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.

What I'd like to see for marines is one book, with different lists/force orgs for the chapters that need it, including their unique units.

I want to see my DA something like this:

Captain- termie armor, bike, jump pack, power weapon, power fist, lightning claw(s) bolter, stalker bolter, combi-weapon, bolt, plasma, grav pistols, maybe all special weapons

Lietenant (there's only one captain in a company, after all) same as above

Librarian- bike, jump pack, termie armor, force weapon, bolt, grav, plasma pistols, psychic powers by points codicier/epistolary upgrades

Chaplain- bike, jump pack, termie armor, crozius, grav, plasma, bolt pistols, upgrade to interrogator

Azzy

Sammy

Asmodai

Ezekiel


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Insectum7 wrote:

Blastaar wrote:

 Insectum7 wrote:

Blastaar wrote:
Fun is a feeling. Fussing over the difference in S and AP between a sword or maul

Subjective.

If you don't care to fuss about it, just pick one and move on. Easy.

The problem is that one of them is strictly better than the other options. I like swords. A spear might be cool. But if they're ineffective in games, that isn't fun. I want to pick the power weapon I think looks cool, or fits the background and fighting style I created for the character.

Easy solution, balance them better. Or play counts-as, most metas I've played in have been fine with that.

My solution to balancing them is to give them one profile. What do you suggest?

 Insectum7 wrote:

Blastaar wrote:

 Insectum7 wrote:

Blastaar wrote:
Fun is a feeling. Fussing over the difference in S and AP between a sword or maul

Subjective.

If you don't care to fuss about it, just pick one and move on. Easy.

The problem is that one of them is strictly better than the other options. I like swords. A spear might be cool. But if they're ineffective in games, that isn't fun. I want to pick the power weapon I think looks cool, or fits the background and fighting style I created for the character.

Easy solution, balance them better.

The problem becomes, at that level, balancing them in a way that doesn't just leave them all identical is hard with the extremely limited design space available (and especially if we want to make them all the same cost). Going from a power weapon to a power fist is a fairly reasonable shift given what there is to work with, monkeying about with essentially just 4 "points" to play with split between two stats (strength and AP) among 3+ different weapons doesn't really work as well.

Or play counts-as, most metas I've played in have been fine with that.

Which is essentially just treating them all as being the same thing anyway.

Insectum7 wrote:Imagery is just as important (actually more important) than gameplay in 40K. I'm dead serious.

So if imagery is more important than rules, is that not an argument in favour of generic rules that you "flavour" through model aesthetics? (And, for what it's worth, I actually agree. Imagery is more important than gameplay. But I think we have different ideas of imagery, because I don't need rules/gameplay to inform my imagery. My imagery is more along the lines of "my guy carries a great two handed axe into battle to reflect his role as an executioner - it uses a thunder hammer profile to represent the massive weight and heft of it" than "I need a great-axe profile because I built my guy with a big axe".)

Sure, your "melee weapon" could be the rusty bayonet or ornate chainsword, both very different in flavour and imagery, but mechanically (gameplay) the same.

Insectum7 wrote:Bikes aren't really a CC unit, while TWC are 100% dedicated to it.

Veteran Bikers (which TWC are much closer to, having also Veteran statlines) are equipped for melee though, and aside from 2", different types of mount attack, and Swift Attack (which, let's face it, SW bikers should have) - they're not different.

Insectum7 wrote:Sure homogenize everything and make chapter identity meaningless

Chapters can already take CQC Bikers. They're called Veterans on Bikes.

Imo not good product design, especially when lots of sales come from people who collect multiple SM armies.

I thought the important part was the imagery, not the gameplay?
It shouldn't matter if all SM have the same mechanical rules, it's down to the players to take the imagery GW provides and run with that for their own flavour.

Vaktathi wrote:

 Insectum7 wrote:
Or play counts-as, most metas I've played in have been fine with that.

Which is essentially just treating them all as being the same thing anyway.

EXACTLY!
If you're just saying "well, we just count-as the best weapon, regardless of WYSIWGY", isn't that just an implicit endorsement of "well, we should just have a good weapon profile which covers this whole bracket of weapons".

Otherwise, what happened to that "imagery over gameplay" that you were talking about?

 Vaktathi wrote:

 Insectum7 wrote:

Blastaar wrote:

 Insectum7 wrote:

Blastaar wrote:
Fun is a feeling. Fussing over the difference in S and AP between a sword or maul

Subjective.

If you don't care to fuss about it, just pick one and move on. Easy.

The problem is that one of them is strictly better than the other options. I like swords. A spear might be cool. But if they're ineffective in games, that isn't fun. I want to pick the power weapon I think looks cool, or fits the background and fighting style I created for the character.

