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so id like to create a discussion on cc and tanks and how to fix them, ive come up with what i feel is how we de-escalate the firepower while remaining fair to the units their based in. im not shutting off peoples ability to play a shooting army but to make shooting a much more smarter phase for some armies and less of a do well or die for others. this will also tone down the serious issues that divide the power of a tank over the power of a monster. it would also force people out of their monobuilds on some units that currently they run

1st change is to overwatch and fear i've discussed this in some other places and i feel this is fair, ill go over the changes briefly and why i feel they need to happen

overwatch amend to:

if a unit elects to overwatch and a close combat should occur anyway that unit attacks in cc at weapon skill 1 for the duration of their first round of combat. in addition the units that preformed the overwatch cannot exit a close combat by any means (unless they are a gargantuan monstrous creature/superheavy/titan or the charging unit has slow and purposeful) until the start of the next turn for the player that charged.

the idea here is to downplay overwatch and turn it into a mechanical thing you can choose to do as opposed to not. it lets you take a unit and react to close combat in the way they fight best rather then having free attacks before they can attack in cc anyway. this also makes it tough to decide if your going to overwatch with a unit that can hit n run or exit combat via some means and makes it a lot less clear whether you should shoot or take the cc on the chin before running away. and yes this does mean vehicles can become locked in a CC. this makes overwatch much more mechanical as opposed to this thing you just do because "the brb said so". deciding when and where to overwatch on the table is now an informed tactical decision. naturally some armies will do it anyway like tau would but this way if their just bad at shooting they cant just brush it off and have the unit potentially just leave



next change im going to move onto is fear, ATSKNF, and Fearless, amend to the following if you will:

should a unit with this special rule make a successful sweeping advance, or destroy an entire enemy unit as a result of a close combat inflict fear upon enemy units within 8". units afflicted by fear (that aren't joined by an independent character or they are a vehicle or a gargantuan monstrous creature, or are a flying unit) must make one run move d6 inches (2d6 for bikes and jetbikes) in a random direction immediately (determined by a scatter dice). if they should run through a friendly unit they count as having gone around/through them and arriving on the other side. if they should run into impassable terrain or an enemy unit they stop one inch away. a unit cannot be effected by fear more then once per turn


ATSKNF: a unit with this special rule can always determine the direction of travel it makes as a result of fear (though they still travel their normal distance)

fearless: a unit with this special rule can elect to ignore the effects of fear on an unmodified leadership check.

these changes put fear back into the center of the game again, with fear changes to the following a cc has potentially disastrous results for armies that enjoy defensive/passive play. the rules changes are meant to make fear do exactly what fear does. it makes people run in terror of a foe. command has broken down and all your yelling and order hymnals arent going to change things. your guys want out, their buddies just got slaughtered by a paragon of war 5 feet away. they dont want to be next. the atsknf change is meant to reflect that marines dont run away they simply move in a direction away from a threat they arent prepared to handle and are leaving it for another unit. people might point out that this means marines get free run moves if they let a charge kill some marines but that marine player might not have wanted those marines to move, they could be holding an objective, or they could have been in a position to charge and kill that cc threat, and now their running away making the charge harder. but the idea here is that fear makes your units move in directions you have no control over or at least move when you dont want them too. and yes this means units can run off the table from a cc again! (and lo there was much feasting and rejoicing). some may argue that this would cause fear heavy armies to cause a near endless cycle of fear runs for an enemy but as noted many units are immune to fear, and you might not always want a unit to run away, and terrain and table situation may dictate that fearing an enemy could be counter productive. basically it wont always be absolutely broken

vehicle drivers are immune to fear as they feel safe behind their thick armour plates. and can be looked at as sort of a positive over a monster who runs away potentially



invisible amend too:

invisible no longer causes enemy attacks in cc at ws1.

i wont lie this is really just a balance change not a fluffy change. it means that you cant use these rules changes in conjunction with invisible to resurrect invisible-stars




gargantuan monstrous creatures/monstrous creatures are next on my list, here the change i propose, while i haven't gone and talked with anyone one this or play tested it (like i have with the above which has been mostly positive though i feel there may be some issues i haven't encountered yet in armies i haven't played against yet). i feel these changes will at least not make the clear superior position of monsters over tanks be such an issue on the table. when shooting with a monstrous/gargantuan/flying monstrous creature creature please amend to:

a monstrous creature/gargantuan monstrous creature may only fire once every two turn (not counting overwatch) with any of its weapons starting the count from the first time the model/unit elects to fire them for the first time

the idea here is that unlike a tank who has a loader mechanism of some sort. a monster has to produce a new biological round in its body, or in the case of a clearly not a walker like the stormsurge the weapons need to cool down and recharge, unlike the tanks that have heat sinks to dump excess heat or auto-loading magazines on their weapons. this makes the use of a monster a lot less shooting oriented and more cc oriented. a weapon used when its necessary and not just this thing you can do every turn to lay waste to the enemy. which is why things like the flying hive tyrant have become such a staple of tyranids, its ability to spam large plates from the air is just so good that his other options or configurations seem worthless. and with the changes above at least giving pause about picking up a cc upgrade here n there in your army again means that the idea of using them for cc might not be as bad, or at least as a multi-role unit that can do both. about the only issue i can think of is the dreadknight, whom i feel would need to move to walker. if that makes a move i feel the rest of this wouldn't be to bad for them

The probelm with the proposed overwatch change is this: if overwatch still means "you can fire Snap Shots at a unit that charges you", it never makes sense to sacrifice both full BS shooting and effectiveness in CC to be able to overwatch. Even units that are worthless in CC - like most Tau units - would still rather fire at full BS on the previous shooting phase, and possibly try to escape with Hit & Run if they have it.

