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Craft world eldar added to first post

Changes for codex Tyranids now in the first post

Astra militarum changes are up.

Not the biggest fan of yarrick as a lord of war, mostly because yoi can't take him and a baneblade for pseudo Fortress of Arrogance. That and compared to guys like Clagar, Ghaz, Logan, and other character LoW he just isn't as good.

Leman russes get a decent boost with heavy actually being a benefit now in regards to ordnance.

Most other things seem in order, just my thoughts on it.

Most things seem ok but you need an entire book just to keep record of all your house rules. Missed out the one where the visitor brings the beer though

I made Yarrick a lord of war for the thematics of it, and his fortress of arrogance is in there

I have a lot of houserules, but the errata for the different armies is actually voluntary within my group. If you wanted to run pure codex, and your opponent didn't, they would still be a fairly balanced game.

Say you wanted to run the errata for eldar, and your opponent wanted pure Tyranids. Your armies would be much closer in power than they are now, and the same is true vice versa.

They would balance out better if both ran with the errata, but being closer means the game would already be more competitive.


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Also, we have a jar for donations and a potluck for food once a month for all day gaming. So there may be beer here already

First post updated, now with 100% MORE chaos space marines!

I'm not too keen on the changes to the Helldrakes, although making it a monstrous creature means it no longer counts as having a hull mounted weapon, it loses a lot of survivability. Weapons that before were useless against it (such as heavy bolters and to a degree, grav spam) are now either able to would it or in the case of grav, completely neuter it. Add on the requirement to have to see if they crash every time you take a wound which causes even more damage and you have one very dead chicken.

But, it is very rare for those things to have skyfire. There is also the fact that now it can drop down and fight in close combat (forgot to add 3 attacks @ ws3 and strength 7)

I'll update the post, can't believe I forgot to add that

With toughness 7 it won't matter that they don't have skyfire. They can put out enough shots that one can bring it crashing Down for another wound. Not to mention the weapons that would typically have skyfire to take them out are more likely to damage it than with the armour 12 as it is guaranteed damage on an extra dice face in every instance.

But, with a 3+ save most of the hullpoints dealt out will be negated without jinking.

If a quadgun now wounds on a 4+ instead of glancing on a 5 your survivability doesn't drop that much since you will deny damage with one higher chance than jink would.

Also, couldn't heavy bolters still wound the rear armor?

For a heavy bolter to cause a wound without skyfire you would need about 96 shots to do so. Compound that with there only being a chance to fall out of the sky and you being able to charge if it did happen. Hell, you would still have a 5++ to help with the wound from being grounded if it did happen.

If you aren't sure about it working, play a game! Have a buddy take a look at the houserules, both of you build lists using the eratta, and give it a go.

My buddy who plays chaos hates having to play without these houserules. It actually annoys him how few options he has when he plays anywhere else.

Ok, let's put that into practice in the scenario my helldrake was in yesterday. Storm raven vs helldrake. In my matchup using the Base rules, the only weapon it had was a multimedia to harm me, and unless he somehow got behind me, his bolters could glance. In your situation, everything could have wounded me, so 12 bolter shots. 3 heavy bolter shots and the Melta. Suddenly those Stats don't seem as appealing. On the subject, it still wouldn't work anyway as a flying monstrous creature as it's effectively a mutated fighter jet, and when was the last time you saw a fighter jet fight something head to head. The vector strike is literally the sort of thing a hawk does, fly past and claw at whatever it banks out against before moving off. It doesn't hit the ground, stop and dust itself off then fly away

Just looking at that hurts. I think you may have overstepped the bounds of 'house rules' and gone into the realm of 'I'm going to rewrite the rules as I see fit'.

If the hell Drake can already hover, and the harpy/hive crone are able to fight on the ground with no legs to walk on, what is the big deal? Did you jink the multimelta? If so, the. You weakened your ability to injure other things because of jink.

Now, with the rule change you will be more maneuverable, have the ability to fire 360° when shooting, and gain smash. Don't forget, there is also no chance to be exploded in one shot by the multimelta. No chance to lose weapons or crash and burn due to immobilised results.

