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I've been thinking, what are some wys to make MC and vehicles slightly more viable but without changing points or power level.

Then i also started to think about infantry and the damage chart.

What if the Damage Chart was by +2 or -2 to damage on 2+ and 6+?

Example:
Strength equal to Tough; wounds on 4+
Strength higher than Toughness by 1; wounds on 3+
Strength lower than Toughness by 1; wounds on 5+
Strength higher than Toughness by 2 or more; wounds on 2+
Strength lower than Toughness by 2 or more; wounds on 6+

This would make S5 wound infantry on a 2+, and S5 wound T7 on a 6+, making cheap infantry slightly easier to kill and tanks slightly harder to kill

You could also add an addition rule if wanted (Double the strength deals 1 additional MW for hit fail armor or invul save)

You mean going back to 7th edition?

We saw how that turned out, we don't want S6-7 spam to become a thing again.

It's a novel idea, but would make some guns hilariously un-killy. Space Marines for example would become BARELY better than Guardsmen. In fact, the issue with chaff being able to damage anything doens't change, it just makes MEQ infantry less viable to an even more drastic extent.

I think I'd just make the standard light infantry statline T2. Keep marines at T4. Then Bolters wound light infantry on 2s. It also allows more nuance between Guardsmen and Marines. Aspect Warriors for example could stay T3.

Resilience was eliminated from the game while damage was scaled up about 300-400%. Bring mor models or lose.

I'm not a fan of the OP suggestion. It is essentially the same as the last few editions. While it's an ok change on paper, it ends up making Marines even worse and S6-7 spam really good again.
The current To-Wound chart gives a bit more breathing room for weapons and avoids strX being the go-to for most situations.
Str 4, for example is decent against T3 (most non-super human Infantry) while not being useless against T6/7 (most vehicles). This is good for the health of the game.

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 Galef wrote:
it ends up making.. S6-7 spam really good again.

Would the simple solution to that not be to just make S6-7 harder to spam?

I don't like this. Infantry need to be made tougher, not weaker. Damage compared to defense is so out of whack this edition.

bouncingboredom wrote:

 Galef wrote:
it ends up making.. S6-7 spam really good again.

Would the simple solution to that not be to just make S6-7 harder to spam?

How do you do that? The CWE codex alone would need a complete rewrite. 3 out of their 5 common weapon upgrades are S6. Not so simple of a solution.
Keeping the current To-wound system as-is, however, makes this work out just fine.

Although to counter my own argument, one of the things that made Str6 spam so good in prior editions was how good it was at stripping Hull Points, which are no longer a thing, so it might not be so bad.

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HoundsofDemos wrote:
I don't like this. Infantry need to be made tougher, not weaker. Damage compared to defense is so out of whack this edition.

More like “In future defense has been purposely eliminated.”

Pancakey wrote:
Resilience was eliminated from the game while damage was scaled up about 300-400%. Bring mor models or lose.

NOPE.

Damage was significantly altered. There used to be hard caps as to who could get saves versus things(AP) or damage other things. Those are gone.
Resilience has shifted from "I can stack an invulnerable and/or cover save to insane proportions" to "I have negative hit modifiers!".

OP: you want more survivable vehicles and monsters? Keywords. That's really the simplest and best solution.

Also, some of them just don't need it.

To be fair, stacking invulns to ridiculous levels is still a thing. GW has nerfed a few of the ways to get a 2++ already, and a 3++ is still considered pretty good.

I definitely think lethality of the game has absolutely gone through the roof though. Nothing feels durable if it doesn't have an invuln, and even stuff with an invuln feels vulnerable if it is only like a 5++. Knights are T8, 24 wounds, 5++. In any sane game they would be among the most durable units. As it stands? They are trivially one-shottable for a good army.

 Kanluwen wrote:

Pancakey wrote:
Resilience was eliminated from the game while damage was scaled up about 300-400%. Bring mor models or lose.

NOPE.

Damage was significantly altered. There used to be hard caps as to who could get saves versus things(AP) or damage other things. Those are gone.
Resilience has shifted from "I can stack an invulnerable and/or cover save to insane proportions" to "I have negative hit modifiers!".

OP: you want more survivable vehicles and monsters? Keywords. That's really the simplest and best solution.

Also, some of them just don't need it.

Agreed. Also realize that vehicle and monsters got tons of wounds this edition. and vehicles got armour saves
Most vehicles only had 3 Hull Points and no save before. Now most have about 10+ wounds and a 3+ armour.
Even though Str 4 wounds them on 5+, that's a lot to get through, so the odds are about the same as before (actually even better in some cases in favor of the vehicle remaining unwounded).

Overall, I think the combination of the new To-wound Chart, AP system and Damage system, GW has done a very good job of scaling most units and keeping a decent balance.
Currently the biggest issues are CPs and how they are generated and Stratagems. The biggest issue probably being armies with -1 to be hit, which should really be a cover bonus instead.

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Going back to the old To Wound Chart would not be a positive IMHO. The core rules for 8th edition are rather good. The problems are:

Under-Valued Offense: Rate of fire weapons are generally undervalued, making them the go-to option for competitive list. The same is true for no-LOS weapons

Over-Valued Defense: Outside of Invulnerable Saves, good armor is undervalued compared to additional bodies with additional wounds

Command Point Imbalance: The method of Command Point generation means there is no expected CP per game size. it is trivially easy for your opponent to have multiples of your CP if they have a cheap unit army and you have an expensive unit army

Stratagem/Relic Imbalance: GW doesn't seem to have a strong grasp on how strong Relics or Stratagems should be compared to each other both on an inter- and intra-codex level

 Galef wrote:
The biggest issue probably being armies with -1 to be hit, which should really be a cover bonus instead.
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Disagree. Negative hit modifiers should absolutely be in, but there needs to be some kinds of counters when it comes to certain 'classes' of items with them.

