8th Ed. An unofficial 9th Edition - Brainstorming Thread

[NIGHTBRINGER]

I am hard pressed to come up with ways to weaken the cannon without ruining them. My first instinct is just make cannons more costly or monsters cheaper. My second thought is to give riders a better chance at avoiding the templates but that only helps characters on mounts, a lot of monsters don't have characters.

You also have to understand that Warhammer players whose primary armies have cannons get defensive at the suggestion that cannon rules be changed.

When thinking about canons. Think about your response if someone tells you Slann are too good and need a severe nerfing.

To begin, the cannonball shot should randomize between rider and ridden monster. I think that is an easy fix.


Fixing the rest of the issues with cannons is tougher. Some brainstorming options include...

• introduce the use of ballistic skill when firing cannons
• reduce the cannon's multiple wounds from (d6) to (d3)
• create a mechanic that introduces the potential of cannonballs deviating left or right of the target (thereby making it harder to hit single targets but not limiting effectiveness on units)
• guess range... not the most elegant solution as it favors some people over others, but it has historical precedence

 

[ASSASSIN_NR_1]

The problem I see with cannons is that there is next to no counterplay, you basically cannot protect yourself against it, and if you have just a single monster on the field, it is way too easy for that cannon to make its points back, especially if the monster has a character on top.
Sure some people might use a lot of terrain, but I find that most people don't, and it's not like all terrain block LOS. I'm in favor of the BS approach, it can also make some factions cannons more accurate than others, which from a lore perspective makes sense.
Furthermore, I think monsters in general should get a buff, maybe just in the form of a point decrease or in general have 6 wounds. Then make cannons do D3+2 wounds. That way it can always kill a lone character, but can never kill a monster outright; The character will be harder to hit and might get a look out sir, while the monster is easier (when using BS) and cannot get a look out sir.
The change to BS also makes gives more options for counterplay, since there are more spells affecting it, but also allows the user of the cannons to buff the BS with magic, or some character might give +1 BS.
Some armies maybe should also get the option for some defense for select monsters, like magic items giving a 5+ ward save against shooting/artillery attacks.

 

[pendrake]

create a mechanic that introduces the potential of cannonballs deviating left or right of the target (thereby making it harder to hit single targets but not limiting effectiveness on units)

I have already thought of one. No time right now to type it up.

Another thing to look at is bouncing. Cannon balls can bounce on grassy battlefields. I don’t have any thoughts on an improved mechanic for that. Yet.

 

[Lord Agragax of Lunaxoatl]

To begin, the cannonball shot should randomize between rider and ridden monster. I think that is an easy fix.

Agreed - I had already mentioned how this could be done previously in the thread if you haven’t already seen. Just use the rules for randomising all other shooting attacks - on a 1-4 the cannonball embeds itself in the monster and doesn’t go any further, while on a 5-6 it instead flies over the monster and hits the rider square in the face.

• introduce the use of ballistic skill when firing cannons

As I have said before, using ballistic skill to determine if one shot Hits is difficult unless you have a BS of 3 or better, and you still have to take long range into account, but BS could be used to reduce the horizontal distance the cannonball moves in the manner of 40K blast templates.

• reduce the cannon's multiple wounds from (d6) to (d3)

I think D3 would be too weak to represent the full extent of damage from a massive great cannonball, but either D3 + 2 as @ASSASSIN_NR_1 says or 2D3 would both reduce the killability of cannonballs.

• create a mechanic that introduces the potential of cannonballs deviating left or right of the target (thereby making it harder to hit single targets but not limiting effectiveness on units)

See above, although I would say that cannonballs often only move horizontally during their trajectory if strong winds are pushing it either to the left or right due to their heavy weight, and while wind direction is a factor that has to play a part in wargames such as those for sailing ships, I think it might add an unnecessary layer of complexity in a land battle game.

• guess range... not the most elegant solution as it favors some people over others, but it has historical precedence

As far as I recall this was the rule for firing cannons in 7th Edition. Certainly this was the way I had always fired my cannon - guess a range, roll an artillery dice and add the result to it to determine the distance reached by the shot and then roll the artillery dice again to determine the bounce distance.

 

[Lord Agragax of Lunaxoatl]

Another thing to look at is bouncing. Cannon balls can bounce on grassy battlefields. I don’t have any thoughts on an improved mechanic for that. Yet.

If you’re saying cannons shouldn’t bounce on grassy battlefields, I have played quite a few games where cannonballs do bounce on grass and it all seems to be natural. Also using terrain to determine whether a cannonball should bounce or not would again cause some unnecessary complexity and could allow opponents to purposefully set up terrain to stop cannonballs from bouncing.

 

[NIGHTBRINGER]

See above, although I would say that cannonballs often only move horizontally during their trajectory if strong winds are pushing it either to the left or right due to their heavy weight, and while wind direction is a factor that has to play a part in wargames such as those for sailing ships, I think it might add an unnecessary layer of complexity in a land battle game.

