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.

This is a weird little hybrid: https://www.warhammer-community.com/2020/01/10/forge-world-pre-order-rock-it-with-rockets/

Are they using Horus heresy to experiment with rules for 40k? And I swear I was talking about something like that XD

i had the same thought.

Why blast markers and scatter dices are they gone in the first time?

Time consuming and source of quarrel between players.
They were a good solution with a lot of fun in a smaller format .

i am nostalgic but in don't want them back . games are long enought with many miniatures to move and strategms to planify and anticipate.

look at flamethrowers.
The rule is totaly stupid and simple. xd6 auto hit weapon with short range.
but it works. why? because autohit and short range perfectly simulate a weapon using torrent of fire/acid.
ws? no use. To hit malus? pointless.
efficiency in overwatch, thus affecting units charging throught fhleshmelting wall of fire? maximum
it works wonder.

just for god's sake don't use it to shoot flyers off the sky. this is dumb and need to be adressed.


so, is there a solution to build a rule that fits the system while being simpler with a better simulation of explosions, shockwave, ordnance and all the blasting things?

goals:

_don't consume too muche time
_simulate the progressive efficiency versus larger units.
_ fit in the core rules

first let's make a difference between a tank hunting canon/ krak missile/ focused burst of energy of any kind and ordnance.

even if they are explosion weapons they uses direct fire and no arc of fire.
they are fine as they are.
xdy shots using ws to hit.

"bombardment a/b" minimum range --- maximum range

weapons with this rule do not make to hit roll. instead select an enemy unit in range (note the absence of "visible") for each model in the enemy unit roll a dice, instead roll five dices for each model with vehicle or monster keyword and 10 dices for a model with titanic keyword . substract 1 to the result of each dice if you moved in your preceding movment phase and 1 if your target have the hard to hit rule.
For each result of a you score a hit to a maximum of b total hits.
proceed as normal.
be aware that bombardment weapons usualy have a minimum range of fire.

exemple.
weapon range type S AP D
mortar 6"-48" bombardment 5/6 4 0 1
ap shell 12-72 bombardment 5/3 8 -3 d6
demolition 6" bombardment 5/3 8 -3 d3 this weapon do not suffer malus for firing after a movment.
charge
medusa shell 12"-48" bombardment 4/10 6 -2 2 this weapon ignores covers


damage goes up with unit's size.
immune to lign of sight and to hit maluses but can't be used to hunt flying jetfighters .

two birds one stone

tired of alpha legion cultists, plaguebearers , magic boxes and so on? simply point a direction, throw high volume of higly explosive things in the air and praise the emperor of mankind or wathever you think is needed for them to land where you want to.

Some good thoughts there, agony.

Part of answering the question, "how should blast weapons work," is answering the questions, "what makes blast weapons unique," and, "why should they work differently from other weapons.

One take is that blast weapons should exist as a long-ranged auto-hit weapon that disregards to-hit modifiers because you just have to land the shell vaguely in the general area of the thing you're trying to hit. In that case, many of the variations on, "Generate automatic hits based on the number of models in the unit," probably represents that. However, I personally dislike this role for blast weapons because....

A.) It automatically cancels some of the major defensive tools of many armies without requiring any major tradeoff on the part of the attacker. It's one thing if you cancel out Veil of Tears'd Harlequins using Lightning Fast Reactions by getting a flamer right in their faces. It's another thing to let a guard gunline's mortars and bassilisks ignore those to-hit penalties from a safe distance.

B.) It doesn't really fit the mechanics of past editions where missing with a blast was generally very possible unless you were targeting a very large and spread out squad. I'm not in favor of sticking to old rules for the sake of it, but making blasts auto-hit gives blast weapons a power up that they haven't had in any past edition (that I'm aware of). This would be a major change to the power of the weapons that would call for a major change to the cost of the weapons and would change the roles of many weapons. Suddenly mortars become relatively good at sniping planes, for instance.

I like the idea of blast weapons serving the niche of, "weapons that are better against hordes than against elites." It's a niche that kind of doesn't exist with 40k weapons presently as anything that is good at killing a horde is generally also better at killing elites.

By simply giving blast/template weapons X shots per Y models in the enemy unit (Y can be a large number like 10 to simplify counting), you...
A. fill the "better against hordes" role.

B. you don't require that every clunky arcing explodey shell in the 41st millenium suddenly be good at hitting fast moving stealthy stuff.

C. You give blasts a unique feel without requiring they work dramatically differently form other weapons in the game. You could get rid of the random number of shots, for instance, and simply roll to hit, wound, etc. as normal.But those frag missiles getting extra shots against the termagaunt blob will still feel unique.

I prefer a combination of factors.

Ie, blast weapons are likely to hit the target with something, even if not completely accurate. also, they are generally only a single shot that causes it.

