OK, I've re-read it and it does seem to disallow the empty t'hawk recycle option we now have. This might need looking at.

Maybe when ground attacking the AC gets the option to land. In doing so it can behave like a WE transport, be bound by terrain when shooting and be subject to OW attacks? Then once it makes it attacks it makes a disengage move. How does that sound?

I don't like the idea of not being able to land with transport aircraft.

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I don't want to create complications but I thought I'd bring up another long lost point:

Somebody (if memory serves me it was TRC?) brought up two other aircraft orders that were not viable in the standard Air Rules. One of them was escort duty and I can't remember the second one. Just throwing it out there while we're discussing the revamp.

In regard to Intercept and the Orks... Hena has pointed out the potential for Bombers (and Fighta-Bombers are really best at being Bombers) to be more powerful in this set of rules. Is it possible that the change itself will mitigate the loss of the +2 Waaaaagh? And if not, is there any way to work the Intercept back into the rules? I'm not seeing one but it might just be that I'm hungry and not thinking straight.
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In regard to the landed aircraft, I really don't understand the urgency to get them 'off' the table, even as it relates to these modified rules. Yes, I understand it creates another piece of flak on the board, but these are units that are now stuck on the board for an entire turn. Wouldn't having their primary function (flying) gone for a turn balance out against their ability to contest objectives? Just a question - there might be some reasonable explanation that was provided before but I simply can't remember.

On the flip side, even if they do have to take off right away, at least they aren't getting flak rushed.

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Sounds like a massive upgrade to Thunderhawks, Vampires and Landas, which would no longer just take a few BM's during the turn and be auto-destroyed after being broken (with enemies within 15cm).

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Wouldn't it be easier to just disallow AA-umbrellas and give ground AA-units a -1 to hit on their AA if they have moved?

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Well, I think grounded aircraft, if they were to make a comeback (I don't think this would be unreasonable), shouldn't be allowed flak attacks. Their AA weaponry is supposed to represent defence turrets or AA gun with a fixed Arc of fire, intended to be used for their defence while airborne. TH don't carry a hydra turret on their back after all.

Anyway, grounded aircraft (aircraft for which the player choose not to disengage right after and air Assault/Drop mission) should stay on board until they take an action next turn. While they would be immune to flak during the time they're on the ground, this would give them added vulnerability to all the ground to ground weaponry during that time, and as they are immobile and not fearless, they would be auto-destroyed if beaten in an assault as well (or broken and damaged by subsequent blast markers). Basically, they would forfeit their flak and become immobile ground unit until they take off again.

Allowing them to perform an action, land, then disengage in the same action is too much IMHO.
If they perform an air assault (say a thunderhawk come, drops his armoured superheroes of death), they can choose to either :
a) participate in the assault and then disengage
OR
b) participate in the assault and then stay grounded until they take an action in the next turn (possibly an evac or a ground attack) and disengage/leave the board at that time.

Allowing them to Air assault, stay grounded and evac troops in the same turn doesn't make that much sense and is essentially allowing them to roll two actions into one.

Actually, i think the alternative rules are pretty good. What we saw thus far require mostly small adjustments (Whaaag bonus, evac'ed unit being able to come back). I think the possible issues we may still have to really iron out is this air assault/grounded craft mechanism.

It may lead to some debate as it will probably influence the balance of Air assault oriented list, but as there is already quite a lot of debate about those lists, many arguing their balancing need a review already.

I think actually, given the current overall of the marine list (usual suspect concerning these issues), it is probably the right time to iron out such rules.

The proposal i made in my last post essentially imply that you can no longer Air assault, then use the disengage move of the same turn to evac' another formation. If you wanted to use Thunderhawk recycling, you'd have to air assault on turn one, stay grounded*, then you move a formation in the TH with a later action in turn 1 or in turn 2, then with its turn 2 activation, the TH takes off and evac with it's belly full of troops or ground attack elsewhere** and disengage.

Then you would be able to air assault again in Turn 3 with your loaded TH.

We need to assess how important an impact this is. If theses rules imply some repricing of Aircraft assets, well, so be it. We may hardly expect them not to.


*with all the risk you may incur, but then again marines have a high SR and might well air assault at the end of the turn and disengage as their first action the next turn. Landa recycling would be quite riskier actually. I don't know how often it's used.

