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 alextroy wrote:
The Bolt Rifle has always been AP -1. That's been its biggest selling point.

Wellwellwell, I might be up to a rough surprise here... I actually can't tell apart the Primaris stuff very well, but the local Primaris player is using AP 0 Bolt Rifles. They are, like, 500%-sure AP 0, I have seen the entry of the weapon with my own eyes. Please don't tell me that he has been using the wrong gun all along...

 AtoMaki wrote:

 alextroy wrote:
The Bolt Rifle has always been AP -1. That's been its biggest selling point.

Wellwellwell, I might be up to a rough surprise here... I actually can't tell apart the Primaris stuff very well, but the local Primaris player is using AP 0 Bolt Rifles. They are, like, 500%-sure AP 0, I have seen the entry of the weapon with my own eyes. Please don't tell me that he has been using the wrong gun all along...

I'm pretty sure the auto bolt rifle is AP0. I wanna say it's the one with the drum mag if that helps.

 AtoMaki wrote:

 alextroy wrote:
The Bolt Rifle has always been AP -1. That's been its biggest selling point.

Wellwellwell, I might be up to a rough surprise here... I actually can't tell apart the Primaris stuff very well, but the local Primaris player is using AP 0 Bolt Rifles. They are, like, 500%-sure AP 0, I have seen the entry of the weapon with my own eyes. Please don't tell me that he has been using the wrong gun all along...

So here we see why people have been clamoring for bolter consolidation for a while now lol

Or someone can beat me to it.

Whelp. Now I have to figure out how to break it for the guy. Embarrassing.

 Daedalus81 wrote:

 AtoMaki wrote:
lasguns will still fare poorly against them so what this rule actually does is to make lasguns a little better versus MEQ because they essentially get -1 AP if the Marine is in cover.

So what if Marines get a 2+ cover against my mighty lasguns? Will it trigger an IRL nuclear war from the angry AM players working at NORAD? Or what?

Here's storm bolters vs marines not in cover - this comes to about 20 points in damage done ( current points ) :


And this is the same with marines getting a cover bonus - predictably half the damage so 10 points worth:


And here's SB vs guard in cover - this comes to 29 points of damage:


So what you're effectively saying is that it's OK for marines to take 1/3 the damage of guard as long as it doesn't hurt anyone's sensibilities? Maybe we should just increase the AP on guns to make it fair. Wait...

Sounds like a job for weapons that Ignore Cover or using melee units that Guard have.

Oh wait y'all don't want to do that.

No, because needing to roll 120 dice on average to remove a single basic trooper of the most common faction in the game is stupid and should actually be addressed at the source.

EviscerationPlague wrote:

Sounds like a job for weapons that Ignore Cover or using melee units that Guard have.

Oh wait y'all don't want to do that.

So mortars and flamers?

and slow as feth ogryns that need to tank like 2 turns of shooting before reaching the marines?

Alternate solution to the MEQ in cover thing?
Drop Marines back to 1W and allow them to get the cover bonus.

The 3+ cover thing also isn't just about Marines, it effects everyone with a 3+, so Sisters, a bunch of Necrons, Crisis Suits, etc. It's more of a "Get out and move your dudes!" mechanic.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 catbarf wrote:
No, because needing to roll 120 dice on average to remove a single basic trooper of the most common faction in the game is stupid and should actually be addressed at the source.

Yeah, this too.

 Insectum7 wrote:
Alternate solution to the MEQ in cover thing?
Drop Marines back to 1W and allow them to get the cover bonus.

Ehh. That's probably an even bigger swing in balance without making marines super cheap in points thereby making them more damaging when they're packing bigger guns.

 Insectum7 wrote:
Alternate solution to the MEQ in cover thing?
Drop Marines back to 1W and allow them to get the cover bonus.

.

This becomes a gigantic hit in efficiency to any elite marine unit. being 30-40pts with one wound and +3sv is very bad. Especialy when other factions gets tanks for 2-3 marines like that. Makes taking something else then a basic marine something a marine player should not be doing, and when that happens we are back to 2x5 minimal troops and either spaming units that somehow go around the +3sv/1W downgrade, or spaming tanks. And if neither thing can be done, then marines become a very bad army. Like post 8th ed Gulliman gunline marines nerf bad.

 VladimirHerzog wrote:

EviscerationPlague wrote:

Sounds like a job for weapons that Ignore Cover or using melee units that Guard have.

Oh wait y'all don't want to do that.

So mortars and flamers?

and slow as feth ogryns that need to tank like 2 turns of shooting before reaching the marines?