Easy solution, balance them better.

The problem becomes, at that level, balancing them in a way that doesn't just leave them all identical is hard with the extremely limited design space available (and especially if we want to make them all the same cost). Going from a power weapon to a power fist is a fairly reasonable shift given what there is to work with, monkeying about with essentially just 4 "points" to play with split between two stats (strength and AP) among 3+ different weapons doesn't really work as well.

Or play counts-as, most metas I've played in have been fine with that.

Which is essentially just treating them all as being the same thing anyway.

No imagination, my friend! There's always bespoke special rules .

Opening bid:
Axe as is.
Sword +1 attack like chainswords OR -1 to hit for enemy models attacking owning model
Maul, as is but +1 to wound.

 Insectum7 wrote:
Opening bid:
Axe as is.
Sword +1 attack like chainswords OR -1 to hit for enemy models attacking owning model
Maul, as is but +1 to wound.

What about daggers? Rapiers? Halberds? At a certain point, do I just have to play count-as?

 Insectum7 wrote:
No imagination, my friend! There's always bespoke special rules .

Opening bid:
Axe as is.
Sword +1 attack like chainswords OR -1 to hit for enemy models attacking owning model
Maul, as is but +1 to wound.

Rather than asking how we can differentiate these weapons to the point where we could conceivably justify not merging them, might it be more sensible to start from the other direction?

As in, what is the end goal here? What are we trying to achieve by keeping these weapons separate?

Do we want these weapons to each fulfil different roles? If so, what are those roles and how do they differ from the roles of weapons such as Lightning Claws and Power Fists?

 Insectum7 wrote:

 Vaktathi wrote:

 Insectum7 wrote:

Blastaar wrote:

 Insectum7 wrote:

Blastaar wrote:
Fun is a feeling. Fussing over the difference in S and AP between a sword or maul

Subjective.

If you don't care to fuss about it, just pick one and move on. Easy.

The problem is that one of them is strictly better than the other options. I like swords. A spear might be cool. But if they're ineffective in games, that isn't fun. I want to pick the power weapon I think looks cool, or fits the background and fighting style I created for the character.

Easy solution, balance them better.

The problem becomes, at that level, balancing them in a way that doesn't just leave them all identical is hard with the extremely limited design space available (and especially if we want to make them all the same cost). Going from a power weapon to a power fist is a fairly reasonable shift given what there is to work with, monkeying about with essentially just 4 "points" to play with split between two stats (strength and AP) among 3+ different weapons doesn't really work as well.

Or play counts-as, most metas I've played in have been fine with that.

Which is essentially just treating them all as being the same thing anyway.

No imagination, my friend! There's always bespoke special rules .

Opening bid:
Axe as is.
Sword +1 attack like chainswords OR -1 to hit for enemy models attacking owning model
Maul, as is but +1 to wound.

Opening up different things can be interesting, but in this case all kinda ends up the same way.

Assuming 2 base attacks, WS3+

S4 with Axe vs T4 3+ = 0.74074 wounds
S4 with Axe vs T3 5+ =1.11 wounds
S4 with Axe vs T7 3+ =0.2962 wounds

S4 with Sword (assuming AP remains -3 and +1S is removed in favor of +1A) vs T4 3+ =0.833 wounds
S4 with Sword (assuming AP remains -3 and +1S is removed in favor of +1A) vs T3 5+ =1.333 wounds
S4 with Sword (assuming AP remains -3 and +1S is removed in favor of +1A) vs T7 3+ =0.555 wounds

S4 with Maul vs T4 3+ =0.555 wounds
S4 with Maul vs T3 5+ =0.926 wounds
S4 with Maul vs T7 3+ =0.333 wounds

The Sword is clearly better at each task than every other option, and the Maul struggles to find any value. EDIT: miscalculated for Maul vs T7 3+ originally as being better than it is.

I looked at what bumping the Sword down to just AP-2 did instead of AP-3, but while that makes the Axe more attractive, it's still flat out as good or better than the Maul.

By comparison, a Lightning Claw and a Powerfist give us

LC vs T4 3+=1 wound
LC vs T3 5+=1.776 wounds
LC vs T7 3+=0.74074

PF vs T4 3+= 0.69 wounds/1.38 wounds (doubled for a multiwound model)
PF vs T3 5+=0.8333/1.66 wounds (doubled for a multiwound model)
PF vs T7 3+=1.11/2.22 wounds (doubled for a multiwound model)

The -1 to hit option to represent a sword parry in place of the +1A could be more interesting, but its value would be harder to determine, and would dramatically drop the Sword's offensive performance to the bottom.

 vipoid wrote:

 Insectum7 wrote:
No imagination, my friend! There's always bespoke special rules .

