GCE Core Rules feedback and suggestions

[Ben_S]

So, you roll a d6 for damage (4, let's say) and then roll four separate times for location?

It might make more sense to hit one location four times, rather than (potentially) four different locations.

 

[Gornn65]

Actually, this brings me to my next question, then, so I understand the intention:

So I am crystal clear on the order of things:

Eavy Shoota

1. Rolls 2 Sustained fire dice
2. rolls to hit for each shot, (has a higher chance to jam and make ammo rolls)
3. Rolls for the location for each successful hit
4. Rolls to penetrate each hit.
5. deals 1 damage for each shot.

Rokkit

1. Rolls once to hit
2. Rolls Damage (lets say it gets a 5)
3. Rolls 5x for hit locations
4. Rolls to penetrate each hit location (again 5 times, let's say 2 were successful: Wheels and Gubbinz)
5. Rolls for the results on the wheels and gubbinz chart.

 

[Gornn65]

The thing to take into account here is Ammo rolls are taken more on the Eavy Shoota

And if you roll once to penetrate once, vs multiple times. Simply because the XP rewards are different.
It could be 5xp or 30xp for a rokkit that hits.

 

[Ben_S]

Actually, this does seem a bit weird.

Normally, you'd only roll d6 damage after successfully wounding. But that won't work for vehicles, because different locations may have different armour. So, damage would have to be before penetration. But that means one hit with d6 damage is treated the same as something that does d6 hits, each doing 1 damage.

I think that's another reason why the change I suggested earlier might be better. It would distinguish them, because the former would multi-hit one location, whereas the latter would hit several locations.

 

[Gornn65]

Here's how I look at it. Cost of the Weapon vs Damage vs amount of xp gained.

Eavy Shoota is the gold standard. It's 15 teef, grants a lot of XP and does good damage.
The Rokkit is 13 teef, grants much less XP but does incredible damage (especially with damage rolls applied)

If you roll damage before penetration, you can gain more XP. (5xp per penetrating shot). However, this increases the odds of a single shot granting 30xp - Also possible with an Eavy Shoota (although much slimmer odds and higher chance for a Jam from a more expensive weapon)

If you roll damage after penetration, you only gain 5xp even if you roll a 6 for damage and get 6 damage results within that location.
Higher chance of disabling a vehicle, but lower XP.
Disabling a vehicle is great and very rewarding in it's own way, but doesn't give me extra XP

I kind of like the idea of rolling damage before you roll locations to gain the extra XP, but also have a chance to reduce some of the effectiveness of a Rokkit launcher by having to roll more penetration rolls. This feels the most fair when taking into account the cost, xp and damage.

Thats just my opinion tho.

 

[Flamekebab]

Putting aside the experience points side of things, which is a valid discussion that needs to be had but will muddy the waters, I see the choice as something like this:

• Rokkit launcher - armour penetrating, single shot. Good for vehicles and single infantry targets.
• Harpoon Gun - Gambler's anti-armour, single shot. Good for infantry, good against vehicles if you're lucky.
• 'Eavy Shoota - medium armour penetration, multi-shot. Best all-rounder.
• Spear Gun - anti-infantry, cheap.
• Scorcha - anti-infantry, chaotic, unreliable.

A rokkit launcher that's not all that good against vehicles seems like it's rather pointless. It has a 6+ ammo roll too, so can't be relied on throughout a game.
Hitting multiple locations is more of an abstraction working within the mechanics of the game. If one rolls on a single location for two hits, that location is usually toast. Rolling D6 basically guarantees it.

That may be a better outcome, I don't know. Discuss!

 

[Gornn65]

So how did you play Flame?

When I read GCE, because rolling damage is mentioned in the Determine Location section, it reads to me like that's when you should be rolling the damage of the Rokkit. and then determining the location for each point of damage.

(please correct me if I'm wrong or you played it differently)

 

[Ben_S]

If one rolls on a single location for two hits, that location is usually toast. Rolling D6 basically guarantees it.

Do the multiple hits occur simultaneously or sequentially? I'd suggest the latter. So, if you've already destroyed Gubbinz (for instance) then you can still go on and hit the Engine. But it's massive damage in one place, unlike peppering the vehicle with multiple separate hits.

 

[Flamekebab]

I play it as follows, if memory serves:

1. Roll to hit
2. Roll to determine how many points of Damage the hit does (let's assume 3)
3. Determine 3 locations
4. In ascending location number, resolve hit completely.
5. If a location has already been destroyed/isn't available anymore, that hit doesn't need to be resolved. The hit doesn't go anywhere further.

There's been a lot of water under the bridge since we wrote this bit of GCE. Well, not water, probably bourbon. I've no guesses as to what I meant by bridge.

This section feels a bit messy though so let's get it tightened up.

 

[Gornn65]

On a sidenote: From a gameplay perspective, I think you guys were really smart to make the Eavy Shoota -2 at long instead of -1.
I think the Eavy Shoota is balanced the way it is for the cost.


