Irishroughe was kind enough as to collect a few of the more popular ideas from the recent threads and the arnis poll.
Please feel free to elaborate on why you think one variant is better then the other.

I voted for the charge doing -1 primary. Out of all the options, I like it the best. It would really help tone down the "Charge Monkey" out there.

*chuckle* Of course, I think my House Rule is very good too. While this may not be for everybody.....I and my players like it.

 Charges and rams must be in a straight line and the ruler must fall within the unit’s front arc.
 The player will declare a ram or charge special attack, but not move his attacking unit. Place a ruler along the attack path. Roll to see if the ram/charge is successful. If successful, move the attacking unit into base contact. If unsuccessful, roll 1D6, and place the attacking unit a number of inches past the BASE of the target as indicated on the 1D6. The target gets a free spin, but the attacker ends his turn facing away from the target. A charging 'Mech will take one click of damage and two clicks of heat for the charge as per normal rules. A ramming vehicle will take one click of damage per normal rules. If for any reason the charging/ramming vehicle cannot travel the full run past distance, deal 1 extra click of damage and place the unit just out of base contact with the target, along the line of travel.

However, given the numerous official statements from Wk that they have no intention of changing the Charge rules, I feel we are beating a dead horse here.

I do not like all the complicated ideas here, and I do think charge should ignore armor as to allow weak or salvaged units to overcome hardened armor units.
Problem is, the damage potential of strong chargers is far to high. I am pretty sure the +1 to damage was because they wanted salvaged units to be able to charge for 1 click, but that would not be needed if charging was defined to always deal at least one click of damage.

So reducing charge damage to +0 or even -1 would be much more useful, because it would not effect "last ditch charging" at all and mostly weaken charges of the really big primary damage dealers.

More heat could become too evil, since it would shut down non-evade-4-heat-clicks units on a push at once. Not a desireable effect.

In the current environment of huge attack ranges (VTOLS, tank drops, artillery), double charge movement is sadly needed, albeit I will never get used to the fact that most units can cross the board in two or three turns.

The straight line option will get complicated. If you include infantry immunity to make it useful against shielded targets, you will get troubles with figure placement. If you let infantry be a meat shield, everyone will just get a few peasants or minigun cycles with every mech.... Again, not a good solution, no matter which way round.

+2 Defense sounds simple at first, but illogical. I don´t want even MORE extremes in this game - I would rather have a halfway reliable attack (as it is right now) that deals MODERATE damage, instead of a rare chance to deal MASSIVE damage. That´s why damage reduction is much more appealing.

None of those. I think a base charge damage of 3, like vehicles has a base ram damage of 2, should be adopted.

Most of those ideas in the poll are good ideas but right now charge is so powerful that any one of ideas by itself would be insufficient to really stop all the chargemonkeyism that's going on.

1) I would say the damage a charge does = the attackers Primary damage -1 (to a min of 1).

2) The attacker should also get damage = to the defenders primary damage - 1 (to a min of 1).

3) A charge can only be conducted against something in your front arc and does not start the turn in your rear arc (this prevents abuse by the 360 deg front-arc mechs).

4) I think charge distance should also be reduced to 1x movement. I know a lot of people scream that this would no longer allow some units to hit from outside of weapons range which reduces your options greatly. This may be true. But this doesn't stop you from RUNNING. Instead of charging from 24 inches away, use the speed to run in to the back arc of the target (where he can't shoot you) and force him to either move and gain heat to prevent the back shot ... or else get SHOT. Hmmm ... there's an idea ... actually SHOOTING a target.

5) Another posibility. If the attacker misses the target he doesn't take any damage. But he has to place his unit with his back arc towards the target. This signifies that the target moved out of the way in time and the attacking mech ran past the target and now has a big ol bullseye on his backside.

The bottom line is right now charge is not balanced as far as risk vs reward and the above suggested fixes in the poll are not enough to bring things back in to balance if only one is selected. Charge is supposed to be a desparation attack ... not the primary attack type it is now. The changes in the poll would not change that if only a single one was implemented. If the changes suggested above in this post were all put in to effect charge would still be able to hit a target with armor for heavy damage but the charger in return could expect to get hit hard (whether he hit or missed) for doing so ... so he would have to weigh carefully whether doing so is worth risking his own mech to deal out that damage.

Forgot to add four things.

Armor SE's reduces charge damage. (heavy and Hardened only)
Movement SE's Camo and Evade work against Charge.
Brawling adds 1 to charge damage.
Melee on Primary adds 1 to charge damage.

While I really like the idea of armor reducing the damage as per normal damage, I don't think that's really that much of a detriment to the charger.

I do like the idea of a flat damage of 3 for a charge, plus one if they have brawling. That way the units that paid for the armor gets a chance at surviving if they are only taking a max of four, minus armor effects.

Exaclty. Mechs built for charging (brawling and melee on primary) should do more than the average gun-boat but armor is armor...it should still help.

I like the idea of armor affecting Charge.

