Specialist Arms Forum
Necromunda => [Necro] Rules Development Feedback => [Necro] House Rules => Topic started by: mad mcgobbo on May 31, 2009, 10:44:39 AM
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Recently while looking over the rules for redemptionists, me and my group found that there is a sticking point to the redemptionists that not even the scavvies have to put up with.
As you all know, in the after game sequence all gangs/outlanders can goto their trading post and buy common items. Redemptionists have a stipulation in their rules that say they cannot buy common items but can buy from their weapon list(the one from gang generation). Now unfortunately this does restrict play a little too much in our opinions. So rather than saying the redemptionists cannot buy common items we allow it, so you can have Deacons with plasma guns or zealots with chainswords.
I'd like to know what others think, maybe in the future the restricive bit of text could be removed officially.
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As long as they are giving up rare trades to buy weapons that aren't on their house list I don't see a real problem with it.
As to changing it, there doesn't seem to be an abundance of support for SG at the moment so I wouldn't expect any changes anytime soon.
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I agree that the redemptionists should swap a roll on the rare trade to buy one item not on their weapon list as it give a feel for the fluff that says they are supported rather than finding the items themselves.
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To be honest and this might be somewhat controversial but I'd recommend playing a redemption as a Cawdor gang. I'm afraid in my opinion the rules for the redemption are horriblely broken and you'll likely soon find one of the gangs in your campaign has nigh infinite resources and an overwhelming number of people on the board at any one time.
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To be honest and this might be somewhat controversial but I'd recommend playing a redemption as a Cawdor gang. I'm afraid in my opinion the rules for the redemption are horriblely broken and you'll likely soon find one of the gangs in your campaign has nigh infinite resources and an overwhelming number of people on the board at any one time.
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I don't know about how bad the current rules can get for overkill but the older Necromag rules were horribly overpowered. By gang rating 1500 the Redemptionists couldn't be touched. As for the Cawdor idea, I personally think thats unworkable due to eviscerators and exterminator cartridges.
There is a reworked Outlandeds set thats being worked on by Ant on his website that keeps the feeling of how they were in the old rules without over weighing them towards the overkill that seems to have been in previous versions.
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I play Redemtionists and can honestly say they are not either under nor over powered. Redemtionists real advantage is that they can have as many heavies(minus the Stubber) as they can afford, but that is not to say that is a good thing. Redemptionists are a very well thought out gang and not as imba as many make out.
I play a large gang, about 15 models atm and against the top gangs in the campaign it is hard fought. It had its teething problems to begin with but as the juves matured it has really come into its own, with my opponents trembling in the face of my CC block not my 8 Exterminators. The Mob list is quite terrifying tbh. I was lucky and won enough games to buy my mob a priest.
However as for the common items dispute I would say no they cannot use weapons not on their list but yes to Flugs Etc. From a fluff POV the Ordo Hereticus and Sisters of Battle revere the trinity of Bolter, Melta and Flamer as the weapons of the ritcheous so from that stand point it would make sense.
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I don't know about how bad the current rules can get for overkill but the older Necromag rules were horribly overpowered. By gang rating 1500 the Redemptionists couldn't be touched. As for the Cawdor idea, I personally think thats unworkable due to eviscerators and exterminator cartridges.
There is a reworked Outlandeds set thats being worked on by Ant on his website that keeps the feeling of how they were in the old rules without over weighing them towards the overkill that seems to have been in previous versions.
Well, their income is based on the number of guys they have and each lost devotee is replaced on a 4+ for free. With no gang size limits and no way to starve and no income penalties for size this gang is pushed to become an army.
I have found that the gangs with the most members have also been the most effective in the campaigns I've played in. All a player needs to do to break this gang is keep buying devotees with autopistols.
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I have to disagree with you there. With the exeption of possibly Ratskins all Outlanders are at a disadvantage in a long campaign.
Yes Redemptionists have a lot of models but they have no heavy weapons and can usually only ever generate 35-40 creds a game and for a Bizzare reason Redemptionists cannot loot territories.
I have to throw Devotees at my opponents because I simply don't have the kit to deal with them in any other fashion.
Redemptionists do grow steadily but also very slowly as opposed to house gangs who can grow exponentially. Archeotech hordes for one.
In our campaign My 16 strong redemption crusade is second atm after winning 6 of their 7 games to an Escher Gang who have only won 3 of their 6 games. How does this compute as Redemptionists being unbalanced?
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Gang rating is not an effective measure of gang power. The fact you have won 6 of your 7 games and the escher has won 3 of 6 says more.