I see the helldrake in the imperial Knight game and it makes perfect sense to have it fight in melee.


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 CREEEEEEEEED wrote:
Just looking at that hurts. I think you may have overstepped the bounds of 'house rules' and gone into the realm of 'I'm going to rewrite the rules as I see fit'.

That's fair, but my group and I have been evolving these rules for several years. People would bring up rules issues they either see personally or see a lot of questions/complaints about online and we discuss if it will be an issue for us and what we want to do about it.

So, we ended up where we're at. A bunch of tweens to most every part of the game that lets every codex compete on a pretty even footing.

Lythrandire Biehrellian wrote:
If the hell Drake can already hover, and the harpy/hive crone are able to fight on the ground with no legs to walk on, what is the big deal? Did you jink the multimelta? If so, the. You weakened your ability to injure other things because of jink.

Now, with the rule change you will be more maneuverable, have the ability to fire 360° when shooting, and gain smash. Don't forget, there is also no chance to be exploded in one shot by the multimelta. No chance to lose weapons or crash and burn due to immobilised results.

I see the helldrake in the imperial Knight game and it makes perfect sense to have it fight in melee.

No, I didn't need to as he was too far away and didn't roll high enough to damage it. also, there is a difference between hovering and "fighting on the ground with no legs" hovering is that effort is taken to keep away from the floor to bring things to bear. fighting on the ground as a harpy/ hive crone is more of a strafing attack where they close in enough to bring their scythes and talons to bear. a heldrakes claws aren't made for proper fighting, they're made for grabbing on and tearing things out when they pull away like a bird of prey pulling prey into the air. different fighting styles.

There are lots of other things I could say about this, why only 3+ save, mechanoids are 2+. immobilised can be ignored by fliers. They're referred to as daemon ENGINES, so they are likely to be vehicles. same as with what you have done to the mauler and forge fiend. you made them go from laughing at the paltry space marines to actually being able to be taken down by them.

Here's something to think about, lightning claws. they would mince all of the above in close combat where as before they could not be damaged by them as they weren't strong enough. a 5 man assault squad with lightning claws would easily shave about 2-3 wounds off that in one turn. the thing to think about is that warhammer (as imperfect as it is) is a very loose game of triangles. each unit has a strength and a weakness of sorts. some have weakness against mass shots, others have weakness against Quality shots and some things such as vehicles are supposed to be unconquerable by a standard model. making these a monstrous creature gives no massive benefits apart from rudimentary protection from explosions but makes them far easier to wound and kill to the average piece.

Flyers don't ignore immobilised results, they are either stunned or crashed.

Lightning claws wound on a 6, so there would have to be a lot of them to take one down, and as daemons they have a 5+ invul save to keep them going.

Why would a harpy and hive crone work that way but not the helldrake? The two Tyranid monsters also don't have a long prehensile neck. Couldn't it fight in melee in the exact same way as the Tyranid fmc's?

Considering most people scream about how rediculous it is that these creatures are robots and weaker than most monstrous creatures, I didn't think I someone would argue about them being so.

(Also, my houserules for the riptide take it to a 3+ with a "Mecha" special rule and the dreadknight is a walker in their update.)

Lythrandire Biehrellian wrote:
Flyers don't ignore immobilised results, they are either stunned or crashed.

Lightning claws wound on a 6, so there would have to be a lot of them to take one down, and as daemons they have a 5+ invul save to keep them going.

Why would a harpy and hive crone work that way but not the helldrake? The two Tyranid monsters also don't have a long prehensile neck. Couldn't it fight in melee in the exact same way as the Tyranid fmc's?

Considering most people scream about how rediculous it is that these creatures are robots and weaker than most monstrous creatures, I didn't think I someone would argue about them being so.

(Also, my houserules for the riptide take it to a 3+ with a "Mecha" special rule and the dreadknight is a walker in their update.)

