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Imo they could get a lot more sales out of the boxnaught by Killa kanning them.

Just make them squadrons with basic infantry weapons rather than the dreadnought Ifield versions the primaris ones have.

Ie

Boxnaught 2-3 in a squad

M7" t8 w10 sv3+ ld6+ oc3

Twin linked lascannon (twinlinked)
Twin linked missile launcher (twinlinked)
Powerfist A4 3+ s10 ap-2 d2

Etc

Then people could make dreadnought armies of they wanted

I was thinking about this yesterday. Tell me what I'm missing:

Legendary Freeblade: Once per turn, you can target this model with a Strategem for 0CP, and can do so even if you have already targeted a different unit with that Strategem in the same phase.

Trophy Claim - Effect: If your model destroys that enemy unit this phase, you gain 1 CP...

Weaken an enemy, then put Trophy Claim on Rex for 0CP, kill it, generate a free CP out of nothing.

 Hellebore wrote:
Imo they could get a lot more sales out of the boxnaught by Killa kanning them.

If a particularly promising Space Marine Scout is mortally wounded in battle, he is interred in a Mini-Dread. Squadrons of Mini-Dreads move ahead of Dreadnought formations, flushing ambushing forces out of cover, and corralling larger targets into the path of the approaching full-sized Dreadnoughts.

^I like that idea!


Just wondering if we know yet what looks to be the best delivery system for the new terminators?

Thought with the previewed tank survival rules if land raiders and terminators are a good combo, if people are leaning one way over another or still wait and see.

On the particular topic of lethality -- it seems like there's disagreement about exactly what less lethal is supposed to mean. Everyone has their own mental image of this that no one else can access.

One might think a point of AP or a pip of strength is "not enough".

Mathematically those two changes are both the same effect. Take one particular outcome:
1 * .666 * .666 * .666 = 0.3

It doesn't matter where I remove something - the outcome is the same given that it's just a string of probabilities. In this particular scenario a single pip has reduced the outcome by 25%.
1 * .666 * .5 * .666 = 0.2
1 * .666 * .666 * .5 = 0.2

In a scenario where the odds are worse it's a 33% reduction. What this means is that weaker models shouldn't get hit as much in the process to reduce lethality. This may be partly why marines can't get cover against AP0.
1 * .333 * .5 * .5 = 0.08
1 * .333 * .5 * .333 = 0.06

And when things are really good -- it's "only" a 20% reduction ( calculated with all the significant digits ).
1 * .833 * .833 * .833 = 0.6
1 * .833 * .833 * .666 = 0.5

Now quite likely any of those weapons picked up some ability, which limits how much their weapon is nerfed. Let's take our baseline, nerf it by 1, and add a sustained hits:

1 * .666 * .666 * .666 = 0.3 // baseline (0.295)
((1 * .167 * 2) + (1 * .5)) * .666 * .5 = 0.277
7% decrease

((1 * .167 * 2) + (1 * .5)) * .5 * .5 = 0.208 // nerfed twice
30% decrease

That's a pretty big gap. Note that such a "twice nerfed" weapon without an extra rule would see a 44% decrease. These factors are going to be all over the place depending on the interaction and the target type. A lethal hit might greatly benefit from something S3 hitting T12 - that's a huge increase, but a really tiny overall outcome.

In a D6 system a single pip can change the outcome only by 20% / 25% / 33% / 50%. 50% is the max and that's on terrible weapons. So most often the nerfs will be in the 20% range unless they get hit twice. And then you add the layers, which reduce the nerf to some degree. Once we start adding layers we wind up having to then introduce the layers from 9th, which gets REALLY complicated.

I made this table when the IG article came out over personal concern about lethal hits. These are the efficiency changes from a BS3 weapon ( I don't know why I chose BS3 at the time ) getting one pip worse, but gaining lethal hits.


And this is two pips worse. In this scenario Lethal Hits is the only thing keeping the weapons from being terrible.


