I've been working on the points and updated all of them to suit newer rules and stuff check them out in the cards section of my blog. Also there are monster cards I added for halloween and a ghost town mission. Tell me what you think.

I've been sick and among other things has happened for me to post pone these cards.

They look pretty, and they show a lot of effort.

Several take game balance, and throw it to the wolves, and others for historical vehicles make absolutely no sense.

A few quick points as examples: Fighting Spirit disappeared with the Revised Core Rules. If you consider its implications for a full sized unit, you should be able to see that it would have to cost a ridiculous amount to come close to being playable as other than a game breaker. I think it might come back in a future expansion, but it would have to be in a very different form tomaintain balance.

Your Sun Gun is a 20 point one shot weapon. For that, you have a 91% chance for a one shot kill on the Fireball , and a 96% chance of a one shot kill on any medium walker currently available. Take two, and you have a 99% chance to eliminate an 82 point target for 40 points, with a 91% probability of killing it with the first shot, and having the other for something else. That doesn't address the ridiculous odds any infantry unit has of surviving the attack, which are worse .

You note the M8 Greyhound as armor 3, but the M18 Hellcat as armor 2 and the M36 Jackson as armor 5. All were open topped, but the Hellcat carried thicker armor on almost every facing compared to the Greyhound, while the Jackson carried far less than the Sherman. When compared to the descriptions for armor values, all are designed to be able to stop small arms, so armor 3 would be appropriate. Armor 2 would be best for half tracks, 3 for most armored cars & open topped tank destroyers, 4 for most tanks before the real heavies, 5 for the heavies, 6 for the rare few like the Maus or using VK technology, and 7 for things like the Fireball. Your historical vehicle armor values don't come very close to matching history.

I applaud your efforts, but new units should be made to add to the game, and not break it.

I have to disagree with Gimp on this one. While tha cards show a lot of effort for making them, the units you have posted don't throw game balance to the wolves.

They throw game balance to the wolves, nuke them from orbit with your Sun Gun, and then blast the resulting ashes into sub-atomic particles with your Teleforce Death Ray.

Now, as with Gimp, I do appreciate that you have put a lot of effort into making these cards. They look pretty slick, and it's cool to have the Dust fanbase putting up fan-created content for the game. However, while you obviously put time into making the cards , it feels like you put very little time or thought into the design for the actual units . More specifically, they don't fit with historical examples, they don't fit with the design critera of current units, they don't fit with the stated fluff and background info, and they certainly don't fit within any kind of game balance of Dust,

Some of the "historical" units not matching up with reality have already been listed, so I'll not delve into that too much. Thing is, years ago I bought the game Gear Krieg by DP9, because it was alternate-history WW2 with walking tanks. After taking one look through the rules book, I put it on my shelf, where it has collected dust since. Why? Because while the game was pretty good, and the walking tanks were cool, the historical units did not function as they should have. This is a serious turn-off for gamers that are also any degree of history buff. So when I see your open-topped M7 Priest card has the exact same armor as the M4 Sherman, it makes my skin crawl.

Units in Dust also fit with one another. For example, the only models in Dust that have a movement value of 2 are the Allied jetpack troops. Everything else is move 1, and if they are quick on their feet for some reason they have abilities like fast, agile or charge. So why did you make a character with a jetpack speed 3 AND agile, when jetpacks are needed to even have a speed of 2? In addition to not fitting with other models, this also causes issue with the Rocketeer joining a unit, which would bring its speed up to three (with agile as well). Since Dust does not yet include any units that increase the movement value of a unit directly yet, presumably when they do there will be a reason for it. As is, "this guy has a faster jetpack so these other guys do too" just doesn't seem to cut it.

Another point for consideration with current design critera are your "Kolossus" unit cards. Even just a cursory glance at the descriptions of different Armor Classes in the basic revised core set rules book will reveal, on page 4, that armor 4 is for "Soldiers wearing armor that is far beyond what is found on Earth in 1947." I.e., armor 4 is pretty much reserved for the Vrill if they ever come out.

As far as fitting with stated fluff and background for the game, take the Barking Dog. The product info for it on the model's page says about its weapon system, quite explicitly, "They are designed to fire all at the same time on the same target, delivering a powerful blow to any armor or fortification." Yet your version has six one-shot weapons that cannot be reloaded. Your "Ludolf" walker has a single 88mm gun (even though you have it listed as a 8.8mm by mistake), the same type that the Ludwig was a pair of. According to the fluff, the Ludwig is designed so that both of its guns fire at the exact same point to have a better whance of cracking through Russian vechile armor. Yet your version of a single 88mm, on both your Tiger and your Ludolf, has almost the exact same statline as the double guns.

Not even delving into slightly less obvious things like Nick Fury and the Holwing Commandos, I already mentioned two of the biggest game-breakers. Why would I not take an army of all death rays? Unless my opponent brings an army consisting entirely of sniper and observer teams, the only units less expensive than your one-shot, insta-kill wonder, I win. Heck, even limiting it to one per army doesn't fix anything, it just breaks it slightly less. Just one death ray still is enough to destroy one unit of your choice, whenever and wherever you like. If you're going that route, you might as well just streamline the process, and have the death ray's special ability say "Remove one enemy unit of your choice from the game after setup."

Again, I do appreciate the work that you have put into making these. I'm no stranger to photoshopping up new cards for games myself, so believe me when I say I know how much effort you have put into them. But fan-made extras should add things to a game, extra content that the game designers haven't put in yet, or possibly even won't put in ever. Fan-made extras should not just be unbalanced rules problems, regardless of how pretty looking they may be.

Gimp - The sun gun and teleforce gun are both uniques and you can only have one of I think it says it on the article that I made when they came out.

All my tanks are gone by the front armor since all the walkers in dust do the same. I can't go making side armor and rear armor for a tank that doesnt have those aspect in the game. so also while the tank is less that the other most of them are slightly less and I have to take that into consideration considering there are only 7 armor values.

As for the Maus and Ratte being armor 7 is due to it was never build bc they knew they didnt have the appropriate technology to make it and its size was improbable. My whole idea for them was that with this new tech they made the adjustments to them and upped it.

Tank value is also arranged by thickness. Sherman's thickness is 53mm. While I do know about naval ships do contracting design at a shipyard and stuff like tanks I don't have as much experience with so I went with the ship knowledge i have and being that when certain thickness of armor is available its harder to penetrate.

Grey Knight - They throw game balance to the wolves, nuke them from orbit with your Sun Gun, and then blast the resulting ashes into sub-atomic particles with your Teleforce Death Ray.

"Now, as with Gimp, I do appreciate that you have put a lot of effort into making these cards. They look pretty slick, and it's cool to have the Dust fanbase putting up fan-created content for the game. However, while you obviously put time into making the cards, it feels like you put very little time or thought into the design for the actual units. More specifically, they don't fit with historical examples, they don't fit with the design critera of current units, they don't fit with the stated fluff and background info, and they certainly don't fit within any kind of game balance of Dust"

This all is done by arkangl not gimp.

"Some of the "historical" units not matching up with reality have already been listed, so I'll not delve into that too much. Thing is, years ago I bought the game Gear Krieg by DP9, because it was alternate-history WW2 with walking tanks. After taking one look through the rules book, I put it on my shelf, where it has collected dust since. Why? Because while the game was pretty good, and the walking tanks were cool, the historical units did not function as they should have. This is a serious turn-off for gamers that are also any degree of history buff. So when I see your open-topped M7 Priest card has the exact same armor as the M4 Sherman, it makes my skin crawl."

