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This could go into two forums but the first question is to address what kinda of fluff gives giant meks and toughness value rather then a armor value. As an ork player stuck with the sub-par Mork/Gorkanaut, who can be blown up with one shot and only have a 5++ save. I feel that Wraith Knights/Lords and Riptides should be susceptible to the same type of catastrophic damage. They cost the same points, except that the non-ork giant meks have better saves and weapons that can be damaged.

 Mojo1jojo wrote:
This could go into two forums but the first question is to address what kinda of fluff gives giant meks and toughness value rather then an armor value. As an ork player stuck with the sub-par Mork/Gorkanaut, who can be blown up with one shot and only have a 5++ save. I feel that Wraith Knights/Lords and Riptides should be susceptible to the same type of catastrophic damage. They cost the same points, except that the non-ork giant meks have better saves and weapons that can be damaged.

Let me preface this with a reminder to check your spelling; it will help people take you more seriously.

Alright, so Consider how Imperial Knight Players feel, with out Knights only having AV 13 on the front, and an Ion Shield that's arguably worse than the Kustom Force Field. Knights Cost more, have less durability, and maybe an equivalent amount of firepower.

Also, Superheavy vehicles cannot be OHKO'd anymore, except by Destroya weapons. It would take a minimum of 2 lascannon shots and one-in-a-thousand odds to bring down a Gorkanaut that quickly.

That being said, Riptides are definitely overpowered. With a 2+/5++ save that can be upgraded to 3++, there is probably something wrong, given their low cost. Basically, It should probably cost MORE than the six terminators it is more durable and packs more firepower than, while it usually winds up costing about the same.

I won't worry as much about the Wraithknight. They don't have a 2+ armor save, and have to sacrifice something to gain an Invulnerable save, and have no way to get FNP. They aren't worthwhile in most lists (though that may be due more to all the other crazy stuff Eldar have...), and they can be taken down by massed infantry shooting.

The Gorkanaut isn't a superheavy. Unlike a knight it's vulnerable to weapon destroyed and immobilized results and all the other guff that a normal vehicle suffers. On the plus side, though, that does mean it can fire overwatch. I've seen people run an entire squad face-first into skorcha and deffstorm mega-shoota fire after making that mistake!

Wraithknights also arn't especially vulnerable to massed infantry fire - with T8, you need a minimum of strength 5 (or poison) to hurt them.



As to the background - Wraithlords were originally made monstrous creatures 'to be a bit different' to dreadnoughts. They aren't piloted, they're a single sort-of-living thing, just like wraithguard. When they introduced the wraithknight, they made it the same for consitancy.

Riptides are the same - crisis and broadside battlesuits are (big) infantry, not small walkers, so since the riptide was a bigger battlesuit, they went monstrous creature. It's not inherently a problem by itself - the problem is more one of capabiltiy and cost. The Gorkanaut probably deserves to be quite a bit cheaper; two Krushin' Krews is a 1500 point army - compare that to four Imperial Knights and the difference is so vast that it's not even funny.

Yes, you have 30 hull points total compared to 24. But no ion shields, virtually no ability to hurt another vehicle at range, a Strength 10 klaw of gork (or possibly mork) rather than a Strength D reaper chainsword, and most importantly only a 6" move and vulnerability to normal vehicle damage results.

I still want to try an army with 6 'nauts, but I'm not convinced they'll achieve much!



That said, with one or two as supporting units, they are good. You have to learn to use their advantages: the Morkanaut's kustom force field is indeed awesome and can shield two or three of them. A small burna boyz mob with meks can fit inside it, fixing every hit point as it's inflicted, so that whilst you can suffer explodes - it becomes the only damn way to kill you!

locarno24 wrote:
The Gorkanaut isn't a superheavy. Unlike a knight it's vulnerable to weapon destroyed and immobilized results and all the other guff that a normal vehicle suffers. On the plus side, though, that does mean it can fire overwatch. I've seen people run an entire squad face-first into skorcha and deffstorm mega-shoota fire after making that mistake!

Wraithknights also arn't especially vulnerable to massed infantry fire - with T8, you need a minimum of strength 5 (or poison) to hurt them.

Fair enough, I was still stuck on Ripetide mode, with is only toughness 6.

As for that, I'm still convinced that Knights cost slightly more than they should. That's part of what I'm trying to rectify with my Knights Wargear thread, but it dosn't address the underlying problem that you're paying ~400 points for a AV13 unit.

Also, Gorkanauts not being superheavy strengthens the OP's point; they can be OHKO'd. Anyone got any ideas for fixing them?

