@ Horizon,
I know, and it is my feeling that Eldar should have some form of minimum movement, although in retrospect it should be less than all other races, likely 5cm per phase. Without it the Nightshade fleet would remain the most effective in the game, and the Eldar would still ignore a crucial game mechanic; you can't wait forever. I wanted to put out my feelers for this one, and we will see.
How do you feel about the defences? I needed to put in a ~500 point station for campaign purposes, and the miniature stations are the best that I came up with.
How about the fluff? Most is from RT books, some I wrote myself. Anything you would change?
How about ship names? I decided to give the transport classes names from Bees, Apis=Scientific name for honeybee, Bombus=Scientific name for bumblebee. This was because of the fact that their escorts are named from poisonous flowers, and bees somehow seemed appropriate.
The Mechanics of transports having a points cost and losing capacity over hits taken?
Frigates, Destroyers and Raiders?
I don't think vampires are a huge issue on the Hemlock.... why would they be?
@All (General Mechanic Notes)
On Mine Fields; These proved to be the most problematic of all defence types, with individual mines they proved to be the best option for defending a planet. Their rules were irrational, they were not dangerous to move through, at least no more than an asteroid field, and yet they were able to produce an infinite number of mines that could travel the board! As the infinite generation of mines causes problems with rules wording and launch capacity. To correct this minefields will become a large obstruction, as they always should have been, that is extremely dangerous to travel through. Likely size would be D6x10cm by D6x5cm, and the rules would state that a ship travelling through would be hit by:
D6 mines if it is a capital ship/defence
D3 mines if it is an escort
+D3 if it is on all ahead full
-1 if it moves less than half speed
-1 if it passes a leadership check to navigate the field
Obviously they would be able to use turrets as normal, and each race would have its own unique mine fields. Ordnance will no longer be something that one can purchase, it will be available through launch bays, as this causes massive wording and rules problems.
Frigates will include vessels of 2 hits, I may make the Dhow, Defender, and Corsair 2 hits. @Horizon, do you think that the Hellebore could be 2 hits?
The precise wording will be something along these lines:
Frigates are Escort ships that are much larger than Destroyers or Raiders albeit smaller than a light cruiser. Unlike other escorts these vessels occasionally have multiple hits like Capital Ships, however unlike Capital Ships these vessels are not crippled when they are at half damage capacity. Additionally they are still destroyed when suffering a critical hit, like other escorts. Damage is allotted to them the same way that it would be to a capital ship squadron; meaning the nearest vessel takes hits until it is destroyed and so on.
Due to their size Frigates have the Stalwart quality (which will need to be reworded to have a -1 to H&Rs) and when attempting Brace for Impact orders they roll 3D6 choosing the two lowest die before comparing the result to their leadership.
*Possible rule; Frigates must move 5cm before turning.
Note: Escorts lose the escort bonus for navigating celestial phenomena.
Raiders: Although comically the Corsairs have no raiders, here are what I am thinking will be the rules for them:
Although Raiders rarely undertake a uniform pattern or scheme, they are all designed to be fast, maneuverable, and are good at using local celestial phenomena. Decause of this when navigating celestial phenomena they roll 3D6 and choose the two lowest before comparing them to their LD. Additionally when determining additional distance for All Ahead Full orders they may re-roll the result, however the second roll stands.
Destroyers: This was worked out of the Hemlock;
Destroyers true to their name are built to do one thing; be as destructive as possible. These vessels have a sort of minimalistic view when it comes to crew and armour, fixing as much weapons as possible to the hull Destroyers are always far better at causing damage than they are at taking it. To this fact Destroyers have the Skeleton Crew quality, and roll 3D6 choosing the two lowest die for Reload Ordnance and Lock On orders due to their small and easy to manage crews.
Note that Skeleton Crew means a +1 to hit and run attacks the vessel is subject to.
Defence/Transport Notes
On Ground Defences: These will be represented by a 40mm square base with an arc and a point on it. This will allow for some modelling work for players. I don't know how useful these are... and I hope someone can produce some insight. I know that ground defences can fire into about 1/4 of the low-orbit table, but only 15cm of real valuable territory. Hrmm... I really don't know what to do with these.
As a rules note, ground defences will have a launch capacity seperate from the rest of the fleet, this will be presumed that the craft they launch are not fully 'spaceworthy'. Obviously their craft will only be permitted on the low orbit table.
Defences in general: Defences will gain full functionality as appropriate. Due to their 'stationary' weakness their armour will mostly be increased to 6+ (for Human types) to compensate on the gunnery charts. I will attempt to make each fleet have a ~500 point pirate base, as well as at least one orbital type and ground based defences. Defences will act much more like stationary ships than official rules. Obviously they will not be allowed to disengage.
Transports: Every fleet will have some type of transport, and probably multiple variants. There are a few racial notes:
Rogue Traders: This fleet will have a wider variety of transports, and may buy transports with their own fleet points, however all these vessels will lose the 'transport' quality unless actually purchased with the transport points. The RT player must inform his opponent which vessels are carrying the loot.
Necrons: This one was an interesting fix, and I have not come up wiht a suitable Necron conversion/model yet. The Necron version of a transport will be called an Ark Teleporter, which will not be able to make AAF orders due to its need to power its sizeable teleportation array. It will likely only be armed with portals.
Tyranids: I have not decided for certain if this fleet should be given a seperate transport class or if they should simply be able to 'upgrade' the transport quality on their ships, or at least certain ones. Thoughts?
On the Craftworld Eldar
So I plan to dig in to the CWE over the weekend, hopefully it won't take too long. I was planning on adding their own unique philosophy system.... something small along the lines of which deity the Craftworld associates with. Like the Corsair they would not have an automatic LD boon.
Asuryan=+1 LD
Isha=Augmented Damage Control, Ignore all Negatives to LD and ignore the 'communication' problems from radiation bursts.
Khaine=Rending weapons and Relentless, Roll 3D6 choosing the two highest on LD checks to Brace or Disengage.
Kurnous=+2 LD from the enemy being on SO, *need something else..... maybe some bonus to weapons on a turn they enter/travel through celestial phenomena.
Lilileath=Enemy ships starting their movement within 15cm of these vessels must pass a LD check or do nothing during the following shooting, ordnance and end phases.
Morai-Heg=You may re-roll the result of any critical hit on your ships or your enemies (but not the results of H&R attacks), you may also re-roll the results of any catastrophic damage your Craftworld vessels inflict or is inflicted upon your Craftworld vessels.
Vaul=Your vessels lose the fragile quality and only reduce their weapons strength by 1/4 when crippled.
Ynnead=(Not sure if he should be included, or about this rule), your opponent only gains 75% (possibly less) victory points for any vessels he destroys. In a campaign, he reduces the amount of renown he gains (excluding renown gained from subplots) by half.
Cegorach, Hoec and Gea= well Cegorach and Hoec are already pretty well represented in the Corsairs, Gea is only a footnote. I don't know that much about Eldar fluff, but do Craftworlds devote themselves to these gods? or to Ynnead?
