Gangs Vs. Kill Teams

[Insurgent]

This is a thread devoted to Necromunda gangs fighting Shadow War kill teams. Lay out your best tactical theories and real game experiences. It is totally possible for Necromunda gangs to fight SWA kill teams and have a competitive chance at holding their own.

My first tactical suggestion to get us started off is for gangs fighting Space Marine Scouts and Grey knights to use Man Stopper shot gun shells. With a -2 armor save modifier and a cost of 5 credits they have a chance to even the odds against heavily armored opponents.

 

[knowman]

Are Manstopper shells St4/-2 in Shadow War? Heck of an upgrade from Necromunda.

 

[Insurgent]

Are Manstopper shells St4/-2 in Shadow War? Heck of an upgrade from Necromunda.

That is their stats in ORB

 

[knowman]

Fair enough, my mistake for not thinking of ORB stats. In NCE they're ST4 with Knockback but no armor save modifier. I didn't realize there was such a significant difference between ORB and NCE on shotguns.

I wonder why shotguns are so much cheaper than lasguns, then, especially if ammo rolls are now on two dice, as I'm given to understand. Maybe there's an answer in the ORB...

 

[Insurgent]

There has been a lot of tinkering in the weapon stats with NCE. It's a community build so there is input from all directions. I always found people have a tendency to tinker with equipment inventories. Problem is this can have unforeseen market consequences.

It looks like Shadow War Armageddon is using clone ORB rules. That means it will be possible to link SWA with ORB: Necromunda. It could mean we that an all out war breaks out with 40K players entering the hobby. To which I say, "BRING IT ON". But I sense there is hesitation among the veteran community. They have invested a lot while this community held on. They must go now and teach the secrets of skirmish wargaming to the legions. The gangs can fight but now they must war. The Necromunda community can play with SWA players and still use the campaign rules that suit gangs.

We treat Promethium Caches as Isotopic Fuel Rods and suddenly we watch the credits roll in. A lot more income would allow a gang to get really deadly really quickly. Gangs might even start investing in light vehicles and defensive fortifications?

 

[knowman]

Yes, looking at the ORB stats I was surprised to see lasguns gave a -1 to armor saves. Time to break out the old rulebook.

Do you, or does anyone, have a suggestion for which type of Kill Team to use the stats for if you want to play a Necromunda Gang? The IG seemed like the obvious choice, with either Chaos Cultists or Genestealer Cult as alternatives if one has a couple of CSM/GSC figs around, which I do.

 

[Insurgent]

That's the thing, use any gang you want out of the ORB. Everything about it will work on the SWA tabletop. The in game rules match ORB. Just play you gang like you are playing a game of Necromunda, except you're fighting a kill team.

That -1 armor on the ORB Lasgun was useless in gang warfare but had broader gaming implications for the greater 40K universe.

 

[Kaludram]

So, has anyone given this a shot yet?

 

[Insurgent]

I played my first game of Gang Vs. Kill Team yesterday and it went great. I will be making a battle report later. I was playing a Goliath Gang (to prove a point) and I fought two gang fights against Ork and Harlequin kill teams. I lost both gang fights, but it was still really competitive game play. I am convinced this is going to work out.

 

[rippounet]

Just played my first game(s) of gang vs. kill team as well.
We played the promethium caches as isotropic fuel rods, but I'm not entirely sure how to play them once all the gang's territories that could be turned into colonies have been. Also, I'm not sure whether rods that are used in such a way should be counted toward the 15 maximum limit or not for the purpose of winning the campaign... Gangs don't get much income compared to kill teams so both possibilities have merit.

Other than that I think it works very well (to my surprise). The Necromunda gang kept the possibility of getting advances for all its members, which means it evolves better and that kids are a real advantage. We also gave it five territories as normal, but with the income being washed through the table, which means it doesn't get as much ressources as kill teams (around 55 per game). We also kept the possibility of getting rare items for the gang.
All in all it seems fairly balanced though we'd have to see how it'd work in the long run.

I haven't seen any major issues. Gangs start weaker than kill teams overall, but they have more possibilities. We also decided that gangs have no upper limit for the number of members.

 

[Insurgent]

Glad to see a similar positive experience with Gangs Vs. Kill Teams.

Piling up fuel rods can seem kind of weird. At a certain point you can start saving them as victory tokens in the hope of being the victor of the campaign. In theory if you win a "Gang Fight" or an "Ambush" scenario with 3 to 1 down or out you will win a territory. I just consider this the obligatory hideout territory that even Spyres had. I would roll it on the Outlaw territory chart. You can also score territories with a Ratskin Scout. The choice is always yours if you want to turn them into a settlement.

