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I've been reading through various codexes and started to wonder why Dreadnoughts and Helbrutes are vehicles and not MC's.

Back in 2nd and 3rd additions it made sense but now there are several units that make it questionable.

Both Loyal and traitors are piloted by a spacemarine. Even missing arms, legs and parts of the rest of their body they would still have a biomass equal to or even greater then any Tau Pilot. Based on that, how can a Ghosthelm or Riptide be a MC when they have a higher mechanical element then a Dreadnought.

Alongside that Wraith constructs (warp Plastic) and Kastelan Robots don't have any natural organics.

Wouldn't it make sense to either make these other units vehicles or make Dreadnoughts & Helbrutes MC's?

If dreadnoughts were changed, what Toughness and Armour Save would you give it?

Possibly T6 for Dreadnought, Ironclads and Helbrutes, T7 for Venerables

3+Sv on Dreadnoughts, Venerables & Helbrutes and a 2+ on Ironclads.

I think the idea was walkers were the first thing, and would be dreadnoughts and such. The walker rules are even written in such a way they were definitely thinking Dreadnoughts - without torso twisting capabilities as a lot of SM players I know like to claim they have. (They have yet to show a rule where a Dreadnought gets to twist on its torso.)

MC's were meant to add something that moves in a much more natural/fluid way. It also accounts for tyranids who have big creature like things that should not be able to fit into transports, and bulky-very bulky-extremely bulky don't account for. Or act more like big people, not somewhat bulky twisting things like Sentinals or Dreadnoughts.

While I understand an SM pilots a Dreadnought, the idea is that an MC is even more integrated with their pilots than a Dreadnought can hope to match. (Despite novels which depict Dreadnoughts as driven by guys who don't think they are driving things.)

The game-play issue is that right now MCs are better than Vehicles. They don't suffer any kind of penalities for taking damage, while vehicles do.

I don't think the solution is to make Dreadnoughts into MCs (because then..what about Sentinals? Why should an Eldar Walker act like a Sentinal when it's a lot more mobile/agile than a Sentinal?)

Really they need to balance vehicles vs MCs and the problems mostly go away with different flavours. There are a number of threads on how to do that. Some of which don't even get weird and bulky or require massive rewrite of all codexes. (This is something where a lot of proposals fail. If you want to fix walkers, instead of turning them into MCs, or picking and choosing who gets love when, you have to modify the BRB in ways that don't require errata for every single codex with a walker or whatnot.)

I agree with you on about Tyranids, the point is more that dreadnoughts are piloted directly by the users mind. Used as there own body.

All tau suits are piloted with manual controls (the Farsight Novel even goes on about how his hands getting damaged will stop him piloting a crisis suit)

This is more about logic balance - how can something miploted by a keyboard (Stormsurge) be more fluid then something something controlled by the mind. Imperial knights are any other example but we don't really need another OP GMC

In regards to the torso twist this probably came about from Dawn of war where marine dreadnoughts do actually spin like that in game (not just cinematics) so I'm not surprised alot of 40K players go along with that.

ScarVet101 wrote:
All tau suits are piloted with manual controls (the Farsight Novel even goes on about how his hands getting damaged will stop him piloting a crisis suit)

Is incorrect

"An XV8 Crisis Battlesuit pilot sits in a foetal position within the central torso section of the Battlesuit, and pilots the Battlesuit through a neural link that connects the Fire Warrior’s brain to the Battlesuit's control interface through a monofilament needle inserted through the back of the head."
Whit regards to the novel are you sure you not reading it backwards ( if the criss suits hands get damaged farsights hands will feel damaged ) There are a few accounts in lore where the battle suits heads gets blown off and the pilot goes into coma form the shock/trauma of it. I don't recall the literature though

In the novel farsights suit is destroyed and he is out in a killer storm which is eating away at his flesh.

Yes there are some mind links but a lot of the systems key controlled (just look at the Ghost helm kit as well)

ScarVet101 wrote:
In the novel farsights suit is destroyed and he is out in a killer storm which is eating away at his flesh.

Yes there are some mind links but a lot of the systems key controlled (just look at the Ghost helm kit as well)

No, it's all suits are mindlinked , its how thy move. There are no controls for movement inside them. ( obviously stormsurge is different and i agree it shouldn't a be a mc ) . The ghostkeel , if you get a nice good close up pic , its just a guy sitting in a chair position. It doesn't even look like there are actual controls either.

http://www.imgrum.net/media/1121061389041853566_346354024

I vote to keep Dreadnaughts the way they are.

Like I said to start with, this is more of a logic query.

I'm not asking for Dreadnoughts to be MC, just that compared a good number of units which are, such as Tau suits, they have a far better argument to be MC then A Riptide

The alternative, how would you make things like the riptide vehicles?