Once might be inclined to say that the small arms getting such a huge benefit is bad, but those guns were never shaking things up despite the memes. e.g. a Lasgun shooting ( no nerfs ) T6 3+ ( this isn't in the table above ) goes from 0.028 to 0.074 wounds. Said another way - over 100 shots the unit will produce an extra 4.6 wounds. That's a 10 man unit rapid firing for an entire game. So, IS gain 'one wound per turn' as long as they're shooting the toughest thing around. But that's kind of the high end given they won't be in RF range and they'll take casualties.

The true outcome of all of this can't conceivably be known until games are played, but the baseline is getting nerfed and the number of layers that can be added are being removed. These factors combined will produce a less lethal game, but other factors like terrain and missions are going to matter on how all of this unfolds.

lost_lilliputian wrote:
^I like that idea!


Just wondering if we know yet what looks to be the best delivery system for the new terminators?

Thought with the previewed tank survival rules if land raiders and terminators are a good combo, if people are leaning one way over another or still wait and see.

We still have no idea about points, what transports can carry terminators, how useful land raiders are beside transport, any ways to improve charge odds from ds beside reroll charges...

Anybody who claims to know best in 10e is liar.

 H.B.M.C. wrote:
I was thinking about this yesterday. Tell me what I'm missing:

Legendary Freeblade: Once per turn, you can target this model with a Strategem for 0CP, and can do so even if you have already targeted a different unit with that Strategem in the same phase.

Trophy Claim - Effect: If your model destroys that enemy unit this phase, you gain 1 CP...

Weaken an enemy, then put Trophy Claim on Rex for 0CP, kill it, generate a free CP out of nothing.

Don't think you're missing anything, although you could just double tank shock and pretty much always get the max 6 MW every time if you have Canis and another thunderstrike gauntlet knight.

 Insularum wrote:

 H.B.M.C. wrote:
I was thinking about this yesterday. Tell me what I'm missing:

Legendary Freeblade: Once per turn, you can target this model with a Strategem for 0CP, and can do so even if you have already targeted a different unit with that Strategem in the same phase.

Trophy Claim - Effect: If your model destroys that enemy unit this phase, you gain 1 CP...

Weaken an enemy, then put Trophy Claim on Rex for 0CP, kill it, generate a free CP out of nothing.

Don't think you're missing anything, although you could just double tank shock and pretty much always get the max 6 MW every time if you have Canis and another thunderstrike gauntlet knight.

You wouldn't get cp then.

But yes as long as you don't fail to kill target free way to get cp.

Spoletta wrote:
Ok let's take a land raider.

Melta/fists/missiles wounded it on 4+, now it wounds it on 5+.
Lascannon wounded it on 3+ now it wounds on 5+.
Railgun wounded it on 2+, now it wounds it on 3+.

Different vehicles? Ok let's look at the Rhino.

Fists wounded it on 3+, now on 5+.
Melta and missiles from 3+ to 4+.
Plasma from 3+ to 5+ and also has less AP.

Lethality has gone DOWN, and not by a small margin.

good example but
Lascannon has S12 and LR has T12 so 4+ not 5+

So the argument gripping the Necron Facebook group;
Reanimation Protocols says it happens at the end of your command phase.
Battleshock Tests say they happen after all Command Phase abilities and then the Command Phase ends.

Which happens first?

 AduroT wrote:
So the argument gripping the Necron Facebook group;
Reanimation Protocols says it happens at the end of your command phase.
Battleshock Tests say they happen after all Command Phase abilities and then the Command Phase ends.

Which happens first?

Ouch. Yeah, you really need to know, this could conceivably make a massive difference.

 AduroT wrote:
So the argument gripping the Necron Facebook group;
Reanimation Protocols says it happens at the end of your command phase.
Battleshock Tests say they happen after all Command Phase abilities and then the Command Phase ends.

Which happens first?

