Hello!

I've been playing OW for a while now, and despite nerfing Accurate Weapons to make them into sniping weapons rather than main combat weapons, the ratling comrade abilities seem to overcome this easily.

I'm assuming that comrade advances that has an action listed in parenthesis is what the comrade needs to spend, not what the ratling does.

So using Spotter (passive) and set-up shot (Order, half action) this is possible:

1. comrade takes aim action which benefits ratling

2. Ratling takes own aim action (making it Full-action aim)

3. comrade shoots at target using own half action, the target is unable to dodge (despite having Step Aside and super-dodge talents)

4. Rating fires as half action using Long Las at less than 75 meters: +20 full aim +10 accurate +10 range, +10 single shot. If he scores 5 DoS that means 3d10+4 (avg. 20) damage pen 1 that can't be dodged.

Did I get anything wrong here? Most of the time ratling fires at enemies with regular amount of TB and wounds he one-shots them. That's fitting with the sniper theme, and allows him to be very useful to the otherwise more experienced party, and he hardly outkills the Heavy gunner using the Heavy Stubber, yet getting undodgeable shots at little cost.

I¨'m not sure if I want to houserule and nerf more, but first I want to see if we're doing it correct in the first place.

It's a bit of a gray area, in theory everything seems fine but:

1. It's not stated if two half-action aim actions stack, it's either a half-action for +10 or full-action for +20, I'd rule it that they don't and spotter can either use his full action or his half action to give according bonus, but not half spotter and half sniper for one full.

2. As stated in the description for the "Spotter" the comrade uses magnoculars and "other tools", whatever they may be, and for the "set-up shot" he uses his own rifle. In this situation if he wanted to use both skills in one round it would be impossible since changing an equipment needs at least half-action.

I'd also like to ask how you nerfed "Accurate", it's strong but not overpowered in my oppinion, you need to take aim action for it to take effect and it can only be used with single shot, moreover without proper talent (3 tier form Hammer of the Emperor, "Versatile Shooter") bonus damage from the trait works only with basic weapons. Also Accurate weapons should be quite rare to get and mostly reserved for the sniper weapons, making them, well... sniper weapons that one shot kill most targets.

It's a bit of a gray area, in theory everything seems fine but:

1. It's not stated if two half-action aim actions stack, it's either a half-action for +10 or full-action for +20, I'd rule it that they don't and spotter can either use his full action or his half action to give according bonus, but not half spotter and half sniper for one full.

2. As stated in the description for the "Spotter" the comrade uses magnoculars and "other tools", whatever they may be, and for the "set-up shot" he uses his own rifle. In this situation if he wanted to use both skills in one round it would be impossible since changing an equipment needs at least half-action.

I'd also like to ask how you nerfed "Accurate", it's strong but not overpowered in my opinion, you need to take aim action for it to take effect and it can only be used with single shot, moreover without proper talent (3 tier form Hammer of the Emperor, "Versatile Shooter") bonus damage from the trait works only with basic weapons. Also Accurate weapons should be quite rare to get and mostly reserved for the sniper weapons, making them, well... sniper weapons that one shot kill most targets.

Well, i nerfed it by requiring the full-action aim to get extra damage. So by combining the two aim actions is the only way to get accurate damage every turn by my rules. I can understand how a primary sniper can do better than most normal guardsman.

I got the impression the tools part was fluff more than hard rules, other talents implies that comrades have whatever they need in their hands at the right time, otherwise the Weapon Specialists advance would not work to quickly be handed another weapon. If nothing else, the comrade could be using rifle scope optics instead to spot with. Note that Spotter has no action time in itself or order needed, yet only a half action is needed for the comrade, not half-action to ready binocs and then another half action to aim and call target.

Because of my own nerf, If I make it impossible to use both advances at the same time, that would mean the sniper would only benefit from the no-dodge shot when able to take a full-turn aim (I.E ambush situations). That would make him pretty useless in normal combat against enemies with good dodge.

Than it would be as it is with snipers in a normal world usually a regular soldier fieres away half his clip in time that the sniper aims and kills one enemy. Sharpshooters, marksman and snipers are more of support / precision strike units, and not full on combat ones.

Your nerf sounds reasonable enough, and with that I can understand your logic and letting them stack the aim action, sounds good.

Without it, a good sniper that want to do a full round aim and shoot an undodgable round into enemy, would need a "Ranged Weapon Expert" 3 tier talent from HotE.

If you are willing to consider it I would propose a bit different nerf to Accurate, for half round aim you can only get +1d10 dam with 2 DoS, and with full round aim you can get up to +2d10 dam as in RAW. But that's just suggestion

Also, sure, the equipment might be just for fluff, but even looking at modern times it's easier to get good, high quality binoculars with rangefinder and other additional features than to get the same thing on a scope, binoculars can be more massive to accomodate additional features and sensors for measurments as in scope of a rifle is suppose to be relatively light as not to unbalance the weapon and make it awkward to shoot. Sure the technology is much more advanced, but simple guardsman rarely have access to such sophisticated technology as omni scopes or sth like that.

The best part of "Spotter" as in RAW is that the sniper can move and take an aimed ("Accurate") shot in the same round.