I have found more guys > heavy weapons. With effective use of cover and positioning numbers can neutralise one heavy very easily, if they have splashed out on two its even easier. This depends on how much terrain you have and what type of terrain. My games typically run 3+ sets of necromunda terrain, so heavy terrain on multiple levels.
Redemptionists cannot loot because they have no territories to be taken off them. Its a trade off.
The average house gang income isn't much more than 35-40 creds. Even with an archeotech hoard. This goes down if guys go out of action. That does not happen for a Redemptionist gang. To truly break redemptionists you need to set out to do it, but that doesn't mean the gang isn't unbalanced. Try a gang of a priest with lasgun, 3 crusaders with autoguns and 15 devotees with autopistols. You will on average earn enough to buy a new devotee + pistol every game. And this increases your income and the odds of winning. Any dead guys have a 50% chance of being replaced for free. All of them will be earning D6xp per game and skilling up sooner or later.
Gang balance issues for the most part tend to become apparent over longer campaigns.
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I have to agree that the redemption is unbalanced. Our first campaign ground to a halt once one of the new players started redemptionists. Once he realized that having seventeen CC-guys madly charging with one-shot flamers was nigh on unbeatable all games started to look exactly the same, with him winning everything. His gang rating was pretty low, acctually, but his "I jus run evarybodi up thar" reguarly beat just about anything. Generally people felt like they weren't really loosing to him, just to the redemtionists in general.
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Cael there is one major flaw to that plan, Bottle Rolls and Pinning Tests.
IMHO Devotees are juves so cant help a guy get up and with leadership 6 chances are the entire mob are going to leg it as soon as bob gets his head blown off.
Exterminators are expinsive and have to be attatched to weapons 50 + 15 + 15 X 17 = 1370 credits. Impossible for a starting gang and unlikley untill late campaign.
House Gangs get all the groovy stuff only the priesthood can get and I will be dammned if I'm paying 60creds just for the priveledge of wielding a sword.
A normal gang can field hordes too if the want and will probably come off better for it too but nobody does because they are seduced by the Heavy Stubber of Plasma Cannons they can get.
My CC group got creamed against our Escher in their last meeting and I lost my Eviscerator too. Redemptionists are not broken, they simply offer a different play style. If you can't pin a Redemptionist Devotee horde outside of flamer range then start playing Delaque.
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A normal gang can field hordes too if the want and will probably come off better for it too but nobody does because they are seduced by the Heavy Stubber of Plasma Cannons they can get.
For House gangs, the more models there are, the less money they get, making what is called a 'soft cap'.
There is no such cap for Redemption. More models = more money, which leads to more models. There is no upper bounds to this formula. Making this situation even more self sustaining is that dead models have a 50% chance to be replaced on their own.
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Cael there is one major flaw to that plan, Bottle Rolls and Pinning Tests.
IMHO Devotees are juves so cant help a guy get up and with leadership 6 chances are the entire mob are going to leg it as soon as bob gets his head blown off.
Exterminators are expinsive and have to be attatched to weapons 50 + 15 + 15 X 17 = 1370 credits. Impossible for a starting gang and unlikley untill late campaign.
House Gangs get all the groovy stuff only the priesthood can get and I will be dammned if I'm paying 60creds just for the priveledge of wielding a sword.
A normal gang can field hordes too if the want and will probably come off better for it too but nobody does because they are seduced by the Heavy Stubber of Plasma Cannons they can get.
My CC group got creamed against our Escher in their last meeting and I lost my Eviscerator too. Redemptionists are not broken, they simply offer a different play style. If you can't pin a Redemptionist Devotee horde outside of flamer range then start playing Delaque.
Well we must be playing completely different styles then. Because to my mind a system that only rewards a Necromunda gang the more people it has is quite broken. I managed to destroy necromunda gangs with hordes of ratskins/scavvies under the old rules. These rules just emphasise (to my mind) the problems that would occur. I never had any problem with break tests (which i assume you mean, not bottle rolls which are hardly a problem for the larger gangs) or pinning tests. Keep your guys far enough apart that they don't break, if someone gets pinned there will always be more people to move forward and take return shots. Remember if they can see you to shoot you, you can see them to shoot them. Additionally, there is nowhere in the rules that says Devotees are juves, and as such don't help anyone for recovering pinning.
The last time i played I didn't injure their heavy before my opponent bottled, i just kept him pinned with sheer volume of shots such that he couldn't return fire. Additionally I don't recommend overwhelming numbers of flamers, that cuts down on the number of guys you can have. However, they don't force you to get closer, they just mean your gang is more effective when you do get closer. And you will.