ScarVet101 wrote:
Like I said to start with, this is more of a logic query.

I'm not asking for Dreadnoughts to be MC, just that compared a good number of units which are, such as Tau suits, they have a far better argument to be MC then A Riptide

The alternative, how would you make things like the riptide vehicles?

Again i disagree with you logic.

I agree that both the dreadnaught and all the tau suits have the same control mechanics , neural linked control , but the actual performance of the constructs are very different. All the suits ( except stormsurge ) behave just like a body , except larger and with a few more added on features . Suits have limbs , joints , fingers . It would not hinder your performance in anyway if you were to don a suit and do something ( barring size/weight restrictions), it would only improve. Now the dreads , they are very limited in movement , are quite cumbersome , and have limited ranges of motion . They cannot do anything with agility or precision , they are not built for that purpose. Now neral is not that end all of what i would consider MC controls , dread knights show this . They perform just like a large body with no use of controls, they are the controls themselves via the harness the marine is strapped into. If the dreads had a full range of motion and the same agility has a marine i would argue they too would be MC's as well

Thats not what happens in game...walkers do behave like a body? they move and fight like infantry the same as mc, they only damage like a vehicle, somthing the big tau suits would likely also do. I fail to see how you crit his logic with this argument? cannon wise your correct an all but its not really supporte by the current rules distinctions. it just make dreds a bit crap.

Vehicle rules make dreads crap . Hull points make dreads crap. At least the grenade ruling was a step in the right direction but the entire vehicle rules need to get redone they are just so bad i can't comprehend why they did this.

ScarVet101 wrote:

If dreadnoughts were changed, what Toughness and Armour Save would you give it?

Possibly T6 for Dreadnought, Ironclads and Helbrutes, T7 for Venerables

3+Sv on Dreadnoughts, Venerables & Helbrutes and a 2+ on Ironclads.

The easy rule of thumb that I think makes sense is to transpose Armour 14 to T10 and Sv2+, and work down from there.

kambien wrote:
Vehicle rules make dreads crap . Hull points make dreads crap. At least the grenade ruling was a step in the right direction but the entire vehicle rules need to get redone they are just so bad i can't comprehend why they did this.

No, the grenade ruling was not a step in the right direction. What that rule did do was nerf arguably one of the best units in my Ork Codex (tankbustas), which ironically is the only reliable Anti-vehicle option my codex has. *SIDE NOTE: isn't it pretty sad that the best anti-tank weapon in my codex is S3 T4 boyz with a 6+ armor save who have to take a rickety open topped vehicle to get anywhere

What needs to happen is a complete rework on the vehicle rules and a complete re-write on the MC and GMC rules. Because I am sorry but in what world should a 300ish point Wraith Knight be able to kill a 770 points stompa regularly. Simply by changing the Stompa's type to GMC it fixes all of the durability issues and makes it almost worth its 770points in our current broken rules of 7th edition.

(I am by no means saying that the Stompa should be a GMC, granted it makes about as much sense as the Tau shenanigans)


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 insaniak wrote:

ScarVet101 wrote:

If dreadnoughts were changed, what Toughness and Armour Save would you give it?

Possibly T6 for Dreadnought, Ironclads and Helbrutes, T7 for Venerables

3+Sv on Dreadnoughts, Venerables & Helbrutes and a 2+ on Ironclads.

The easy rule of thumb that I think makes sense is to transpose Armour 14 to T10 and Sv2+, and work down from there.

Does that mean you get rid of the side facings completely? the reason I ask is that under that rule my Battle Wagon would have the same save as a Land Raider and the same T Value, I don't think that is fair because realistically a Land Raider is far more expensive and shouldn't be on the same scale as my Battle Wagon.

I think you should maybe add up the 3 armor values and use that to determine the T value and the Save. Landraider = 42 = T10 2+ Save Battlewagon = 36 = T9 2+ or 3+

The reason the eldar wraith constructs should stay monstrous creatures is they have no mechanical bits to cause motion. There is no motor, there is no pistons or gears to facilitate movement. They actually have a tactile sense of their surroundings iirc. That means that they aren't receiving signals from a sensor, their "skin" can actually feel.

A wraithlord or wraithknight could pick up a living loved one and feel the hug. Their spirit might be deadened enough to not get emotional about it, but they would be able to do it.

I watched enough star trek to know non-organic doesn't mean it isn't alive

Then make walkers super duper cheap, because they are super duper mega garbage.

SemperMortis wrote:


Does that mean you get rid of the side facings completely?

If they're going to be Monstrous Creatures, then yes, that would remove side and rear facings.

the reason I ask is that under that rule my Battle Wagon would have the same save as a Land Raider and the same T Value, I don't think that is fair because realistically a Land Raider is far more expensive and shouldn't be on the same scale as my Battle Wagon.

