Damage Lethality:

[Inquisitor_Lensoven]

Indeed AV14 was the old cap which actually did mean a lot of tanks were immune to certain grades of weapons. Very often meaning you had to get a better angle to even dent armour with lesser weapons...unless you were necrons then...well "ha ha Gauss go BRRRT" (until 5th hit...)

 

It was certainly a clunky mechanic however with similar issues to how old templates and scatter did, requiring various edge case rules for extremely daft or super niche scenarios such as unable to clearly see the face that you are in the arc of but you can see another facing. It was kind of fun but also kind of silly as if you think tanks drift these days ho boy it was much funnier back in "the good ol' days" where you would actually move the tank, then begin rotating it at the final spot as to maximise AV facing. Tanks were doing donuts and crescent cuts with flourishes! On top of the further clunk of walkers and when and when not you would hit their rear armour value in melee (some like "I used to be an adventurer like you..."

 

So ultimately it was a flawed system mainly because by all accounts such systems would really only work if we had a full on proper spin-off game system in 40k for tanks and monsters only really. As it stands, the current system is best but just for some reason the valves haven't be correctly opened. Weapon strength being unlocked was a massive deal, much like removing the bloat of WS and BS higher than 5 (if you boys hated charts, 7th was the pinnacle of charts) however I look at how Toughness never moved beyond as well. Really we are playing 9th edition with 7th edition monsters with less wounds (because of the new stat: Damage).

ya I'm just saying move T ceiling up to 14, not bring back the facings or the shaken/stunned/etc mechanics.

 

Just T14 for super heavies, and 10-12 for things like landraider sand leman russes. That would also help fixe the imbalance between hvy bolters and autocannons for the guard.

Edited April 16, 2021 by Inquisitor_Lensoven

[MARK0SIAN]

Toughness definitely needs to go up on vehicles but I think the core issue is needing your T to be twice the strength of the weapon before it changes from wounding on a 5+ to a 6.

 

One option might be a new rule/ability for tanks something like:

 

Heavy Armour - If the weapon attacking this vehicle has a strength less than 7 it can only wound on an unmodified roll of 6.

 

It saves them having to redo the wound table but it does change the maths.

[Waking Dreamer]

^ That seems like the most elegant solution thus far. It also prevents lascannons and melta equivalents from wounding lemun russes and land raiders on 5+.

[Waking Dreamer]

I would also limit it to ranged weapons as some armies rely on infantry characters, and S5-S6 melee attacks to Wound T7-T8 on 5s.

[Valkyrion]

I kind of agree with Mark0Sian, but I'd rather it was tied to AP - it does mean Armour Penetration after all - so weapons with AP0 shouldn't be able to damage a vehicle that has a diminishing profile. This way the mass lasguns of the guard can still shoot venoms, land speeders, sentinels etc but not land raiders, russes etc.

It allows designers in the future to implement the 'treat ap-1 as ap0' rule, which is already quite commonplace, on certain vehicles.

 

(it also opens the door for the future removal of the To Wound roll, which is another topic, but is a poor form of damage mitigation, IMO)

[MARK0SIAN]

I kind of agree with Mark0Sian, but I'd rather it was tied to AP - it does mean Armour Penetration after all - so weapons with AP0 shouldn't be able to damage a vehicle that has a diminishing profile. This way the mass lasguns of the guard can still shoot venoms, land speeders, sentinels etc but not land raiders, russes etc.

It allows designers in the future to implement the 'treat ap-1 as ap0' rule, which is already quite commonplace, on certain vehicles.

 

(it also opens the door for the future removal of the To Wound roll, which is another topic, but is a poor form of damage mitigation, IMO)

I think the problem with tying it to AP is that very few weapons are actually 0AP. Most of the problem weapons that are S5 and above that are currently wounding vehicles on a 5+ have at least 1 point of AP.  Each new codex we see seems to up the damage and AP of weapons too, Marines, Dark Eldar and the new AdMech stats we've seen are all doing this, which is bad enough on middle ranking armies like AdMech but is going to be hell if that pattern continues with Sisters.

