Fixing Possessed Marines

[Cornelias]

well he seems happy enough using them, at the end of the day that's what counts.

[Lord Humongous]

And they do not work . Yes when you play against army X and get roll Y it can be the awesome . only being random doesnt work like that. most of the time against a certain opponent its too easy to counter them [offten even with the optimal buff rolled] . This has been dont a thousand times , but kill wise unless they roll power weapons , possessed work like zerkers [only they arent scoring] .

 

Sounds to me like what would really rock would be to modify the "table" to simply be a list that you can choose from following deployment. Obviously in this case the list would need to be different to balance the choices (likely no power weapons). I think this would make a lot of sense, given that the fluff implies the demons have minor precognitive powers, and it also sort of makes them a match to Obliterators, in terms of being an "all purpose" unit.

 

At the current cost, here's choices I think might be worthwhile:

-All attacks are rending and poisioned (4+) (Choppy Demons)

-Feal No Pain, Counter Attack (Tough Demons)

-Scouts, Move through Cover, Stealth. If held in reserves, may flank. (Sneaky Demons)

-Fleet, Furious Charge (Agile Demons)

-All enemy psychers within 18" must roll an additional d6 (cumulative per unit with this ability) and discard all but the highest two dice when making psychich tests. "Perils of the Warp" causes instant death, regardless of toughness. (Warpy Demons)

-Instead of moving in its movment phase, the unit may re-deploy via deep-strike- simply pick them up, then treat them as if they arived from reserves and are deep striking as normal. May not be used if inside a transport, or the same turn as disembarking. If held in reserves, the unit may deepstrike as normal when it arrives from reserves. (Warpy Demons)

-All units shooting at the Possesed (or thier transport, if embarked) must roll as if affected by Night Fighting rules. Night Vision / Accute Senses (or any other rule that negates / aids Night Fighting rolls) does not help the shooting unit. Entire Possesed unit is treated as having offensive and defensive grenades. (Warpy Demons)

 

Obviously seme are better than others, but all are quite powerful, especially since you choose which you want AFTER seeing your enemes army and deployment, and can hold the unit in reserves knowing you will be able to choose one that allows flanking or deepstrike.

[Smurfalypse]

well it take this as a jibe at me and everyone who says they dont work . I tested possessed too , for tournament and friendlly setting [the difference being you check how a list does in 3 consecutive games against different opponents and the other you just gold fish against the normal builds without checking all the scenarios for all builds]. And they do not work . Yes when you play against army X and get roll Y it can be the awesome . only being random doesnt work like that. most of the time against a certain opponent its too easy to counter them [offten even with the optimal buff rolled] . This has been dont a thousand times , but kill wise unless they roll power weapons , possessed work like zerkers [only they arent scoring] . they need transports and still need to be baby sited by an HQ[what more or less means no DP].

 

as the big units go . Well first of all we dont see 20 man zerker armies run around , dont we? why ? well because in a setting where there is eldrad , lash and calidus a possessed unit may get boged down in terraint for 2 turns[or whole game in case of lash]. now if possessed were free [like the old 4th BA death company] , one could think about them . but they arent free , they cost pts and each point spent on them means less scoring units , less meta choices , less support . For a unit that is random ,and may end up doing nothing, its not worth it .

 

Naa it wasnt a jab at you man, in fact i agree with what you say about them...Most of the time they arnt going to make up their points or fulfill their role in the battlefield. However, comparing them to zerkers is really apples and oranges. Possessed have a good deal more staying power than zerkers in general just from the invuln. Then you add in abilities and they usually are close to as killy as them, the big difference is scoring vs non-scoring and the zerker becomes a better unit in the overall scheme of things. Zerkers arnt undivided though and lets face it, some of us play for story and fluff and not so much tourny oriented, those that enjoy the story are the ones who would use the possessed, the ones that tourny are the ones that wont.