**With its belly full of troops as well ? I don't think this would be problematic, given the additional risk of getting shot down and losing the full cargo. The loaded TH or Vampire strafing a formation on its way home wouldn't be too out of character IMO.

Don´t they have that since the 2008Errata (at least for disengagement)??

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I don't like this, at least without further review. Unless I'm misreading something, it makes Ork FightaBommas 1+ Initiative, in all situations. We already have issues with players in our group not liking it being 1+ in most situations. The part I like about Orks, is that some things, they do really well, and some things, they do really poorly. Making the air fleet all "really well" seems a bit meh. We already have Landas always Initiative 1+ base (because of their inability to do other actions). Do Orks REALLY have the best fighter fleet in the Epic universe?

Morgan Vening

Guys, the rules posted were a draft. Several tweaks were discussed. Before the rules progressed very far the decision was made that there would not be enough time to get them tested and implemented before the Rules Review was scheduled to be complete. Since they weren't being considered, they were never revised.

Following are some explanations for why certain decisions were made. Note, I'm NOT defending these ideas. I'm just laying them out there to provide background for discussion.

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Evac: The "non-return" evac was for a few reasons. From a balance perspective, the lack of return was specifically to prevent recycling air assaults. A number of the aircraft rules oddities were introduced to keep tabs on those strategies. Removing the ability was intended to streamline the rules and avoid needing to consider what new problems might be introduced under the immediate disengage regime. As others have already noted, the lack of aircraft remaining on the board is something of a boost, as it eliminates the substantial vulnerability of a loaded AC sitting on the ground.

From a realism perspective, an air transport is not going to land, load, take off and return to a hot LZ within the ~15 minutes of an Epic turn. Nor is a ground formation going to embark, reorganize and plan a new attack in that time frame. The air game is highly abstracted. It's not "this exact aircraft flies over 3 times, and that exact aircraft is shot down." A formation of aircraft isn't one specific formation. It represents a total level of support over the course of the game, provided by multiple flights of aircraft. Recycling air assaults violates that abstraction because it is unavoidably "these exact units."

There was also something of a desire to have some rules that were primarily intended for scenario use rather than having everything implicitly geared towards GT play. Evac would obviously be of little use in the "fight to the death in the arena" style of the GT and would be mostly for use in scenarios.

That said, allowing Evac aircraft and troops to return was one of the most common requests/suggestions.


Landed aircraft: Aircraft landing was removed entirely for a couple of reasons as well. First, there was the balance issue of objective grabs, which many people thought was cheesy (and eventually led to the "contest, but can't capture" change in the 2008 review).

More importantly, though, the transition from air unit to ground unit and back again was a common source of confusion. There was a constant stream of questions about what actions an aircraft could take, at exactly what point they switched from air to ground, what happened to BMs in the transition, and so on. As an example, many people thought a landed aircraft could "hop" around the battlefield by using a Ground Attack action and moving via the approach move rules.

I understand your concern, but with the orks loosing the +2 to intercept, their fighter become much worse at doing actual fighter job.

Maybe one, or both bonus could be lowered if this is really a balance concern.

Oh, I'd have no problem with that. Make CAP +1. Or make all Ork Air 2+ (and remove Waagh from aircraft as redundant there). I just have an issue with boosting the only weak aspect of Ork Air because one of their strengths is gone.

Morgan Vening

Actually, most of it makes sense. I'm not so sure any more; I still think the rules could be amended to enable some measure of recycling (the two turns recycle I proposed is acceptable I think, one turn recycle always looked very gamey and unrealistic to me) If "popular demand" is that we should still be able to.

Aircraft being completely unable to claim or contest objective is fine by me, actually i don't like aircraft contesting objectives at all.

Being able to return evac'd troops doesn't make much sense if the returning aircraft is not supposed to be the same as the one who evac'ed them of course.

Actually, I think I could go with the original alternative rule (possibly with something done for the orks "Power of the whaaaagh!" rule), OR with a set of revised alternative rules with the discussed amendments about returning evac'ed troops and possibly aircraft grounding for a turn.

I loathe the one turn "air-assault -> pick up guys -> get out" and aircrafts grabbing objective with passion, I merely dislike aircraft contesting objective.

Being able to ground an air-assaulting aircraft and have it waiting until the next turn to take off, possibly loaded with guys is OK.

I, personally, like non-return evac and no landing.

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