[Dark Shepherd]

Increased toughness would be great. Tanks esp Imperial need something for sure as their armour saves are mostly bypassed

 

Most are 3+, its hard to get cover, invuls are rare, Meltas are AP-4, add on doctrines to them or other weapons like Las or Plasma cannons...Im not sure they appropriately appreciate marine on marine conflict and theres a lot of that

[Schlitzaf]

People on both sides of the argument always seem to use the guardsman with lasgun against a tank example when arguing about chip damage but that isn’t the problem. It’s true no one is lining up loads of conscripts to shoot at vehicles. But what they are lining up are loads of mid tier stuff like heavy bolters, assault/chain cannons, rockets, even regular Primaris bolters etc and those things are causing way too much chip damage compared to what they should actually be causing.

 

To be clear, they’re not building anti-vehicle lists around those weapons (that’s what Melta is for) but they’re equipping those weapons because they’re good against too wide a variety of things, including vehicles.

I discussed those earlier actually. If you looked at my discussions about Autocannons/etc I bring up what you are talking about. And against most tanks or tanks that people took the change is not very big or one in favor. For example in 7th it 18 Heavys Bolters (36 if in Cover) so 36/72 Attacks to kill a Rhino. In comparison now it takes.

 

36 Hits, (12 Wound and 6 Failed saves), or 54/72 Attacks. Vs Land Raider Crusader you need 72 Heavy Bolter/ (-1 AP, 2 Damage Wounding on 5’s) Hits and 108 or 144 Attacks. Which is quite a number. As chip damage to take off a a few wounds? But to kill a Land Raider Level Tank.

 

Not particulary useful.

[MARK0SIAN]

 

People on both sides of the argument always seem to use the guardsman with lasgun against a tank example when arguing about chip damage but that isn’t the problem. It’s true no one is lining up loads of conscripts to shoot at vehicles. But what they are lining up are loads of mid tier stuff like heavy bolters, assault/chain cannons, rockets, even regular Primaris bolters etc and those things are causing way too much chip damage compared to what they should actually be causing.

 

To be clear, they’re not building anti-vehicle lists around those weapons (that’s what Melta is for) but they’re equipping those weapons because they’re good against too wide a variety of things, including vehicles.

I discussed those earlier actually. If you looked at my discussions about Autocannons/etc I bring up what you are talking about. And against most tanks or tanks that people took the change is not very big or one in favor. For example in 7th it 18 Heavys Bolters (36 if in Cover) so 36/72 Attacks to kill a Rhino. In comparison now it takes.

 

36 Hits, (12 Wound and 6 Failed saves), or 54/72 Attacks. Vs Land Raider Crusader you need 72 Heavy Bolter/ (-1 AP, 2 Damage Wounding on 5’s) Hits and 108 or 144 Attacks. Which is quite a number. As chip damage to take off a a few wounds? But to kill a Land Raider Level Tank.

 

Not particulary useful.

That’s what I said, them not being fielded as someone’s primary anti-armour strategy but they are fielded because they’re effective against a lot of targets and often pile on multiple damage. So tanks don’t just have to contend with things like melta and plasma which cut straight through their save and are buffed by rerolls and high damage, but they’ve also got to contend with lots of these mid strength weapons, most of which have a 1/3 chance of wounding, have some level of AP and often multiple damage.

 

Just like infantry, vehicles get their full save against fewer and fewer weapons with each new codex and across the board increases in lethality are bad for the game and really bad for vehicles.

[Schlitzaf]

Marko I was agreeing with you.

 

But wanted to point out mass HBolters aren’t killing Tanks anymore efficiency were in the past. Honestly less they were able to in the past. In general if s HBolter were killing Rhino/T7&3+SV teir tank they been just as effective as they were in the past editions

[MARK0SIAN]

Marko I was agreeing with you.

 

But wanted to point out mass HBolters aren’t killing Tanks anymore efficiency were in the past. Honestly less they were able to in the past. In general if s HBolter were killing Rhino/T7&3+SV teir tank they been just as effective as they were in the past editions

Apologies, misunderstood

[Rogue]

I can't say I've fully mathed this out or anything, but how about this:

 

1. Give tanks a keyword that makes their save effectively invulnerable. Now a Land Raider always saves on 2s, for example.