I didn't mean that it would deviate left or right due to wind or any such factor, but rather the crew missing their target slightly. Maybe better BS could help minimize this.

As far as I recall this was the rule for firing cannons in 7th Edition. Certainly this was the way I had always fired my cannon - guess a range, roll an artillery dice and add the result to it to determine the distance reached by the shot and then roll the artillery dice again to determine the bounce distance.

You are correct, that is the way that cannons were played in 7th. That's why I included in the list, even though it is far from my favourite option. The problem is that some people are inherently much better at guessing range than others and I think 8th edition actively tried to turn away from that.

 

[ASSASSIN_NR_1]

D3 + 2 A’s @ASSASSIN_NR_1 says or 2D3 would both reduce the killability of cannonballs

Well actually it makes the cannons more reliable, it just tightens the interval of damage.

1 D6: [Avg: 3.5, max: 6 , min: 1}

2 D3 :[Avg: 4, max: 6 , min: 2}

1 D3+2: [Avg: 4, max: 5 , min: 3]

I'm in favor of the latter, while also giving monsters an additional wound. Alternatively make it

1 D3+1: [Avg: 3, max: 4 , min: 2]

Then it always kills lone heroes, usually kills lone lords, but never kills a single monster.

Essentially I would call it a quality of life change, since it opens for a bit of counterplay for the players with monsters, while also ensuring that the player with the cannon never rolls a 1 for damage, which I imagine really is a bummer when it happens.

As far as I recall this was the rule for firing cannons in 7th Edition. Certainly this was the way I had always fired my cannon - guess a range, roll an artillery dice and add the result to it to determine the distance reached by the shot and then roll the artillery dice again to determine the bounce distance.

I never liked all that guessing and using different dice. Why not just one one type of die for everything?
Using BS is not so bad really, sure there is long range, but if you shoot at a large target you get +1 to hit anyway, essentially nullifying the long range. If that is still not good enough, why not just give cannons more range, I bet they could shoot very far in real life anyway.

 

[pendrake]

why not just give cannons more range, I bet they could shoot very far in real life anyway.

You would win that wager.

 

[pendrake]

I didn't mean that it would deviate left or right due to wind or any such factor

Good instinct @NIGHTBRINGER

The largest distance a Wargame Table that is meant for Warhammer can provide is 535 Scale Feet. (That’s the 107 inch maximum corner to corner diagonal on a 48x96 inch table.)

Real cannons, firing spherical shot, would not experience significant windage over such a short distance. Real cannons can easily shoot a full mile. (535 feet is only about 1/10th of a mile)

This fellow estimates one foot of horizontal deviatiation (due to wind) in one mile of travel:

A cannon ball, or a shell, would be traveling much faster than any possible wind, and the wind wouldn't have had that much effect on such a dense projectile anyway, but it may have made a difference of a foot or so per mile. A rifled cannon shell would have had a much longer range than a ball - up to seven miles in some cases - so the wind would have proportionally more effect on it.

A much larger deviation would be caused by spin. The ball could be spinning at high speed in any plane, so would tend to drift left or right like a hooked or sliced golf ball, and that would be completely unpredictable as it would depend which part of the ball touched the barrel last before exiting. A shell, on the other hand, would be spinning axially in a predictable way. It would still drift, but the drift would be predictable and could be allowed for in sighting.

Finally, the Reynolds number (related to air resistance) is greater for a ball than for a pointed elongated projectile, so the ball would be retarded more.

A great deal of work was done on this subject in the late 19th Century, especially in the field of reducing air resistance for shells. It was known that a boat shaped, rounded end shell had less air resistance and a longer range than a flat ended shell, but for some reason was far less accurate. This was because at the moment of leaving the muzzle, the gas pressure escaping behind the shell would push on a rounded bottom in an unpredictable way and push the shell off course. Consequently shells are always flat bottomed.

—Peter Hand, Quora webpage

 

[pendrake]

I have already thought of one. No time right now to type it up.

Another thing to look at is bouncing. Cannon balls can bounce on grassy battlefields. I don’t have any thoughts on an improved mechanic for that. Yet.

If you’re saying cannons shouldn’t bounce on grassy battlefields, I have played quite a few games where cannonballs do bounce on grass and it all seems to be natural.

I was not saying that at all. But I was not very clear.

In real life cannonballs can bounce (conditions: level ground or close to it, roundshot, fired on a near flat trajectory, low to the ground.)

There should exist a rules mechanic in Warhammer to represent this. I remember the one from 7th/8th Edition. But I am not impressed with it.

Also using terrain to determine whether a cannonball should bounce or not would again cause some unnecessary complexity and could allow opponents to purposefully set up terrain to stop cannonballs from bouncing.

