Captains and Chaplains

[James 40K Champ ***]

Whats the exact differences between the two?

points? stats? abilites?

and why doesnt this make sence?

And if im having a white scars army my command is usless anyway? no? Cos ill have very few foot troops to need commanding.

[Adoni-Zedek]

As far as I know, Chaplains allow you to reroll failed leadership tests with 8", and come with a rosarius. Captains lend their Ld to units within 12" and provide a strategy rating (5 or occasionally 6 for a few special characters). So unless you provide rules allowing other models to be the army commander, the captain is required to lead.

It does sound like a fully-mounted White Scars army would have little use for chaplains. That has grave implications for opponents that rely heavily on fear and terror tests, like Tyranids and Dark Eldar (and perhaps Slannesh armies with mounted daemonettes)

Grey Knights are another army that doesn't need chaplains. Why pay for a reroll when you automatically pass all your Ld tests?

[James 40K Champ ***]

Oh cool thanks, captains are still better than chaplains then.

So without a captain SM's are strat 4?! I dont think weve been using that?! but it sounds right

[Adoni-Zedek]

Under straight 2nd Ed rules, a Space Marine force is not usable without a Captain. I personally favor the idea of letting a 'non-command' character (chaplain/librarian, exarch, BigBoss, perhaps even a Tyranid warrior squad) lead at a reduced Strat rating, but no rules for it currently exist.

[James 40K Champ ***]

Well we have been allowing any character to lead the army..

so if we continue to do so, I sugest a -1 to strat rating for anything other than the army's principal command character.

[El Capitan]

We allow any charctatrer to lean an army, thjough no strategy reductions are in place.

Allowing Chaplains to lead the army therefore renders the captain useless (just compare!), so curently we have impliocated a rule whereby the chaplain can only use his crozius arcanum in close combat (fits in better with story anyway). Other ideas (and these are from players who use 1-2 chaplains a game) are to eliminate the highest level chaplain choice (im against this) and to take away their wargear allowance

[Charly]

i think changing the rules or stats for chaplains isnt the rite way to go about it, the strategy change is a better idea in my opinion. the problem came wen we stopped having to take captains for space marines, which was a good move, because a company only has one captain its not likely that he would be in command of every single skirmish force. so i think captains strat rating 5, mighty hero chaplains lv4, hero chaplains lv 3 , and so on.

[bot]

if you agree to play without captains, seers, bigbosses etc. army commanders in other words (which is ok imo) you loose the abilty 'army commander' which is 12" reroll using commander's ld.
so it's okay to choose a mekaniak to lead your force, but you gain no 'army commander' abilty.

chaplain is great in point cost (rosarius, crosius) but captin (army commander) has that extra ability mentioned above.

[Charly]

but a captain has an 8" re-roll of leadership which isnt a bad compromise, im mainly talking about the chaplain hero at 84pts, who really needs no extra equipment.

[Simon]

The strategy rating doesn't necessarily rely entirely on the commander. It mostly depends on the force itself; its mobility, global tactics etc. Reducing the strategy rating isn't a good solution to it. Here is a direct comparison between a Mighty Chaplain and a Captain:

Chaplain comes with a 4+ unmodified save, a captain does not.
Chaplain comes with a decent close combat weapon, the captain does not.
The Captain has the choice of 3 wargear cards, the Chaplain can only have 2
The Captain and Chaplain have a rule that effect leadership (comparatively, these are pretty similar in advantages)
Both can choose from the equipment sections.
The captain is 29 points less expensive than the Chaplain.

If they were kitted out with similar equipment then the captain would be approximately 9 points cheaper, and the Captain actually has greater versatility when you choose him.

As far as I was aware, we did away with the reduced strategy rating anyway for a non commander leading a force.

[tturen]

The 2nd Ed rules set is designed to reflect both the nature of the army and the ability of the commander. The first is based on the army strategy rating for deployment. The second is based on commanders strategy rating for gaining first turn. Only commanders have such a rating. If a non-command character is used it makes perfect sense to reduce the command rating as the replacement character does not have actual overall command responsibilities (In fact they have no such rating in the rules.) as part of his regular duties. They simply are not going to have the training or experience of the regular commander.

The original dual leader/army command ratings do an excellent job of reflecting the effects of critical elements of army training and leadership both critical battlefield force multipliers. Together they are an excellent feature in the game system.

[Charly]

so what are the options then? i wouldnt be in favour of limiting the chaplains ability, altho increasing the captains abilities may be an option. we could bring back the compulsary captain rule, this makes the rules fit, but i feel its a little unrealistic - the captain cant be everywhere. chaplains are trained leaders also, they wouldnt have the leader ship re-roll otherwise, but maybe only space marines within 12" of a captain can use his leadership, ie any other character playing the role of army commander shouldnt lend his leadership to marines around him. but again i think a chaplain would be a leader figure so that doesnt seem to fit quite rite. what do ppl think the best solution is? or shud we just ignore it.

[James 40K Champ ***]

Thanks for the comparison simon, thats what I wanted to be able to look at the situation propperly.

[James 40K Champ ***]

Personally I think we should go for the reduced strat rating accross all armys..

Mariens should only get 5 if they take a Captain, any other character below the highest level should be allowed to lead the army at -1 strat.. I think that would make the comparison of captains and chaplains fine.

There should be some kind of punishment for taking a chaplain over a captain...

[James 40K Champ ***]

Because of the way we have limited characters, they are much less influential in games.. which has led to people using cheaper characters with less equipment to lead their forces.

All fair enough, but I think more expensive characters should still have a more important command role making it worth taking them. Giving them a strat rating advantage is a good way to strengthen the need supireor characters.

[tturen]

Chaplains inspire those around to go above and beyond for the emperor/God. Its why they get a re-roll. It's not the same type of leadership expressed by say a Wolf Lord whos strategic cunning (leadership) assists his army in gaining the innitiative. So I agree the General should recieve the basic Strat rating he is granted. Other leaders should recieve a -1.

[James 40K Champ ***]

Fits in story wise that all army commanders of higher stature would be slightly more adept at positioning their troops.

But other than that it fits very nicely game wise in making army commanders slightly better (as they should be) against things like Chaplains.

[Charly]

yeah if youre desperate to get the first turn or need that extra edge then taking a captain helps with that.

[El Capitan]

-1 strat to non-command would come in across the board + its much better than the reduced LD range [which just punishes some armies far more than others]. It wont be in palce tis Tournament but I guess we can begin testing afterwards

[Charly]

so is there gonna be no change to chaplains this tournament now?