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I hear a lot of complaints on Dakka about stagnant gun lines taking the fun out of the game, especially for assault based armies. So, can anyone think of quick fixes easily implemented as house rules? For instance:

House Rule Revision to Deep Strike:

Instead of the current restrictions placed on Deep Striking units (can't move further, Can shoot but counts as having moved, can't assault) change the restricions to being allowed to operate one phase as normal. I.e. after deep strike, you may move OR shoot OR assault. Additionally, armies with special rules that allow assault after deep strike (cough cough, Blood Angels) may pick two. (I.e shoot AND assault) following regular restrictions (only assault guns)

I think a simple -1 BS over half range would already make it a lot more balanced...

Remove any weapons with the "Ignores Cover" SR.

Allow Assault from Disembarking/DS Arrival.

Brother Michael wrote:
I think a simple -1 BS over half range would already make it a lot more balanced...

That would make a ton of since, but the Eldar infantry based players would throw a fit. (My 12" guns now only work well at 6"?!) Perhaps that rule on non assault weapons? Reduce Tau lines to 15" effective range, and make them move places.

 Will1541 wrote:

Brother Michael wrote:
I think a simple -1 BS over half range would already make it a lot more balanced...

That would make a ton of since, but the Eldar infantry based players would throw a fit. (My 12" guns now only work well at 6"?!) Perhaps that rule on non assault weapons? Reduce Tau lines to 15" effective range, and make them move places.

Marker lights invalidates that change for Tau.

Assaulting after running would go a long ways to making assault better.

We could start by letting units assault out of outflank...

I'd return assault from transport, from reserves and after run with fleet, but they make for disordered charges. I'd also give disordered charges a slightly higher penalty possibly, like facing thicker overwatch or something.

So yeah, you can pull off the assault, but it won't be an ideal assault so it won't work out quite so well for you.

 ClockworkZion wrote:

 Will1541 wrote:

Brother Michael wrote:
I think a simple -1 BS over half range would already make it a lot more balanced...

That would make a ton of since, but the Eldar infantry based players would throw a fit. (My 12" guns now only work well at 6"?!) Perhaps that rule on non assault weapons? Reduce Tau lines to 15" effective range, and make them move places.

Marker lights invalidates that change for Tau.

I think half range is too much, esp for short ranged weapons. Would -1BS at 18" and -2BS (to a min of 1) at 36" make sense?

This means that marker lights are penalised as well; and their bonuses are all the more valuable.

Gun line is a defensive tactic. You as the opponent facing the gunline need to find ways around it.
Now that being said, my "fix" to gunline is this: give the unit that successfully charged the "fear" USR for tha turn

thematically, a unit that just fired in overwatch failed to stop the charge, the charged unit rolls for morale and whether they pass or fail shows that they have amoment of doubt and panic as the desperate attack was useless.

Game balancing: the unit that's charging is best advised to come heavy or not at all. You are charging a well defended position, bring friends.
You have assault unit "A" and assault unit "B" force the opponent into a lose-lose situation where they have to choose the lesser of two evils to overwatch. Assault unit A is a much larger and beefer squad, so the defending player targets "A" and allows "B" to hit. Unit "B" forces a morale check which MAY force them to give up the position.

How to actually fix gunlines:

1) Use enough terrain, especially LOS-blocking terrain. Don't just put a couple ruins (with windows that everyone can shoot through without losing LOS) and expect it to be enough, there should be enough terrain that you can't just put your whole army in an ADL castle in the corner and expect to shoot effectively at the entire table.

2) Emphasize objectives. The weakness of a gunline is that it can't come out and claim objectives very well. If you have enough terrain that you can't just effortlessly shoot objectives clear from across the table then the gunline will be forced to break up and move out into the rest of the table where you can kill it.

 Will1541 wrote:
Instead of the current restrictions placed on Deep Striking units (can't move further, Can shoot but counts as having moved, can't assault) change the restricions to being allowed to operate one phase as normal. I.e. after deep strike, you may move OR shoot OR assault. Additionally, armies with special rules that allow assault after deep strike (cough cough, Blood Angels) may pick two. (I.e shoot AND assault) following regular restrictions (only assault guns)

This is a really bad change. You nerf gunlines, but you replace them with auto-win assault armies that deep strike in, immediately charge, and wipe out half your army before you can respond.

 greyknight12 wrote:
Assaulting after running would go a long ways to making assault better.

It would make assault better, but only at the cost of making the table smaller. If you're going to make everything get into combat faster then you might as well just take 12" off the length of the table and have the deployment zones 6" apart.

Brother Michael wrote:
I think a simple -1 BS over half range would already make it a lot more balanced...

