Tactics: Drop Pod Armies

Afternoon Gents & Ladies.

Today we (I) shall be talking about drop pods. Ah, that wonderous deep striking Space Marine contraption that has been in plastic for a while now, but is sorely in need of a few tweaks to make it sell like GW REALLY want's it to....

So first let's go over how the drop pod works:

Av - 12 All around vehicle (Good) Open Topped (not horrible)Immobile (duh - It's an orbital lander, not an orbital lander-then tank)

It comes stock with a Storm Bolter (24" Range S4 AP5 Assualt 2) Pretty Standard

Inertial Guidance - Yay, i can't hit impassable terrain or enemies. but i can still scatter off the table edge, or land in dificult terrain possibly makeing bad things happen to my storm bolter.

Ok, it's got 2 options -

Deathwind Missile Launcher - (12" Range S6 AP- Large Blast) Really? 20 points? are you shitting me? So i pay 20 points to throw out a large blast at anything that is within range to run away so i can not shoot. That sounds like a good time.... Not.

Locator Beacon - 10 Points - Makes ANYTHING of MINE Deep Striking within 6" of the HULL of the vehicle not scatter. Really? I'll take 4. Why? Termies, Assault Marines, Other Drop Pods (with more beacons) and the most important LAND SPEEDERS can drop and not scatter.

Ok, now the downside:

Drop Pod Assault:
During your first turn you select half of your army's drop pods (rounded up) and deploy them. Yeah. seems kinda cool until you think about it. Yeah, what happens when your opponent puts everything in reserve? Ouch.

So how do you alleviate this?

Well, there are not many options,

Take 1,3 or a lot of Drop pods. Why? 1 lets you drop it 1st turn and not worry about it, 3 lets you drop 2 and keep 1 for later. or you can take lots of drop pods and choose how you deploy.

Say you take 8. this is a full drop pod list and lets you choose your battles.

this lets you drop 4 pods turn 1 and the rest in reserves. Awesome.

Now say your opponent decides that he will be deploying in reserve how do you deploy?
answer, deploy your 4 tac squads on the ground and put their pods where they go.

Now on your 1st turn with your opponent having nothing on the table drop 4 empty pods across 1 half of his deployment edge making him come in on the other side. and have your tac squad ready to drop a salvo of fire into that side.

Now you have done 2 things. your tac squads are not out of place (since you deployed them) and you've cut off part of your opponent's deployment edge (thus forcing him to make decisions) and done yourself a world of good.

Now imagine that 2 of those pods had Locator beacons, in future turns you can drop your other 4 pods near those and not worry about scatter.


Now, How would I fix these problems in rules design?

2 things -

1. Change the wording of Drop Pod Assault to you MAY do this or keep all of your pods in tactical reserve.

2. Make it so that the pod can shoot the turn it drops. maybe then the deathwind missile launcher will be taken.... some time.