Okay. Why? And how would you fix* them? * and I do not mean "neutering them so they won't reproduce". Too late for that, they're already here.
I like the idea of Khawarijs as super glass cannons. I would not change them individually, but I would add a special Faith* Fireteam (like the Morat Tarlok fireteam) for Khawarijis: It is considered that members of the Faith* Fireteam with the Faith* tag gain TacAwareness. *Placeholder for a cooler name. This would dial Khawarijis fireteams to 11 while keeping their trademark weakness on the reactive turn.
Special Terrain: Jungle is about 1pt skill, maybe less. And totally situational - outside of a specific table, you need to draw a Battle Conditions card for it to have any meaining. Tarlok Fireteam's bonus is therefore next to fluff-only. Tactical Awareness is - judging by Zuyong Invincibles - a 3pts skill, and definitely one worth the points. Giving it to Khawarij "Faith" Fireteams would be a big bonus for free (as it would mean a Fireteam having 3 or more TacAware Orders with no point cost), also, it would do nothing to fix the singular Khawarij - eg. in vanilla. So I'm sorry, but I can't consider it a good idea.
How do you fix any 1 W troop that costs 20pts or more? Traditionally making them an elite naildriver, which doesn't fit here. Mimetism doesn't fit either. Frenzy maybe? Dogged would fit too. Ph 11 with dodge +1 is crappy. A lot of them are overloaded with lots of guns. Honestly? CC 22, PH 12, and then martial arts L2, Dogged and Frenzy. Give them a ML/Shotgun profile too. Take them out the Alg link, give Wildcats (Alguaciles), make Jags (Correctional). Now both units are better and have specific vibes.
I would be fine with "giving powerful stuff for free" to promote certain Army themes. Fireteams are built on that philosophy. Do you feel that Khawarij in RTF would be overpowered with this change? I think it would promote their usage and give people a reason to use them. Right now, they are extremely hard to justify them in RTF. In Vanilla, that is something different. I have little idea how to make them work.
It is very difficult to balance, I'd say. You get the downside of being forced into a specific unit, and paying their cost. This, in turn, is an opportunity cost - you can't then afford to choose other units, in layer #1 - because they are not present in a given sectorial at all, and in layer #2, because you were forced to put X models of unit Y into the limited number of slots in your Combat Group(s). Yes! Dang, I need to give them a try next time i'm playing RTF... a 3-man Haris. Certainly a different kettle of fish, but I don't think we can treat tthese problems separately.
Ugh, this is a hard one because anything that makes them usable steps on the toes of other units. TBH, I don't know what to do with them without stepping on other unit's toes. It was a poorly conceived unit to begin with, along with the Diablos, and was a pointless addon to a sectorial that has no real use for them. What is their role? What could be their role?
I believe that Armor 4, BTS 6, 2 Structure, and Remote Presence more than makes up for that weakness.
I'd suggest getting back to the drawing board, and trying from scratch. Fluff-wise, if I get it right, Lobos are the prison guard of Corregidor. given the Corregidor lore, the prison guard there has to be able to deal with some extra spicy kittens in there (cue Diablos). The figure design implies they are the riot squad guards. This in turn implies they are used to fighting in close quarters, and not necessarily for lethal effect. Alguaciles are militarized police forces on Corregidor, that was estabilished in the fluff since N1, so the "Lobos count-as Alguaciles for Fireteam purposes" has some sollid base in fluff IMO. Seeing them as elite Alguaciles does have some appeal.
