Vehicles and 7th

The vehicle damage table has been leaked and I am liking what I see.  Seems vehicles will get  decent buff but will not be the power they were in 5th either.  Glancing will be an issue, but lucky one shots will be far harder to achieve and it is nice to see that some things were cleared up, it seems GW is trying to do better with rules writing.  On to the table.

1-3 Crew Shaken: vehicle only firing snap shots like normal

4 Crew Stunned: vehicle only firing snap shots and cannot move or pivot. Zooming flyers cannot turn and must move 18". 

5 Weapon Destroyed: as normal and if all weapons have run out of ammunition or or already destroyed count as immobilized

6 Immobilized: Chariots count as Crew Stunned, Flyers 1-2 flyer crashes with Crash and Burn rule. 3+ it counts as crew stunned.An already immobilized vehicle suffering another immobilized result loses an additional hull point.

7+Explodes: D6 radius for a Strength 4 hit on nearby units. vehicle destroyed

 

What I like is that everything is clarified, they mention chariots and include limited ammo weapons into the equation so there is no guessing on how it will affect the results.  I really like how they dealt with flyers, as locked velocity was a pain, and really didn't make sense as if the engines were damaged, most likely the flyer would fall out of the sky or compensate.  

Now this makes more sense.  If a flyer is "immobilized", it can straight up fall out of the sky on a 1 or 2, this means a flyer has more chances of being destroyed than before.  On the flip side, it is only limited to the 18" movement and no turning/ snap shots for only one turn if your roll a 3+ (crew stunned).  I like this and it makes  a little more sense fluff wise and the different results balance each other out.  Now if you roll like me, your flyers will prob be falling out of the sky quite often from immobilized results ;).

Of course the 7+ needed to outright destroy vehicles is very nice and means most vehicles won't be one shotted.  Glancing still happens, so some vehicles will only see a minor improvement, but its there none the less.  In order to reliably kill vehicles, you'll need dedicated anti tank weapons to truly reliably kill them.  Otherwise your going to have to rely on lots of shots and hope for glances.  Against higher AV targets, this will be much harder and your going to have to dedicate anti tank to take them out.

There are still more rules left to be seen regarding vehicles, and I hope that heavy vehicles can fire ordnance weapons with no penalties, but that is yet to be seen.  It would go a long way to making the standard leman russ more viable,  though it doesn't do a bad job right now, just not a great one.  Will be interesting to see how tank shock and ramming are changed, if at all.  

Overall vehicles are getting a needed little boost that doesn't take them over the top, being able to score with them as well (minus flyers) makes them more useful and less chances of dying right off the bat from a lucky shot.  I'm looking forward to seeing more vehicles in games and I think this gives enough incentive for that to happen.

GG