How to make tanks better

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**G00fySmiley**

I brought this thread up while doing a game and a friend and i were thinking about it while playing and trying to incorporate more the the ways to increase vehicle/monster survivability without being too crazy. one method we both liked was more defined damage guns. as in throw out D-d3 damage and just assign it a 2, throw out D-d6 weapons in favor of flat D3 (or D4 for melta type). Additionally something along the lines of ignoring low Ap such as ignore ap-1 when rolling saves so that its harder to plink one to death with small arms fire but still making it so melta guns are quite powerful against them.

**Not Online!!!**

the problem isn't the land raider.
The problem children are things like preds or other t7 mbts.
Which do not have a 1/3 i get out of jail for free card.
Indeed more likely it will be that it is an 1/2 since well, MoP and Venoms are a thing that likes eachother.
Meanwhile a pred or other MBT's and even the landraider just don't slot in aswell in synergy.
Also an issue is the overall cost allocated to the vehicles you brought up JNA.
Dedicateing an eighth of a standard army to a singular unit which doesn't necessrily synergise aswell with the rest of the army as compared to the 110 venom is quite a bit a diffrent consideration.

**JNAProductions**

Well yeah. Land Raiders aren’t good-but that doesn’t mean they’re fragile.

And even a Rhino is more durable per point against anything AP-2 or less.

**Not Online!!!**

JNAProductions wrote:
Well yeah. Land Raiders aren’t good-but that doesn’t mean they’re fragile.

And even a Rhino is more durable per point against anything AP-2 or less.

Well -2 AP isn't the core issue between the problematic state compression and too cheap high power AT:

**Unit1126PLL**

The problem with durability for tanks goes to the problem with lethality in general:

Buffs, more than stats.

Eradicator melta rifles aren't that great (1 shot, 24" range). Three of them should miss once, fail to wound once, and then do between 3 and 6 damage to a Leman Russ depending on range.

But!

They get double shots if they shoot the same target (not-statline-related buff)
They have access to rerolls/modifiers to hit and to wound (not-statline-related buff)
They have access to at least one reroll for damage (not-statline-related buff).

Same for Retributors, or really any unit.

Even with small arms, it's crazy. Against a T7 3+ target like a Chimera, based on raw stats alone it takes something like 14-15 shots to put a single wound on it with bolters hitting on 3s.

But!
AP -1 (doctrine stuff): 9 shots
AP -2 (doctrine stuff + other buffs): ~7ish shots
Reroll to-hit (from some access): ~10 shots
Reroll to-wound: ~9 shots again.

Roll all those buffs together and you get:
AP -1 rerolling hits and wounds to do 1 wound to a chimera with a bolter: about 4 or 5 shots.

This means that a regular tactical squad with no weapon upgrades can very nearly bracket a Chimera in one shooting phase, provided it has the right buffs, with the basic rifleman's weapon. God help you if they're AP -2 Primaris marines.

**Jidmah**

Unit1126PLL wrote:
The problem with durability for tanks goes to the problem with lethality in general:

Buffs, more than stats.

Eradicator melta rifles aren't that great (1 shot, 24" range). Three of them should miss once, fail to wound once, and then do between 3 and 6 damage to a Leman Russ depending on range.

But!

They get double shots if they shoot the same target (not-statline-related buff)
They have access to rerolls/modifiers to hit and to wound (not-statline-related buff)
They have access to at least one reroll for damage (not-statline-related buff).

Same for Retributors, or really any unit.

I can totally agree with this.

Even with small arms, it's crazy. Against a T7 3+ target like a Chimera, based on raw stats alone it takes something like 14-15 shots to put a single wound on it with bolters hitting on 3s.

But!
AP -1 (doctrine stuff): 9 shots
AP -2 (doctrine stuff + other buffs): ~7ish shots
Reroll to-hit (from some access): ~10 shots
Reroll to-wound: ~9 shots again.

Roll all those buffs together and you get:
AP -1 rerolling hits and wounds to do 1 wound to a chimera with a bolter: about 4 or 5 shots.

This means that a regular tactical squad with no weapon upgrades can very nearly bracket a Chimera in one shooting phase, provided it has the right buffs, with the basic rifleman's weapon. God help you if they're AP -2 Primaris marines.

Yikes, this again. You do realize that you've just thrown a chapter master, a sergeant and a tactical squad at a 75 point transport so it can "nearly" bracket it? And that is assuming marines can even buff full re-rolls to wound or AP-1, which I couldn't find (though admittedly I didn't look very thoroughly).