Answer is things like the old Autotargeting System that the FW Hydra had. It ignored Supersonic and Jink special rules Cover Save bonuses, while still allowing for the 'normal' Cover Save bonuses.

Yeah there'd need to be some effort applied here, but it shouldn't be unreasonably hard to manage something.

Oh, I didn't mean to-hit mods shouldn't be in the game, they certainly should be there. I was just saying that they should NOT be army traits. Army traits should be a cover bonus.
That would limit the amount of stacking -1 to hits. Combine with a general rule that natural 6s always hit, and that particular issue is fixed

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Galef wrote:How do you do that? The CWE codex alone would need a complete rewrite. 3 out of their 5 common weapon upgrades are S6. Not so simple of a solution.

Presumably if the entire strength/toughness system is being rewritten it's as part of a new edition, so codexes would be done at the same time? If it's being proposed as a quick fix then that is more of a problem.

After all the Codexes published since 8th Edition dropped, I put the chance of GW changing the core rules in a way that requires redoing all of them at near 0%.

I take everything on this subforum as a quick fix. When we’re using house rules I don’t want everyone to have to change their army lists and models around every time we try something new. Assuming point and options changes is too much of a hassle to put three or four people through.

 Galef wrote:
Oh, I didn't mean to-hit mods shouldn't be in the game, they certainly should be there. I was just saying that they should NOT be army traits. Army traits should be a cover bonus.
That would limit the amount of stacking -1 to hits. Combine with a general rule that natural 6s always hit, and that particular issue is fixed
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It wouldn't "limit the amount of stacking -1 to hits". It would basically eliminate the -1 to hits, period.

There's, AFAIK, one army that can stack beyond a single unit...and that's Aeldari.
AdMech? The only unit getting multiple -1 to hits is Stygies Dragoons.
Space Marines? No stacking for Raven Guard stuff, pretty sure no stacking for Alpha Legion as well.
Aeldari get Rangers with a -1 from their Cloaks and Alaitoc and -1 from Flyers and Alaitoc, plus a stratagem that does another -1 to hit for Rangers (IIRC).

It isn't as widely spread as you might think.

I liked the old toughness system it made ever point a huge up in durability and made S5/T5 alot better.

 Kanluwen wrote:

Aeldari get Rangers with a -1 from their Cloaks and Alaitoc and -1 from Flyers and Alaitoc, plus a stratagem that does another -1 to hit for Rangers (IIRC).

Rangers have a specific Strat that makes a single unit of Rangers only be hit on 6s. But there is also Lightning Fast reflexes that give a -1 to hit for Infantry or models with FLY. It's also 2CPs, so I consider it a last act of desperation to use on a unit that you really can't afford to lose.
But in general, I agree that -1 to hit stacking is really and Eldar thing, which could be fixed by making Alaitoc a cover bonus and making a general rule that unmodified 6s always hit.

 Kanluwen wrote:
It isn't as widely spread as you might think.

I agree, but people sure do complain enough about -1 to hit mods that making Alaitoc, RG and AL a cover bonus instead would certainly stop a good deal of the whining

 mew28 wrote:
I liked the old toughness system it made ever point a huge up in durability and made S5/T5 alot better.

But at the same time, it made S6/7 really good as they wound T4/5 on 2s, so it works both ways.
The current to wound system allows for more subtly.

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 Galef wrote:

 Kanluwen wrote:

Aeldari get Rangers with a -1 from their Cloaks and Alaitoc and -1 from Flyers and Alaitoc, plus a stratagem that does another -1 to hit for Rangers (IIRC).

Rangers have a specific Strat that makes a single unit of Rangers only be hit on 6s. But there is also Lightning Fast reflexes that give a -1 to hit for Infantry or models with FLY. It's also 2CPs, so I consider it a last act of desperation to use on a unit that you really can't afford to lose.
But in general, I agree that -1 to hit stacking is really and Eldar thing, which could be fixed by making Alaitoc a cover bonus and making a general rule that unmodified 6s always hit.

Correct me if I'm wrong, but isn't the Ranger Camo Cloak also a negative hit modifier? If that's the case(I forgot to check when I was at the shop today unfortunately, and I don't have an Aeldari book as I don't own an army) that's part of the problem, since the Marine versions are a benefit to the save granted by Cover.

Personally, I see no real issue with the Alaitoc bonus beyond the Fly benefit since Flyers already get a -1 to be hit and the potential Camo Cloak bit.

 Kanluwen wrote:
It isn't as widely spread as you might think.

I agree, but people sure do complain enough about -1 to hit mods that making Alaitoc, RG and AL a cover bonus instead would certainly stop a good deal of the whining

Just so we're clear: RG, AL, and Stygies weren't complained about because of the -1 to hit. It was the Infiltrate stratagem that they had.

An important note to be made with regards to the Camo Cloak thing:
Remember that for Marines, it's a benefit to the save granted by Cover. Tau have their Stealth Fields but don't get an armywide negative hit modifier--and I'm sure others can pinpoint stuff that might be problematic.

I'm still of the opinion that it really is a problem best solved by weapons gaining keyword interactions.