Vehicle Squadron rules

[Simon]

Just got a couple of questions about the rules for them. I've got Dark Millennium, and it states that vehicles that cost under 100 pts can be made into a squadron. Now, I know that we've used razorbacks in squadrons before and I was wondering if this was due to an oversight or if we had changed the rules.

Also, is a vehicle squadron one support slot for each vehicle, or a support slot for the squadron as a whole?

[bot]

what slot??

we formed dreadnofs and landraiders as into squadron as well.

[Charly]

check the rule again as its written, as i can remember it sed any vehicle can be made into squadrons. the points just affect the size of the squadron, like if u have 5 vehicles u should make 2 squadrons, one of 3 and one of 2 etc. i should explain for bot, in ogc rules we use the squads section of an army list (with the exception of units like scouts) as mainstay units for vehicles, ie to have a vehicle u need a squad, 3 vehicles, 3 squads, u get the idea... hence simons slots comment. and its one slot per vehicle not squadron.

[tturen]

Under the original Dark Mil. rules vehicles of all types MAY form squadrons. If the vehicles cost less than 100 points though they MUST form one. Vehicles over 100 have the option. Transports also have the option even if they cost less than 100 points.

"and its one slot per vehicle not squadron."

Not a bad house rule but I assume there is a consideration of some type made for light vehicles? Why isn't this troop/vehicle requirement points based instead? I can see lots of balance issues if its strictly based on a squad/vehicle requirement.

[Simon]

The typical force organisation is still in place, just that this is an extra limitation. I think that we had a stipulation for light vehicles where 3 count as 1 choice.

[tturen]

As a rule I think anything that encourages the use of more troops is a good thing but one problem I have is that one given army can pay 75 points or so for a squad to support the armor while an army like the marines will require a 300 point troop choice. There is an equity/balance issue inherit here.

[El Capitan]

the support % still counts other thna that theres not much more that can be done. for vehicle squads of low points, it only really applies to orks and they have special rules for making squads from the support section. other ar,ies light veicles come in the squads section so they themselves can be the unit that enables the support choice to allow for all mounted armies.

[tturen]

"the support % still counts other thna that theres not much more that can be done."

Why not use a points requirement instead of a squad requirement? Woudn't that be more balanced? Say you have to take 150 points of basic troops to even bring in a vehicle?

[El Capitan]

it would need to be a little different for each army though, a 150 point mob of orks would be quite big but the eldar could lash out a 150 point aspect squad by default.
though i agree something needs to be done to stop minimal squads appearing for vehicles. In a sense the slots rule is from the IG book but with a little more versatility, the fixed squad numbers though make fine their, its the other amries that are the problem. maybe 5 man squad minimum for marine, aspect and chaos armies, and 10 squad minimum for eldar guardians and orks etc

[James 40K Champ ***]

I personaly dont think there has been a problem with this?
People always seem to have a decent amount of squads as far as I have seen.

Cant we just just impose a penalty for using too many vehicles, like throwing sticks at them?

[tturen]

I like the slots rule myself simply because it encouarges the use of basic troops. A point based slot could be rather flexible with a race like Orks taking more than one squad to slot a vehicle while a marine force could slot two with one squad.

Its nice to hear you don't have problems right now but I know for certain we would without a point based slot. Our guys tend to ladel the cheese into the army list...

[James 40K Champ ***]

We do use % based vaules aswell..

i.e. you can spend

25% MIN on squads
25% MAX characters (i think thats what we use, thou often people spend much less)
50% MAX support

thats ontop of slots, which generaly restricts everything considerably

Find the Army restrictions at:
ogc.org.uk/Pages/Rules/40k.htm (and click on the top pdf)

[tturen]

Not bad at all. Our guys though don't tend to like restrictions and tend to play with original allotments. I would like to see a basic infantry requirement though.

[James 40K Champ ***]

We dont see our games as ristricted at all.. people having plenty of infantry provides a really fun and tactical game.. taking a beefed up character, or too much armour would probably lose it anyway against mass troops!

I dont understand the ethos of people pushing the limits of characters etc.. its not what 40k is about.

[Adoni-Zedek]

I don't know what you guys will think of this, but in my group, we give troops a 25% discount. This tends to make the big tough characters cost about as much as a squad by themselves, and I've seen a steady decrease in the number of characters and vehicles in our games. They're still there, of course, but you no longer have 3-4 characters taking over half the board by themselves

[James 40K Champ ***]

hmm interesting, not sure how that would work out, sounds interesting.

But I think there would be unbalances all over the place, for instance some armys have useless infantry (ie imperial guard) and others like mariens and necrons, have elite basic troops, they would be sorted.

Another problem is that it would compeltly change how many VPs squads are worth, and that has been carfully built into their points costs.

[Adoni-Zedek]

It reduces the points of all troops equally, so the 'useless' Imperial guardsman costs 7.5 points, and the marine costs 22.5, still three times as much. The relations between opposing squads are unchanged.

As far as victory points are concerned, it really just makes characters more tempting targets, further reducing people's desire to field large numbers of them.

Incidentally, elite troops like Terminators and Ogryns don't get the discount.

It does change the dynamic and value of basic units, but we haven't seen any problems with it. Granted, we don't have any IG in our group (yet, but we've got two more guys coming is soon), but I haven't encountered any problems with an ork army vs marines.

If you decide to try it out, be sure to let me know what you think.

[James 40K Champ ***]

Oh yeah of course, percentages.. silly me.

Well that seems fine.. but still, larger groups of troops will be worth less victory points than they should, which makes them much more efficient.

If it works for you, at least its better than character heavy armys, but we are happy with the points as they are and a couple of ristrictions.

One exapmle I can think of, is a guard squad is worth 3 VPs (i think), and if they were cheaper would be worth only 2.. a HUGE difference accross the army.

[tturen]

A 25% reduction for troops? An interesting thought that would get the job done I suppose. Our group might even go for that or at least give it a try simply because its not a 'restriction' to an army list. In terms of cost/effectiveness basic troops are I think over priced anyway compared to say vehicles and heavy weapons squads.

Characters though are another matter. I know I have always enjoyed killing tooled up characters.

I think James has a good point on victory points. Altering the troop values would impact this but then thats just an incentive to take more basic troops! Heck an IG squad could then throw a heavy bolter and a special weapon into the squad and still squeak in under a 100pts.

[Charly]

i think the points cost of troops is fine as it is written and perfectly balanced in with the cost of vehicles or beardy characters, dont really see any need to reduce the cost of core troops.

another question regarding support slots, if i were to have a support weapon battery of 2 weapons, costing 100 pts, how many support slots would this take up as far as mainstay troop choices goes?