Forum adverts like this one are shown to any user who is not logged in. Join us by filling out a tiny 3 field form and you will get your own, free, dakka user account which gives a good range of benefits to you: No adverts like this in the forums anymore. Times and dates in your local timezone. Full tracking of what you have read so you can skip to your first unread post, easily see what has changed since you last logged in, and easily see what is new at a glance. Email notifications for threads you want to watch closely. Being a part of the oldest wargaming community on the net. If you are already a member then feel free to login now.

S6/7 is the best way to kill most vehicles in 7th, due to the Pen table change. IIRC, the intention behind the change was to make AP1/2 stuff much more relevant for wrecking vehicles. So, effectively, it backfired.

Suggested solution:
-All non-SH non-Flyer vehicles gain +1 HP
-AP3 and better all get +1 to the Pen result

This would make mid S with bad AP much less effective at killing tanks. Serpent Shield, scatter Lasers, Shuriken Cannons, Assault Cannons.

It would make the stuff designed to kill tanks that much better at it (Krak missiles are now more penetrating than a Heavy Bolter. Melta pens now have a good chance to kaboom something. Individual Lascannons are a threat).

Also, it'd make disabling vehicles mean more, as they are more likely to survive the HP loss if its not an Explodes.

Why don't SH get an additional HP? Screw Knights. Perhaps I'm biased. Besides, SH have a lot of HP already.

Why don't flyers get an additional HP? Because Flyers are inherently less stable. S6/7 spam feels right when it brings down my Stormtalon.

A more complex solution might be more balanced, but would take too much work. One such example would be:
Pen Effect- d6 - [Remaining HP] - [Pen AP] +4?
Natural 6: Additional Pen, applied after the current one, instead of Pen Table effect (resolved at same AP)
7+, "Explosion: does D3 HP. If the vehicle is reduced to 0 or below HP, its an 'Explodes', as now.
1-6: As now
0 and below: No additional effect

This would apply to SH as well (their HP is their protection).

Think about this. AP suddenly matters, but a random Lascannon is probably not popping an untouched LR. It could, but much less likely. But the AP2 on it really helps.

I'm very much in favor of both giving AP3 weapons +1 on the pen chart and of changing "Explodes" to "Critical Hit" or something similar where you lose d3 HP and go boom if there are none left.

OTOH, I'm less sure about adding +1 HP across the board. It's not bad exactly, though. I'm mentally running through how vehicles tend to die in most of my games. It seems to me I see the most kabooms against open-topped AV10 squishies (because most anything can kaboom it) and against AV14 (which takes few enough damaging hits that the probability of one being an Explodes starts to get up there). The exception is Haywire, which I'm not sure what to do about - it's like Fleshbane for vehicles, except that most models with a T value have an armor save (and most Fleshbane weapons have bad AP).

I think +1 HP would make Rhinos, Razorbacks, Devilfish, Wave Serpents and most other such things last longer. I worry about the margins, though - Raider/Ravager/Venom/Trukk on the one extreme, Land Raider/Monolith on the other. I suspect most of the AV10 open-topped squishies will still be dying to spamguns, they'll just be blowing up proportionally more often than they already do, while AV14 will be depending on fishing for kabooms more than is already the case. Though, that's partially counterbalanced by the fact that a Raider might live through a Crit/Explode from an autocannon (woo, I lose three HP. Got one left!), whereas now, it's definitely dead if that happens.

Not even sure why you listed Assault Cannons on that list. It isn't like they're spammable enough to actually do any real work. Plus they Rend so they'll get AP2...

Slayer-Fan123 wrote:
Not even sure why you listed Assault Cannons on that list. It isn't like they're spammable enough to actually do any real work. Plus they Rend so they'll get AP2...

Not against vehicles this edition they won't.

I'm in favour of increased hull points across the board, possibly also increased armour. Tanks in 30k feel a lot more like tanks should to me than tanks in 40k, and they managed to do that by making a 5HP Land Raider with twice the guns and a 13-12-12 Predator with triple the guns the staple vehicles.

I had thought that the "resolved as AP2" effect on Rending weapons didn't apply to the vehicle damage chart - was I wrong about that?

Also, between Storm Talons, Razorbacks, Land Speeders, etc, you can get a fairly good number of assault cannon shots out there.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
Also, just giving a few more vehicles AV12 on the rear could help somewhat (even AV11 can help, since that makes bolters and shuricats ping off, and leaves pulse weapons and burst cannons fishing for sixes).

Rear AV10 is an important drawback. Many infantry in the game have a snowballs chance in hell of killing an AV10, but can't even touch AV11. So, front is immune, rear is fairly safe.

There is enough completely-immune stuff in this game already.

WRT the Assault Cannon: you cannot roll a 6 to wound as you're not rolling to wound - so still AP4.