Are there any armor 1 soldiers in Dust at the moment, or is armor 1 just a theoretical prospect? Or is it just meant to be used with more conventional WW2 troops crossing over into DW house rules wise?

In Dust Tactics, how does it work out when armor 3 models apparently are just as easily killed by normal assault rifles as armor 2 dudes (and don't say it's already penetrating as well as it can, when armor 1 takes double hits). Do you find that they get shot with "special" weapons enough to make them worth it? What examples of Armor 3 units are there?

Does anyone have any idea how cover works in DW? Does it basically make you require to do more damage to actually kill guys, and is this a flat number above which everything is a kill, or a ratio (2 hits needed per one kill) ?

Sami K said:

There are no armor 1 soldiers yet. No idea when they will be released. Part of me wonders if Armor 1 soldiers will actually be little alien critters when the alien faction eventually gets released.

Armor 3 can definitely make a difference. Quite a few weapons make a difference with them, and one of the big ones is knives vs combat knives or knives with grenades. Several units can do no damage in close combat at all against Armor 3, which means your Armor 3 units can get in close and hit hard without any fear of retaliation.

If it's similar to Dust Tactics, then the defender rolls dice (1 for each hit rolled by the attacker), and if in soft cover, any targets (1/3 chance) block, and in hard cover, any blanks (2/3 chance) block and the damage gets negated. However, in the Beasts of War preview, they talk about the defender rolling 2 dice in hard cover instead of 1 to try to block hits - perhaps they were misremembering, or perhaps the rules for cover in Dust Warfare are quite different.

Okay, no armor 1 guys...pretty weird. Well, I suppose that leaves room for scenario design and house rules to insert "normal" 28mm plastics in (like the new Bolt Action miniatures) to duke it out with the special ops guys. That's pretty interesting, in any case.

Speaking of which, how does such a combat system cover differences in troop quality? Better quality troops get better cover saves, maybe even some re-rolls to hit? What about poor quality units?

Sami K said:

You mean if you have 2 of the exact same unit type but one is a battle trained veteran and the other is green? I'm not sure if the game takes that into account or not. Dust Tactics doesn't. But then, the rules aren't even out yet. Wait a couple weeks and I'm sure people will be able to answer all your questions.

Yeah, something like that, I didn't mean in the sense that "better units have better guns", but rather, how similarly equipped units with different levels of combat expertise would work.

That's pretty worrisome if Dust Tactics doesn't have that at all, but let's wait and see. As long as the system has enough wiggle room for scenario design, I guess I can live with the fact that organized play assumes every soldier is about the same level of expertise...boring as that is.

Personally I'm not sure if I'd like experience coming into it. I want to be able to look at the battlefield and know what I'm dealing with, and not have to worry about whether some troops are better than others even though I can't tell from looking at the table.

From the previews I've been reading / watching, it looks like Dust Warfare is designed to be quite fast-paced, and thus might not have some of those added complications. The guys at Beasts of War, for instance, said they were able to put in 3 games of Dust Warfare in an evening, which puts it at around similar timing for Dust Tactics games.

As far as scenario design goes, I think there will be lots of room for it. Also, scenario design can be part of the game - where each player bids points on game objectives, conditions, and deployment, and thus the two players co-create a scenario at the beginning of the game to try to match what they both are hoping to play.

AT43 was loosely based on this background and literally the only Armor 1 troops were the little Therian bomb spiders. So I don't expect any human size models to be armor 1 in this game.

Sami K said:

I have the rule book and can assist a little in answering these questions.

There are only 2 types of cover afford to you in the game, Soft Cover and Hard Cover.

Soft Cover- is basically what would be defined as area terrain in Warhammer 40K so think like brush areas and craters. This allows a cover save of 1 so you ignore 1 of the wounds caused by enemy firer.

Hard Cover- Think fortifications, bunkers, bases. This allows a cover save of 2 which means you ignore 2 of the wounds caused by enemy firer.

As for Armor saves they are all the same so no differences i can tell between armor afforded to "Grizzled veterans" VS "Baby faced recruits". This makes sense to me as guess what no matter how much you have seen you still get the same armor as the other guys and can die to the same stuff as well.

So does that mean if a unit is in soft cover, there would be no point in even trying to fire at them with a 1/1 weapon (or a 2/1 weapon for someone in Hard Cover)? The cover always blocks the first 1 or 2 wounds?

Wow, so they changed the cover system for Warfare. I guess it makes sense since they're not using the cards

Yeah - this seems to be a case where they actually simplified the rule - same for every unit and no rolling. Although it seems if you're down to a small number of weaker units on both sides, you'd hit a stalemate as being in cover would make them invincible (except to close combat I suppose, but who would want to risk leaving cover at that stage?)

It depends on whats firing at what, most of the units have multiple models firing so like if you have a squad of 5 guys firing 1/1 weapons I means that's 5 potential shots to hit, you get around 2 hits on average sure but remember its a dice game and every now and then you role the magic 5 hits. Like it actually is a great cover system in all honesty. Also don't forget that you shoot all your weapons when you shoot so basically if your guys have grenades and such you can unload grenades and shooting at the same time which means now for that squad of 5 guys you can be putting out 10 shots and now at least 4 are hitting home on average.

felkor said:

There are lots of reasons to leave cover, namely the fact that most units have a limited range on their weapons, Also some units are better in Close Combat. Also note that close Combat attacks are made at 3" away from the enemy model, they don't need to be in base to base like in 40K. Also most boards when you play are going to have limited cover. Yes it is strategically important to utilize cover in the game, but it is not the only way to play.