That's if we ignore the fact that those same weapons would also yield a bigger return against the guard as they won't get cover either.

 Daedalus81 wrote:

 Insectum7 wrote:
Alternate solution to the MEQ in cover thing?
Drop Marines back to 1W and allow them to get the cover bonus.

Ehh. That's probably an even bigger swing in balance without making marines super cheap in points thereby making them more damaging when they're packing bigger guns.

Then rebalance.

It sucks for other armies when their small arms are so ineffective against Marines.

 Insectum7 wrote:

 Daedalus81 wrote:

 Insectum7 wrote:
Alternate solution to the MEQ in cover thing?
Drop Marines back to 1W and allow them to get the cover bonus.

Ehh. That's probably an even bigger swing in balance without making marines super cheap in points thereby making them more damaging when they're packing bigger guns.

Then rebalance.

It sucks for other armies when their small arms are so ineffective against Marines.

Then access to more weapons that Ignore Cover or rules that grant ignoring cover should be a thing.

Y'all really make this rocket science as if it were a problem for 9th overall.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

Dudeface wrote:

 VladimirHerzog wrote:

EviscerationPlague wrote:

Sounds like a job for weapons that Ignore Cover or using melee units that Guard have.

Oh wait y'all don't want to do that.

So mortars and flamers?

and slow as feth ogryns that need to tank like 2 turns of shooting before reaching the marines?

That's if we ignore the fact that those same weapons would also yield a bigger return against the guard as they won't get cover either.

You both can just say you didn't math it out and don't bother to.

EviscerationPlague wrote:

You both can just say you didn't math it out and don't bother to.

true, since mortars and flamers don't even ignore cover in that game lmao.

even if we discount the strength of weapons, marines will save a lot more shots than guardsmen

(2+ vs 4+)

 Insectum7 wrote:
Alternate solution to the MEQ in cover thing?
Drop Marines back to 1W and allow them to get the cover bonus.

That seems fair.

EviscerationPlague wrote:

 Insectum7 wrote:

 Daedalus81 wrote:

 Insectum7 wrote:
Alternate solution to the MEQ in cover thing?
Drop Marines back to 1W and allow them to get the cover bonus.

Ehh. That's probably an even bigger swing in balance without making marines super cheap in points thereby making them more damaging when they're packing bigger guns.

Then rebalance.

It sucks for other armies when their small arms are so ineffective against Marines.

Then access to more weapons that Ignore Cover or rules that grant ignoring cover should be a thing.

Y'all really make this rocket science as if it were a problem for 9th overall.

Fully agree. Make Flamers Great Again!

Also agree that balancing for 40k is not rocket science

 Insectum7 wrote:

EviscerationPlague wrote:

 Insectum7 wrote:

 Daedalus81 wrote:

 Insectum7 wrote:
Alternate solution to the MEQ in cover thing?
Drop Marines back to 1W and allow them to get the cover bonus.

Ehh. That's probably an even bigger swing in balance without making marines super cheap in points thereby making them more damaging when they're packing bigger guns.

Then rebalance.

It sucks for other armies when their small arms are so ineffective against Marines.

Then access to more weapons that Ignore Cover or rules that grant ignoring cover should be a thing.

Y'all really make this rocket science as if it were a problem for 9th overall.

Fully agree. Make Flamers Great Again!

It's like we get these complaints about Marines in cover when the answer is part of the core rules missing things like more ignoring cover weapons, or making melee units more enticing. No I don't care how much someone detests a melee unit and only wants to range attack. This is 40k, maybe you should've brought a TAC list.

Well, part of the definition on TAC is that it has an answer to anything, and CC would be part of the toolkit anyways.

But also, to the 2W vs. 1W Marine thing. . . For funsies, instead of asking about Lasguns (the typical mathhammer example), ask instead how many Marines should it take to kill a Marine?

With an AP 0 Bolter, it takes 9 Rapid Firing Marines, to down a Marine.
(18×.666×.5×.333)=1.99 wounds.
Bolt Rifle with its AP -1 takes 6.

You could shrug off the AP0 and say Bolt Rifles are the go-to (although 6 is still pretty bad), but the AP0 translates to Marines in CC too. So without charging bonus it takes 9 Marines to take down a single Marine in a round of combat, which feels comically inept.

Edit: New Marine CC weapon profile is 3 A, so 6 instead of 9. Still pretty bad though!

 Afrodactyl wrote:

 AtoMaki wrote:

 alextroy wrote:
The Bolt Rifle has always been AP -1. That's been its biggest selling point.

