What if Profiles didn't Degrade?

[Jorin Helm-splitter]

What sort of impact do you think removing degrading profiles would have on 40K?

 

IMO the pros & cons would be...

 

Pros

Faster gameplay - we wouldn't have to check our unit entries for wounded vehicles/monsters we'd only have to remember one set of base stats.

No more 9 vs. 10 wounds awkwardness - having one fewer wound shouldn't be a buff.... but it is.

vehicles in general need a boost - this would be a pretty universal change (only army I can think of that it wouldn't affect is harlies). I'm not sure if MCs need it as much but I suspect they do.

Centerpiece models perform better - The models are expensive in terms of cost, time to paint, and points in game and can get bracketed before they even get to move. This would make them feel stronger even if they had a rough first turn unless they died.

Vehicles & monsters can't complete actions - this is a pretty big drawback in this edition, so I do think they should get a corresponding benefit. 

 

 

Cons

Invalidates some fraction bonuses - This wouldn't be a big deal if GW was more willing to help underperforming fractions but they don't have a good track record with it. For example Chaos Marines still having one wound.

Immersion - Vehicles & Monsters losing capabilities as their damaged makes sense. Granted the fact that having less than 10 wounds makes them immune to it is weird.

Lethality - This edition is pretty crazy for the amount of damage it kicks out. This would increase it, it's tough to tell by how much because it only feels like a handful of these units see play but it would make it easier for those units to have impact.

Points may need an update - I'm not sure if they factor it into some of these unit's points costs (my gut instinct is they don't lol).

List construction - List building in 40k has so many options now that it's just really easy to make extreme builds. would this create a new 70% win rate fraction? I tend to think it wouldn't because putting 12 wounds on something is pretty easy so most things don't survive anyways.  

 

Do you see any other pros or cons that I missed? Do you think it would help or hurt the game?

 

For what it's worth I'd like to at least give it try, and plan to line up some games where it we ignore it. 

 

edit: Posted this then looked the goonhammer review for the new nid book. Maybe monsters don't need the help.

Edited April 9, 2022 by Jorin Helm-splitter

[MARK0SIAN]

I think degrading profiles should definitely go. Vehicles hardly last any time at all anyway, you should at least get to use them properly for the one or two turns they’re on the table.

[Inquisitor_Lensoven]

Yep degrading profiles is stupid.

I’d rather go back to the old damage charts than keep going with damage brackets.

[Jorin Helm-splitter]

I think degrading profiles should definitely go. Vehicles hardly last any time at all anyway, you should at least get to use them properly for the one or two turns they’re on the table.

 

Would you be more likely to run more vehicles with that change? Or would you view more as a quality-of-life improvement?

[Jorin Helm-splitter]

Yep degrading profiles is stupid.

I’d rather go back to the old damage charts than keep going with damage brackets.

 

In the confines of the current system do you think it would be an improvement to just not have them? I mainly ask because throwing in a damage chart would be a new edition worthy change, whereas as just saying to ignore the degrading part of profiles wouldn't be nearly as hard to try.  

[MARK0SIAN]

 

 

I think degrading profiles should definitely go. Vehicles hardly last any time at all anyway, you should at least get to use them properly for the one or two turns they’re on the table.

Would you be more likely to run more vehicles with that change? Or would you view more as a quality-of-life improvement?

It would generally be a quality of life improvement I think. It probably would make me more inclined to run a particular vehicle if I was on the fence but wouldn’t be enough on its own I don’t think, mainly because I like vehicles so I tend to run the ones I have anyway unless they’re really poor. So if a vehicle is particularly poor this wouldn’t be enough to get me to take it but would definitely help with the ones I do take.

[Valkyrion]

It's a good idea.

 

To offer something by way of compensation you could change exploding to ;

if the model is reduced from full wounds to zero wounds in the same SHOOTING PHASE the model automatically explodes

otherwise it explodes on 6+ as normal.

 

This would encourage targeted ranged attacks and encourage players to keep their rhinos and storm speeders and other 10 wounders behind cover, rather than just brazenly having a load of T7/8, 10-16W, 3+/2+ save models out in the open. 