As for MCs firing every other turn, that's OK for MCs like the Hive Tyrant, Carnifex, Nemesis Dreadknight and Daemon Prince, that can have both effective shooting builds and effective melee builds. But for shooting-mostly MCs (like the Exocrine or the Riptide), it's a huge nerf. It's such a huge nerf for both of those that they become not worth taking. Spending 165-300 points for a model that must spend every other turn doing basically nothing is a kick in the teeth.

Now, one might argue that the Riptide needs that nerf, but the Exocrine does not. Nor do the various C'Tan Shards, for example. (Also, applying that nerf to a Riptide simply makes it outcompeted by Crisis Suits - at least they can shoot every turn. Mutatis mutandis, for most other shooting-heavy MCs that have little CC capability.)

The Dreadknight, oddly, isn't that badly affected - it has CC weapons, good WS and I and a decent number of attacks. The consensus on moving the Riptide to being a walker is mostly negative, too - apparently that makes it even more immortal than it already is by making it harder to kill in melee.

I think the real issue lies at the core resolution method for shooting and close combat.

Shooting hits on a flat value no natter what, Where as assault has to maneuver into close range , and then has an opposed roll to hit.
This leaves assault at a clear dis advantage.

Because there is no 'fine adjustment' in balancing shooting with an opposed stat, like 'doge' or 'stealth' skill.
40k flip flops between assault edition ans shooting edition.

This issue is magnified by the alternating game turn 40k uses.

I am sure if better balance between shooting and assault could be had, the team of professional game developers at GW towers would have hit on it in the last 17 year or so?

Therefore I think the inclusion of an opposing stat to BS is worth looking at.

I think opposing stats bog everything down. WS should work exactly like BS does now. Do you have a higher WS? You will hit with more of your attacks. Do you have a lower? Well, I hope you have a bunch of swings.

Some might argue that in general WSs can be higher then BS on more units in the game I agree, but in order to USE that WS they have to charge, survive overwatch, make it to their initiative step. With all that happening they SHOULD have a better chance of hitting with potential for rerolls on the really good units.

The other changes proposed are incredibly complex rules that are addressing symptoms not causes and are creating other problems as a result. You don't want to boost melee by hurting shooting. You want to boost melee by addressing the reason melee doesn't hold up at the moment.

As said, hurting MC isn't what you want to do. MC are fine in general. A few units need personal adjustments. Hive Tyrants need to cost less at base and wings need to occupy a set of arms (replacing a gun). If a HT cost... 30 points less a walking HT with 2 TL dev would be much more cost effective and a Flying HT with 1 TL dev and a thorax swarm would be a much more reasonable opponent that could still fire 2 weapons a turn (if they fly close enough to make use of the template) without the crazy 12 TL Str 6 shots that the devs dish out now. Also, I think the non electroshock grubs might become a little more popular.

Overwatch, as stated, just creates a uninteresting and ineffective choice. Which amounts to no choice, because why would you choose to hamper yourself?

I would get rid of overwatch entirely, it hurts so many CC units it's not even funny.

I think overwatch is less of an issue than charge distance. Charge needs to be something like 6+d6 (certain abilities either giving a reroll or rolling two and taking the best).

I think the biggest issue with GMCs is their toe in cover bs rule.

Vehicles just flat out need a buff in comparison to MCs/GMCs.

I feel most cc weapons are either subpar or too costly. As are many cc units. You NEED to be able to take cc in large groups than shooting for it to be effective.

I think Overwatch is needed in the game, but needs some tweaks and changes.

I think invisibility needs changes too.

I think charge distance would be fixed if you could run in shooting and charge in assault. Nothing else needs fixing at that point. If your capable of both shooting and assault you make a choice. If your a pure assault unit, you get to assault easier.

I really don't understand why they don't allow it to begin with.

As for active overwatch, I think it should be a choice like shooting or running in the shooting phase.


Instead of shooting a unit may declare that it is going on overwatch.

A Unit that is on overwatch cannot run in the shooting phase or charge in the assault phase.

At the end of any opponents phase, a unit on overwatch my fire their weapons at an enemy unit at half range. Any weapon that cannot be fired as snap shots cannot be fired on overwatch (no templates, no blast) Rapid fire weapons reduce their rapid fire range by half as well.

All units begin the game on overwatch.

A unit may only fire overwatch once a turn.


This would give you an interesting tactical choice. If you cannot shoot anyone then go on overwatch and let them come to you. Granted at a much reduce range. This means if an enemy moves or runs to get near for an assault, you can trigger an overwatch after they move to get a shot at them. If you don't do this, the enemy can just charge you without fear of overwatch.

To counter how potent over watch can be units should be able to run and charge, charge after arriving via deepstrike, infiltrator, and leaving a vehicle. .

I like the idea of units being on over watch not being allowed to shoot in the shooting phase, for me this one change could redress the balance between cc and shooty armies

So, once again, you'd have to choose between shooting at full BS in the shooting phase, or not shooting at all so that you can fire snap shots if you get charged? That... really does not seem like much of a choice to me, except in those cases where you can't hit anything anyway, but something can still get into charge range - I suppose that could happen with very short-range guns like Eldar shuriken catapults.