Therefore something like this:

Roll one die to hit as normal. A hit scores X number of hits (see the weapon) up to the number of models in the target.

if a miss is rolled, check the die to see how much you 'missed' by to determine if you hit with anything:

If you missed by 1 (needed a 4 and rolled a 3), you hit with half the hits. If you missed by 2 you score a quarter of the hits. By 3 or more is a total miss. 1s always count as a total miss regardless of what was required.

ie frag missle is Blast (4). If you need a 5+ to hit, you score 4 hits on 5 or 6, you score 2 hits on a 4, 1 hit on a 3 and nothing on a 1-2.

This keeps the 'scatter' effect 'inside' the hit die roll.

I have been jotting up some house rules to go with a pet project of mine, the TX78 Hammerhead (new updated Hammerhead, fresh out of Research and Development).

One of the main changes is the 'rail cannon', which is supposed to represent the next generation of turret mounted linear accelerators. The 'Submunition' shot has been replaced with 'Smart Shot', which to represent a large blast now gets 2D6 shots, as opposed to D6, the second change is the shot now detonates 'above' enemies, rendering cover useless, therefore ignoring the benefits of cover and causing some sort of hit to Morale.

I think removing blast templates was a mistake, but the best method of mitigating it is to increase the shots from D6 to 2D6.

Gary_1986 wrote:

think removing blast templates was a mistake, but the best method of mitigating it is to increase the shots from D6 to 2D6.

Sincere question: what makes you say that? Why do you feel it was a mistake to remove blast templates given the various failings that have been attributed to them in this thread? Why is giving all weapons that used to be "blasts" 2d6 shots the best way of handling them? Why not cutting down on dice rolling by making it 7 shots (the average of 2d6) or using one of the other options presented in this thread?

It was the ideal method of representing a blast weapon. The template showed, in a visual sense, there, that is where the blast is. The issue came from people quarrelling about things, but that shouldn't be an issue. When we had games (me and friends) the rule was, if I can hit it, then a blast template can go there, no complaints. Also, blast templates forced gamers to NOT clump up their troops, as because it was a finite sized template it was beneficial to spread out or suffer the consequences. Now, it's D6 regardless of spacing, which just seems a bit random. You could arrange a six man squad, maximum spacing, in a line and hit all six of them with a weapon that would have, in the past been a small blast and hit perhaps two of them.

The best solution would be to bring back templates.

Some interesting points and suggestions have been brought up.

I wouldn’t bring back templates and blast markers or scatter for the reasons already mentioned.
I still keep coming back to my initial suggestion though, but I know it’s not perfect, this is what I’m thinking now:

For template weapons I’d have a max number of hits eg template (5) where it hits that many times, but capped by the target unit size, so against a single model unit it’s 1 hit, against a 3 model unit it’s 3 hits and against a 5 or more model unit it hits 5 times. I’d still keep it as auto hit, but if the target has the Flyer battlefield role then it loses the auto hit and rolls BS as normal.

For blast weapons, I was considering making it auto hit the same as template weapons to better represent the ability to still cause damage when less accurate, but I think somebody made the point earlier that it might be too powerful at long range and I’m inclined to agree. So I was thinking blast (5) would work the same as templates when compared to the size of the target unit, but instead of number of hits it would be number of shots. BS would be rolled for each shot. The downside here is that the blast weapons is functionally the same as a high ROF weapon like an assault cannon. To fix this, I’d give a blast weapon a single to hit roll, if the BS roll is passed it scores the number of hits in brackets (up to number of models in the target unit) but if the hit roll is failed, the number in brackets is replaced by the unmodified to hit roll, and a 1 always misses.

So if a blast weapon with blast (5) targeting a 10 model unit scores a hit, you would make 5 wound rolls, if you are BS 5+ and you rolled a 4, you make 4 wound rolls etc.

i am not a fan of blast and indirect firing weapons being affected by reroll bublles or to hit modifier (either positive or negative).
I see there a good option for balance.

Most of the options that have been proposed have good systems to ramp up damage with unit's size.
Being imune to hit and reroll (except specific rules for them) could be a feature.

with cautions of course. i don't like shooting planes with artillery.

Agony, I agree for the most part. Though, I still think the best solution is bring back templates.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

agony.deluxe wrote:
i am not a fan of blast and indirect firing weapons being affected by reroll bublles or to hit modifier (either positive or negative).
I see there a good option for balance.

Most of the options that have been proposed have good systems to ramp up damage with unit's size.
Being imune to hit and reroll (except specific rules for them) could be a feature.

with cautions of course. i don't like shooting planes with artillery.

I would stipulate such weapon as indirect artillery should be ruled in a sense that prevents them from targeting aircraft, surface to surface fire only.

