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I was told deep striking a bloodthirster from this book doesn't force the bloodthirster to start as swooping because it is just "deep strike" via summoning not "deep strike reserve"....which means they can be summoned gliding when they elect it in their movement. Is this true?

I read both the rulebook and the codex and it appears you can also use your blood points at the beginning of the turn, which means you should be able to switch to gliding during movement. It makes no mention of not being able to switch multiple times, it only says you -must- switch during your movement step.


Can anyone shed some light on this?

Thank you!

The reason why I'm asking is because it makes little sense when the codex allows a player to summon a bloodthirster/winged daemon prince, but they can't be used for 3 turns...by that time the game is over.

Conjuration, which is the spell type for summoning, says that units arrive by deepstrike and count as coming from reserves. P.26 7e brb

Flying monsterous creature rules say that if they come on the field by deepstrike they must start swooping. P. 68 7e brb

So, they must start swooping.

The deepstrike rules say "In the movement phase in which the arrive, deepstriking units may not move any further...". P. 162 7e brb Which implies that the bloodthirster would arrive in the movement phase, but psychic summons happen in the psychic phase so that is out the window.

Flying monsterous creature rules say the must declare a flight mode at the beginning of their move. P. 68 7e brb

The turn rules say the start of the turn events happen before the movement phase. P. 17 7e brb

So, if the blood thirster is summoned at the start of the turn, he must start swooping, but I don't see anything that says he can't change flight modes that turn, though he can't move any further.



Automatically Appended Next Post:
Ignoring my previous post,

With the blood host (is that the decurion style formation?) you should be able to get 8 blood points by turn 3, making the bloodthirster useful on turn 5. If one(or more) of those blood points is that bloodthirster summoning weapon then you will have 2, and obviously starting with that big d monster you should be able to get 3 bloodthirsters on the table at once without too much effort, unless your opponent is deliberatly not killing things.

Yeah I had the same thought as the OP. Sure you can't move after deep strike but is there anything that says you can't change flight modes?

Wouldn't the blood tithe stuff happen before the movement phase? As far as I can tell there's no way around the whole no assault out of deep strike thing but I don't think you're forced to sit there for 3turns like some people have been saying

You can only declare your flight mode at the start of your turn. Once you deep strike in (which is the only way to arrive via conjuration, which is used with both Malefic Daemonology and the Blood Tithe), your flight mode is already locked for that turn. You cannot move during the movement phase, although you could run.

Since you are mandated as a FMC to arrive in swooping mode, you cannot be gliding that turn. You cannot charge in the turn that you arrive from reserves no matter what.

Next turn, you are able to alter your flight mode if you choose; however you cannot declare a charge in the same turn that you change flight modes, meaning that if you achieve 8 blood points before your turn 3 starts, your bloodthirster will not be able to attempt a charge until turn 5. Really sort of poor rules by GW there if you ask me. Really limits the viability of the entire detachment by how late into the game you're actually able to cash in for anything significant. Especially since turn 1 and 2 you may not be getting many charges off, which is what you need to issue challenges

Actually an FMC declares its flight mode at the start of its move. So although the Bloodthirster arrives in swooping mode because of Deep Striking, I can't see anything preventing it changing flight mode at the start of a Run move. Obviously there's still no way for it to charge in the turn it comes in but it would be able to in the next turn. I agree that if they had to wait yet another turn it would limit the viability of the Bloodthirster.

Also, a Bloodthirster being summoned as a result of the Blood Tithe has nothing to do with Conjuration-type psychic powers, Malefic Daemonology, or the similarly named Summoning psychic power (Khorne hates Psykers).

" at the start of its move, a FMC must declare whether it is swooping or gliding until the start of its next turn"

"If a FMC arrives via Deep Strike Reserve, it always counts as being in swooping mode"

Its the start of its next turn restriction that stops changing when you run.

Captyn_Bob wrote:
" at the start of its move, a FMC must declare whether it is swooping or gliding until the start of its next turn"

"If a FMC arrives via Deep Strike Reserve, it always counts as being in swooping mode"

Its the start of its next turn restriction that stops changing when you run.

right,

I dont see what the issue is. You summon him at the start of the turn in swooping mode, you change his flight mode at the start of movement to gliding and then you run him during shooting.

It seems like people are purposefully TRYING to make the rule bad so as to whine and moan about GW.

Rest assured , that is not the case.

Haha indeed. I heart Bloodthirsters. The issue is that changing flight modes says "at the start of its move" and deep strike into the table is obviously a move. So can you do something "at the start of your move" before you move onto the table? You could, except for the fact that you have to be swooping when you deep strike onto the table, I think you're already locked into swooping for that turn since you didn't declare gliding at the start of your move (which again, you couldn't since you had to be swooping to arrive via deep strike)

To sum up the sequence of events:

1) bloodthirster is summoned at the start of the turn via blood tithe, before movement phase

2) bloodthirster must declare swooping to come in via deep strike

3) bloodthirster moves onto the table via deep strike

4) since bloodthirster has already moved this turn, the "start of its move" has already passed and it must wait to alter flight mode until next turn

@luke1705: We can agree that we move the model from the side of the board and onto it, but that's not what's meant when talking about a model's move.

Really? Then why does the BRB say that a model who deep strikes onto the table counts as having moved, even though it cannot move any further that turn in the movement phase? It's pretty clear that this is part of a model's move.

If it was not (as you are implying), then any time that you "arrive by deep strike" and are mandated to be in swooping mode, you could just immediately change to gliding mode. What, then, would be the point of mandating that you arrive in swooping mode, if you could just say "nah, I don't feel like doing that"

Its pretty clear-cut that the BT deepstirkes and is stuck as swooping.

Therefor they serve more as an emergency brake, and anti-alpha-strike, as if things went REALLY sour on T1, you can summon him (and if using the formation you net an extra deamon prince) and he will land on time to make a difference.

Its not worthy to stack up for him later, and intentional or not, its smart mechanics.
You get an assault army that does not suffer TOO much from getting hit on heavy on T1-2 when he is yet to hit people.

The brb says in the movement phase in which it arrives it cannot move any further. If it arrives before the movement phase in the same way summoned daemons arrive in the psychic phase, then it hasn't arrived in the movement phase and this rule can be ignored.

 luke1705 wrote:
Haha indeed. I heart Bloodthirsters. The issue is that changing flight modes says "at the start of its move" and deep strike into the table is obviously a move. So can you do something "at the start of your move" before you move onto the table? You could, except for the fact that you have to be swooping when you deep strike onto the table, I think you're already locked into swooping for that turn since you didn't declare gliding at the start of your move (which again, you couldn't since you had to be swooping to arrive via deep strike)

To sum up the sequence of events:

1) bloodthirster is summoned at the start of the turn via blood tithe, before movement phase

2) bloodthirster must declare swooping to come in via deep strike

3) bloodthirster moves onto the table via deep strike

4) since bloodthirster has already moved this turn, the "start of its move" has already passed and it must wait to alter flight mode until next turn

What you're ignoring is that what the Deep Strike rules actually say is that the deep striking unit counts as having moved in the Movement Phase. The BRB also explicitly defines actions occurring at the start of the turn to be resolved separately to, and before the Movement Phase. So when summoned by the Blood Tithe the Bloodthirster deep strikes in at the start of the turn (and is swooping) and has therefore not yet moved.

Whether you consider the "counts as having moved" part of the Deep Strike rules as the model actually moving (despite remaining physically stationary on the table) is another issue, but if you think that this is the case then there is nothing to prevent the Bloodthirster changing flight modes in the movement phases as per the rules for FMC, as the start of its move occurs during this phase. If you consider the Bloodthirster not to have actually moved in the movement phase but just "counts as", then there's nothing to stop it changing flight modes in the Assault phase as part of a Run move (which would then be the start of its move).

@luke1705: I see your point and you could very well be right. There are two reasons to why I'm not sure if you are.

1) The mandatory Swooping mode could just be GW's interpretation of how the Flying Monstrous Creature arrives to the battlefield: if it's by Deep Strike, it symbolises that it's arriving from the skies and so needs to be in Swooping mode, though when it's here, it's free to change mode. Sometimes GW makes up rules which are supposed to reflect reality but which only confuses.

2) The second reason is that I don't think that GW intended a 2-turn charge delay for Flying Monstrous Creatures compared to a single-turn charge delay for everything else.

Yeah I think this is probably going to end up a RAW vs RAI situation, which generally comes down to what you and your group decide to go with.

Now that a few more people have posted I can definitely see where the idea that the BT must wait more than one turn comes from, but I'm still not 100% sold on that.

Tonberry7, could you quote that section for me? I was looking for something like that in the rules but couldn't find it. That would go a ways towards strengthening the case for a change in flight modes being allowed.

Chaospling,

I agree with both of your points. If we (or Tonberry) can find that section which states that there is actually a "pre-movement phase", if you will, for things that occur "at the start of your turn", then I think I'd be ok interpreting it like that.

The new bloodthirsters tempted me back into 40k, but I see the rules are still as gak as ever.

Does anyone here legitimately think that the authors even knew how the rules would interact with the summoned thirsters? That they intentionally made them feth around for two turns before being able to do anything?

Because IMO its far more likely they just had no idea, and accidentally made one of the major rules for the Khorne stuff next to useless.

 Dakkamite wrote:
The new bloodthirsters tempted me back into 40k, but I see the rules are still as gak as ever.

Does anyone here legitimately think that the authors even knew how the rules would interact with the summoned thirsters? That they intentionally made them feth around for two turns before being able to do anything?

Because IMO its far more likely they just had no idea, and accidentally made one of the major rules for the Khorne stuff next to useless.

Yep. That's GW.

I interpreted it as since blood tithe points is done at the beginning over your turn before deep strike or movement, you can summon your bloodthirster which comes in swooping, then when deep strike reserve/move hits (after your summoning) you -must- elect either swooping or gliding according to the rule, it doesn't say anything about not being allowed to change modes


I mean...they couldn't have purposely made it so you can summon a bloodthirster that can't even do anything until the game ends...GW can count right?

It may very well work that way. It would just be nice if GW made things a little more clear for those of us who like to be certain rather than pretty sure (like me)

I think that's probably how I'll be playing it going forward, but it will be interesting to see how tournaments rule this in the future

 luke1705 wrote:
It may very well work that way. It would just be nice if GW made things a little more clear for those of us who like to be certain rather than pretty sure (like me)

I think that's probably how I'll be playing it going forward, but it will be interesting to see how tournaments rule this in the future

I agree it will be interesting but I will be playing it with the Bloodthirster and Daemon Prince able to change to gliding in their movement phase of the turn they arrive.

Page 17 of the rule book.

You see that turns are segmented in 6 different phases.

1-Beginning of the turn
2-Movement Phase
3-psy phase
4-Shooting phase
5-Assault phase( wich include the fight/CC sub phase)
6-End of the turn.

Deep Strike ( be it normal or via Blood tithe) Happens in the Beginning of the turn "phase", wich happens BEFORE the movement phase.

While true that a DSing unit cannot move, it doesn't prevent the model for doing anything else that it can do in the movement phase.

Just like a unit/model where he is affected by a rule that says " cannot shoot in the shooting phase", that doesn't mean that the model cannot Run instead, just that it doesn't shoot.

Same goes for switching flight modes, You don't move the model, but you still can switch his alltitude, now it won't allow him to assault the same turn it DSed and it still will wait the next turn for that.

Simply you don't have to do like people believed at first; DS on turn 3, turn 4 switch to gliding, turn 5 assault.

 Slayer le boucher wrote:
Page 17 of the rule book.

You see that turns are segmented in 6 different phases.

1-Beginning of the turn
2-Movement Phase
3-psy phase
4-Shooting phase
5-Assault phase( wich include the fight/CC sub phase)
6-End of the turn.

Deep Strike ( be it normal or via Blood tithe) Happens in the Beginning of the turn "phase", wich happens BEFORE the movement phase.

While true that a DSing unit cannot move, it doesn't prevent the model for doing anything else that it can do in the movement phase.

Just like a unit/model where he is affected by a rule that says " cannot shoot in the shooting phase", that doesn't mean that the model cannot Run instead, just that it doesn't shoot.

Same goes for switching flight modes, You don't move the model, but you still can switch his alltitude, now it won't allow him to assault the same turn it DSed and it still will wait the next turn for that.

Simply you don't have to do like people believed at first; DS on turn 3, turn 4 switch to gliding, turn 5 assault.

This is what makes more sense to me from a rules perspective...why write a rule that can never be used? This is how I'm going to play it until its FAQ'd.

on BRB(i have the pocket size book, but should be the same?) page 135, under the section heading: "arriving from reserve", it says that same "at the start of your turn", which is defined as a separate phase before movement. (as per previous poster's points.)


where does it state that a model, in this case specifically an FMC, can make other movement actions after deep striking?
-there are clear uses of "move[s] onto the table" on page 135 and 136. though that is not clearly from deep strike reserve.
-on page 162, it states "… units may not move any further, other than to disembark [from a transport if they are in one]"

don't intend to play daemonkin, but i like my tzeentch circus list and am curious.

The real question that this raises for me is how this is different from a normal deep strike. I would have assumed that the answer was "normal deep strike happens at the start of your movement phase, whereas this happens at the start of your turn, which is before your movement phase"

However, if slamma is correct (not questioning - just don't have my rulebook in front of me to consult) and deep strike also happens "at the start of your turn" normally, then what I'm not seeing here is the explicit permission to override the "must arrive as swooping". It doesn't say that you change flight modes at the start of the movement phase - it says that you change flight modes at the start of the FMC's move, which I am still struggling to compartmentalize away from the deep strike onto the table. That seems like movement to me, especially when we are told that it counts as moving for the purposes of firing a weapon that cares whether or not you moved in the movement phase.

You should ask yourself - what will you achieve by proving that the bloodthirsters can't do anything for most of the game? Are you improving peoples game experience, or gaking all over it?

Some questions are better left unanswered mate.

Let the mono-Khorne players have their fun. Its not like this will be remotely competitive with or without derped out thirsters, and besides, Tau will probably get the same thing with their next codex, free riptides for killing the maximum number of enemy units on the first turn or some gak.

 luke1705 wrote:
The real question that this raises for me is how this is different from a normal deep strike. I would have assumed that the answer was "normal deep strike happens at the start of your movement phase, whereas this happens at the start of your turn, which is before your movement phase"

However, if slamma is correct (not questioning - just don't have my rulebook in front of me to consult) and deep strike also happens "at the start of your turn" normally, then what I'm not seeing here is the explicit permission to override the "must arrive as swooping". It doesn't say that you change flight modes at the start of the movement phase - it says that you change flight modes at the start of the FMC's move, which I am still struggling to compartmentalize away from the deep strike onto the table. That seems like movement to me, especially when we are told that it counts as moving for the purposes of firing a weapon that cares whether or not you moved in the movement phase.

The thing is i think, that you are analysing the rule by force of habit.

because in previous versions of the rules( 3rd to 6th editions), the Deep strike rule was written to be the movement or to count has having moved; and since the change of the Phases in the turn and how the rule is written has only changed in a subtle way, no one really gave any after though, myself was still using the old Jink rule, where you had to first move during the movement phase to be able to declare a jink, while in 7th you don't have to first move to get it, you just need to declare it.

In 7th its not a move, its a deployement methode, its the way you enter on the table, you still have the movement phase afterwards.

Now yes Deep Strike rules says that the model cannot move in the same movement phase of the same turn it did deploy, but like i said, nothing prevents the said model to do anything else during the phase.

"what I'm not seeing here is the explicit permission to override the "must arrive as swooping". It doesn't say that you change flight modes at the start of the movement phase - it says that you change flight modes at the start of the FMC's move, which I am still struggling to compartmentalize away from the deep strike onto the table. That seems like movement to me, especially when we are told that it counts as moving for the purposes of firing a weapon that cares whether or not you moved in the movement phase."

(sorry, new to forum, dunno how to properly quote)

i am in no way saying i am correct or not, merely reading the rule book and asking questions (also fairly new to 7th edition). but this is the same issue i see with this dilemma.

but yes, it seems lame to me that a blood tithed bloodthirster ends up being somewhat worthless to the daemonkin.
it also affects anyone trying to deep strike a FMC, so it seems worth exploring. and using FMCs myself, i am curious.

 Dakkamite wrote:
You should ask yourself - what will you achieve by proving that the bloodthirsters can't do anything for most of the game? Are you improving peoples game experience, or gaking all over it?

Some questions are better left unanswered mate.

Let the mono-Khorne players have their fun. Its not like this will be remotely competitive with or without derped out thirsters, and besides, Tau will probably get the same thing with their next codex, free riptides for killing the maximum number of enemy units on the first turn or some gak.

Not trying to rain on anyone's parade man. I've had Berzerkers since I was 12 and I currently own 3 Bloodthirsters, with plans to pick up a fourth simply because that new model is spectacular. The only thing I'm trying to do here is figure out what RAW is since it's not entirely clear (or at least it wasn't when I started looking at it). I'm running a tournament this Saturday and I can guarantee that I will be ruling that a FMC summoned by the blood tithe can change its flight mode the turn it arrives if it so chooses. That's what TO's do - they look at the lemons that GW hands us and make lemonade that people will actually want to drink.

Probably won't have you write the next Tau codex though - I think Riptides are fine as is


Automatically Appended Next Post:

slamma wrote:

but yes, it seems lame to me that a blood tithed bloodthirster ends up being somewhat worthless to the daemonkin.
it also affects anyone trying to deep strike a FMC, so it seems worth exploring. and using FMCs myself, i am curious.

My thoughts exactly. A ruling like this has greater implications than just for the blood tithe, since they both enter play in almost exactly the same way, at the exact point in the turn.

And just click the quote box to the top right corner of the post that you want to quote. You can then add or edit whatever you want, like how I shortened your previous post for emphasis