This is explained with what I said to Gimp.

"Units in Dust also fit with one another. For example, the only models in Dust that have a movement value of 2 are the Allied jetpack troops. Everything else is move 1, and if they are quick on their feet for some reason they have abilities like fast, agile or charge. So why did you make a character with a jetpack speed 3 AND agile, when jetpacks are needed to even have a speed of 2? In addition to not fitting with other models, this also causes issue with the Rocketeer joining a unit, which would bring its speed up to three (with agile as well). Since Dust does not yet include any units that increase the movement value of a unit directly yet, presumably when they do there will be a reason for it. As is, "this guy has a faster jetpack so these other guys do too" just doesn't seem to cut it."

There is something you're definitely not getting. Rocketeer is armor 2 and units like the Grim Reapers are armor 3. I took the idea that since he is lighter and not wearing as must armor as the reapers are he would go faster. Also currently there is not unit the Rocketeer could join. the Reapers armor value difference prevents them from joining him.

"Another point for consideration with current design critera are your "Kolossus" unit cards. Even just a cursory glance at the descriptions of different Armor Classes in the basic revised core set rules book will reveal, on page 4, that armor 4 is for "Soldiers wearing armor that is far beyond what is found on Earth in 1947." I.e., armor 4 is pretty much reserved for the Vrill if they ever come out."

As being that nor the Soviets or the Aliens are out I had made this decision on the idea that look at the heavy rangers and the heavy grenadiers there is one difference between them at the Kolossus. The Kolossus is a fully enclosed walking suit. It's too small to be a vehicle like I had at one point but its too big to be the armor 3 like you would like it. I look at it as the Soviets made full use of the armor of the aliens.

"As far as fitting with stated fluff and background for the game, take the Barking Dog. The product info for it on the model's page says about its weapon system, quite explicitly, "They are designed to fire all at the same time on the same target, delivering a powerful blow to any armor or fortification." Yet your version has six one-shot weapons that cannot be reloaded. Your "Ludolf" walker has a single 88mm gun (even though you have it listed as a 8.8mm by mistake), the same type that the Ludwig was a pair of. According to the fluff, the Ludwig is designed so that both of its guns fire at the exact same point to have a better whance of cracking through Russian vechile armor. Yet your version of a single 88mm, on both your Tiger and your Ludolf, has almost the exact same statline as the double guns."

I did the barking dog way before they made the description. I had the model as a promo model a store got. I immediately made the card b4 they made their fluff. Plus you know how useless the Barking dog would be if it fired all at once. Think about it. It already only has 6 shots lets making it nerfed more than you want it to be. I'm not going to find it but Olivier explained this, on BGG forums, when people were asking the questions of whether the Ludwig has 2 or 1 statlines and was this a typo. He explained that b/c they fired at the same time they it only increased the damage but so much. While also doing this the 8.8cm was still more powerful than the pounder in WWII and thats the explination for the Ludolf and the Tiger. If you play games like 40k its more like twin-linked being added in extra dice rather than rerolling.

"Not even delving into slightly less obvious things like Nick Fury and the Holwing Commandos, I already mentioned two of the biggest game-breakers. Why would I not take an army of all death rays? Unless my opponent brings an army consisting entirely of sniper and observer teams, the only units less expensive than your one-shot, insta-kill wonder, I win. Heck, even limiting it to one per army doesn't fix anything, it just breaks it slightly less. Just one death ray still is enough to destroy one unit of your choice, whenever and wherever you like. If you're going that route, you might as well just streamline the process, and have the death ray's special ability say "Remove one enemy unit of your choice from the game after setup."

Death rays are uniques like mentioned to Gimp. They made one satellite for both and thats circling the world. Ever play the game gears of war for the 360 they had one just like this except when it fired it was mostly a 1 shotter and flaky. I was gonna redo them both to make them more like phasers but I haven't gotten a chance to do it.

Again, I do appreciate the work that you have put into making these. I'm no stranger to photoshopping up new cards for games myself, so believe me when I say I know how much effort you have put into them. But fan-made extras should add things to a game, extra content that the game designers haven't put in yet, or possibly even won't put in ever. Fan-made extras should not just be unbalanced rules problems, regardless of how pretty looking they may be.

As for the card all of these card were made b4 the revised. With new stuff coming out I do have to constantly update these due to how the game works. I only ask how you liked my heroes not the tanks. I am in the process of redoing them so people like you dont fuss my head off.

I would never have commented on your blog units, except that you came here to the forum and asked for opinions. I'd glanced at your blog, liked the conversion ideas, but stopped looking at the unit cards after a cursory examination until you asked for opinions. With all of your unit cards being together, commenting on issues with one group, without addressing issues with the other, would be inefficient, at best. You asked, for opinions, so I gave you mine.

The Teleforce Gun and Sun Gun being unique is not the issue. The fact that either one of them, while costing less than almost every unit in the game, have over a 90% chance of destroying the most powerful unit released for the game so far, while costing less than a quarter as much, is the problem.

The Teleforce Gun is worse than the Sun Gun, as it has a 96% chance to kill a Fireball, while costing only 15 points. The Fireball has no place to hide from their attacks, either. Either one, however, give your opponent no reason to take bigger units, because those two are close to a guaranteed kill against the two most powerful units your opponent fields. Two kill shots with better than a 90% success rate, while costing less combined than most medium walkers, is a huge advantage.

While your tanks may be thought to go by frontal armor, I'd suggest you look a little closer at the armor values you are using, and also consider the definitions given in the rules. If armor 4 is defined as being for most tanks from early to mid-war, armored cars and light tank destroyers should not qualify. The Jackson was as close as an open topped tank destoryer came, but it's foolish not to consider a vehicle's primary weakness when assigning capabilities. When you are considering a tank's armor with a single value, not considering the issues from weaker side or turret armor for that single value gives a ridiculously skewed version of the vehicle's capabilities. You may also want to verify your sources, as a Chafee was far better armored than your M8 Greyhound, for a simple example.

If you check modern sources, you can also find there have been records found of the Maus in battle against Soviet forces. They had the technology, and made them, just not very many.

Grey Knight was not giving me credit for any of your work, he was agreeing with me that you had obviously done a lot of work, however flawed he or I might find it.

Grey Knight's point about the Rocketeer still stands. Fine, he's wearing less armor. So is a Hans compared to a Ludwig, yet you notice no speed difference there. The Hans gets a Scout move at the beginning of the game, yet otherwise stays the same speed. The fastest walkers get Fast, for a minor additional movement. The rocket troops currently in the game can fly over some obstacles, but still only get a 33% higher maximum speed than fast normal infantry. Your Rocketeer doubles that speed, and adds Agile, for even more maneuverability. Whether he can join a Jump unit now, or not, is irrelevent to what he adds to the game for maneuver. Consider those missions where the Allies are working to close Axis entry points, or simply reach an objective point, to win. Now add a unit that travels 50% further per turn than any other unit in the game. Speed 3 is a huge shift in tactical capability for certain scenarios.

Using Armor 4 for heroes simply because you want them better than current units is not a balanced decision. Look at what other units can do to Armor 4. Consider thet Armor 3 for vehicles includes all fighting vehicles better than a halftrack up to the pre-43 main battle tanks, and you should be able to realize there is a lot of room for what a single Armor rating represents. The Panther and Tiger I are both pre-43 tanks. If infantry Armor 4 is defined as beyond anything on Earth in 1947, no unit from Earth in 1947 can have infantry Armor 4. Bigger does not mean better armored, it sometimes just means bigger. The Sherman was bigger than a Panther, but was much less protected.

