that vehicle destroyed results are randomized because "they're flimsier",
Weapon destroyed you mean? Again, yes, but many vehicles only have one weapon anyway, and when your expected lifespan is 33-50% lower, thing's don't look so good. Couple that with the fact that you're more likely to get those 3
HP's off before you get a "1 in 6 on a X in 6" Weapon Destroyed result, and it's not so rosy.
or that units inside a transport can now target different units than their transport because "they're flimsier",
Unless I played every game of 5E wrong for 4 years, that's not new.
and you can ignore all of the structural advantages to vehicles like allowing you to basically (or literally) ignore terrain for the purposes of movement
If you're a skimmer. Otherwise you treat it the same way jump infantry and bikers do, as Dangerous Terrain.
and the fact that there are whole swaths of weapons that can't even hurt them because "they're flimsier".
Many weapons can't hurt a Wraithlord or C'tan either. A Trygon doesn't have to worry about an Autocannon inflicting Instant Death on it with a lucky roll.
You can say what you want, but solipsistic nerdrage about hull points wasn't useful 20 months ago, and it's still not useful now.
Leave the insults please.
Vehicles have changed, and for the better.
And yet, aside from some of the Skimmer xenos armies, they're fielded in notably fewer quantities with notably less frequency than in 5E. This isn't exactly a secret.
The inability after years of play to realise that hull points didn't cause tanks to fall apart like soggy cardboard doesn't change that.
and you've given zero evidence to support it, only a lot of excuses why it shouldn't matter.
Also, consider this as an example:
Let's say that you play a game where your opponent puts down 6 vehicles, and you put down 6 units that are guaranteed to put down exactly one glancing hit per turn. In 5th edition, the game would have started with you putting a glancing hit on each of his vehicles, shutting them down that turn (with shaken or stunned results) or possibly the entire game (like a weapon destroyed or immobilized result on a vindicator). For the rest of the game, your opponent does nothing as he slowly starts losing vehicles to stacked immobilized/weapon destroyed results. The end result is a comprehensive victory with no losses and with some amount of your opponent's stuff dead.
Now move that to 6th edition. In this case, you use your 6 glances to strip 6 hull points, and kill two vehicles. The other 4 vehicles are fine, and they turn their righteous anger at your guns killing some number of them. That means you're not killing 2 vehicles next turn, which means your opponent has relatively more to shoot you with than the previous turn. The vehicle player still loses a few vehicles, but the non-vehicle player loses everything, and the person with the tanks won.
That's a colossal difference. Replacing "one and done" glancing with hull points with hull points makes it so that vehicles can actually do their jobs, which means that they can break out of their old constraints and be properly useful, especially earlier in the game.
Having read this example, I really really do get where it's going, but it's based on a perfect fantasy premise that simply doesn't exist in the game, as the presence of any penetrating hits or any imbalance of weaponry negates it. I can't help but attack the premise. The assumptions under which this works are so detached from the reality of the game as to be irrelevant.
First, you're never going to be assured of anything, plain and simple. Assuming can generate exactly 1 glancing hit per turn per vehicle (with no pens and no going over or under 1 per vehicle) is not something that's possible. You could probably work it out so you *averaged* one glance per vehicle per turn, but that's not the same thing. It also leads into point number 2...
Second, you probably didn't forget all your heavy
AT weapons at home. Unless we're talking an bunch of scatterlasers (and nothing heavier) against an AV12 Chimera wall or something similar (in which case you've brought a gakky army list in the first place), anything you'd throw at these vehicles that isn't desperation fire is going to be penetrating at least as often, if not singificantly more, as it will be glancing (especially if another armor facing is able to be engaged) thus throwing off the whole equation
Third your
AT usually won't be able to each be so neatly allocated. If you've got something like Havocs they have to put all that firepower into one unit, meaning you just can't split your
AT up enough to accomplish that. Alternatively you may have more than enough weapons to possibly get 2+ hits on some or all of the vehicles, in which case the advantage of
HP's also disappears.
Fourth, this is assuming all of the vehicles involved are gun tanks with significant firepower and are able to respond at the same range as your glancing
AT weapons. This is rarely the case. Not all the vehicles may have sufficient range (e.g. Vindicators). Some may be relatively lightly armed (effectively unarmed) transports. Some may not have the appropriate firepower to engage your
AT assets (it be trying to plug a couple Bright Lances into your glance capable infantry squad in cover or may be trying to ineffectually heavy flamer the front of your hydra)
Fifth this assumes no other assets on the opponents half with which to engage your
AT assets except their own tanks, and that your glance capable weapons may not also have other targets like
MC's or enemy infantry.
This is the problem with the
HP's versus Shaken/Stunned tradeoff, it only works out under very specific matching conditions that you're probably never going to see on a table. If there's an imbalance in the weapons-to-enemy-tank ratio, weapon allocation, weapon effectiveness, any assymetry in targeting, or penetrating and/or multiple hits come into play (both of which are likely pretty much assured in any game you play), then the
HP advantage is lost. Outside of this highly unlikely constructed scenario, the tanks are notably better off with the 5E rules.
Ultimately yes, tanks got some neat stuff. However they lost so much durability, transport, and objective utility that ultimately vehicles end up notably less effective and capable. The armies you see routinely rolling with lots of armor (particularly mid
AV vehicles that do something other than hide in the back) are either Necrons (with their great flyers and generous flyer transport rules, enhanced rear armor and AV13 shields to block most
HP-chipping weapons and get skimmer saves on top of that and an additional
HP on their ground transport) or Eldar/Tau (which can roll around the table the entire game with 4+ or 3+ cover saves in the open).