If you could make a Chaos ship legal, which one(s) would it be?

[horizon]

Havoc = an escort class from the Rogue Trader RPG book. Something like a Cobra without torps.

[Masque]

I noticed that all the documents got a stealth update from X.2 to X.3 and such and I was wondering what the differences were?  I didn't do a complete comparison but in the Powers of Chaos document I don't see any difference.  If there is a X.4 update, please, please, please highlight the sections that are different from X.3 so we can see what has been fixed.

[Sigoroth]

Conqueror: Per rulebook and everyone except Sigoroth the broadsides are correct.

I'm sure I'm not the only person who doesn't play combined decks. And it is not correct as per the rulebook. All you have to do is look at the Dev to see that. One of these is wrong. Therefore right off the bat the Conqueror has a 50% chance of being wrong. When you add in that both the WB + Lance Slaughter and the LB + Lance Dev look cool whereas their alternatives look shit then the odds shift in favour of the Slaughter being the one pictured wrong. Hell, I sure remember everyone at the time this first cropped up saying the Slaughter is the one pictured wrong.

Besides, combined decks add nothing to the game. They're always just 4WB@30cmL+R + 1L@30cmL+R. If you consider that the Slaughter comes about its firepower from 1 WB hardpoint and 1 lance hardpoint then it gives precedent for the WB hardpoint to represent 8WB@30cm (Slaughter), 6WB@45cm (Murder/Carnage) and 4WB@60cm (Carnage). Likewise the lance deck could be 2L@30cm (Slaughter) or 2L@45cm (Dev) with longer ranged, and underpowered, lances being represented by turrets being plugged directly into the hull (Acheron, Desolator). This allows for more combinations than the combi-deck does. The combi-deck is a fixed (and useless) value.

On top of this there is no evidence for the existence of the combi-deck. IN sprues come with a WB, LB and lance deck. The fact that Chaos also come with 3 suggests the same. According to the assembly instructions the Slaughter and Acheron are assembled the same way (though are described and pictured differently). Surely this is a mistake. If the pictures are wrong (Slaughter/Dev disparity), and the assembly instructions are wrong (Slaughter/Acheron disparity), then why the insistence that the Slaughter is the correct one, even though it invents a new weapon hardpoint while invalidating another ship? I believe the Slaughter was pictured that way simply so that you could make a Carnage/Murder + a Dev/Slaughter out of a twin cruiser box. Otherwise whenever you made a Carnage or Murder (or Hades) you'd be forced to make a heavy cruiser or be limited to just Devs. The only time you'd be able to make Slaughters was when making two. As it happens, this restriction isn't a problem, since you always take Slaughters in pairs anyway.

That is the case for the no combi-deck. Now perhaps that doesn't convince you. So you want to play the Slaughter as pictured. Fine. Leave the option open. The Conqueror closes the option. It makes the combi-deck official. I don't want the fuckin retarded combi-deck. So, either swap a lance for 4 WB or swap 4WB for a lance. Then the non-combi-deck players could just swap for the appropriate number of WB or lance decks and the combi-deck players could do the inverse. So if it were 16WB + 2L at 30cm range I could use 2 WB hardpoints and 1 lance hardpoint. Conversely a combi-deck player could construct it as per a Slaughter with +1 WB deck. If it had 8WB + 4L I would use 1 WB deck and 2 lance decks. A combi-deck player would use a Slaughter + some lances plugged into the hull. Option open.

[lastspartacus]

What would the points increase be if the Murder gained the option for L/R/F prow lances?  Would it be balanced out if its gun decks went to 30cm?

[horizon]

Why do you want that?

[Masque]

Nate,

This is all in reference to the 2.4 version of the Powers of Chaos.

The Siren's Summon ability in the Slaanesh fleet seems really powerful.  It's also poorly worded.  It doesn't say exactly when the enemy ships take the test.  It also seems able to prevent bracing for impact and repairing criticals.  If you want to keep it fairly powerful I'd make it prevent ships from ramming, boarding, shooting, or launching ordinance rather than only allowing movement.  This should keep the enemy from taking offensive action but not lead to weird arguments over exactly what else the ship can and cannot do.  Even then I think it'll be too powerful once ships get into melee range.  I'd limit it's effect to only one enemy per turn.  If you want to have it disable multiple enemies at a time i would only have it prevent the ships from going on special orders (other than brace).

Most of the other fleet powers seem reasonable except for maybe the Warp Beasts in the Tzeentch list.  Giving that to a couple ships and using them both at once will pretty much kill any cruiser outright or cripple a battleship all in one go.

I see the Emasculator has been dubbed Inferno.  I remember you mentioning that the Emasculator was chosen because it had gone through plenty of playtesting over the years.  The problem I see here is that the ship you have listed is not the Emasculator I'm familiar with.  The original source was BFG Magazine #1 and I don't ever remember it getting an update.  The new ship looks fine because it's just pulling the Murder variant on a Carnage but it's strange to just sort of give it hand-wave approval because it was tested previously when it's not the ship that was tested (as far as I know).