And this suffers from the same problem: it makes most of the table irrelevant, and ensures that the only relevant action happens in a small area in the center of the table. Plus, it doesn't make any sense. If you're going to add BS modifiers to represent the difficulty of a long-range shot then you also need to add BS bonuses for easy shots. For example, shooting at a Land Raider (a large target) with a lascannon (an instant-hit weapon with no bullet drop to correct for) should be so easy that even a BS 2 conscript can hit 100% of the time. Similarly, guided missiles should be proper guided missiles, and roll to hit based on the missile's BS (usually BS 10), not the shooting model's BS. And of course ranges should be accurate as well, laser weapons should have infinite range, pulse rifles and bolters should have at least 72" range, and heavy weapons should have a range best described as "shoot anything in the same building as your game".


Automatically Appended Next Post:

gealgain wrote:
Now that being said, my "fix" to gunline is this: give the unit that successfully charged the "fear" USR for tha turn

This actually makes gunlines better, not worse. Gunline units almost always die helplessly in melee, so the worst possible outcome of a charge is that you manage to lose combat by a small enough margin that you "pass" your leadership test and stay locked in combat, preventing the rest of your army from slaughtering the screaming idiots with swords. You want to do as little damage as possible, and suffer as many casualties as possible, so that you break from combat and leave the charging unit exposed to shooting next turn. The Fear USR accomplishes both of these goals, if you "fail" your leadership test you get a harder to-hit roll and you possibly take more hits in return.

 Peregrine wrote:

 Will1541 wrote:
Instead of the current restrictions placed on Deep Striking units (can't move further, Can shoot but counts as having moved, can't assault) change the restricions to being allowed to operate one phase as normal. I.e. after deep strike, you may move OR shoot OR assault. Additionally, armies with special rules that allow assault after deep strike (cough cough, Blood Angels) may pick two. (I.e shoot AND assault) following regular restrictions (only assault guns)

This is a really bad change. You nerf gunlines, but you replace them with auto-win assault armies that deep strike in, immediately charge, and wipe out half your army before you can respond.

Not really. As an applied concept, thinning out a tau list and moving them forward they will still stand a chance against assault based forces like Blood Angels or Wolves. It really balances out the list and makes it assault based. Granted, the gunline force now has to do more than "sit in corner. Shoot. Win." and need tactics, but that's the point.

there is an issue with gunline armies? can't we just ban them? or would that just mean no Tau and Imperial Guard?

Tongue in cheek warning.


How dare they make a game that represents a setting in which cultures with access to guns that can destroy planets and stars would rather shoot at each other across a battlefield instead of blindly charging at each other with sticks and pointy objects?

The temerity!

 agnosto wrote:
Tongue in cheek warning.


How dare they make a game that represents a setting in which cultures with access to guns that can destroy planets and stars would rather shoot at each other across a battlefield instead of blindly charging at each other with sticks and pointy objects?

The temerity!

I think it's called balance...

Balance? Are we talking about the same game? The one that includes game-breaking dataslates and superheavies?


(kidding).

I think that as long as Khorne Daemons exist as an army, Deep-Strike-Assault is simply not capable of existing as a balanced and well-planned addition to the game.

Not all assault units are awful, but the working ones tend to combine 3 factors into a single package:
- They are good at assault
- They are fast. 'Fleet' alone is not enough.
- They are durable.

This is why Flesh Hounds, Spawn, Beast Packs etc. are all seen in competitive play, and why Possessed or Assault Marines are not.
Assault is not dead, it is simply beyond the capacity of most units to perform. To that end, if a unit wants to be in assault, it should simply be given the tools to do so. An Assault Terminator is plenty tough and plenty hitty, it simply lacks a delivery system that isn't prohibitively expensive. So introduce another assault vehicle that doesn't pay for AV14, Lascannons, or Flier rules.

In fact an increase of delivery vehicles in general would be a nice change without fundamentally shifting the balance of power, making dedicated assault units and armies deadly without pulling the rug from shooting altogether. Assault would be the realm of specialists and a rare thing to excel at, but brutally powerful if you can execute it properly.

So, more assault transports. If you can justify a defence increase somehow, go for it. Reaching assault tends to be the hard part over killing once you hit it.

 agnosto wrote:
Tongue in cheek warning.


How dare they make a game that represents a setting in which cultures with access to guns that can destroy planets and stars would rather shoot at each other across a battlefield instead of blindly charging at each other with sticks and pointy objects?

The temerity!

You provide a point I highly agree with, but at the same time it turns 40k into a game of tennis. Two sides shoot each other until one fails their cover saves. Woo, so interesting. As such, I agree with the push towards guns and emphasis on shooting, but not to the point Assault units are worthless.

since this thread seems to be a solution to a specific problem, let's figure out what the rwal problem is...

what armies have you played that worked like this? Imperial Guard? Tau? there are ways to break gunlines. changing the rules is not a fix to poor strategy.

 viewfinder wrote:
since this thread seems to be a solution to a specific problem, let's figure out what the rwal problem is...

what armies have you played that worked like this? Imperial Guard? Tau? there are ways to break gunlines. changing the rules is not a fix to poor strategy.

