 |
| My 2020 reading... |
Skirmish Sangin is definitely at the plausible, simulation side of the gaming spectrum, while the W40K franchise has all sorts of madness requiring a suspension of one's disbelief to accommodate for bio-engineered super-warriors who'd instead use a chainsaw than shooting something dead.
So how might one play a Space Marine in Skirmish Sangin?
In the Warhammer 40,000 lore, there are a number of defining characteristics that 'make' a Space Marine, including their Power Armour, Resilience, Boltguns, Amazing Combat Skills and Fearlessness. They are meant to be beyond any mortal man's capabilities and it would take ridiculous numbers of regular soldiers to best them, or a lot of luck. Here are some thoughts in that regard:
Power Armour
Skirmish Sangin provides infantry with two body armour options:
- Helmet + Body Armour: delivers 1d10+4 points of protection, reduces the BODY stat by -2 and costs 10 Points.
- Helmet + Light Body Armour: 1d6+4 protection, -1 BODY and costs 5 Points.
So when a gun hits an armoured target, an opposed roll is made and the difference/excess is applied as points of damage. E.g., Light Body Armour which would roll 1d6+4 to offset an Assault Rifle's 2d10 damage - yeah, it will rarely end well being on the receiving end of gunfire.
The game does provide for vehicular and other non-personnel Armour as well. Armour is rated 0-20, with a Car being 0, APCs being in the 3-5 range and an Abrams Tank being a 16. Weapons have a Weapon Penetration Rating, also rated 0-20: Small Arms are 0, 14mm Heavy Machine Guns are 2, RPGs are 10s, while Tank Cannons and big missile systems hit the teens.
What does it mean? Well, Small Arms against a Car has a 50% chance of being non-effectual, against a crappy APC (Armour Rating 3) and are of no consequence whatsoever to a Tank. A Heavy Machine Gun is about 10% more effective against a Car but can punch through the more hardened armour of better APCs. An RPG is about 50% likely to damage a APC. One thing though: if a Weapon cannot penetrate armour, then it is totally ineffectual. E.g., there's absolutely nothing to be gained shooting an Abrams with an Assualt Rifle or even RPG - you need something nasty to do the job.
So, my initial thoughts are to provide Space Marines with a buff on their Armour Points coupled with an actual infantry Armour Rating. There are many scenes within the novels where Marines storm through a hail of small arms fire with hardly a thought, and only rarely does an autogun even harm, let alone incapacitate one of the Adeptus Astartes. Mmm. Now comes the hard part: what values to apply.Maybe an Armour Rating of 2 is a good place to start. That means small arms (Penetration 0) would only have a 12% chance of penetrating, but something like a Heavy Machine Gun (PEN 2) can penetrate 50% of the time. If the Armour Rating of 2 were coupled with Body Armour value of 2d10+4, then even if an Assault Rifle did penetrate, typically it would be absorbed by the armour (avg 10 damage vs avg 14 armour). Additionally, by setting it as 2, I can still provide a less effective 1 Rated armour if I ever want to go that way.
Now Rated 2 Armour above sounds pretty tough, but given that it's meant to render a Space Marine near invulnerable against mundane threats, it feels about right. Thinking it through: only 1-in-9 shots are going to penetrate a Space Marine's armour, and less than half of them would actually hurt the Marine.
Body Armour normally slows the wearer down, reflected by a BODY stat penalty of -1 or -2. Power Armour is, well "powered" all but eliminating the encumbrance. That's easily resolved: Power Armour doesn't debuff a Marine's Body.
Points-wise... well that's a hard one. At a guess, it would be 10 or more times the cost of Body Armour, so maybe 100 Points?