For indirect weapons, since (to my knowledge) every one is a random number of shots, I've proposed that they roll two dice and take the LOWER ONE when firing without LoS. (For Basilisks, since they natively roll 2 and take the higher, they'd just roll 1 and take that for number of shots when not in LoS.)

 JNAProductions wrote:
For indirect weapons, since (to my knowledge) every one is a random number of shots, I've proposed that they roll two dice and take the LOWER ONE when firing without LoS. (For Basilisks, since they natively roll 2 and take the higher, they'd just roll 1 and take that for number of shots when not in LoS.)

Not roll three and take the middle one? (Joke)

Gary_1986 wrote:It was the ideal method of representing a blast weapon. The template showed, in a visual sense, there, that is where the blast is. The issue came from people quarrelling about things, but that shouldn't be an issue. When we had games (me and friends) the rule was, if I can hit it, then a blast template can go there, no complaints. Also, blast templates forced gamers to NOT clump up their troops, as because it was a finite sized template it was beneficial to spread out or suffer the consequences. Now, it's D6 regardless of spacing, which just seems a bit random. You could arrange a six man squad, maximum spacing, in a line and hit all six of them with a weapon that would have, in the past been a small blast and hit perhaps two of them.

Just Tony wrote:The best solution would be to bring back templates.

I am bringing this discussion back given the talk about the anticipated "blast" type weapons in upcoming 9th ed.

One advantage - in my opinion - about blast templates was that they helped to indirectly reinforce the influence of cover and terrain in the game.

Often, the largest templates were indirect fire weapons, big lobbers.
And smaller templates too...

When these templates were placed, they would cover tightly grouped models trying to hide behind cover.
So, the unit might be hiding behind cover, waiting for a screen or for cover fire to rush out and perhaps charge a unit on overwatch.

There was risk in grouping models in this way, when using templates.
Also, there was added anxiety about making sure that your screen arrived and absorbed the overwatch fire, and added anxiety about redirecting fire from another unit to afford cover instead of shooting at something else, before that blast weeapon got into position and was able to drive the unit from cover, or wipe it out, thereby ending that strategy, to charge down that particular target unit and so on.

There was also more specific reason to have that specific tank, or type of gun, and this added to the strategy involved in unit placement and use of terrain and cover in the game... one tried to anticipate how the terrain and cover may be useful to either side, and one would deploy resources to control the flow of the game, accordingly.


My point is that this simple and more realistic way of representing interactions on the tabletop - blast templates - added to the depth of the game, the immersion and it helped to make sense of why things were done the way that they were done, whereas the current method is less intuitive with none of the upshots.

Might we expect blast templates to emerge as a general house rule if GW is unable to make sense of such interactions intuitively in this next edition?

No. We would not expect it. While the blast template had lots of thematic appeal, they are ultimately a rule that slows down the game. I doubt people will flock to a house rule that both slows down the game and is not balanced.

 alextroy wrote:
No. We would not expect it. While the blast template had lots of thematic appeal, they are ultimately a rule that slows down the game. I doubt people will flock to a house rule that both slows down the game and is not balanced.

That's not my experience at all. I've gotten almost a dozen games of 3rd edition in over thr course of the last year or two and templates never caused an issue. All parties involved rolled scatter as close to the template as possible to prevent gamer drift and resolution of coverage was always fast.

And how much more time did that take than rolling the number of attacks and then moving on to rolling to-hit?

And more importantly, how much more time did your opponents take positioning their models to avoid getting hit too hard by your pie-plate?

 alextroy wrote:
And how much more time did that take than rolling the number of attacks and then moving on to rolling to-hit?

And more importantly, how much more time did your opponents take positioning their models to avoid getting hit too hard by your pie-plate?

Movement? Completely unchanged. Swapping out rolling to hit with rolling to scatter? May have added two to four seconds. If THAT much time is enough to compromise your ADHD, then I humbly suggest you have WAY more pressing issues than templates.

If we want a quick and simple rule my favourite is:
BlastX The number of shots is equal to the number of models up to X.
For this to work properly and be balanced X has to be rather small. I think the best values would be Blast3 for the old 3“ template weapons and Blast5 for the old 5“ templates. This way it just does the maximum number of shots against the most common MSU size so its not completely unbalanced against something like 10 model units. Normally against templates you would like to place your models far enough apart so no more than 5 models are hit. The edge cases of one long thin line or a large clump are less common and thus should not be taken into account. If you make blast weapons more complicated than this it would be better to just go back to templates. Any rule can only try to approximate the intricacies of templates and after a certain point they are more complicated than the original while still achieving less.

 Just Tony wrote:

 alextroy wrote:
And how much more time did that take than rolling the number of attacks and then moving on to rolling to-hit?

And more importantly, how much more time did your opponents take positioning their models to avoid getting hit too hard by your pie-plate?