The Barking Dog as a six shot weapon is not a game breaker, though the capability you give it of an 18 dice attack is ridiculously overpowered. Recoiless rifles were both easily reloadable, and also not Indirect Fire weapons. They were direct fire only weapons capable of being mounted on light vehicles like Jeeps. The Petard Mortar was an externally reloaded weapon, so why shouldn't the Barking Dog's recoiless rifles be able to be used as they were designed? A vehicle only able to fire six times in a prolonged engagement would be a vehilcle any sensible military would not issue to troops for combat.

Fighting Spirit was mentioned in my first post, but I'll delve into it again. The ability was removed from the Core Revised Set, and for good reason. Take Wolverine. He Charges a 5 man Armor 2 unit, and attacks with his M1AR for a hit 2/3rd's of the time. He follows up with his 6 Attack for close combat, scoring 4 more hits. An average unit will score 2 wounds against him, which he can negate 2/3rd's of the time. So he wipes out a unit in exchange for a single one of hie six wounds when he gets within 4 spaces.

Nick Fury and the Howling Commandos have an 8 Attack to range 4 against Armor 2, hitting 5.26 times on average, which kills a five man unit every turn. They project a 6 Attack against Armor 3, scoring 4 hits on average, killing an Armor 3 unit with Damage Resilient.

Fighting Spirit as it was originally written does not work within the structure of the game. You should accept they had a reason to remove it.

Again, I would never have commented on your Blog. What you want to create and play with when you push around toy soldiers does not matter to me unless I'm across the table from you. However; you came to the forum and asked for opinions here on your units there. I'm sorry you didn't like the answers, but I see no reason not to be honest about my opinions; your units are significantly broken for balanced play, logical construction, and historical accuracy. You did a lot of work, and it shows, but the end result is significantly flawed. You may be having a grand time playing with people while using them, and that's fine, but I prefer balance, logic, and historical accuracy to some degree when it fits the situation.

I was thinking the monster and the ratte not the maus. Look at the Maus its armor value is quadruple the value of the Tiger and thats classed at a 5 with 50-60mm thick armor the maus is 220mm how would that even compare in armor value.

"Grey Knight's point about the Rocketeer still stands. Fine, he's wearing less armor. So is a Hans compared to a Ludwig, yet you notice no speed difference there. The Hans gets a Scout move at the beginning of the game, yet otherwise stays the same speed. The fastest walkers get Fast, for a minor additional movement. The rocket troops currently in the game can fly over some obstacles, but still only get a 33% higher maximum speed than fast normal infantry. Your Rocketeer doubles that speed, and adds Agile, for even more maneuverability. Whether he can join a Jump unit now, or not, is irrelevent to what he adds to the game for maneuver. Consider those missions where the Allies are working to close Axis entry points, or simply reach an objective point, to win. Now add a unit that travels 50% further per turn than any other unit in the game. Speed 3 is a huge shift in tactical capability for certain scenarios."

Most of those missions were not built to hold this kind of person. If you are saying that then whats the difference for the superheroes. A lot of my heroes were to create for a massive annihilation battle not some objective battle. Also a lot of those objective games make you hold the objective until turn 8. A lot of them are the same way. If need be you have reactive fire and I would be sure if he is moving that distance you would have multiple units that he can get hit by. Also a lot of these units I have play tested myself and he's not as powerful as you think yea he can move fast but armor 2 and 3 wounds cannot join any units he will be knocked out instantly. He is a matter a fact one of the favorites with Captain America with my fans. I actually get emails for those specific ones and ppl telling me they like him a lot.

"The Barking Dog as a six shot weapon is not a game breaker, though the capability you give it of an 18 dice attack is ridiculously overpowered. Recoiless rifles were both easily reloadable, and also not Indirect Fire weapons. They were direct fire only weapons capable of being mounted on light vehicles like Jeeps. The Petard Mortar was an externally reloaded weapon, so why shouldn't the Barking Dog's recoiless rifles be able to be used as they were designed? A vehicle only able to fire six times in a prolonged engagement would be a vehilcle any sensible military would not issue to troops for combat."

Have you actually owned the model maybe you should look at it the possibility of it being able to reload in a skirmish like is insane. Lets take a look at the Barking Dog it is a standard Allies walker that has 6 recoiless cannons on it. They are connected by bolts and angles of stainless steel that stick out about 2-3 feet. There is no opening for the turret itself to feed a bullet to the cannon. Also the crew would have to get out, get a ladder, climb up the ladder with a nice size ammunition and reload the gun. I don't know about you but mount a recoiless rifle to the side of your car sticking about 2 feet away from it and jack it up 15 feet and put monster truck wheels then try to reload a gun like that. I only think stuff like the neblewerfer reload bc there is more than one in the gun itself but recoiless rifles have 1 per gun then need to be reloaded.

"Fighting Spirit was mentioned in my first post, but I'll delve into it again. The ability was removed from the Core Revised Set, and for good reason. Take Wolverine. He Charges a 5 man Armor 2 unit, and attacks with his M1AR for a hit 2/3rd's of the time. He follows up with his 6 Attack for close combat, scoring 4 more hits. An average unit will score 2 wounds against him, which he can negate 2/3rd's of the time. So he wipes out a unit in exchange for a single one of his six wounds when he gets within 4 spaces."

He's a superhero read the rules for them if you want to play with them they have to be agreed on. Also a set ammount of points would be used to add one. He's OP bc he's a superhero. It happens in heroclix when there are normal ppl in the game they get raped by superheroes. Also Wolverine cannot use his M1 AR and charge at the same time read the rules. Good luck with that and tell me how it works.

"Nick Fury and the Howling Commandos have an 8 Attack to range 4 against Armor 2, hitting 5.26 times on average, which kills a five man unit every turn. They project a 6 Attack against Armor 3, scoring 4 hits on average, killing an Armor 3 unit with Damage Resilient."

"Fighting Spirit as it was originally written does not work within the structure of the game. You should accept they had a reason to remove it."

Ok then I'll put spotter on all the units and have the same effect with no difference. Thats why they got rid of the ability bc it had the same effect. OR I could just add it to my own rules and you can deal with it.

Again, I would never have commented on your Blog. What you want to create and play with when you push around toy soldiers does not matter to me unless I'm across the table from you. However; you came to the forum and asked for opinions here on your units there. I'm sorry you didn't like the answers, but I see no reason not to be honest about my opinions; your units are significantly broken for balanced play, logical construction, and historical accuracy. You did a lot of work, and it shows, but the end result is significantly flawed. You may be having a grand time playing with people while using them, and that's fine, but I prefer balance, logic, and historical accuracy to some degree when it fits the situation.

Also my some of this stuff is broken on specifics to do so and add extra to the game. Like for example the superheroes, its only to add some fun to the game with more advance heroes than normal. Almost all the superheroes I have play tested and they are not as OP you think they are especially at large scale games which I created them for. The only thing I can think of is adding that all superheroes have to be played at games 400+ points or larger so they are not so OP.

I'm sorry your not going to like this answer, I usually give ppl a chance but, ppl are right your more annoying than Kris and they funny part is I like Kris and reading his ideas.

The Tiger I would fit the game's specification of 'most tanks of the 1940's' Armor 4, as it does not really meet the 'Heavy tanks that appeared around 1943' Armor 5 (it was fielded in 1942 to match earlier Soviet tanks). It is only Armor 5 on your card , so using that value as a reference is superfluous when you're defending another value you chose . The Tiger I also had armor up to 132mm thick on multiple facings, and no areas to the front or side other than the tracks that would be under 60mm (other than the top and bottom armor rounds would rarely get a chance at), so you may want to check your sources. If they could build a Ratte because of VK technology, it would probably wind up Armor 7, but you already have the Maus at Armor 7. Shouldn't the Ratte be able to have a higher rating?

