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Good morning,

I'm trying to convince my brother / friends that you're supposed to roll for each reserve unit separately. The way they play it now is say they have 4 units in reserves, they just roll 4 dice all together. If for example 2 of the 4 pass the test and come on the board, then they'll look at their four units and go "Hrm... Do I want to bring on the drop pods or outflank with..." etc. The way I've seen it played online is people declare "Ok I'm rolling for the drop pod *roll 1 die*. Ok i'm rolling for the outflanking unit X *roll 1 die*" and so on.

I've seen it discussed in this forum before but search fails me. If somebody could point me in the right direction, or cares to rehash it, I would appreciate it.

Thanks.

P94.
At the start of each of his Movement phases except the
first, before moving any unit, the player must roll a dice
for each of his units in reserve. Depending on the turn
in question, a certain result will mean that the unit has
arrived.

It's pretty clear... right there in the reserve rules.

The wording seems ambiguous. If I roll 4 dice all together, ive "rolled a dice for each". It doesn't say to roll them separately. Or maybe that is your point.

In which case its up for interpretation.

Or maybe I'm missing your point.

Pge 94 BRB first sentence under rolling for reserves; "...the player must roll a dice for each of his units in reserve." It then goes on to say that a certain result will mean that the unit has arrived. This is in the singular tense, meaning that you roll for each unit in reserve individually.

EDIT:Ninja's by Gorkamorka.
One other point, if you were allowed to roll for all the units at one time and then choose which were to arrive, the rules would tell you to do it this way. (eg. "...the player rolls a die for each unit in reserve and from the successful rolls chooses which units will arrive that turn..."

p94 rolling for reserves.

...roll a dice for each unit.... a certain result will mean that the unit has arrived....

thus you roll a die for each unit if sucessful it goes into the available pool for later as below...

the BBB says to pick "from" the arriving units, it doesnt says pick which units arrive. thus you have to have determined which unit are available before choosing which ones can be chosen from.


interestingly enough i never paid attention to this but IG should roll for each unit in a FoS not the FoS as a whole.

JRedbeard wrote:The wording seems ambiguous. If I roll 4 dice all together, ive "rolled a dice for each". It doesn't say to roll them separately. Or maybe that is your point.

In which case its up for interpretation.

Or maybe I'm missing your point.

Exactly, you've "rolled a dice for each." That doesn't mean you pick and choose which ones come on - it means you have a die that represents each unit. For instance, I have a drop pod and three units of outflanking bikes. I separate a different color die for each one of these units. I roll them all together. Now, the ones that were designated to their respective reserve units and passed their reserve roll get to come onto the board.

JRedbeard wrote:The wording seems ambiguous. If I roll 4 dice all together, ive "rolled a dice for each". It doesn't say to roll them separately. Or maybe that is your point.

In which case its up for interpretation.

Or maybe I'm missing your point.

I can see your point. People that want to contest it RAW could argue it either way.

You should house rule it and be done with it. If they decide to play it their way, try not to laugh when a tournament judge tells them they're wrong

Chi3f wrote:

JRedbeard wrote:The wording seems ambiguous. If I roll 4 dice all together, ive "rolled a dice for each". It doesn't say to roll them separately. Or maybe that is your point.

In which case its up for interpretation.

Or maybe I'm missing your point.

I can see your point. People that want to contest it RAW could argue it either way.

You should house rule it and be done with it. If they decide to play it their way, try not to laugh when a tournament judge tells them they're wrong

no the RaW is clear, because when you choose which units to place on the board you choose from the arriving pool. if you dont declare whcih die is for which single unit there is nothing in the arriving pool.

lixulana wrote: no the RaW is clear, because when you choose which units to place on the board you choose from the arriving pool. if you dont declare whcih die is for which single unit there is nothing in the arriving pool.

There is also the last paragraph that says that reserves have to arrive as soon as available. You can't delay the roll or keep the units in reserve until you decide you need them. If you just roll a bunch of dice and then pick and choose which arrive, you are violating this rule.

His response:

"I still cont see your point they arguing the same way we do...and if the idiots actually read the entire rule it says after the units have been rolled for, the players picks "ANY" one of the units and deploys it.

Personally the people that are still rolling for their reserves seperatly are playing by the old codex and do not want to change. In the old codex I believe you did not have to roll for your reserves every turn if you did not want to. Now you have to roll for all your reserves starting on the second turn...do I think they gave you the ability to chose which reserves you want to bring on"


My response:

Exactly. After you've rolled to see which units come on, you pick ANY of the units and deploy them. In other words, rolling order does not equal the order you have to place them. You roll it out and then after youve determined which units are coming on you pick ANY to place.

You're welcome to disagree with whats in the book, but from what I can tell the "people still rolling separately" is the entire tournament scene. That might not mean anything to you (as tournaments can have house rules just like anybody else) but when I cant find one single person supporting your views and officially sanctioned events are run in the opposite way I tend to think you're wrong. ...

Ugh.

One of you UKers may be able to confirm this... it is my understanding that in the UK, the word "Dice" is used for the singular and the plural of the word. (like "sheep")

So when they say "A dice" that translates into 'american' as "A die".