I said flyers can, not do, ignore immobilised. difference in meaning of words.

ok, so a heldrake fights with its head, gonna be very difficult not to overbalance and crash. Tyranids don't need prehensile necks as they have claws positioned to attack. ever watched starship troopers, there are flying bugs that make strafing attacks and slice at people, that's exactly how a harpy would do it.

ok, lightning claws wound on a six, but you can also use the shred rule as it is a roll to wound, not penetrate, so more damage when as a vehicle they cannot damage. same could also be said of how now that they are a monstrous creature, they are vulnerable to snipers, poison and even instant death weapons. the black mace reads that it is basically an infected mace that liquefies people, how do you liquefy a daemon engine which is machine using a disease?

They're not weaker than monstrous creatures really when you look at how people will take them down. being toughness 7 and 3+ save means nothing when the weapons designed to take you out are things like lascannons and missile launchers which, surprise surprise, ignore your armour anyway. that's why being a vehicle is better. you have an additional side of the dice where your opponent can't harm you so it doesn't matter that you have no armour save because you would not get one anyway. when I field my pack of 5 Maulerfiends against my opponent, I want to know that his mundane guns are useless and that he has to carefully consider his shots as they rampage towards him, undaunted by anything lesser than an assault cannon.

As for the Riptide edit, by that logic a terminator should be armour 3+ as well then as the chest armour of a riptide (Which is made of a better, much denser alloy than a standard crisis suit) is much thicker than the armour that protects a terminator.

The riptide is 3+ because every other jetpack unit and both of the other big suits are 3+

Your daemon engines are armor plates creatures with bulging MUSCLES and visible veins. They can swallow people and have obvious organic components.

While you would have some weakness to bolters, you are infinitely more protected against melta and grav as well as those high strength weapons like lascannons only ever possibly doing g a single wound to the creature as opposed to the damage table currently.

The Tyranid creatures don't have claws, they have a tail to strike with and have to bite otherwise. You have rear mounted claws to strike with, a more maneuverable neck, and giant bladed retractable wings. The helldrake is more valuable in melee that the Tyranids are...

Lythrandire Biehrellian wrote:
The riptide is 3+ because every other jetpack unit and both of the other big suits are 3+

Your daemon engines are armor plates creatures with bulging MUSCLES and visible veins. They can swallow people and have obvious organic components.

While you would have some weakness to bolters, you are infinitely more protected against melta and grav as well as those high strength weapons like lascannons only ever possibly doing g a single wound to the creature as opposed to the damage table currently.

The Tyranid creatures don't have claws, they have a tail to strike with and have to bite otherwise. You have rear mounted claws to strike with, a more maneuverable neck, and giant bladed retractable wings. The helldrake is more valuable in melee that the Tyranids are...

I presume by you saying both the other big suits you mean the ghost keel and the Storm surge. so lets analyse that. The ghostkeel is a smaller frame, and is designed for stealth, so a heavy, all protective armour would not suit that role, they have a better stealth save instead and the 12 inch snapshot rule. the Stormsurge is a walking artillery piece so isn't made for frontline fighting, thus the reduced need for expensive heavy armour. that's why astra militarum artillery has low armour values. the Riptide is made to cut swathes in frontline fighting so would be heavy armoured so that it lasts longer as it draws more fire.

the damage table isn't as scary as it used to be, 4 of the results are minor and while the last 2 hurt, it's still very difficult to outright explode them. which is thy you use the same tactic as monstrous creatures, hug cover. Grav seems intentionally poorly balanced to the max so GW can sell new kits. why take a melta gun or lascannon when grav does both anti-MEQ and TEQ. a weapon like that should either have lots of shots or be good at wounding, not both.

Regarding the rear mounted claws, have you lloked at the size of them, they suffer from T-Rex syndrome, there's no way they would be any good in an actual fight. the wings appear bladed but how are you going to use them in a fight with a marine on the ground. their lower body would hit the ground before they even came close to the head clearance of a marine. the heldrake isn't more valuable than a tyranid in melee because a heldrake wasn't designed to fight on or near the ground for an extended period due to innate weakness, it was designed to spit death over the battlefield from above and throw fliers around when they drew it's ire.

Which is where it will spend most of its time. It has more wounds than it did hullpoints, can fight if needed, and gained better versatility without needing to start off the field, not needing to jink anything with ap4 (which is the most common anti air weapon AP value) and having a 360° firing arc, and has a shorter movement minimum.