Opening bid:
Axe as is.
Sword +1 attack like chainswords OR -1 to hit for enemy models attacking owning model
Maul, as is but +1 to wound.

Rather than asking how we can differentiate these weapons to the point where we could conceivably justify not merging them, might it be more sensible to start from the other direction?

As in, what is the end goal here? What are we trying to achieve by keeping these weapons separate?

Do we want these weapons to each fulfil different roles? If so, what are those roles and how do they differ from the roles of weapons such as Lightning Claws and Power Fists?

The point is to have a selection of choices for list fiddling and potential datasheet character, in the sense that some units may have access to only some options. Choice for model aesthetic/character/potential role.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Sgt_Smudge wrote:

 Insectum7 wrote:
Opening bid:
Axe as is.
Sword +1 attack like chainswords OR -1 to hit for enemy models attacking owning model
Maul, as is but +1 to wound.

What about daggers? Rapiers? Halberds? At a certain point, do I just have to play count-as?

Not in the perview of this excercise.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Vaktathi wrote:

 Insectum7 wrote:

 Vaktathi wrote:

 Insectum7 wrote:

Blastaar wrote:

 Insectum7 wrote:

Blastaar wrote:
Fun is a feeling. Fussing over the difference in S and AP between a sword or maul

Subjective.

If you don't care to fuss about it, just pick one and move on. Easy.

The problem is that one of them is strictly better than the other options. I like swords. A spear might be cool. But if they're ineffective in games, that isn't fun. I want to pick the power weapon I think looks cool, or fits the background and fighting style I created for the character.

Easy solution, balance them better.

The problem becomes, at that level, balancing them in a way that doesn't just leave them all identical is hard with the extremely limited design space available (and especially if we want to make them all the same cost). Going from a power weapon to a power fist is a fairly reasonable shift given what there is to work with, monkeying about with essentially just 4 "points" to play with split between two stats (strength and AP) among 3+ different weapons doesn't really work as well.

Or play counts-as, most metas I've played in have been fine with that.

Which is essentially just treating them all as being the same thing anyway.

No imagination, my friend! There's always bespoke special rules .

Opening bid:
Axe as is.
Sword +1 attack like chainswords OR -1 to hit for enemy models attacking owning model
Maul, as is but +1 to wound.

Opening up different things can be interesting, but in this case all kinda ends up the same way.

Assuming 2 base attacks, WS3+

S4 with Axe vs T4 3+ = 0.74074 wounds
S4 with Axe vs T3 5+ =1.11 wounds
S4 with Axe vs T7 3+ =0.2962 wounds

S4 with Sword (assuming AP remains -3 and +1S is removed in favor of +1A) vs T4 3+ =0.833 wounds
S4 with Sword (assuming AP remains -3 and +1S is removed in favor of +1A) vs T3 5+ =1.333 wounds
S4 with Sword (assuming AP remains -3 and +1S is removed in favor of +1A) vs T7 3+ =0.555 wounds

S4 with Maul vs T4 3+ =0.555 wounds
S4 with Maul vs T3 5+ =0.926 wounds
S4 with Maul vs T7 3+ =0.333 wounds

The Sword is clearly better at each task than every other option, and the Maul struggles to find any value. EDIT: miscalculated for Maul vs T7 3+ originally as being better than it is.

I looked at what bumping the Sword down to just AP-2 did instead of AP-3, but while that makes the Axe more attractive, it's still flat out as good or better than the Maul.

By comparison, a Lightning Claw and a Powerfist give us

LC vs T4 3+=1 wound
LC vs T3 5+=1.776 wounds
LC vs T7 3+=0.74074

PF vs T4 3+= 0.69 wounds/1.38 wounds (doubled for a multiwound model)
PF vs T3 5+=0.8333/1.66 wounds (doubled for a multiwound model)
PF vs T7 3+=1.11/2.22 wounds (doubled for a multiwound model)

The -1 to hit option to represent a sword parry in place of the +1A could be more interesting, but its value would be harder to determine, and would dramatically drop the Sword's offensive performance to the bottom.

So we tweak it a bit. But remember, not everybody has access to lightning claws, and we can restrict some units to not have all options as well. There's plenty of room once you realize that these can be universal weapons regardless of faction.

 Insectum7 wrote:

 vipoid wrote:

 Insectum7 wrote:
No imagination, my friend! There's always bespoke special rules .

Opening bid:
Axe as is.
Sword +1 attack like chainswords OR -1 to hit for enemy models attacking owning model
Maul, as is but +1 to wound.

