Is anyone else less than thrilled with the way vehicles interact with terrain in 40k? As someone who has ridden in a bunch of armored vehicles I find the rules for permanently immobilizing vehicles on terrain absurd.
Here in the GiF Man-cave we have come up with this simple solution.
Bogged Down
When a vehicle enters difficult or dangerous terrain some times they become temporarily immobilized; stuck in the terrain they are attempting to cross.
Follow the normal procedure for vehicles moving in difficult or dangerous terrain; if they get immobilized place a marker next to the vehicle. Then on the next turn follow the procedure listed below.
If a vehicle gets bogged down it may un-bog its self on a D6 roll of a 4+ for difficult terrain and a 5+ for dangerous. The turn the vehicle un-bogs it cannot move but may fire as normal.
See I told you it was simple! Comments and feedback welcome. If you try these rules out for yourself, I'd love to hear about it!
Yep, good and simple. Now let's complicate it. ;-)
ReplyDeleteMaybe not allow it for Dangerous terrain - that seems more to me like treads being blown off, etc. that could be harder to address in a battle. Besides, you want to leave at least some value to the poor Techmarines and Engineseers.
They have plenty of use fixing damage taken from shooting!
ReplyDelete-Jim
I think it adds more tactical value this way than simply *poof*. Maybe if you get stuck you must reverse out the next turn?
ReplyDeleteDangerous isn't just concrete rubble, could be mines/explosives too. Something to think about:)
Realism. It can be very hard to make the game more realistic. The current rules for terrain tests are by their nature simple. Simple rules make it easier to run tournaments.
ReplyDeleteThat being said, home rules like the ones above add a bit of realism to the game. To me, this could be a interesting addition to the rules set as I am constantly rolling ones for difficult terrain.
That's a good point Flekkzo, but here in the Man-cave we actually have separate rules for mines.
ReplyDeleteMags, while I agree with you to a large extent, Flames of War handles bogging in a similar way and it is a thriving tourney game!
Thanks for the comments!
-Jim
How much "real" time does a 5-7 turn game of 40k take up? With the number of infantry/vehicles on the table in a standard game, I'd wager it's measured in minutes rather than hours, which isn't a lot of time when you're talking about recovering a bogged-down fighting vehicle. I think the fastest we ever recovered a stuck Humvee in country was 10-15 minutes, recovering a tank that tossed its track took 1+ hours even with mechanic support.
ReplyDeleteThanks for the comments, Chris.
ReplyDeleteI have no clue what the 'real time' would be for a standard game of 40k. It used to be stated that is was on sliding scale way back in the dark ages of rogue trader.
In game a Rhino can fix any sort of immobilization on a 6+, so I would imagine a standard game is more than a few minutes of 'real time'.
I know these rules won't be most peoples cup o' coffee. I am just offering an alternative way of doing things.
Cheers
-Jim
I kind of feel like terrain should be a little more dangerous and unpredictable, whereas this makes it safer. Something I might kick around would be: When moving into, through, or out of difficult terrain, roll a D6 as usual. On a 1 the vehicle is immobilized as usual. On a 2 the vehicle is bogged down and cannot move any further this turn, but is not immobilized.
ReplyDeleteThat keeps it simple, but adds a little bit more terrain interaction without being overly punitive. You could consider things like halving speed as a third result type, but I think that just starts to over-complicate things.
In any event, I think more terrain interaction with vehicles is definitely a good goal.
Thanks for the comments.
ReplyDeleteI see what you are trying to accomplish, but it really defeats what I was doing with this rule.
Now if we were to take the rule I presented and added your result of a 2 that could be interesting.
So the extra rule would read like this:
On the result of a 2 the vehicle becomes temporarily stuck, it immediately stops it's movement at the edge of the difficult terrain; but is free to move in the following game turn.
Jim