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Not sure where people get the idea that armor realistically can't be harmed by basic infantrymen. Knocking a wound off here and there is fine for representing soft kill contributors like de-tracking, damaging comms equipment, knocking out optics, crew injuries through lucky vision slit shots, damage to air intakes, etc. There are lots of ways to mission-kill an MBT that never involve penetrating the hull, especially when they're not buttoned-up like so many vehicle models in 40K.

I've never seen a game where basic Guardsmen have focus fired a tank from full health to dead, so it's not like lasguns are reasonable substitutes for proper AT weapons now. They can theoretically kill a tank, in the same way that a WW2-era grunt could theoretically put a .30-06 through the cupola of a PzIV, kill the TC via ricochet, and have the rest of the crew bail out. In practice, it's an extraordinarily rare occurrence, but the threat is significant enough to be worth modeling.

If a player is wary about getting their tanks close to basic infantry, even though it's statistically unlikely that they'll be appreciably harmed, then I'd say the mechanics have done a good job of reflecting reality.

Anyways, how on earth would having vehicles remain fully functional until they lose their last wound, at which point they suddenly explode, either be more realistic or improve the game? Degrading BS and speed are a simple and reasonably effective way to model degrading combat performance as a vehicle takes damage.

 greatbigtree wrote:
Frag grenade in an exhaust port? Frag grenade in a track? Frag grenade in a cannon? Frag grenade in a vision port? Crowbar pries open a hatch, and drop a frag grenade inside? Open a fuel port and drop a frag grenade inside? Wedge a frag grenade between a turret and the hull?

Attacks don’t necessarily represent a soldier punching armour. Sometimes it represents non-morons figuring out a way to damage a vehicle at close range using materials at hand. Overcharge a plasma pistol and use it like a melta bomb.

Free your mind!

And none of those are going to do anything to the tank because it's a frag grenade, a fragmentary device with minimal ability to penetrate armor and will cause superficial damage to a tank, not cause it to catastrophically explode. Besides grenades already have rules, they're called krak grenades. Likewise pistols can be used in melee too so once more, already accounted for in the rules and there is no need to allow for guardsmen to somehow injure titans on 6's. And vehicles either need the ability once more to simply splatter some infantry by driving over them or have appropriate melee attacks to represent them simply driving right over infantry foolish enough to charge them with bayonets.

I've never seen a game where basic Guardsmen have focus fired a tank from full health to dead, so it's not like lasguns are reasonable substitutes for proper AT weapons now. They can theoretically kill a tank, in the same way that a WW2-era grunt could theoretically put a .30-06 through the cupola of a PzIV, kill the TC via ricochet, and have the rest of the crew bail out. In practice, it's an extraordinarily rare occurrence, but the threat is significant enough to be worth modeling.

It happened - reading book on snipers and in some desperation the women were trying this - most failed and some killed doing so but now and again it worked. They fired at the driving slits. You don't need to destroy a tank to make it ineffective

In early 2017, an ISIS drone video shows an attack on an unsuspecting Iraqi M1, impacting the top of the tank and killing the exposed tank commander who was standing in his cupola.

Tanks operate with infantry support for a reason - if they don't it often goes very very badly.

On the purely gaming side having the ability for everything to damage everything else means that there is always a chance which IMO is a good thing - we all know how much fun it was in previous editions for Orks to face Knights - even though the fluff has them causing a threat by climbing all over it and trying to smash it up.

And vehicles either need the ability once more to simply splatter some infantry by driving over them

Well they at least have attacks now rather than Tank shock which so many were immune to but I would not be against vehicles being better at it.

I think strength and toughness should be lost, on accuracy.

Let people get a better chance to hurt the unit, but they aren't useless after two turns.

 Mr Morden wrote:
It happened - reading book on snipers and in some desperation the women were trying this - most failed and some killed doing so but now and again it worked. They fired at the driving slits. You don't need to destroy a tank to make it ineffective

Yep, that was exactly my point. It may be rare for a rifle or a frag grenade to damage or even incapacitate a tank, but it happens.

Throughout 20th-century military history, tanks have regularly been knocked out not because the armor is penetrated and the crew all killed, but because the crew bails in response to their vehicle no longer being able to move, no longer being armed, having a dead TC, being driven out by smoke and/or fire, or the sheer psychological pressure of being stuck in a tiny metal box amplifying the deafening sound of bullets hitting the hull. None of these require the hull to even be penetrated.

