Cover ARM bonus can't be more than your base armour could work. Separately, strictly speaking, reducing the cost of anything will up order counts on average. But making expensive things tougher, and cheap things weaker will lower them. Also, I think removing the arm bonus from cover wouldn't significantly worsten the tactical significance of cover and flanking. The ARM bonus is already a very secondary consideration to the BS mod, and if anything removing it would encourage more movement from highly armoured troops if they got an always on effective ARM bump instead. It would also mean bringing anti armour tools would be an actually important consideration.
Pardon me, been away from the internet for a while. You do know that for the Bin Laden raid, only 12 troops actually entered the building out of 79 (plus maybe another 49 in reaction forces), right? One or two dudes doing most of the heavy lifting while everyone else is providing security is pretty normal. Not to mention that Ramboing can leave your badass model's ass hanging in the breeze if you're not careful, so it's easy to get the Rambo killed. What's wrong with your trooper picking up a rock to distract the target while you sneak up behind him to shank him? That would be a really good fix! Very much agree with this one!
I feel the value of the ARM bonus is going to be a very subjective point. I will say that if, as you suggest, the BS modifier is the biggest factor in cover then I don't see this change encouraging HI movement, especially as they're the high BS shooters that normally benefit from the negative mod. Again, I think this is down to personal preference, playstyle, and fluff/reality congruence. My personal opinion is to make: DTWs more expensive/weaker AP ignores or reduces cover ARM bonus This would make AP weapons more effective, not just for Super-HI and TAGs, but also digging out ARO LI. Cheap warbands with DTW would be less threatening against armour. It also avoids the second order effect of decreasing the handicap that Impetuous imposes.
Make: DTWs more expensive AP flat -3 ARM that applies to Cover Reprice ARM to be cheaper I think that's a reasonable solution. But one of the reasons I actually like making Impetuous not so bad is that it justifies *significantly* increasing the cost. At the moment Impetuous is seen as a 'penalty' that gives a cost discount. Moving it to cost neutral (where the extra order is balanced be the limitations) is, I think, a good idea. This also benefits frenzy/impetuous links: as it means that you don't get an Impetuous price discount while not suffering the effects. On of the ways of making ARM cheaper is giving it to free to MI and HI based on their archetypal weaknesses (or alternatively price MI and HI archetypal weaknesses the same as ARM1-3 and ARM 1-4 respectively). So all MI based on a 10pt profile: 4-2 Move, CC13, BS11, PH 10, WIP 13, W1, ARM3, BTS0. Combi, Pistol, Knife. For HI, all HI based on a 10pt profile: 4-4 Move, CC13, BS11, PH10, WIP13, W1, ARM4, BTS0. Combi, Pistol, Knife. Most TAGs are in an OK place right now. The exception largely being any of those that had to pay for Tac Awareness.
And your point is? I'm talking about rules, on-board gameplay and the disproportionality of Fireteam being an Order multiplier allowing you to daisychain movement across the board (and thus boosting your board control in an extreme fashion). You're talking about fluff and How True Operators Operate. Complete non sequitur, mate.
AP as a MOD to ARM so AP(-3) or AP(-6) or AP(-9) and able to offset cover ARM bonus could def work. An AP round on an smg shouldn't have the same armour reducing capacity as an armour buster missile anyway.
You could do that as AP1 (-3), AP2 (-6) if you wanted to. A little additional complexity, but not really that much. I think you need to remove AP from SMGs if you're going to promote high ARM troops. Perhaps not all of them, but moving SMGs to Shock SMGs, AP SMGs etc would work.
In terms of gameplay, Fireteams have their fair share of cons: When you activate a Fireteam, you'd better have just your Team Leader visible to your opponent's units, otherwise other guys in your link might receive an unopposed ARO. This is especially gruesome when you receive a template to the face. When you ARO with your Fireteam, you must declare the same ARO without breaking the link. You cannot Discover with one dude, delay with another and Dodge with the third while still keeping the Fireteam. Maneuvering Fireteams around the battlefield is quite finicky. It's pretty easy with Tohaa where you only have highly mobile Triads, but trying to maneuver a 5-man Core link is a completely different story. What order multiplication are you talking about? You exaggerate the issue. Most factions are limited to having just one Core link and one Haris, so the maximum order economy you get out of this is 6, and this is only if you actually use the links actively. Most links are there to provide ARO and only get their share of the fun at the 3rd round. As a final thought, I would say that your argument seems to be based on the premise that you just can't figure out a way to deal with Fireteams using the current rules and instead of keeping trying, you resort to calls for changing the rules to your liking. This is not neccesarily a bad thing as some parts of the game could really benefit from redesign, but your suggestion to remove the Fireteams is similar to suggesting to remove Queens from chess because they can move both in cardinal directions and diagonally while not being limited in range.