Not sure. I think giving them superheavy status would probably make them too powerful unless you bump their points a bit, because of the benefits that unstoppable behemoth brings automatically in the rule.


I'm less sure about knights. Yes, they're only AV13 on the front, but with their 4+ ion shields they take about the same amount of fire to kill as twice their number of leman russ battle tanks - and they're far, far faster and deadlier. Yes, they're vulnerable to S7 fire (and S4 Rending attacks) but bear in mind that a knight army has no infantry. No light vehicles.

You're almost always playing at an effective point advantage because a knight doesn't have to face ~400 points of enemies - 4 knights have to face that proportion of the enemy army which can actually threaten them, which is a much, much smaller quantity - every antipersonnel weapon, power sword, even krak grenade, might as well not be on the board.

Heir of the Void wrote:

locarno24 wrote:
The Gorkanaut isn't a superheavy. Unlike a knight it's vulnerable to weapon destroyed and immobilized results and all the other guff that a normal vehicle suffers...

... Also, Gorkanauts not being superheavy strengthens the OP's point; they can be OHKO'd. Anyone got any ideas for fixing them?

OOO I DO! Don't run them in the competitive environment.

In all seriousness, it depresses me to say this, but it's the complete truth. Alternatively you could put a Big Mek with the Mega KFF for a 4+ invulnerable save on a Bike (with some other bikers) and run them along side. Put some Meks inside to repair it. But in all honesty, think of Gorkies and Morkies as Nobs. They're tough. But they die to their instant death equivilant. A Mega KFF Big Mek Biker is an expensive way, but you could take 3 Gorkies in the formation. It would add quite a lot of hurt and protection against ranged attacks. Your downside would be getting into CC against the superheavies.

In the competitive scene, Morkies and Gorkies have to compete with Lobbas, KMKs, Traktor Kannons, Battlewagons and Lootas. Orks typically need mobility to be effective these days. Most mobile armies need ranged support to cover their advances and take out lighter threats. If you can't move fast, and your troops can't make it to objectives, then you'll struggle. As neither the Morky or Gorky are assult vechiles, any unit they transport is dead weight on the turn they disembark, which is a really big turn off for me. + with no fire access points just makes me dislike this even more.

I'm not saying they're devastating (they're not), but as you note yourself they need support to work.

Weapon destroyed isn't too bad - you have so many zogging weapons that the odds of losing the two guns you really care about in any given situation (the mega-shoota or the klaw) are fairly low.

Being forced to snap-shot isn't that bad (only -1 BS!)

It's immobilized or stunned that are really game-breakers. As noted, if you can't get to objectives you're buggered, and since the 'naut moves at infantry speed....that takes too long anyway, especially since running is so-so: you don't have fleet and you're giving up way too much firepower to make running attractive. If the formation boosted the speed at all, I'd be all over them like bad moonz on free teef.

Not being an assault transport isn't the end of the world, because the transport capacity is so low. You're not carrying a viable assault threat anyway. That's why if I were to take anything, I'd recommend burna boyz. A small unit can still make a mess the turn it opens the hatches. It's a real shame it has no fire points, though - I'll agree with you there.

In response to your original post, I have 2 clear answers:
1. Because Tau and Eldar weren't selling a lot at the time and they wanted to make more £££ from a dead product
2. Because GW are "a model company first, a games company second" so expect their games to be wildly out of balance.

Why then are they called GAMES Workshop rather than MODEL Workshop? False advsertising?

To me, the Morky and Gorky should never have been released. So many other armies have big walkers, and we also have a Stompa. There was never a call for it. No one ever asked for it. What they should've given us was a Battlefortress model. That would have been a better centre peace for orks IMO.

It is something I've never really understood. The Stompa looks much more imposing, has all sorts of shiny extra bits Forgeworld have designed for it....... represents more points in game, and is about the same price.

Wraithknight is debatable. Wraithlords should be MCs, but at 3w and 6" move aren't a problem. WKs have that gakky fluff of having the wraith's still-living twin pilot it. So its someone riding an MC? Could go either way.

NDKs and Tides are walkers. Rules should be fixed.

All 3 are far too survivable. WK is t8 6w. Far too many HP. Other two have 2+/5+ t6 with tons of HP. Just wrong.

There is no fluff justification for Riptides and Dreadknights being MC's- they should be walkers.

Eldar units being MC's makes sense only because they're essentially giant lumps of animated clay, and in the fluff they even rapidly regenerate. So the material of their bodies is more akin to that of flesh and bone then a vehicle. They also don't have pilots, thus making them immune to crew shaken/stunned type situations (a psychic pilot isn't quite the same thing- it's more akin to a "brain" then an actual pilot).