The concerns brought up about game balance are because a unit added to a game should fit the game. That would mean it should fit the kinds of scenarios the game currently has. If a home brewed unit breaks the official scenarios, it breaks the game. That doesn't mean the people playing with it can't enjoy it, but simply that it does not fit within the balance structure of the game. At the least, such units should be noted as such for new players who might want to use them with standard scenarios.

Scenario 7 of Operation Blue Thunder requires a unit only enter a specific square to win the game. Scenario 3 of Operation Cyclone does the same. Scenario 4 of Operation Cyclone requires a unit be on one of two squares at the end of any turn after turn 1 to win, which becomes very easy with an agile flyer with a movement of 6 if they move last. All of those scenarios are lost as soon as that objective is reached.

It's fine to suggest lots of reactive fire, but that requires units that have not activated, are within range with line of sight to the axis of movement, and roll the 1/3rd chance to actually be able to fire. Even Advanced and Superior Reactive Fire need the reacting unit to have not yet activated for the turn. A scenario coming down to a lucky Initiative and Reactive Fire roll every time simply because of an overpowered unit has lost competitive balance.

Whether players like a home brewed character or not does not directly relate to game balance. Games can be quite fun without game balance, if they still contain other things players want. Some games have maintained popularity for years with lousy competitive balance because they appealed to fans through other things. For players who want competitive balance, as well as the fun of pushing toy soldiers around, balance should be maintained. I don't mean only for tournaments. I enjoy competitive play with every game I play. I can have fun with unbalanced gaming, but I prefer the challenge of pitting myself against my opponent where it comes down solely to how we play and the roll of the dice, with no extra advantages to either side.

I have seen the Barking Dog model. I see no more issue with reloading it than would come from the Lothar reloading its nebelwerfer after a volley, as the nebelwerfers were not designed to just fire one or two rockets at a time, but rather the entire rack. Many petard mortar vehicles required some of the crew to exit to reload, as well. Where do the Heavy Flak Grenadiers carry their ammo? If DUST can allow a reload for those, why not for a recoiless rifle? Think about my main point for the Barking Dog: would you be willing to go into combat in a vehicle that got into the thick of a firefight, but could only shoot six times through the entire battle? I've never met a soldier that crazy. That would be the insanity.

You are correct, and I did err on Wolverine's Charge. I tend to prefer a gunfight to a knife fight, and usually only add close combat after a move and fire or Sustained Attack. He would average killing an Armor 3 squad, and all but one of an Armor 2 squad within 4 Squares on average. He would need to start 2 spaces away and not Charge to kill either one. I was finishing typing before cooking, and went too quickly. I never claimed infallibility, only honesty and thought.

A Spotter can give a unit the same capability as Fighting Spirit, but look at how it is applied within the rules . Every unit cannot have a Spotter for a reason . A Sniper Team, with two 1 dice attacks, with the possible addition of an Armor 2 character, can have a Spotter. Heavy Weapon Teams, whose stats have not yet been released, may also have Spotters, though how large the team is, how many attack dice it will have, or how often they will have Spotters has not been stated. Snipers with Spotters makes sense, and is a very limited set of attacks. Even with a character, their survivability is very limited. A Sniper Team gets 2 attack dice, averaging 1.33 hits per attack. Without Nick Fury, the Howling Commandos still get 7 attack dice for 4.33 average hits per attack against Armor 2. That's a rather significant additional statistical impact.

I understand you feel you have playtested your heroes. There is, however, a significant difference between playing with new models, and playtesting for balance with those models. Many playtesters I have dealt with through the years in multiple games have been very good at the former, but very weak at the latter. Playtesting for balance would have brought to light the issues that have been noted for your heroes, so I had to conclude they had simply been tried and enjoyed, with players happy whether they were truly balanced, or not. Saying something is not overpowered in larger games is meaningless, as that simply means the effect the unit had is more easily obscured with more stuff in the way. Playtesting with large battles is only really good for playtesting rules for large engagements because of its obscuring effect on individual units.

Your blog units work for you. You have found others that like them, as well. Congratulations. Enjoy them. Hopefully, no new players will get turned off on DUST because they got to play with them, and thought the game was unbalanced because of them. I've seen that happen with home brewed units before; players blame the core game instead of the fan who wanted to add something without actually verifying competitive balance. Blaming the game is easier than suggesting another person made a mistake.

As for your opinion of me; I see no reason to care. Some people like the way I analyze. Some people don't. I do not expect everyone to share my opinions, and would be a fool if I did. I will be honest with my opinions, and will have spent time thinking before posting them, whether you agree, or not. Whether you even bother to read them, or not, is irrelevant. I have fun playing, and with the people I play with. Someone on the internet that doesn't like my opinions will not impact that in the slightest. Someone on the internet not liking my opinions does not invalidate them, either.

As I noted before, I only stated my opinions on your blog units because you came to the forums and asked for opinions. I cannot control whether you like the answers you got.

"The Tiger I would fit the game's specification of 'most tanks of the 1940's' Armor 4, as it does not really meet the 'Heavy tanks that appeared around 1943' Armor 5 (it was fielded in 1942 to match earlier Soviet tanks). It is only Armor 5 on your card, so using that value as a reference is superfluous when you're defending another value you chose. The Tiger I also had armor up to 132mm thick on multiple facings, and no areas to the front or side other than the tracks that would be under 60mm (other than the top and bottom armor rounds would rarely get a chance at), so you may want to check your sources. If they could build a Ratte because of VK technology, it would probably wind up Armor 7, but you already have the Maus at Armor 7. Shouldn't the Ratte be able to have a higher rating?"

Ok lets talk about how you are saying this because I can prove you completely wrong in all parts when I do my tanks.

1) Armor 4: it says on page 4 that it is classed as all Medium ARMORED tanks not Medium TANKS and it says most tanks in the 1940s. If you are putting it in this terms you make it that event he Maus should be armor 4. This adds to the part where tanks like the Panther or the Panver IV are classed never ever the Tiger. I'm right you're wrong.

2) Tiger is classed as a Heavy Tank and it says for armor 5 Heavy Tanks. I'm right you're wrong again.

3) The armor 7 says Mobile Fortresses that benifit from the Heaviest ARMOR ever made. The heaviest armor ever made was on the Soviets tank (forget the name) and the Maus for the Nazis. Nothing in the entire WWII was ever as heavily armored as these 2 vehicles even the Ratte and the Monster were at the same thickness but I say the Maus is better because of the size of the tank and how hard it is to hit compared to the size of the Landkreuzers. The Maus is also classed as a Super Heavy not too many tanks in WWII are classed as this. Right yet again.

My sources come from Wikipedia, Opsrey, Axis and Allies Miniatures, and FOW. I hate to say it but I've made my armor specifically to the standards of the Dust Tactics rules with using other rules to compare to it. Like for example the Pounder has the same armor as he Sherman. Everything from there is either raised or lowered in the game base off of that aspect of the game.

"The concerns brought up about game balance are because a unit added to a game should fit the game. That would mean it should fit the kinds of scenarios the game currently has. If a home brewed unit breaks the official scenarios, it breaks the game. That doesn't mean the people playing with it can't enjoy it, but simply that it does not fit within the balance structure of the game. At the least, such units should be noted as such for new players who might want to use them with standard scenarios."