Rather than asking how we can differentiate these weapons to the point where we could conceivably justify not merging them, might it be more sensible to start from the other direction?

As in, what is the end goal here? What are we trying to achieve by keeping these weapons separate?

Do we want these weapons to each fulfil different roles? If so, what are those roles and how do they differ from the roles of weapons such as Lightning Claws and Power Fists?

The point is to have a selection of choices for list fiddling and potential datasheet character, in the sense that some units may have access to only some options. Choice for model aesthetic/character/potential role.

What is the point of list fiddling if the choices are meaningless? Part of the point of rolling swords and stuff into "power weapon" is to increase character and aesthetic choices so that players are not disadvantaged by taking the weapon they think looks cool, but sucks.

This minutiae would be great in a skirmish game, though, where you only have around 20 minis who act independently.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Sgt_Smudge wrote:

 Insectum7 wrote:
Opening bid:
Axe as is.
Sword +1 attack like chainswords OR -1 to hit for enemy models attacking owning model
Maul, as is but +1 to wound.

What about daggers? Rapiers? Halberds? At a certain point, do I just have to play count-as?

Not in the perview of this excercise.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Vaktathi wrote:

 Insectum7 wrote:

 Vaktathi wrote:

 Insectum7 wrote:

Blastaar wrote:

 Insectum7 wrote:

Blastaar wrote:
Fun is a feeling. Fussing over the difference in S and AP between a sword or maul

Subjective.

If you don't care to fuss about it, just pick one and move on. Easy.

The problem is that one of them is strictly better than the other options. I like swords. A spear might be cool. But if they're ineffective in games, that isn't fun. I want to pick the power weapon I think looks cool, or fits the background and fighting style I created for the character.

Easy solution, balance them better.

The problem becomes, at that level, balancing them in a way that doesn't just leave them all identical is hard with the extremely limited design space available (and especially if we want to make them all the same cost). Going from a power weapon to a power fist is a fairly reasonable shift given what there is to work with, monkeying about with essentially just 4 "points" to play with split between two stats (strength and AP) among 3+ different weapons doesn't really work as well.

Or play counts-as, most metas I've played in have been fine with that.

Which is essentially just treating them all as being the same thing anyway.

No imagination, my friend! There's always bespoke special rules .

Opening bid:
Axe as is.
Sword +1 attack like chainswords OR -1 to hit for enemy models attacking owning model
Maul, as is but +1 to wound.

Opening up different things can be interesting, but in this case all kinda ends up the same way.

Assuming 2 base attacks, WS3+

S4 with Axe vs T4 3+ = 0.74074 wounds
S4 with Axe vs T3 5+ =1.11 wounds
S4 with Axe vs T7 3+ =0.2962 wounds

S4 with Sword (assuming AP remains -3 and +1S is removed in favor of +1A) vs T4 3+ =0.833 wounds
S4 with Sword (assuming AP remains -3 and +1S is removed in favor of +1A) vs T3 5+ =1.333 wounds
S4 with Sword (assuming AP remains -3 and +1S is removed in favor of +1A) vs T7 3+ =0.555 wounds

S4 with Maul vs T4 3+ =0.555 wounds
S4 with Maul vs T3 5+ =0.926 wounds
S4 with Maul vs T7 3+ =0.333 wounds

The Sword is clearly better at each task than every other option, and the Maul struggles to find any value. EDIT: miscalculated for Maul vs T7 3+ originally as being better than it is.

I looked at what bumping the Sword down to just AP-2 did instead of AP-3, but while that makes the Axe more attractive, it's still flat out as good or better than the Maul.

By comparison, a Lightning Claw and a Powerfist give us

LC vs T4 3+=1 wound
LC vs T3 5+=1.776 wounds
LC vs T7 3+=0.74074

PF vs T4 3+= 0.69 wounds/1.38 wounds (doubled for a multiwound model)
PF vs T3 5+=0.8333/1.66 wounds (doubled for a multiwound model)
PF vs T7 3+=1.11/2.22 wounds (doubled for a multiwound model)

The -1 to hit option to represent a sword parry in place of the +1A could be more interesting, but its value would be harder to determine, and would dramatically drop the Sword's offensive performance to the bottom. So we tweak it a bit. But remember, not everybody has access to lightning claws, and we can restrict some units to not have all options as well. There's plenty of room once you realize that these can be universal weapons regardless of faction.

At the scale of this game, is it relevant or fun to represent parries? That's abstracted into WS, anyway. Modifers do not necessarily make playing the game more fun.

What is the purpose of standardizing weapons across armies? There will be similarities, and probably some weapons that are identical to what other armies have, but they aren't, and shouldn't be, all the same. Not to mention Nids..........