 

2. Give some weapons a keyword that bypasses this rule. But only the specifically anti-tank weapons.

 

So something like a heavy bolter can still do damage, but loses any AP against tanks, making it more difficult. Whereas a lascannon or melta gun can have the anti-tank keyword and continue to operate normally.

 

This represents the heavier armour of a tank largely shrugging small arms and medium weapons, whilst still having to be wary of dedicated tank-hunting weapons.

 

You could even couple it with Markosian's heavy armour suggestion above.

[Cornishman]

To me to be effective any 'fixes' would need to be easily applied to monsters. I would really want to avoid 3E-7E where there was a huge (and to me needless) divide between things based on whether they are mostly mechanical or organic in nature. Fortunately, I see no reason why monsters can't be similarly up-armoured. This would also allow things to be differentiated (e.g. the various types of space elves favour invulns, were as Imperial types often go for the brute force damage reduction).I would be careful at giving things to much of both... I think giving things 'everything' is kind of how we've got the the place we're in now that unless the monster/vehilce is T8 and/or has a 5++ it disappears a bit to quickly.
 

Overall lethality in melee to me isn’t much of a problem. Antitank melee options are often -1 to hit and 2 damage, so even with the ability to fight in the opponent’s turn this alone isn’t likely to take a big thing down quickly unless it’s already been softened up, or you’ve got a way to bring a lot of attacks/ increase that damage. This is one of the reasons even with the nerf to AP the thunder hammer still seems to rule as the go to infantry based marine melee AT (the other is that that extra point of damage is so useful vs -1 Dam affects). If anything, outside bring masses of thunder hammers (or similar), or getting a close combat enabled vehicles/ monster (like a dreadnought) tank like vehicles/monster seem a bit too durable in an area where they should be weak.

 

To me the biggest issue with lethality that a unit’s durability simply doesn't seem to be taken into account in the points costing of things.

I've got no problem with a Quad Las Predator [insert other tank] not lasting long on the table, if it was priced to match. Looking across the codexes there seem to be a range of vehicles/ monsters that in terms of damage output are broadly comparable to Quad Las Predator, but are significantly more durable without a that significant points increase.

To me units of interest include:
[fresh 9e codex]

Plagueburst Crawler +5pts (+ve Vastly more durable, T8, +1W, 5++, Flat -1 Dam, -ve 2 x entropy cannon and plague mortar give similar, if slightly inferior damage output)

Doomsday Ark +20pts (+ve Hugely more durable, whilst T6 is only ever wounded on 4+, +3W, 5++, will regen 1W/Turn, +20pts. -ve Needs to be stationary to fire on high power)

Canoptek Doomstalker -30pts (+Hugely more durable: +1W, 4++, will regen 1W/Turn, -Ve BS4+ -1T and needs to be stationary to fire on high power)

Ravager -30pts (+ve Significantly more durable due to 5++, Triple lance significantly more damage to T7 than quad las, -ve -1T, triple lance v.slight less effective vs T8, and noticeably less effective than quad las Vs T8/5++)

[8E]
Leman Russ w/Demolisher cannon -5pts (+ve Significantly more durable +1T,+1W, higher damage (2D6 shots with AP -4 demolisher cannon), -ve B4+ (countered by fire twice), slow movement to get fire twice), shorter range weapon/limited threat range

With Ad-Mec getting boosts to weapons will be very interested to see what points they come in at given that lots of their units have a 5++/6+ which can makesa big difference in durability. Granted this is now in the realms of postulating but If the Ad Mec’s Dunecrawler's Neutron laser gets an upgrade (say 2 shots at D3+3), and doesn't go up in price

Dunecrawler (-45pts, +ve signifianctly more durable 5++, -ve ~3/4 of damage of quad las). At ~3/4 of cost it would offer ~3/4 firepower on more durable platform, which overall seems to be a solid win for me

 

This doesn't help the meta at all. With the Predator (not to mention the Gladiator) seemingly rather pricy it drives C:SM the use of more efficient platforms (e.g. eradicators, attackbikes and multi-meltas). Likewise for DG the PBC is going to the be preferred over the Predator every single time. The three main C:SM alternative are similar in many ways, and overall are rather lethal but fragile. With the ease of access to marines this drives the point of comparison away from the iconic tanks (e.g. predator, leman russ) to the eradicator/ attack bike, with the PBC not mentioned that much.