Dude I hardly play the scenarios when I play a friendly game unless I play for a recap on my blog. There is one big specific reason to this. When you play most games for a tournament the scenarios are balanced. As much as 40k is not balanced the games scenarios are not one sided. This specific reason I like the scenarios for 40k and not too many for Dust. They seriously need to work on those.

"Scenario 7 of Operation Blue Thunder requires a unit only enter a specific square to win the game. Scenario 3 of Operation Cyclone does the same. Scenario 4 of Operation Cyclone requires a unit be on one of two squares at the end of any turn after turn 1 to win, which becomes very easy with an agile flyer with a movement of 6 if they move last. All of those scenarios are lost as soon as that objective is reached."

Yes and stick a tank on the objective which you can and he cannot enter the objectiver, then fire at him when he gets into LOS and you've defeated the rocketeer bc he cannot take on a tank. Trust me I have played with him a lot. Also what the difference between that and movement 2 you can still move to the objective in 2 turns. Same with the rocketeer it's still 2 turns.

"It's fine to suggest lots of reactive fire, but that requires units that have not activated, are within range with line of sight to the axis of movement, and roll the 1/3rd chance to actually be able to fire. Even Advanced and Superior Reactive Fire need the reacting unit to have not yet activated for the turn. A scenario coming down to a lucky Initiative and Reactive Fire roll every time simply because of an overpowered unit has lost competitive balance."

No even going to answer this b/c I answered it in the previous one.

At work thats all I have time to repond to.

BTW, welcome to the reason why "just make up your own rules and have fun" with normal vehicles doesn't work out.

Walls of text with individual interpretations of why certain vehicles have certain stats. Even with the greatest arguments and logic on both sides, it needs an official ruling or all it stays is a fun little set of rules for playing in your own basement and not much of anywhere else.

That was the whole reasoning for me to create these cards for people who want to play with them. I just figure why not give people a physical rule rather than something that would be discribed as just playing with armymen. I also wanted to add some fun and added the superheroes to put a twist on the war.

arkangl said:

I just want to say how much I appreciate the work you put into your blog! I very much enjoy reading it. I'm not much into playing with unofficial units, but I do enjoy seeing what you come up with for them anyway. Keep up the good work!

arkangl said:

No. You really can't. On the other hand of course, it's hard to prove you wrong, since your posts seem to lack any sort of coherent grammatical structure. Please use the dang spell check button, so that trying to read your posts is more like having a rational conversation and less like trying to decipher the enigma code.

I'm leery of spending the time to fully answer the "points" you bring up, as you seem to answer them out of context and then say "I'm right you're wrong" or "you're annoying," as if this somehow helps your argument. However, your last post has such glaringly, obviously flawed logic that I feel I must yet again post in support of everyone's favorite grumpy grandpa (aka Gimp).

arkangl said:

So there is somehow a difference to you between medium armored tanks and medium tanks? Last I checked, a tank is a tracked, ARMORED fighting vehicle.

Also, Gimp is not saying that even the Maus should be armor 4. If you paid attention during this argument to what Gimp is actually saying, rather than just disagreeing with him without trying to understand what he means, you might realize that. The Tiger II would fall squarely into the armor 5 catagory, as armor 5 is "Heavy tanks and walkers that appeared around 1943 or 1944," which is when the Tiger II cam out. The Tiger I was heavy at the time it came out, but it came out in 1942, which is before the timeframe listed for armor 5. Also, the Tiger II was significantly better armored than the Tiger 1. So while yes, the Tiger I was a heavy tank, at the time it was produced, it does not fit within Dust's description of armor five. According to your so-called "sources" (another point I will make in a moment here), the prototype German K-Wagen was a SUPER-HEAVY TANK! WOW! That means it should have like armor 6, maybe seven, right? Oh, wait. that doesn't work because it was designed in WWI, so it doesn't fit with Dust's design critera for that... kind of like your example with the Tiger I.

arkangl said:

My godfather was a twenty-year carrer U.S. Army tanker. If I showed him your sources, he would simultaneously suffer a heart attack, a stroke, and die from fright. Of your "sources," the only one that is worth metioning is Osprey.

I'm not even going to touch the fact that you listed wiki as a source, except to point out the the Wikipedia page about the Reliability of Wikipedia says, and I qoute, "Academics have also criticized Wikipedia for its perceived failure as a reliable source." Of course, that might be wrong. Maybe the page about Wikipedia not being reliable is not reliable. I have to wonder, if Gimp or I put little blue numbers next to the points we are attempting to make, perhaps then you would believe what we say.

The Axis and Allies minis are cool, and the game is not bad. However, you should not mistake a fun game with cool minis for an accurate source; it isn't.

Flames of War rates up there about as high as a wiki for accuracy. The game is 40K with a WWII re-skin. And I'm sorry, even though FoW says that "Commando Kelly" was the most decorated hero of WWII, they are dead wrong. That honor belongs to Audie Murphy, one of the greatest men to ever live. He makes Captain America look like an amature, even though he was about the size of my little sister. Not even touching things like the tanks in FoW, or the fact that the main German artillery piece in the game only had something like six units produced through the whole war, the fact that FoW messed up something as obvious as Audie Murphy is downright shameful.

The fact that these are your "sources" explains a lot to me, however. It explains to me why, as you would say, "I'm right and you're wrong."

I actually just got off the phone with my godfather. After I explained this forum topic to him, and after his shock at your opinions wore off, he recommended that you should get yourself a copy of "Armored Vehicles of the World" so that you have a real source to draw your ideas from. He also recomended that a trip to the Bovington Tank Musuem, wher you could read about some real history, would greatly benefit you.

In regards to your current sources, he told me to mention the following quote from John Wayne to you. "Life is hard, It's even harder when you're stupid."

And for those of you who are worried, my godfather in now in stable condition after his heart attack/stroke.

Posting problem deleted entry

Ok lets talk about how you are saying this because I can prove you completely wrong in all parts when I do my tanks.
1) Armor 4: it says on page 4 that it is classed as all Medium ARMORED tanks not Medium TANKS and it says most tanks in the 1940s. If you are putting it in this terms you make it that event he Maus should be armor 4. This adds to the part where tanks like the Panther or the Panver IV are classed never ever the Tiger. I'm right you're wrong.

Armor 4 is noted for medium armor on a scale of 1-7, with Armor 4 being noted as for 'most tanks of the 40's.' Not medium tanks, not heavy tanks, not light tanks, but simply most tanks when considered within their range of Armor 1 to Armor 7.

The Tiger I was not armored much more heavily than the T-34 it was designed to face, and far less than the late war heavy tanks like the Stalin, Tiger II, Elefant, or others. Assigning Armor 5 is giving the Tiger I a lot of extra credit without having data to back it up.

With the use of Armor 5 for the Tiger being based only on personal opinion, rather than actual fact, there is no right or wrong on varied opinions.

2) Tiger is classed as a Heavy Tank and it says for armor 5 Heavy Tanks. I'm right you're wrong again.

The Tiger was simply classed as Pzkmpf VI by the Germans. Some people call it a heavy tank, and others don't. The Soviet T-35 was classed as a heavy WW2 tank, but it had armor equivalent to a Pzkmpf III. Should it be classed as Armor 5 simply because it was called a heavy tank? That would justify Armor 5 for the Pzkmpf III, so should it, as well? If not for either of them, why for the Tiger I that had nothing like the armor of the late war heavy tanks, but was closer to the Sherman and T-34?

Again, opinion does not make right or wrong, it only expresses opinion.