Denied said:

Actually, I prefer the Warfare cover system. In general it always feels inelegant if both attacker and defender have to roll to see how many hits occur. There should always be a way to streamline things so just the attacker rolls. I can see the occasional special rule like Damage Resilience changing it up, but for the norm I prefer if just the attacker rolls.

You mentioned 40K. A certain "Grand Inquisitor" on BGG has made the claim that Dust Warfare is very similar to 40K. Is it? I don't really know much about 40K to be honest, but I'm curious if it has lifted much from it. (All I know is on Beasts of War, they said that Warfare felt like a melding of 40K, Infinity, and AT-43.)

felkor said:

not sure what BGG is, but I would say that guy sounds like he is using drugs. I mean sure its a table top miniatures game in that vein it is very similar to 40K, just like Warmachine and Flames of War and every other table top miniatures game is similar to 40K (IE not at all). There are elements that have a 40K feel to them in some regards like universal special rules or having HQ like units in some regard, but honestly its a rough stretch to say this game is very similar to 40k. This system takes the good parts of every other system out there then makes it better, they are indeed standing on the shoulders of giants but it is novel enough to stand on its own to legs with out saying its like X or Y or Z.

He's referring to board game geek (BGG), one of the bloggers is a major anti Dust Warfare poster. Thanks for all the info Denied, may I ask can all the Herod lead platoons, or is it only specific ones?

Thanks for the clarification!

And BGG is boardgamegeek (www.boardgamegeek.com). I guess if you're just into miniatures gaming it's probably not the most active place to go, but for board games in general it would be the most popular site on the 'net.

The heroes each have a unit they can take along with them, I think with the exception of "The Chef", but that guy is just lawlzie to began with. Yeah like I started with 40K and with the current trends of GW I see myself leaving them to a more comprehensive and fun tournament scene, which to me is what DUST Warfare offers. I cant wait for the actual release so I can get other people to play with.

Oh, so it is indeed the type of cover I first imagined, a flat amount of hits reduced. As someone said, this means reduced squads are in trouble, but we don't know yet if you can combine fire (of course there has to be a dice pool limit there, because otherwise things would get ridiculous), but as a whole I'm not sure if I like the concept that (theoretically) a platoon of 20 guys in 4-man fireteams couldn't really hurt a target in hard cover nearly as much as that whole platoon as one firing unit - logic would dictate that being able to shoot from a lot of different angles would just make it harder to stay alive, not easier!

But this just might be one of those nods for faster gameplay that might work out in the end, we'll see in the finished product.

To be honest though, I'm a big fan of the concept of the man being the most important thing, not the machine, and emphasizing that (like in Force on Force, where it's all about troop quality and morale, not the guns they have), so if DW entirely does away with that, that might be a bit too much simplification for me.

Sounds like I'll have to read the reviews and descriptions and commit to buying a bit later than I thought and not just rush out and buy it.

Suppression rules come into this game, so certainly morale comes into it.

My understanding is that they give the veteran units all the new toys, so the Amor 3 units in the power suits are more veteran than the regular Armor 2 troops.

I'm sure there could also be houseruling to change things up for experience, or you could design a campaign that adds special rules for it. And of course, this just the first rulebook and I'm sure more will get added down the line.

It would be interesting to see squads with different experience levels but it seems all the current squads are on about the same level. You do see some differences, with the Armor 3 infantry, and I sure it could be represented by having similary armed units who roll more dice or hit on blanks etc. I am not sure how morale works, but it is a welcome element that tactics was missing.

SGTManuel said:

Morale is actually not really in the book I mean there is supression which if a unit takes any unsaved wound from one source they take a suppression marker this instantly gives them a bonus to their cover : No cover goes to soft cover, soft cover goes to hard cover, hard cover cant get higher. If they take any additional unsaved wounds from a different source they take a second suppresion marker. This new marker does not enhance cover, They also can only ever get two supression markers I believe (need to rules verify that). These suppression markers take away the ability to act in your activation phase, Normally you have the ability to do two actions move and shoot, move and move, aim and shoot (re rolls dice), or you can react using one of those actions as well. Each suppression marker takes away one of those actions so you would essentially be able to do nothing except at the start of your activation phase you role a die for each suppression marker and if you score a hit it clears a marker. So if your lucky you clear both and act normally if not your effectivly pinned or a turn and on average you will clear one marker and still be able to make one action.

I'd probably put morale and experience together -i.e., experienced troops are less likey to get supressed. I don't think experience rules are necessary, but it would be fun to have a campaign where troops who survive the first mission are harder to supress in the next mission.

SGTManuel said:

SGTManuel said:

SGTManuel said:

Morale is actually not really in the book I mean there is supression which if a unit takes any unsaved wound from one source they take a suppression marker this instantly gives them a bonus to their cover : No cover goes to soft cover, soft cover goes to hard cover, hard cover cant get higher. If they take any additional unsaved wounds from a different source they take a second suppresion marker. This new marker does not enhance cover, They also can only ever get two supression markers I believe (need to rules verify that). These suppression markers take away the ability to act in your activation phase, Normally you have the ability to do two actions move and shoot, move and move, aim and shoot (re rolls dice), or you can react using one of those actions as well. Each suppression marker takes away one of those actions so you would essentially be able to do nothing except at the start of your activation phase you role a die for each suppression marker and if you score a hit it clears a marker. So if your lucky you clear both and act normally if not your effectivly pinned or a turn and on average you will clear one marker and still be able to make one action.