The go to marine & DG alternatives (Melta/Entropy Cannons), like much Drukhari and CWE and are S8, AP-4 which is a sweet spot for magnifying the difference between T7 and T8 (or otherwise only wounding on a 4+), and having an invulnerable or not.

As for other weapon choices, with AP-1 Autocannons remain comically atrocious at taking on lighter armour. Give it AP-2, a 3^rd shot, D3 maybe S8, possibly AP-2 & D3 (I don’t know it really needs something) and it may have a fighting chance of having a useful niche. At present your low RoF, High Str, High AP antitank (e.g. lascannons) can usually be counted on to do a better job of dealing with light armour (sentinels {both scout and armoured}, landspeeders, ork buggies etc…) better than the autocannon (or similar RoF 2-3 S6/7 AP-1) on a weapon by weapon basis (e.g. 1 lascannon is better than 1 autocannon), and being better against the 'big' stuff. Given that you usually swap out a weapon on a 1:1 basis then the autocannon remains inferior.

[Valkyrion]

I can't say I've fully mathed this out or anything, but how about this:

 

1. Give tanks a keyword that makes their save effectively invulnerable. Now a Land Raider always saves on 2s, for example.

 

2. Give some weapons a keyword that bypasses this rule. But only the specifically anti-tank weapons.

 

So something like a heavy bolter can still do damage, but loses any AP against tanks, making it more difficult. Whereas a lascannon or melta gun can have the anti-tank keyword and continue to operate normally.

 

This represents the heavier armour of a tank largely shrugging small arms and medium weapons, whilst still having to be wary of dedicated tank-hunting weapons.

 

You could even couple it with Markosian's heavy armour suggestion above.

 

'Against weapons with an AP of -2 or less treat this attack as AP0 if this model has the Vehicle keyword'

 

No need to add any more keywords to get the same result.

[Dark Shepherd]

That would put missile launchers in an odd position. AP-1 might be better or ignores first point of AP

 

Id be more in favour of reduce damage by one (for larger tanks) and more 2+ saves and maybe higher T.

 

S5+ weapons plinking wounds is ok to me as that could be blowing up treads, sponsons, weapons, exposed gunners etc

[chapter master 454]

I don't believe in adding extra special rules unless you build them from a foundational point of view. When I mentioned the idea of keywords, they could all have application outside of just tanks. You can have a Light Monster or a Heavy Monster as well however the new for there to be a defining word like Tank just makes sense. 

 

Adding random Pseudo-Special Rules which would become more like the "totally not Universal Special Rules" is something to try and avoid. I bring up the idea of expanding toughness because strength got expanded but not toughness and toughness being expanded is a very real and reasonable thing to adjust, on top of adding only 1 more tier to the wounding table (the concept of auto-pass or auto-fail). I don't believe in the charts of old because they very rapidly made weapons invalid, just being toughness 6 made you near immune to bolter fire and marines were being laid out by assault cannons wounding them on 2+. The chart may of been granular but it wasn't effective because it wasn't correctly scaled for each strength: each strength scaled the exact same way, Plus or Minus 2 of the targets toughness was really the only factor, after that you didn't care. I believe some editions did have the chance of auto-failing to wound but you needed to be so hilariously weak that I think only grots had that as a thing!

 

Avoiding the need for extra special rules that require cross referencing with various other special rules is a good idea.

"Ok so my tank ignores AP1 weaponry and thus gets the buff. But you have a special buff that treats your weapon as AP2 instead so it negates my buff but only modifies my save by 1 because it is only treated as AP2, not as AP2 because they didn't want this weapon getting left out as an anti-tank weapon".

