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Is that only bike army even legal?

Thank you so much, Viper.

General concensus in the past is that yes, you can legally tank shock / ram onto the board. As long as there is the tiniest sliver of board available for you to begin said tank shock / ram, you're golden. Note that there's no restriction on beginning a tank shock within 1" of an enemy model. It's not normal movement, and you're beginning the movement phase within 1" of the enemy model, not ending it.

Yup. You take Kahn on his bike then Bikes become troop choices.

Lokirfellheart wrote:Is that only bike army even legal?

Yes. Kor'sarro Khan and the Spess Mehree Captain (on a Spess Mehreen Bike) both make bike squads count as troops choices.

SaintHazard wrote:This is 100% legal and an awesome move. High-five to the savvy Tau player.

This, kids, is why you don't hold an entire army in reserve when your opponent has hordes of infiltrators.

Or why a White Scars player who plans to hold everything in reserve should have a Ko'sarro Khan card up his sleeve.

puma713 wrote:

SaintHazard wrote:This is 100% legal and an awesome move. High-five to the savvy Tau player.

This, kids, is why you don't hold an entire army in reserve when your opponent has hordes of infiltrators.

Or why a White Scars player who plans to hold everything in reserve should have a Ko'sarro Khan card up his sleeve.

Or a drop pod, or scouts, or any of the other 19,480,314,932,443 ways to get around that tactic that I didn't mention because there are roughly 19,480,314,932,443 of them.

SaintHazard wrote:

puma713 wrote:

SaintHazard wrote:This is 100% legal and an awesome move. High-five to the savvy Tau player.

This, kids, is why you don't hold an entire army in reserve when your opponent has hordes of infiltrators.

Or why a White Scars player who plans to hold everything in reserve should have a Ko'sarro Khan card up his sleeve.

Or a drop pod, or scouts, or any of the other 19,480,314,932,443 ways to get around that tactic that I didn't mention because there are roughly 19,480,314,932,443 of them.

thats a big number......

ko'sarro khan card? did i miss something in this quip??

hcordes wrote:ko'sarro khan card? did i miss something in this quip??

Kor'sarro Khan's Chapter Tactics removes Combat Tactics and gives Dedicated Transports the ability to outflank.

SaintHazard wrote:

hcordes wrote:
ko'sarro khan card? did i miss something in this quip??

Kor'sarro Khan's Chapter Tactics removes Combat Tactics and gives Dedicated Transports the ability to outflank.

Gives -everything- the ability to outflank.

hcordes wrote:

SaintHazard wrote:

puma713 wrote:

SaintHazard wrote:This is 100% legal and an awesome move. High-five to the savvy Tau player.

This, kids, is why you don't hold an entire army in reserve when your opponent has hordes of infiltrators.

Or why a White Scars player who plans to hold everything in reserve should have a Ko'sarro Khan card up his sleeve.

Or a drop pod, or scouts, or any of the other 19,480,314,932,443 ways to get around that tactic that I didn't mention because there are roughly 19,480,314,932,443 of them.

thats a big number......

ko'sarro khan card? did i miss something in this quip??

Ko'sarro Khan is a nasty piece of work. The bike list is devastating when it works.

puma713 wrote:Gives -everything- the ability to outflank.

Yep, you're right, my bad. I somehow selective readeded the second sentence, and skipped the first.

Yes, this is legal, but very unlikely. The following conditions all have to be met:

1) Player A goes first
2) Player A contains enough infiltrators to cover an entire long board edge
3) Player B reserves his entire army
4) Player B has no vehicles, no jump packs, no flanking, no deep strike, no jetbikes (what else am I missing?)

So, be aware this strategy can happen. If your army has enough infiltrators, be on the lookout for a list that doesn't contain a way to get past you and reserves everything. If your army doesn't have a way to get past an enemy unit, don't reserve everything if your opponent has tons of infiltrators.

It's not a particularly obvious strategy, but be aware of it and don't let it happen to you/take advantage when you can!

If my opponent ever did this to me, I'd laugh.

The spectacular absurdity of doing this goes way beyond "dick move" and well into the territory of hilariously awesome.

You cant call it being a dick move because the other guy left himself open for it so badly. This is pretty much a never happens kind of move but given the right situation and such, you get that picture lol. I bet that white scars player never pulled THAT again against Tau

To me, it is like "Fool's Mate" in chess. If you're paying any amount of attention at all, it shouldn't happen.

LOL, I think the leason here is don't be a dick and keep everyone in reserve, or someone smarter then you will make you pay. I be giving the Tau a pat on the back, for beating the other guy at his own game.

hcordes wrote:One would think that you wouldn't hold your entire army in reserve in the first place unless there was a guaranteed way of getting them onto the board, i.e. drop pod.
in a casual game.. that is a pretty d*ck move.....
in a tournament.... d*ck moves turn into strategy.

QFT^

In a casual game i woudl have been annoyed if someone pulled this on me (but i also wont reserve everything unless i'm outflanking, or deep striking them just so this wouldn't happen.

in a tournament well anythng goes, and you can't be too annoyed that you messed up and let someone pull that on you! haah. i wonder what it was like for the tau player if he knew this trick or if he just stood there thnking where to deploy and then was like what if i did this hahaah and then did it hahaahhahaha.