Whatever allows it to hover close enough to the ground for marines to run up and plant a grenade on it would allow it to hover and bite/claw them for trying now.

The broadsides are also long range support fire and they are 2+ the riptide is an outlier that boasts too high a defensive capability for the points it puts on the table. If you think a standard 4-5 foot range is a close range weapon, you aren't paying attention.

The riptide is fast fire support, it shouldn't also be as durable as a tank to boot.

Lythrandire Biehrellian wrote:
Which is where it will spend most of its time. It has more wounds than it did hullpoints, can fight if needed, and gained better versatility without needing to start off the field, not needing to jink anything with ap4 (which is the most common anti air weapon AP value) and having a 360° firing arc, and has a shorter movement minimum.

Whatever allows it to hover close enough to the ground for marines to run up and plant a grenade on it would allow it to hover and bite/claw them for trying now.

The broadsides are also long range support fire and they are 2+ the riptide is an outlier that boasts too high a defensive capability for the points it puts on the table. If you think a standard 4-5 foot range is a close range weapon, you aren't paying attention.

The riptide is fast fire support, it shouldn't also be as durable as a tank to boot.

Ok, so its a flying monstrous creature. all of a sudden it wants to fly away but oh wait, there's men there so it can't because its locked in combat when realistically it would just jet off and burn whomever was stupid enough to be trying to keep it down. you are too focused on what seems positive that you are completely missing the disadvantages that come with being an infantry piece over a vehicle for the heldrake.

Broadsides have long been established that way as "higher armour than a crisis suit" so were given a 2+ save, Riptides fall into the same category, their armour is better than a crisis suit, so the save must be higher, thus the 2+ save. there are plenty of posts quoting that a D6 system is poor representation of armour because it is so limited in scope that things that would have slightly inferior armour if fluff are in fact the same as another piece. If the scope were wider, I've no doubt that the saves would be different. with such a limited system, you have to work off the question "is it weaker, the equivalent of, or stronger than?" the riptide is definitely in the stronger than category because it was designed to be more protective, with thicker plates and a denser material.

also, I've never seen people sit at 4-5 foot range with a riptide because you have a secondary weapon system that you can fire. the ability to move in, rapid fire plasma's and then assault move away means that my riptides are rarely on my own side of the board. they cause damage because your opponent feels pressured to remove them if they are on your side of the board, ignoring other targets that would be easier to remove that can cause more problems.

if you're saying that a riptides armour has to come down to a 3+, you are effectively saying that the entire armies save must be reduced by one to compensate and keep with the "is it higher, equal or lower" perspective, and good luck selling that.

I kind of wish I could play at your FLGS. My Guard might actually be worth taking

My biggest issue is poison and sniper working as normal against gargantuan creatures.
Harridans are stupidly expensive as it is.
I rather not have 300 points of DE venoms able to just gun it down with ease like it's a carnifex.

If you're being tied down in melee, something has already gone terribly wrong. If you hovered a helldrake before, it got charged and killed. Now you can fire overwatch at least and can get some attacks in to boot.

The harridan in my rules is 90 points cheaper and is only hit with snapshots by those venoms.

Tau in first post

The Ordnance rule doesn't really do anything to infantry/Monstrous Creatures. So... Not sure what you're trying to accomplish.

 JNAProductions wrote:
The Ordnance rule doesn't really do anything to infantry/Monstrous Creatures. So... Not sure what you're trying to accomplish.

Look at his first spoiler'd image. You'll see that Ordnance weapons are changed to do d3 wounds for every unsaved wound against Monstrous Creatures (it should arguably be against anything with multiple wounds, but eh, whatever).

Edit II: In fact, I'd rather see the Ordnance effects on MC parallel the effect on Vehicles, one way or another - whether you change Ordnance to cause d3 HP of damage on a Penetrating hit instead of allowing you to roll an extra dice to Pen, or give Ordnance weapons the ability to re-roll to-wound rolls against MC and other multi-wound infantry. That makes it significantly easier to understand and recall the effects of special rules.