[MARK0SIAN]

It's a good idea.

 

To offer something by way of compensation you could change exploding to ;

if the model is reduced from full wounds to zero wounds in the same SHOOTING PHASE the model automatically explodes

otherwise it explodes on 6+ as normal.

 

This would encourage targeted ranged attacks and encourage players to keep their rhinos and storm speeders and other 10 wounders behind cover, rather than just brazenly having a load of T7/8, 10-16W, 3+/2+ save models out in the open.

I think if you offered that kind of compensation you’d actually reduce people’s desire to take vehicles. Nothing about this change makes vehicles harder to kill and there’s plenty of stuff that can annihilate most vehicles in a single shooting phase. You’d effectively be asking people to pepper their own lines and formations with bombs that your opponent can trivially explode and hurt the rest of your army. Not to mention some of those vehicles will be transports. I can’t think of any force who’d have trouble popping a rhino in a single volley for a guaranteed explosion.

[Valkyrion]

 

It's a good idea.

 

To offer something by way of compensation you could change exploding to ;

if the model is reduced from full wounds to zero wounds in the same SHOOTING PHASE the model automatically explodes

otherwise it explodes on 6+ as normal.

 

This would encourage targeted ranged attacks and encourage players to keep their rhinos and storm speeders and other 10 wounders behind cover, rather than just brazenly having a load of T7/8, 10-16W, 3+/2+ save models out in the open.

I think if you offered that kind of compensation you’d actually reduce people’s desire to take vehicles. Nothing about this change makes vehicles harder to kill and there’s plenty of stuff that can annihilate most vehicles in a single shooting phase. You’d effectively be asking people to pepper their own lines and formations with bombs that your opponent can trivially explode and hurt the rest of your army. Not to mention some of those vehicles will be transports. I can’t think of any force who’d have trouble popping a rhino in a single volley for a guaranteed explosion.

 

 

It presents a different tactical challenge though.

You can get guaranteed mortal wounds by blowing up a vehicle, but if you can't blow up that vehicle in one turn would you bother shooting at it at all? Because if you take a single wound off it then it's back to exploding on 6's in future turns.

 

You're probably right, and I obviously haven't tested the theory - just wondering whether you would need a deterrent against using too many vehicles if you took the degrading profile away. 

[MARK0SIAN]

 

 

 

It's a good idea.

 

To offer something by way of compensation you could change exploding to ;

if the model is reduced from full wounds to zero wounds in the same SHOOTING PHASE the model automatically explodes

otherwise it explodes on 6+ as normal.

 

This would encourage targeted ranged attacks and encourage players to keep their rhinos and storm speeders and other 10 wounders behind cover, rather than just brazenly having a load of T7/8, 10-16W, 3+/2+ save models out in the open.

I think if you offered that kind of compensation you’d actually reduce people’s desire to take vehicles. Nothing about this change makes vehicles harder to kill and there’s plenty of stuff that can annihilate most vehicles in a single shooting phase. You’d effectively be asking people to pepper their own lines and formations with bombs that your opponent can trivially explode and hurt the rest of your army. Not to mention some of those vehicles will be transports. I can’t think of any force who’d have trouble popping a rhino in a single volley for a guaranteed explosion.

It presents a different tactical challenge though.

You can get guaranteed mortal wounds by blowing up a vehicle, but if you can't blow up that vehicle in one turn would you bother shooting at it at all? Because if you take a single wound off it then it's back to exploding on 6's in future turns.

 

You're probably right, and I obviously haven't tested the theory - just wondering whether you would need a deterrent against using too many vehicles if you took the degrading profile away.

I don’t think the degrading profiles are the main reason people aren’t spamming vehicles unfortunately. I think it’s that they’re just too fragile. I honestly don’t think you’d need anything to compensate for this change. The only thing it might be an issue with is knights but they’re already hampered by the core rules anyway :(

[Jorin Helm-splitter]

 

 

I think degrading profiles should definitely go. Vehicles hardly last any time at all anyway, you should at least get to use them properly for the one or two turns they’re on the table.