The fact that you have to bring massive numbers of CC attacks for them to matter is a larger problem, so is random charge distance. I like the d6+6 idea - some random component is needed or it's too easy to stay away (fixed 6" charge with 6" moves) or too hard to stay away (fixed 12" charge with 6" moves), but 2d6 leads to silly things like failing a 3" charge against a pinned enemy.

Run then charge is not a bad idea. Some balancing would be needed, since that's essentially the secret sauce that some Harlequin formations get, and Orks (WAAAGH!), but it would help. Maybe fix it so that units that can already run and charge can shoot, run and charge, while others can shoot or run, then charge. (Things that can't charge if they shoot are already mostly covered by Rapid-fire, Heavy and Salvo weapons)


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 NorseSig wrote:
I think overwatch is less of an issue than charge distance. Charge needs to be something like 6+d6 (certain abilities either giving a reroll or rolling two and taking the best).

I think the biggest issue with GMCs is their toe in cover bs rule.

Vehicles just flat out need a buff in comparison to MCs/GMCs.

I feel most cc weapons are either subpar or too costly. As are many cc units. You NEED to be able to take cc in large groups than shooting for it to be effective.

I think Overwatch is needed in the game, but needs some tweaks and changes.

I think invisibility needs changes too.

Yup, mostly agreed on all of the above. Toe in cover is pretty lame for MCs too, honestly.

Melee cost is tricky - the one thing melee has going for it is "locked in combat". You can assault something that you'll lose against just to glue it down so it can't shoot. I think that does probably make melee-centric units, especially fast ones, worth a bit of a price premium. Weapons, though, are too expensive, yes, and there's also the "power sword costs the same for a guard sergeant as a Wolf Lord" issue.

Invisibility, ugh. I think the ITC fix isn't a bad one - all attacks against the invisible unit are resolved at WS1/BS1, so at least you can fire blasts and templates. (And you still hit on at least a 5+ in melee).

Part of the problem is due to GW making it much harder to get off a first or in some cases even a second turn charge, the shooting unit gets to fire once or twice at full BS and then when I'm finally going to get into attack, you get to make snap shots at me and if you have flame weapons, you get auto hits.

If we rolled back the clock and take some rules from 5th edition.

Allow units to attack out of outflank.
Allow units to assault out of a transport if it hasn't moved

additionally
Allow all units to run and assault in the same turn, most dedicated assault units have either no shooting attacks or a fairly bad one.
make charge ranges 6 inches plus 6.

@ionusx: I'm afraid I'm not a fan of these proposed changes. :( Let's take a look at some of your ideas.

Overwatch:
I see what you're going for, but I don't think this would produce the results you intended. Something that's already much better at shooting than punching, but they aren't really losing anything from doing so. Fire warriors, as a classic example, aren't likely to deal many punching wounds anyway, so they might as well shoot. Units that don't shoot at all don't care about this change too much (when they're on the receiving end of things that is). The problem I see with it is that moderately-shooty-moderately-assaulty units are the ones that are punished the most. That fire warrior will gladly give up a single measley point of WS to overwatch, but a tac marine or assault marine unit? Those guys are either losing out on 3 points of WS (to the fire warrior's 1) or giving up their chance to overwatch with flamers, plasma, bolters, etc.

So the result is that...
* Shooty units hardly get penalized by it when charged and don't usually do charging themselves.
* "Balanced" units are relatively severely penalized by it when charged, but don't benefit from it at all when charging a choppy unit and only benefit from it a little when charging a shooty unit (because they were already going to punch the shooty unit's teeth in).
*Choppy units don't care about this rule when on the receiving end of a charge, and they were already stomping the snot out of shooty units anyway.

I guess maybe this helps when balanced or choppy units assault a balanced unit, but honestly, overwatch never seemed like it needed fixing in those situations. Outside of squishy-but-expensive assault units like harlequins or wyches, and outside of armies that have rule to make overwatch more devastating (tau, dark angels, etc.), overwatch usually isn't all that crippling.

The scariest thing about overwatch is that it might make you fail a charge, but that's more of an issue with random charges.

Also, I'm not a fan of keeping track of which units are WS 1 for a turn or of denying a unit the chance to fly away (hit & run) because it's panic-firing at something.

Fear/ATSKNF/Fearless:
The biggest problem with Fear is that so many things in the game ignore it. While your changes do a good job of creating an atmosphere of panicked disarray, they don't really address this problem. Sure, guardsmen might run away in a random direction, but marines will just choose the direction (possibly using the move to run *towards* the unit they're "afraid" of), and fearless units still aren't affected.

Also, if you're proposed changes are in addition to the normal rules for ATSKNF and Fearless, then you won't actually sweep a unit very often because marines and fearless units won't be sweepable. If your proposed rules *replace* the current ATSKNF and Fearless rules, then keep in mind that those rules are no longer helping against shooting, psychic powers, etc.

On top of that, these proposed changes are just plain time-consuming. At the end of an assault phase (which is already generally pretty involved), you roll leadership for every unit in a bubble (after figuring out which units are in that bubble), and then potentially have to roll a run die for each unit, and then have to take the time to move all those units.

And then, after you do all that, it won't actually make much difference for most units. A unit that is already within 8" of a combat is probably not going to have trouble shooting at the fear-causing unit in the following turn. Even if the scatter die moves them directly away from the fear-causers (and it's entirely possible it won't), then can still move and fire normally in the following turn. Even heavy weapons aren't going to mind their little panic dance all that much so long as that d6" run move hasn't thrown off their line of fire or made them run *closer to* the fear-causer.

