Re: [Epic] Detailed Daemon Engines.

From: Richard Desnoyers <rdesnoye_at_...>
Date: Fri, 15 May 1998 15:25:47 -0600

At 11:32 AM 5/15/98 -0400, you wrote:
>> Tzeench wrote:
> Shouldn't that be Tzeentch?

Not according to his e-mail address (tzeench_at_...) to which I
was replying. Somewhat of a trivial point in any case.

> From looking at the army lists, I gathered that the Transport
>ability costs about 1 pt/slot, at least for the Transport(2) units. My
>version of the Death Dealer was priced with that in mind. I did reduce
>its carrying capacity to 4 because (1) high capacity transport units got
>reduced almost across the board in E40k and (2) the main body of the DD
>really isn't that big. If you want to go with Transport(5) to match the
>SM/TL stats, I'd recommend adding a point or two to the cost.

I would agree that this sounds about right from doing my own comparisons.
In terms of WYSIWYG, I had been considering a reduction in the transport
capability of the DD as well. Transport of 4 seems fair & reasonable.

> The Death Dealers are expensive for APCs and slower than Rhinos;
>however, having them allows you to transport your Bloodletters - Blood
>for the Blood God!!! Cheesy players might also use them to give a 1st
>round boost to their Fleshhounds' movement, though... hmmm....

I suppose that there is always that ever present danger of "Cheese."

> Another idea for the Cauldron of Blood that I had was to use the
>old Nurgle Stream of Corruption template (which happens to be 15cm
>long); roll to hit every unit touched, ignoring cover. But that would have
>given it an effective FP of 1 and thus made the Close Support ability
>worthless. I decided instead to model it after the current Hellhound
>stats.

An interesting idea here (the template) that has potential for further
development.

>> Nurgle:
>> Plague Tower - "Boarding Actions" - does anyone use one, does anyone care?
>> [I could post the SM rules for this if anyone would like to see them.]
> I thought about this but eventually decided that it wasn't
>worth it. Towers move a whopping 20cm a turn, generally need to
>advance into enemy territory in order to use the boarding maneuver,
>and will get torn apart by AT and DR shots. Or even by straight FP.
>It is no longer survivable enough to function in this capacity, IMO.

So, the Plague Tower really went through a major downgrade in the
conversion process from what I gather here. I was thinking something along
the lines that units entering into CC from a PT would receive a +1 bonus
(for the entire detachment, that is) on the die roll. Not a lot, but I
think that a +2 bonus would be too much.

> One idea I was toying with was giving a 4+ 'daemonic aura'
>save to the LoB and Plague Tower, to represent the chaos-card-
>sacrifice thing from SM/TL - this would likely result in a large
>point-cost increase though, and would take some playtesting to get
>right.

It seems to me that my LoB could be (and from time to time was) destroyed
much too easily (IMO) in terms of how many points it cost me, in the few
games that I've already played.

>> Daemon Engines of Slaanesh
> The Slaanesh knights are another SM/TL unit that changed
>a lot between versions. The E40k version is better at shooting
>but is less durable. The problem with ramping down all the ranges
>to match with the SM/TL stats is that eventually you'll have
>almost no non-marine units that can shoot farther than 30cm... I
>don't know, I just don't like the idea.

A variety of weapon ranges definately creates an atmosphere which should
(hopefully) foster more variety in terms of tactics employed, being able to
cater to different playing styles, and so on, making the game much more
interesting and enjoyable.

>> I agree with Tzeench, who beat me to the punch here. I was going to post a
>> message on this topic. According to the GW "fluff" that I've read about
>> Daemon Knights (WD 190), they are the remnants of "Knight Households
>> [which] have been corrupted by Chaos down the centuries." The E40K rules
>> for Imperial Knights (CJ 21) describe them as having a "directional power
>> field" which gives them a "Save" against hits. Now I will mix the old and
>> the new rules together in regards to the Slaanesh DK's. I can easily
>> envision their directional power fields becoming corrupted by Chaos and
>> manifesting themselves as the [shifting, swirling aura called the] "Glamour
>> of Slaanesh" which would work the same way, giving a DK a "Save" against
hits.

> The old Knight 'directional power field' was the shield that,
>if an attack passed through it, the save mod of the attack was ignored.
>The old Galmour just made attacks on the target at -1 to hit, and it
>was not effective against template weapons (kinda eldar-ish, actually,
>which is fairly appropriate for Slaanesh). A bit of a difference
>there - harder to hit as opposed to more durable. Still, I suppose
>that Save could cover either case.

I suppose that this is more of flavour issue for me here then anything
else. These are after all Daemon engines under the sway of Slaanesh who
bestows (or at least used to) special gifts and powers upon his minions.
It looked like I hit the Hell-______, but did I really? With an AR of 5 I
don't expect them to hold up for very long anyway, unless you're getting
really lucky with the die rolls, but then again such are the forces of
Chaos at work on the battlefield. For me anyway, the WH40K universe
wouldn't be nearly as interesting if hadn't been built upon this blend of
swords & sorcery with hi-tech sci-fi. The more I go through these proposed
upgrades/conversions, the more I'm coming to realize how much of this
element was removed from the new rule system :(

>> >I also think the subjugator titan is badly done. Instead of 6FP and a
>> >close combat weapon, it should have a close combat weapon and 2 or 3
>> >Antitank for its psi-pulse.
> The Subjugator has more problems than just that - for one
>thing, it's horribly overpriced.

In looking over the stats for this and doing some comparisons, I would have
to concur whole-heartedly on this one. It needs to be reworked.

>> Finally, one last thing. No one has has said anything about the Silver
>> Towers. For me this is another flavour enhancer.
>> Silver Towers:
>> "Magical Warding" exists between two towers within 10 cm's of each other,
>> anything targeted (by an AT shot for example) through this field will
>> receive a +1 armour bonus up to a maximum of 6 (or a "Save)." Once again,
>> I think that I prefer the idea of a "Save".
> Too much. Imagine a string of silver towers in front of the
>main force of an enemy army, with backup units ready to pick up the
>warding should you shoot out one or two towers.
> Heck, imagine say 4 towers sitting in front of a bunch of LRs
>on OW and titan(s) with 60cm DRs (to pick off any units in range of
>the towers and out of range of the LRs).

Once again the spectre of a very foul smelling cheese could undoubtedly
rear its ugly head. However, if you are playing a game which, for example,
requires you to Take & Hold objectives, pulling something like that off
would IMO be easier said then done. If you were in a defensive position
then it could happen. It's hard to say, but I'm not sure what the likely
hood of anyone having hordes of ST's (which die easily enough) would be
anyway. A possible solution could be to limit the number of ST's to 2 or 4
for any one detachment? Tricky to say the least.
Tzeentch, the Great Sorcerer, is not pleased.

>> Did anyone ever use this when playing SM? Was it of any real use?
> Yes. No. The warding only existed between towers in the
>same detachment, and they came in detachments of 2. Opponent would
>kill one tower in a pair, dropping the warding and gaining 4 (!!!)
>VPs. The towers are hard to hide as well, as they are on flying
>bases.

Very easy VP's indeed!

>> Someone could place their H.Q. unit behind this field for added protection.
>> {If I ever get a hold of a scanner I could e-mail people a *.gif or *.jpg
>> of the Magical Warding Template if they wanted it.)
>
> It's just a 10cm long rectangle.

Yes it is, a person could easily make their own if they wanted to.
Or, they could just as easily print one off with their computer.

Richard
Received on Fri May 15 1998 - 21:25:47 UTC