How do you even come to the conclusion that almost 400 points of bolters dealing two damage to a T7 vehicle is a problem? Especially when those marine could easily wreck that chimera in previous editions.

**G00fySmiley**

Unit1126PLL wrote:
The problem with durability for tanks goes to the problem with lethality in general:

Buffs, more than stats.

Eradicator melta rifles aren't that great (1 shot, 24" range). Three of them should miss once, fail to wound once, and then do between 3 and 6 damage to a Leman Russ depending on range.

But!

They get double shots if they shoot the same target (not-statline-related buff)
They have access to rerolls/modifiers to hit and to wound (not-statline-related buff)
They have access to at least one reroll for damage (not-statline-related buff).

Same for Retributors, or really any unit.

Even with small arms, it's crazy. Against a T7 3+ target like a Chimera, based on raw stats alone it takes something like 14-15 shots to put a single wound on it with bolters hitting on 3s.

But!
AP -1 (doctrine stuff): 9 shots
AP -2 (doctrine stuff + other buffs): ~7ish shots
Reroll to-hit (from some access): ~10 shots
Reroll to-wound: ~9 shots again.

Roll all those buffs together and you get:
AP -1 rerolling hits and wounds to do 1 wound to a chimera with a bolter: about 4 or 5 shots.

This means that a regular tactical squad with no weapon upgrades can very nearly bracket a Chimera in one shooting phase, provided it has the right buffs, with the basic rifleman's weapon. God help you if they're AP -2 Primaris marines.

on the last part ap -2 marines. the heavy intersessors are 5 for 140 points (150 if you want the heavy bolter) they are 1 shot each (2 with heavy bolter) AP-2, D2 (3 for heavy)

they are heavy and not rapid fire so ... shot at a chimera.

4 executer bolt rifles 2.64 hits, .87 if those wound and the 75 point chimera gets a 5+ save so.... .58 D2 go through
1 executioner heavy bolter 2 shots, 1.32 hits, .43 wounds, after save .29 D3 go through.

so they probably get 2 damage on it. not saying that marines do not have tools to deal with chimeras, but the point of heavy intersessors is to be good point for point at killing other space marines, as light armor killing goes they are kind of gak at that job

**Unit1126PLL**

Jidmah wrote:
How do you even come to the conclusion that almost 400 points of bolters dealing two damage to a T7 vehicle is a problem? Especially when those marine could easily wreck that chimera in previous editions.

I just used it as an example of "weapon stats not determining damage as much as extra super-special buffs".

Plus, there's a whole separate (and off-topic) discussion about whether or not 400 points of unit should automagically beat 75 points. One could make quite a convincing case that 400 points of the wrong weapon should do exactly nothing to 75 points of target.

A M1 tank costs 2.5+ million dollars, while a MIG-19 only costs probably less than 500k. That doesn't mean we should plan for the M1 tank to reliably damage the MIG-19. In fact, weapon-to-target paring is a really fun and engaging part of other wargames.

EDIT:
The AP-2 marines comes with regular Intercessors with Bolt Rifles in Tactical Doctrine (pretty sure I've fought those before, but honestly I didn't do exhaustive research).

**Tyran**

Marines have easy access to mid AP because doctrines, specially on rapid fire weapons.

But IIRC the 9th codex crippled most of their sources of full re-rolls, specially to wound ones.

Still have plenty of re-rolling 1s, but those are less of an issue as mathematically, re-rolling 1s are a fixed buff.

**G00fySmiley**

ahh yea, on the tactical doctrin the regular intersessors will be ap-2 but str 4 and damage 1 so even less effective (though 50 points cheaper). I keep seeing complaints on the new heavy intersessors with the -2 AP and for the point si don't actually think they are great, good yes but not gamebreakingly so.

**catbarf**

By my math a unit of 10 Intercessors totaling 200pts rapid firing Bolt Rifles in Tactical doctrine score an average of 2.96 wounds to a Chimera. With a basic Chimera at 10 Wounds and 65pts, that means 19pts of damage done, or just under 10%.

That's not amazing and doesn't seem like a problem. I think there's a more legitimate concern for what S5 weapons do against things like tanks; heavy bolters are more efficient against Leman Russes than they are against most infantry.

**Spoletta**

G00fySmiley wrote:
ahh yea, on the tactical doctrin the regular intersessors will be ap-2 but str 4 and damage 1 so even less effective (though 50 points cheaper). I keep seeing complaints on the new heavy intersessors with the -2 AP and for the point si don't actually think they are great, good yes but not gamebreakingly so.

