What house rules do you guys use?

[Mike]

I was just curious what house rules you guys have in place at your local level. We have some we are experimenting with to try and solve some issues.

Armored Cars in transport slots: In base BA rules these can be captured by the stupidity of having enemy models closer. We have changed it to if the model is armed and had an armor value of 7+ then the capture rule does not apply. Vehicle crews were trained to defend themselves and at least in the German army, even drivers had sub guns.

Troops in open topped armored transports: It was doctrine that armored transports literally drove to the objective while the guys inside used the armor as a mobile pillbox dumping fire on the objective and suppressing anyone on it. Therefore vehicles with guys inside can fire from the inside of a transport measured from the cargo compartment. If the vehicle moves or moved in the previous turn the guys inside count as moving(Even Americans). If the vehicle moves at full speed then the guys inside cannot fire either. Weapons that cannot move and fire, cannot do so while transported as well.

Weapons teams and losing the gunner: Both members of weapons teams are taught to load and fire their weapon. If the gunner is taken out of action due to a sniper or a confirmed 6, then roll a dice. On a 4+ the loader is able to take over the weapon. He does suffer the -1 for missing a crewman like normal.

 

[Nat]

Common ones I’m aware of..

MMG teams count as artillery (so can’t be killed off by exceptional damage/ sniper fie)

MMG teams do D3 pins instead of 1….OR MMGs do an extra pin if in range before rolling to hit

[invisible officer]

Using historical OOB, not point based. Works only with close friends.

[Paul Nettle]

Snipers can only kill men, not equipment.

Area terrain such as woods – troops can only be seen if they are within one inch of the edge; or if enemy troops are within six inches.  Troops inside can also only see enemy within six inches away unless the troops are within one inch of the edge, when they have unrestricted view.  This allows troops to hide in woods.

A revised Romanian list to use historical equipment and get rid of the ridiculous official Romanian list which allows panzerfausts and a Panther tank in 1941.

Allow Soviets in 1941 to use Machine Gun Artillery platoons.

I do like some of the other rules suggested here.

[Steeljackal]

My humble opinion…

1)

“Weapons teams and losing the gunner: Both members of weapons teams are taught to load and fire their weapon. If the gunner is taken out of action due to a sniper or a confirmed 6, then roll a dice. On a 4+ the loader is able to take over the weapon. He does suffer the -1 for missing a crewman like normal.”

From rulebook “This represents the fact that ometime it’s the Sarge who gets it, or that a machine gun can jam or be damaged beyond repair.” so it does not necessarily mean that the gunner has been killed, but it is the statistical “simulation” (as happens for many other things in the game, such as the so-called “finished fuel” for the flamethrower which in reality, as explained in the rulebook, represents something else) of a number of things, such as a gun jam. For example gun jam in other games it is simulated in other moments of the game, but in BA they have chosen to simplify (rightly in my opinion) in this way, and the result more or less does not change.

So in my humble opinion it is not correct to vary the mechanism of exceptional damage. Instead I could agree with the sniper damage variation, where only with the double 6 there is exceptional damage on a support weapon (for the reasons already explained in the regulation above). But even here I don’t know, this could also be an approximation of the effect of a sniper fire on a support weapon, maybe the assistants of the gunner who died under the sniper fire leave their position, I don’t know what considerations the creator made.

 

2)

More pins for MG fire. Here I agree. MG fire does not have the sole purpose of making losses but to pin and block the enemy. In other games (Advance Squad Leader or Close Combat on PC) the main use of MG and the effect is precisely to block the enemy. In BA the ability to block the enemy is the same as that of any infantry squad.

[Nat]

At Paul Neettle – Sorry going to disagree with your first point I mean if you remove snipers ability to do exceptional damage (that is ‘remove equipment’ – that includes LMGs & panzerfausts) you have removed them from the game…. ok they hit better and have a 12-36″ range but still wound the same as a normal rifle.  Thats not worth the 50 or 65 points for a single shot per turn weapon…. look at MMGs same cost, same range (without the minimum) but 4 shots and are derided as the worst unit in the game – you’ve just made snipers even worse than them!

[Mike]

As someone who has crewed a weapons team and has seen how much damage period ones can take before being unusable(capture from ww2 ) its not that easy. Hell pretty much everyone in a US infantry platoon when I was in knew how to operate a 50cal. The driver of my 113 who was stuck in a maintenance yard was hit by OpFor and he jumped on a 50 he never previously messed with(he was in the yard literally to babysit it). But thats why we have the 4+ roll to roll to see if the gun or the gunner died, similar to the German NCO rule if someone is motivated or experienced  enough to take over.

I do really like the switching it to an artillery status. That makes it useful while not negating snipers at the same time.

[Jacob Carter]

One of the house rules I’ve been toying with about snipers is to remove the exceptional damage ability and replace it with a pinning mechanic somewhat similar to HE.  On a hit the unit receives d2 pins, wound is d3, and exceptional damage is d6.

I think this can represent the immense fear a sniper could cause, since I believe there are stories of singular German snipers slowing down the Allied advance.  Plus snipers won’t always find the leader of the squad or destroy a weapon so no one can use it.  I’m also tempted to give snipers +1 to wound rolls against infantry cause they seem to have the accuracy of a 3 year old with a BB gun when shooting at anything better than inexperienced.

[Nat]

hmms … I sense a new topic… sniper changes for v3

[Paul Nettle]

Hi Nat – In my club snipers cans till remove LMGs and Panzerfausts becuase they are carried by men.  But in my club, snipers cannot destroy MMGs.  They can only take out a member of the MMG squad.

[Nat]

@paul. …ah just a different way of getting the same result as making the mmg team count as artillery (which protects the mmg from all small arms not just snipers)

[Anonymous]

What are the “Machine Gun Artillery platoons” mentioned above ??

Also, where do the rules state that Artillery ignores Snipers ??

[Nat]

@danny G Delong:

1) Soviet army Machine gun Artillery platoons… basically think instead of infantry squads you’d have 2 or 3 MMG teams…. its not something you can currently take in the game, unlike say soviet AT gun platoons

2) Artillery can only take exceptional damage from heavy weapons.. sniper rifles are in the small arms category.  (its the 1st paragraph under Damage on Artillery Units) So all a sniper can do is remove a crewman as there is no squad leader and the -1 Ld is only applied when there is only 1 crewman left… there are better targets for snipers!

 

• This reply was modified 3 years, 12 months ago by Nat.

[Anonymous]

Thanks for the explaination.

[Paul Nettle]

I did a previous post on Soviet ‘Machine Gun Artillery’ Platoons.  It will be on previous pages.   https://www.warlordgames.com/community/topic/machinegun-artillery-pulyemyetno-artillyeriyskiy-platoon/

Soviet ‘Machine Gun Artillery’ Platoons were only used in 1941 in designated defensive zones.  As well as multiple MMG there are multiple LMG Teams (3 men), 0-2 Anti-tank guns, 0-3 Anti-tank rifles, multiple mortars etc plus wire, mines, dragons teeth etc.  They have no infantry or transport or tanks or armoured cars.

Yes, they were a historical organisation abandoned after 1941.

• This reply was modified 3 years, 12 months ago by Paul Nettle.

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