The battle wagon has a lower BS and worse weapons, so it doesn't make them exactly the same.

Dreadnaught are fine as vehicles. It is the vehicle rules that need addressing. Make AP2 do nothing on the chart and AP1 go back to only giving +1. Or make glances roll on the chart -2 with no Hull point inflicted. A "glance" should do actual damage

A better Question is: Should Riptides & DreadKnights be Walkers? I think the answer is yes.

Only constructs that are "living" should be MCs. WraithLords and WraithKnights for example are made of Wraithbone (a substance that is grown, not made) and have an integrated soul stone planted in them. There is no "pilot" in a WraithLord and it isn't a "robot". There is a pilot in a WK, but it is the living twin of the soul stone used to power the whole thing, and is actually in a trance so that it's mind merges with it's dead twin.

I think we should stop making things MC when they clearly aren't. Why is a Riptide an MC? Dreadknight? Why make a Dreadnaught an MC? Its 90% machine. The Chaos stuff actually has some reasoning to be MC because they are all weird fleshy dinobots, but a Dreadnaught? Well, you tell me the last time you thought a refrigerator should be considered a biological organism.

kambien wrote:

ScarVet101 wrote:
Like I said to start with, this is more of a logic query.

I'm not asking for Dreadnoughts to be MC, just that compared a good number of units which are, such as Tau suits, they have a far better argument to be MC then A Riptide

The alternative, how would you make things like the riptide vehicles?

Again i disagree with you logic.

I agree that both the dreadnaught and all the tau suits have the same control mechanics , neural linked control , but the actual performance of the constructs are very different. All the suits ( except stormsurge ) behave just like a body , except larger and with a few more added on features . Suits have limbs , joints , fingers . It would not hinder your performance in anyway if you were to don a suit and do something ( barring size/weight restrictions), it would only improve. Now the dreads , they are very limited in movement , are quite cumbersome , and have limited ranges of motion . They cannot do anything with agility or precision , they are not built for that purpose. Now neral is not that end all of what i would consider MC controls , dread knights show this . They perform just like a large body with no use of controls, they are the controls themselves via the harness the marine is strapped into. If the dreads had a full range of motion and the same agility has a marine i would argue they too would be MC's as well

There is zero logic to the whole thing, even by 40k standards...- why are MCs not reduced in effectivness as they take wounds..........why are open topped ones not ? Why cant Penitent engines be effected by Poison. Why can't Tau suits be effected by Haywire like a giant robot suit?

Both Knights and Titans are Walkers and the "pilots" are linked directly to their machines - so much so that there is a stigmata feedback element in that pilots can die if their machine takes too much damage.

There are lots of things that should be MCs or GMCs - Daemon engines are a major contendor.........they are living metal (and stuff). - as has been argued many times on the forum, all big stuff should have the same rules...........

Lendys wrote:
I think the idea was walkers were the first thing, and would be dreadnoughts and such. The walker rules are even written in such a way they were definitely thinking Dreadnoughts - without torso twisting capabilities as a lot of SM players I know like to claim they have. (They have yet to show a rule where a Dreadnought gets to twist on its torso.)

Dreadnought 'torso twist' is represented by the fact that Walkers (all walkers) can make a single turn at the start of the shooting phase.

 Furyou Miko wrote:

Lendys wrote:
I think the idea was walkers were the first thing, and would be dreadnoughts and such. The walker rules are even written in such a way they were definitely thinking Dreadnoughts - without torso twisting capabilities as a lot of SM players I know like to claim they have. (They have yet to show a rule where a Dreadnought gets to twist on its torso.)

Dreadnought 'torso twist' is represented by the fact that Walkers (all walkers) can make a single turn at the start of the shooting phase.

In DoW 2, don't Melee Dreadnaughts do full 360 spins and smack everything around them? That seems to be a torso twist.

That's just the DoW team being silly. that kind of thing would be impossible unless the internal communication was wireless based, which falls under the category of 'too stupid to live'.

Anyway, I wasn't saying Dreads don't have any torso twist, I was saying that the Walker rules give walkers a 'free turn' in the shooting phase because they torso twist.

to fix the dreadnaught a bigger and more functional fix would be lots of adjusting to gmc/mc rules

id lock back up the superheavies and gmc's into apoc again they can disappear back into the ether the band of roaches. the exception i would keep would be the imperial knight and imperial knights move to allies of convenience for imperials and chaos marines with CTA for all other factions. this is because the imperial knights are an army unto themselves and it would be unfair to tell someone there whole army is now apocalypse only. we have imperial knights codex players at my store so i know these players exist and its unfair to tell them to take a hike.

the next thing i would do is write a new tyranids codex with formations and supplements, i would shift focus away from flyrants in fact most of the formations from shield of baal would go away, flyrants have 6th helldrake sickness where they were just so good they could cover for an entire codex full of units made of potato.