I like what you're going for, but I think the execution could use some work. I think a streamlined, polished version of this would make a good rule for a Night Lords formation or "legion tactic."


Invisible:
Invisibility being broken is more of its own issue than a "shooting is too good" issue. There are plenty of ways to fix it, but I think it needs to be fixed against both shooty and assaulty armies; not just the latter.


"Staggered" MC/GMC Shooting:
As has been pointed out, this seriously hurts some things more than others, and it probably hurts any shooty MC more than it should. Was a barbed strangler carnifex or a wraith lord really shooting too much? Sure, this tones down the annoyingly powerful shooty MCs (which are mostly Tau MCs and the wraith knight), but it also makes the former almost not worth taking.

Your fluff reasoning for it doesn't really make sense to me either. MCs that are mechanical in nature (rip tides, for instance) can reasonably assumed to have whatever auto-loaders or cooling systems their vehicular cousins have. Sticking it on legs rather than treads or a skimmer base shouldn't really change that. Wraith lords and wraith knights do not seem to have crews manually changing out ammo. Whether that star cannon is mounted to a wraith lord, a wraith knight, or a falcon, whatever mechanism puts the next shot in the chamber is going to go just as fast for one as for the other. Organic and supernatural weapons (tyranid MCs and daemon MCs) shouldn't be assumed to fire more slowly. Sure, a barbed strangler shoots organic stuff, but the tyranid doesn't have to take the time to form a fresh kidney stone each time it shoots. It can reasonably be assumed to have a bunch of the things already stored in the weapon. It can also be assumed to have organic ways of dealing with excess heat or any other proposed issues. These are aliens designed specifically to shoot meat bullets at you. It is literally the one thing they do in "life." As for daemonic shooting, I think we can agree that there is no "realistic" rate of fire for a reality-bending barrage of warp fire or Nurgle barf.

Staggered fire is an interesting idea, but I think it would work better as something you slap on specific weapons rather than giving it only to (all) MCs.

jade_angel wrote:
So, once again, you'd have to choose between shooting at full BS in the shooting phase, or not shooting at all so that you can fire snap shots if you get charged? That... really does not seem like much of a choice to me, except in those cases where you can't hit anything anyway, but something can still get into charge range - I suppose that could happen with very short-range guns like Eldar shuriken catapults.

I said you fire overwatch at full BS but at half range, but with the same restrictions to what guns can and cannot be fired. You would get to make that shot at the end of any enemy phase. So... enemy movement, a unit moves into your Overwatch range, You can take your shots before he moves on to shooting. You sacrifice your shooting in the shooting phase for a reactive shot in the enemies turn at half range with weapon restrictions.

The fact that you have to bring massive numbers of CC attacks for them to matter is a larger problem, so is random charge distance. I like the d6+6 idea - some random component is needed or it's too easy to stay away (fixed 6" charge with 6" moves) or too hard to stay away (fixed 12" charge with 6" moves), but 2d6 leads to silly things like failing a 3" charge against a pinned enemy.

Run then charge is not a bad idea. Some balancing would be needed, since that's essentially the secret sauce that some Harlequin formations get, and Orks (WAAAGH!), but it would help. Maybe fix it so that units that can already run and charge can shoot, run and charge, while others can shoot or run, then charge. (Things that can't charge if they shoot are already mostly covered by Rapid-fire, Heavy and Salvo weapons)

I was thinking they could shoot then run then charge myself. Running and then shooting can get really nuts, but specifying that they could do a normal move, fire their weapons, and then run to help close the distance for assault would not be a game breaking bonus for those formations and special rules that otherwise allowed running and assault.

Automatically Appended Next Post:

 NorseSig wrote:
I think overwatch is less of an issue than charge distance. Charge needs to be something like 6+d6 (certain abilities either giving a reroll or rolling two and taking the best).

I think the biggest issue with GMCs is their toe in cover bs rule.

Vehicles just flat out need a buff in comparison to MCs/GMCs.[]

I feel most cc weapons are either subpar or too costly. As are many cc units. You NEED to be able to take cc in large groups than shooting for it to be effective.

I think Overwatch is needed in the game, but needs some tweaks and changes.

I think invisibility needs changes too.

Yup, mostly agreed on all of the above. Toe in cover is pretty lame for MCs too, honestly.

Melee cost is tricky - the one thing melee has going for it is "locked in combat". You can assault something that you'll lose against just to glue it down so it can't shoot. I think that does probably make melee-centric units, especially fast ones, worth a bit of a price premium. Weapons, though, are too expensive, yes, and there's also the "power sword costs the same for a guard sergeant as a Wolf Lord" issue.

Invisibility, ugh. I think the ITC fix isn't a bad one - all attacks against the invisible unit are resolved at WS1/BS1, so at least you can fire blasts and templates. (And you still hit on at least a 5+ in melee).

I agree with WS/BS 1 for invisible. I also agree that it is important to remember that locked in combat is a massive potential bonus.

The short answer for fixing vehicles is just to up hull point counts across the board. Volume of S6-7 won't be the one-stop solution to everything if it takes more than two or three 4s to kill light vehicles, low-AP weapons will become more important if you actually need to fish for damage results instead of killing a tank by pumping lots of bullets into it, and with more survivable transports and worse long-range tank-killing choices the close-range/melee game might make a resurgence.

Tanks in 30k feel a lot more like tanks than the ones in 40k, because armour values and hull point values are slightly higher on average and D-strength weapons aren't a normal fixture of the battlefield.