It's not an issue for me. I play Saim Hann Eldar and break lines with ease. However, many people complain about their effectiveness so i just wanted to make a thread on how to fix the issue with simple House Rules.

 Will1541 wrote:

 agnosto wrote:
Tongue in cheek warning.


How dare they make a game that represents a setting in which cultures with access to guns that can destroy planets and stars would rather shoot at each other across a battlefield instead of blindly charging at each other with sticks and pointy objects?

The temerity!

You provide a point I highly agree with, but at the same time it turns 40k into a game of tennis. Two sides shoot each other until one fails their cover saves. Woo, so interesting. As such, I agree with the push towards guns and emphasis on shooting, but not to the point Assault units are worthless.

Well tennis is played on a flat surface. A modern sport that more closet resembles a shooting war like airsoft or paintball is played with terrain that provides cover and blocks line of sight throughout the battlefield. This forces the players to advance up the field in order to produce clear lines of sight against each other.

I'm a Tau player that likes to be mobile, but I find little motivation to do so when I can position my forces in such a way that my opponent has to weather my storm of fire and has no place to hide. Chop up the firelanes and I am going to need to come after you if I want to kill you. I'm also not going to be able to focus fire you down with my whole army and things like Broadsides and Pathfinders may be forced to reposition themselves instead of shooting those High Yield Missile Pods and Markerlights. Dense terrain also makes it hard for me to castle up because I have only so much room to position my forces. Finally, the terrain can be used to shield Deep Strikers and Outflankers for that critical turn between arrival and assault.

So, if you want Gunlines to turn into armies that move forward into close range, clutter up that table. Give yourself something they can't shoot through to advance behind. Then, when everyone is nice and close together, being able to push the other team around and off of objectives comes into play.

 Will1541 wrote:

 viewfinder wrote:
since this thread seems to be a solution to a specific problem, let's figure out what the rwal problem is...

what armies have you played that worked like this? Imperial Guard? Tau? there are ways to break gunlines. changing the rules is not a fix to poor strategy.

It's not an issue for me. I play Saim Hann Eldar and break lines with ease. However, many people complain about their effectiveness so i just wanted to make a thread on how to fix the issue with simple House Rules.

House rules aren't there to fix specific problems. Otherwise, you'll turn away gunline players with your long and complicated nerf to their armies.

as an ork player I've never had a problem with people penning themselves in. defence lines give the opponent an advantage straight away - they go down before you roll for deployment, so if you go first, you know where the opponent is going to be. I second the fact that putting enough terrain on the table makes castling an exercise in redundancy, and the same with objectives. i've never found a gunline to be a problem, it's a tactic, and it's usually from an army that'd be shooting you anyway. want to mix it up a bit, send a hard-hitter into their aegis, steal their quad gun. rinse and repeat until they stop taking the quad gun but i guess orks do have the advantage of mass-assault vehicles, for the rest of the assault armies I'd bring, for chaos, maulerfiends - ignore the terrain when moving and charging, seriously disrupt their tactics. flying monsters for chaos, daemons and nids. (don't give me the 'but nid fliers are terrible because they only have T5 and a 4+ save ' thing, you evade in range of a venomthrope and you're sitting on 3+ cover). if you really want to get to the opponent, you can bring some super-cheap ork allies - 2 trukks of 10 boys and a big mek will set you back 225 points, and can really irritate an opponent.

I have to agree with Peregrine and Jeffar, if you are having problems with gunlines, add some LOS blocking terrain, some more LOS blocking terrain, and then finish it off by adding some LOS blocking terrain. I am talking large chuncks of terrain here, you should be able to deny LOS to a landraider on a properly setup, no grant cover, but deny shooting altogether. This makes movement and positioning critical to the shooting game, and gives assault units and short range shooting units the opportunity to close on the opponent before getting annihilated.

If you are unable to find sufficient LOS blocking terrain, I suggest adopting the area terrains rules from 4e. These rules abstract LOS so things like forest and ruins can be used for LOS denial rather than simple cover.

Jefffar wrote:

 Will1541 wrote:

 agnosto wrote:
Tongue in cheek warning.


How dare they make a game that represents a setting in which cultures with access to guns that can destroy planets and stars would rather shoot at each other across a battlefield instead of blindly charging at each other with sticks and pointy objects?

The temerity!

You provide a point I highly agree with, but at the same time it turns 40k into a game of tennis. Two sides shoot each other until one fails their cover saves. Woo, so interesting. As such, I agree with the push towards guns and emphasis on shooting, but not to the point Assault units are worthless.