I fundamentally like Fireteams. But I find defensive Fireteams are getting a little rediculous for particular factions. In the AHD thread I proposed a Short Skill only Hacking program that makes the target fail it's Final Coherency Check (I called it 'Solvent'). This would drop the target out of a Fireteam, but it returns to th Fireteam at the start of its next Turn (assuming the Fireteam survives). It basically allows temporarily stripping Fireteam bonuses. I think something like this is a good solution: it adds a useful tool, but is decidedly inefficient so it's a trade off to use it. Because at the moment there are very few tools other than creatively killing things to strip bonuses (Jammers).
I suggested ways of making them a tactical choice, not a no-brainer go-to source of B+1 and +3 mod, among other buffs. And yeah, tell me please how having a problem with the board control of "I move all 5 models of my links 8" forward with 1 Regular order, provoking 1 ARO, at no Command Token cost and can keep doing it indefinitely until I run out of Orders" is "exaggerated" when a Vanilla faction can only do this with up to 4 models, provoking 4 ARO, at the high price of 1 CT and 1 Regular Order (coordinated order)? Or defensive links that get the +1B and +3 to hit on absurd units with TO camo / ODD and with long range weapons like sniper rifles or missile launchers? All of that on tough models in cover? It's a strongly skewed mechanic that literally breaks the game in several places (e.g. Fatality 2 on models like Tarik or Sheeskin, especially with the new tougher Boarding Action Sheeskin). It's an additional layer of strong buffs that is not available globally and is so good that it's taken by default. It needs to be addressed somehow. Removal would probably be healthy for the game, but at the very least making it less of a no-brainer and links less of a starting point in list building would be a start.
Its a judgement call for sure but there are some objective ways to look at it. If we consider a Jotum with +3 ARM compared to now (But no ARM cover bonus). If it really wants to flank it doesn't care that much about losing a FTF against a combi ARO whose LOF it wants to cross. It only loses a wound on a crit, and can't even be put unconscious (outside a very unlikley triple crit from suppression). The extra armour outside cover but doesn't fundamentally change this situation, but it does make the TAG a little more attractive to move in it. In the same situation a 0 ARM Light Infantry is likely to go down if it loses the FTF in cover or out of it, with the cover ARM bonus or without it. But it's less likely to lose that FTF in cover. AP(X) where X equals the amount the AP reduces ARM, cover stays the same might help somewhat - making a lot of AP better against lighter ARM. Doesn't really fix the fundamental problem of ARM being not good enough for cost, and lowering the price of ARM not making a big enough difference for the already expensive things that need it to be a better defence than it is to be worthwhile though I think. Essentially it matters a lot more to a TAG if its ARM saved it from death than if it cost a bit less.
AP(X) actually works neatly with the [Descriptor] [Ammo] [Base] weapon system you and I chatted about (I'm not sold if [Ammo] [Descriptor] [Base] works better or not). Basically it revolves around reducing the amount of different weapons and then just applying modifiers to them. [Base] defines the base Burst, DAM and Range-bands used. [Ammo] defines what Ammo type or types are used. [Descriptors] modify the base Burst, DAM and Range-bands used. So a Combi Rifle is just a Rifle with the Combi Descriptor added. Where Combi has the property of adding a +3 BS Mod in the 0-8 range band. A Mk 12 is a Heavy Marksman-rifle. Where Heavy is +2 DAM. Spitfires are Assault Marksman-rifles (Assault = +1 DAM and +1 Burst). Red Furies are Rapid (+1 Burst) Shock Marksman-rifles. Current Heavy Pistols are actually Heavy Shock Pistols. (With Pistols changed to DAM12 so that they align with Breaker pistols or vice versa and all pistols based on DAM11). This allows you to increase the number of weapons in the game but reduce complexity. You can keep the fluff names for things: "The Heavy Marksman-rifle is widely known as the Mk-12 after a popular version of the type." but it means you don't need to remember that a Spitfire and a Red Fury have slightly different range bands because they wouldn't, and then forget which version of the range bands the Mk-12 shares: they're all based onto the same base. You would need to 'polish' some weapons so that they conform to this design: Assault Pistols and SMGs in particular are in a weird place. The downside to this is that you lose a little bit of evocative language (EMauler becomes EM Mines) but it makes for clearer gameplay (I was once playing an opponent who was experienced enough to know better and I deployed an EMauler in ARO, he thought it was a Repeater with catastrophic consequences for his Asura). The difference between EMitters (EM Launchers), EMaulers (EM Mines), EMarats (EM Throwers) and Zappers (Light EM2 Throwers) is something I think *really* could do with clearing up. And as cool as Riotstoppers sound they'd have been even clearer from a gameplay POV as Adhesive Throwers and Light Adhesive Throwers. (Which immediately makes Adhesive Mines just something that can be added to the game with no real additional information). I haven't quite worked out how to make Light Shotguns and Boarding Shotguns work in this system, but it should be doable (it'd be easier if LSGs where 'Boarding' Shotguns and BSGs where just Shotguns). Grenade Launchers are another interesting one: you can either make that [Ammo] [Grenade] [Launchers] (where Grenade = + Circular Impact Template and + Spec Fire) or as [Ammo] [Descriptor] [Grenade-launcher] as a specific weapon type. Either way you'd rename HGLs as 'Mortars' or similar.