Wellwellwell, I might be up to a rough surprise here... I actually can't tell apart the Primaris stuff very well, but the local Primaris player is using AP 0 Bolt Rifles. They are, like, 500%-sure AP 0, I have seen the entry of the weapon with my own eyes. Please don't tell me that he has been using the wrong gun all along...

I'm pretty sure the auto bolt rifle is AP0. I wanna say it's the one with the drum mag if that helps.

The Autobolt rifle is/was AP0 - it was the one that was Assault 3 that SHOULD have had the drum mags (assuming the builder knew it mattered and which was which - documentation on that wasn't that strong in the original releases).

EviscerationPlague wrote:

You both can just say you didn't math it out and don't bother to.

Thanks for showing your working in support of your argument also.

I don't need to math it out, there's maths above showing the difference between guardsmen and marines benefitting from cover, where you'll note the guardsmen lose value 3x as fast if cover applies to marines. Those same marines who carry better guns etc.

Likewise if you're suggesting that ignoring cover doesn't also reduce the survivability of guardsmen, then you're off your rocker.

The differential in value lost between 2+ and a 4+ rather than a 3+ and 5+ will be a greater difference

To continue storm bolter maths, as above

2+ = 10 points of marines, 4+ = 29 points of guard

3+ = 20 points of marines, 5+ = 38 points of guard

So yes the gap is closer, but to get to that point you require multiple this to happen first:

- The marines are unfairly resilient in cover against none ignores cover weapons
- The marines get to benefit from cover with their generally superior small arms for longer
- To resolve this you need a large selection of ignores cover
- Providing these are only short range/melee you force players to stack jump units and flamer equivalents on fast platforms
- Assuming they don't own such units, they simply can't compete

The next logical step is a proliferation of "ignores cover" weapons with range, rendering the entire cover system pointless.

Dudeface wrote:

Spoiler:

EviscerationPlague wrote:

You both can just say you didn't math it out and don't bother to.

Thanks for showing your working in support of your argument also.

I don't need to math it out, there's maths above showing the difference between guardsmen and marines benefitting from cover, where you'll note the guardsmen lose value 3x as fast if cover applies to marines. Those same marines who carry better guns etc.

Likewise if you're suggesting that ignoring cover doesn't also reduce the survivability of guardsmen, then you're off your rocker.

The differential in value lost between 2+ and a 4+ rather than a 3+ and 5+ will be a greater difference

To continue storm bolter maths, as above

2+ = 10 points of marines, 4+ = 29 points of guard

3+ = 20 points of marines, 5+ = 38 points of guard

So yes the gap is closer, but to get to that point you require multiple this to happen first:

- The marines are unfairly resilient in cover against none ignores cover weapons
- The marines get to benefit from cover with their generally superior small arms for longer
- To resolve this you need a large selection of ignores cover
- Providing these are only short range/melee you force players to stack jump units and flamer equivalents on fast platforms
- Assuming they don't own such units, they simply can't compete

The next logical step is a proliferation of "ignores cover" weapons with range, rendering the entire cover system pointless.

Great summary

 Insectum7 wrote:

But also, to the 2W vs. 1W Marine thing. . . For funsies, instead of asking about Lasguns (the typical mathhammer example), ask instead how many Marines should it take to kill a Marine?

I don't particularly care about mirror matches so it doesn't really matter.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Jidmah wrote:

Dudeface wrote:

Spoiler:

EviscerationPlague wrote:

You both can just say you didn't math it out and don't bother to.

Thanks for showing your working in support of your argument also.

I don't need to math it out, there's maths above showing the difference between guardsmen and marines benefitting from cover, where you'll note the guardsmen lose value 3x as fast if cover applies to marines. Those same marines who carry better guns etc.

Likewise if you're suggesting that ignoring cover doesn't also reduce the survivability of guardsmen, then you're off your rocker.

The differential in value lost between 2+ and a 4+ rather than a 3+ and 5+ will be a greater difference

To continue storm bolter maths, as above

2+ = 10 points of marines, 4+ = 29 points of guard

3+ = 20 points of marines, 5+ = 38 points of guard

So yes the gap is closer, but to get to that point you require multiple this to happen first:

- The marines are unfairly resilient in cover against none ignores cover weapons
- The marines get to benefit from cover with their generally superior small arms for longer
- To resolve this you need a large selection of ignores cover
- Providing these are only short range/melee you force players to stack jump units and flamer equivalents on fast platforms
- Assuming they don't own such units, they simply can't compete

The next logical step is a proliferation of "ignores cover" weapons with range, rendering the entire cover system pointless.