Well tennis is played on a flat surface. A modern sport that more closet resembles a shooting war like airsoft or paintball is played with terrain that provides cover and blocks line of sight throughout the battlefield. This forces the players to advance up the field in order to produce clear lines of sight against each other.

I'm a Tau player that likes to be mobile, but I find little motivation to do so when I can position my forces in such a way that my opponent has to weather my storm of fire and has no place to hide. Chop up the firelanes and I am going to need to come after you if I want to kill you. I'm also not going to be able to focus fire you down with my whole army and things like Broadsides and Pathfinders may be forced to reposition themselves instead of shooting those High Yield Missile Pods and Markerlights. Dense terrain also makes it hard for me to castle up because I have only so much room to position my forces. Finally, the terrain can be used to shield Deep Strikers and Outflankers for that critical turn between arrival and assault.

So, if you want Gunlines to turn into armies that move forward into close range, clutter up that table. Give yourself something they can't shoot through to advance behind. Then, when everyone is nice and close together, being able to push the other team around and off of objectives comes into play.

The Tau Player I fight consistently cries about there being "too much cover" when there's barely any. (I.e, two forests and two ruins on a 6'x4' table) and he downright refuses the purchase of Cities of Death.

Standard rule is 25 percent of the table covered with terrain and distribution of 1D3 pieces for 2x2 square of the table. If there is less than that he has no real right to complain about too much terrain on the table.

There are plenty of counters to gunlines. Especially the Tau gunline.

1) Tau gunline is relatively short ranged. They have longer ranged basic troops than most armies, but if you look at the range bands, how far are they really firing? 36". Missilesides are 36" range, Firewarriors 30", Missile Crisis 36". Outside of Riptides, Tau have nothing deadly to Marines over 36".
In contrast, many armies can actually outrange tau with 48" missile launchers and lascannons, both of which are extremely deadly to Tau battlesuits.

2) Clustered armies are very vulnerable to blasts.

3) Cover is overrated. Many many armies these days get ignores cover weapons. The ADL isn't what it used to be.

4) Play the objective game. A gunline army is terrible at taking objectives. Not only should you learn to stay on objectives to deny them to the Tau, but you can also learn to PLACE objectives to deny the gunline player good positions. Does he have a big ruin that he's hiding in? Put the objective outside of the ruin to create a 12" bubble of denial.


...
All of that being said, I've played a few games of modified 40k where the rules were modified like so: All weapon ranges are halved, but number of shots are doubled unless you are assaulting. Assault distance is reduced to 6". It makes for a very different, very fun game.

I see an objection above that shorter weapon ranges make large portions of the board irrelevant. In reality, my experience is that it makes positioning much more important. In current 40k I can take a Riptide or Hammerhead and essentially be within range of everything all the time. Most of the board is then relegated to 'can I cross this to the enemy before I get shot'. Point-click-kill.
With shorter weapon ranges, you can't have units camping objectives and firing at full strength all game. Instead, you need to head towards the enemy to get anything done, and maneuvering takes on a more important aspect. You often end up with 2 or 3 separate skirmishes where you need to actually commit forces to help out one particular battle, rather than plonking them in the middle and letting them fire at both.

The shorter weapon range approach is used in other games: in Warmachine the longest weapon ranges are ~16". In Dust (which plays very like a modernised 40k) most infantry fire only 16". Both of them IMO are more interesting games than 40k in part because armies must close together which much greater frequency. Ranged and combat armies both do very well.

 Will1541 wrote:
You provide a point I highly agree with, but at the same time it turns 40k into a game of tennis. Two sides shoot each other until one fails their cover saves. Woo, so interesting.

Lol, no. Shooting-only is not the same thing as gunline-only. A shooting-only game can still have a strong emphasis on out-maneuvering the enemy, especially if it includes things like reactions, unit facings, suppressing fire, etc. But even without those things it's still possible. X-Wing is a game of pure shooting with no melee at all (for obvious reasons), but I don't think any reasonable person could call it a game of tennis between static gunlines.

Trasvi wrote:
With shorter weapon ranges, you can't have units camping objectives and firing at full strength all game. Instead, you need to head towards the enemy to get anything done, and maneuvering takes on a more important aspect.

And that's the whole problem: if you have to get close to get anything done then only the small area in the middle of the table around the objectives is relevant. Your deployment zones might as well not exist, and you could just play on a 6x2 table and deploy 6" from the center. You need long-range weapons to make the entire table relevant, including those back corners far away from the action in the middle.

40k's problem isn't weapon ranges (which are laughably short), it's the absence of LOS-blocking terrain that should make long-range weapons more complicated than just putting them behind an ADL and removing units. Even when you have a decent amount of terrain on the table the TLOS rules are completely broken. Shooting through a tiny bullet hole in a solid wall shouldn't give the same 4+ cover save as shooting at a model that has half its body sticking out, but that's the game we get.