The rulebook says that 'any other abilities that need to be resolved in the Command Phase' are done before going to the Battleshock step, so i'd say that has precedence before the Reanimation Protocols vignette.

 Insularum wrote:

 H.B.M.C. wrote:
I was thinking about this yesterday. Tell me what I'm missing:

Legendary Freeblade: Once per turn, you can target this model with a Strategem for 0CP, and can do so even if you have already targeted a different unit with that Strategem in the same phase.

Trophy Claim - Effect: If your model destroys that enemy unit this phase, you gain 1 CP...

Weaken an enemy, then put Trophy Claim on Rex for 0CP, kill it, generate a free CP out of nothing.

Don't think you're missing anything, although you could just double tank shock and pretty much always get the max 6 MW every time if you have Canis and another thunderstrike gauntlet knight.

Agree. It's a cute combo, but it doesn't come without the cost of opportunity. You might gain 1 CP, but you could also just have used a 2 CP stratagem for free for the same CP net amount.

Tsagualsa wrote:

 AduroT wrote:
So the argument gripping the Necron Facebook group;
Reanimation Protocols says it happens at the end of your command phase.
Battleshock Tests say they happen after all Command Phase abilities and then the Command Phase ends.

Which happens first?

The rulebook says that 'any other abilities that need to be resolved in the Command Phase' are done before going to the Battleshock step, so i'd say that has precedence before the Reanimation Protocols vignette.

Agreed.

It really doesn't help that they decided to label the first step of the command phase as "Command", so we have:
Command phase - 1. Command step
Command phase - 2. Battleshock step

Certainly seems like they intended one thing but wrote something else.

I wonder if at some point Battleshock was a phase by itself, then got merged into the command phase as a late revision.

 AduroT wrote:
So the argument gripping the Necron Facebook group;
Reanimation Protocols says it happens at the end of your command phase.
Battleshock Tests say they happen after all Command Phase abilities and then the Command Phase ends.

Which happens first?

RP then Battleshock. That is at least how I read the rules from the leak.

 xttz wrote:
It really doesn't help that they decided to label the first step of the command phase as "Command", so we have:
Command phase - 1. Command step
Command phase - 2. Battleshock step

Certainly seems like they intended one thing but wrote something else.

I wonder if at some point Battleshock was a phase by itself, then got merged into the command phase as a late revision.

Or they just made a typo/oversight in the Vignette and wrote 'at the end of the Command Phase' when they meant 'at the end of the Command Step'. I think the intent is clear enough, as the FF article mentions RP 'helping your units to stay over half-strength and avoiding Battleshock'.

Knights looking interesting.

In terms of killing the buggers? 5+ Inv is of course useful, but I note it doesn’t apply in HTH. With Armiger and Regular chassis both having a 3+ save, Knight Tipping may be a decent route, if you’ve heavy hitters in HTH.

Armiger OC being 8 is pretty nice as well.

The rest will, as ever, be Found Out In Play.

A thing I'd flag up is that lethality isn't linear because people don't automatically get the average result. The tails will show up in real games.

One of the issues I think with 9th was that if you "expected" to get a 60% return on your points, there was probably a significant chance of getting an 80-100% return on your points. This is what produced turn 2 tablings if people didn't hide their units.

As an example, if you have 3 hits wounding on 3s, the odds of no wounds are just 3.7%. By contrast if you have 3 hits wounding on 5s, the odds of no wounds goes up to 29.6%. The first is unlucky while the second will happen all the time. In theory the damage is halved - but the odds of a "critical failure" are actually 8~ times higher. (And it gets worse if we assume 1 wound wouldn't have significant impact etc).

