I hope the main book will have include the vehicle stats seeing they might be quite essential to the campaign...

It would be nice...for once.

There was a vehicle supplement, back in the Black Industry days, but it disappeared into the veils of obscurity. I'm pretty sure they'll come up with something for this, since vehicles are such a core part of Guard exploits.

Of all the lines this is the one where it makes the most sense (and in my mind would not actually be a complete game without). Detailed vehicle rules are not needed (rather than wished for) in Dark Heresy (the game of investigation and conspiracy), Rogue Trader (why drive when you can sail through space?), Deathwatch (the game of small squads of elite supersoldiers) and Black Crusade (anti-Dark Heresy). The game of the Imperial Guard, the organisation where their vehicles are one of their most iconic elements? Yes, it needs the vehicle rules in the core book (and if they can put the spaceship rules in RT why couldn't they put the vehicle rules in this?).

Unless there's some massive mechanic part we don't know about, Vehicle rules sound like they might be in the book - after all, the IG is not in the habit of fielding space ships, having Navigator powers, creating Daemon weapons, mutating for fun and profit or doing other stuff that was the main mechanic of the games. The only special mechanic I could see being adapted would be the Squad Tactics from DW.

I think a mass combat system is what we'll be getting from OW. Something more involved and in depth than what came from RT's Battlefleet Koronus. I expect that vehicles will be done like it has in RT and DW, in the player book (Uplifting Primer?), but I wouldn't change my pants from surprise if they were finally in the CRB.

This is the kind of thing that does make me wish they'd make a comprehensive rulebook for the 40k RPG line, and I'd like it to not overrule the previous books, but I couldn't see them doing that without making a 2nd edition. And I think we know how dividing that issue is in any RPG community. Any. But something like D&D's Rule Compendium? 1 book with the Crit Charts, the most basic of mechanics that haven't changed at all, basic equipment, vehicle rules, and a collection of various enemies that can be used in the multiple lines? I think it could be done, if FFG really put their mind to it.

Maybe even port some modular rule sets to be more universal. Horde rules with hints and tips for DH/RT/BC, Demon binding from from DH for the Heretic Commissar in OW, Spaceships and space combat for Space Marines and BC. All of these are usable in the other lines, but sometimes come with unseen repercussions. RT ships could be used for some BC characters with little to no change, but RT characters are tailored to all include something they can do during space combat. If this were something the group wanted from the get go, I think it could work with DW, but I'd be worried about throwing some Eldar ships at a group of DH people. And if I recall correctly, DW Hordes would chew through mere mortals way more than I'm comfortable with. Fate Points only go so far, you know?

I would love to see vehicle rules in the core book. There are so many potential vehicles and variants for the Imperial Guard that I suspect it will get its own supplement; but the core book should at least cover the transport vehicles like the Chimera and the Valkyrie.

My two bits on this issue:

DH is an investigative game, where the players get the most out of their own abilities. While vehicles help get from Point A to Point B, and might make a good escape option, they are also possibly conspicuous. Also, the players might be broke, so acquiring a vehicle, while not a ship, might still be a bit prohibitively expensive. Thus, I forgave them, though it pissed me off.

RT has the biggest vehicles you can get, and you just GET one. Still, lesser vehicles could have helped, especially when money is now no object (mostly), and I think we had to wait till Into the Storm for any. Most of those are air- or space-based, with only the Rhino, Sentinel, and Land Speeder sneaking in, and I guess the Ork Warbike.

DW finally delivered, with Rites of Battle, but Guardsmen and Space Marines get vastly different vehicles, and they get a bit down-played because Space Marines are supermen, who don't NEED vehicles; they just happen to use some, if they are available.

Vehicle Apocrypha was a great fan-supplement, but I wouldn't mind something official, just for fun. This is still the only place I'd seen Chimeras, even with the love affair Inquisitors and IG Officers have with them.

