Greetings, brethern

I bought "Into the Storm" yesterday to get a hand on the official vehicle rules (and some more background about star ships) for my DH games.

While I will surely make good use of the given vehicle stats, I am still unsure about my own. In a futur mission, I plan to give my players access to an old hovercraft (to get through some swamps). What I am uncertain about is the speed and some other stats

The vehicle is going to be rather small (perhaps the size of a pick-up truck, but "lower"), open-topped and will be intended to carry a squad of people and supplies. Being a military squad vehicle, it will be armed with heavy stubber.

I thought about allowing turns similiar to how a void craft is able to "over-turn" (hovercraft are more manouverable then other ground vehicles, I suppose) and think about a tatical speed of 17meters (more then the Rhino APC, less then the Scout Bike). Armour will be rather low (AP 8 at the front, AP 4 everywhere else and AP 2 if somebody calls shots for the "skirts"). Their won´t be to much structure easy, me thinks (since it has to be light wait).


Any thoughts/comments? Thank you

These sorts of things?

And the good old LCAC..

As for stats, no idea, dont have that book yet

Hover Technology is reletively simple when compared to Antigrav Technology, so it's be a common type vehicle i guess on many worlds.

Just use it like a ground vehicle that can travel on water. Treats the water like clear terrain. Perhaps reduce levels of terrain, such as rough becomes clear, mountainous becomes hilly, like that. Or just make it like a ground vehicle with a +20 to handling on all terrains.

Over clear terrain a skirted hover craft is more than capable, especially when having to make a change from water to ground. Rough terrain will offer a challenge to a skirted air-cushion hovercraft as it may disrupt the skirt and adversely effect it's mobility. They are best used when transiting from land(beach, quay, harbor) across water to another location Transport ship or on ground. At slow speeds they can turn on a dime, at cruising speed they will act much more like a flyer(45deg) than ground vehicle(90deg).

Milspec hovercraft: (LCAC)

type: Ground(Amphibious)

Tactical spd: 10

Cruising: 70kph

Manoeuverability: Tactical +20, Cruising +0

Structural Integrity: 25

Size: Enormous

armor: F16 S15 R13

Crew:: pilot, co-pilot, 3x gunner

Carry Capacity: 60 metric tonnes

Note: skirt armored against glancing small arms AP 3(treat as flak)

Weapons: Heavy stubber, autocannon, automatic grenade launcher

Civspec hovercraft

Type: Ground (Amphibious)

Tactical: 15

Cruising: 60kph

Manoeuverability: Tactical +20, cruising +0

Structural integrity: 10

Size: Hulking

Armor: F10 S10 R10

Crew: Driver

Carry Capacity: 1 person and 100kg cargo

Note: skirt unarmored AP1(due to materials used)

First of all, thanks for all the input already given!

@Velvet
More like your first picture (nice drawing? Where does it hail from?). But I imagine it to be larger (with a loading space similiar to a pic up so it coulde transport 6 persons and gear for them) and one MG to be mounted up front so the driver can fire while driving. Yes, this is a STUPID concept... but I want to use it for DarkHeresy where my guardsmen player is the one who was although willing to spent ("waste") points on "Drive (Ground Vehicle)".

@PhantomOfTruth
Thanks for the stats and the ideas for the rules. Know I just need to make the thing a little smaller aaaand....

I just googled Military Hovercraft on the image search 1st page of results.

Reminds me of stuff from Twilight 2k, Mechwarrior rpg, and Shadowrun 2nd ed

Hovercraft ideas:

If you simply want something that can go through water and such there's the Chimera APC. Fully amphibious. Multi laser on turret (stats on other vehicles) and heavy bolter on the hull as standard armament. Armor stats would be the armor values of the land speeder for sides and back. Armor slightly better than the rhino on the front. Crews 2 or 3 and cargo is 13 passengers.

I'm not sure how many you want to carry but the land speeder listed has like a crew of 2 and cargo for 5 more. Can add heavy bolter quite easily. Multiple of these to carry more people is always an option.

If you wanted to go as simple as possible you could take the rhino stats and just give it a heavy bolter and let it hover instead. The least fuss and less work that you need to do to play.

Keep in mind that overcrafts aren't agile - sure they can be fast, but they handle like a pig on ice (with greased feet...). The reason is that they don't touch the ground, which means they can't use friction to alter their motion and instead must rely on thrust and possibly aerodynamic surfaces. And those aren't very effective since they're slower than airplanes.

In ruls terms that would translate as high top speed but weak acceleration, poor handling and crappy braking. They're also reasonably impervious to road condition - running on firm ground, mud or ice is the same. On the other hand, broken ground and slopes are major problems. Broken ground because it tends to cause 'leaks' of the air cushion - wich can cause rough landings and maybe even leave you stuck. Slopes because sine you don't have any friction with the ground, the overcraft will drift downslope.

All considered, their playgrounds are flat surfaces with few obstacles. If teh terrain is good they have an advantage of speed over whelled or tracked vehicles, on poor ground they're about the only vehicle able to navigate the terrain.

Ringarin said:

For sure an nice idea, but I plan to send the pc into the environment of swamps and bogs. While unexperienced as it comes to APC, I expect that they will get stuck due to their weight.

An amphibious APC will have srious trouble in a swamp : sure it floats, but with the armor something like 80% of the hull are under water. The yswim more like a corcodile than a duck :-). That translates as something like a 2 meters draft, more than enough to mired in bottom murk soft enough that the thread don't grip and thick enough to block forward progression...Which would leave dragging with a winch as the only reliable method... if one can find something sturdy enough to tie the cable to.

Swamps are a real pain to move through, and one of the places where overcrafts are the vehicles of choice.

And in case you need some inspiration for 'boss' vehicles...

http://gizmodo.com/388911/russias-zubr-hovercraft-may-finally-justify-use-of-xtreme

http://www.google.be/images?hl=nl&rlz=&q=ekranoplan&um=1&ie=UTF-8&source=univ&ei=21eYTKKOJdm5jAebmIws&sa=X&oi=image_result_group&ct=title&resnum=1&ved=0CCUQsAQwAA&biw=1920&bih=923

http://www.google.be/images?hl=nl&rlz=&=&q=VVA-14&um=1&ie=UTF-8&source=og&sa=N&tab=wi&biw=1920&bih=923

Here's a good'un for an APC

http://www.hovercraft-museum.org/russaist.html