I agree that bespoke special rules can be useful, but they need to be though-out. and used with intention to supplement what is already there, not to make a thing unique because the main rules do not provide those tools.

All of that is just details to be sorted out if we were actually responsible for implementation. Like I said, this is my opening bid for overall organization and an initial proposal for power weapons. Everything would be tied to a whole host of relationships between units and rules, much of which would be adjusted and have various fallout.

The main reason for the power weapon proposal is to illustrate that you have more to play with than just strength and AP. Need to improve the maul? Make mauls do 2d on a wound roll of 5+, or whatever. Just tweak until you have a balance between character and utility.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

Blastaar wrote:

What is the point of list fiddling if the choices are meaningless? Part of the point of rolling swords and stuff into "power weapon" is to increase character and aesthetic choices so that players are not disadvantaged by taking the weapon they think looks cool, but sucks.

This minutiae would be great in a skirmish game, though, where you only have around 20 minis who act independently.

I find CC weapon choice to be fun, and it's not meaningless if they're different enough. All you have to do is make each choice worthwhile.

Conversely, if you find them too similar, then you should feel more free to model whatever version you want on your model. That's the catch 22 I described in my earlier posts.

 Insectum7 wrote:
So we tweak it a bit.

I think with the limited design space you could tweak it all day and run into the same issue unless we're going to come up with something really outside of GW's established design paradigm.

But remember, not everybody has access to lightning claws,

Sure, but none of the options came anywhere near that level of performance except the Sword that was just better than everything else already anyway.

and we can restrict some units to not have all options as well.

Which would seem to restrict the choice and flavor we're generally looking to support. If bespoke rules are needed for a unit (say for power lances on a biker/cavalry unit like shining spears), they can get their unique weapon rules there, but otherwise it seems the generic option fills this role just fine.

There's plenty of room once you realize that these can be universal weapons regardless of faction.

Sure, but so can a single weapons profile without all these other issues.

 Insectum7 wrote:
All of that is just details to be sorted out if we were actually responsible for implementation.

That's historically where GW has fallen down however, and where it appears we're running into issues at as well, and trying to handwave that away saying "it can just be sorted out" would seem to be avoiding the problem. We're making stats just to make stuff different for its own sake without a clear reason for each weapon to do something, resulting in a grip of options that don't appear to have a clear focus but where a clear favorite is present and minor changes radically shift relative performance because the granularity of variables to work with isn't terribly precise and we're trying to keep them all within a narrow power range where they're better than a chainsword but not as good as a lightning claw, with with less performance differentation between them than other options generally available (e.g. chainsword vs Lightning Claw vs Powerfist are all radically more different from each other than any of these power weapon options are to each other). It seems like the effort and detail going into that, and avoidance of balance issues and options paralysis, is better spent on other priorities at the scale 40k plays at.

 Insectum7 wrote:

Opening bid:
Axe as is.
Sword +1 attack like chainswords OR -1 to hit for enemy models attacking owning model
Maul, as is but +1 to wound.

So the sword with +1 attacks makes a pair of lightning claws obsolete. and -1 to hit makes all of them obsolete. We all know how powerful penalties to hit are.
The moment you buff the maul the powerfist looses any reason to exist. The design space isn't occupied by just power weapons. It's occupied by every option on the datasheet.

Wah wah. We can bicker about the details but it doesn't change the fact that fundamentally all we're looking at the difference between 3 profiles and 5, which is still fewer than the heavy weapon choices available to Tac marines. Guys, this is minor.

 Lance845 wrote:

 Insectum7 wrote:

Opening bid:
Axe as is.
Sword +1 attack like chainswords OR -1 to hit for enemy models attacking owning model
Maul, as is but +1 to wound.

So the sword with +1 attacks makes a pair of lightning claws obsolete. and -1 to hit makes all of them obsolete. We all know how powerful penalties to hit are.
The moment you buff the maul the powerfist looses any reason to exist. The design space isn't occupied by just power weapons. It's occupied by every option on the datasheet.

Seriously? Lightning Claws rerolling to wound ring any bells? Powerfist does multiple damage at a higher AP than the Maul? Just throw your hands in the air and give up immediately with "it can't be done!"s, why don't you. If you were actually commited to doing it, you can do it.

 Insectum7 wrote:
Wah wah. We can bicker about the details but it doesn't change the fact that fundamentally all we're looking at the difference between 3 profiles and 5, which is still fewer than the heavy weapon choices available to Tac marines. Guys, this is minor.

 Lance845 wrote:

 Insectum7 wrote:

Opening bid:
Axe as is.
Sword +1 attack like chainswords OR -1 to hit for enemy models attacking owning model
Maul, as is but +1 to wound.