Would you be more likely to run more vehicles with that change? Or would you view more as a quality-of-life improvement?

It would generally be a quality of life improvement I think. It probably would make me more inclined to run a particular vehicle if I was on the fence but wouldn’t be enough on its own I don’t think, mainly because I like vehicles so I tend to run the ones I have anyway unless they’re really poor. So if a vehicle is particularly poor this wouldn’t be enough to get me to take it but would definitely help with the ones I do take.

 

 

Yeah that was my assessment as well. Was just curious to see if people would offer some opposing viewpoints I hadn't considered. In my experience I tend to only have one damaged vehicle at a time because they just don't last. That said I run more like 4-5 in a game (2 implusors, 2 stormspeeders, and a dread) so I do feel that i'm going to have blindspots on this topic. 

 

It's a good idea.

 

To offer something by way of compensation you could change exploding to ;

if the model is reduced from full wounds to zero wounds in the same SHOOTING PHASE the model automatically explodes

otherwise it explodes on 6+ as normal.

 

This would encourage targeted ranged attacks and encourage players to keep their rhinos and storm speeders and other 10 wounders behind cover, rather than just brazenly having a load of T7/8, 10-16W, 3+/2+ save models out in the open. 

 

I tend to play 2000 point games, so I'm used to losing vehicles from full health to zero in a turn and often its on the second turn (against certain armies earlier).  So while I think this rule is pretty cool in theory I'm not sure how practical it would be. I honestly think it would reward you for not taking vehicles and alpha striking which I think 9th already does a good job of. When my brother & I first starting playing 9th we were ending games on the third turn, literally had to make area terrain ruins so the first turn wasn't decisive.

[Jings]

I'm kinda inclined to agree with the scrapping of degrading profiles. I like the idea on paper, but I agree that it gets in the way of game flow when you're constantly having to check if a stat has dropped, and which stat has dropped given the variation of stats they effect. 

 

There does need to be some sort of mechanic present to represent the damage taken though. A tank with 1 wound shouldn't be as effective as a tank at full. Maybe a return to a universal vehicle damage chart for monsters/vehicles over X wounds, something like roll a D3/6 when they hit half wounds, with a corresponding debuff along the lines of half movement, toughness reduction, can only shoot half weapons? There'd be bookkeeping involved, but at least it would be in one place and not the variety of degredations within the current system. 

Edited April 9, 2022 by Jings

[Schlitzaf]

Marking to explain fully later. Basically its too hard to bracket something and when you do bracket somethings its mostlt irrelavent.

[MARK0SIAN]

I'm kinda inclined to agree with the scrapping of degrading profiles. I like the idea on paper, but I agree that it gets in the way of game flow when you're constantly having to check if a stat has dropped, and which stat has dropped given the variation of stats they effect.

 

There does need to be some sort of mechanic present to represent the damage taken though. A tank with 1 wound shouldn't be as effective as a tank at full. Maybe a return to a universal vehicle damage chart for monsters/vehicles over X wounds, something like roll a D3/6 when they hit half wounds, with a corresponding debuff along the lines of half movement, toughness reduction, can only shoot half weapons? There'd be bookkeeping involved, but at least it would be in one place and not the variety of degredations within the current system.

I’m in two minds about whether there does need to be a mechanic to represent the damage taken to be honest. If we were talking about a situation where tanks and other vehicles were consistently surviving 4-5 turns then I’d say yes definitely we do. However they’re very often barely surviving 2 turns. I don’t think allowing them to be a full threat during their short lifespan is very immersion breaking. Plus, it’s not like a marine fights less effectively when they’ve lost one wound or vehicles with less than 10 wounds fight less effectively.

 

I think GW need to pick a lane with this. They seem to want to treat vehicles exactly the same as infantry and smaller monsters as far as wounding and AP etc goes but then want to treat them differently as far as damage goes to represent them being a vehicle. There’s nothing representing them being a vehicle when it comes to their defences. I’d like them to either properly treat vehicles differently in all respects or just treat them exactly the same as other units as far as damage goes.