[Schlitzaf]

Also Space Marines vs C’Tan was over slightly more reasonable and Str3 vs T7.

[Vanger]

Am I jaded? Wrong? Nothing in 8th or 9th genuinely feels more lethal then when I played in prior editions (admittedy most of my experience is 5th)

I know that others have already expanded on this, but I still would like to react to this, especialy, because you had most of your experience in 5th.

 

While weapons themselves kinda-sorta have the same damage capability if viewed in a vacum, we tand to ignore, all other changes in the ruleset and stats. The simple truth that in my oppinion gets forgotten is, that we shoot more. Number of shots went up. Mobility and the ability to shoot on the move has exponentialy increased in 8th, now that we don't have main guns and snap shots if a unit moved. All this then toped of with all the re-rolls, modifiers and strategems, that further enhance these shots. And coupled with how to wound and saves work in the new editions, it made everything more lethal.

[Kaldoth]

Agree on the toughness increase. It's bewildering why we have high strength weapons but every vehicle in the game caps at 8.

 

A slightly less elegant solution that might work is creating a Heavy Armor rule for certain vehicles. Something along the lines of "If this vehicle is hit by a weapon who's strength does not meet or exceed it's toughness, reduce the damage and AP characteristic of that hit by one." Heavy bolter spam is now wounding vehicles on 5s with 0 AP at D1, but lascannons and meltas are still wounding normally. The rule would have to be granted on a case by case basis of course. Light transports and skimmer types shouldn't have a heavy armor rule obviously.

Edited April 20, 2021 by Kaldoth

[chapter master 454]

Agree on the toughness increase. It's bewildering why we have high strength weapons but every vehicle in the game caps at 8.

 

A slightly less elegant solution that might work is creating a Heavy Armor rule for certain vehicles. Something along the lines of "If this vehicle is hit by a weapon who's strength does not meet or exceed it's toughness, reduce the damage and AP characteristic of that hit by one." Heavy bolter spam is now wounding vehicles on 5s with 0 AP at D1, but lascannons and meltas are still wounding normally. The rule would have to be granted on a case by case basis of course. Light transports and skimmer types shouldn't have a heavy armor rule obviously.

 

I feel this sort of solution is only viable if each faction has a variant of it really. I am somewhat of a stickler for details and to me, what can make a game really engaging is when mechanics and lore have a semblance of similarity. Now that does require lore not to get stupid and overly pandering to any faction (even within their own codex) but we can agree that such a rule would feel extremely thematic on an Imperial tank, like a Leman Russ, Land Raider or maybe even an Ironclad dreadnought.

 

It is certainly case by case but for other factions such as Eldar, they would require something different. Not because their tanks are hyper durable but because they are annoyingly hard to hit. However as of late they have been eating cake and having it so yea, I can see backlash at me for that one (just know that Eldar Tanks would never have a 3+ save if I had the say! 4+ at best).

[The Yncarne]

I'm not seeing Kaldoth's solution applying to anything other than Imperial, Chaos, Necron monoliths and maybe a few Ork vehicles. Its a good idea, but not sure what aeldari, Thousand Sons, or Tau have to overcome such a thing other than haywire which is pretty limited or non-existent in those factions.

[Valkyrion]

What if we got rid of AP in general?

 

Keep current armour saves as they are, but with no AP they in effect become invulnerable. (in effect, not exactly)

 

From there you could do something like;

Weapons with S9 or higher, or weapons with a Strength double their targets Toughness inflict mortal wounds instead of regular damage (thus negating an armour save)

This option means that weapons like Melta Guns will still eat a space marine squad as they should, but leads to an increased focus on Mortal Wound spamming to negate armour saves.

 

Or introduce the Anti Tank special rule which means Vehicles cannot take their armour save against that weapon.

This negates mortal wound spam, but means guardsman can still 5+ against eradicators, which seems silly. 

 

Or Weapons with S9 or higher, or weapons with a Strength double their targets Toughness inflict double damage should the armour save be failed.

