[Epic] Night fighting, other house rules, a desperate plea

From: Eugene Earnshaw-Whyte <eug_at_...>
Date: Wed, 10 Sep 1997 00:51:38 -0700

    Erik's optional rules for Ork clans reminded me of something I've been
meaning to do for a while. My Marine chapter (the Midnight Hammers) tend to do
most of their fighting at night, so I have wanted to come up with some optional
rules for night battles. After thinking about it for a while, I have come up
with some different options; which you use (if any) is up to your preference, of
course.

Option 1: it is assumed that the ground troops of all armies have access to
night vision equipment, and can operate in darkness with no penalty. The only
effect of a night battle is that neither side may employ flyers of any kind; the
darkness makes ground attack and transport missions impossible.

comment: easy to employ, and a good excuse for not bothering with flyers

Option 2: as option 1, but it is assumed that all armies are equally hampered by
the darkness. Shift all firing one column to the right on the firepower chart.
The column to the right of "infantry and vehicles in cover" may be obtained by
taking the "infantry and vehicles in the open" column, and dividing all the
numbers by two (rounding fractions up). Superheavy weapons are treated slightly
differently; if the unit is on overwatch orders, superheavy weapons fire as if
on regular orders; if the unit is on regular orders, the weapon must roll a 4+
to lock on, and on assault orders, the weapon must roll a six to lock on.
Optionally, flyers may be allowed, but also suffer these firing penalties.

comment: not to difficult to use, might favour Tyranids and, perhaps Chaos and
Orks.

Option 3: as option two, however, some unit types may ignore the firing
penalties for night. These unit types are: all space marine troops; all chaos
marine troops, all Tyranid infantry (but not Tyranid vehicles), all chaos marine
troops, all daemons, all imperial War Engines, all Eldar war engines, all Chaos
war engines, and all Tyranid War Engines.

Optionally, Imperial vehicles, all Eldar troops, and possibly all Tyranid
troops, may ignore night penalties.

In addition to the firing penalties a detachment that consists of at least 50%
troops that may ignore night penalties gains a +1 to its die roll in close
assaults and firefights vs. detachments not so constituted.

Optionally, War Machines never get this bonus in close assault.

Comments: I would prefer not to use the options, but I thought I'd mention them.
The main difficulty is balancing this option in play; completely off the top of
my head, I might say that night capable units are probably worth about an extra
25% point cost in a night scenario; this might be quite a bit off.

Further Night Options: you might decide that some vehicles mount big
searchlights (most likely Gargants and Battle fortresses, to even things up a
bit for the Orks). These might work as follows. A unit mounting a searchlight
may choose to illuminate a single enemy detachment within 45 cm. Both the
illuminating and the illuminated unit may be fired at by any other units without
the usual night penalties; additionally, the illuminator may fire at the
illuminatee without penalty, but the illuminator suffers automatically suffers
whatever night penalties it would usually suffer, regardless of its target, to
reflect the effects of the searchlight glare.

comments: the searchlight range might need tweaking. Evens things up for Orks
some.

These rules are probably best used in a campaign setting or in a special
scenario, but with some playtesting it might be possible to make them suitable
for regular competitive games.

One final thing: I've lost my copy of that long 4-player battle report I posted
to the list (don't ask how). You know, the one with the Midnight Hammers and
Sergeant Octavius, that came in two parts and was really long. If any of you
still have a copy of that beast, I would greatly appreciate it if you would send
it to eug_at_...
Received on Wed Sep 10 1997 - 07:51:38 UTC