[Cleon]

My preference would be to change how bracketing works and to have it apply as a lower profile for every 10 wounds lost, so a 10W model wouldn't degrade, but an 11 would, but the lower profile would only be n effect when on 1 wound, so wouldn't feel like a downgrade over having 10 wounds. The idea being it'd be the same lines for everything and it only really comes into effect on things that do take a load of damage and survive, but does let you feel like you are doing something as you plink wounds off of Lords of War.

 

To try and put that better... I think Degrading profiles is something useful to have as part of the game mechanics when you have super heavy units, or armies consisting entirely of units with masses of wounds, making sure the other player feels like they've achieved something even if they can't take down (for example) one of four knights that make up the enemy force in a turn make facing those kinds of forces more palatable. Once you have the mechanic, it should then apply evenly across the board, ideally without creating the current 'feels bad' moment that a 10W model effectively has fewer wounds at full power than a 9W model.

Edited April 9, 2022 by Cleon

[spessmarine]

Always felt like it was something they ported over pretty directly from AoS. It's a good idea, stuff like a monster on its last legs either being really weak or super strong is pretty flavourful. But it needs better implementation, like the W9 vs W10 where having one less wound is a strict improvement is a bit silly.

Table should be less punishing and some things in the W10 and slightly above range really shouldn't decay.

[Jorin Helm-splitter]

I'm kinda inclined to agree with the scrapping of degrading profiles. I like the idea on paper, but I agree that it gets in the way of game flow when you're constantly having to check if a stat has dropped, and which stat has dropped given the variation of stats they effect. 

 

There does need to be some sort of mechanic present to represent the damage taken though. A tank with 1 wound shouldn't be as effective as a tank at full. Maybe a return to a universal vehicle damage chart for monsters/vehicles over X wounds, something like roll a D3/6 when they hit half wounds, with a corresponding debuff along the lines of half movement, toughness reduction, can only shoot half weapons? There'd be bookkeeping involved, but at least it would be in one place and not the variety of degredations within the current system. 

 

Yeah out of the cons of taking out degrading profiles I do think the immersion aspect is the toughest part. Tanks just shouldn't be as effective after they've taken damage.

 

That said I don't really like the ideal of a universal damage table because I think it's hard to make it feel even. A dread only being able to move 3 inches is brutal, but a wave serpent being limited to 8 isn't really that bad. Or a redemptor giving up their storm bolter shots when they can only shoot half their weapons vs. a predator losing 2 of 4 lascannons.  That doesn't mean it couldn't work but I think it would be something you'd want to consider while designing units. It does make me want to play battletech though. 

 

My preference would be to change how bracketing works and to have it apply as a lower profile for every 10 wounds lost, so a 10W model wouldn't degrade, but an 11 would, but the lower profile would only be n effect when on 1 wound, so wouldn't feel like a downgrade over having 10 wounds. The idea being it'd be the same lines for everything and it only really comes into effect on things that do take a load of damage and survive, but does let you feel like you are doing something as you plink wounds off of Lords of War.

 

To try and put that better... I think Degrading profiles is something useful to have as part of the game mechanics when you have super heavy units, or armies consisting entirely of units with masses of wounds, making sure the other player feels like they've achieved something even if they can't take down (for example) one of four knights that make up the enemy force in a turn make facing those kinds of forces more palatable. Once you have the mechanic, it should then apply evenly across the board, ideally without creating the current 'feels bad' moment that a 10W model effectively has fewer wounds at full power than a 9W model.

 

That's an interesting solution. For a lot of vehicles you wouldn't be negatively effected much at all because you'd need to be down to one or two wounds. Plus for the armies like knights that would be affected by it, they have less models to keep track of.  I would prefer it over the current system, I think the tricky part would be how punishing the profile change would be. 

[Inquisitor_Lensoven]

 

I'm kinda inclined to agree with the scrapping of degrading profiles. I like the idea on paper, but I agree that it gets in the way of game flow when you're constantly having to check if a stat has dropped, and which stat has dropped given the variation of stats they effect.