So the sword with +1 attacks makes a pair of lightning claws obsolete. and -1 to hit makes all of them obsolete. We all know how powerful penalties to hit are.
The moment you buff the maul the powerfist looses any reason to exist. The design space isn't occupied by just power weapons. It's occupied by every option on the datasheet.

Seriously? Lightning Claws rerolling to wound ring any bells? Powerfist does multiple damage at a higher AP than the Maul? Just throw your hands in the air and give up immediately with "it can't be done!"s, why don't you. If you were actually commited to doing it, you can do it.

Sorry I mixed the Maul with the Thunder Hammer.

No, you can't. The captain datasheet has 8 different melee weapons on it. There are not 8 different types of targets to optimize them for.

The chainsword/lightning claw is optimized towards weak save hoard units becuse despite doing less damage then something like the relic blade per hit it is capable of generating more hits and that is what you want versus single wound targets especially with weaker saves and a lot of bodies.

The power weapons/relic blade have AP (unless it's the maul which only has ap-1). So they are optimized as MEQ weapons. Not just because of the AP but the bonus strength gives them wounds at 3+. (The maul getting +1 to wound and ap-1 means the maul wounds everything on a really broad spectrum but it can't deal with the armor of anything on that spectrum. So what the hell is it doing versus any other option on the datasheet?) With the relic blade having 6 str and -3 AP and Dd3 making it a pretty optimal TEQ killer which ALSO makes it the best MEQ killer. It's a flat upgrade to anything the power weapons can do. The fist and thunderhammer again have the exact same targets. One will mathmatically be better at it then the other. And it is. The thunder hammer doesn't have variable damage.

In other to give the other 4 weapons on the list an actual role to fill you need 4 other kinds of targets for them to take out AND they need to be better at taking them out then the other weapons without taking away their niche. I am happy to say that no. It cannot actually be done. The design space is actually that limited. And most important to the power weapons sepcficially you got from GEQ (lighting claws) to MEQ (The trio of power weapons) to TEQ (relic blade) so in order to find something for the other 2 power weapons (+ any other variety of them you want to represent such as spear) you need to find other targets to go after without stepping on their toes within THAT range band. Otherwise those weapons need to start killing vehicles. And if they are going to start killing vehicles they need to do it better then the Str8 Thunderhammer but not as good as either when strength 8 matter.


Edited because I keep mixing up all the dumb power weapon profiles. Fixed now.

I mean you are ignoring the price difference.

For example thunder hammers have always been better than fists but they cost much more. Having different options to fight the same targets but at different point levels isn't a bad thing. (It also allows for good point fillers when you are at 1990 etc points. Thats the reason why misericordia exist for Adeptus Custodes)

Is ok for a lighting claw to be better than a chainsword at the same task if the lighting claw costs 3 times as much.

Right now with 9th, Fists, Chainfists and Thunderhammers each have their clear use: Thunderhammer wins agaisnt 3 wound models and bigger stuff, Chainfists wins agaisnt all kind of vehicles, and Fists win again 2 wound infantry.

In the axe vs sword vs powermace debate I believe you dont need to remove all the options. Just remove one. The mace is redundant. Just make it power swords and power axes: Powersword specialized in fighting agaisnt armored opponents and the axe a more middle of the road weapon as it is now. And keep both as cheap options in comparison with the three power weapons designed to kill multiwound or big stuff.

Relic Blade is a special weapon for space marine characters that no other Codex has, but many codex have access to power weapons, so don't use the Relic Blade to claim redundancy for other options when many armies don't have it.

 Galas wrote:
I mean you are ignoring the price difference.

For example thunder hammers have always been better than fists but they cost much more. Having different options to fight the same targets but at different point levels isn't a bad thing.

As Type likes to bring up. PvNP. You spend a lot of time and resources trying to balance a bunch of options that essentially do the same jobs. The Thunderhammer kills those same targets just as dead and it could probably get slightly cheaper if it didn't have to be costed agaisnt these other options and instead took a generic profile of "Heavy Power Weapon" that could represent all 3.

Is ok for a lighting claw to be better than a chainsword at the same task if the lighting claw costs 3 times as much.

More importantly the chainsword is a stock weapon. It's cool to have a weaker stock weapon and then you pay for upgrades. But the upgrades shouldn't be competing with each other otherwise you end up with redundant entries.

Right now with 9th, Fists, Chainfists and Thunderhammers each have their clear use: Thunderhammer wins agaisnt 3 wound models and bigger stuff, Chainfists wins agaisnt all kind of vehicles, and Fists win again 2 wound infantry.