next we can discuss grav grav is going to get massive price jacks, units with it natively will recieve a jack as well. expect minimum 10-15 points increase with 35 being on the high end depending on volume of grav on the base unit, the land raider excel wouldnt change under these rulings its already overcosted. i would probably put bikes on the list of things to fix while i was there with the exception being black knights. i wouldnt jack up prices but there special rules packages would just be gutted and no more twin linked bike guns, now you just have a pair of guns

next we can discuss the riptide and dreadknight, your arse is moving to walker, your getting and AV and your going to like it sunny jim, i would feel compelled to allow them to have an invul save however such as a 6++ or a 5++ for the nemisis

next we can start cutting the eldar redwood thats been growing into a colossal eyesore out back down to size, its kind of outrageous the wraithknight disappearing would help but we need to go further, windriders and magic tables, and relics, all need changes, id probably move windriders to fast and make them like siting there

this would probably be the best start and from here we could see about making other changes via playtesting and errata and faq to polish out details and there would be regular checkups everytime we talked about a new walker of mc coming into the game

 ionusx wrote:

id probably move windriders to fast and make them like siting there

Thank GW, this will never happen. I started Eldar in 4th ed because Jetbikes were troops. Take that away and I can no longer play a Battle Forged army without using the Windrider Warhost formation. (which woun't be awful, but still)

If you want to "fix" Windriders, start with their armour save. It really should be a 4+, not 3+. Since the Kit comes with Heavy weapons for all bikes, the dream on making it 1 per 3 again will only come true on 1 condition: GW makes 2 Windrider units. 1 that is Troops that can only have 1 per 3 weapon, and 1 that is Fast Attack that can go nuts like now.

Back on topic: I think Dreads suffer from the lack of good vehicle rules. Vehicle & MC rules SHOULD be different, and naturally one will always be better that the other. I appreciate that GW has bridged the gap some with stuff like Hull Points. More is obviously needed, but this edition is the closest I have ever seen

--

not to sound inflamitory, but wouldn't we be having the same discussion in the opposite direction if vehicles were better? "Why aren't Tau suits vehicles? I mean they are not organic!"

I think the "theory" of why GW designers decide whether a unit is MC or AV is dependent on the specific designers idea of how integrated the model is, combined with what is already out there. Take the DK for example: It is almost certain that when designing it, they compared it to a Dreadnought and thought "Ya know, a Naught is basically a walking life-support system for a dying Marine, but this new thing is piloted by a full health Terminator integrated into the suit. BAM! MC status"

Something similar (but the other side of the coin) probably happened with the Riptide and WK. Similar, smaller units already existed and were well established in the 40K universe. Since other Tau suits and Eldar Wraith-constructs had T values, so would the Riptide & WK.

--

 Brennonjw wrote:
not to sound inflamitory, but wouldn't we be having the same discussion in the opposite direction if vehicles were better? "Why aren't Tau suits vehicles? I mean they are not organic!"

This is kind of what I was originally aiming at I don't think Dreadnoughts need to be MC, but there are a lot of units that are that really shouldn't be. Only Nids & Daemons (and Forge World Kroot) should really have this.

But what would make vehicles on par with MC's?

ScarVet101 wrote:

But what would make vehicles on par with MC's?

A few things off the top of my head:

Smash on Walkers
no more +1 for AP2/ +2 for AP1. Should only be +1 for AP1.
GMCs should not be nearly immune to Poison, but rather only roll -1 to wound with Poison. ID should cause D3+1 wound

I am actually working on altering the Damage chart to do just this:
http://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/list/691302.page

-

 Galef wrote:

 ionusx wrote:

id probably move windriders to fast and make them like siting there

Since the Kit comes with Heavy weapons for all bikes, the dream on making it 1 per 3 again will only come true on 1 condition: GW makes 2 Windrider units. 1 that is Troops that can only have 1 per 3 weapon, and 1 that is Fast Attack that can go nuts like now.

I don't see how you work that out. They can just have the same kit with different rules.

pm713 wrote:

 Galef wrote:

 ionusx wrote:

id probably move windriders to fast and make them like siting there

Since the Kit comes with Heavy weapons for all bikes, the dream on making it 1 per 3 again will only come true on 1 condition: GW makes 2 Windrider units. 1 that is Troops that can only have 1 per 3 weapon, and 1 that is Fast Attack that can go nuts like now.

I don't see how you work that out. They can just have the same kit with different rules.

My point is that in recent rules changes, GW has made great efforts to make sure all options have rules and all rule have options. Their legal issues with Chapter House made sure of that. So since the kit has options for each bike to have a heavy weapon, they will almost assuredly always have the rules option for each bike to have a heavy weapon