3) The armor 7 says Mobile Fortresses that benifit from the Heaviest ARMOR ever made. The heaviest armor ever made was on the Soviets tank (forget the name) and the Maus for the Nazis. Nothing in the entire WWII was ever as heavily armored as these 2 vehicles even the Ratte and the Monster were at the same thickness but I say the Maus is better because of the size of the tank and how hard it is to hit compared to the size of the Landkreuzers. The Maus is also classed as a Super Heavy not too many tanks in WWII are classed as this. Right yet again.

Armor 7 is the heaviest armor ever made using VK technology. The M1 Abrams is far superior to any WW2 tank in armor, though it weighs less than some. Since the Maus was made with actual WW2 technology, and was not that far beyond other WW2 fighting vehicles, assigning it a high tech armor rating as the best ever made is questionable, at best.

My sources come from Wikipedia, Opsrey, Axis and Allies Miniatures, and FOW. I hate to say it but I've made my armor specifically to the standards of the Dust Tactics rules with using other rules to compare to it. Like for example the Pounder has the same armor as he Sherman. Everything from there is either raised or lowered in the game base off of that aspect of the game.

You reference an online source acknowledged as not being accurate, a simplistic miniatures game that needs optional rules to not allow German and Japanese units to fight together in 'historical battles' (Axis & Allies Miniatures), a drastically inaccurate game nicknamed (19)49K by many (FoW), and a book publisher that publishes reference books for everything from simple painting to moderate information references for units across centuries without specifying the actual books referenced. That doesn't say much for reference quality.

I am using "Tanks and Other Armoured Fighting Vehicles of World War II" by BT White, "The Encyclopedia of Tanks & Armored Fighting Vehicles" by Chris Bishop (ed), "Western Allied Tanks 1939-45" by David Porter, "Soviet Tank Units 1939-45" by David Porter, "Panzergrenadier Divisions 1939-45" by Chris Bishop, and "Werhmacht Panzer Divisions 1939-45" by Jorge Rasado & Chris Bishop. I use "Disposable Heroes" by Iron Ivan Games as a quick reference, simply because we have never found an error when checking their data to this date. I also reference battle accounts in other books, but won't bother citing the non-reference works. Which set of references do you think I would give better credence to?

Dude I hardly play the scenarios when I play a friendly game unless I play for a recap on my blog. There is one big specific reason to this. When you play most games for a tournament the scenarios are balanced. As much as 40k is not balanced the games scenarios are not one sided. This specific reason I like the scenarios for 40k and not too many for Dust. They seriously need to work on those.
"Scenario 7 of Operation Blue Thunder requires a unit only enter a specific square to win the game. Scenario 3 of Operation Cyclone does the same. Scenario 4 of Operation Cyclone requires a unit be on one of two squares at the end of any turn after turn 1 to win, which becomes very easy with an agile flyer with a movement of 6 if they move last. All of those scenarios are lost as soon as that objective is reached."
Yes and stick a tank on the objective which you can and he cannot enter the objectiver, then fire at him when he gets into LOS and you've defeated the rocketeer bc he cannot take on a tank. Trust me I have played with him a lot. Also what the difference between that and movement 2 you can still move to the objective in 2 turns. Same with the rocketeer it's still 2 turns.

While you don't like to play the published scenarios, other people using your home brews might. If it breaks the scenario for those that do play official scenarios, it doesn't fit the game.
Scenario 7 can be won with the Rocketeer on turn 1 before the Axis player even places a unit on the table if the Allies win initiative due to your Flight rules. No Axis units can reach the objective space on turn 1 except some of your home brews.
Scenario 3's objective is six spaces away from any Axis entry points, and two turns away from victory for the Rocketeer, while the Allies start with a 4:1 numerical advantage. Any Axis units moving to stop the Rocketeer are going to face a withering fire in the open.
Scenario 4's objective is five spaces away from entry areas. The only thing stopping a turn 1 win for the Allies is the stipulation to hold the objective on turn 2. With good placement of Anti-tank traps, there is little the Axis can do to stop the turn 2 win for the Rocketeer.

Hey Grey Knight I'll listen to you making fun of my grammar when you learn to spell. I was typing on my iPhone what's your excuse. Category not catagory, criteria not critera, career not carrer, mentioning not metioning, quote instead of qoute, amateur not amature, recommended not recomended, Museum not Musuem. I misspelled respond bc i forgot an S which was prob the phone, objective added an R also because of the phone, and the only true word i misspelled was benefit. Maybe your ass should take your godfathers advise I'll go back to grammar school when you go back to spelling school.

IF you are right. Your armor value would make the sherman go down to a 3. OR I would have to give the Tiger like or 6 wounds compared to the Sherman's 4 due to the fact the Sherman could not and will not stand toe to toe with a Tiger. The only reason they won against Tigers was because they out numbered them.I was thinking of making it have stationary fire though along with some other tanks.

I thought I would google search some place and I don't really care what you are thinking oh i need to read this book and blah blah blah.

http://community.discovery.com/eve/forums/a/tpc/f/5161991318/m/3011901458 - this one is us fighting about it right now. They are saying both ones better than the other.

www.2worldwar2.com/sherman.htm

As for scenario 7 I am looking at the deployment. Where do you count 6 movements onto the objective on first turn. It would take 2 turns. Which it would, no matter what, be open to be fired at on turn 2 and with it alone and armor 2 with 3 wounds I would be able to take him out with a .50cal and a .30cal if i needed to on turn 2. That scenario was play with the Rocketeer.

http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-ceQjt87-1jE/Tbd1w1X5qKI/AAAAAAAAAjM/89zXqhKYoM4/s1600/0410010154.jpg

If I were to hazard a guess, I would expect Grey Knight's mis-spelling was on purpose, simply to showcase the problems with not bothering to try and edit your posts. On a forum where some of the members do not use English as their primary language, self-editing is a more significant courtesy to keep the discussions functional, but it is an appropriate courtesy anywhere. It doesn't matter whether you are using a phone, iPad, laptop, or whatever to type, all of them allow self-editing. If you are not trying to make your point clearly enough to be understood, you're wasting people's time.

I'm not worried about you reading books. I don't care if you read any books. I cited books to point out that I was using valid references for my arguments, while you stated you were using Wikipedia and historically inaccurate games. I brought up books to show the quality of respective reference materials behind our arguments.

My view of armor values does not require a Sherman to be reduced to Armor 3. The Sherman was close to the same armor values of most of its contemporaries when it entered battle, matching closely to the PzKmpf IV, T-34, and others. The Tiger I and Panther were the first steps toward much higher armor values by the Axis, as they had to match the Soviets. Based on their descriptions:

Armor 1: Unarmored vehicles

Armor 2: Half-tracks and other vehicles with minimal armor

Armor 3: Fully armored vehicles such as armored cars and light tanks

Armor 4: Most main battle tanks produced before the really heavy tanks of the late war

Armor 5: Heavily armored tanks and guns appearing late war such as the Tiger II, Stalin series, etc

Armor 6: Extreme tanks from the end of the normal war era and the beginning of major VK improvements, such as perhaps the Maus

Armor 7: The best VK technology can add to the battlefield. Think M1 Abrams in WW2.

Adding damage points to the Tiger I is not needed, either, as both the Tiger I and Sherman in all of its versions could be taken out with a single shot. Four damage already makes that difficult.