I have a few ideas for the Rokkit:

Make the Damage D3 or D3+1, have it apply after penetration, leave the rest as is.

OR

Play it as you intended. D6 damage before penetration is rolled, then you can gain more xp per penetration, similar to the Eavy Shoota.
The multiple locations is a bit more abstract, but the Rokkit also explodes, so it makes sense that multiple locations are damaged .

I kind of like the idea of rolling damage before penetration, it balances similarly to the Eavy Shoota in that way, but has more risk of missing the entire shot with just one roll to hit. As opposed tothe SFD of an Eavy Shoota, where you'll get 3 -4 shots on average.

OR

Keep the original intent, 1 damage vs a vehicle / d6 vs a warrior, reduce the cost down to 10

 

[Wurrkop]

Did a couple of searches but didnt come up with an answer.

When Running, a Warrior loses their chance to shoot this turn.

And

Reloading: Each time a Six-Shoota is fired a shooting phase must be spent reloading it (if the Warrior wishes to fire again during the battle).

A ganger that runs obviously cant shoot, but does that also mean they are also unable to reload?

Losing the chance to shoot this turn does not necessarily mean they are not spending their shooting phase doing something, it isnt obvious to me if reloading is an action that can ONLY be done when shooting otherwise COULD or if its just a shooting phase that needs to pass without shooting being done for a reload to happen.

 

[Flamekebab]

Did a couple of searches but didnt come up with an answer.


And


A ganger that runs obviously cant shoot, but does that also mean they are also unable to reload?

Losing the chance to shoot this turn does not necessarily mean they are not spending their shooting phase doing something, it isnt obvious to me if reloading is an action that can ONLY be done when shooting otherwise COULD or if its just a shooting phase that needs to pass without shooting being done for a reload to happen.

A Warrior that runs isn't eligible to do anything during the Shooting Phase. Therefore they cannot reload during that Shooting Phase.

 

[Bester]

Hello everyone, Bester here, the GCE editor.

I've been musing over the effects of unlocking damage for vehicles and I have seen the confusion this has caused above. I do have a solution though...

TL;DR: you add the Damage roll to the your result on the Damage Table.

Example: A Rokkit Launcher successfully hits an enemy Trukk, the location is Engine and the shot successfully Penetrates.
The next step would be to roll on the Engine's Damage Table, let's say you roll a 1, which would normally result in Thruster Jam.

However, Rokkits come with D6 Damage and it is at this point you will roll the dice and add it to your score, let's say you roll a 3.

The combined total is now 4 - Outright strut snapped off - The vehicle is immobilised.

This serves a few purposes: (1) it addresses the multiple use of the term Damage in the rules which is applied slightly differently between Warriors and Vehicles. I believe it is a natural fit for players to associate Damage with one of the last steps in the process, whether it is for a Warrior or a Vehicle, (2) it guarantees a result of 2 or higher on the vehicle damage tables with such weapons, and (3) despite this guarantee the Damage roll still has an element of randomness and so it will not always be reliable at generating a high damage results.

Note: results higher than 6 have no additional effect.

 

[Torealis]

Hello everyone, Bester here, the GCE editor.

I've been musing over the effects of unlocking damage for vehicles and I have seen the confusion this has caused above. I do have a solution though...

TL;DR: you add the Damage roll to the your result on the Damage Table.

Example: A Rokkit Launcher successfully hits an enemy Trukk, the location is Engine and the shot successfully Penetrates.
The next step would be to roll on the Engine's Damage Table, let's say you roll a 1, which would normally result in Thruster Jam.

However, Rokkits come with D6 Damage and it is at this point you will roll the dice and add it to your score, let's say you roll a 3.

The combined total is now 4 - Outright strut snapped off - The vehicle is immobilised.

This serves a few purposes: (1) it addresses the multiple use of the term Damage in the rules which is applied slightly differently between Warriors and Vehicles. I believe it is a natural fit for players to associate Damage with one of the last steps in the process, whether it is for a Warrior or a Vehicle, (2) it guarantees a result of 2 or higher on the vehicle damage tables with such weapons, and (3) despite this guarantee the Damage roll still has an element of randomness and so it will not always be reliable at generating a high damage results.

Note: results higher than 6 have no additional effect.

This is a very elegant fix! Well done.

 

[Ben_S]

While that proposal does indeed have some merits, I have to say I'm not particularly keen on it.

Turning what's ordinarily a d6 table into (in this case) a 2d6 table massively skews things. Yes, perhaps we want Rokkits to do a lot of damage - but not necessarily to that degree. (I assume the d6 roll for their damage is supposed to indicate unreliability...)

Further, there's a bit of an anomaly, assuming this addition only applies to variable damage. A d6 roll of 1 for damage ends up being better than a fixed damage 1. (And, indeed, if there were weapons that did a fixed 2 damage, it would be better than that too!)