Average House gang would be 9 guys. My suggested list outnumbers them 2 to 1. Additionally with 0xp on 15 of the guys, you will be in with a good chance of picking at least a few of your first games.
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You do have some very good points but I fail to see where they are broken? Yes they have a steadier income but are limited to what they can spend it on, preventing them from diverging from 1 or 2 different tactics.
As for Devotees I think it is implied that they are Juves, some cost, exp leadership etc. Also the fluff describes them as civillians not gangfighters, personally I think it's unfair to treat them as anything but juves as I believe they were written that way to be the drawback to a large horde.
Plus the bigger the Crusade becomes the worse their chances of winning a game become. Having three of your poor men beaten to a pulp in a raid by enforcers every time you play is upsetting.
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I think your group might play Necromunda very diffrently from mine, and maybe most people's. Because, well;
Plus the bigger the Crusade becomes the worse their chances of winning a game become.
This sentance goes against just about all my Necromunda experiences ever. The only real downside of having a bigger gang is income, either because of the income filter or because of starvation. The boosts of having a large gangs is that you have a lot more meatshields, a lot more punch in CC, a lot more chances to pin the opponent, etc. etc. ad naseum. And Redemptionists gain more money the more models they have, and they don't use the starvation rules, and can even get free guys when you capture someone or someone dies, so the usual downsides of large gangs don't apply. As a result you get a gang that's bigger than all of the other gangs and profits from growing bigger.
Exterminators are expinsive and have to be attatched to weapons 50 + 15 + 15 X 17 = 1370 credits. Impossible for a starting gang and unlikley untill late campaign.
Ah, bad grammar on my part. I didn't mean to imply that all 17 guys had exterminators. It was probably "just" six or seven of them. ::) And 15 points for a one-shot flamer isn't expensive in any way, shape or form. For any other gang it costs 25 points and demands that you give up a roll on the rare trade. For each.
On a side note it's totally possible to get 18 Devotees with Massive weapons and exterminators for under 1000 points, by the way. I don't know how good that would be, but I wouldn't want to face it.
A normal gang can field hordes too if the want and will probably come off better for it too but nobody does because they are seduced by the Heavy Stubber of Plasma Cannons they can get.
Why would house gangs come of better? They're severly penalized for having to large gangs which is the main reason house gangs often have 9 or 12 models starting out.
My CC group got creamed against our Escher in their last meeting and I lost my Eviscerator too. Redemptionists are not broken, they simply offer a different play style. If you can't pin a Redemptionist Devotee horde outside of flamer range then start playing Delaque.
Redemptionists are not unbeatable. But they ARE much harder to beat than ordinary house gangs, simply because they can afford to bring more, relatively well-equipped, models than the opposition has the resources to deal with. It's not because they have a diffrent play style, because they don't. All CC-oriented gangs benefit from having lots and lots of models, it's just that most of them can't afford to have very many and instead equip the ones they have as well as they can. Redemptionists, on the other hand, gain money exponentially to how many gangers they have, which means that they can expand their gangs fast and faster and faster as their numbers increase.
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You do have some very good points but I fail to see where they are broken? Yes they have a steadier income but are limited to what they can spend it on, preventing them from diverging from 1 or 2 different tactics.
As for Devotees I think it is implied that they are Juves, some cost, exp leadership etc. Also the fluff describes them as civillians not gangfighters, personally I think it's unfair to treat them as anything but juves as I believe they were written that way to be the drawback to a large horde.
Plus the bigger the Crusade becomes the worse their chances of winning a game become. Having three of your poor men beaten to a pulp in a raid by enforcers every time you play is upsetting.
A gaming group with an enforcer gang would require a change of playing styles. Yes, but that is usually something you know before you make the gang. Technically speaking, they're also not official yet.
As to limiting their tactics, you don't have to spend all your money on recruits, that's just the easiest way to keep the ball rolling. You increase it to a level you are comfortable winning with, then you equip your guys better. You don't have to max out on numbers, the point is merely to show that once you start the ball rolling the opponent really has no way to stop it. The longer the campaign, the stronger a redemptionist gang will get (comparatively speaking).
As to whether or not they are juves...Are scavvies juves? When do they become "gangers"? Are deacons "heavies" because of their xp and greater weapon access? These are things that should be spelled out and aren't, resulting in ambiguity and personal interpretation. In some cases it is relatively easy to interpret, in others it isn't. The general rule of thumb for games, though, is that unless it specifically states something is a particular way then it generally isn't.
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Sorry what I meant to say was the bigger the gang the less likley you are to pick the scenario and therefore getting creamed.
Devotees cannot get Exterminators as they do not have access to the Grenades and shells list where the Exterminator is located.