Great summary

Except it isn't.
1. What's "unfairly resilient"? Vehicles are unfairly resilient against small arms and Flamers but maybe you should build a list to potentially fight vehicles.
2. Marines aren't the only units with a 3+, as you forget about Sisters, whom should also benefit. Y'all forget about them in the argument, and don't think of the scaling when I bring up Bullgryns vs Ogryns. Doesn't matter though since it doesn't fit your narrative.
3. And there's nothing wrong with a larger selection of Ignores Cover weapons, or even weapons that ignore LoS. It's a way to boost various weapons and give them potential niches that might not be filled by other small arms or special weapons.
4. No gak Flamers are more effective on faster platforms. Melta is more effective on faster platforms. Short range weapons are more effective on fast platforms. The earth is round.
5. That's the fault of transport rules. When I brought up melee units as a counter, someone whined their Gryns aren't fast enough in Chimeras, as though there might not be a problem with Guard transports to begin with. Once again, that doesn't fit your narrative.

A greater selection of Ignores Cover weapons doesn't stop the effectiveness of cover to begin with, but I guess with your kind you're probably just doing the GW method of throwing darts at a board to choose them. No wonder you think it's so hard to get rules right.

Dudeface wrote:

- The marines are unfairly resilient in cover against none ignores cover weapons

This is only true against AP0 weapons. Against anything AP -1 and better, Marines do get the 2+ effective cover that gets reduced back by the AP but they still shave off 1 point of AP. This has a few strange situations like AP0 weapons not benefitting from 1 point of AP increase when they fire at Marines in cover, or AP -1 weapons being exactly as effective vs Marines in cover as AP0 weapons. And if the enemy has little to no AP0 weaponry then the whole exception is completely pointless and Marines go back to hugging cover.

Reading some of this argument also gives me the idea that the real reason this rule exists is the design team not wanting to upset things too much, because while it could be done much better it would also take a lot more work, not to mention the domino effect.

Karol wrote:

 Insectum7 wrote:
Alternate solution to the MEQ in cover thing?
Drop Marines back to 1W and allow them to get the cover bonus.

.

This becomes a gigantic hit in efficiency to any elite marine unit. being 30-40pts with one wound and +3sv is very bad. Especialy when other factions gets tanks for 2-3 marines like that. Makes taking something else then a basic marine something a marine player should not be doing, and when that happens we are back to 2x5 minimal troops and either spaming units that somehow go around the +3sv/1W downgrade, or spaming tanks. And if neither thing can be done, then marines become a very bad army. Like post 8th ed Gulliman gunline marines nerf bad.

I mean, the simplest solutions is to make more elite marines 2w and grunt marines 1w. Intercessors, Tacs, Assault marines, etc. are all 1, while Command Squad marines, vets of all sorts, etc. are all 2 wound. Make termies and Gravis 3 wounds and call it a day.

 Insectum7 wrote:

EviscerationPlague wrote:

 Insectum7 wrote:

 Daedalus81 wrote:

 Insectum7 wrote:
Alternate solution to the MEQ in cover thing?
Drop Marines back to 1W and allow them to get the cover bonus.

Ehh. That's probably an even bigger swing in balance without making marines super cheap in points thereby making them more damaging when they're packing bigger guns.

Then rebalance.

It sucks for other armies when their small arms are so ineffective against Marines.

Then access to more weapons that Ignore Cover or rules that grant ignoring cover should be a thing.

Y'all really make this rocket science as if it were a problem for 9th overall.

Fully agree. Make Flamers Great Again!

Also agree that balancing for 40k is not rocket science

You guys are making it out to be simple, when it isn't and then talk about adding more ignores cover which, as noted earlier, affects all units equally.

EviscerationPlague wrote:

Except it isn't.
1. What's "unfairly resilient"? Vehicles are unfairly resilient against small arms and Flamers but maybe you should build a list to potentially fight vehicles.

Vehicles are resilient as part of the base profile, 3+ save units gaining a 100% increase in durability due to cover is an unfair benefit against small arms. You have no argument or point here.

2. Marines aren't the only units with a 3+, as you forget about Sisters, whom should also benefit. Y'all forget about them in the argument, and don't think of the scaling when I bring up Bullgryns vs Ogryns. Doesn't matter though since it doesn't fit your narrative.

Marines and guardsmen were used as examples, frankly nobody cares enough to work out the differences for every profile in existence. It's unfairly benefits 3+ saves of which Marines are the standard example. You have no point here either.