Why is he talking about a codex? The rules are in the BRB.


The second paragraph seems to make it even more obvious

Once all of the units have been rolled for, the player picks any one of the units arriving and deploys it, moving it onto the table as described later.

He "picks any one of the units arriving"; so you don't pick a unit to arrive, that has already been determined, you are picking a unit that is arriving.

coredump wrote:One of you UKers may be able to confirm this... it is my understanding that in the UK, the word "Dice" is used for the singular and the plural of the word. (like "sheep")

So when they say "A dice" that translates into 'american' as "A die".

For some reason GW call it that, but I have always called a Single Die, well a Die.

You could point out the Eldar Stratagem in Planetstrike that makes reserve rules work exactly as he is arguing, since by virtue of its existence it proves his reading incorrect.

Not strictly relevant to a rule discussion but it might be useful for convincing someone your reading is correct.

Jack

JRedbeard wrote:His response:

"I still cont see your point they arguing the same way we do...and if the idiots actually read the entire rule it says after the units have been rolled for, the players picks "ANY" one of the units and deploys it.

Personally the people that are still rolling for their reserves seperatly are playing by the old codex and do not want to change. In the old codex I believe you did not have to roll for your reserves every turn if you did not want to. Now you have to roll for all your reserves starting on the second turn...do I think they gave you the ability to chose which reserves you want to bring on"


My response:

Exactly. After you've rolled to see which units come on, you pick ANY of the units and deploy them. In other words, rolling order does not equal the order you have to place them. You roll it out and then after youve determined which units are coming on you pick ANY to place.

You're welcome to disagree with whats in the book, but from what I can tell the "people still rolling separately" is the entire tournament scene. That might not mean anything to you (as tournaments can have house rules just like anybody else) but when I cant find one single person supporting your views and officially sanctioned events are run in the opposite way I tend to think you're wrong. ...

Ugh.

Is this still in debate? If it isn't then ignore this, if it is, please point this out:

...the player must roll --->a<--- dice
for --->each<--- of his units in reserve...


For example, on Turn 1 no reserves arrive, on
Turn 2 the player needs a 4+ for a unit to arrive, and so
on until Turn 5, when any units left will arrive
automatically (see the Reserves table on this page).

p94

He has not conceded the point yet, still working on it.

We went over the text you quoted a bit above Visavis, I cant read that and conclusively say im right... though luckily some people have posted some other supporting quotes.

That's almost as outrageous as rolling for a clump of wounds on a differently-equipped, multi-wound unit, and then assigning a single unsaved wound to each group.

As far as I'm concerned, an opponent should declare each roll for each unit/model/group FOR EVERYTHING. It's a more precise way to play, and doesn't create as many problems in the long run.

If your friends feel the need to pick and choose optimal units for each reserves roll, and you don't have any serious issues with it, I would just let it go. In the name of good sportsmanship, house rules for casual play shouldn't be fiercely disputed over. I am sure you expect such a move from your brother/friends by now, and have positioned your dudes accordingly. Let them match their best against your best, and determine the victor from there.

Earlier you mentioned the search function on Dakka. I believe that it sorts the searched-for entries from oldest to most recent, which can be confusing to some at times.

As for the actual rule in question, the way everyone does it is this:

Roll one die for each unit (if you like to roll all at once, use different colours or sizes)
The successful units may be deployed in any order.

If you do not specify which unit you are rolling for with each die, then none of the units can come in, as you haven't rolled for them yet.

Here's the way I see it and how I would explain it in your position. The text "the player must roll a dice for each of his units in reserve" means that the player must declare which unit each dice corresponds to. If it were done the way your brother / friends do it it would be written like this:

"The player rolls a number of dice equal to the number of units held in reserve. For each successful roll, he may select and deploy a unit."

If there is still confusion, look at the next paragraph, which begins "Once all of the units have been rolled for..." meaning rather than as soon as a successful roll is made for the unit. This implies that units are rolled for individually.

I don't know if your brother has ever played against a Chaos Daemon player. His argument would fall apart fairly quickly if he did play a daemon army; it'd be hard to miss how broken a daemon player would be when choosing exactly what they want to bring in from reserves, just by passing some rolls.

It sounds like he'll refuse any explanation you provide, so either don't play him with reserves for either side or play by his rules. I'd run a list that abuses the crap out of his misinterpretation to prove the point myself, but I'm mean to my siblings.

JRedbeard wrote:...and if the idiots actually read the entire rule it says after the units have been rolled for, the players picks "ANY" one of the units and deploys it.

It actually says to pick any of the units arriving.

Meaning you pick any of the units that have just passed their Reserve roll, and deploy them.

Personally the people that are still rolling for their reserves seperatly are playing by the old codex and do not want to change.

Which codex has anything to do with this? The Reserves rules are in the rulebook.

In the old codex I believe you did not have to roll for your reserves every turn if you did not want to.

You have always (at least for as long as the Reserves rule has existed in the game) had to roll for them every turn.

Well I appreciate everyone's attempts here.

I cant in good conscience (from the text provided) say that my interpretation is correct. We've decided to house rule it since it benefits us all (with the armies we play) equally and leave it at that.