I play a split gang of 1 Zealot with an Eviscerator, 1 Priest with a Cs AP and Ex, 5 Crusaders with Shotguns and exterminators and 9 Devotees with Aps. I turn the Shotgunners into Marksmen with Bolt Rounds and have them follow the Devotees and Priest into combat. That is when I pick the scenario, now I am a victim of my own sucess and often get my gang destroyed piecemeal in raids and hit and runs.
There is something to be said for a heavy with a plasma cannon setting up 8" away from you.
The income is supposed to average out to 35 to 40 creds a game so puts them on a par with an average house gang in terms of income.
As for Devotees I really do think that they should be played as Juves and that anyone else who doesn't is cheating pure and simple. If it looks like a Juve and smells like a juve and cannot have basic weapons like a juve then I guess it's a juve. Suddenly the massive Mobs don't look so scary do they?
And I can tell you from experience Exterminators might be a good deterrent but in reality they aren't that great. They blow up easily and 3+ to wound fails 1in3 times plus you rob your own models of XP if you wound more than 1 model in a blast.
I fail to see why people gripe about playing against them, I would rather face a Redemtionist mob than a half decent Van Saar Gang any day of the week.
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Sorry what I meant to say was the bigger the gang the less likley you are to pick the scenario and therefore getting creamed.
Well, no, the bigger the gang rating the lower the chance. Big diffrence. Y'see, one of the main reasons the big-gang approach is so good is that a CC-oriented gang can bring alot of models for a lot less of the gang rating. You've mentioned Plasma Cannons. I currently have a heavy with one of those. He, the plasmacannon and a backup autogun totals in at a gang rating of 425+D6, starting out. For that you can get ten juves with autopistols. Or for gangers with chainswords. I'm not saying that the Plasmacannon doesn't have it's place, but when it comes to gang rating, more guys != higher gang rating.
Devotees cannot get Exterminators as they do not have access to the Grenades and shells list where the Exterminator is located.
Ah, my bad. So you're limited to "just" having less than ten cheaper versions of the hand flamer, which in itself is a horror. :D
There is something to be said for a heavy with a plasma cannon setting up 8" away from you.
"Overkill"? or "Why on earth is he so close with a 72" weapon?" :D ;)
The income is supposed to average out to 35 to 40 creds a game so puts them on a par with an average house gang in terms of income.
Oh, yes. The only diffrence is that while normal gang start out at an average of 35 or 40 creds from their territories, most of the time the only way they go from there is down as the gang grows.
And I can tell you from experience Exterminators might be a good deterrent but in reality they aren't that great. They blow up easily and 3+ to wound fails 1in3 times plus you rob your own models of XP if you wound more than 1 model in a blast.
The mean thing about the hand flamer isn't that it's a phenomenal killer. It's that it does the job of a 70 point flamer while counting as a pistol, with all that this implies, för 25 points. 15 in case of exterminators. And the point of a flamer isn't just to kill people, it's to automatically pin multiple models with one shot that doesn't need to roll to hit. And fails 1/3 times? Compare to an autopistol which costs the same and fails 7/12 times, only gets to shoot at one model and doesn't ignore cover. That's what other gangs have available for close-quarter shooting.
Really, though, as I said, I suspect that the metagame might work very diffrently in your group compared to mine. Over here everybody (including the Redemptionst player) just agreed that the redemptionist rules weren't balanced enough to have in a campaign and decided to simply let people play Cawdor if they wanted fanatics.
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Sorry what I meant to say was the bigger the gang the less likley you are to pick the scenario and therefore getting creamed.
Depends, by the time your GR is that high most of your guys should have advanced, gotten skill ups. Its all subjective after the start.
I play a split gang of 1 Zealot with an Eviscerator, 1 Priest with a Cs AP and Ex, 5 Crusaders with Shotguns and exterminators and 9 Devotees with Aps. I turn the Shotgunners into Marksmen with Bolt Rounds and have them follow the Devotees and Priest into combat. That is when I pick the scenario, now I am a victim of my own sucess and often get my gang destroyed piecemeal in raids and hit and runs.
Now I know we play different styles. That many shotguns? *shudder*
There is something to be said for a heavy with a plasma cannon setting up 8" away from you.
That he's going to get charged?
The income is supposed to average out to 35 to 40 creds a game so puts them on a par with an average house gang in terms of income.
And that works, right up until they start adding members to their starting gang.
As for Devotees I really do think that they should be played as Juves and that anyone else who doesn't is cheating pure and simple. If it looks like a Juve and smells like a juve and cannot have basic weapons like a juve then I guess it's a juve. Suddenly the massive Mobs don't look so scary do they?