Edit: Looking through the list again, I'd like some clarification: How does the Ordnance and "AP1 unsaved wounds cause an extra wound to MC" changes interact? Would an unsaved wound result in d3 wounds as well as an additional wound rolled? If that additional wound succeeds, would that be another d3 wounds, or just a single additional wound?

A few questions for Lythrandire about the changes:

Why are Skyrays made so expensive? A D-shot Railgun-equipped Hammerhead is less expensive than your default Skyray... Can you point on the doll where the bad Skyray touched you?
Edit: Or was that a typo, and you meant 105 points instead of 150? That would make a lot more sense.

Did you forget to include the "Riptides have 3+ instead of 2+ armor" change you've been discussing?

Should the Mecha rule also give a Poisoned or Fleshbane equivalent with the Haywire special rule (i.e. units with the Mecha subtype are wounded on a 2+ from attacks with Haywire)?

Which option list is available for the Stormsurge now that it is a Vehicle? If it is a vehicle, that means it no longer has access to a Shield Generator, presumably, and instead will have to rely on cover saves and a Dpod?

You've given Kroot Stealth (Ruins) and Vespid Shrouded (Ruins). Why are Kroot, who are better known for their stealth capabilities and have more to gain from cover saves (by being more reliant upon them), less protected than Vespid?

Ah, oki. Didn't read through everything, so I missed that.

It was a typo and omission. (I'm running on 4 hours of sleep)

The second wound generated by ap1 wouldn't benefit from ordinance. There are very few ordinance ap1 weapons, so there shouldn't be too much of a problem.

The reason for the kroot change is that in the formation the current benefit is kroot gain shrouded forest and the vespid gain stealth forests. I added the bonus the other way because it would make sense. The vespid gain the benefit of kroot stealth craft, while the kroot may have gotten a "taste" of the vespid's inherent camouflage. (Get it?)

I wasn't worried about the haywire change for Mecha because it is much more prevalent in the game than fleshbane. If your meta needed it to take down the tau mech suits, feel free to add it!

Why wouldn't the storm surge have access to shield generators? It is just an invul save...

Lythrandire Biehrellian wrote:
It was a typo and omission. (I'm running on 4 hours of sleep)

Makes sense. S'all good!

The second wound generated by ap1 wouldn't benefit from ordinance. There are very few ordinance ap1 weapons, so there shouldn't be too much of a problem.

Not a lot of ordinance AP 1 weapons, but there are a LOT of Melta AP1 weapons, and you make Melta count as Ordinance against mecha MC. That will happen a LOT.

The reason for the kroot change is that in the formation the current benefit is kroot gain shrouded forest and the vespid gain stealth forests. I added the bonus the other way because it would make sense. The vespid gain the benefit of kroot stealth craft, while the kroot may have gotten a "taste" of the vespid's inherent camouflage. (Get it?)

I'm not seeing it, but I could just be dense.
Edit: Do Vespid come standard with Stealth (ruins)? Its been so long since I've played them...

I wasn't worried about the haywire change for Mecha because it is much more prevalent in the game than fleshbane. If your meta needed it to take down the tau mech suits, feel free to add it!

Fair nuff. I just like seeing parallels between rules for ease of understanding. Haywire works as a combination of Poison(2+) and Rending, but vehicle only, and it seems like it should apply the same against mechanical creatures like 'tides.

Why wouldn't the storm surge have access to shield generators? It is just an invul save...

Vehicles in the Tau Empire don't have access to the Infantry wargear choices, and visa versa. You've changed the Stormsurge from an infantry model to a vehicle model. Vehicles do NOT have access to a Shield Generator choice.

Was your intention not to change the wargear choices (so that the SHV can choose the infantry gear choices, like EWO and Shield Generators) despite the change in type? That's something you might want to make explicit.

Edit: Just to be clear, as you didn't state the choices change, a RAW reading of your house rule is that the Stormsurge would still choose from the Infantry wargear list. It is your intention I'm wondering about, and I think its worth being explicit whichever way you go, as a change in unit type that significant has pretty significant implications for the choices available.