This option doesn't increase the chance of causing damage, but does increase the chance of any damage being severe. 

 

I quite like option three. It's big swing damage, and a Land Raider would still have a 2+ save against a Lascannon, but if it rolls a 1 it could lose 12 wounds. 

 

 

Points would have to be adjusted, especially for units with a 2+ save, but that's kinda the point of those units, no? Terminators are supposed to be able to shrug off lascannons, but underneath they are still a space marine that will be obliterated by said lascannon should his armour fail.

[Schlitzaf]

 

 

Am I jaded? Wrong? Nothing in 8th or 9th genuinely feels more lethal then when I played in prior editions (admittedy most of my experience is 5th)

I know that others have already expanded on this, but I still would like to react to this, especialy, because you had most of your experience in 5th.

 

While weapons themselves kinda-sorta have the same damage capability if viewed in a vacum, we tand to ignore, all other changes in the ruleset and stats. The simple truth that in my oppinion gets forgotten is, that we shoot more. Number of shots went up. Mobility and the ability to shoot on the move has exponentialy increased in 8th, now that we don't have main guns and snap shots if a unit moved. All this then toped of with all the re-rolls, modifiers and strategems, that further enhance these shots. And coupled with how to wound and saves work in the new editions, it made everything more lethal.

We now always have saves we didn’t before. So yeah we are being shot more, but we also more effective defense. You cannot be one round killed by stray lascannons, you can screen suicide sterngaurd, going an inch into ruins no longer immobilises you 20% of the time (16% if you want to be pedantic).

 

You can shoot your small arms into combat as a vehicle. And if we accepted the “shot”, the lethality of weapons vs tanks is down. By almost 50% in some cases and around 33% if you assume the tank had cover in prior edition.

[Kaldoth]

I'm not seeing Kaldoth's solution applying to anything other than Imperial, Chaos, Necron monoliths and maybe a few Ork vehicles. Its a good idea, but not sure what aeldari, Thousand Sons, or Tau have to overcome such a thing other than haywire which is pretty limited or non-existent in those factions.

I'm not super well versed in tau or eldar, but are fusion cannons/d cannons/star cannons/railguns/hunter killer missiles not a thing anymore? Definitely not knowledgeable on tsons either, but do they no longer have access to the vehicles in the chaos dex? I honestly have no idea. I know theyve got demon princes and terminators still.

 

Regardless, I don't feel like an army being weaker in one particular area should keep a rule from being implemented. It's what makes the game flavorful :) And as far as that rule really only applying to the armies listed... Yeah, but that's kind of the point. Eldar/Dark Eldar vehicles are supposed to be hard to hit but not particularly tough. It's mostly the non xenos forces that have giant armored hulks loaded down with guns, barring ork battlewagons and monoliths as you mentioned.

[The Yncarne]

@Kaldoth

 

My point is if several factions have no means to overcome a special rule, the special rule should probably be rethought or other options provided.

 

Personally, I'd prefer to just up some vehicle's toughness to 10 since it seems the simplest way to improve resilience for some of these issues (which really seem to stem from all the Imperial weapon changes that have cascaded down to chaos).

 

You can skip this:

 

• Thousand Sons do have access predators and land raiders. IIRC, that's the only source they have for anything S9. I tried taking these for anti-vehicle, but they suffer the same challenges that this thread is trying to solve with special rules.
• Daemon Princes with Infernal Strength is probably best for anti-tank, but you gotta get into HTH
• Scarab Occult can get a S8 H2 D3 missile launcher for every 5 models.
• I can't think of anything else non-psychic that is above S6 and that is for force staves

In my experience Eldar and Tau have these issues:

• their weapons still tend to be pretty swingy, especially on the Tau side
• still have BS4 for most of the cited weapons
• have to get close to use fusion which often results in the player having one turn to try to do their thing before being wiped out or charged by scrubs
• have to rely on gimmicks like marker lights to deliver those seeker missiles more than 16% of the time

None of those are deal breaking once GW gets around to those codexes, but I haven't seen point drops improve Eldar and Tau win rates in 9th.