I'm not arguing that its right, i'm arguing what the rules state. They're not cheating, because the rules don't say they're juves. Pure and simple. If the rules do not say something, it is not so. It makes an extremely minor difference in my game play. Besides, as i pointed out before, I don't keep mobs close together. It makes them template bait and regardless of whether they're juves or not their leadership means they break.
I fail to see why people gripe about playing against them, I would rather face a Redemtionist mob than a half decent Van Saar Gang any day of the week.
Are you comparing a starting Redemptionist mob to an experienced Van Saar gang? Because going from basic stats I will bet on the 19 member Redemptionist mob over the 7 member with heavy plasma gun kind of gang you've been talking about. At this point I think we're going to have to agree to disagree.
Edit: Note also, that while their average incomes may be similar any additional income the Redemptionists earn is not washed through the income chart IIRC. That is quite a large advantage. I would definitely be picking scavengers as often as possible. Not only because it gets extra income but because it forces my opponent to move from a static position in order to either gain money for himself or prevent me from getting it.
On top of this they get the rules for redeeming and inspiring, not something to be sneered at.
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Plus the bigger the Crusade becomes the worse their chances of winning a game become. Having three of your poor men beaten to a pulp in a raid by enforcers every time you play is upsetting.
Seriously, the larger they become the less chance they have of winning? When I read things like that I'm tempted to use hyperbole and ask if you're even playing Necromunda, because numbers win out in skirmish games more often then they don't. Raids are also not worth using as an example, small elite units dominate in raids - that's great, it should be that way as a slight balance against the horde style of play.
Caelwyn is describing a tried and true tactic for dominating Necromunda campaigns, horde-style Crusades generate a lot of money compared to most and still have access to some of the best equipment even with their limited lists, so they do just fine. A while back on the old boards (and on Eastern Fringe) I ran the maths for how a Crusade operates and given average circumstances they become dominating after just a handful of games. I even went the whole hog and took a Crusade armed with knives (apart from a few key Crusaders and a Priest who provided cover fire) and what happened later was so disgusting we threw the Redemptionist rules out of the window and used Ant's house rules instead.
Frankly, the Redemptionist rules need burning to the ground and reworking from scratch and Necromunda needs hard gang size caps like Mordhiem has.
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Fen I don't think the rules are quite as bad as you say, but yes a cap may be needed for them in the long run.
As for what you all say about do I actually play Necromunda? Yes and I have since the games inception way back when. And I do agree that the Redemptionist Rules do need a rework of some kind but they are no worse than they used to be.
In the long run I still feel that the House Gangs (with the probable exception of Goliath) still have far more of an advantage over the Outlanders. The simple fact that Redemptionists have a steady income is not in my mind greater than the fact that an Escher Gang can start with swords. Or that Van Saar can simply Ignore the Ammo Rules after a half dozen games.
However I feel that I will not win this argument so will bow out gracefully and defer.
I will say one final thing however, instead of nerfing the Reddemptionists why not simply work your Gang in the band lower on the Income chart?
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Fen I don't think the rules are quite as bad as you say, but yes a cap may be needed for them in the long run.
As for what you all say about do I actually play Necromunda? Yes and I have since the games inception way back when. And I do agree that the Redemptionist Rules do need a rework of some kind but they are no worse than they used to be.
I think it's just a case of hyperbole. We're not saying you don't play Necromunda, but that your experiences with it are far from ours. You must have a much less rules-lawyer-y kind of group. In mine, if someone spotted something abusable like this. They would run with it for all it's worth. And pick caravan lots.
In the long run I still feel that the House Gangs (with the probable exception of Goliath) still have far more of an advantage over the Outlanders. The simple fact that Redemptionists have a steady income is not in my mind greater than the fact that an Escher Gang can start with swords. Or that Van Saar can simply Ignore the Ammo Rules after a half dozen games.
However I feel that I will not win this argument so will bow out gracefully and defer.
I will say one final thing however, instead of nerfing the Reddemptionists why not simply work your Gang in the band lower on the Income chart?
The thing is, its not going to be just one gang that needs to adjusting in order to catch up. Its going to be every other gang in the campaign. The different bonuses (like resilient or mutations) that outlanders get are hard to quantify compared to the bonuses that house gangs get and they're going to affect different groups in different ways. Don't feel like you have to censor any more of your opinions just because we disagree. Although I do agree that there's not really much further we can go with this argument. We've both presented our views on why we feel this is or isn't broken. Its not one thing making it broken, its a combination of little things. Money based on the number of guys you have, no gang limit, no income washing, 50% free replacement for dead guys. With other advantages thrown in.