Lance845 wrote:

jade_angel wrote:
So, once again, you'd have to choose between shooting at full BS in the shooting phase, or not shooting at all so that you can fire snap shots if you get charged? That... really does not seem like much of a choice to me, except in those cases where you can't hit anything anyway, but something can still get into charge range - I suppose that could happen with very short-range guns like Eldar shuriken catapults.

I said you fire overwatch at full BS but at half range, but with the same restrictions to what guns can and cannot be fired. You would get to make that shot at the end of any enemy phase. So... enemy movement, a unit moves into your Overwatch range, You can take your shots before he moves on to shooting. You sacrifice your shooting in the shooting phase for a reactive shot in the enemies turn at half range with weapon restrictions.

Oh, that makes more sense. That's actually a decent tactical choice, if you can't reach anything or can only reach a suboptimal target, and it might also be a decent way to deny enemy shooting with Pinning weapons, etc.


<snip>

I don't see Overwatch as much of an issue. Unless charging a unit of flamers or a large mob of Ork Shootaboyz I've never seen Overwatch kill more than three or four models at most, even against a unit of Devastators with Heavy Bolters.

Tau, of course, are a different bag of beans. Against them you need a hard unit of chargers to shrug off the firepower or sacrifice a unit to draw Overwatch before charging the rest of the Tau. But Tau are mostly so bad in close combat that the rule kind of makes sense for them.

I'd love to see 'ignores cover' weapons sharply curtailed to help advancing melee infantry, though.

As far as vehicles go, it's way too easy to hit a moving vehicle in close combat under the current rules. Traditionally it takes guts to charge a fifty ton moving monstrosity sporting multiple guns. To reflect that I'd make charging a tank require a Ld test. Other vehicles would not require a test.

Going with current trends, stationary vehicles in close combat should be treated as WS1, cruising speed WS3, flat-out WS5. It really IS harder to hit a fast moving vehicle in a vulnerable spot with a grenade or melee weapon than a stationary one.

Other than that, some vehicles should probably get an increase in Hull Points... mostly tanks again. I'd give tanks another 2-3, and heavy walkers like Dreadnoughts another 1-2. Skimmers and Ork Buggies, which are around AV10 and come in squadrons, are probably fine where they are. Light walkers like Sentinels, Warwalkers and Killa Kans are probably also OK.

jade_angel wrote:

Lance845 wrote:

jade_angel wrote:
So, once again, you'd have to choose between shooting at full BS in the shooting phase, or not shooting at all so that you can fire snap shots if you get charged? That... really does not seem like much of a choice to me, except in those cases where you can't hit anything anyway, but something can still get into charge range - I suppose that could happen with very short-range guns like Eldar shuriken catapults.

I said you fire overwatch at full BS but at half range, but with the same restrictions to what guns can and cannot be fired. You would get to make that shot at the end of any enemy phase. So... enemy movement, a unit moves into your Overwatch range, You can take your shots before he moves on to shooting. You sacrifice your shooting in the shooting phase for a reactive shot in the enemies turn at half range with weapon restrictions.

Oh, that makes more sense. That's actually a decent tactical choice, if you can't reach anything or can only reach a suboptimal target, and it might also be a decent way to deny enemy shooting with Pinning weapons, etc.


<snip>

That is my thought. Good use of pinning could counter over watch usage. Over watch usage can become effective weapons against assault as they have to go through move, psychic, shoot (or run) and charge with each step being an opportunity for over watch to trigger. Assault should get to run and charge and charge after deepstrike to up their threat, but the enemy gets no overwatch unless they prepare for it.

And I have said this in other places, unsure if I said it here, but if these rules are in effect then all units should begin the game on overwatch. You could not drop pod or infiltrate onto their door step and do a turn 1 assault without a barrage of over watch coming from the enemy line. It's not that you CAN'T assault turn 1, it's that it's extremely risky. A much more interesting set of choices for the players to make.

Lance845 wrote:

I said you fire overwatch at full BS but at half range, but with the same restrictions to what guns can and cannot be fired. You would get to make that shot at the end of any enemy phase. So... enemy movement, a unit moves into your Overwatch range, You can take your shots before he moves on to shooting. You sacrifice your shooting in the shooting phase for a reactive shot in the enemies turn at half range with weapon restrictions.

This idea is similar to the "reaction" system I use, that enemy actions within a specific range trigger a reaction (eg 6" inch and if you sacrifice your shooting phase for Overwatch you get 12" reaction range)

The difference is that I add more possible reactions (like counter charge to add something for pure melee units) and only models react, not whole units (no need to decrease weapon range because you can only shoot at the unit which triggered the reaction)

 kodos wrote:

Lance845 wrote:

I said you fire overwatch at full BS but at half range, but with the same restrictions to what guns can and cannot be fired. You would get to make that shot at the end of any enemy phase. So... enemy movement, a unit moves into your Overwatch range, You can take your shots before he moves on to shooting. You sacrifice your shooting in the shooting phase for a reactive shot in the enemies turn at half range with weapon restrictions.

This idea is similar to the "reaction" system I use, that enemy actions within a specific range trigger a reaction (eg 6" inch and if you sacrifice your shooting phase for Overwatch you get 12" reaction range)

The difference is that I add more possible reactions (like counter charge to add something for pure melee units) and only models react, not whole units (no need to decrease weapon range because you can only shoot at the unit which triggered the reaction)

The problems I see arriving from your reaction system are twofold.