The Tiger I was better protected than the Sherman, and had a better gun, but it was also less maneuverable and harder to maintain. The idea of the Sherman only being able to take out a Tiger from close range and behind comes from Holloywood with Kelly's Heroes. Actual battle data showed the Sherman could take out a Tiger I from the front with a good shot. Not with the ease of a Tiger I taking out a Sherman, but the Sherman offset that with better maneuverability and gyrostabilzation on its gun, which the Germans lacked for all of their tanks.

Truly Gimp, it makes my heart glad to know that somebody here can appreciate subtle irony.

Arkangl, y u no get mai funny? Iz dis beter?

I’m pretty much in agreement with your ideas for tank armour Gimp. That’s probably because your ideas are in alignment with what is stated in the rules booklet… funny how that works.

However, I would be willing to see the Tiger have more HP than the Sherman as a way to differentiate protection. So if they both had an armour 4 (@ arky, since they are both typical tanks from the 1940’s and that is what the rules book suggests), you would still be able to vary their survivability to a degree. And ark, what would be so bad about having different wound values? Isn’t that kind of the reason that the walkers have different values?

Also ark, you advise someone to take advice, not the other way around. So perhaps I’ll take your “advise” into consideration. I still think that a better way of getting my point across to you would be to go to wiki school instead of spelling school, and just edit pages to be accurate before linking them to you.

I'll add a small extra on posting. I don't expect people to always post perfectly. Everybody makes mistakes.

That said, it is never a bad idea to check over your posts and make sure they say whatever it is you're trying for with some level of coherence and clarity.

If a point is worth making, it's a lot more powerful if people reading it can actually understand the point being made.

As for the Tiger I having more wounds, it would work, but it also doesn't have to be a huge difference. I would prefer actual WW2 tanks stop at four damage points, because that would mean a flamethrower is a scary proposition for any of them, which it was.

Grey Knight yea eye kan reed u loud n kleer. hahaha My links are to a discovery discussion about the same thing and an article someone wrote that has the tiger vs the sherman. Not to wiki

Gimp, as for the tanks having different wounds look at the new walkers with a different wound value than their armor or look at Dust Models cards with the same thing. All tanks fear the napalm in Dust and pretty much any real life scenario. You will just be more cautious of taking your expensive tank on a joy ride around the battlefield and get it close to the Hot Dog and the regular flamethrower in units still does a decent ammount to it.

Also I was thinking about how these tanks need something that makes them weaker than the walkers b/c that's the whole reason they got rid of them. I thought up stationary fire for non assault tanks (the tiger is an example of it while the sherman is an assault tank). Basically it means that when the tank fires it cannot do any other action but it is allowed sustain fire. It forces a person with a tank to make a decision to either move or shoot in a turn not both. A lot of the tanks in WWII were this way they could only do one or the other not both, but not all weapons on the tank are that way like the machine guns on it. So at the bottom of the card it'll says, 8.8cm - Stationary Weapon kind like Lasers says Lasers. This will mean you can still fire all the MGs as normal and move but if you want to use the big gun you have to stop.

Here's all my new tank values for tanks a lot of them maybe the same. I upped some of the light tanks due to the description of armor 3 and not armor 2. I also added stationary to the tanks that will get stationary fire.

New Tank Stats

US Tanks

Tesla Sherman 1 4 4 Stationary

M3 Stuart 1 3 3

M41 Walker Bulldog 2 3 3

M18 Hellcat 2 3 3

M36 Jackson 1 5 5

M24 Chaffee 1 3 3

M26 Pershing 1 5 6 Stationary

M4 Sherman 1 4 4

M46 Patton 1 5 5

M7 Priest 1 4 4

M2 Light Tank 1 2 3

M3 Lee 1 4 4

M8 Greyhound 2 2 2

M10 Wolverine 1 4 4 Stationary

M8 Scott 1 3 3 Stationary

M12 GMC 1 4 4 Stationary

M22 Locust 2 3 3

M40 GMC 1 4 4 Stationary

T17 Staghound 2 2 3

UK

Light Tank VI 1 3 3

Cruiser Tank Mk V Covenanter 1 3 3

Cruiser Tank Mk VI Crusader 1 3 4

Cruiser Tank Mk VII Cavalier 1 4 4

Cruiser Tank Mk VIII Centaur 1 4 4

Cruiser Tank Mk VIII Cromwell 1 4 4 Stationary

Cruiser Tank Challenger 1 4 5

Cruiser Tank Comet 1 5 5 Stationary

Infantry Tank MK III Valentine 1 3 3

Infantry Tank MK IV Churchill 1 5 5

Bishop 1 3 3 Stationary

Archer 1 3 3 Stationary

Achilles 1 4 4 Stationary

Avenger 1 4 5 Stationary

Black Prince 1 5 6

Centurion 1 5 5 Stationary

Excelsior 1 5 5 Stationary

Tortoise 1 5 5 Stationary

Canada/Australia
Ram 1 4 4

Grizzly I 1 4 4

Sentinel 1 4 4

Sexton 1 4 4

Germans

Panzer I 1 3 3

Panzer II 1 3 3

Panzer III 1 4 4

Panzer IV 1 4 4

Panther 1 4 5

Tiger I 1 4 6 Stationary

Tiger II 1 5 6 Stationary

Panzer 35(t) 1 3 3

Panzer 38(t) 1 4 4

Wespe 1 3 3 Stationary

Hummel 1 4 4 Stationary

Panzerwerfer 42 1 2 3

Grille 1 3 3

StuG III 1 3 3 Stationary

StuG IV 1 4 4 Stationary

Brummbar 1 4 4 Stationary

Sturmtiger 1 4 6 Stationary

Panzerjager I 1 3 3 Stationary

Marder I 1 3 3 Stationary

Marder II 1 3 3 Stationary

Marder III 1 3 3 Stationary

Nashorn 1 4 4 Stationary

Elefant 1 4 6 Stationary

Jadgpanzer IV 1 4 5 Stationary

Hetzer 1 3 4 Stationary

Jagdpanther 1 4 5 Stationary

Jagdtiger 1 4 6 Stationary

Flakpanzer I 1 3 3

Panzer VIII Maus 1 6 8 Stationary

Panther II 1 5 6 Stationary

Heuskrecke 10 1 4 4 Stationary

Ratte 1 7 20

Monster 1 7 25 Stationary

Japanese Tanks

Type 2 Ho-I 1 4 4

Type 95 Ha-Go 1 2 2

Type 98 Ke-Ni 1 2 2

Type 2 Ke-To 1 2 2

Type 4 Ke-Nu 1 2 3 Stationary

Type 5 Ke-Ho 1 3 3

Type 2 Ke-To 1 3 3

Type 3 Chi-Nu 1 4 4 Stationary

Type 89 I-Go 1 3 4

Type 97 Chi-Ha 1 3 4

Type 1 Chi-He 1 4 4

Type 4 Chi-To 1 4 4 Stationary

Type 5 Chi-Ra 1 4 4

Soviets

BT-5 2 3 3

BT-7 2 3 3

BT-8 2 3 3

T-28 1 4 4

T-34 1 4 4

T-44 1 4 4

KV Models 1 4 5 Stationary

IS Models 1 5 5 Stationary

T-26 1 3 3

T-60 1 3 4

T-70 1 3 3

T-80 1 3 4

ZiS-30 1 3 3 Stationary

SU-76 1 4 4 Stationary

SU-85 1 4 4 Stationary

SU-100 1 4 4 Stationary

SU-122 1 4 4 Stationary

SU-152 1 4 4Stationary

ISU-122 1 4 4 Stationary

ISU-152 1 4 4 Stationary

I glanced at the discussions of the documentaries, and saw they were simply the traditional argument over what makes one tank better than another. There's validity to both sides of the argument, because they're arguing different points of opinion that don't really overlap, so it doesn't really say much in the end. The Tiger had a better gun and better armor overall. The Sherman was more reliable and maneuverable with better gun sighting. The Sherman also changed radically from the M4 'Ronson' Sherman on through to the M4A3E2 (76) Jumbo Sherman, which adds more variables. Each had strengths and weaknesses, but the crew determined how well the tank fought. Anything beyond that is opinion, and nothing more. Because neither vehicle ever fought all alone, how well they worked within their army's combined arms operations mattered more than their individual abilities, as well.