 

There does need to be some sort of mechanic present to represent the damage taken though. A tank with 1 wound shouldn't be as effective as a tank at full. Maybe a return to a universal vehicle damage chart for monsters/vehicles over X wounds, something like roll a D3/6 when they hit half wounds, with a corresponding debuff along the lines of half movement, toughness reduction, can only shoot half weapons? There'd be bookkeeping involved, but at least it would be in one place and not the variety of degredations within the current system.

I’m in two minds about whether there does need to be a mechanic to represent the damage taken to be honest. If we were talking about a situation where tanks and other vehicles were consistently surviving 4-5 turns then I’d say yes definitely we do. However they’re very often barely surviving 2 turns. I don’t think allowing them to be a full threat during their short lifespan is very immersion breaking. Plus, it’s not like a marine fights less effectively when they’ve lost one wound or vehicles with less than 10 wounds fight less effectively.

 

I think GW need to pick a lane with this. They seem to want to treat vehicles exactly the same as infantry and smaller monsters as far as wounding and AP etc goes but then want to treat them differently as far as damage goes to represent them being a vehicle. There’s nothing representing them being a vehicle when it comes to their defences. I’d like them to either properly treat vehicles differently in all respects or just treat them exactly the same as other units as far as damage goes.

the argument can be made that as it is they still are.

 

Think of an intercessor squad as a single clump of wounds and shots, etc.

The unit degrades in effectiveness as models are removed from the unit.

 

So instead of losing firepower and guns, you lose movement and accuracy.

 

I still don’t like it, but theoretically it’s units the same just not individual models.

[Iron Father Ferrum]

This does nothing to really counter the "vehicles are too fragile" meta-problem in the game right now.  In a world of Fire Dragons, Eradicators, and Hammerheads simply blinking tanks out of existence with relative ease, the only real changes that would make vehicles worth keeping around is to increase their wound count -- dramatically increase, in many cases.

 

I remember the days of Editions past where a single lascannon or meltagun hit could do the same, but it wasn't easy -- especially in 5th, which was basically my heyday of 40k.  I'm not going to wax poetic about the differences, but suffice to say that battle tanks in general lived longer than they do now.

[Inquisitor_Lensoven]

This does nothing to really counter the "vehicles are too fragile" meta-problem in the game right now. In a world of Fire Dragons, Eradicators, and Hammerheads simply blinking tanks out of existence with relative ease, the only real changes that would make vehicles worth keeping around is to increase their wound count -- dramatically increase, in many cases.

 

I remember the days of Editions past where a single lascannon or meltagun hit could do the same, but it wasn't easy -- especially in 5th, which was basically my heyday of 40k. I'm not going to wax poetic about the differences, but suffice to say that battle tanks in general lived longer than they do now.

or increase their T, or damage reduction rules, or invulnerable saves.

[The Unseen]

The degradation chart is way better than the old vehicle damage system, which had all sorts of problems.

I don't want to bring back stunlocking tanks or immobilizing my melee dread.

 

Vehicles are too easy to kill because the lethality of the game has exploded (again). And there's no fixing it without a new edition at this point.

 

Though the numbers of when big things bracket could use a look for sure.

Making it a flat # of wounds for each bracket might work, if it was tuned correctly.

Larger scarier vehicles have more brackets, weaker lighter vehicles have fewer, but would never have more wounds at top profile than a heavier vehicle.

 

Or just make the breakpoints different, vehicles spend half their life penalized, but very rarely does anything live at bottom bracket, since most have like 3 wounds left at that point.

[Jings]

 

 

I'm kinda inclined to agree with the scrapping of degrading profiles. I like the idea on paper, but I agree that it gets in the way of game flow when you're constantly having to check if a stat has dropped, and which stat has dropped given the variation of stats they effect.

 

There does need to be some sort of mechanic present to represent the damage taken though. A tank with 1 wound shouldn't be as effective as a tank at full. Maybe a return to a universal vehicle damage chart for monsters/vehicles over X wounds, something like roll a D3/6 when they hit half wounds, with a corresponding debuff along the lines of half movement, toughness reduction, can only shoot half weapons? There'd be bookkeeping involved, but at least it would be in one place and not the variety of degredations within the current system.