 Wyzilla wrote:
And none of those are going to do anything to the tank because it's a frag grenade, a fragmentary device with minimal ability to penetrate armor and will cause superficial damage to a tank, not cause it to catastrophically explode.

You know fragmentation grenades were regularly used to disable tanks in WW2, right? A grenade to a track roller results in a non-repairable de-tracking, allowing infantry to close and knock out the tank by firing into vision slits, stuffing more grenades into the turret ring or cupola, blasting into the engine deck to knock out electrical power, or any other number of nasty tricks. That's assuming they haven't already bailed, which if you're a tank crewman in a mobility-killed vehicle surrounded by enemy infantry is going to seem like a pretty good idea.

Finnish infantry beat Soviet armor with molotov cocktails during the Winter War, despite their utter inability to penetrate armor. The Soviets learned, as did the rest of the world, that a lack of armor penetration ability does not limit infantry to causing 'superficial damage to a tank'.

During the Battle of Baghdad in 2003, an M1 Abrams, a tank with armor so thick that PG-7 EFPs (dedicated anti-tank rockets) cannot penetrate it, was hit with machine gun fire which penetrated and ignited an external fuel tank. The fire spread to the engine compartment and knocked out the tank.

One thing I have consistently found is that wargamers, regardless of era or setting, consistently underestimate the vulnerability of armor to infantry, and utterly neglect the psychology of tank crews. Allowing tanks to operate with zero fear of being harmed by basic infantry is far more unrealistic than the possibility that multiple platoons of infantry coordinating fire at short range for the entire length of a game might knock out an intact tank, something I have yet to see actually happen on the tabletop.

5Yeah, Tanks irl aren't these unstoppable juggernauts that can only be beaten with specialized armor piercing weapons. You totally can cripple a tank with a lucky shot, and getting mobbed by infantry is still a possibility.

Hell, a molotov is just a bottle of gasoline, and that was quite effective against tanks, as whilst it didn't make the tank explode, the burning liquid would sometimes seep inside the tank to burn the crew, or melt the rubber on the wheels. An immobilized tank could be mobbed by infantry, who will seek out weakpoints in the tank.
Even today a modern tank could be rendered inoperable if the molotov destroys the electronics, it and if it lands in an open hatch its still game over. And that's not even mentioning the psychological effect it has on the crew.

It would be interesting if morale modifiers were based on wounds lost, not models, to represent the tank crew or monster freaking out. Of course, their morale stat would have to be pretty high too so they don't just run away if they take a single wound. At least 10, I would think. That way the vehicle / monster would have to take 5 wounds in a round in order to have a remote chance of failing.

To be fair, any successful infantry attack against a tank without dedicated anti-tank weaponry is ridiculously rare. Molotov cocktails work when prepared in advance and the attackers have ample cover such as an urban or heavily forested area.

Thinking that tank crews are highly vulnerable to basic infantry is an overblown myth. Good luck with that crowbar on a tank hatch...not happening. People struggle to open a damaged car door with a crowbar. Shooting into gun slits? What tank since the 30's hasn't had ballistic glass covering vision slits? The Japanese used to try to attack the vision slits on American tanks during WW II with bayonets only to discover this had no effect (this tactic was used against Russian BT tanks some years earlier). US tank crews stated that the most annoying thing about Japanese infantry attacks was the huge number of flies attracted after the suicidal troops got ground into the tracks. Platoons of tanks often fired upon themselves to scrub enemy infantry off of tanks because they knew the machine guns wouldn't harm the platoon.

Attacking a tank is a very dangerous business, and without special weapons it is desperate if not suicidal.

Indeed.

Infantry without dedicated AT weapons can harm tanks, but it's extremely dangerous and relatively rare. A lot of the stuff mentioned is blind luck or only relevant to early tank designs, or reliant on an isolated and unsupported vehicle being caught in close quarters by preprepared ambush. A molotov cocktail isn't gonna do much to any remotely modern vehicle, and a hand grenade causing (field) irreparable track damage is going to require someone sticking their hand into something analogous to a very large meatgrinder. That said, acknowledging that tanks arent totally invulnerable is good too, sometimes a crazy yahoo is willing to risk a hand in the tracks and doesn't get immediately mowed down.

As is, the system 40k uses in 8E is broadly ok, you aren't going to be able to successfully deal with armor without dedicated tools, but you can do minor damage or finish off an already badly damaged vehicle. That works for me.

As far as the OT goes, no. Meaningful damage tracks is the best think to happen to vehicles this edition. If anything I'd vote for the opposite of doing away with damage, it feels like most vehicles need 25% - 50% more damage boxes.