"OK, I'm gonna charge you for 3"
BOING!
"OK, armor reduces it to 1, now my 'Mech is gonna beat your 'Mech over the head for 3 clicks."

The idea of armor reducing damage IMHO isn't a great idea. Sure it would reduce charge damage .. but think about what result that would have on the game. Suddenly everyone is fielding Yuri due to being a cheap unit with good attack and hardened armor. You just made some units more useful ... but only a mere handful of them. We are wanting changes that will make most, or even ALL mechs more useful.

I voted to limit charge range to walking speed, but I'd also like to see the +2 defense bonus. It shouldn't be too hard to step to the side and avoid getting rammed by a psycho mechjock. And that'd make the Locusts (and other 'Mechs with really low defenses) a lot more viable.

DFA isn't used because the risk is too great for the reward. One extra click of damage than charge, but it is at a lower range and a -2 to hit. Plus you take more damage for a failure.

Charge has too much reward without the great risk. Then you add in evade that reduces the negative heat portion of the charge.

Either the risk needs to be increased, or the reward needs to fall.

To increase risk: Defender gets a bonus to defence, attacker takes more damage on a successful or unsuccessful charge, attacker takes more heat, etc...

To lessen the reward: Damage is limited like ram or lowered, armor lowers damage, etc...

My opinion would be to add a +1 to the defenders defence (DFA gets a +2 to defender with a +2 to damage on a successful hit, charge would be a +1 to defence and a +1 to damage) and to make an unsuccessful charge cause the attacker more harm. Either give the attacker more damage, like DFA, more heat, or both. Keep the basic mechanics the same, but alter the risk vs. reward. Make a player second guess the tactic, have them look at the possibility of a failure and what that would mean to the unit.

It's like many of you have stated, make charge a despiration maneuver for players.

Then all we have to do is make transports act like every other click game and we should be set for a while.

Larry

I agree, charge is likely going to take more than 1 of the options above to completely fix/balance itself (IMO).

I personally like the less damage option (which I voted for), but a close second choice would have been the lesser distance for charge.

I don't think I'd ever support armor being useful against a charge, though. It is and always should remain a reliable way to damage an armored mech (if you can hit it). My reasoning is that charge isn't about an explosion or incinerating armor. It's about knocking stuff loose. Throw your cell phone across the room and if it doesn't shatter, it's likely at least the viewscreen will be cracked. A mech being hit by a charge is not just susceptible to external damage, but internal as well. Not to mention the driver/pilot will be shaken up a bit too. No, armor shouldn't help against charging...But, charging should do less damage IMO.

Also...If you're going to give the advantage to heavy mech's by allowing the defender to do primary damage back to the mech who charged him, then you might as well take speed into account as far as a "to hit" bonus/penalty as well. Otherwise, you're just reducing the power of lighter (less powerful) mechs. But, at this point things are getting a bit complicated anyway...For example, a mech with 12 speed charges a mech with 6 speed. You'd think the 12 speed mech could hit much easier compared to if the 6 speed mech charged the 12 speed mech. Say, +/- 1 to hit for every 2 speed difference. But, nevermind that...it's taking too much reality into account, and not enough balance/playability (or is it?). Thus, I think it's not going to work.

This would fix CHARGING:

1. Charging only in a straight line. If a Charge is NOT in a straight line, then target gets +4 to defense. (You cannot charge straight at a mech, then run around it. Doing so would get the +4 to defense. NOT going around, you do not get the +4 penalty).

2. You cannot charge if your mech is touching, or goes through any PLACED terrain. This includes water, low walls, hindering, etc.

3. Charging may use either “close combat” icon on the dial. If there is no Close Combat icon, then Primary attack may be used. The target gets the marked damage +1. The attacker gets the marked damage –1. IE, a 4 damage results in 5 damage to the target, attacker gets 3 damage. This damage cannot be avoided. IF there is no printed damage, then roll a 1d6(+1 for the charge still applies).

4. If a Charge is missed, attacker takes 2 clicks of damage.

5. Charging, the attacker must “run” his mech, even if the distance is within a “walk”. This give the mech a +1 heat for the run, +1 for the Charge. If the mech has evade, then it can avoid the +1 heat for the run.

6. You cannot charge while salvage.


I know some of the rules already exist, like the heat, and salvage, but I included them anyway.

While I voted for "none of the above," it's not because I don't think that charging is a major problem. I voted that way because I believe that none of the proposed changes, taken individually, is sufficient to rectify the situation. I think the solution lies in combining several of the proposals, the most effective (and simplest to implement) being:

- Let heavy/hardened armor (but not reactive or reflective armor) effect charge damage.

- Reduce charge range to printed movement radius, rather than run movement radius.

- Reduce charge damage to primary (not primary +1); primary -1 is too extreme, especially when used in concert with all the other modifications.

- A charger should take 1 damage if his attack is successful, and 2 damage if the attack is unsuccessful (to make the attack a riskier proposition).