They are just the last knee jerk reaction to a model that in the end proves to be quite tame. It has been playable on TTS for an eternity and still sees very little use.

On the actual topic of tanks, we surely need some higher T value for some tanks. T9 needs to be in the game, and Leman Russes surely qualify for that. Land Raiders and Monoliths could even require a T10 (and a point increase).
Couple that with a slight increase in the cost AT weapons, and the problem is solved.

**Karol**

I think that the monolith with the rules it has now, could stay the same point cost wise , even if it had t10 . even if it had 4-6 extra woulds it would still be tame in comperation to toher stuff in the game

**Unit1126PLL**

catbarf wrote:
By my math a unit of 10 Intercessors totaling 200pts rapid firing Bolt Rifles in Tactical doctrine score an average of 2.96 wounds to a Chimera. With a basic Chimera at 10 Wounds and 65pts, that means 19pts of damage done, or just under 10%.

That's not amazing and doesn't seem like a problem. I think there's a more legitimate concern for what S5 weapons do against things like tanks; heavy bolters are more efficient against Leman Russes than they are against most infantry.

Again, though, this is one buff.

It's not the weapon statlines that are good.

It's the stacking buffs.

Plus, from an immersion perspective, if my armored transports were suffering 33% systems damage in one volley when confronting a single squad of regular infantrymen armed exclusively with standard handheld rifles following their army's usual doctrine, I'd probably have gentle words for my ordnance procurement officer who told me I was getting armored vehicles!

**Spoletta**

Good thing then that 10 regular infantrymen with standard handheld rifles inflict around half a wound on such a vehicle.

**catbarf**

Unit1126PLL wrote:
Plus, from an immersion perspective, if my armored transports were suffering 33% systems damage in one volley when confronting a single squad of regular infantrymen armed exclusively with standard handheld rifles following their army's usual doctrine, I'd probably have gentle words for my ordnance procurement officer who told me I was getting armored vehicles!

I get where you're coming from, but I have to point out that we're not actually talking about 'regular infantrymen' when we're talking Marines.

Four whole squads of Guardsmen rapid firing a Chimera at under 12" do, let's see... 2.11 wounds, not exactly a wild amount. And it's not like a modern IFV is completely immune to small arms; getting magdumped by a whole platoon is not something a Bradley driver is going to ignore. A wound or two seems about right to represent the very real risk of damage to mobility and optics from even small arms. I would argue it's closer to reasonable than the old days where infantry couldn't do anything. YMMV.

Again, I'm just not sure it's a real issue for APCs/IFVs. It's when you're still doing multiple wounds to an MBT that I feel it starts to become unreasonable.

**BrianDavion**

Tyel wrote:
I feel GW won't push up T because it messes with factions that only have access to S8 anti-tank weapons..

then they need to give those factions better anti-tank.

**Unit1126PLL**

catbarf wrote:
Unit1126PLL wrote:
Plus, from an immersion perspective, if my armored transports were suffering 33% systems damage in one volley when confronting a single squad of regular infantrymen armed exclusively with standard handheld rifles following their army's usual doctrine, I'd probably have gentle words for my ordnance procurement officer who told me I was getting armored vehicles!

I get where you're coming from, but I have to point out that we're not actually talking about 'regular infantrymen' when we're talking Marines.

Four whole squads of Guardsmen rapid firing a Chimera at under 12" do, let's see... 2.11 wounds, not exactly a wild amount. And it's not like a modern IFV is completely immune to small arms; getting magdumped by a whole platoon is not something a Bradley driver is going to ignore. A wound or two seems about right to represent the very real risk of damage to mobility and optics from even small arms. I would argue it's closer to reasonable than the old days where infantry couldn't do anything. YMMV.

Again, I'm just not sure it's a real issue for APCs/IFVs. It's when you're still doing multiple wounds to an MBT that I feel it starts to become unreasonable.

Marines are standard infantry or roughly equivalent. The guard fight equally tough opponents (if not outright CSM) often enough.

Getting magdumped by a whole platoon will not reduce 20% effectiveness of a Bradley.

Remember, "a couple wounds" is 1/5th of the total durability of the unit.

Plus, remember what I said about stacking buffs?
-Add FRFSRF (i.e. a platoon commander telling his men to shoot) and it is nearly half dead. (Edit: you would need two company commanders to get all 4 squads, which is immersion breaking in itself, i.e. "you need 2 Captains to efficiently C2 a platoon!")
- Add rerolls (from other orders or sources like Yarrick) and it gets worse.

**vipoid**

The idea that GW won't give vehicles T9+ because anti-tank weapons wounding them on 5s feels bad rings somewhat hollow to my ears.