3. And there's nothing wrong with a larger selection of Ignores Cover weapons, or even weapons that ignore LoS. It's a way to boost various weapons and give them potential niches that might not be filled by other small arms or special weapons.

See previous post, give out too many and it either renders the cover system pointless. Make 3+ save units almost immune to common weapons in cover, you make it a mandatory trait for a weapon. You have a slight point as it's a way to selectively add value, you're flat wrong ignoring the risk of over proliferation though.

4. No gak Flamers are more effective on faster platforms. Melta is more effective on faster platforms. Short range weapons are more effective on fast platforms. The earth is round.

Congratulations on letting the point sail past you at mach 10. If you have slow moving infantry with weapons you just made essential, they now need to slog up the board as they get pelted by fire in return. You're forcing the advantage to armies with fast flamer/melee delivery.

5. That's the fault of transport rules. When I brought up melee units as a counter, someone whined their Gryns aren't fast enough in Chimeras, as though there might not be a problem with Guard transports to begin with. Once again, that doesn't fit your narrative.

OK, so now we need to let everyone assault out of transports that have moved just to counter 3+ saves in cover, right? What is your point here? You're just reiterating you have to shoehorn melee options in mandatorily.

A greater selection of Ignores Cover weapons doesn't stop the effectiveness of cover to begin with, but I guess with your kind you're probably just doing the GW method of throwing darts at a board to choose them. No wonder you think it's so hard to get rules right.

You're claiming it doesn't fit with my narrative. You are the one spit balling sweeping rules changes, this is your narrative, people are simply showing you it doesn't work. You've provided no metrics, maths, evidence (despite calling out others for not doing so), to back your narrative up. You try the little needling comments such as "your kind" as if I represent a group, you insult my ability to apply critical thinking to rules writing when you make unsubstantiated claims.

Of course you resort to insults, as you can't actually answer the points, just stop being a prick.

 ProfSrlojohn wrote:

Karol wrote:

 Insectum7 wrote:
Alternate solution to the MEQ in cover thing?
Drop Marines back to 1W and allow them to get the cover bonus.

.

This becomes a gigantic hit in efficiency to any elite marine unit. being 30-40pts with one wound and +3sv is very bad. Especialy when other factions gets tanks for 2-3 marines like that. Makes taking something else then a basic marine something a marine player should not be doing, and when that happens we are back to 2x5 minimal troops and either spaming units that somehow go around the +3sv/1W downgrade, or spaming tanks. And if neither thing can be done, then marines become a very bad army. Like post 8th ed Gulliman gunline marines nerf bad.

I mean, the simplest solutions is to make more elite marines 2w and grunt marines 1w. Intercessors, Tacs, Assault marines, etc. are all 1, while Command Squad marines, vets of all sorts, etc. are all 2 wound. Make termies and Gravis 3 wounds and call it a day.

You can't fix the cover rules by breaking the rest of the game

Now GW could have chosen a different route for Cover entirely, but any cover rule will have knock-on effects for the rest of the game. The designers decided the best option was to keep this relatively simple cover rule of +1 Armor Save with a rider to prevent 3+ Saves from improving to a 2+ Save. It may relate to Space Marines in particular, who along with their Chaos brethren are a large part of game. It may also just have to do with 3+ Saves in totality. There are many non-Astartes units in the game, including a vast majority of the vehicles, with 3+ Saves. This rule impacts them as well.

EviscerationPlague's suggestion is akin to saying the best way to fix Eldar stacking negative penalties to hit would have been to make missile launchers get +1 to hit.

It wouldn't really fix the armies that are the worst offenders, it wouldn't fix the problem of most of your weapons being ineffective, and it would make everyone more vulnerable, not just the armies that are actually causing the problem.

The 'no better than 3+' rule is a clunky solution, just as a hard cap on negative modifiers was, but it directly targets the actual problem (cover doubling durability / multiple stacked negative modifiers) rather than trying to nudge it with borderline irrelevant changes.

I'd also like to see more Ignores Cover, just not as a purported solution for lasguns needing 120 dice rolls on average to remove a single model from the board.

And I mean, if your alternative suggestion involves 'Guard just need to get up the board and get into melee', it's probably time to stop.

 alextroy wrote:
The designers decided the best option was to keep this relatively simple cover rule of +1 Armor Save with a rider to prevent 3+ Saves from improving to a 2+ Save.

I will laugh if they add a special ability that improves the Benefit of Cover bonus to +2.