It’s been a few weeks since I promised to share some of the changes coming to Beyond the Gates of Antares with the Heroic Edition. There are numerous changes I could cover, some more significant than others. But I thought I should start with the change that started it all: shooting.
Where I first started considering house rules to streamline gameplay, I looked first at how shooting is resolved. Shooting happens more than just about anything else in the game – whether you’re advancing or firing, you frequently have to measure range, check modifiers, assign hits and remove casualties. As something that happens so frequently, I figured that if I could make it even a little simpler, it would pay dividends, particularly in larger games.
Some of these changes are clearly influenced by Bolt Action, though I wanted to make sure that this wouldn’t turn Antares into a mere reskin of Warlord’s biggest game. The shooting phase has been updated to simplify hit assignment and reduce the number of different modifiers that can be applied to a single round of shooting.
Weapon Range
Weapons now have a single weapon range, rather than range bands. This means a weapon is either in range or is not. This reduces the number of times players need to check weapon stats, because it is far easier to remember a single number per weapon than a series of numbers.
It also means that where weapons only differ by range (e.g. Mag Gun vs Mag Pistol), players don’t need to apply and track different modifiers to the roll.
The exception is overhead weapons, which still have a minimum range. This is expressed as 10-40″, for example, denoting a minimum range of 10″ and a maximum of 40″.
Since some weapons (namely compression weapons) are supposed to be more effective at short range, these will be covered by special rules that cater to those specifically without complicating other weapon profiles.
Rolling to Hit
The accuracy stat has been removed. Instead, all shots are assumed to hit on a 5 or less. Modifiers may still affect this as normal, though those have been changed slightly. Mechanically, this won’t make much difference, since only one unit in 2E had accuracy 7 (the Isorian Phase Sniper). Of the remainder, one third had accuracy 6, and the remainder had accuracy 5. The new rules aim to preserve that distribution with the addition of unit experience (more on that in a future article).
With the removal of range bands, the only modifiers likely to apply to a shot now are as follows:
| Modifier Type | Situation | Mod |
| Fire on the Move | Shooting with an Advance order | -1 |
| Pinned | One or more pins on shooting unit | -1 |
| Obscuring Terrain | LoS drawn through up to 4″ of obscuring terrain/obstacles | -1 |
| Inexperienced | Shooting unit is Inexperienced | -1 |
| Crew short | Support / heavy weapon has less than the required number of crew | -1 |
| Small Target | Target has the Small rule | -1 |
| Large Target | Target has the Large rule | +1 |
| Overhead | Weapon is firing overhead | -1 |
(note that there is no more automatic penalty for rapid fire – this will be dealt with by reducing the range for RF weapons)
With no other modifiers, units will be hitting on a 4 (inexperienced) or 5 (regular/veteran), which is marginally less than 2E, where units typically hit on a 5 or 6. This helps to offset the generally higher casualty rate seen below, but is partly mitigated by the lack of range penalties and the less severe pin penalty, which is -1 for any number of pins, rather than -1 per pin from 2E.
Assigning Hits
Hits are no longer assigned before taking Res tests. While this made hit assignment more realistic, it inevitably slows down gameplay for something that happens very frequently. The defending player must first decide where to assign shots, then announce what those assignments are, then roll, then remember which colour D10 applied to which model.
Instead, Res tests are rolled without assigning hits to individual models. To support this, all models in a unit will have the same Res value. This was normally the case in first and second editions of Antares, but character models would often be supported by a retinue of lesser-equipped bodyguards. This is now handled by the concept of Heroes (to be discussed in a future post).
Once all Res tests have been rolled, the defender then assigns failures, removing a casualty for each. This will often result in more casualties than the same scenario in 2E.
For example, imagine a unit of Algoryn Armoured Infantry is hit by 10 shots. In 2E, each model would take 2 shots, and these would be rolled separately. It is entirely possible to fail 5 Res tests without losing the whole unit – two models may fail both rolls, while one more model fails a single roll. The remaining two models both pass, and the unit lives to fight another day. In the new rules, one model falls casualty for each failed Res test, so even if 5 tests pass and 5 fail, the unit is still wiped out.
This is a deliberate and acknowledged consequence of the new rules. Damage is generally more deadly, particularly massed fire. Some mitigations are put in place elsewhere to balance this, but in general, players should expect to see more casualties than in 2E.
While defending players may suffer more casualties on average, they also have greater control over where those casualties fall. Excepting lucky hits (see below), defenders can choose to assign casualties in order to preserve important models, such as a plasma lance trooper or grenadier. Where a leader infers a Tough reroll, this may be made against any of the failed Res tests, but if the roll fails, the leader must be assigned as a casualty.
As further mitigation for higher casualty rates, certain units will be harder to kill – not by increasing their Res stat, but by requiring multiple hits or more powerful weapons in order to inflict a casualty. This will be covered in a future post talking about heroes and wounds.
Critical Hits
A roll of a 1 is now referred to as a Critical Hit, rather than a Lucky Hit. It is still limited to one die, but allows the attacker to either:
- Deal an additional hit at the same SV as the critical hit
- The attacker may assign the hit to any model in the unit (this is the same as a Lucky Hit in 2E)
This addresses the sometimes underwhelming nature of lucky hits, where assigning the extra hit made little or no difference to the outcome. Now a lucky hit might also represent a piercing shot or a ricochet.
Conclusion
The changes to shooting are the fundamental core of the Heroic Edition of Antares. Most of the rules changes in HE sprouted from the initial goal of reducing the cognitive load on players and speeding up gameplay. In the next post, I’ll talk about how the above changes necessitated some interesting developments for heroic characters and tougher units.
Antares Nexus 