 BlaxicanX wrote:
There is no fluff justification for Riptides and Dreadknights being MC's- they should be walkers.

Eldar units being MC's makes sense only because they're essentially giant lumps of animated clay, and in the fluff they even rapidly regenerate. So the material of their bodies is more akin to that of flesh and bone then a vehicle. They also don't have pilots, thus making them immune to crew shaken/stunned type situations (a psychic pilot isn't quite the same thing- it's more akin to a "brain" then an actual pilot).

Riptides, much like regular xv8 battlesuits are connected to the driver. When a riptide gets shot in the arm with a lascannon, the driver feels it.
Which fits the rules for having X amount of wounds instead of hull points.

I totally agree though, the two are way too OP right now and need balancing out.

 Wilson wrote:

 BlaxicanX wrote:
There is no fluff justification for Riptides and Dreadknights being MC's- they should be walkers.

Eldar units being MC's makes sense only because they're essentially giant lumps of animated clay, and in the fluff they even rapidly regenerate. So the material of their bodies is more akin to that of flesh and bone then a vehicle. They also don't have pilots, thus making them immune to crew shaken/stunned type situations (a psychic pilot isn't quite the same thing- it's more akin to a "brain" then an actual pilot).

Riptides, much like regular xv8 battlesuits are connected to the driver. When a riptide gets shot in the arm with a lascannon, the driver feels it.
Which fits the rules for having X amount of wounds instead of hull points.

I totally agree though, the two are way too OP right now and need balancing out.

From a fluff perspective...that seems like such a bad idea. What is the point of being in a big ass suit if you still feel the pain of being shot? One could argue that being connected makes the suit react just as quickly as your body would without the suit, increasing its effectiveness...but if your driver is getting hurt...he will be less effective, making the suit...well...kinda pointless in the grand scheme of it. If the suit gets peppered with artillery fire, and the driver is 'getting hurt', how is that making the damn suit work!? WUT!? Even for an Ork, dat is madness!

 Wilson wrote:
Riptides, much like regular xv8 battlesuits are connected to the driver. When a riptide gets shot in the arm with a lascannon, the driver feels it.

Dreadnoughts work in a similar fashion, iirc.

Melevolence wrote:

 Wilson wrote:

 BlaxicanX wrote:
There is no fluff justification for Riptides and Dreadknights being MC's- they should be walkers.

Eldar units being MC's makes sense only because they're essentially giant lumps of animated clay, and in the fluff they even rapidly regenerate. So the material of their bodies is more akin to that of flesh and bone then a vehicle. They also don't have pilots, thus making them immune to crew shaken/stunned type situations (a psychic pilot isn't quite the same thing- it's more akin to a "brain" then an actual pilot).

Riptides, much like regular xv8 battlesuits are connected to the driver. When a riptide gets shot in the arm with a lascannon, the driver feels it.
Which fits the rules for having X amount of wounds instead of hull points.

I totally agree though, the two are way too OP right now and need balancing out.

From a fluff perspective...that seems like such a bad idea. What is the point of being in a big ass suit if you still feel the pain of being shot? One could argue that being connected makes the suit react just as quickly as your body would without the suit, increasing its effectiveness...but if your driver is getting hurt...he will be less effective, making the suit...well...kinda pointless in the grand scheme of it. If the suit gets peppered with artillery fire, and the driver is 'getting hurt', how is that making the damn suit work!? WUT!? Even for an Ork, dat is madness!

But if a suit wanted a beer, it could drink the beer and feel drunk.

rules explained.

 Wilson wrote:

Melevolence wrote:

 Wilson wrote:

 BlaxicanX wrote:
There is no fluff justification for Riptides and Dreadknights being MC's- they should be walkers.

Eldar units being MC's makes sense only because they're essentially giant lumps of animated clay, and in the fluff they even rapidly regenerate. So the material of their bodies is more akin to that of flesh and bone then a vehicle. They also don't have pilots, thus making them immune to crew shaken/stunned type situations (a psychic pilot isn't quite the same thing- it's more akin to a "brain" then an actual pilot).

Riptides, much like regular xv8 battlesuits are connected to the driver. When a riptide gets shot in the arm with a lascannon, the driver feels it.
Which fits the rules for having X amount of wounds instead of hull points.

I totally agree though, the two are way too OP right now and need balancing out.

From a fluff perspective...that seems like such a bad idea. What is the point of being in a big ass suit if you still feel the pain of being shot? One could argue that being connected makes the suit react just as quickly as your body would without the suit, increasing its effectiveness...but if your driver is getting hurt...he will be less effective, making the suit...well...kinda pointless in the grand scheme of it. If the suit gets peppered with artillery fire, and the driver is 'getting hurt', how is that making the damn suit work!? WUT!? Even for an Ork, dat is madness!

