Recently I’ve been playing around with the Gaslands rules again. I played the game many years ago with the kids, but it got sidelined (for no good reason). I picked up Gaslands: Refuelled and that reignited an interest in looking at the rules. This was around the same time as painting up my Achilles Ridgerunner, so it seemed natural to look at how Gaslands could support some vehicular combat in 40k. The Gaslands: Refuelled rulebook recommends scaling up the templates by about 30% as your going from 1:64 (20mm) cars to 28mm-32mm models. I didn’t do that! As I was hoping to use smaller models, mostly bikes, I reckoned I’d try the models at their original size…
The first couple of run throughs were with my Atalan Jackals, pitting small rival gangs against each other. I simply used the rules for bikes, with some being armed with shotguns.
This worked really well, as their base sizes aren’t too big. I just played straight-up fights, but these could work well in a race, again, some kind of ritual challenge settled in race form (albeit with guns too!).
Next up I wanted to see how a Space Marine bike could be speced up. Here’s my attempt:
- Buggy (6)
- Minigun + Machine Gun (5 + 2)
- Armour Plating* (4)
- Grenades (1) p76
- Blunderbuss (2) (Power Sword) p76
- Bullet-Time (3) p105
- Loader (2) p109
- Expertise** (3) p110
Cost: 30
There’s probably a bit much going on there, but here’s my rationale. The Buggy when upgraded with Armour Plating now has Hull 8. I think this represents how tough a Space Marine’s ride is, certainly when compared with a standard bike. Expertise raises the Handling 5, again representing the super human nature of a Space Marine. Bullet-Time gives some flexibility when firing fixed mount weapons, specifically giving them a 360º fire arc when the vehicle slides. All of the other upgrades relate to weapons! This is a legal vehicle in the Gasland’s rules, but I do compromise (the rules!) and combine the firing of the Minigun and Machine Gun for a 6D6 weapon. Again, I’m trying to represent the firepower of twin Bolters. The Loader rule (as the Buggy has a crew of 2) allows me to focus all of the Space Marine’s attention into a single weapon to hit on 3s rather than 4s. The Blunderbuss (strangling representing a Power Sword, or Chainsword) and Grenades could easily be dropped.
Here are the rules that I’ve been using to represent Kulghu Ghol, a White Scar Deathwatch Adeptus Astartes and his Cyberhawk, Mologhai:
| Vehicle Type | Weight | Hull | Handling | Max Gear | Crew | Build Slots | Special Rules |
| Buggy | Lightweight | 8* | 5** | 6 | 2 | 2 | Roll Cage |
Weapons
- Front: Double / 6D6 (Note: Bullet Time / Loader)
- Crew Fired (360º): Small Blast / 2D6 (Note: Splash / Loader)
- Crew Fired (360º): Grenades / Medium (Note: Loader)
- Crew Fired (360º): Handguns / Medium / 1D6 (Bolt Pistol)
Special
- Cyberhawk: activates independently; may move Long in any direction; does not cause collisions; may add or remove a Hazard from any model it is in contact with at the end of its movement.
I used these rules to play through a few games, both with the White Scar rider and with some Blood Angel Primaris on bikes. They worked well, gave a fun game and the Bullet-Time rule meant that you often wanted to have the bikes sliding around. The Atalan Wolfquad was represented as a Buggy with a front arc Flamethrower!
The original template sizes work pretty well, but the short range of the weapons necessarily bring the vehicles in close where their larger models and base sizes increase the chance of collisions. I think increasing the weapon ranges, whilst keeping the manoeuvre distances the same, would overcome this. I’ll experiment with it!
I’ll be intrigued to see what vehicles are being released for Necromunda. They could work well with Gaslands (or indeed, whatever new rules come along with them).
Until next time,
Owen