I love em and people i have played in my area have actually started to complain that i use them so much and how "sick of dealing with them" they are. But again, lash wrecked them in ard-boyz so :P

[the jeske]

Zerkers arnt undivided though and lets face it, some of us play for story and fluff and not so much tourny oriented, those that enjoy the story are the ones who would use the possessed, the ones that tourny are the ones that wont.

fluff is dead and GW tells you to use counts as . Techniclly speaking there is no such thing as zerkers any more . Anything with a base can be zerkers . Hell one could even take the possessed models [that really look ok considering how the last few incarnations of this unit looked like in the past] and use them with zerker rules . Probally this is the only way of fixing them.

[Zhukov]

Fluff still exist in some peoples mind Jeske...

[Cornelias]

your being a bit harsh again jeske, try to chill a bit and see things from a different point of view from your own. i see and understand where your coming from, your very serious and winning means alot to you. some of us can build fairly competitive lists for friendly play and throw in a wild card (like possessed) unit for a bit of fun. surely we can't be criticized for that?

[Smurfalypse]

Zerkers arnt undivided though and lets face it, some of us play for story and fluff and not so much tourny oriented, those that enjoy the story are the ones who would use the possessed, the ones that tourny are the ones that wont.

fluff is dead and GW tells you to use counts as . Techniclly speaking there is no such thing as zerkers any more . Anything with a base can be zerkers . Hell one could even take the possessed models [that really look ok considering how the last few incarnations of this unit looked like in the past] and use them with zerker rules . Probally this is the only way of fixing them.

 

lol kinda EMO arnt we? I just agreed with you and you come back with some whine.

 

Fluff is no where near dead, the people who actually care about fluff work hard to keep their lists going that way, the people who dont just run double lash and call their list death guard or alpha legion. Just because fluff is dead with you doenst mean its dead for piles of other players, but again this is a topic for another thread.

[Night Stalker]

If fluff is dead or not is not the issue here.

 

Issue:

-Possessed are random

-Possessed are overcosted

 

Are they fun to play ? Sure - even Chaos Spawns are fun to play.

 

There are three school of thoughts:

-I want Possessed come with fixed abilities

-I want them cheaper

-They are fine, leave them as they are

 

Obviously, the third choice is ... strange ... ?

 

As for playing inferior unit to stay true to the fluff. Sure, you can - i can do it too (and i do it, last time i played, i used 10 man raptor squad with TWO PLASMA PISTOLS!!!), but it does not change the fact that Possessed are inferior unit.

 

Sure, superior player can win using those inferior units, i've done it before - and i'll still try to do it. But i can do this easier using better units in optimised list. Right ?

[Drudge Dreadnought]

The game can be a lot funner when both players use balanced armies instead of the best power build. As long as the army is the same power it comes down to skill then. It doesn't matter what that actual power level is. In other words, the problems arise when power gamers play vs fluffheads.

 

I know a pair of friends who play each other constantly and have purposely decided not to powergame. The Chaos player uses things like lords, possessed, spawn, havocs, and dakka preds. The loyalist one does similar things. They both work together and compose each army list and agree on the fairness of the units included vs the other list. They try to make both about the same power. Then they switch of playing each list, and then decide on future tweaks to them to keep them balanced against each other. Lots of fluff is included. They probably enjoy this game more than anyone else i've seen.

[Smurfalypse]

If fluff is dead or not is not the issue here.

 

Issue:

-Possessed are random

-Possessed are overcosted

 

Are they fun to play ? Sure - even Chaos Spawns are fun to play.

 

There are three school of thoughts:

-I want Possessed come with fixed abilities

-I want them cheaper

-They are fine, leave them as they are

 

Obviously, the third choice is ... strange ... ?

 

As for playing inferior unit to stay true to the fluff. Sure, you can - i can do it too (and i do it, last time i played, i used 10 man raptor squad with TWO PLASMA PISTOLS!!!), but it does not change the fact that Possessed are inferior unit.

 

Sure, superior player can win using those inferior units, i've done it before - and i'll still try to do it. But i can do this easier using better units in optimised list. Right ?

 

 

This was very well explained and i pretty much agree 100%. They need tweeking, the random ability thing didnt work in 3.0 codex chaos and it didnt work this time. Though in that one you could roll three dice and get up to three abilities. Ive always been under the feeling that a small fix or two would have made them fine units. Give them frag equivelent, and if you take an aspiring champ you get to reroll your random ability, or something close to that. Right now there is no reason to take the champ other than another body for a greater daemon.