Grakmar wrote:Yes, this is legal, but very unlikely. The following conditions all have to be met:

1) Player A goes first
2) Player A contains enough infiltrators to cover an entire long board edge
3) Player B reserves his entire army
4) Player B has no vehicles, no jump packs, no flanking, no deep strike, no jetbikes (what else am I missing?)

And 5) Whoever is adjudicating the game rules that it results in your entire army in Reserve being destroyed.


The simple fact is that the situation is completely legal... but resolving it requires a house rule, since the rules don't cover what happens if a unit is supposed to move on from Reserve and doesn't.

Although some players are of the opinion that the rules do in fact allow the enemy units to move on, on the basis that the rule forcing them to move on would over-ride the normal prohibition on moving within 1" of enemy models... 'Must' over-riding 'may not'.

Ultimately, unless the rules for what happens in this case have been sorted out ahead of time, this is not a clever way of winning a game. It's a clever way of bringing the game to a halt by exploiting a loophole. Whether or not that becomes a win depends on the ruling made to deal with it.

insaniak wrote:And 5) Whoever is adjudicating the game rules that it results in your entire army in Reserve being destroyed.

The simple fact is that the situation is completely legal... but resolving it requires a house rule, since the rules don't cover what happens if a unit is supposed to move on from Reserve and doesn't.

That is also true. Or, alternatively, the Reserves rules force you to place the unit on the table, the presence of an enemy model forces you NOT to place the unit on the table, and the universe implodes. I like option A: Make gak up.

Noir wrote:LOL, I think the leason here is don't be a dick and keep everyone in reserve, or someone smarter then you will make you pay. I be giving the Tau a pat on the back, for beating the other guy at his own game.

What? How is it being a dick to keep everything in reserve? That's a standard tactic against many armies, and a totally fair one.

If keeping your units in reserve is a dick move, so is playing an alpha-strike list looking to wipe out your opponent before they can have a turn.

Technically, this situation isn't covered in the rules, and you'd get stuck in the beginning of the second (SM) player's movement phase if you follow RAW. Just as units that aren't fully on the table (2D perspective) isn't covered by the rules fully (again, technically it's allowed, but that's a whole different can of worms).

Note, however, that when moving on to the board, the unit is placed outside the board, so a tank could tank shock just fine even if there weren't a sliver of board's edge to use. The rules specifically say that placing a model the tiniest fraction on the board and then measuring from the model is illegal and that you should measure from the table edge.

Edit: Also, before calling something a "dick move" (grotesque use of language), try to evaluate what other options there are to play. Some codices do not offer much in terms of viable options, so being annoyed because someone uses them is just... silly. The only thing I'd call a dick move is using distinctly overpowered units in a friendly game.

Saldiven wrote:To me, it is like "Fool's Mate" in chess. If you're paying any amount of attention at all, it shouldn't happen.

Couldn't have put it better myself.

Of course as far as i know the Scars player deployed as he did to deny the Tau a turn of shooting (which is very important to the tau) but, still praising himself about his cunning deployment, he didn't realise that this could happen. Tbh, i can't blame him, it's a pretty insane kinda thing to do (though well done to the guy who actually though 'hang on a minute, if i just...') and you wouldn't expect it. The Scars player is a bit unlucky imo, as has been mentioned, there are a lot of things- tanks, deep strikers- that could have kept him in the game, he just happened not to have any of them. Though now obviously people are gonna be a bit more wary of this kind of thing, as this picture is known my most of us wargamers.

Apparently, this was the second time it had happened at that particular tournament, the first being the year before. Don't quote me on it, though, my memory is sketchy on this.

I rarely see the "keep everything in Reserve" tactic work out too well anyway.

This is why I run kroot. Just waiting to see the guy that trys to put everything in reserves at the FLGS. Try to deny me a turn of shooting, will you!

Thanks for posting this up, not kidding. Seeing it again brought a smile to my face. Look at how happy the Tau guy is!

I had a similar thing occur in final round of 'ard Boyz in Philadelphia this year. Was playing a nids player with my Ork horde, and he wins roll, has me go first.

I place things as far forward as I can, and he puts everything into reserve, everything outflanking.

I get two turns of move + run and snikrot + 15 kommandos come on turn 2 as well. I'm able to block off all of one side of the board with the kommandos and some grots, and all but the last 4-6" of the other side with grots and some truk boyz.

He gets in all but 1 unit, and is only able to move 1 unit of genestealers onto the board- he immediately concedes and refuses to play a 'for fun' game instead. So... I sat around in Media, PA for almost 3 hours with nothing to do but watch everyone else's games.

Legit, but pretty damn impossible to pull off on a common basis.
As stated, there are too many factors to make it work.


IMO: I give the tau player credit here.

Tau suck in cmobat, marines will tear through there quickly (even more so than normal due to more speed)

Tau player simply makes a move that stops combat from working ...... or anything else for that matter.

Lots of good posts, thanks guys! I had never seen this until this morning when an old gaming buddy sent to me. I am such a casual player that I have only played in one tournament in the last fours years. (getting married and two kids will do that to you.) So i am not as rules savvy as some of you out there, so I had no real idea about the situation or it's "inner workings"

+1 to all

If it's a White Scar army he should of had the Khan and then he would be outflanking and this deployment would be useless.