But if a suit wanted a beer, it could drink the beer and feel drunk.

rules explained.

But...the suit can't drink! It's a SUIT! D: MADNESS!

Wraith constructs are not machines with some guy sitting inside them. They are wraithbone animated, that is, possessed, by a spirit. They are alive.

Alcibiades wrote:
Wraith constructs are not machines with some guy sitting inside them. They are wraithbone animated, that is, possessed, by a spirit. They are alive.

And Wraithknights are constructs that are possessed by the soul of an Eldar, and piloted by the souls still living twin.

Yes, it's fairly obvious when GW is making a "rules = cash" gambit.

In a better world, with a better company at the helm, tides would've been jump pack walkers, and still costed a small bit more. Not much since the switch from MC to walker is a big drop in durability, including the possibility of losing weapons, movement, and turns of doing stuff.

I was a magic tourney player and DCI judge for a while, and all I can say is that I wish GW had a rules design team like they do. Even the most corner cases have clear solutions, and silly amounts of playtesting goes into new sets. The only epic fail I remember is skullclamp, which they outright said was a mistake that slipped through. (And it was immediately tourney banned before people started trying to buy them.)

Like, if you played it for a long time, you can tell that the designers want to make the game awesome, not bleed the players for cash.

niv-mizzet wrote:
Yes, it's fairly obvious when GW is making a "rules = cash" gambit.

In a better world, with a better company at the helm, tides would've been jump pack walkers, and still costed a small bit more. Not much since the switch from MC to walker is a big drop in durability, including the possibility of losing weapons, movement, and turns of doing stuff.

I was a magic tourney player and DCI judge for a while, and all I can say is that I wish GW had a rules design team like they do. Even the most corner cases have clear solutions, and silly amounts of playtesting goes into new sets. The only epic fail I remember is skullclamp, which they outright said was a mistake that slipped through. (And it was immediately tourney banned before people started trying to buy them.)

Like, if you played it for a long time, you can tell that the designers want to make the game awesome, not bleed the players for cash.

I sold my mtg collection to buy wh40k. I regret it. I lost so much money selling to the comic book store at 40%. I am now losing money selling my wh40k. I lost so much money playing these games. I wish I could go back in time and warn my self about how much GW bleed the players for cash.

Naughts face the same problem all expensive vehicles face. It's no big deal if you get immobilized or explode result for a kan. And even a deff dread is affordable. But the problem is you have identical chances to loose a kan, a dread and a naught as soon as they get penned. And it's not that hard to pen an av13 vehicle for more than half of your opponents. And the ammount of weapons able to deal with a vehicle is far superior to the ammount of weapons able to deal with a MC. The argument: "But my riptide can be wounded by a lazgun!11" doesn't mean much when you need 72 lazgun shots before fnp to inflict a single wound on a 5-wound model. And around 5-6 melta or gravgun shots to more or less reliably invalidate a naught in one turn.

It's like having "roll d6 every time you're wounded and add +1 for ap2 or +2 for ap1; when the result is a 6 - the model can't move; when the result is a 7 - the model instantly dies" for your MC for no point reduction. Not talking about crew stunned and shaken.

Riptides aren't walkers because Broadsides and Crisis suits aren't walkers and the Riptide is just a bigger version of that.

Tell ya what- I'll trade the Riptide MC status for a Tau Empire Psyker that can use Divination and grant Invisibility and do all of the other psychic bs that every other faction but the DE gets to do.

Speaking of which, DE totally need a big cool MC.

I was unaware Tyranids could role on Divination or Telekinesis, that Necrons has psykers, I wasn't even aware they had Battle Brothers with whom they could be buffed by to get said spells like the DE!

And I do admit its pretty awesome that Invisibility is a primaris power so your guaranteed to get it every time.

...oh wait. No seriously I could go on all day. Markerlights ARE your psychic powers.

Yeah, the whole thing defies logic at this stage. Elder walkers were originally MCs because this made them different to Imperial and Ork ones - because they're lviging suits of armour rather than piloted vehicles, with reaction times to match.

Then the dread knight, riptide and wraith knight were released which probably stretched this concept a bit too far, giving you giant MC robots and a bit of a mess.

After all, the same logc (living brain 'wears' the suit like armour) is exactly how Dreadnoughts work, so why are they still walkers? And then why do Dresdknights (which, fluff wise, have less connection to their pilot than Dreadnoughts) get the MC advantage.

Generally, I think they should either make all these 'big robot' things walkers, and bring the walker rules more in line with the MC ones, or just make everything a MC and scrap walkers altogether.