Back within DUST;

The concerns I have for tanks and flamethrowers is simply preference. If a tank can handle a flamethrower, while a medium walker can't, the tank becomes preferable if you play against flamethrowers. I'd rather not see that. It could work, but additional wounds should be very carefully applied with points added appropriately.

If a heavy walker with the best protection available only has ten damage, normal tanks should only dream of such numbers.

Consider what they did for the Jagdluther compared to the Ludwig: for the loss of a machinegun, a minor increase in main gun power, increased armor, and double the damage points, the Jagdluther increased from the 4 points for a Ludwig up to 10 points. With the tournament values effectively being an increase in scale of 10x when rounded, that puts the Jagdluther at between 95-105 points under the current point scale. That's 250% of the cost of a Ludwig.

There are weapons that can affect Armor 4, and not Armor 6, but not many. Phasers and the 75mm Howitzer lose out, the Napalm Throwers go from instant kill to only damage 6, the 17 Pounder and Dual Piat each lose a single attack die, and all other Allied anti-tank weapons stay the same against either Armor value.

The Jagdluther's dual 75mm's add an extra die to all attacks compared to the Ludwig's dual 88mm's, which shifts damage output, but not to a huge degree. A single attack still needs lucky rolls to take out any current vehicles, and the loss of the machinegun makes the Jagdluther weaker against infanntry even with the increased firepower of the dual 75mm's. For any of those reading that might wonder; the 75mmL70 of the Panther did have superior armor penatration to the 88mmL56 of the Tiger I. Bigger guns did not always mean better armor penetration, as velocity can be more important than round mass for armor penetration.

That means the extra damage points have to account for the majority of the point increase from the Ludwig. Take 30% of the increase as due to the weapons and armor for a base (which I would consider high, but makes the math analysis easy), and that still means the extra damage points would be worth 120% of the value of the Ludwig. Each damage point would be increasing the point value by 30%. 10% from weapons and armor, and 35% per damage point, would probably be closer.

People have talked about walkers' greatest asset being their mobility, so tanks could be forced to work with a facing. It wouldn't matter for firing with a turret, but if a tank had to turn to move in a new direction, they would be handicapped. If a tank could move into only its forward three spaces, and had to spend an action turning in place to rotate to the side, it would stay simple, but reduce their mobility. A non-turreted vehicle could be further restricted, and only be able to fire their main gun in the 90 degree arc it faced. Hull mounted machineguns would face the same issue. Armored cars could be allowed to move like walkers, but still have to worry about whether they have a turret for firing. That would give differentiation between types of fighting vehicle without adding significant complexity to the game.

Vehicles' movement would then be able to be reined in to match walker speeds for ease of point values and scenario balance, while keeping them viable. A vehicle could travel faster than the infantry, but they didn't want to in combat once at engagement ranges.

Firing on the move could be penalized, or restricted. Gyrostabilization could allow movement and firing with no penalty on the same turn, while normal tanks firing weapons other than machineguns could fire at half value, rounded up. A walking vehicle would not be more stable than a tracked vehicle, but it could be assumed that VK technology was being applied first to walkers, and then to upgrade tanks. There could be a point multiplier to eliminate tank firing penalties to represent VK tech being retrofitted to the vehicle.

Take those ideas and play with them if you want, or ignore them as you wish.

.

Yea that sounds like a good idea. What if something like if the tank moves it fires with half the dice rounded down minimum a 1/1 and can only shoot the main gun the direction it was pointing without pivoting unless it is turret mounted then its only forward left or right not backwards. If it is stationary it shoots and can pivot as needed. Also something like tanks can only move forward backward left and right not diagonal. That way its still limiting the tanks.

As far as your new armor values go, they look like they ought to work overall. However, one big thing I would change is to make any open-topped tanks, like the M7, armor 3 instead of armor 4. The M7 was based off of the Lee chassis, (later versions were based on the Sherman instead), so while the body armor will be similar, the fact that they were open-topped made them much more susceptible to fire. I would keep the wounds the same, to show that they were just as resilient, but lower the armor to 3 to show that they were more vulnerable to enemy fire.

As far as limiting movement, firing arcs, or stationary shots and whatnot, I'd stay away from making new rules for tanks. There are several reasons for this.

First, Dust Tactics is a very fast, lightweight game. It does not include rules for unit facings, turning during movement, etc. The previews people have posted of Dust Warfare (such as the pic of the vehicle damage chart from Gencon) show that it will be much more in depth then Tactics is. Any extra rules you make for tanks in Tactics are going to have to be transferred across to Warfare in the next few months, and I think it would be cool if your tank cards were able to be used without having to re-make them when the next game comes out.

Secondly, I believe that using current rules with just a few minor modifications will be able to represent what you want your tank cards to be like.

For example, one big difference between tanks and walkers is the weaponry. Most of the walkers in Dust have auto-loading guns. Even the Ludwig's twin 88s are drum-fed, while on a Tiger I they had to be reloaded manually. So, rather than making a new rule for move or fire, just keep it simple and streamlined: all tanks with a main gun (not machine guns and the like) have reload. This represents tanks being less maneuverable than walkers, but keeps it so that you don't need any extra rules to do it.

In Dust, walkers are less maneuverable then infantry, and this is represented by the fact that walkers may not move around corners, while infantry can. Since tanks are less maneuverable then walkers, take this to the next logical step: tanks may not move on diagonals. While this is making a new ability, it's still keeping very, very close to the rules already in place. You could name the ability something like “Cumbersome,” and you're done. Again, simple, and I think it achieves what you want for your end product.

I would not worry about facing for tanks in Dust Tactics. Technically, walkers would have to worry about facings too, but in Tactics they don't. Perhaps in Warfare you can have slightly more detailed rules for facing and such, since it's open-table rather than on a grid. However, until we see what that is like, I don't see any reason for it. You can very easily represent that tanks are slower and less maneuverable then walkers just by giving them reload and “cumbersome.” That way, players don't need to worry about and remember new rules for moving and firing or anything like that, and you don't have to worry about balancing new rules when making cards.

Yea I was thinking reload too but I just was thinking and wanted to see if anything of my idea sounded good to use. The bad part is to transfer this to Dust Warfare. It's not going to work as well as you think I playtested the rules and its going to be some tricky parts to it.

The KISS principle is important when you consider we're talking about two related games using the same units.

Because DUST Warfare is largely unknown, any changes added to DUST Tactics can wind up worthless when considered in relation to DUST Warfare, and require complete re-working to remain viable.

With that consideration, Reload is probably a better way to deal with variations between vehicles and walkers, as it is an existing mechanic. New maneuver or arc of fire rules could easily wind up worthless when Warfare is released, however well they might work for Tactics.

Any new abilities add complexity, both from interfacing with both Tactics and Warfare, but also from requiring new quantities to consider for point values. The fewer new considerations to deal with at one time, the easier it is to assign effective point values to new items, as there are fewer new variables to obscure the issues.