First it creates a system where assault vs assault favours the defender trying to get close to charge means they charge you first. It likewise cripples abilities like furious charge and gaining the extra attacks on the charge. As the defender watching some carnifex getting closer to charge why would I ever not preemptively charge first denying them hammer of wrath +1 attack and +1 str? Even with a shooty unit its better to deny them.

Second, saying reaction range is x vs half range fails to account for different army's strengths and weaknesses. The tau should have a stronger overwatch. Sniper weapons should cover more ground then pistols. That variance creates a more dynamic battlefield inherently which creates a more interesting gameplay experience.

jade_angel wrote:
The probelm with the proposed overwatch change is this: if overwatch still means "you can fire Snap Shots at a unit that charges you", it never makes sense to sacrifice both full BS shooting and effectiveness in CC to be able to overwatch. Even units that are worthless in CC - like most Tau units - would still rather fire at full BS on the previous shooting phase, and possibly try to escape with Hit & Run if they have it.

yes well in the case of the tau they have markerlights to modify their BS and group overwatch, its not like they dont have enough ways to negate their low bs as is, about the only army i can see this being a problem for is the mech, as the orks and marine flavours would all relish the cc chance anyway and would likely move to cc being the solution anyway, with chaos daemons same thing, a lot of their units are a lot better at cc anyway and those that arent generally arent first in line, the tyranids perhaps offer the biggest issue as does the guardsmen. guard rely on weight of gunfire to kill things and only really have the gryn twins who would want to lock horns, they arent the worst at it but it isnt their forte, but that can be amended on a codex level, the tyranids have sheer weight of gunfire in squads if they bring it and certain units are currently being press ganged into shooting anyway like warriors for example. the dark eldar and eldar have issues but i think this game gives enough consolations to the eldar twins as is, what with the harleys being really strong in the first place for cc thanks to beasts like the solitaire, and their ludicrous magic and jetbikes

As for MCs firing every other turn, that's OK for MCs like the Hive Tyrant, Carnifex, Nemesis Dreadknight and Daemon Prince, that can have both effective shooting builds and effective melee builds. But for shooting-mostly MCs (like the Exocrine or the Riptide), it's a huge nerf. It's such a huge nerf for both of those that they become not worth taking. Spending 165-300 points for a model that must spend every other turn doing basically nothing is a kick in the teeth.

Now, one might argue that the Riptide needs that nerf, but the Exocrine does not. Nor do the various C'Tan Shards, for example. (Also, applying that nerf to a Riptide simply makes it outcompeted by Crisis Suits - at least they can shoot every turn. Mutatis mutandis, for most other shooting-heavy MCs that have little CC capability.)

your right on the front of the exocrine but its meant as a field gun of sorts not an actively moving monster, same with the riptide and stormsurge and ta'unra and while it might be unfair to them. its certainly making the though of hammerheads a lot more appealing. and really when was the last time a tau player bothered with hammers and skyrays when he can have those ranged damage monsters. it might be a nerf outside of the codex on a grand scale, a bad one but internally it levels off a lot of the imbalance between their vehicles and monsters. treating them more as a desert unit you include to top off an army, rather then a meat n potatoes auto-take. ill need to dwell on the exo but thats how i feel towards the tau suits issue

The Dreadknight, oddly, isn't that badly affected - it has CC weapons, good WS and I and a decent number of attacks. The consensus on moving the Riptide to being a walker is mostly negative, too - apparently that makes it even more immortal than it already is by making it harder to kill in melee.

yeah but moving the tide or surge to a walker means you might kill it with lascannons, mortal enemy of walkers. set the av right and you have a whole new way to safely disarm it beyond, dropping a unit in or rushing a unit at it and getting lucky/spamming grav like its the end of days, which by the way is another reason these monster nerfs need to happen, grav is too much of an auto take for marines, and cutting down on good targets for a grav gun means your taking out the incentive for spamming it in every unit you can stuff it. in a conventional marine army specialists have flamers and meltas and plasmas, and a variety of heavy weapons. on the table its missiles, gravs and the odd melta because you didnt have points for more grav

Lance845 wrote:

The problems I see arriving from your reaction system are twofold.

First it creates a system where assault vs assault favours the defender trying to get close to charge means they charge you first. It likewise cripples abilities like furious charge and gaining the extra attacks on the charge. As the defender watching some carnifex getting closer to charge why would I ever not preemptively charge first denying them hammer of wrath +1 attack and +1 str? Even with a shooty unit its better to deny them.

Second, saying reaction range is x vs half range fails to account for different army's strengths and weaknesses. The tau should have a stronger overwatch. Sniper weapons should cover more ground then pistols. That variance creates a more dynamic battlefield inherently which creates a more interesting gameplay experience.

I seem, I did not make it that clear that reactions are done after the action is performed not in between or before (at least I understand "reaction" that way that it is always performed afterwards and not before the triggering action is finished). Otherwise it would not work.
even if the reaction interrupts the action you cannot deny hammer of wrath or stuff like that because the charging unit still charges.
So the first problem does not exist and you need no special rules for overwatch units in close combat because units which are better at shooting just do so and get no additional strike chance in melee, while units without ranged weapons can strike back and both units get their charge bonus

a bigger reaction range for some special weapons (like sniper rifles) would not be the problem, while 1,5" melter range (for melter pistols) make those weapons not worth taking.
I like the idea of a more dynamic battlefield, but I don't like the flat -50% for all (I would see it more like, 1/4 weapon range for heavy weapons, 1/2 for assault and rapid fire, full range for pistols)

In the first I was thinking of reacting to a run or move that put the enemy in range. If the assault unit runs to close the gap for a charge and the other unit reacts by charging first all the on the charge bonuses would be negated. But I very likely did not understand your proposed system.