I’m in two minds about whether there does need to be a mechanic to represent the damage taken to be honest. If we were talking about a situation where tanks and other vehicles were consistently surviving 4-5 turns then I’d say yes definitely we do. However they’re very often barely surviving 2 turns. I don’t think allowing them to be a full threat during their short lifespan is very immersion breaking. Plus, it’s not like a marine fights less effectively when they’ve lost one wound or vehicles with less than 10 wounds fight less effectively.

 

I think GW need to pick a lane with this. They seem to want to treat vehicles exactly the same as infantry and smaller monsters as far as wounding and AP etc goes but then want to treat them differently as far as damage goes to represent them being a vehicle. There’s nothing representing them being a vehicle when it comes to their defences. I’d like them to either properly treat vehicles differently in all respects or just treat them exactly the same as other units as far as damage goes.

the argument can be made that as it is they still are.

 

Think of an intercessor squad as a single clump of wounds and shots, etc.

The unit degrades in effectiveness as models are removed from the unit.

 

So instead of losing firepower and guns, you lose movement and accuracy.

 

I still don’t like it, but theoretically it’s units the same just not individual models.

 

 

Perhaps a simpler solution (and one I've seen espoused elsewhere) is simply giving vehicles around 50% more wounds across the board? That, and maybe a flat ignore AP-1, would go a long way in increasing survivability and perhaps warrant the degrading profile alongside reducing the frequency at which it would need to be referenced. 

[Captain Idaho]

I'm down with getting rid of degrading profiles. It's just more book keeping and rules to keep track of in a game full of exceptions and brain tingling variations on EVERYTHING.

 

Any abstract representation of damage is clumsy anyway. Guns getting destroyed now is represented by the vehicle firing slightly less accurately? Erosion of performance for vehicles and big monsters but not for anything else when they're injured?

 

The abstraction jars and detracts from the representation it's supposed to give us anyway.

[Dark Shepherd]

Limit degrading profiles to certain keywords eg superheavy/titannic/large monster

[Jorin Helm-splitter]

This does nothing to really counter the "vehicles are too fragile" meta-problem in the game right now.  In a world of Fire Dragons, Eradicators, and Hammerheads simply blinking tanks out of existence with relative ease, the only real changes that would make vehicles worth keeping around is to increase their wound count -- dramatically increase, in many cases.

 

I remember the days of Editions past where a single lascannon or meltagun hit could do the same, but it wasn't easy -- especially in 5th, which was basically my heyday of 40k.  I'm not going to wax poetic about the differences, but suffice to say that battle tanks in general lived longer than they do now.

 

Yeah, I don't see it being a fix for vehicles, at this point I think that would require a new edition or rebalancing of heavy weapons. The suggestion is more for quality of life and a boost for those of us who run them.  I've spent a lot of time double checking profiles for vehicles who quite rarely affect the game much once they are on that bottom bracket. Getting a few more quality shots or a decent assault would be a buff. Remembering one block of stats would also mean less time looking things up.  To me that's a pretty decent benefit for something that is really easy to do and would benefit most armies.

 

Not going to lie though I would take any buff for vehicles at this point as long as its universal and doesn't require current books being invalidated. 

 

I'm down with getting rid of degrading profiles. It's just more book keeping and rules to keep track of in a game full of exceptions and brain tingling variations on EVERYTHING.

 

Any abstract representation of damage is clumsy anyway. Guns getting destroyed now is represented by the vehicle firing slightly less accurately? Erosion of performance for vehicles and big monsters but not for anything else when they're injured?

 

The abstraction jars and detracts from the representation it's supposed to give us anyway.

 

Yeah I think that a solid argument that the current system isn't immersive either. Characters, multiwound infantry, and small monsters really shouldn't be immune to penalties when they take a damage. By the same token the degrading profiles aren't even some units have skills that don't degrades, others lose stats at different rates.

 

Hopefully the look at something new for 10th. Maybe giving IK and other lords of war damage tables and just leaving the small stuff alone.