Just add a damage table to MC and it'll be fine. I wouldn't mind this odd situations with MC/Walkers as thisis all abstractions anywayz. And a proper techpriest is more of a walker than infantry.

The problem is that MC and Vehicles have unballanced between oneself rules considering the current meta. We can argue on the benefits and drawbacks of vehicles and MC all day long but we can easilly see from tabletop experience that vehicles are generally much easier to deal with than MC. Just don't compare a Wave serpent and a single talos or something. Don't go in for extremes and it's an easilly observed trend.

My guess has always been is that GW knew the hull point system was a little flimsy when they released the models and they were lazy with coming up with the rules. They wanted to sell a lot of models so they gave them outstanding rules.

Not sure why they didn't just make them walkers with AV 13 and give them a saving throws instead. This would have accomplished the same without making everyone scratch their heads.

 EmpNortonII wrote:
Riptides aren't walkers because Broadsides and Crisis suits aren't walkers and the Riptide is just a bigger version of that.

Tell ya what- I'll trade the Riptide MC status for a Tau Empire Psyker that can use Divination and grant Invisibility and do all of the other psychic bs that every other faction but the DE gets to do.

Speaking of which, DE totally need a big cool MC.

They did - at one brief point - have one. In Epic: Armageddon there were unofficial playtest lists for quite a few armies which never got model releases. The Dark Eldar list included.... well, let's basically call it a Rancor. It was a war engine (read: gargantuan creature) which was a king-of-the-arena-monsters type, which could be bought as an expensive support option for a witch cult detachment. Turn one, you'd open a webway portal, poke it with agonisers until it came rampaging through, then close and lock said portal rather firmly behind it. You could either have beastmasters trailing behind it (in which case you could more or less persuade it to go where you wanted it to) or not (in which case you stayed the hell away whilst it hulk-smash-ed one flank of the enemy army).

Buggered if I can remember what the thing was called, though.

locarno24 wrote:

 EmpNortonII wrote:
Riptides aren't walkers because Broadsides and Crisis suits aren't walkers and the Riptide is just a bigger version of that.

Tell ya what- I'll trade the Riptide MC status for a Tau Empire Psyker that can use Divination and grant Invisibility and do all of the other psychic bs that every other faction but the DE gets to do.

Speaking of which, DE totally need a big cool MC.

They did - at one brief point - have one. In Epic: Armageddon there were unofficial playtest lists for quite a few armies which never got model releases. The Dark Eldar list included.... well, let's basically call it a Rancor. It was a war engine (read: gargantuan creature) which was a king-of-the-arena-monsters type, which could be bought as an expensive support option for a witch cult detachment. Turn one, you'd open a webway portal, poke it with agonisers until it came rampaging through, then close and lock said portal rather firmly behind it. You could either have beastmasters trailing behind it (in which case you could more or less persuade it to go where you wanted it to) or not (in which case you stayed the hell away whilst it hulk-smash-ed one flank of the enemy army).

Buggered if I can remember what the thing was called, though.

That sounds very cool. It needs to be resurrected.

 EmpNortonII wrote:
Riptides aren't walkers because Broadsides and Crisis suits aren't walkers and the Riptide is just a bigger version of that.

Surely with this reasoning Dreadnoughts should be MC since they are just bigger versions of TDA?

Personally i don't think Riptides should be MC for the following reason: take one Fire warrior model, then compare it to a Riptide then you will find that the suit have MUCH more Mecha parts then Squishy parts.

Here is my reasoning why i think Riptides should me Walkers:
Mecha Parts>Squishy Parts= Walker
Squishy Parts>Mecha Parts= MC


*And i know that GW models aren't to scale^^

 erinil0905 wrote:

 EmpNortonII wrote:
Riptides aren't walkers because Broadsides and Crisis suits aren't walkers and the Riptide is just a bigger version of that.

Surely with this reasoning Dreadnoughts should be MC since they are just bigger versions of TDA?

Personally i don't think Riptides should be MC for the following reason: take one Fire warrior model, then compare it to a Riptide then you will find that the suit have MUCH more Mecha parts then Squishy parts.

Here is my reasoning why i think Riptides should me Walkers:
Mecha Parts>Squishy Parts= Walker
Squishy Parts>Mecha Parts= MC

*And i know that GW models aren't to scale^^

So do crisis suits, broadsides, dreadknights, centurions and terminators all deserve to be walkers? They all have more metal than flesh? What about marines? They're all metal, so are they now vehicles?

The riptide isn't a walker as the Tau have no walkers; that's one of the things that makes Tau unique.