Sunday, April 9, 2017

5 things I’d like in 8th Edition to change (4 of 4): Vehicles

5. Vehicles

Two things really.

First I don’t mind hull points. I remember the days of invincible rhino houses and I hate them, and never want them to come back. I do think vehicles should have more hull points though, it’s far too easy to glance things out currently. If you added 1 or 2 hull points all around it would go a long way towards vehicles being more useful on the table.

Second the penetrating hit table is a joke. 6th edition saw Shaken get two spots and 7th saw it get three. If we don’t stop it now, I’m confident that by 20th edition all dice results in 40k will be Shaken. Wake up people! THIS IS A REAL THREAT!

Additionally, I never liked that Super heavies got a free pass, so they get effected again. And I don’t like the whole scattering blast mechanic for explosions, there is something on the end for that.
So below is a quick rework of the Damage Table. All still remove one hull point and 1-4 only last for one turn with 5-7 being permanent unless fixed somehow.


 “1” – Startled: Vehicle suffers -1ws/-1bs. Primary Weapons get a 3+ save to ignore this result, roll each save individually if a vehicle has more than one. Multiple “1” do not stack the -1ws/-1bs, but do require more tests for primary weapons.

“2” – Startled…er: Vehicle suffers -2ws/-2bs. Primary Weapons get a 4+ save to ignore this result, roll each save individually if a vehicle has more than one. Multiple “2” do not stack the -2ws/-2bs, but do require more tests for primary weapons.

“3” – Shaken (YOU GET ONE): Vehicle suffers -3ws/-3bs, with blasts if a hit roll is rolled you must re-roll it until an arrow is shown (there is a small arrow, but it’s annoying to use), Bombs dropped scatter 3+d6”, halve/rounded up the number of units hit by flamers, and you can’t make use of the Twin-linked rule. Primary Weapons get a 5+ save to ignore this result, roll each save individually if a vehicle has more than one. Multiple “3” do not stack the -3ws/-3bs, but do require more tests for primary weapons.

“4” – Stunned: Vehicle suffers a Shaken Result and additionally all movement in all phases is halved/rounding up after result, including charges for walkers. Multiple effects have no effect. Flyers can’t make turns for any reason.

“5” – Weapon Destroyed: Vehicle randomly has one of its weapons destroyed. If a Primary weapon is randomly picked, a 5+ save will ignore the result. If the vehicle has no weapons, vehicle will suffer an immobilizedish result instead. 

“6” – Immobilizedish: A Vehicle that has suffered an immobilizedish result, has -3” to its primary movement value and can no longer move flat out. Each consecutive result adds an additionally minus 3”, if the moment is ever reduced to 0” each additional immobilisedish results instead causes 1 additional hull point being lost. Flyers suffer Locked velocity; the only time they can pick the direction they are facing is on a turn they come on from reserve. 

“7” – Explosion: Exactly as it is now for vehicles. Flyers would scatter, but measure the explosion effect from the center of where the model would have ended up and +3".

Should a super heavy loose its last hull point we’ll use the same Catastrophic Damage Table as now, except changing D to Str10 for “1-3” results, and Super Heavies would now use a random distance measured from their hull/base on who gets hit by each band instead of using a blast template. The change could be something like.....

First Band: d6” from the hull 
Second Band: the first band distance to +3” further
Third Band the second band distance to +3” further 

Super Heavy Flyers would scatter, but measure the explosion effect from the center of where the model would have ended up and +3" to the first band above.

To determine which Models are hit, and in which band, measure to the base for non-vehicles or nearest part of the hull for vehicles.

For Example, an Imperial Knight Explodes. A 4 is rolled on the damage table and a 3 is rolled for how far. Models 3” would take a Str D/Ap 2 hits, Models between 3” and 6” would take Str 10/Ap 3 hits, and models between 6” and 9” would take str 5/Ap 4 hits.


Almost Done Talking I Swear


Well I’m confident none of this will happen, but it doesn’t mean I can’t dream.