Some terrain should hinder or even stop cannonballs.

 

[pendrake]

I guess they just don’t teach Physics anymore...

...create a mechanic that introduces the potential of cannonballs deviating left or right of the target...

Yes ^ this...

But not because of wind...

...although I would say that cannonballs often only move horizontally during their trajectory if strong winds are pushing it either to the left or right due to their heavy weight, and while wind direction is a factor that has to play a part in wargames such as those for sailing ships, I think it might add an unnecessary layer of complexity in a land battle game.

What Real Cannonballs Do

They do deviate left and right. But... Wind on an ordinary day has little to do with how much and may be discounted as a factor. (There is a different reason: read on.)

They can hypothetically fly as far as three miles (hence the old Three Mile Limit to international waters). But one mile is a more typical practical range. One nautical mile is about 17 tables if the cannon is shooting parallel to the long dimension of a 4x6 foot table. They could shoot anything on the same table.

They could be fired two at a time. From the same cannon barrel. Using the same powder charge as as one cannonball. Range would be halved (only 8 table lengths) accuracy would be some degree worse, but both would hit the same barn (or ship).

They bounce on grassy, park-like, battlefields. Just not in an absolutely straight line. Each time they touch the ground they are slowed a bit, could deviate right or left, or they could embed in the mud under the grass.

They rattle as they are forced down the barrel and they spin in flight. The axis of spin is completely random for a round cannonball. They rattle in the barrel because there is a tiny amount of space between the walls of the barrel and the roundshot. These two factors together can cause enough horizontal deviation to the flight path to miss a character. This ^ should also be the case in Warhammer.

 

[airjamy]

I would actually, advocate of the devil here, not nerf cannons. Instead, i would buff monsters and other artillery. In my mind it should work like this:

- Infantry should be the mainstay of armies, but they should be beaten by monsters as they do not really have the tools to deal with them. They are historic examples of 60 elephants crushing 1.000's of infantrymen. Right now, steadfast means infantry beats some monsters when attacked from the front.

- Specialized equipment however, like artillery, should beat monsters. You would need this to make sure that not everybody just puts 3 steggies in his list and calls it a day.

- Cavalry and other support units kill artillery, as they are fast enough to slip behind enemy lines. They however, do not have enough hitting power to punch through infantry blocks.

Steadfast really changed 8th, and i think it made infantry a tad too strong in the big picture perspective. Perhaps make it so that infantry lose steadfast when they are in combat with a monster so a monster can somewhat reliably break through the infantry line like the tank they are?

 

[pendrake]

Horizontal Deviation Mechanic (proposed)

Roll two six sided dice (2D6). The dice need to be differently colored; one color is assigned to Right, the other to Left. Read as follows: if the result is DOUBLES the cannon ball has (amazingly) gone straight and true. All other results indicate the shot has deviated either right or left.

(I don’t think it is a perfect mechanic anywhere near the reality. I think perfectly straight is actually much less likely than 6 out of 36.)

The distance it has deviated is given by the value of the die that rolled the smallest value. The color of the small die decides Right or Left.

 

[pendrake]

I would actually, advocate of the devil here, not nerf cannons. Instead, I would buff monsters...

What, if anything, to do about cannons is fraught with complexity...which is why I suggested starting with the magic as the one and only change for the first round of testing.

Cavalry ... do not have enough hitting power to punch through infantry blocks...

But in the Middle Ages Cavalry could do exactly that. But in the Roman era Cavalry was more easily beaten. But again, in the late Middle Ages and Renaissance infantry started to dominate.

The goal for Warhammer should be none of the above. The goal should be: 300 pt Cavalry Squadron = 300 pt Tank = 300 pt Infantry block = 300 pt Monster.

Steadfast really changed 8th, and i think it made infantry a tad too strong in the big picture perspective.

Yes it did.

 

[airjamy]

But in the Middle Ages Cavalry could do exactly that. But in the Roman era Cavalry was more easily beaten. But again, in the late Middle Ages and Renaissance infantry started to dominate.

The goal for Warhammer should be none of the above. The goal should be: 300 pt Cavalry Squadron = 300 pt Tank = 300 pt Infantry block = 300 pt Monster.

I agree! That is why i think we need a system like: X counters Y, but X is countered by W, but W is countered by Y. Making cannons stronger can work in this system, as long as monsters are just buffed more.

 

[pendrake]

I agree! That is why i think we need a system like: X counters Y, but X is countered by W, but W is countered by Y. Making cannons stronger can work in this system, as long as monsters are just buffed more.

We do not agree at all. To explain using your variable letters, I want:

X = Y = W = Z For any given point value.

You have proposed: X > Y > W > X

The place where 8th left off was: a 280point Stegadon is always shredded by two 140point cannons. And you want to make the cannons stronger. And that doesn’t even address (the absurdity of) using cannons as sniper rifles against Characters on Foot.

