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Hi all,

Was playing my second game yesterday (My IG against 700 points of my friends Tau) just feeling out the rules and a few simple questions came up. First, my Platoon Command Squad wanted to assault. I had four guards with lasguns (rapid-fire) and my commander had a CC weapon and a bolt pistol. We both thought it was fine to assault as long as my Commander was the only one that shot. Based on what I read in the rule book this seems right. Would anyone be so kind as to confirm?

And a second question. What is the minimum distance one must be away from another unit to still be able to fire. I've looked for this several times in the rule book because I recall something on this subject in there somewhere. I thought if one was too close then they could only assault.

Oh and the Tau won when the game ended at turn 5. He grabbed an objective just in time.

Many thanks for the help!

frozenmilk wrote:Hi all,

Was playing my second game yesterday (My IG against 700 points of my friends Tau) just feeling out the rules and a few simple questions came up. First, my Platoon Command Squad wanted to assault. I had four guards with lasguns (rapid-fire) and my commander had a CC weapon and a bolt pistol. We both thought it was fine to assault as long as my Commander was the only one that shot. Based on what I read in the rule book this seems right. Would anyone be so kind as to confirm?

And a second question. What is the minimum distance one must be away from another unit to still be able to fire. I've looked for this several times in the rule book because I recall something on this subject in there somewhere. I thought if one was too close then they could only assault.

Oh and the Tau won when the game ended at turn 5. He grabbed an objective just in time.

Many thanks for the help!

1) Page 16, BRB. Where it says some models can choose not to fire.

2) You are recalling wrongly. You can shoot at an enemy unit even if you are 1" away. Some specific units (for example, Blood Claws) have special rules that limit how they can fire, but it is not a general rule.

Thanks for the help! I think my eyes had rather glazed over yesterday after reading the rule book all day.

Not really Gwar!, while it is true that the rule book doesn't say there IS a minimum distance to fire from it DOES say that you can't be closer then 1" or 2" to an enemy unit. I would call this the minimum distance or else they are locked in CC and therefore cannot fire at all. You could argue that because the rules say you are not allowed within that distance of an enemy squad that my point is mute but as far as establishing any minimum this would be it.

ComputerGeek01 wrote:Not really Gwar!, while it is true that the rule book doesn't say there IS a minimum distance to fire from it DOES say that you can't be closer then 1" or 2" to an enemy unit. I would call this the minimum distance or else they are locked in CC and therefore cannot fire at all. You could argue that because the rules say you are not allowed within that distance of an enemy squad that my point is mute but as far as establishing any minimum this would be it.

1) You cannot move to closer than 1" of a model in the movement phase.
2) Moving to less than 1" in the assault phase does not lock you in combat, only BTB does. For example, there are 2 vehicles next to each other, 1 Dreadnought and a Predator that are 0.1" away from each other (they are on the same side so they can do this). You assault the predator. The assaulting models can move closer than 1" of the Dreadnought, but won't be locked in combat unless they move into BtB.

So yeah, your point is "moot" and doesn't actually change anything I said.

Not really Gwar!, while it is true that the rule book doesn't say there IS a minimum distance to fire from it DOES say that you can't be closer then 1" or 2" to an enemy unit. I would call this the minimum distance or else they are locked in CC and therefore cannot fire at all. You could argue that because the rules say you are not allowed within that distance of an enemy squad that my point is mute but as far as establishing any minimum this would be it.

This is the way we were more or less playing. We were going with about three inches of buffer around the mini unless there was an assault so we weren't far off. Thanks!

Except that what youre quoting is wrong?

being within 1" doesnt mean assault.

Oh, I see now. Thanks for the clarification. I think my question had more to do with movement than shooting, I just didn't realize it until now.

In certain cases you can even be in Base Contact with an enemy unit and still fire - most typically a unit in base contact with a vehicle can still shoot in the shooting phase and make its close combat attacks.