The latter point could be resolved if all weapons added their damage value (variable or fixed) to the roll. Though, if everything became at least d6+1, this would again skew results. So, perhaps it should be d6 + damage - 1, but at this point things are getting a bit clunky...

Here's another proposal (pretty much off the top of my head):

You roll d6 on the damage table (like normal) then apply either that result or your damage value, whichever is higher. For a weapon with damage = 1, nothing changes (the result is simply the d6 roll). But for Rokkits, it essentially means roll two separate d6 and apply for the higher result. That still makes them more dangerous, but not to the extent that 2d6 (combined) would.

 

[Torealis]

While that proposal does indeed have some merits, I have to say I'm not particularly keen on it.

Turning what's ordinarily a d6 table into (in this case) a 2d6 table massively skews things. Yes, perhaps we want Rokkits to do a lot of damage - but not necessarily to that degree. (I assume the d6 roll for their damage is supposed to indicate unreliability...)

Further, there's a bit of an anomaly, assuming this addition only applies to variable damage. A d6 roll of 1 for damage ends up being better than a fixed damage 1. (And, indeed, if there were weapons that did a fixed 2 damage, it would be better than that too!)

The latter point could be resolved if all weapons added their damage value (variable or fixed) to the roll. Though, if everything became at least d6+1, this would again skew results. So, perhaps it should be d6 + damage - 1, but at this point things are getting a bit clunky...

Here's another proposal (pretty much off the top of my head):

You roll d6 on the damage table (like normal) then apply either that result or your damage value, whichever is higher. For a weapon with damage = 1, nothing changes (the result is simply the d6 roll). But for Rokkits, it essentially means roll two separate d6 and apply for the higher result. That still makes them more dangerous, but not to the extent that 2d6 (combined) would.

Not sure if you misread besters idea or not but he's saying you add that variable damage roll to the roll you ordinarily make on a vehicle damage chart. The chart doesn't change, your chances of doing a more harmful result though, increases dramatically.

So ordinarily you hit and penetrate and roll a 2, say. Bester is proposing that if this hit was with a rokkit, you would roll it's damage dice and add that to this result, say you roll a 3, the result on the damage chart becomes a 5

 

[Ben_S]

Yeah, I understood Bester's proposal. Maybe my comment wasn't clear enough though.

It would still be a table with six results (1-6) but, in the case of Rokkits, you'd effectively be rolling 2d6 on that table (the normal d6 plus the extra d6 for damage), giving results 2, 3, 4, 5, or 6+. And it would be 6+ most of the time.* That's why I thought it excessively skewed to high results.

*If my maths is correct, 26/36, which is more than 2/3rds of the time.

 

[Wurrkop]

You roll d6 on the damage table (like normal) then apply either that result or your damage value, whichever is higher. For a weapon with damage = 1, nothing changes (the result is simply the d6 roll). But for Rokkits, it essentially means roll two separate d6 and apply for the higher result. That still makes them more dangerous, but not to the extent that 2d6 (combined) would.

That sounds like a reasonable balance point to me, more reliable damage output for multi damage weapons like rokkits or the harpoon gun without blowing past the top of the damage table but:
I dont have the full list of other weapons in my head, are there weapons with damage stats variations for which this would not fit neatly into the pattern of a straight additional roll and picking the highest?


And questions from me regarding rules:

Movement:
Obviously models can not end their movement on top of other models.
(excluding boarding vehicles but thats a separate action outside of this question)
I expect that enemies are impassable and have to be navigated around.
But what about friendlies?
Do gangers go "'Scuze me, mate.", and the stationary friendly ganger lets them pass, as long as their movement is enough that their bases clear each other.
Or are friendlies also impassable?


Saves:
Hits from shoot, melee and damage inflicted via rolls on the vehicle hit location tables allow for saving throws.
Hits from being squashed say nothing about armour so i guess they are regular hits and should thereby allow for saves?
Its stated that fall damage can not be saved against, even by flak armour if falling off a vehicle.
Are there other damage sources that allow for saves to be used?
Are there other damage sources that can not be saved against?

 

[Ben_S]

That sounds like a reasonable balance point to me, more reliable damage output for multi damage weapons like rokkits or the harpoon gun without blowing past the top of the damage table but:
I dont have the full list of other weapons in my head, are there weapons with damage stats variations for which this would not fit?
Like d3+1 or such?

I don't know of any such damage values, but also don't see why it wouldn't work even if there are.
You roll your normal d6. Let's say a 2. And you also roll the damage (d3 + 1). Let's say a (2 + 1 =) 3. Apply the highest - in this case, the 3.
Similarly, it would also work if there's a weapon with fixed damage = 2. In that case, you basically have a d6 but with a roll of 1 counted as 2 anyway.

 

[Torealis]

Gotcha! Solid solution for sure