Why does the Vengeful Spirit cost more than a standard Despoiler?  Am I missing something?  One last thing, what's with the weird line drawing of the City of Light?  Why the broadside lance?

[lastspartacus]

Awesome, love the flavor in the god-specific fleets  Also, damn you for making my 7000 points of chaos now too small for all the variety ^^

Warp Beasts:  Should be limited to one ship.
Strand of Fate:  Cool!
Hives of Nurgle:  Cool!

Ark of Pestilence:  25 points for a 1/6 chance to cause a fire critical, while boarding?  For 25 points, just make it 'suffers automatic fire critical.'
I mean, it can still be repaired anyway, and probably still isnt worth 25 points.  More like 10.

Berzerker Tide:  Needs some clarification.  If i understand it right, you must pass a second RO to get d3 markers, and either way can't use ordnance next turn?

Second Skorne Power:  Needs one

Veil of Lust:  I think it is both too cheap and too limitless.  I don't like the idea of most of the abilities being in the whole fleet, makes em less special.

Siren's Summon:  I'm going to save my horrified comments that this came from the group in charge of official documents for my favorite game
For one, yes, when you take the test is unclear, and what it effects.  Secondly, do you realize that this, coupled with the leadership reduction from MoS itself, makes this perhaps the most broken thing in the game?  I'm hoping I'm missing something here.

Edit:  I wanted the Murder that way because it is kind of a clunky design next to the Carnage, and with L/R/F lances it could bring equal firepower to a broadside, no more.

[horizon]

The Murder ain't clunky just a ship with another role then the Carnage.

[flybywire-E2C]

Awesome, love the flavor in the god-specific fleets  Also, damn you for making my 7000 points of chaos now too small for all the variety ^^

Warp Beasts:  Should be limited to one ship.
Strand of Fate:  Cool!
Hives of Nurgle:  Cool!

Ark of Pestilence:  25 points for a 1/6 chance to cause a fire critical, while boarding?  For 25 points, just make it 'suffers automatic fire critical.'
I mean, it can still be repaired anyway, and probably still isnt worth 25 points.  More like 10.

Berzerker Tide:  Needs some clarification.  If i understand it right, you must pass a second RO to get d3 markers, and either way can't use ordnance next turn?

Second Skorne Power:  Needs one

Veil of Lust:  I think it is both too cheap and too limitless.  I don't like the idea of most of the abilities being in the whole fleet, makes em less special.

Siren's Summon:  I'm going to save my horrified comments that this came from the group in charge of official documents for my favorite game
For one, yes, when you take the test is unclear, and what it effects.  Secondly, do you realize that this, coupled with the leadership reduction from MoS itself, makes this perhaps the most broken thing in the game?  I'm hoping I'm missing something here.

Edit:  I wanted the Murder that way because it is kind of a clunky design next to the Carnage, and with L/R/F lances it could bring equal firepower to a broadside, no more.

Hi LastSpartacus! Excellent feedback! Not to worry, this project is still a work in progress and has a little while before its stamped "Final." Not everything is even fully play-tested yet so some things here will likely be altered or maybe changed or removed outright. Feedback like yours is EXACTLY why we posted it while still only half-baked.

BTW- I will say this for a fast-pass. Khorne HATES magic and all things that don't involve a knife-fight in a phone booth. It is intentional that Khorne only gets one Force of Chaos. However, as balance its the only flavored fleet that gets a Space Hulk.

- Nate

[Plaxor]

Khorne HATES magic and all things that don't involve a knife-fight in a phone booth.

Khorne is way classier than that. He would instead use some sort of chain axe in this phone-booth knife fight.

Edit: is there any way that we can get some special ability on the Khornate BB called 'chain axe'? It doesn't have to do anything, just have it in the rules: The conquerors crew are equipped with chain axe. (yes... with poor wordage and all). This would balance out the special ability issue you're having.

[lastspartacus]

Hi LastSpartacus! Excellent feedback! Not to worry, this project is still a work in progress and has a little while before its stamped "Final." Not everything is even fully play-tested yet so some things here will likely be altered or maybe changed or removed outright. Feedback like yours is EXACTLY why we posted it while still only half-baked.

And its appreciated.  I'm still miffed after the entire Privateer Press field test, they went and made rules that were completely different to anything that had been tested or advised.    Good to see the innards.

BTW- I will say this for a fast-pass. Khorne HATES magic and all things that don't involve a knife-fight in a phone booth. It is intentional that Khorne only gets one Force of Chaos. However, as balance its the only flavored fleet that gets a Space Hulk.

Hmm, true enough.

[Zelnik]

If your looking for wooge to give the knornate ship, give them a bonus to critical damage as result of a boarding action.  There, problem solved.

[flybywire-E2C]

If your looking for wooge to give the knornate ship, give them a bonus to critical damage as result of a boarding action.  There, problem solved.

This actually doesn't sound bad. So say you all?   

- Nate

[Sigoroth]

Don't know. Still trying to figure out what a 'wooge' is.

[lastspartacus]

Sounds fine to me if appropriately costed.

Nate, you just need a link to your tinyurl in your sig