They didn't seem to have an issue with, for example, Dark Lances needing 5s just to penetrate Chimeras for 5 entire editions. Or for the majority of Necron anti-tank to be 'fire a lot of shots and really hope to roll some 6s'. Hence, I struggle to see why it's suddenly a problem now.

**kurhanik**

Tyran wrote:
AnomanderRake wrote:
Tyel wrote:

I don't think we're going 'round in circles. The point is to differentiate AT from other weapons, if by buffing armour's T you also have to buff the Strength on some dedicated AT weapons I think we would have accomplished our goal.

That is your point, but that point makes nothing about the issue of multi-meltas.

That is the primary divide of this thread. Those that want to address the issue of tanks on a competitive level, and those that want to address it from a immersive level.

That is why most people advocating for increasing Toughness cap and rejiggering Strength scores are *also* saying more wounds and saves are needed. An autocannon and its equivalents still wounds up to T13 on a 5+, meaning it is still a viable option for dealing chip damage against things that are not mainline battletanks without being too strong, while overcharged plasma would be doing the same up to T15.

Bump up Toughness on Vehicles and Monsters, throw in more wounds to give them some tankiness, and then buff full anti-tank to match it. If a Lascannon or its Xenos equivalent is S18 or the like, who cares? It was already wounding all but the tankiest of infantry on a 2+, same with S8. T5 infantry would suffer from it, but I dunno, if someone is firing their anti-tank at your infantry instead of your tanks, that already sounds like a win, especially since except for a few outliers, most anti tank weapons have limited shots.

Playing with the Toughness and Strength caps also creates more design space as right now a light vehicle is T6, and a heavy tank is T8. Making the lightest vehicles/monsters T10 and working up from there creates a more varied field of possibilities, and also allows for T6-9 to represent other things besides vehicles.

**H.B.M.C.**

catbarf wrote:
That's not amazing and doesn't seem like a problem. I think there's a more legitimate concern for what S5 weapons do against things like tanks; heavy bolters are more efficient against Leman Russes than they are against most infantry.

Which is what some of us have been saying since the beginning of this thread - the mid-strength, mid-damage, multi-shot weapons are the issue - but that got drowned out with "Chip damage isn't a thing/Bolters aren't a big deal/It's the Lascannons and Multi-Meltas that are the issue here!" nonsense.

**Tyran**

kurhanik wrote:

That is why most people advocating for increasing Toughness cap and rejiggering Strength scores are *also* saying more wounds and saves are needed. An autocannon and its equivalents still wounds up to T13 on a 5+, meaning it is still a viable option for dealing chip damage against things that are not mainline battletanks without being too strong, while overcharged plasma would be doing the same up to T15.

Bump up Toughness on Vehicles and Monsters, throw in more wounds to give them some tankiness, and then buff full anti-tank to match it. If a Lascannon or its Xenos equivalent is S18 or the like, who cares? It was already wounding all but the tankiest of infantry on a 2+, same with S8. T5 infantry would suffer from it, but I dunno, if someone is firing their anti-tank at your infantry instead of your tanks, that already sounds like a win, especially since except for a few outliers, most anti tank weapons have limited shots.

Playing with the Toughness and Strength caps also creates more design space as right now a light vehicle is T6, and a heavy tank is T8. Making the lightest vehicles/monsters T10 and working up from there creates a more varied field of possibilities, and also allows for T6-9 to represent other things besides vehicles.

When most people say bump toughness, they refer to relatively small increases like tanks being T8, T9 heavy tanks and super heavy T10.

They are not advocating for making tanks T15, because sure you create a design space, that then you fill with what making Space Marines T7 and oh look the heavy bolter is now S9 and is still wounding tanks on a 5+ and the multi melta is S16 or something like that and we got nowhere.

**The Red Hobbit**

I think he was using S18 as a hyperbole and not actually advocating for S18 lascannons.

If I understood his point correctly it doesn't really matter if a lascannon jumps to S18 and nothing else does, it was wounding nearly every infantry on 2+ before and it will afterwards as well.

I agree that raising S solely on antitank and raising T solely on Tanks would be an improvement. I also agree some additional wounds for durability would go a long way.

**alextroy**

vipoid wrote:
The idea that GW won't give vehicles T9+ because anti-tank weapons wounding them on 5s feels bad rings somewhat hollow to my ears.

They didn't seem to have an issue with, for example, Dark Lances needing 5s just to penetrate Chimeras for 5 entire editions. Or for the majority of Necron anti-tank to be 'fire a lot of shots and really hope to roll some 6s'. Hence, I struggle to see why it's suddenly a problem now.