[Mutt-Man!]

I used a squad of 20 possessed and I feel dirty. I rolled rending, with icon of slaanesh. (Fate? heh) And they faced down a unit of 9 death company, the result was a little one sided. The fella looked at the possessed entry (he never faced them before) and he got so mad. He pays just as much or more for his rending marines, and well.... They dont come with options, icons, or invulnerable saves (furious charge vs +1 strength, go figure)...

 

I felt better about possessed after seeing that. I feel dirty still though, haha. Just imagine what our terminators are in comparison, since we like comparing termies to them a lot.

 

Imagine if I rolled power weapons....

 

 

Oh and Lord H.

A: Furious Charge+12" assault(or fleet).

B: Scout+Rend

C: Scoring+Deep Srike

 

A=Munchy, B=Sneakyslashy, C=Tacticalicious.

Sounds good and simple yeah?

[DeathsHead]

The game can be a lot funner when both players use balanced armies instead of the best power build. As long as the army is the same power it comes down to skill then. It doesn't matter what that actual power level is. In other words, the problems arise when power gamers play vs fluffheads.

 

I know a pair of friends who play each other constantly and have purposely decided not to powergame. The Chaos player uses things like lords, possessed, spawn, havocs, and dakka preds. The loyalist one does similar things. They both work together and compose each army list and agree on the fairness of the units included vs the other list. They try to make both about the same power. Then they switch of playing each list, and then decide on future tweaks to them to keep them balanced against each other. Lots of fluff is included. They probably enjoy this game more than anyone else i've seen.

 

I agree - 'friendly' games with balanced builds created to enact fluffy scenarios are much, much more fun than competitive powergaming set ups. In my mind, that's pretty much a universal truth in all roleplaying games, board games and video games... with obvious exceptions like chess. I really can't comprehend why someone would want to play 40k like chess.

 

But Possessed still suck because they don't really function the way one imagines they should. Possessed SEEM like they should be a scary shock-attack unit. As it is, they only succeed at being this part of the time, and I think that's really due more to clumsy oversights on the part of the designer team than it is due to deliberate planning. I think it wouldn't take too much effort to redesign them in such a way that they retain a SMALL amount of unpredictability while are at the same time more easy to work into an army list.

 

Jeske - I know you prefer to avoid anything that smacks of wishlisting, but as you're clearly someone with a good grasp of game mechanics, I'm curious as to what you think it would take to make possessed un-suck while retaining the appropriate character. I command you - WISH!

[the jeske]

hmm. unsuck possessed. same pts two rolls on the table or one roll , but auto fleet. then when building an assault hvy army , they would be an interesting choice fighting for the elite spot against termis . thats one thing that could be done.

 

+1A on the profile . Scoring or not when a unit has str 5 possible rending/power weapons and base 4A[icon of khorn] its an ok option . they probablly should cost 2/3 pts more then.

 

 

some sort of special Vet character or BL guy that lets you take one possessed unit and make it scoring . something like pedro .

 

non of those makes them an auto choice like oblits , doesnt unbalance the game , but gives options for at least more hth chaos armies .

[Mutt-Man!]

Well for the sake of paying 4 points for 5+ invulnerable save. Lose ranged weapons for the sake of +1 strength. Become fearless for +1 point. Then add 6 points worth in a random table of melee contents half of which are unfavorable in most games.

 

Remove the 6 point "upgrade" and then I will consider them.

 

We have our infiltrate/outflankers with cool choices.

We have our deepstriking terminators with powerful options.

We got our (loved*) dreadnought.

(* we can arm it appropriately so its not a nuisance, Missile launcher and 1 DCCW or 2 DCCW)

Then we have... 20 point possessed without the random table, and any cult icon they pick gives them cool bonuses. I can live with that. I would ask an opponent to let me go with such a thing, on the basis that we dont get to use our scout rule and +4 point terminators are superior in most ways. (I would barter and show him what sort of terminators he would have to face instead if he said no, hehe)

 

Instead of changing, lets just plain remove it and leave it as a players consent thing. Heck they dont even score, that wont bug them much. Even tell them you could have the same unit as troops using fabius, (with ranged weapons~)