Movement? Completely unchanged. Swapping out rolling to hit with rolling to scatter? May have added two to four seconds. If THAT much time is enough to compromise your ADHD, then I humbly suggest you have WAY more pressing issues than templates.

You're saying that neither player spent any time spreading out their models to be 2" apart in order to avoid giving more hits to a lucky blast? Because that was mandatory behavior for my ork and tyranid opponents in 5th through 7th edition. I don't want to go back to punishing players for not agonizing over 2" spacing.

From what I understand, the 9th edition approach to blasts is to just give them the max number of shots w hen they target units containing enough models. There's preobably still room for improvement, but that seems like a decent approach to me. Blasts will be more likely to do more damage to hordes, but the possibility of a total miss still exists.

Wyldhunt wrote:
You're saying that neither player spent any time spreading out their models to be 2" apart in order to avoid giving more hits to a lucky blast? Because that was mandatory behavior for my ork and tyranid opponents in 5th through 7th edition. I don't want to go back to punishing players for not agonizing over 2" spacing.

From what I understand, the 9th edition approach to blasts is to just give them the max number of shots w hen they target units containing enough models. There's preobably still room for improvement, but that seems like a decent approach to me. Blasts will be more likely to do more damage to hordes, but the possibility of a total miss still exists.

No, I'm saying that the time it takes to advance a unit its normal speed is EXACTLY the same time as advancing its normal speed while spacing out. Add to the fact that almost every person on the planet that plays 40K measures the lead model and mass moves the rest of the unit.

I'm sure you'll magically find the one person on the planet that individually measures their model movement with calipers that measure to .001 of an inch, but all the normal people aren't fretting the details to the point of adding hours to the game.

The simple fact is that templates don't slow the game down even noticeably, let alone significantly.

In your experience, that may be true. But it seems to not be the case for most players I've heard from.

That being said, the 9th Edition Blast rules seems to be the best of both worlds. Against small units, you save that time futzing around with blast marker and roll the die to see how may shots you get. Against large units you get to skip that set and get the maximum number of shots.

Please explain how rolling the dice, placing the blast marker in the right location, and determining the number of models hit is easier than that?

Sounds more like your saying doing x in a friendly environment where everyone's chill enough to be playing measure one model and shove the rest and and and arn't trying to be exact enough with their movement or positioning for it to slow the game down, they also arn't arguing over who is or isnt under the template.

While most people are okay with play by intention, I have also seen people have to recind that courtesy from some players as they are literally shoving piles of models across the board after measuring like 2 models. That can get nasty when they get flagged for slow play or someone is trying to deepstrike around said unit as it magically takes on a footprint it just doesn't have.

Also I can't remeber more rules that caused more arguments that where borderline unsolvable. It was ever worse when you have the direct hit /blast profile that I remember from one of the editions as minimal deviations in direction or measurement ment a big difference.

alextroy wrote:In your experience, that may be true. But it seems to not be the case for most players I've heard from.

That being said, the 9th Edition Blast rules seems to be the best of both worlds. Against small units, you save that time futzing around with blast marker and roll the die to see how may shots you get. Against large units you get to skip that set and get the maximum number of shots.

Please explain how rolling the dice, placing the blast marker in the right location, and determining the number of models hit is easier than that?

So we're moving from faster to easier now? Fantastic. Let me know when the goalpost is set so I can continue attempting discussion.

Now here's the big question, how many shots is max? If you're topping out at 6 hits on a large unit that may be massively bunched together, then I'd say it's a pretty poor representation of how a blast weapon would work in combat. Ask me how I'd know. Go on, ask me...

Ice_can wrote:Sounds more like your saying doing x in a friendly environment where everyone's chill enough to be playing measure one model and shove the rest and and and arn't trying to be exact enough with their movement or positioning for it to slow the game down, they also arn't arguing over who is or isnt under the template.

While most people are okay with play by intention, I have also seen people have to recind that courtesy from some players as they are literally shoving piles of models across the board after measuring like 2 models. That can get nasty when they get flagged for slow play or someone is trying to deepstrike around said unit as it magically takes on a footprint it just doesn't have.

Also I can't remeber more rules that caused more arguments that where borderline unsolvable. It was ever worse when you have the direct hit /blast profile that I remember from one of the editions as minimal deviations in direction or measurement ment a big difference.

There's always going to be TFG, no matter how everyone else plays. I had a clown in 5th who conga lined a Tyranid Warrior squad out of cover but leaving the EXACT amount of bases in cover to exploit the rule. Those people will tear down anything for the win. Doesn't mean that blast templates aren't a valid way to achieve damage results.


ALSO, for both of you, templates punish people who huddle models, just like a blast weapon would "punish" a group of soldiers who are huddled together when the grenade/mortar/whatever hits where they're sitting. Eliminating templates and eliminating penalties for close intervals ALSO eliminates strategy and tactics that are vital to actual combat.