In the axe vs sword vs powermace debate I believe you dont need to remove all the options. Just remove one. The mace is redundant. Just make it power swords and power axes: Powersword specialized in fighting agaisnt armored opponents and the axe a more middle of the road weapon as it is now. And keep both as cheap options in comparison with the three power weapons designed to kill multiwound or big stuff.

I disagree that the 2 fill distinct roles. -2 AP is already a great AP. SM become 5+ saves. Essentially guardsmen. And anything gaurdsmen or less have no save. At +1 strength at the critical juncture of 5 str is far more valuable. You change your wounds from a 4+ to a 3+ against MEQ. It's far more valuable to roll more wounds against a 5+ save then it is 16% less wounds against a 6+ save. Nothing with that higher Sv is going to have that Lower T to make those weapons matter as a choice.

Relic Blade is a special weapon for space marine characters that no other Codex has, but many codex have access to power weapons, so don't use the Relic Blade to claim redundancy for other options when many armies don't have it.

I am not arguing that the relic blade is redundant. I think it's redundant to give the characters who have access to the relic blade access to the power weapons but I think it's good to have the power weapon profile available to the units that do not have access to the relic blade.

I think part of the issue (possibly due to shallow rules and limited design space) is that a lot of melee weapons are just direct improvements over others.

For example, a Power Fist is basically just an outright improvement over Swords, Axes and Mauls. Yes, it has -1 to hit, but that is more than made up for by its strength, even before you get to its AP and damage.

So rather than tailoring a character towards battling vehicles/monsters, a Power Fist tailors a character towards fighting anything.

You could maybe make an argument for Power Claws or a Relic Blade as alternatives, but even then we're still ignoring all three varieties of basic Power Weapon, so what's the point?

 vipoid wrote:
I think part of the issue (possibly due to shallow rules and limited design space) is that a lot of melee weapons are just direct improvements over others.

For example, a Power Fist is basically just an outright improvement over Swords, Axes and Mauls. Yes, it has -1 to hit, but that is more than made up for by its strength, even before you get to its AP and damage.

So rather than tailoring a character towards battling vehicles/monsters, a Power Fist tailors a character towards fighting anything.

You could maybe make an argument for Power Claws or a Relic Blade as alternatives, but even then we're still ignoring all three varieties of basic Power Weapon, so what's the point?

Part of the equation historically was that power fists were more expensive than power weapons, so you were really investing into melee by taking a power fist, but also the Initiative system provided more of a downside. Going last meant you were at real risk of being killed before you got to swing. Bringing that back would be a much more significant balancing factor than the current -1 to hit. It's great at fighting anything... but expensive, and with no guarantee that you'll ever get to swing.

 catbarf wrote:

 vipoid wrote:
I think part of the issue (possibly due to shallow rules and limited design space) is that a lot of melee weapons are just direct improvements over others.

For example, a Power Fist is basically just an outright improvement over Swords, Axes and Mauls. Yes, it has -1 to hit, but that is more than made up for by its strength, even before you get to its AP and damage.

So rather than tailoring a character towards battling vehicles/monsters, a Power Fist tailors a character towards fighting anything.

You could maybe make an argument for Power Claws or a Relic Blade as alternatives, but even then we're still ignoring all three varieties of basic Power Weapon, so what's the point?

Part of the equation historically was that power fists were more expensive than power weapons, so you were really investing into melee by taking a power fist, but also the Initiative system provided more of a downside. Going last meant you were at real risk of being killed before you got to swing. Bringing that back would be a much more significant balancing factor than the current -1 to hit. It's great at fighting anything... but expensive, and with no guarantee that you'll ever get to swing.

Oh absolutely.

Unfortunately, one of the problems with the current system is that it doesn't allow for that sort of drawback except in the case of lone-models or entire units all with power fists (since initiative is resolved by unit, not by model).

 vipoid wrote:

 catbarf wrote:

 vipoid wrote:
I think part of the issue (possibly due to shallow rules and limited design space) is that a lot of melee weapons are just direct improvements over others.

For example, a Power Fist is basically just an outright improvement over Swords, Axes and Mauls. Yes, it has -1 to hit, but that is more than made up for by its strength, even before you get to its AP and damage.

So rather than tailoring a character towards battling vehicles/monsters, a Power Fist tailors a character towards fighting anything.

You could maybe make an argument for Power Claws or a Relic Blade as alternatives, but even then we're still ignoring all three varieties of basic Power Weapon, so what's the point?

Part of the equation historically was that power fists were more expensive than power weapons, so you were really investing into melee by taking a power fist, but also the Initiative system provided more of a downside. Going last meant you were at real risk of being killed before you got to swing. Bringing that back would be a much more significant balancing factor than the current -1 to hit. It's great at fighting anything... but expensive, and with no guarantee that you'll ever get to swing.