 

[Dreggrod Da Traitor]

I will be experimenting with merging the Necromunda ORB and Shadow War: Armageddon rule sets, or at the very least, making them somewhat compatible. Me and a friend of mine will be doing some play testing of different gangs, including some more obscure stuff like Vampires. I'll definitely post some photos, though beware, there will be proxies and plastic.

 

[Insurgent]

This is kind of a dated thread but here are the rules I eventually decided on. It feels solid and plays well for me but I can't get a consensus on it around here. I don't think people like merging SWA and Necromunda into one catch all campaign setting.
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Original Rule Book (ORB) or Living Rule Book (LRB) Necromunda fits easily into Shadow War Armageddon (SWA) tabletop combat. Though the two games have different campaign rules they can operate parallel to each other. Let the Kill Teams of SWA play their military campaign system and let the gangs of the hive city conduct "business as usual" by playing the traditional Necromunda campaign system.

When Gangs fight Kill Teams there are a few simple rules to remember.

BUSINESS AS USUAL IN THE HIVE: Easy rules for Gangs in SWA
#1. If a Necromunda Gang fights a Kill Team then you roll the scenario on the SWA scenario table and follow those scenario rules.
#2. Ratskin Scouts and Ratskin Maps still provide local knowledge and can still modify the SWA scenario table.
#3. Any promethium caches awarded for playing a SWA scenario are still awarded to a Necromunda Gang.
#4. Promethium caches double as Isotopic Fuel Rods for gangs and can be used to turn any territory into a settlement, stashed, or sold at half cost for 25 credits.
#5. If a gang loses 3 to 1 casualties in a Kill Team Fight or an Ambush the gang must forfeit a settlement or its most valuable territory to the Kill Team, the Kill Team loots the territory for an additional prometheum cache.
#6. Gangs roll on their own injury chart, use their own experience progression, use their own skill tables, and collect income from territories. Gangs disregard Underdog and Giant Killer Bonus when fighting Kill Teams.
#7. Any forces of the Imperium can report gangs and make them roll on the Outlaw chart with the -3 for fighting forces of the Imperium.
#8. Necromunda gangs can also fight other Necromunda gangs in a campaign involving SWA Kill Teams. Gangs use all the standard rules for gangs fighting gangs. They roll on the Necromunda or Outlaw scenario chart as normal. No promethium caches are awarded when gangs fight gangs.
#9. Gangs use Necromunda ammo rolls to represent their poorly maintained equipment. Use SWA sustained fire rules.
#10. THE GENERAL RULE, if you are playing a gang use the Necromunda rule for it.

Some of these rules bring balance, fluff, and incentive for Gangs and Kill Teams to fight each other. Please consider using them as a whole as they provide balanced advantages and disadvantages.
-Insurgent

 

[Aulenback]

It would also be quite possible to swing these rules in the other direction, bringing SW:A strike teams into the deep Underhive. Since all of this is decidedly "black ops" work on a possibly alien [if not Imperium kill teams] planet, treat any SW:A kill team as outlanders. They are deep beyond their supply lines, and attrition will be their biggest trouble - getting reinforcements and gear all the way to their base of operations.

1. SW:A teams are Outlanders: as such outlawed and can never buy off their guild price.
2. SW:A teams have a single base of operations which they can work, or can loot-and-move-on as any other Outlaw gang. They will need to scavenge, and fight starvation as any other outlaw gang.
3. SW:A teams use the Outlaws trade chart. If they save up enough to hire their incoming team member gets equipped from their list as normal.
4. "New recruits" start at 0 xp, "Troopers" at 20 xp, specialists at 60 xp, etc, parallel to House Gangs. Advances as per xp gained, rather than per number of scenarios.
5. Special Operatives are gang-specific Hired Guns, at the usual Hired Gun cost. Special Operatives which grant a prometheum cache reward have a 25 credit guild bounty.
6. SW:A gangs use the "guerrilla" skill tree and not the "tech" skill tree.

Yes, this does mean that Inquisitors, Space Marine Scout strike teams, and even Imperial Guard strike teams would have a guild price -- but they are far from the Upper Hive and any orderly supply and command chain, operating in a deep insertion mission. They can do it. Surely, they are not less able to survive in a Hive than some putrid xenos ork, are they? Thought not. Good.

 

[Insurgent]

I guess I'm not asking the SW:A end of things to not really change at all.

As far as considering a SW:A an Outlaw gang, I don't really feel like it would shake out that way. SW:A warbands really represent core troops of every faction that are forced to be the workhorses of an advanced insurgency. They are not completely autonomous like Necromunda gangs or Inquisimunda warbands. All of the SW:A warbands are in some way part of a larger military hierarchy in which 90% of their core infantry troops (Except Dark Eldar) are represented by the SW:A squad list. In this way the SW:A warbands have a regular supply of rations, recruits, and equipment (100 points per game cycle) that fuels operations. Promethean cache are paramount because in the industrial hive landscape the cache double as "Isotopic Fuel Rods" and actually power the systems that make the hive productive, habitable, and navigable. Controle of caches actually translates into controle of the industrial geography of the hive city and are a valid military objective. SW:A warbands are part of a larger military front that may be occurring across a whole hive or may be the probings of a larger military strategy that is occurring across the industrial areas of the whole galaxy.

The final take is that these are military units and operate differently that outlaws, gangs, and autonomous warbands.

 

[Aulenback]

As far as considering a SW:A an Outlaw gang, I don't really feel like it would shake out that way. SW:A warbands really represent core troops of every faction that are forced to be the workhorses of an advanced insurgency. They are not completely autonomous like Necromunda gangs or Inquisimunda warbands. All of the SW:A warbands are in some way part of a larger military hierarchy in which 90% of their core infantry troops (Except Dark Eldar) are represented by the SW:A squad list. In this way the SW:A warbands have a regular supply of rations, recruits, and equipment (100 points per game cycle) that fuels operations. Promethean cache are paramount

All of that is true in the Armageddon setting of SW:A, but would not necessarily be true elsewhere. Many, even most of the factions suggest "high risk, behind enemy lines" operatives for high risk, behind-enemy-lines operations. Space marine scouts, Imperial Army strike teams, ork kommando teams, Inquisition parties, dark eldar raiding parties, Chaos cultists, and so on, are not necessarily front-line, rank-and-file troops.

SW:A units can be part of a large military front and part of a front line offensive, but the units they have chosen are also the units, on the whole, that would be chosen to be part of a sneaky commando operation deep behind occupied lines, with limited access to the supply chain.

The difference isn't in the units, but in whether they are allowed access to the supply chain.

In the SW:A campaign system, they definitely are.

As NM/GM Outlanders, the same units definitely are not.

The choice of which setting to use is, as ever, ours, as the people playing a campaign.

 

[Insurgent]

I feel like one of the hardest parts to translate when you are putting forward various factions all mixing it up is "who is on whos side?" It pretty obvious that the factions in SW:A aren't autonomous and are connected to a larger hierarchy but what kind of military situation would you encounter where SEVERAL different military factions were all equally combatting each other? I guess some would be "states of nature" (Orks, Guard, Gangs, PDF, Arbites) but by in large how would multiple galactic military factions all be fighting against each other at once? This doesn't make sense in any kind of game theory.

The best way I have learned to justify it is that most of the Warbands in a campaign are autonomous like Gangs, Void Pirates Rogue Traders, Ork Spawnings, that represent the "state of nature" in any hive. But then you could sprinkle in maybe three SW:A Kill Teams to represent a larger military conflict that was occuring while "Business As Usual" is happening in the hive. In this limited context Kill Teams make sence and break the mold of autonomous warbands. But too large a variety of Kill Teams, and you really start to wonder why all these guys are fighting over the hive when one faction could simply sit back while two or more other factions slaughter each other?

The cheep excuse to this is that hives are general galaxy wide settings that are constantly in a state of massive anarchy unlike anything we have even witnessed on earth. In that way multiple galaxy wide factions are constantly in the countless hives of the galaxy with objectives too complex and diverse to even speculate upon. "We're just here to fight each other," says the lazy gamer...

 

[Fullork]

So shadow war is based on orb? I was contemplating mixing it with gorkomorka.

 

[Insurgent]

So shadow war is based on orb? I was contemplating mixing it with gorkomorka.

I would use the old Ash Wastes rules if you can. Blood Donor's vehicle rules are still the best.

Necromunda - Streamlined Necromunda Vehicle Rules

Blood Donor submitted a new resource: Streamlined Necromunda Vehicle Rules - Fast and simple rules for turning Ash Wastes or Underhive gaming into vehicular madness. Streamlined Necromunda Vehicle Rules offer easy to follow rules for designing and using vehicles in either the more vast...

yaktribe.games

 

[Aulenback]

So, has anyone given this a shot yet?

Oh, belatedly, we did play a short campaign before folks moved houses of SWA orks versus ORB pit slaves and ORB Ratskins. Worked fine. The campaign rules we used were ORB rather than SWA's very abbreviated campaign, but the setup seemed as balanced as much as ever is.

What I would like to see is a short campaign of SWA orks versus GorkaMorka orks versus ORB Munda orks. That might be the best way to show any confusions due specifically to lists and equipment. [1o credits equals 10 points equals 1 teef]