In the second that is intentional. Pistols should be near if not flat out useless for overwatch. Specialist weapons should be for specialist situations.

Lance845 wrote:
In the first I was thinking of reacting to a run or move that put the enemy in range. If the assault unit runs to close the gap for a charge and the other unit reacts by charging first all the on the charge bonuses would be negated.

If a melee unit moves in 2" of an enemy unit during movement phase instead of staying 6" away to be out of reaction range this will happen (got you wrong).

Lance845 wrote:
Pistols should be near if not flat out useless for overwatch. Specialist weapons should be for specialist situations.

My time in military service is long ago but pistols were only there for "reactions" were heavy or assault weapons could not be used.
The MG loader would draw his pistol to shoot at enemy's in close range instead of bulling the heavy weapon around

So I see pistol as the best Overwatch weapon because the are there to be used at close range at attacking enemy's

 kodos wrote:

Lance845 wrote:
In the first I was thinking of reacting to a run or move that put the enemy in range. If the assault unit runs to close the gap for a charge and the other unit reacts by charging first all the on the charge bonuses would be negated.

If a melee unit moves in 2" of an enemy unit during movement phase instead of staying 6" away to be out of reaction range this will happen (got you wrong).

Lance845 wrote:
Pistols should be near if not flat out useless for overwatch. Specialist weapons should be for specialist situations.

My time in military service is long ago but pistols were only there for "reactions" were heavy or assault weapons could not be used.
The MG loader would draw his pistol to shoot at enemy's in close range instead of bulling the heavy weapon around

So I see pistol as the best Overwatch weapon because the are there to be used at close range at attacking enemy's

But that is not what overwatch is. I get that it's what 40k makes it but an active tactical overwatch is creating an effective killzone and waiting for enemies to enter it.not short range per se but more waiting on ambush. If you have a bolter or bolt rifle why would you wait for the enemy with your pistol?

If you want Overwatch to be an effective killzone with heavy or rapid fire weapons than you need to change also the arc of sight.

Waiting on ambush with a rifle or heavy weapon limit the arc of sight and shooting somewhere else than the direction you point at first should not be possible or at least not with full BS.

That way I would see it working as a tactical option for melee units to flank or get in the back of a unit instead of just being killed no matter from where you attack.

I go around in circles a lot on CC.

Overwatch = I1
I've thought about overwatch meaning you attack at I1 in the following combat as you switch weapons/are overwhelmed by the attackers.
It doesn't stop overwatch but at least causes a decision rather than - here's some dice because.
It would also help towards combat where because you charged into terrain you're again at another disadvantage.

WS - straight rolls
Having WS function like BS with set rolls. However, for CC units you don't actually want to win the first round of combat in your turn. Therefore you need to have less hits go through. What you want is to do damage, survive, and then win the combat in the other player's turn. Which is a roundabout way and therefore not efficient.

Consolidation into a new combat.
I understand why this can seem unfair as once a CC army gets in close they can mince through endless units. Firstly, they'd get the option of overwatch. Then maybe the unit that gets "charged" via consolidation gets a one-off "Hit & Run" option i.e. they get an immediate initiative check. If they pass, they can break away 3".
Again, at least there's there a decision to be made by both players.
At the moment if you do actually get a successful charge in then your CC unit may do it's work too well - and if it does it's left stood there waiting to get shot to bits and then go through charge/overwatch all over again. CC feels like it is being penalised at times.

In short, there should be more decisions to make even if it's A or B.


No matter the option there will always be at least one army that suffers because there are so many of them.

 ionusx wrote:

jade_angel wrote:
The probelm with the proposed overwatch change is this: if overwatch still means "you can fire Snap Shots at a unit that charges you", it never makes sense to sacrifice both full BS shooting and effectiveness in CC to be able to overwatch. Even units that are worthless in CC - like most Tau units - would still rather fire at full BS on the previous shooting phase, and possibly try to escape with Hit & Run if they have it.

yes well in the case of the tau they have markerlights to modify their BS and group overwatch, its not like they dont have enough ways to negate their low bs as is, about the only army i can see this being a problem for is the mech, as the orks and marine flavours would all relish the cc chance anyway and would likely move to cc being the solution anyway, with chaos daemons same thing, a lot of their units are a lot better at cc anyway and those that arent generally arent first in line, the tyranids perhaps offer the biggest issue as does the guardsmen. guard rely on weight of gunfire to kill things and only really have the gryn twins who would want to lock horns, they arent the worst at it but it isnt their forte, but that can be amended on a codex level, the tyranids have sheer weight of gunfire in squads if they bring it and certain units are currently being press ganged into shooting anyway like warriors for example. the dark eldar and eldar have issues but i think this game gives enough consolations to the eldar twins as is, what with the harleys being really strong in the first place for cc thanks to beasts like the solitaire, and their ludicrous magic and jetbikes

Methinks you've missed my point. It's not the losing CC effectiveness that's the kick in the teeth, it's having to give up your shooting phase just to have the option of firing Snap Shots that is. Tau can boost their BS with markerlights, that much is true - but do you know what it takes to do that on Overwatch? You have to use Supporting Fire, for one, since marker tokens drop off after the shooting phase. This means your Pathfinders, Drone Squadrons or the like have to sacrifice their shooting phases also (which means a lot less markerlights to go around for other shooting), then they have to snap fire them. Then, if they score any hits, another unit can use those tokens to boost their BS, but since this is all snap shooting, you're starting from BS1, or maybe BS2 if you have a CDS. Statistically, six Pathfinders get one marker hit. (Which means, about 50% of the time, they'll actually get zero!) Once that's happened, the unit being charged can snag it, and fire at BS2 (no blasts). Very impressive, no? And to do that under your proposed system, unless I misunderstand, both the Pathfinders and the unit at risk of being charged had to stand there and pick their teeth during the shooting phase, and then, if CC ensues anyway, they get to be almost useless (more so than they already were).

