The "Las" rule.

''' The "Las" rule. '''

The by far most powerful and useful part of the imperial guard arsenal might well be their charge packs.

High energy retention, high power output batteries with excellent charge value, reasonable charge times, ease of use and multi-use applications. The humble charge pack is an amazing resource for the guard in the field. Used in a multitude of their equipment and add-on equipment if often powered with charge packs.

To understate the usefulness of the charge packs is easy. But for game purposes it can produce uneven game balance.

If one side is armed with autoguns and the other can simply recharge their ammo in the field for their regular weapons and even some of their heavy weapons it can be seen as unfair to those who chose other heavy and special weapon options.

Therefore as you might have noticed, the main regimental command supplement lacks implementation of laspack recharching. It is simply treated as ammo. Those that want a more genuine 40k experience might want to implement the Las rule. But do note that it will affect some regiments differently and might feel unfair. But that's the in-verse power of las-packs.

Las weapons.

Las charge packs can be recharged and is done so in the field in the field HQ. This is a large part in why standard ammo is free. Large banks filled with charging stations manned by servitors who constantly charge hundreds of packs every day. Other weapons also utilize charge packs and some are even slaved into vehicles generators and thus has infinite power as long as the vehicle has fuel.

So if a squad is in base contact with a friendly HQ, or a friendly site which "has power" (up to the game builder, but it doesn't take too much, civilian housing works for regular ammo, heavy weapons require a bit more) a squad can recharge one set of laspacks per day. So one ammo per day. A laser heavy weapon pack can be charged instead. If the squad has a chimera or other heavier vehicle (so not truck and definitely not wagon) this counts as a charging station if the vehicle has power. A vehicle charging must use fuel even if it stands still to provide charging.

A vehicle with laser weapons has infinite ammo, but can only shoot them in a turn which the vehicle use fuel. The controller may opt to use fuel just to power weapons. If the vehicle runs out of fuel, it cannot shoot any laser weapons.

This negates the vehicle ammo of some vehicles. If a vehicle has a laser main armament and only some minor secondary weapon which require ammo, the vehicle ammo for that vehicle is 2 steps easier to get hold of instead of one. (Defined by the game builder.) But if a lascannon tank with a flamer, this would apply.

As you can see, this makes mechanized companies, certain tank companies and several heavy weapons MUCH more useful. Therefore the Las rule should be discussed before playing with all the players and a consensus achieved.