It means that armies will be able to "spam" armor more effectively, which is fine. You're dancing around the fact that ARM is an overpriced stat.
Not really dancing around it. You can equally address that by making it better for same cost rather than making it cheaper though. For the reasons Ive said, I think it would work better to make ARM more effective, rather than cheaper.
Coordinated Order provokes one ARO. I wholeheartedly agree with n21lv. I think that most of your opinions (which are very strong by the way) come from lack of experience. I'm sure that after some time you will see massive cons of fire teams. Some players even forego them because they are unwieldy and easy to counter. Obviously there are some links that are bending the meta but it's not a problem of the rule per se.
i would say T(essium) ammo would be more appropriate as cover piercing ammo on top of current stats for T2 but for the moment as far as i know its an Ariadna exclusive projectiles atm. from my perspective T2 in its current configuration is just high risk/reward DA ammo proposed rework: T1 ignore cover armor mod and scenery destroyer (allowing it to be avalible for other factions ) T2 above abilities + 2 wounds on failed armor roll (dawn exclusive)
But an AP round from an SMG already doesn't. The missile forces you to roll 3 times instead of one versus ARM, and at higher DAM! Must say, I'm not fond of AP MODs over -3, and even that is a lot. It devalues all ARM below 6 (!) something fierce, and that's at the lowest level of AP. While it would kind of make sense if a missile in hit mode had higher AP value (I don't actually agree that it does for a range of real life reasons - it would make more real life sense if it was normal damage against ARM lower than, say, 6, but ignored ARM and got EXP versus higher ARM) I think the rammifications on the game is too high when Feuerbachs, Missile Launchers, and presumably MHMG started ignoring Gamma level ARM completely - necessitating even further reducing ARM cost and soon we'll be looking at ARM equating to BTS in terms of pricing.
Make lighter AP weapons have a maximum reduction. Maybe either a direct lower tier AP or base it on damage. DAM13 or lower: - 3 max. 14 or 15, - 4. Over 15, -5. So an SMG will only drop a Jotum to 7 now, but the AP mode Multi HMG on said Jotum will drop another to 5. Maybe even harsher. Dam 13 only -2 maximum?
Yeah, that's partially why I revised it to AP(X) where X = the amount it reduces ARM, for finer granularity. I imagine X would generally be fairly low for the reasons you mention, esp if ARM values didn't get a bump up as part of the package. AP in MOD like steps of 3 would need to come with other changes, like a bump up of ARM values generally, and there's no real need to do such big steps tbh.
Going back to this I think it's a brilliant idea. Basically the name of the weapon tells you exactly what it does, meaning less looking things up. I dont think you need three things just a [Type] and [Modifiers] which can go in any order. So the types might be: Launchers (ML range bands, B1, round template ) Machine Guns (B4 HMG range bands) Spitfires (B4 Spitfire range bands) Rifles (B3 Rifle range bands) Shotguns (B2 Shotgun range bands, teardrop template) SMGs (B3 SMG range bands) Pistols (B2 Pistol range bands) Throwing Weapons (B1 throwing weapon range band Bows (bow range bands) Thrower / Sprayers (large / small teardrop dtw) Mines (small teardrop trigger area) Then a bunch of modifiers that can be added with no fixed limit like: Combi - +3 0-8 range band Multi [Type 1, Type 2 etc] - has multiple ammo types it can choose between. Marksman - applies Spitfire Range bands to the weapon. Rocket - applies B2 flame to the weapon Heavy - +1 Dam Light - -1 dam And ammo types AP, EXP, Shock etc apply as per now and as per these modifiers are included in the name too (eg AP Marksman Rifle is B3 Spitfire range bands and AP ammo). Basically it'd become an intuitive mix and match system that's easy to understand and remember once you know the key words, and could easily make all the weapons in game with slight streamlining and less mental load to remember their particulars, because they are right there in the name. Cool idea.
