Reading over the various threads on the knights a thought occurred to me.

Thinking about the comparisons to medieval knights and armies. Cavalry was often more effective when used to chase down already fleeing enemies.

Knights are an assault-based army (mainly) but struggle against the numbers game that EA assaults tend towards. Both in regards winning (out number bonuses) and the big effect losing has (more expensive units being hacked down).

So I wondered..

Could we introduce a rule to make knights more dangerous if they do win an assault (to mirror the concept of cavalry chasing down fleeing foes)?

Something along the lines of..

If a formation of Knights wins an assault the opponent suffers X additional hackdowns*.
*substitute "hackdowns" for the appropriate wording from the rule book.

Make X a fixed number (1,2,etc) or related to the win margin (1 for every 2 points the knights win by) or the number of remaining knights (1 for every 2 knights).

Perhaps it should be limited to when the knights are the attackers (If a formation of Knights initiates and wins an assault the opponent suffers X additional hackdowns).

Theory: to encourage and reward the use of knights in an offensive assault style of play, without the need to raise stats/add more weapons etc

Thoughts?

I'd actually wonder if perhaps Knights should take lesser penalties for being outnumbered (assuming they don't already).

EDIT: Also, since the problem is getting them to win in the first place, wouldn't it make more sense to address that, rather than make them better at something they have trouble doing in the first place?

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Ignoring out numbering is something that I am sure MV has already considered/is considering. It just seems a little mundane as a special rule.

P.S. I should probably have given some kind of name for the suggestion.. something along the lines of "Glorious Charge!"

Edit: there is a danger of messing about with the basic assault modifiers too much, add in multiple inspiring units etc and it gets daft. Thus my suggestion was along slightly different lines.

Not at all in favour of any kind of assault modifier.

Any reasoning there Zombo?

Clausewitz - if there aren't any inspiring units then there's no problem right?

Firstly, plenty of units/armies could give fluff reasons for assault bonuses, knights are nothing special there.

Secondly, I'm never in favour of special rules unless absolutely neccessary.

Thirdly, it'll be bloody annoying for the opponent. "oh, I get +1 just because I'm knights".

That's spirit-stones thinking.

I like it.

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The problem isn't with them not winning assaults. It's with ME not winning Assaults.

A 3 man Lancer formation should average 2 First Strike hits, 2 MW hits, and 2 normal hits. Against most enemies, that's 4 kills. A 3 man Errant formation gets 1 First Strike, 1 MW and 1 normal, if out of position. If in position, it adds an additional 2 MW hits, and another 2 normal hits. And those are just the minimum 225pt formations.

That's fairly impressive outputs. Coupled with a 4+RA on the defensive, it should take an average of 8 attacks at 4+ to take a single one down.

While the random elements do seem to have conspired against me recently, I'm not adverse to making them a little more resilient on the downside. But making them stronger offensively when they already seem to be one of the best non-airborne assault formations, just skews the glass hammer a bit too far.

And I agree with Zombo regarding broadline Assault Modifiers. For one, it's a slippery slope (Hey, my World Eaters should do better! No, my Space Wolves should! What about my Gretchin! Be quiet, Sun Tzork!). For another, as above, the actual abilities of the Knights SHOULD be sufficient. Some kind of tweak of size calculation might be the way to go, but only defensively. It's got me thinking (Hey, what's that burning smell?), but I'd like to see a bigger sampling and opinions from both players and opponents.

Morgan Vening

I take your point zombo...

But there are a lot of armies that do have some kind of rule that works in or around assaults..

SM - ATSKNF
Orks - Grots
Eldar - Hit & Run (Full move consolodate)
AMTL - Voidshields
And the IG have their commisars (not a soecial rule as such but a lot of inspiring around).

The Knight Shield does virtually nothing in an assault (how many FF/CC attacks have TK?). So it's not as if the Knights are piling on the assault special rules. It was more something to give the knights flavour, like ATSKNF/Grots/Hit & Run give the armies those rules are in.

Edit: E&C and MV both ninja'd me
The irony of E&C likiing my idea moments before MV (probably quite rightly) nixed it is rather amusing

Oh, I'm not completely against something that adds some kind of resilience *if necessary*. I'm just yet to see more than two fairly painful examples of what not to do. I mean, if we go based on those, then the FF value of RoughRiders needs tweaking down (I've won more assaults with RoughRiders Firefighting defensively, than I have with them charging, including against a Land Raider formation)


Just a reminder regarding the highlighted section, Knightshields in CC don't work. And there used to be some Chaos, and Tyranids that did. Nothing with TK FF as far as I know.


Given their often differing opinions, I wonder how much broken crockery/furniture there is in the E&C&Z household.

Morgan Vening

I have been engaged by enemy Rough Riders twice in memory... and have lost 900 points of units in those two engagements.

They're brothers. 'nuff said.

I'll leave it up to the reader to interpret that statement. (hint: it could be both)

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As to TK attacks. Titan Close Combat Weapons have TK (AMTL, Eldar and Tyranid lists at the very least) and the Warlock Titan has a TK FF attack. In short not much besides titans.