I get what you're driving at, but I think it's a massive overnerf.

Also, as an aside, Dark Eldar are really not even close to being on the same tier as Craftworld, right now. There are some allied shenanigans, but outside of that they're kind of in a bad spot.

As for MCs firing every other turn, that's OK for MCs like the Hive Tyrant, Carnifex, Nemesis Dreadknight and Daemon Prince, that can have both effective shooting builds and effective melee builds. But for shooting-mostly MCs (like the Exocrine or the Riptide), it's a huge nerf. It's such a huge nerf for both of those that they become not worth taking. Spending 165-300 points for a model that must spend every other turn doing basically nothing is a kick in the teeth.

Now, one might argue that the Riptide needs that nerf, but the Exocrine does not. Nor do the various C'Tan Shards, for example. (Also, applying that nerf to a Riptide simply makes it outcompeted by Crisis Suits - at least they can shoot every turn. Mutatis mutandis, for most other shooting-heavy MCs that have little CC capability.)

your right on the front of the exocrine but its meant as a field gun of sorts not an actively moving monster, same with the riptide and stormsurge and ta'unra and while it might be unfair to them. its certainly making the though of hammerheads a lot more appealing. and really when was the last time a tau player bothered with hammers and skyrays when he can have those ranged damage monsters. it might be a nerf outside of the codex on a grand scale, a bad one but internally it levels off a lot of the imbalance between their vehicles and monsters. treating them more as a desert unit you include to top off an army, rather then a meat n potatoes auto-take. ill need to dwell on the exo but thats how i feel towards the tau suits issue

Something of a fallacy of fungibility - the Riptide is not a Heavy Support choice, both of the tanks are. In Elites, the obvious substitute is more Crisis Suits. The Stormsurge and Ta'unar are both Lords of War, likewise. The problem with Hammerheads and Skyrays is mostly one of vehicles being in a weird place (either made of glass or almost totally immortal - if you can deal with them at all they crumble, if not they're near untouchable) and of one-shot AT weapons being unreliable, not of Riptides being too good - well, unless you're playing Unbound, where the slot competition effect doesn't apply.

Honestly, I think a buff to vehicles goes further toward fixing the problem than does nerfing shooting MCs into the ground. For example, as a Tau player, I'm not about to pay 180 points for a naked Riptide that can only shoot every other turn (and maybe not even that, thanks to Gets Hot). I'll spend those points on more Crisis Suits. Or maybe a Hammerhead, yes. But it moves the unit not from auto-take to merely decent - it moves it from auto-take to never-take, the same kind of bad-joke status that Pyrovores and Vespids are relegated to.

If it does that to something like the Riptide, consider its effect on already-marginal MCs like the Wraithlord. Wraithlords are slow, they lack an invulnerable save, and they take up a heavily-contested Heavy Support slot. As such, despite decent CC stats, they're almost always taken as shooting platforms, when they're seen at all. If they're unable to shoot more than every other turn, they're suddenly not interesting at all. By contrast, the overpowered Wraithknight has no such issues - it's a fast GC that's just about as good in CC as shooting. Still interesting, even nerfed!

The Dreadknight, oddly, isn't that badly affected - it has CC weapons, good WS and I and a decent number of attacks. The consensus on moving the Riptide to being a walker is mostly negative, too - apparently that makes it even more immortal than it already is by making it harder to kill in melee.

yeah but moving the tide or surge to a walker means you might kill it with lascannons, mortal enemy of walkers. set the av right and you have a whole new way to safely disarm it beyond, dropping a unit in or rushing a unit at it and getting lucky/spamming grav like its the end of days, which by the way is another reason these monster nerfs need to happen, grav is too much of an auto take for marines, and cutting down on good targets for a grav gun means your taking out the incentive for spamming it in every unit you can stuff it. in a conventional marine army specialists have flamers and meltas and plasmas, and a variety of heavy weapons. on the table its missiles, gravs and the odd melta because you didnt have points for more grav

Agreed on the grav problem. Grav is necessary, but somewhat too good. It needs some tuning, to put it mildly - the issue is more one of internal balance than external.

As for making the Riptide a walker, part of the issue is this - you get two different main guns. One has 72" range, and that's the one that makes everyone cry. That can dance around outside the range of all but a very few weapons, raining down hell. It's hell on wheels against Marines. Putting that on a walker allows the walker to mostly sit outside of lascannon range, while at the same time being mostly invulnerable to fast-moving assault units, which are one of the few ways to neutralize a Riptide with the IA now.

The other main gun is a 36" mid-strength spamcannon that makes it so you want to be up close, but not in CC - exactly where a walker doesn't want to be. It's in range of just about everything, even with JSJ shenanigans. This, I suspect, is what the current high durability was designed for. Combining T6/W5/2+/5++ with the IA is where the brokenness comes into play.