Oh absolutely.

Unfortunately, one of the problems with the current system is that it doesn't allow for that sort of drawback except in the case of lone-models or entire units all with power fists (since initiative is resolved by unit, not by model).

Honestly just having it cost more should be enough. Although personally I'd prefer the Powerfist to be stronger than it is, giving infantry a better tool against vehicles and leave more space for the power weapons.

In the case of the fist/thunder hammer its not a straight upgrade to basic power weapons. Despite the fluff and naming conventions the 2 weapons are distinctly different things that fill distinctly different roles. Its the fist/thunderhammer that are direct upgrades. The hammer is just a better fist. It doesn't fill a different niche. It doesn't go after different targets. Its JUST a better version of the other one.

TBH thunderhammers were much less common than fists in the past. For example in terminators , if you wanted to use a thunderhammer you had to pay extra points for it and the stormshield, removing all shooting capabilities. And assault terminators had two builds: Anti-elite/chaff build with dual CL or anti vehicles/basically anything barring hordes + durability with TH+SS.

Most marine sargeants had powerfist but no thunderhammer as an option. Chaos had fists but no thunder hammers, etc... comparing weapons is not as simple as comparing profiles but looking at how they are distributed.

Yeah a heavy rail rifle is just a better rail rifle but they are weapons for different units.

Thats true and fair. But the distiction between power fist and thunder hammer NOW is random damage or not. Thats it. A singular profile for Heavy Power Weapon covers both and can be distributed across all datasheets, opening up modeling options while consolidating design space.

Actually fists are damage 2 now and thunderhammer are damage 3. Chainfists are damage 1d3 but 3 vs vehicles. Fists are ap-3 , hammer -2 and chainfist -4.

So basically, as goonhammer mathammer calculations:
-Fists are better agaisnt anything with 2 wounds or 4 wounds
-Hammers are better agaisnt anything with 3 wounds, 5 or more wounds.
-Chainfists are a middle ground agaisnt both 2 wound and 3 wound models and are just better agaisnt vehicles than both weapons.

So as a suggestion. Heavy power weapon. Str x2 Ap-3 Dd3. Always do max damage against VEHICLES and MONSTERS.

I could see that working. GW wont do it but ey. I stopped arguing with my friends about this. From a 20 player group I'm literally the only one that would accept any kind of consolidation. GW knows their public.

This entire thread strikes me as a community thought experiment before someone/s get the gumption to write a home brew rule set. I am for contributing to a community project that covers the breadth of the game, I just don't have the time/resources to crack into every codex. I do however have the time to work with people cracking into the codexes to have everyone check each others work and hold each other accountable.

 Lance845 wrote:
This entire thread strikes me as a community thought experiment before someone/s get the gumption to write a home brew rule set. I am for contributing to a community project that covers the breadth of the game, I just don't have the time/resources to crack into every codex. I do however have the time to work with people cracking into the codexes to have everyone check each others work and hold each other accountable.

Yeah, the various points brought up in the thread constantly made me try and see how i would write a home brew (or even just my own game).

 Galas wrote:
From a 20 player group I'm literally the only one that would accept any kind of consolidation. GW knows their public.

Aye, and this is a real consideration that has to be grappled with.

Imo consolidation with lots of upgrade options would get us the best of both worlds. Fewer things to remember, but greater customization and total permutations. That's also something that becomes harder to balance, and interferes with GWs unfortunate inclination towards no-model-no-rules.



Automatically Appended Next Post:

 VladimirHerzog wrote:

 Lance845 wrote:
This entire thread strikes me as a community thought experiment before someone/s get the gumption to write a home brew rule set. I am for contributing to a community project that covers the breadth of the game, I just don't have the time/resources to crack into every codex. I do however have the time to work with people cracking into the codexes to have everyone check each others work and hold each other accountable.

Yeah, the various points brought up in the thread constantly made me try and see how i would write a home brew (or even just my own game).

Likewise. I've been thinking more about it too, but I'm suuuuper busy these days. :/

I could contribute in more then a "checking work" kind of way on core rules (if the project is deemed to change those), Tyranids, Tau, and MAYBE Necrons as those are the dexes I have the most familiarity with. But any kind of Eldar, Sister of Battle, Custodes etc... I would be mostly lost and need to do a lot of research time to catch myself up.

I would also recommend consolidating in any FW units into the dex for obvious reasons. Like.. why the feth have an armies units in 2-3 books?

I just love cracking into and writing rules. So you know.... I'm in.