Moving Around the Battlefield

Y. Pimenov. On the front road.

Watchwood  here. There's been a fair bit of chatter lately about how many of unit X can unit Y kill in a round - but what about getting them there?  I've been advocating movement speed as a unit stat since nearly the start of the project, and I think it's time to examine the notion in a bit more detail.


I suggest that the 6" standard for movement would be the norm for Joe Marine, while traditionally slower units like normal humand and terminators be given a 5" speed, and faster units like space elves and scout marines move along at 7" per turn.  I would also suggest that overly cumbersome heavy weapons like Heavy bolters and Lascannons and the like also reduce the carrying models speed by 1" - perhaps a Bulky rule to be given to said weapons?  This would increase the emphasis between mobile and static type infantry units to an even greater degree.

Units would be able to not move and fire all their weapons to maximum effect, or move up to their movement speed and fire any non-heavy weapons that they are able to (and and similar actions/abilities they might have), or make a double move and not fire anything at all.  Units with a Slow and Purposeful rule (or equivalent) would be able to move at half speed and be able to fire as though they had not moved at all, a rule which would be given automatically to all vehicles.

Terrain would be grouped into Light, Medium and Heavy terrain.  Light Terrain (barricade walls, trenches, etc) would slow a unit by 1",  Medium Terrain (wrecked vehicles, buildings, etc) would slow a unit by 2", and Heavy Terrain (rubble, Craters, etc)would slow a unit by 3".  I would also suggest that that similar systems be applied to the bonuses for cover (hard cover) and concealment (soft cover), with detailed rules stating what sorts of terrain have what kind of bonuses and movement penalties.

Special Unit types like Jump Infantry, Skimmers, and the like would have any movement bonuses they might have built into their unit type, and the unit type only providing any additional rules changes they might have.

-Watchwood