Why not? Just do the formular they use for Optimized Silverprime or the Moonraker-Bots With an sidelook to the Moonraker bots they deserve a huge tweak, mostly in their point costs. ARM 3 seems to be very expensive. Maybe S4 is not a good thing compared to S2? Anyway they look much to expensive. For long range we have the Sputniks. Maybe the changing the HSG vs a SMG - template is provided by the HFT. Wildcat NCO Spitfire costs 2 pts less than the Lobo. BS 13 and MSV 1. I wonder were the points for the Lobo ar coming from. Mostly from the Veteran skill I guess. That could be useful, but nothing I would build my faith on. Their whole skillset is kinda wierd. Biovisor (okay if its for free) maybe one time its even usful agianst a Imp. BS +1 Dam - okay why not, CC+3 maybe its cheaper than CC23 if anything CC-3 would be more interesting, giving you a -9 total to bring the Para CC to good use. Dodge+1" the skill that they put on Zhanshis and Celestial Guard to keep them expensive. I guess we can save 1 pt here. Religous Troop - which kind of religon they have? for what fluff reason its good for? Curage them and fine. Veteran - I don´t even see them as such. Situational useful. CJC has bad lt. choices maybe we can soften LoL here but for what price? In the weapon section I see the Breaker with the big glue template useful. If the FP +1 B is for free then keep it, otherwise put the FP away save another pt. Why combi and breaker are separate? Just breaker and good. Change breaker pistol for normal one save another pt. Flamerthrower profile is not needed, we have big glue template. With the big shield I could see Nanoscreen or DAM-3. Since the were added to CJC I was wondering for use they are.
I'm not even trying to address the comparison to Moonrakers (same as I never wanted to compare Lunokhods to ArmBots). Should we stick to "for long range, there are Tsyklons", then sorry, but Lunokhods stay irrelevant. SMGs are cheap, but ives the Lunokhod little in terms of rage increase over the HSG. If you want to make serious makeover of a Lunokhod, you could slap on some Mimetism, or Smoke (grenades or Grenade Launcher). Possibly Forward Deployment. But it all would affect the cost. As for the Lobos, I've been thinking about representing their shields / training as a CC -6 (or -9, if one wants to go that far). These guys don't need to be CC monsters, but I think it would be bad for them to be someone CC monsters don't want to get into CC with. And Para CC -6, perhaps.
I think the Lunokhod is great, it's just way too expensive compared to the "new" points formula. If it simply went down to 19 or 20 pts it would still not find its way into all the lists, but definitely into some. So many of these old 1W profiles are simply overcosted. Bring them down to the current level of optimized stuff and they're good to go again.
Rebalancing and recosting units across the board would be very welcome, but I'm afraid it won't happen until N5, and even then there's no guarantee it'd be as comphrehensive as needed. One change I'd like to see as well - though it's not directly related to unit design - is reverting the artificial restriction to 15 models. With N4 improving the value of ARM and more balanced criticals, more durable units, and more TA, the field for proper elite vs horde matchup would be more even, I think.
That would be interesting. If they move it two allowing a full two combat groups, that would radically change list design. I still want to avoid 25+ order lists, though.
Two points: there's nothing preventing you to void this restriction. Yes, Tactical Window is the default mode in current ITS, but the rules do not prohibit running games without model number restriction. playing smaller games makes for a much faster game. Something we've observed in our local meta, having switched from Tactical Window 300pts format to Limited Insertion 250pts. There are less models, less Orders, less AROs, and we are able to finish the game in 2 hours rather than 3, or 3,5h. Now, I'd gladly give a spin to, say, 400pts, no group restrictions - as I do have the models for that. But I'd have to dedicate an entire day off to it. 250pt Limited Insertion means I can fit a game after work, and before dinner... and it makes for a more comfortable affair if one has to get up for work the next day...
I much prefer the 15 models hard limit than see again the hordes of units, a Bakunin list of 40something models has been fielded in a big US tournament to prove a point, and a point it has proven.
Refuge in audacity does work sometimes ;) Personally I find limit of two full combat groups much more reasonable, and able to fit 99% of what people might want to field. Feels more natural to me than restricting the 2nd group to five models. The ideal situation is when the general area for army building is quite open, and there are multiple viable roads to victory, without artificially declaring "this is the way to play".