This leads to Only War (sorry BC, I just don't care), where, I assume, the Guard will be portrayed as the Guard, with battles and wars, strikes and sieges, being fought between vast armies. In the Guard, especially if one has played TT, vehicles aren't really just an extra; they are a necessity, and allow the Guard to get past the fact that they are a bit fragile. No official book I have has stuff for the various Lemans, or other IG big guns, mostly because they would be ridiculous, and insta-kill whatever they hit (if a Guardsman is hit by an Earthshaker shell, wave bye bye to the Guardsman), but in a game based on the IG, serving as an army, rather than as one guy helping an Inquisitor, or a small group being dispatched by a Lord Captain, or even as set pieces to be glimpsed by roving Space Marines, these vehicles will be mandatory, or we wouldn't still have Imperial Guard, thanks to Orks, Nids, and a hundred other terrifying threats. If the Ig have to run with troops, and each side purchases bigger things as "assets", say your army bought two Basilisk shots for the whole encounter, it wouldn't feel right, even if it did ley you save on burning Fate. They should just be there, like everything else, and figure out a way to make things work.

All this said, I don't know what format the game will take; whether you will play an officer, and amass units/hordes to fight for you, or whether you will play as one or more "faceless" men and women, members of vast regiments, watching your comrades die, while you survive (hopefully), slowly climbing the ranks, and grinding your enemy to dust, or whether you will pilot a vehicle, say a Leman Russ, and blast whole swathes of the enemy into paste, till the only way they can stop you is to gum up the treads with their gore. Regardless, however, IG have tanks, whether they are LR's Basilisks, or even Manticores, and they should be present, preferably in the main book, as, for the IG, these units are almost characters in their own right. I'd rather not have to buy a second supplement, and wait. The main RT book has a chapter devoted to ships, one to Navigators, and on. Thus, fitting in one chapter for vehicles, especially if they don't need quite the customization a void ship does, should be cake.

So, let's have some vehicles FFG!!! I won't cry if we don't get the Baneblade, but I would like to see Leman Russ tanks, Chimeras, and Basilisks, maybe even a Hellhound, and please god the Valkyrie (it's been pictured so many times, and still not listed; even Apoc didn't have it, and I had to post it up here, somewhere, not sure how well I did, even). If we got to step away from Tabletop, and get Bikes for IG, too, even better.

venkelos said:

As noted in early designer diaries for Rogue Trader, the vehicle rules (as well as the ship roles, if memory serves) were planned to be part of the Core Rulebook, but were removed for space reasons and expanded versions were included in Into the Storm as a result.

venkelos said:

Actually, the Vehicle Apocrypha was official, once upon a time. It was originally going to be included in what was at the time the Inquisitor's Armoury (which was subsequently merged with the Acolyte's Handbook, to create The Inquisitor's Handbook), and was released as free downloadable content when The Inquisitor's Handbook was pushed back on the release schedule. For whatever reason - one I have no knowledge of, so I'm not even going to speculate - FFG decided not to continue providing it as support, instead going ahead with their own vehicle rules for Rogue Trader.

N0-1_H3r3 said:

Ah, I was unaware; I thought it was one of the earlier fan-products. Still like it, and it's one of the only things I actually took the time to print out. I do still wish that the Valkyrie had been an entry in it, but mine would work, I think, and I'm not running anything, right now, so no big loss, personally. If Only War does half of what I might like, I might actually start something up, and as an IG vehicle, I would expect to see it in there.

N0-1_H3r3 said:

And I'm okay with that, but it did make me sad, when I first got the core book. While I still like Battlefleet Koronus more, in regards to ship stuff (thank you nifty weapons options), Into the Storm is a great book, both for ships and vehicles, and more for characters. For Only War, however, I don't think holding the vehicles off would work as well, no matter the space issues. A Chapter should be devoted to tanks and trucks, with stats for all of the important Guard vehicles, maybe even some that the Codex didn't grab, like their jeeps, a little bit of space for upgrades, something IG doesn't do as much, and vehicle combat rules. I wouldn't think it would need to be any longer than the chapter for starships, since the stuff for "build your unique ship from the ground up" wouldn't be necessary for cookie cutter Leman Russ tanks, so if they could spend 40 to 55 pages on just ships and Navigators, in Rogue Trader, they could burn a decent fraction of that in Only War on tanks, and maybe the 15 pages of Navigator could become 15 pages of "Tactics and the Role of Orders", if it didn't need to go toward vehicles.

N0-1_H3r3 said:

venkelos said: