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Hey folks!

Ran into a situation tonight that I didn't know how to answer:

Battlewagon with a Deffrolla hits a skimmer, which gets to dodge the ram on a 3+. Flipping open the ork codex to the deffrolla, the only requirement for the defrolla to hit is that you tank shock a unit. The skimmer dodged the ram and common sense seems to dictate that it would dodge the deffrolla, but the rules seem to indicate that it doesn't.

And we all know that we abandon common sense when you come to play 40k.

Anyone with something more than an opinion to throw at this?

Yes. No. Maybe?

It's unclear at best.

Gorkamorka wrote:Yes. No. Maybe?

It's unclear at best.

This. The rules are 110% silent on the issue, and there is no RaW answer unfortunately.

I would say it's like ramming so you get the 3+ save, but yeah nothing in the rules to say either way. I'm all for getting the save as a Dark Eldar player =p

Oshova

Gunna disagree with what you said on common sense dash. There's no doubt in my mind that when they wrote the rules they intended for you to be able to dodge it.

The Deffrolla damage is caused by a Ram. If the Skimmer dodges, the Ram doesn't happen. If the Ram doesn't happen, no damage caused by the Ram can happen.

Dodged or not it's pretty clear the skimmer takes the damage.

Why?

Because its a post to be argumentative.

If you dodge the Ram, then no Ram occurred

In which case, as Rank == tank shock, no tank shock occurred

In which case no damage occurs.

So then if you do a deffrolla ram, do you get the d6 hits + the ram?

nosferatu1001 wrote:If you dodge the Ram, then no Ram occurred

In which case, as Rank == tank shock, no tank shock occurred

In which case no damage occurs.

I think you're missing something rather important.

A.) If you shoot at a unit, you may assault it.

B.) If you shoot at a unit, and cause no damage, you still shot at the unit.

C.) If you shoot at a unit and cause no damage because they make their saves.....you STILL get to assault them because you shot at them. They just avoided the damage. The assault isn't based on the damage you did, its based on you declaring the action.
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A.) If you tank shock a unit, you also deffrolla it.

B.) If you tank shock a unit and cause no damage - or if they pass their leadership, or if the vehicle suffers no damage or makes a save) - you STILL tank shocked it.

C.) The deffrolla isn't dependent upon the tank shock causing damage, its dependent upon your declaration of a tank shock on a unit.
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So with that said; I noted in my first post that common sense seemed to dictate that you would dodge the deffrolla if you dodge the ram, although the rules don't seem to support that common sense conclusion.

@Fiercegoldfish, I think you need to re-read what I wrote.

@insaniak: I have the codex and the rulebook. You say the deffrolla damage is caused by a ram...I just explained it the best that I could. Could you elaborate a bit more in depth for me? I've been wrong before, although with two rules lawyers chiming in at the beginning here and telling me there *is* no clear rule...

@nosferatu: I think my logic steps were aimed at you. If you dodge a tank shock hit, you avoid the damage, but the tank shock still happened - see shooting analogy. You don't put the tank shocking vehicle back in its starting location and say, "Well, I didn't tank shock, so I'll try again!" The tank shock was definitely executed; the damage was just avoided.

And to pre-empt anyone's inevitable fluffy argument....the deffrolla is a giant spiked ball on a hinged lever system on the front of a deffrolla. While the skimmer is lifting off and not getting smacked into, the giant spiky ball is following them up and crashing into them. I can see a flier not getting hit, but a skimmer just skims. =p

You tank shock even if you dont make contact anyone, as the ENTIRE move is a "Tank Shock Attack"

So if the Skimmer avoids the Ram the skimmer was never rammed, even though you still performed a Ram Move.

Just the act of tank shocking / ramming a vehicle with a deff rolla will cause deff rolla damage. If the skimmer dodges it would be successful on not getting the “ram” portion of damage but the deff rolla damage would go through. In fact if the deff rolla vehicle is stopped by the dodge move the deff rolla will cause 2d6 hits.

The difficulty most people seem to be having is that GW uses the term tank shock attack to describe two different things.

The entire move from the moment the moving player declares he is making a tank shock is called the tanks shcok attack. And then the moment that the unit the vehicle comes into contact with has to make their morale check is also called the tank shock attack. These obviously aren the same thing but the same term is used.

There is no target or for that matter even a particular unit involved in the first part, its only when an enemy unit is contacted that the second part occurs. So a ram has to occur for the deff rolla to trigger, since it has to be the second usage that ir relevant to the rolla.

For ramming a skimmer the rules tell us that the ramming vehicle moves into contact with the skimmer, and then the skimmer may attempt to dodge. If a 3+ is rolled the skimmer avoids the tank, so the ram never takes place. If the ram never takes place, then there is no tank shock attack involving the skimmer so the deff rolla cannot trigger.

Before anyone argues too much more, there is second hurdle for the ramming vehicle.

Even if the deff rolla somehow would inflict its d6 hits, the dodging skimmer can take no damage from the hits, since the dodge rules specifically tell us that neither vehicle takes any damage.

So one way or the other, a successful dodge negates a deff rolla.



Sliggoth

PS Now if only all the other deff rolla questions were quite so easy to solve. The whole problem of disembarking over/ around the rolla and how does one assault a bw from the front arc?

@dash: I saw what you wrote, I just believe that when a rule cannot be decided, common sense SHOULD be applied. Maybe that's not the way it works around here, but I think it should be.

more on-topic: I think the term "Neither vehicle suffers any damage, and the ramming tank stops in its tracks (literally!), its crew confused and disappointed" (pg 71, "ramming a skimmer") Might be up for interpretation at this point. It does say neither vehicle takes ANY damage, so would this not include the rolla? Would the fact that the crew is now "confused" and has "stopped in its tracks" not mean that further attacks wouldn't be possible?

Edit: beat me to the "any damage point"

In order for "tank shocks" to affect vehicles, you pretty much have to be able to exchange the words "ram" and "tank shock" freely in all rules.

Therefore, if the dodge nullifies the ram, the dodge will also nullify the "tank shock" and thus no damage from the deff rolla occurs.

I'll grant that it's not 100% clear, but I feel that this interpretation has merit. GW fethed up the rules with that FAQ anyways, so we really can't tell what they are any more.

what gave the ability to the deffrolla to hit vehicles was the clarification that a tank shock is a form of ramming. If a skimmer can dodge a ram there for it can dodge a tankshock.

General_Chaos wrote:what gave the ability to the deffrolla to hit vehicles was the clarification that a tank shock is a form of ramming. If a skimmer can dodge a ram there for it can dodge a tankshock.

Except that you're not dodging the tank shock, you're dodging the damage. Kinda like the shooting analogy. Not hurting a unit during shooting doesn't mean you didn't shoot at it.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

Sliggoth wrote:

the dodge rules specifically tell us that neither vehicle takes any damage.

From the ramming hit. The "Doesn't take damage" is not a universal rule that makes it invulnerable to all incoming damage.

Read the ramming a skimmer rules on pg 71 again. On a 3+ the skimmer avoids the tank. Nothing at all about avoiding the damage, its the tank itself thats being avoided. So no ram at all even occurs, because the tank has been avoided. Where do you draw the conclusion that the damage is somehow being avoided? The ram itself at that point is the tank shock, there is no hit inflicted so there is no tank shock. If the rules said that the hit was still inflicted then your arguement would have merit, but there is nothing in the rules to support that idea that the ram occurs.

And there is no restriction on the neither vehicle suffers any damage. Nothing at all says its from the ramming hit. "any damage" is not restrictive in any way, in fact the word any can hardly be any more inclusive.


Sliggoth

It is interesting that this point has not been made here:

the deffrolla does not say when you SUCCESSFULLY tank shock (or ram) a unit.

it says when you tank shock (or ram) a unit.

if a skimmer dodges the ram, that just means neither vehicle is subject to damage under the ram rules.

where does it say anywhere that a skimmer dodge negates the effects of any wargear being carried by the offending vehicle??

I'd love some clarification on this one, but it seems very straightforward from that angle.

NaZ

+1 to NaZ

NaZ wrote:It is interesting that this point has not been made here:

the deffrolla does not say when you SUCCESSFULLY tank shock (or ram) a unit.

it says when you tank shock (or ram) a unit.

if a skimmer dodges the ram, that just means neither vehicle is subject to damage under the ram rules.

where does it say anywhere that a skimmer dodge negates the effects of any wargear being carried by the offending vehicle??

I'd love some clarification on this one, but it seems very straightforward from that angle.

NaZ

So if you ram 13" towards a tank that ends up being 14" away the deffrolla still triggers? You declared a ram, so you tank shocked, even though you didn't actually affect the vehicle you intended to affect.

IMO it's similar to the dodge. You intended to ram (tank shock) the vehicle, but the dodge prevented it from happening.

no, as you never came into contact with a vehicle no tank shock ever occured, invalid example.

You don't have to come into contact with an enemy unit to ram/tank shock.

The rules tell you what to do, you rotate, and move a specified number of inches in the desired direction. The rules then describe what happens if you come into contact with a unit.

Even if you don't come into contact with a unit, you have still tank shocked.

exactly. you dont make a dodge roll for the ram or suffer the effect of the deffrolla if the battlewagon never makes it into btb with the target.

But, according to the idea that the skimmer still takes deffrolla hits even if it dodged, because the battlewagon still executed a tank shock, then you would.

kill dem stunties wrote:no, as you never came into contact with a vehicle no tank shock ever occured, invalid example.

But that's also exactly what happens when the skimmer dodges...

You declare a ram... but the skimmer dodges out of the way, so no ram occurs.


This isn't the same situation as shooting and missing still allowing an assault. That would only be a valid analogy if the Deffrolla allowed you to make an assault phase attack on the unit against which you declared a tank shock.

A tank makes a tank shock move whether or not it actually comes into contact with the target unit. Where the rules get fuzzy is on whether the actual 'Tank Shock' is this tank shock move, or the sequence of events that occurs when this tank shock move brings the tank in contact with an enemy unit.

If the latter, then dodging out of the way means that no Tank Shock (and by extension Ram) has occured.
If the former, then yes, as a tank shock (or ram) has been declared, the Deffrolla damage will happen... but by extension Deffrollas will also inflict their damage on any unit against which a tank shock is declared, whether or not the vehicle actually reaches the unit.

I'm going with the idea that the 'tank shock move' is just the movement involved in attempting to make a Tank Shock... and the actual Tank Shock is what happens when you physically contact the unit... because the other interpretation leads to a very silly place.

willydstyle wrote:

NaZ wrote:It is interesting that this point has not been made here:

the deffrolla does not say when you SUCCESSFULLY tank shock (or ram) a unit.

[....]

NaZ

So if you ram 13" towards a tank that ends up being 14" away the deffrolla still triggers? You declared a ram, so you tank shocked, even though you didn't actually affect the vehicle you intended to affect.

IMO it's similar to the dodge. You intended to ram (tank shock) the vehicle, but the dodge prevented it from happening.

Sooo this.. If this successfully rule would be applied to anything this game would be broken beyond belief. Seriously.. Apply this logic to most of the rules and have fun playing total gak.
Imho - successful dodge equals no TS/Ram on this vehicle, and this equals to no deffrolla damage.

NaZ wrote:It is interesting that this point has not been made here:

the deffrolla does not say when you SUCCESSFULLY tank shock (or ram) a unit.

it says when you tank shock (or ram) a unit.

if a skimmer dodges the ram, that just means neither vehicle is subject to damage under the ram rules.

where does it say anywhere that a skimmer dodge negates the effects of any wargear being carried by the offending vehicle??

I'd love some clarification on this one, but it seems very straightforward from that angle.

NaZ

wow ok so I would declare to tank shock someone 48" away and damn I failed but you still take 1d6 hits... ork technology rocks...