This is an apples to oranges comparison. There is a big difference between needing a 5+ for Pentrating hit that has chance to completely destroy a vehicle or turn it off for a turn compared to needing a 5+ to remove a portion of a models wounds assuming it doesn't make a save.

**AnomanderRake**

And if the to-wound table didn't use 2x/0.5x as the bar for 6+/2+ you could use the design space a lot more effectively without needing to propose, even in jest, things like T15 models or S18 lascannons.

**Karol**

BrianDavion 798946 11154947 wrote:

then they need to give those factions better anti-tank.

And how do they do that when any gear update is linked to obligatory model updates which are planned years in advance? They are never going to tell this or that army players something in the line of , sorry guys we planed the updated for your army for 2024 hang on till then, preferably by buying an army with updated models and rules.

**Eldenfirefly**

A vehicle that is T8 with a 2+ armour save is actually really hard to handle. Especially if you do utilise obscuring cover, dense cover and stay far back. I have 6 entropy cannons in my DG army, but when I played a space wolf list that had a landraider. It took me until turn 4 before I finally destroyed it.

The Landraider suffers not because it isn't resilient enough. Its because its too expensive given it is trying to pack transport space for terminators on top of being resilient and packing lascannons and guns.

And tank commanders are still deadly too. So, I guess the question is, does GW see two classes of tanks. The truly heavy tanks like LR and Leman Russ are one class and everything else on a Rhino chassis are "light tanks".

**Canadian 5th**

catbarf wrote:
DOD spends a ridiculous amount of money to train and equip SOF, and then sticks them in Humvees. Humvees don't stop autocannon rounds. They also don't organize your taxes, serve ice cream sundaes, or do anything else outside their mission profile. You stick expensive highly-trained SOF guys in Humvees so they can get where they need to go as quickly as possible, where uparmoring would be a detriment to the mission rather than an asset. If you need to re-enact D-Day, you put them in something more survivable.

Except that the HMMWV was never designed to be a battle taxi or patrol vehicle. It was designed to move men and supplies around in rear areas and has been terrible in every other role. There's a reason why the US has acquired MRAPs to replace the HMMWV in patrol and urban combat roles and why other nations use a split of MRAPs and things the G-Wagons rather than try to use a one size fits all vehicle like the HMMWV.

The HMMWV's replacement, the JLTV, will also be far heavier than it was with armor integration as a top priority.

If you need to deploy your cadre of shock and awe Space Marines as rapidly as possible, you use Rhinos to get them to the action and then bug out. If you need to deliver them through a hail of anti-tank fire, you use a Land Raider.

This doesn't track when a Predator can move just as fast on the tabletop. Yes, for long-distance transit overland a heavier vehicle pushing more power will have more issues, but for Marines, they should probably move around in something both faster and carrying more armor and damn the endurance.

**JNAProductions**

I dunno. The Omnissiah itself has given the STCs for the Rhino-clearly, it cannot be improved upon and to do so would be heresy.

In other words, it might make sense to give a Rhino more armor. But since when has 40k made perfect sense? Hell, real people in the real world with real stakes don't always make the best decisions-why on earth would the insane folk over in the 41st millennium be any better?

**SemperMortis**

Canadian 5th wrote:

Except that the HMMWV was never designed to be a battle taxi or patrol vehicle. It was designed to move men and supplies around in rear areas and has been terrible in every other role. There's a reason why the US has acquired MRAPs to replace the HMMWV in patrol and urban combat roles and why other nations use a split of MRAPs and things the G-Wagons rather than try to use a one size fits all vehicle like the HMMWV.

The HMMWV's replacement, the JLTV, will also be far heavier than it was with armor integration as a top priority.

Except you are wrong. The Humvee was absolutely designed to be a "Battle Taxi" and a patrol vehicle as well as a convoy escort, scout vehicle etc etc, it was literally purpose designed/built to be a jack of all trades vehicle.

And the reason the US changed over to the MRAP was because Humvees didn't stand up well to the Taliban and Iraqi's #1 weapon system...IEDs. Utility wise a humvee is significantly faster and more maneuverable than an MRAP and has the same armaments, the biggest difference is that the MRAP has significantly thicker armor. Ive watched an MRAP take a 82mm recoil less rifle like it was nothing, likewise ive done BDAs on MRAPs that drove over 20-30lbs of HME and drove off afterwards, where as against a humvee, it would have killed everyone onboard.

regardless we are getting off track