 

[Lord Agragax of Lunaxoatl]

- Infantry should be the mainstay of armies, but they should be beaten by monsters as they do not really have the tools to deal with them. They are historic examples of 60 elephants crushing 1.000's of infantrymen. Right now, steadfast means infantry beats some monsters when attacked from the front.

I agree with this - GW most likely put this in as another way to buff large masses of troops unnecessarily as they did with the stupid horde rule.

- Cavalry and other support units kill artillery, as they are fast enough to slip behind enemy lines. They however, do not have enough hitting power to punch through infantry blocks.

This is certainly not the case much of the time. It all depended on the cavalry unit and also the infantry unit they are fighting. Light cavalry are, as you say, pretty weak against infantry but are good at running down fleeing enemies and taking out artillery pieces. Heavy cavalry, on the other hand, quite easily had the potential to smash through infantry formations, e.g. Cataphracts, Knights, e.t.c, and missile cavalry didn’t even need to charge the enemy and could just sit around firing missiles all day and then run off whenever melee cavalry came to charge them. Also light infantry of any sort are much more prone to being ridden down by any form of cavalry because of their more unformed nature and their poorer quality equipment, while heavy infantry were better equipped and better trained so were more likely to survive cavalry charges. Particular infantry tactics were also more effective at repelling cavalry, such as the phalanx and shieldwall and generally standing at the top of a hill to force the cavalry to climb up and lose their impetus.

But in the Roman era Cavalry was more easily beaten.

I have to disagree with you there in some respects - some cavalry in the Ancient world were really pretty awful (Roman cavalry in particular lost so many battles for the Roman army it was uncanny) while others were harder to beat (Cataphracts in particular come to mind but Celtic Cavalry were also not to be underestimated - they were superior to Roman cavalry units and the Roman army often used to hire Celtic cavalry as mercenaries to fight in their later campaigns)

But again, in the late Middle Ages and Renaissance infantry started to dominate.

This certainly wasn’t always the case either. True, the longbow and firearms spelt the end of the mounted knight, but more lightly-armoured cavalry were still vital to armies in the 15th-19th centuries. Certainly in the English Civil War cavalry were the main counter to Musketeers (who couldn’t fight for toffee in melee), who were in turn a counter to Pikemen (who were much slower and could be whittled down by gunfire more easily) who were a counter to cavalry (obviously because the pikes could be used to knock riders off their horses and also any sensible horse will be much more reluctant to run headlong into a thick forest of long pointy things). In the 18th and 19th centuries cavalry were also used to defeat both infantry and artillery as the focus on infantry training shifted to almost purely focus on shooting over melee as firearms became more reliable and more easily accessible. Indeed it wasn’t until the advent of trench warfare in WWI that really spelt the end of cavalry.

That’s why I’ve recommended introducing the troop types Heavy Infantry, Light Infantry, Heavy Cavalry and Light Cavalry - Light Infantry are chaff Infantry that are often seen in great masses, Heavy Infantry are more elite troops seen in much smaller bands of heroes, Light Cavalry are what 8th currently calls ‘Fast Cavalry’ plus any other lightly armoured cavalry units and Heavy Cavalry are all heavily armoured cavalry units that do a lot more damage on the charge.

 

[ASSASSIN_NR_1]

I'll give my two cents:

I think some kind of middle ground between pendrake's and airjamy's proposals. Units should be balanced, meaning that broadly speaking 300 points is worth the same no matter what it is used oin, but each army has their strengths and might get some features at a small discount.
Furthermore, I think it makes the game more interesting if there is some counterplay. Think of it like Total War Warhammer: Some cheaper units might beat more expensive ones given the right matchup.
If it was always the case that 300 points is the same no matter what you spend it on, then a fight between a 300 point monster and 300 points of infantry will be quite boring since the outcome will always just be 50/50.

 

[Lord Agragax of Lunaxoatl]

I'll give my two cents:

I think some kind of middle ground between pendrake's and airjamy's proposals. Units should be balanced, meaning that broadly speaking 300 points is worth the same no matter what it is used oin, but each army has their strengths and might get some features at a small discount.
Furthermore, I think it makes the game more interesting if there is some counterplay. Think of it like Total War Warhammer: Some cheaper units might beat more expensive ones given the right matchup.
If it was always the case that 300 points is the same no matter what you spend it on, then a fight between a 300 point monster and 300 points of infantry will be quite boring since the outcome will always just be 50/50.

What do you think of my idea?

 

[ASSASSIN_NR_1]

What do you think of my idea?

The unit categories? Hard to say without having concrete stats, but I do think it could work quite well. I assume you want to limit the unit size of heavy units to relatively few models, maybe make max. unit sizes scale with game size?