Something I like from the increased toughness scale is that we get a much better separation between dedicated anti-monster/vehicle weapons and other weapon types. Even though the invulnerable save on knights is still only against ranged attacks, they are no longer so easily butchered in combat by infantry wounding knights on 3s or 4s because infantry close combat weapons didn't scale wiith the toughness increases. A S9 character now wounds knights on 5s rather than 3s. That's a really big difference and doesn't even take into account the often reduced AP of melee weapons. Charging a knight will now be an actual risk for infantry, rather than for the knight.

Tyel wrote:
A thing I'd flag up is that lethality isn't linear because people don't automatically get the average result. The tails will show up in real games.

One of the issues I think with 9th was that if you "expected" to get a 60% return on your points, there was probably a significant chance of getting an 80-100% return on your points. This is what produced turn 2 tablings if people didn't hide their units.

As an example, if you have 3 hits wounding on 3s, the odds of no wounds are just 3.7%. By contrast if you have 3 hits wounding on 5s, the odds of no wounds goes up to 29.6%. The first is unlucky while the second will happen all the time. In theory the damage is halved - but the odds of a "critical failure" are actually 8~ times higher. (And it gets worse if we assume 1 wound wouldn't have significant impact etc).

this matters, its not just the 'average' result you need to know, but the spread of results.

helps to work out the probability curves for various results, ir you then work to say the assumption you will get a P40-P50 result (that is to say assume you will score what you should score 40%-50% of the time) you will take account of the spread

and also accept, as I think all gamers do, that fewer 'actions' means a wider swing on the result of those actions where as more will trend more to the average

which of course is what makes a single shot, powerful, weapon worth typically far less than GW assign to it

The Railgun is actually not absurd.

https://www.warhammer-community.com/2023/05/19/warhammer-40000-faction-focus-tau-empire-2/?utm_source=facebook&utm_medium=social&utm_campaign=warhammer-40,000&utm_content=fftau19052023

As Tau Shall.

For the Greater Good is... a mess to parse. Once you get it, its... fine, but that's an absurdly ugly bit of writing.

For the practical effect of 'half your army (rounded down, but exceptions) can have effective shooting,' its not very good.

Drones as markers cleans up a lot of stupid rules interactions, but it means the board is crowded with what's effectively non-interactable litter.

Looks like tau kept their 4+ armor save.

Drones becoming tokens is interesting. It certainly lightens up the load of taking down their units.

Boosykes wrote:
Looks like tou kept their 4+ armor save.

Pathfinders previously had a 5+ armor save, so this is a buff to them.

Fire Warriors will certainly have kept their 4+.

 Kothra wrote:

Boosykes wrote:
Looks like tou kept their 4+ armor save.

Pathfinders previously had a 5+ armor save, so this is a buff to them.

Fire Warriors will certainly have kept their 4+.

Nice. I'm not that up on tau so thank you.

Kauyon sucks.

Sorry, a detachment ability that doesn't have any effect at all until turn 3 is fething terrible.

 Daedalus81 wrote:
The Railgun is actually not absurd.

Still very good, though. It's probably going to be hitting on 2+ most of the time, and the potential for three hits is not to be laughed at. Thankfully, it only ignores invulnerable saves a wound roll of 6.

Voss wrote:
Kauyon sucks.

Sorry, a detachment ability that doesn't have any effect at all until turn 3 is fething terrible.

Well, given the other synergies I'm sort of glad. It gives time for the opponent to try and take out markerlights. Ignore cover and +1BS is solid for a shooting army.

 Daedalus81 wrote:

Voss wrote:
Kauyon sucks.

Sorry, a detachment ability that doesn't have any effect at all until turn 3 is fething terrible.

Well, given the other synergies I'm sort of glad. It gives time for the opponent to try and take out markerlights. Ignore cover and +1BS is solid for a shooting army.

Right. But that's all greater good stuff.

Kauyon gives you 'have the ability to pray for 6s to get extra shoots after being blatted for almost half the game.'
It is, effectively, a penalty box to give the opponent time to wreck face. The tau player's 'benefit' is basically a massage to their statistical curve to compensate for the casualties they've taken so far